This may come as a surprise to some, but definitely not for me or for those who tinker around with PCs for a living.

Microsoft has recently announced that it would be extending the period within which PC makers could bundle their products with Windows XP (SP2). Redmond has acceded to pleas by both retailers and end users to extend its January 30, 2008 deadline.

While some analysts see the acquiescence as an admission from Microsoft that XP is far from being interred, the latter insists that the extension does not also mean that Vista sales are encountering friction from the operating system’s predecessor. It admits that many consumers are still in the process of upgrading their PC units. Until this happens, demands for XP would still persist.

Old equipment is not the only thing or factor which puts XP on the shelves of PC shops. Computer makers are still issuing units powered by Celeron processors. This Intel chip has a reputation of choking out on demanding applications. Hence, many buyers of low-end units request that it be bundled with XP instead of Vista to ensure that it would not hang on them when applications heat up.

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I was at a local mall yesterday when I came across several desktop and laptop units running on Windows Vista. Although the sight was a bit common nowadays, I was still curious as to processors that were powering the units since the price tags did not seem to suggest that they were high-end ones.

True enough, they were merely Celerons! It’s quite a surprise considering that many touted Vista as a gas-guzzler. In fact, the first PCs that got the “Windows Vista Capable / Ready” seal have at least dual core processors in it.

Celeron chips were originally planned to be interred with XP. However, this cheaper alternative from Intel worked perfectly fine when it played the new Microsoft OS. Could it be that the chip’s maker injected some steroids to the processor which gave it extra strength to load and run Vista?

I’m not sure of Intel made some modifications to their low-end chip. However, I noticed that the manufacturer of the units which featured Celeron processors flooded their product with a least a gigabyte of RAM. Now we all know that adding more RAM to one’s PC is like getting a complete processor upgrade altogether. This news should give hope to those who want to jump to Vista but are quite apprehensive as to the capability of their hardware.

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There will come a time (and it’s sooner than you think) when that dual or quad core processor of yours will become obsolete and will be replaced by a new chip that is 10-20 times more powerful. The news of its impending arrival has been received with both elation and frustration. Some are accusing Intel and AMD of flooding the market with beta chips, and that the two companies have been less candid with consumers on the release dates of their latest models.

Indeed, it would seem that Intel and AMD are taking us for a ride. It wasn’t long ago when Intel bannered its Core Duo processor as the best in the industry. Many rushed to buy new laptops and desktops that have the new chip. A few months later, Intel released the Core 2 Duo processor. Needless to say, the new chip’s predecessor became a collector’s item overnight.

Deceived

Many consumers bought the Core Duo processor, thinking that it’s Intel’s long-term replacement for the Pentium 4. It’s not surprising then, that they felt cheated when Intel released the Core 2 Duo in just a short span of time after it flooded the market with Core Duo chips. They said that Intel should’ve been candid enough to divulge that they will be coming up with another chip that’s twice as powerful as the Core Duo.

I’m one with those who feel bad about the way Intel plays in the market. Of course, it’s a good business strategy. However, consumers might also fight back by delaying the purchase of the chip-maker’s new releases. This could be very detrimental to Intel’s fiscal health, considering that consumers have the ability to delay the purchase of things, even essential ones, for an unreasonable length of time. The top producer of computer processors could then face the dilemma of having to advertise or banner both chips as the best in the market.

Patience Consumes Time, But Saves Money

You might contend that such a situation wouldn’t be a very big headache for Intel. In fact, it might even help them in reaching both spectrums of the market. The company has been successful before in marketing its Celeron and Pentium 4 chips. The former is considerably weaker compared to the latter. However, the Celeron is also substantially cheaper than the Pentium 4 and other more powerful processors. Intel marketed the Celeron to low-income consumers, while aggressively pushed for the use of its high-end chips to those who have plenty of cash to spare.

While the strategy proved to be successful for Intel in their Celeron-Pentium “situation,” especially in developing countries, such a scheme may not be applicable to its present dilemma. For one thing, the price discrepancy of the Core Duo and the Core 2 Duo is not that wide, if there’s any at all. Even if they do decide to cut the price tag of the weaker chip, I don’t think consumers would take a bite at it since they’re already anticipating the release of the next line of processors that Intel and AMD would be releasing within the year or early next year.

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I know it’s already quite late to be talking about Christmas presents, but I can’t help telling everybody that I got an Acer laptop from my mom

It’s not the latest model though, but it’s not a Celeron either. It’s a Pentium M Centrino. It doesn’t boast much in terms of graphics, but the screen resolution is something to brag about.

There are many things to like about the Acer Aspire 3620. For one thing, it’s pleasing to the eyes. It doesn’t look like a brick like some laptops do. You won’t feel like you’re carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders either when you put it in your backpack.

Don’t get carried away by my review. It’s not the perfect notebook. It has no dedicated video memory. To make matters worse, it only comes with 256MB of RAM. It could be upgraded to 1GB, but for those who don’t have the extra bucks, you’re virtually stuck with a unit that constantly has amnesia.

I got my laptop to run faster without having to burn my savings for memory. It turned out that my system registry has been cluttered and modified by certain applications. They are not exactly viruses or malwares. However, these programs usually complicate the registry which, in turn, makes the overall system performance slow.

The screen still freezes sometimes even if I got some errors fixed. However, it now performs much better than it did before I got my system registry checked and fixed.

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