US Customs: Privacy? What's That?

To those planing to travel to the US (or simply passing through) with a laptop, beware. Now the Department of Homeland Security said that "customs agents can routinely--as a matter of course--seize, make copies of, and "analyze the information transported by any individual attempting to enter, re-enter, depart, pass through, or reside in the United States.". Excellent, eh? Repeat after me, people: "before leaving on my trip to the US, I'll set up a full disk encryption system on my laptop." If they are going to try and get to your information, make them fight for it! Here's a CNET article that better describes the situation and gives a few tricks and tips for all you travelers.

Apple's Next Laptop

Apart from the fact that I want one really bad (although less bad than I want an Alienware laptop :p), there's been a lot of talk going about what hardware is it going to have. There are several options, some better than others, but nobody seems inclined to leave all the "fanboyery" behind and do a proper analisys of the posibilities. until now:

The rumorosphere has come up with five competing scenarios for the new Apple laptops:
* Apple may, as Shrout contends, switch to an Nvidia chipset and keep the Intel processor.
* Apple may dump Intel entirely, and adopt an AMD processor and a chipset from AMD’s 2006 acquisition, ATI.
* Apple may stick with an Intel processor, but switch to an ATI chipset.
* Apple may stick with Intel for both processor and chipset, embarrassing all the rumormongers.
* Apple may stick with Intel processors, but design its own chipset, much as the company did in the pre-Intel days.

Of all those options, the one I like the best is the first one (I've had really bad experiences with ATI graphic cards that I'm not willing to repeat and although AMD processors are almost always at Intel's level, IMO they aren't that good for mobile platforms... yet) and guess what, according to the analisys, that's the more likely path to be taken by Apple. Here's to hoping they do. And here's to hoping I'll have enough money for one.

A Glass Of Water On A Mars Bar

So the Phoenix Mars mission is a success so far, having found water AND nutrients on Martian soil. Still no signs of life, but for all I care, they just cleared the biggest doubt there was. And, as was to be expected, the NASA extended the mission for another month, so it's due to end on September. You can read more about here.

Oh, and if you're wondering about the title of this post, it's an old April Fools' joke from the NASA guys. Here's the pic they posted back then, claiming they had found "Water on Mars":