The top 10 tech reviews of 2009

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Love or hate Apple, it’s clear that it spurned the competition to up its game and Dell clearly has the MacBook Air in its sights when it decided to create the Adamo – and we’re glad that it did.

In our review, we described this lightweight, ultra-portable machine as “impossibly slim”, and at 1.8Kg it won’t weigh you down. But it’s how it looks and feels that crucial with tiny lights embedded in the chassis and cool engravings rather than stickers used for the service number.

It’s not the best value or most powerful machine, but it takes the crown as the best looking Windows-based ultra-portable on the planet.

Wolfram Alpha

It seems madness these days to try and take on Google these days, especially in its core search market – but when Wolfram Alpha appeared it used the rather clever explanation that it ‘wasn’t a search engine’.

Then again, everything about Wolfram is clever. The brainchild of Professor Stephen Wolfram, the idea was to create a, ‘computational search engine’ based on the Mathematica modelling system. Instead of just pointing you towards information on the internet, the tool will actually perform computations on data you enter, delivering statistical analysis and comparative data in a flash.

It can be fantastic, but it’s heavily dependent on it understanding on having data on whatever you input. It doesn’t always understand what you enter, but it’s amazing it works at all.

Its basic results have since been integrated into search engines such as Bing but on its own, many will struggle to find a use for it. Even so, it was undeniably one of the most innovative new products of the year.

Click here for our top tech news stories of the year.

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