Packard Bell is set to reposition itself as a trendy design-focused lifestyle brand, following its acquisition by Acer last year.

Speaking at Acer’s Global Press Conference, Emmanuel Fromont, Vice President of Packard Bell Sales and Marketing, said:

“It’s not a totally new positioning. We’ve always differentiated ourselves through design, but as a smaller company and having to do the design in-house, it was more difficult.”

“Now with Acer behind us, we want to create aficionado fans of our products. We want people to have real desire for our brand.”

Pocket-lint spoke to Acer UK country manager Bobby Watkins, and he told us that the new designs for Packard Bell were something we should look out for when they become available sometime next year.

Here’s what happened last time I saw a PB that was trying to be “trendy”:

Those things were a piece of crap, (and fuuuuugly) always falling apart and loads got returned… Let’s hope these are much improved - if not, it will always give us a laugh!

via Pocket Lint and Engadget

Very good…

Was round the in-laws the other day and couldn’t help but notice this one in the garden…

A fine way to retire an old web browser. At least it’s found some use…

A 19-year-old Saaarf London girl has been advised to use the Queen’s English on the phone after her hunt for a cab to whisk her to Bristol airport ended less than satisfactorily.

According to the Daily Mail, the unnamed teen rang directory enquiries two weeks ago and initially requested a number for a “Joe Baxi” firm. The nonplussed operator told her she couldn’t find anyone by that name, to which the lass replied: “It ain’t a person, it’s a cab, innit.”

The enlightened operator duly put her through to Bishop’s Stortford-based retail display supplier Displaysense, where she “spoke to an equally bemused saleswoman” before thundering: “Look love, how hard is it? All I want is your cheapest cab, innit. I need it for 10am. How much is it?”

The answer was £180, and with the deal done by credit card, Displaysense obliged by delivering a display cabinet to her door the next morning.

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Sure, we’ve all read those lists of tweaks you can make to your system to increase productivity, but what if you’re not in such an all-fired hurry to get things done? What if you’re already plenty efficient, and actually need to slow things down a bit until that five o’clock whistle blows? Well, lucky for you, we’ve compiled a list of the top ten best ways to slow down your system, and decrease productivity. Please feel free to add your favorites in the comments. (Oh, and we by no means recommend you do any of these to your friends’ computers, even if it IS April 1st).

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