
projecteyeball - March 19, 2001 - CALL
them the Oscars of computer products.
Local IT portal Hardware Zone kicked off its first
annual Hardware Zone Awards 2000 on Friday, picking IT and consumer
electronic hardware winners from 127 products in 28 categories.
The range included tiny components such as processors and graphics
chips to larger peripherals like scanners and printers.
Canon dominated the scanner categories, in addition
to winning a Best Digital Camera award for its PowerShot G1.
The Most Innovative Digital Audio Player category
brought together some of the weirdest MP3 hybrids in the market,
including FujiFilm's FinePix 40i digital camera, Philips Xpanium
CD/MP3 player and Siemens SL45 mobile phone. The winner was Creative's
Nomad JukeBox, which clinched the top prize for its uniqueness.
Said Terence Ang, editor of Hardware Zone: ''It's
the clear winner because there's nothing like it in the market.''
Retailing at $899, the player was chosen for its
form factor, room-filling Environmental Audio Extension (EAX),
three-dimensional sound effects and huge 6 GB storage space, which
can hold over 150 CDs of digital music, said Ang. Creative swept
the awards for digital audio players, with its 64 MB Nomad II
MG bagging the Best 64 MB Digital Audio Player award.
The top five in each category were nominated earlier
this year and were tested by Hardware Zone staff for performance,
features, price and reliability.
About 80 firms from the IT industry attended the
ceremony, including representatives from Canon, Creative and Palm.
Chairman and CEO of Hardware Zone Jackie Lee said
the awards aimed to recognise the best in computing hardware,
and promote product and service excellence in the IT sector.
THE BEST OF THEM
Most innovative digital audio player: Creative
Nomad Jukebox
Best Palm-OS based handheld: Palm VX
Best digital camera: Canon PowerShot GI
Best photo-realistic inkjet printer: HP
PhotoSmart P1000
Best Sim Lim Square vendor: Marketplace (Richfield
Innovations).
Go to www.hardwarezone.com
for the full list of winners.