Google Reports 30 Pct Profit Rise

By Digital Trends Staff April 17, 2008

Google Reports 30 Pct Profit Rise Google keeps going from strength to strength and even bad economic wear can’t seem to touch it. The search giant has reported that its first-quarter profitswere up 30% on the same time last year, at $1.31 billion. For the period ending March 31, Google reported a rise in sales of 42% to $5.19 billion, easing any worries they’d been hit bythe economic slowdown. However, in part because of the weak dollar, the company for the first time earned more abroad than at home, with 51% of total sales from overseas. comScore has reported that click-throughs on Google’s AdSense program had fallen significantly, with a first-quarter growth of just 1.8%, as opposed to 25% in thefourth quarter of 2007. However, Google has vastly reduced the number of ads on a page in the hope of better targeting. Google chief Eric Schmidt credited "innovation in search, ads, andapps" for the increase in the bottom line.

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Computing

The first 300TB SSD is on the horizon

An SK Hynix SSD over a dark and orange background.

Some of the best SSDs we use are usually 1TB or 2TB, but consumer models go up to 8TB -- which is nothing in the context of a datacenter, and the latest announcement from SK Hynix puts that into perspective. The company revealed that it's currently developing a solid-state drive with a capacity of 300TB, which is a completely unprecedented size. Seeing these enormous SSDs in the flesh might take some time, though.

The company announced the new drive at a press conference in Seoul, South Korea. There are reportedly more interesting products on the way, including various memory solutions, and the focus is entirely on being able to support data centers as the era of AI progresses. According to Tom's Hardware, SK Hynix's market researchers claim that the global volume of data generated on a yearly basis is on an upward trend, and the increase is truly like nothing we've ever seen before. SK Hynix predicts that we'll see a jump up to 660 zettabytes (ZB), up from 15ZB in 2014.

Computing

Best Chromebook deals: Cheap computers starting at $54

HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook front view showing display and keyboard deck.

If you want to grab yourself a Windows laptop but feel that the prices are pretty high, especially when it comes to the best laptops on the market, you may want to consider going for a Chromebook instead. That's because ChromeOS tends to be a lot more lightweight than Windows, so the specs you have can go a much longer way, and even the best Chromebooks don't cost as much as the best Windows laptops. Even better, you can still get some great Chromebook deals, which is why we went out and collected our favorites below, although if you'd still like to go with a laptop, these laptop deals are a good option too.
HP Chromebook 11A G6 Education Edition -- $46, was $244

Probably one of the cheapest options you're going to find for a Chromebook is this education edition that's made to be as basic as possible to bring the price down. The processor is a very entry-level AMD A4 9120C which is just about enough to get productivity tasks completely, and probably can't handle more complex tasks. The 4 GB of RAM isn't a lot either, but at least with ChromeOS not being as demanding resource-wise, you shouldn't feel it as much as you would on a Windows device. The biggest downside is the 16GB SSD, which means you will almost certainly have to rely on one of these external hard drive deals.

Computing

I would give up my Steam Deck if the ROG Ally 2 had these features

Lies of P running on the Asus ROG Ally.

Last year, I wrote about how I went back to my Steam Deck after using the ROG Ally for several months. Asus' device is a real competitor (read our Asus ROG Ally review to learn why), but there are a handful of aspects of the Steam Deck that make it the right handheld for me. That could change with the ROG Ally 2, however.

Rumor has it that Asus is gearing up to release an updated version of the ROG Ally for 2024. Even if this isn't an entirely new handheld, it's hard to imagine Asus will exit the world of handheld gaming PCs any time soon. And if it makes a few key changes to the next iteration of the ROG Ally, I might finally retire my Steam Deck for good.
No Windows lock screen