Archive for the ‘Apple’ Category
The Dell XPS One will hit retail on November 19 according to
this teaser on Dell.com. Apparently no one told Dell that everyone and their grandmother has already seen what the XPS One looks like, both inside and out. Still, we’re with Engadget in pretending to be totally surprised. [Via
Engadget]Sony Ericsson’s much-anticipated announcement today turned out to be an utter disappointment. Only three phones were announced, all of which were leaked well before the announcement. You can read all the specs and details at
GSMArena although we don’t see anything “new” or “special” about these devices. SE is recycling designs and new phones within a product class carry identical feature sets. The only bright spot is the revelation that the W890i will come with version 3 of their Walkman software. Oh and the K660 and W890 actually come with both EDGE and 3G. Amazing!
In SE-related news that is interesting however, we’re hearing rumors about a successor to the P990i and P1i in the form of the P5i. For all we know, this device could be in the fantasies of those SE-fans on eSato but we’re hoping for the best!
If you’ve always wanted an email address ending with @live.com, then boy are you in luck. Microsoft has opened up registration for @live.com email IDs for good and you can snag yours at http://get.live.com [Via CNET News]
Apple updated Quicktime to version 7.3, fixing seven bugs in the process. Six of these bugs can allow hackers to gain access to a PC as they can bypass QT’s security layer altogether. Recommended update if you use Quicktime. [Via TG Daily]
Popularity: 44% [?]
- By Vivek on Nov 7, 2007
Looks like a lot of leaks are happening these days. Sometimes it’s music, sometimes it’s prototype cellphones, and now it’s Rock Band. The game is still a few days away but a Best Buy store in the US put up a demo unit for sale by accident. Someone bought it and is now selling it on eBay. Best Buy wants it back is offering a full refund plus a $100 gift card for it. [Via
Engadget]
In more news on lawsuits, a company called Wi-LAN has just sued 22 companies for patent infringement. Apparently the lawsuit has something to do with Wi-Fi and DSL products. Among the 22 companies are biggies Apple, Dell, Belkin, D-Link, HP, Sony, Texas Instruments, Intel, and Lenovo. We’re pretty sure this case will be thrown out pretty soon. [Via REUTERS]
So, get this. The Nokia N95 has an accelerometer. It is also sensitive and can do cool things when appropriate code is executed on the device. In a simple example, some guys put up this interesting video of a ball rolling around on the screen. Based on how you tilt and move the N95, the on-screen ball moves accordingly. Not very exciting, but think of the possibilities. If you doubt the power of an accelerometer, just think of the Wii and that should dispel any and all doubts. [Via thenokiablog]
ODF drops ODF. Confusing? We thought so. The OpenDocument Format group has dropped its OpenDocument Format and will now back an obscure format from W3c, called the Compound Document Format. We have no idea why they would pick a new format whose name itself sounds complex. Oh well, it was good while it lasted. [Via ArsTechnica]
Napster is losing less money now. The firm posted a lower quarterly loss compared to the same quarter last year. The loss was $5.1 million against $9 million last year. The narrowing of losses was attributed to revenue from new mobile-based and computer-based services. Hey, maybe next year they’ll only lose $1 million. [Via Yahoo! News]
Apple quietly updated its MacBooks today. They have been given a Santa Rosa boost with an Intel X3100 graphics chip compared with the GMA 950 in previous versions. Also, the MacBook Pro now gets a new configuration option in the form of a 2.66GHz processor. [Via Laptoping]
Popularity: 37% [?]
- By Vivek on Nov 2, 2007
Lucky number seven today! We haven’t been getting too many comments to our round-up posts but we’re eager to hear what you have to say. What you like, what you despise, suggestions, whatever. Bring it on folks. At least then I don’t have to keep cribbing about the lack of good news to summarize. Wait. Never mind. I’ll still be cribbing about that.
Eye-Fi SD cards are now shipping. In case you are not familiar with what’s so special about these cards, here’s a hint: what starts with Wi and ends with Fi? Give up? Wi-Fi! Yes, dear readers, these SD cards can turn any ordinary digital camera into one that can send pictures to your computer or any one of 17 online photo service wirelessly. The card costs $100 and is available in a 2GB capacity right now. They definitely to make one for mobile phones that come with browsers but lack Wi-Fi. Seriously. [Via Engadget]
In another highly successful Apple product launch, Leopard sold 2 million copies in its first weekend. It seems as though the $129 price is not stopping anyone with Tiger to grab Leopard as well. The press release mentions that Tiger had the best launch for any Apple OS until now.
Everyone’s favorite savior against the RIAA/MPAA/etc., The Pirate Bay, is developing a new P2P protocol of its own. It will use the .p2p (clever) extension and be backward-compatible with the .torrent extension. According to TPB, this move comes as response to certain new additions to the source code of BitTorrent being closed. TPB also claims that the protocol will be developed to deter spammers and anti-piracy organizations from the ground-up. [TorrentFreak]
Briefly Noted:
1. The 40GB PS3 features cooler, less power intensive 65nm chips.
2. Intel is having trouble meeting processor demand for laptops.
3. Panasonic unleashed a new, $500 Blu-ray with support for the latest BD-Video Final Standard Profile 1.1.
Popularity: 35% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 31, 2007
Did that weekend go by quick or what? Obviously, not a lot of tech news to report since weekends tend to be slow in terms of news. The biggest story from the weekend is multiple reports of Leopard crashing! Yes, the Mac OS X 10.5 is crashing. The problem seems to be with the Unsanity Application Launcher third-party app. Uninstalling it before updating Leopard seems to fix the problem for most people. Read more at Engadget
here.
It appears as though major US games-retailer GameStop has stopped offering a replacement warranty on all Xbox 360s sold through its brick-and-mortar stores. We wouldn’t blame them. The 360 is notorious for its high failure rates and with Microsoft extending the warranty to 3 years anyway, the GameStop warranty was kind of useless. [Via GamerReports]
We could soon be seeing terabyte-capacity flash-drives. If these researchers have their way. A team at the University of Arizona has come up with a new technology based on nanoscience that will open the doors to super-high capacity flash drives in the near future. We won’t bother you with the technical details which you can read over at Wired.
Finally, some music news to wrap up our first weekend update. Several indie bands are now inviting their fans to fund their new albums. With the help of websites such as Sellaband.com, these bands can ask for donations from fans. This money goes into securing a recording studio and the contributors get a copy of the album once it’s done. Some bands also interact with their donors via webcast during the recording of the album. All the money goes straight to the bands and they are not under the RIAA. How could this possibly be any more perfect? [Via Yahoo! News]
Popularity: 39% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 29, 2007
What is up with all these slow news days? No seriously, what happened to the news? Yeah sure, Leopard came out today and everyone is basically spooging all over it. Anyway, let’s get this short post over with. And don’t forget to check out our Recommended Reading link at the end!
It seems like Nokia is gearing up to announce some new phones on November 2. We know they’re having an event next week and some
spy shots of the rumored N82 phone were released today. It’s worth noting that Symbian-Guru leaked the N81 and N82 a few months back and the N81 was indeed for real. The spy shots coupled with the fact that an official event is coming indicate that the N82 does exist. It’s rumored to come with 5MP camera, GPS, QVGA display, Wifi, Bluetooth, and a Series 60 OS. [Via Mobile-Review]
Sticking with leaks, Video Games Blogger has what they’re calling the final setlist for Guitar Hero III. Ordered by difficulty. We don’t know about you, but European Invasion has some very awesome songs. The final tier is sure to bring a lot of pain on higher difficulty levels. The big surprise? DragonForce have been relegated to the bonus tracks! Read the full list here. [Via PC World]
With the DS and the Wii minting money for Nintendo, the company has said that the Wii will not be getting a price cut any time soon. And we don’t blame them. It’s already the top current gen console at $250. The profit margin for Nintendo is pretty sweet and so why would they cut prices? [Via Yahoo! News]
If you keep track of security-related news, you ought to have heard of the Storm worm. Well, it seems like the worm is making its way out. But worms don’t go away that easy, do they? The worm is mounting DDoS on researchers as it can use its botnet to retaliate against anyone trying to probe the worm. Don’t malware authors have nothing better to do? What kind of a loser do you have to be to gain sadistic pleasure from making other people’s lives miserable? [Via ArsTechnica]
Recommended Reading: Run Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) from a USB Flash Drive
Popularity: 40% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 27, 2007
Hello again to our daily news post. Another slow news day unfortunately, but we do have a couple of interesting stories! And another recommended reading at the end of the post. Today’s reading is from HowStuffWorks.com and is on nanotechnology.
It’s time for some earnings reports! On one hand, you have Microsoft whose entertainment division is finally making some money thanks to Master Chief. On the other, you have Sony whose PS3 continues to be a major loss maker. Of course, as always, Nintendo is still laughing all the way to the bank. [Via GameDaily BIZ]
SanDisk is suddenly feeling trigger happy as it just sued 25 (!) companies for patent infringement over USB mass storage device, or flash drives. Among others in the crosshairs are biggies LG, Kingston, and Corsair. The reason given by SanDisk is that it wants to protect those companies that already license its technology. Sounds to us like they want to get these 25 to pay up license fees to fill up SanDisk’s coffers. [Via CNET]
Nvidia could be gearing up to announce a new high-end laptop graphics chip – the 8800GTX which will essentialy be a mobile-optimized version of the desktop 8800GT. It would come in 256MB and 512MB flavors and the announcement could be coming November 19. [Via Electronista]
Finally, some good news for AMD. The company managed to increase its market share at the expense of rival Intel in Q3. Intel lost 0.4% of its market share to AMD during Q3 to end at 76.3% while AMD went up to 23.5%
This doesn’t quite count as news, but the buzz around the interwebs is that Leopard is awesome. It comes out today for the general public. In 16 hours 31 minutes as of this post.
Recommended Reading: How Nanotechnology Works
Popularity: 25% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 26, 2007
A bit of a slow news day today. Not a lot happened but coming up is a short summary of today’s top stories. On slow news days like today, we’ll try and add a “Recommended Reading” link which will take you to an analysis/article/editorial/op-ed that while not news, makes for good reading.
The
Indian government did a U-turn on OLPCs today as it agreed to a pilot project that will give 22 students in Maharashtra an OLPC each. The government will evaluate the usefulness of the OLPC and then decide on whether to get more OLPCs. A few months ago,
the government was bragging about being able to build $10 computers which was as unlikely then as it is now. A year ago, the Indian government snubbed the OLPC but things appear to have changed now. [Via Yahoo! News]
For once, Microsoft has managed to beat Google. The company managed to clinch a 1.6% stake in popular social networking site Facebook earlier today for a whopping $240 million. This means that Facebook is now worth $15 billion in the short span of three years. The deal gives Microsoft exclusive rights to post adverts on the website outside the United States among other things. [Via REUTERS]
In news sure to please open source aficionados, Version 2.4 of the GNU Image Manipulation Program or GIMP was released to public today. While it hasn’t brought any GUI changes with it, the GIMP website has been given a much-needed makeover. Version 2.6 is expected to bring in a new interface but this is a solid release by the GIMP team. Click here to download the latest version.
In our last item for the day, we have information courtesy HardMac that copies of Leopard have already made their way into retail stores ahead of its impending release. Leopard is the new Mac OS X operating system (10.5) and ushers in several new features and enhancements over Tiger. [Via HardMac]
Recommended Reading: Why Motorola and Sony Ericsson need to “get it” from AllAboutSymbian.com
Popularity: 20% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 25, 2007
Yeah the new iPods weren’t particularly shocking for those keeping up with constant rumors but the price drop on the iPhone was a jaw-dropping announcement. Also, it looks like the 4GB iPhone will no longer be available.
Moving on to the iPods, the family now has three different models. The iPod Classic comes in 80GB ($249) and 160GB ($349) flavors. You can choose between white and black versions for both models. The third-gen iPod nano (or fatty) is available in 5 colors with a 4GB version ($149) and an 8GB ($199) one. Finally, the last one launched today was the iPod Touch which is basically an iPhone but without the phone part. It features a widescreen touch-sensitive display and comes in 8GB ($299) and 16GB ($399) versions. Oh, and it’s only in black. Sorry guy.
The Shuffle also got an upgrade, sort-of. You now have a red version and four more color choices. And we don’t like Nelly Furtado either, but Apple apparently does.
Apple
Popularity: 15% [?]
- By Vivek on Sep 6, 2007
All the trouble Dell has been having with its new XPS M1330 and Inspiron laptops is taking a heavy toll on the PC maker. The company’s consumer laptop sales fell by 20 percent in Q2 2007 to just 887,000 laptops as compared to 1.1 million in Q2 2006. On the contrary, HP continues to enjoy booming sales and outsold Dell 3-1 in Q2 by selling 2.4 million laptops.
The good news for Apple fans is that MacBook and MacBook Pro sales totaled 1.1 million which means Dell was outsold by Apple too. Yeah, we’re in shock too. How fortunes change! Not long ago, Dell was the top dog. Now, it’s scrounging for market share.
ComputerWorld
Popularity: 19% [?]
- By Vivek on Sep 3, 2007
What will it be this time? The rumor mill suggests new iPods are coming. We’ve already seen some leaked graphics of the new iPod nano that were taken down by Apple’s legal department from some news sites. But the invitation featured above kind of fuels rumors of a touchscreen iPod with coverflow or as some people say, an iPhone without the phone.
It’s also interesting to note that a new Creative player, called the Creative Zen, was leaked yesterday. Creative seems to have thrown the gauntlet this time and let’s see if Apple’s new products can top Creative.
CNET News
Popularity: 9% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 29, 2007
