Archive for the ‘Hardware’ Category
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
Oh what a start to the week! Lots of good news stories came in today and we had a really hard time picking the ones we thought were most important for your consumption, dear readers! But we’ve come up with the following 5 that we thought were big. Enjoy.
Nvidia has upped the stakes in the graphics card game once again, this time by launching the mid-end 8800 GT card. It consumes 80W less power than it’s elder sibling, the 8800 GTX, and runs considerably cooler as a result. The card also sports a thinner profile and will be available for between $199 and $249. [Via DailyTech]In continuing good news for Intel, its new Penryn processors have been getting the thumbs up from reviewers all over the interwebs. The quad-core desktop processors have been described as the fastest processors out there for any task imaginable. The speed can be attributed to the blazingly fast 1333Mhz FSB and 45nm architecture. Pricing should be revealed very soon. [Via
I4U News]
On the other hand, in continuing bad news for Sony, the PS3 losses could climb as high as $1 billion this fiscal. While Sony has been selling a lot more PS3s since the price drop, demand is lower than the other systems. Sony hopes to reach the break-even point by the second half of this fiscal. We think that ain’t gonna happen. [Via GameDaily BIZ]
Samsung is now shipping a 16x dual-layer DVD burner, which it claims is the world’s fastest dual-layer burner. It can write at 20x on regular DVD media. It’s available for $80 and also features enhancements such as LightScribe. [Via TG Daily]
Lenovo’s first consumer-oriented notebook went on sale in the US today. The Lenovo L3000 Y410 (who comes up with Lenovo product numbers?) features a 14.1″ display, Core 2 Duo T5450, X3100 integrated graphics, 2GB RAM, 160GB HDD, Vista and integrated 1.3MP webcam. The laptop starts at $699. [Via Laptoping]
Popularity: 36% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 30, 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
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
See? We really are back for good! Two posts in two days is an achievement if you look at the past month! Lets look at some of the big news now, shall we?
Popular private BitTorrent tracker OiNK.cd was shut down today after officials confiscated their servers and arrested the administrator. The website was home to several music torrents and was well-known for getting leaked albums and new music before other public trackers. The entire operation was handled by the Interpol and was done at the behest of the IFPI and the BPI. Ironically enough, this comes two weeks after English band Radiohead practically gave away digital copies of their new album and still made boatloads of money. The record labels and anti-piracy organizations still don’t seem to get it. [Via TorrentFreak]
In gaming news, Microsoft finally outed the Arcade edition of the Xbox 360. It has been in stores for a few days now and people already knew what was in the box. It’s basically a Core version with a 256MB memory card, HDMI port, wireless controller, and a disc with 5 (!) arcade-type games to get you gaming right out of the box. Since it costs the same as the price-reduced Core ($279), this definitely represents a much better deal. It’s also a good competitor to the Wii, albeit more expensive. But then again, the holiday bundle coming out for Christmas is much sweeter – the Pro with two games for just $350! [Via TeamXbox]
Dell today announced availability of their new XPS desktop, the XPS 420 featuring aggressive multimedia options. As is usual with XPS systems, this one offers up a variety of high-end components and costs a bomb. We’re talking $1500 and up for this bad boy!
In more Dell news, Engadget has found information on an as yet unannounced XPS all-in-one desktop. FCC documents reveal a 22″ LCD with a 1680×1050 resolution, slot-loading blu-ray burner, built-in webcam, and other goodies. Engadget leaks are generally reliable so keep an eye out for this XPS!
The flash-based MP3-player market might just get a bit of a shake-up as DAPReview.net found info on a 32GB SanDisk Sansa View coming up. Both Creative and Apple offer 16GB devices but neither has gone beyond that. SanDisk has the advantage of being a flash-manufacturer will can help keep prices down. Although, judging from the picture, it looks like the 32GB version will cost $330.
Popularity: 20% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 24, 2007
Hello readers! Did you miss us? We went on a pretty long leave there, didn’t we? Sorry about that. Starting with this post, we’ll be giving you a daily dose of news. Like everyday. Each day’s post will summarize all the major technology news in the past 24 hours. We’ll also have external links for you to read the full stories! And we also promise to stay away from iPhone stories as much as possible! It’s freaky how iPhone stories still cause a big stir on a near-daily basis. But let’s get started with this new format.
One-by-one, all the phones announced on August 29 by Nokia are starting to ship. The N95 started shipping last week and today it was the turn of it’s younger Nseries sibling, the N81. The phone comes in two flavors, one with a whopping 8GB internal flash and another one with a microSD slot. The two versions cost 430 euros and 360 euros respectively.
Alienware computers will now be available for less, as long as you are willing to trade in your old hardware. Under a new program, Alienware will give you money for your old computer or hardware which will automatically mean a lower price on any Alienware computer. While still ridiculously expensive, $300-400 price reductions will entice a lot of customers. My 3-year-old Dell Inspiron 9100 will apparently fetch $364. If your old computer is an Alienware, you get an extra $200!
Dell is looking to expand its presence in brick-and-mortar stores and recently signed a deal with Staples, a major retail chain for office supplies in the United States. Customers will now be able to buy Dell laptops at retail outlets. Dell had already begun selling computers via Wal-Mart and this move is clearly a push to regain market share lost to rivals. [Via ArsTechnica]
HD DVD backers received a major shot in the arm recently when it was revealed today that the HD DVD version of Michael Bay’s Transformers sold about 100,000 copies in its first week in North America alone. While a drop in the ocean compared to the 4.5 million DVDs sold on day one alone, this is still a significant victory for the HD DVD camp. This is the record for high-definition video sales for either format. [Via TG Daily]
Finally, it seems that Microsoft finally decided to throw in the proverbial towel in its decade-long legal battle with the EU over antitrust issues. Microsoft has agreed to the demands of the EU which represents a major shift in attitude. The news of the move bumped Microsoft share prices. Open source developers and enthusiasts are still treading with caution. [Via Yahoo! News]
Popularity: 21% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 23, 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
THIS. IS. 300. FRAMES PER SECOND.
So, the bulky camera featured in the picture above is Casio’s new high-end, 6.0 megapixel shooter. It comes with a 12x zoom and a 2.8-inch LCD. But the big deal about this 650g camera is that it can takes 60 shots per second at full resolution and record a 300 frames per second video at VGA resolution. Videos are stored in the Motion JPEG format while the pictures are stored as JPEG files.
While all that is impressive, we are scratching our heads as to why one would want a 300fps video. It’s not like the eye can tell the difference above 30fps other than maybe see a smoother video. But really, 60fps and above shows no perceptible difference. All it does it create a high-speed video and it might be cool to record objects moving at a fast rate. But really, if that’s the case, then we’d rather have a camera that can do 1000fps and up.
No word on pricing or availability yet.
Casio Press Release
Popularity: 15% [?]
- By Vivek on Sep 2, 2007
SanDisk has announced plans to offer a new SSD in capacities ranging from 2GB to 8GB for the low-cost PC market. The drives, which will not be up for retail, will be first seen in Intel’s Classmate PC and be directly embedded into motherboards.
The drive, dubbed the u5500, will aim to replace HDDs in these low-cost PCs and will be compatible with several flavors of Windows and Linux.
TG Daily
Popularity: 7% [?]
- By Vivek on Sep 2, 2007
