December 2008
47 posts
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“The scalable performance level components may include a processor, memory,...”
– Microsoft outlines pay-per-use PC vision | Business Tech - CNET News
A new twist on an old idea, subsidised computers. But in this scenario, patented by Microsoft, it seems like the end users get one hell of a machine.
According to the way I read this, you get a monster machine capable of high...
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Martin drops porn filtering from FCC free wireless... →
The controversial free wireless for all plan proposed by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, has been revised to remove the proposed smut filter on the service.
This is great news. In my opinion as well as in practice filters such as these do little as far stopping the users that really want to access banned info, and provide enough false positives as to make the maintenance of such a filter a...
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HP MediaSmart Home Server may get some competition... →
Well here is rumor for MacWorld that caught me by surprise but it makes enough sense that this could be legit.
Apple may be introducing a home server box. Something that would centrally store all your iTunes, music and movies, as well as photos, and be able to serve it all up to your Apple TV, your computers, your iPhone, and your iPod Touch.
HP and others have been marketing this sort of...
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LG's magical GD910 wrist phone packs touchscreen,... →
It had to happen sooner or later. My love of watches colliding with my love of connected gadgets have, like a bad 80’s remake of Dick Tracy staring Madonna, collided.
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LG is introducing a touch screen cell phone watch combo, complete with camera capable of video conferencing.
Browsing the web is even possible, but I’m not sure I’d want to...
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RIAA Will Stop Suing People, Which Doesn't Make... →
Hooray for the RIAA!!!! yeah right. They have agreed to stop stealing kids college funds, and grandma’s retirement funds, for now.
But instead of punishing their own customers directly, they are going to try and convince the ISPs to punish their customers on the RIAA behalf.
This takes all the bad publicity off the RIAA, and puts it on the ISPs. Nice, but a bit too late, we all...
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“What’s killing them? The Internet. You can launch a product live now from a...”
– Scobleizer — Tech geek blogger » Blog Archive Are bloggers & social networks killing the big shows? «
Scoble has a nice piece on why the big trade shows are dying, and how it makes perfect sense that even Apple is announcing that this will be the last MacWorld they attend.
Yep, an entire...
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ASUS Eee Top ET1602 Touchscreen Nettop Review -... →
This is actually a pretty slick bit of kit.
With more and more applications moving online we just don’t need powerful machines for everyday use. This snazzy little “nettop” is an all in one computer and monitor that sports a touch screen.
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That makes this a great second computer, for say the kitchen or bedroom. Perfect for watching net...
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jkOnTheRun » Blog Archive Jobs is out: Apple... →
Its official, Steve Jobs is not going to give the infamous “Steve Note” address,at next years MacWorld (in a few weeks).
Speculation is rampant, as to why, everything from his failing health to Steve,s innate fear of a sub $500 Apple computer.
But I think its far less sinister than any of that. I think Steve has been grooming a successor quietly for a while now. I am betting we...
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Rumor: Mac Mini Successor to Appear In January,... →
Wired seems confident in reporting the rumor that the Mac Mini will see an upgrade or possibly even a replacement in January’s MacWorld.
To me this is great news, I like the Mini, and I think Apple needs to have something in the $500 computer range. But the way Apple seemed to be letting this die on the vine, I was worried that they were going to drop the line all together.
I can’t...
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iPhone 3G finally unlocked by the Dev-Team! -... →
Well it’s about time. ;)
Yes if you live in the US, and really want to use an iPhone 3G on T-Mobile (which has almost no 3G network to speak of) it looks like there is, indeed, a Santa. Thank goodness.
Actually, sarcasm aside, this may be of more interest to the international users of which there are plenty of non iPhone offering 3G carriers out there.
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Cowon ships S9 PMP to US soil - Engadget →
If I were looking for a portable media player, audio and Video with a touch screen, and for some reason I had no knowledge of a company that goes with some sort of fruit logo.
This would be the device I’d be lusting after. It plays just about anything you copy over to it, video, audio, on a high resolution screen all for about the same price as that other touch screen hand held by that...
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Addonics' USB-to-NAS adapter: all your external... →
OK this is a bit on the geeky side, but still very cool on a consumer level too.
Do you have an external hard drive not in use, or maybe one that is attached to your computer that you wish could be accessible by any computer in your house, or even across the Internet?
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Well for a mere $55 you could pick up one of these gems and be on your way. Just plug in...
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AT&T now offers iPhone 3G home activation, for... →
It’s back. Yep, now (finally) you can buy an iPhone online, and activate it at home, through iTunes.
That great feature that the first generation iPhone had is back for the iPhone 3G. Just in time for holiday gift giving.
In case you didn’t realize, the iPhone 3G could not be given as a surprise gift because you could not buy it without activating it in store.
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IPhone Apps: SimCity May Be the First Must-Have... →
Gizmodo may think this is the first must have iPhone/Touch game, but IMO it’s far from it. See my previous post on the top 5 games here.
However this sure does look like one I’d add to the list. Graphics look tight, gameplay is supposed to be very good, and who hasn’ grown up in the age of computers not wasting many an hour playing this classic game.
What would make this game...
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Are two laptops better than one? | Crave - CNET →
Matthew Elliott of CNET’s Crave blog gets asked constantly “which laptop should I buy?”
I feel his pain, as the family techy and the sole IT guy in a small business I am constantly asked similar questions from friends, family, and fellow employees.
It’s frustrating, as there is no one answer for everyone.
But Matt decided to take on the question from his own point of...
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Handy Netbook Holiday Gift Guide | Crave - CNET →
CNET has a quick but nice roundup of four out of the ever increasing thousands of netbooks on the market this holiday season. Including the Dell Mini 9 that I should be recieving this week.
…
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Tis the season to be a gamer | Crave - CNET →
Well I just finished the must have list for iPod & iPod Touch, so logically I should do my next favorite gaming device the Xbox 360….
Well no, I can’t do that. Truth be told my xbox 360 gaming experience is pretty limited. Being a father, and a husband with a full time job, a full time hobby and three part time websites to keep up to date with daily posts, I am lucky if I get...
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Macenstein | Macenstein’s Top 20 iPhone games of... →
Dr. Macenstein has put together a pretty damn good list of the top 20 games you should have on your iPhone or iPod Touch.
Since it’s the holidays and I am betting none of us have a spare $100 to drop on the App store this time of year, I am going to do you all a solid.
I am taking their list of the top 20 and narrowing it down to the top 5 must have games.
#5 Missile Command - This one...
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Creative's Vado HD 720p pocket camcorder now on... →
It’s the year of the netbooks, for sure, but it is also the year of the pocket HD camcorder.
First we had the Kodak Zi6, then came the very popular Flip, with it’s Flip Mini HD, and now just under the ire for holiday Shopping is Creative’s Vado HD.
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The Vado uses the same form factor as the previous two units, even down to the built in USB...
“$359.99 starting tomorrow. That’ll net you an 8.9-inch panel, Atom N270...”
– HP Mini 1000 to get $40 price cut - Engadget
Not a bad deal, still not as good as the $299 Dell I ordered but, the extra $50 is probably for the privilage of having Windows XP on there.
The Votes Are In: BlackBerry Storm Sucks | Gadget... →
The only thing I can say is, 90% of the complaints seem to be software based. Since Verizon has aleady released one update, lets hope they stay on top of this, and save what is one sexy piece of hardware…
Have you got a Storm, have you applied the update? What do you think?
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Hidden SDK features transform iPhone into TV... →
Now this is cool. Ars Technica commissioned Freeverse to put together a version of their popular iPhone, iPod Touch game Moto Chaser, using Some existing but undocumented (and therefor unsupported) API calls for Video output, and guess what.
The 2nd generation iPod Touch has enough horsepower to not only output to a TV screen, but it can actually upscale the image a bit, and it looks down right...
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Verizon expected to release firmware update for... →
This is great news, and not just for Storm users. Verizon is not known for issuing any sort of timely update, to any of its phone, despite the manufacturer having the fix.
As a curve owner for a while now I have spent hours on forums looking for leaked updates, and hacking them into my device to hopefully make it do what I think it should do, not what Verizon has crippled it to do.
Yesterday...
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Is PC gaming a dodo bird?
The following is an editorial comment by frequent commentor, sometimes Science Editor, and Opera Singing Banker RebRob. Do you have something to say? Email me, wolfmank[at]gmail[dot]com and maybe you too can get some of your prose up on Technology Viewer.
Unless you’re a teenager, college student, or work for Penny Arcade, you can’t play games 24/7, or 3/5, or sometimes even 1/2. ...
“I have no issue with the carriers making a fair profit and offering add-on value...”
– jkOnTheRun:Verizon locates switch to enable GPS on RIM 8330, 8130
I F#*&!^G AGREE
That is all… nothing to see here… carry on… Move along…
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Apple In-Ear Headphones hands-on, ears-on, and... →
Engadget put their hands on the new Apple headphones with the built in Mic and remote and they were generally pleased.
“sound really, really good (warm lows and crisp highs, a distinct lack of that modern, pushy mid-range)”
Performing as good or better than higher priced other in ear earbuds is a good thing to hear, and despite previous rumors they do apparently work with the iPhone...
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ASUS Eee PC 1002HA reviewed: looks cool but the... →
Laptop Mag has reviewed the Asus Eee PC 1002HA, yet another new offering in the ever expanding Eee PC lineup from Asus and geve it a very stellar review, except when it came to battery life.
Apparently Asus has decided that this latest 10” Micro Lappy netbook ultra portable doohickey should only be portable for three hours or less.
I thought the idea of these things is that you could could...
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Giz Explains: Why OS X Shrugs Off Viruses Off... →
Gizmodo, normally just the National Enquirer of Tech and Gadget news actually put together a very nice, short, and in layman’s terms explanation of why Apple and Linux systems aren’t as susceptible to viruses as Windows computers are.
If you have ever wondered why this is, or thought it was just “a matter of opinion” give this a read, it’s worth your time.
In my...
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Eee Box: Eee Box Upgraded With HDMI and Discrete... →
The mostly unknown Eee Box, was basically the Eee PC netbook slipped into a snazzy Wii like case and sold as a desktop version of Asus’s popular Eee PC micro lappy.
For $300 I don’t think too many people gave it much of a second look. Considering you needed to bring your own monitor, keyboard and mouse to the party it was really just an underpowered discount PC.
What was the point?
...
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Buffalo unveils 16GB and 32GB SSDs for Inspiron... →
Well this is cool if you happened to grab one of the early Dell Mini 9 netbooks, as this is a darn easy way to boost your SSD size (hard drive space).
But, if it were me, I’d be checking out the Runcore SSD’s first. Almost the same price, more size options, and rumored to be much faster.
Technology Viewer covered the Runcore SSD back on November 19th. Check out our article and the...
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Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic -... →
Apple has finally gotten around to releasing their promised new In-Ear Headphones. They were originally promised for September, pushed back to October, and now in December we can actually order them.
Now normally I wouldn’t care too much about an set of $79 ear buds but… These buds are not only offering some serious audio improvements, but new features for compatible iPods as well.
...
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jkOnTheRun:Is that FCC Sony device a Picturebook... →
Yesterday I spied a leaked image from the FCC approval department showing what might have been Sony’s first foray into the world of netbooks. But frankly I was too blown away by the end of the day yesterday by the sudden announcement of pownce shutting down to post anything else here.
Well the long time mobile geeks over at jkOntheRun spied it too, and they are guessing that Sony is...
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“So, to sum up, Apple’s recommendations have changed not a whit in 18...”
– Apple updates antivirus version numbers, security savants lose grip on reality - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
This article is in response to the vicious and unfounded rumors that Apple is now suddenly recommending people use antivirus on a Mac.
It’s not at all sudden it’s been...
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A Netbook that can handle games? We test the Asus... →
Talk about a misleading headline. Crave should be ashamed, well I suppose I should be too, as it just became my headline as well… But they did it first damn it! ;-)
Well the short storey is, NO, even the Asus N10J with a real-ish graphics processor tucked into the unit you are not going to get any better performance than any other budget laptop.
Real gaming requires a real PC, or a...
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BlackBerry Storm OS 4.7.0.76, other versions left... →
It looks like unofficial Blackberry Storm OS version are leaking out of Rim like water through a siv.
According to The Boy Genius Report, the latest version 4.7.0.76 fixes a bunch of user interface issues, but messes up some camera issues.
personally I’m thrilled to hear this. The reviews of the Storm ranged from it’s an OK device to why would anyone buy this. So I’m pleased...
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Dell Home Cyber Monday Sale - dealnews.com →
Just when you thought the Black Friday Thanksgiving weekend deal madness was over and we could get back to some real Tech news…
It’s Cyber Monday.
I’m not going to do full out reviews like I did leading up to Black Friday, but at quick glance it looks like whatever deal you might have missed out on, online… You can get it again today.
At Dell that means the Mini 9...