CrunchGear |  |
- The Back Burner: Things we didn’t post this week
- Daily Crunch: Down at the Station Edition
- Dear Valve, where is Episode 3?
- Advertisers get creative at Waterloo Station, create craziness with projectors
- Bioshock 2 video preview
- Smartphone Showdown: iPhone 3GS vs Motorola Droid
- Our 13.5-inch Radeon 5870 X2 will blot out the sun!
- RED updates its lineup, throws a bone to current RED owners
- Review: Sanyo Xacti CG10 compact HD camcorder
- Asus’ U3S6: First USB 3.0 + SATA 6.0 PCI-E card
- Don’t forget to enter our costume contest
- CrunchDeals: Logitech Harmony 1100 Remote for $300
- Steve Jobs would be proud of this Ikea hack
- Spooky Tesla Radio in a jar
- Tread lightly re: GameStop’s Modern Warfare 2 pre-order $20 ‘deal’
- Wherein we talk about Tekken 6
- Juniper wants to make the “iPhone of networking”
- Yes, the 27″ iMac’s screen is “better than HD” – kind of like most monitors
- Secret software turns Win 7 into a Wi-Fi access point
- ‘Hold you wee for a Wii’ family gets $16.5 million recompense
| The Back Burner: Things we didn’t post this week Posted: 31 Oct 2009 05:00 AM PDT
A big thank you to everybody for filling our tips-at-crunchgear-dot-com inbox with wonderful, unique, and newsworthy items. Here are a few that we missed.
Oh hey there, Cherry. I see you've blocked me on Facebook yet you’re not above dropping a hint as blatant as this one. So that’s why you haven’t been returning my calls, emails, twoots, pings, AIMs, or DMs. That was a one time thing, Cherry. And if I may say so, you weren't much help in that department. We Can Do It? Well, you didn't. Not even close, as you'll recall. Anyway, I’ll send you a check just in case.
Dear Mike, Boy am I glad to hear from you. We have multiple loads per day that need to be shipped all over North America. We’ll need you to hand deliver each of our articles to rural areas with slow or non-existent internet access. If fewer than 50 people live in a given geographical area, you may simply thumbtack each post to the town’s centrally-located "Readin' Tree" but otherwise we’ll need you to stop at each individual house in areas containing more than 50 residents. We’ll need these shipments to go out roughly once every 30 minutes. Please get back to me with a quote as quickly as possible. FYI, we can’t afford to pay you in actual dollars but we can provide a link to your company on our web site as well as semi-regular payments in thumb drives and iPhone screen protectors.
God dag, Isaak! Did Cherry put you up to this? To be honest with you, she’s been a real tough nut to crack lately. But it’s like, lady, come on! If you're going to ignore me, ignore me! Don't string me along like this. And definitely don't make poor Isaak send out emails like this! God dag! I do appreciate the poem you included, though. The part about "lovers spooning and some children gathering" might rub people the wrong way but the stuff about the Compuserve user ID and my fishingrod getting rayther is spot on. Spot god dag on. Click here to read previous Back Burner posts…
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| Daily Crunch: Down at the Station Edition Posted: 31 Oct 2009 12:00 AM PDT |
| Dear Valve, where is Episode 3? Posted: 30 Oct 2009 08:30 PM PDT
When Half-Life 2 was released in 2004, it was met with critical praise and great sales. Since then, two episodes have been released, the aptly titled Half-Life: Episode One in 2006 and Half-Life: Episode 2 in 2007. Both titles were extremely well made, though a bit short in nature, to the dismay of the fans. Since then, we’ve heard very little. Valve has worked steadily on other projects (like Team Fortress 2 and Portal) but many have wondered what has become of Gordon Freeman and Alyx Vance. Valve has stated previously that they intend on releasing Half-Life: Episode 3 sometime, but no one has heard anything about it since. So the real question is, will Valve ever release Episode 3? Have they pulled a Bungie and moved on to other titles? Or are they just playing it really close to their proverbial vests, and planning to spring the title on us with no warning, as they’ve done before? Only time will tell, but I certainly hope we’re not looking at another Duke Nukem Forever. And the fans are starting to get restless. [via Reddit(the comments are worth reading)]
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| Advertisers get creative at Waterloo Station, create craziness with projectors Posted: 30 Oct 2009 07:55 PM PDT Advertising is rough. People get jaded, technology gets old. Viral videos aren’t what they used to be. It’s not just a case of throwing a simple website up and hoping they come to you, you have to actually work for it. Projectors seem to be where it’s at these days. Companies are using them on walls, pool tables, and now train stations. Waterloo Station in the UK is the site of the latest example, using AdTrace, created by two companies in Great Britain. I think it’s safe to assume that this technology will be coming to the US in the near future.
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| Posted: 30 Oct 2009 07:51 PM PDT I’ve been told that I need to play the original Bioshock. I missed out on it when it first came out, but picked it up on Steam a while back and just never played it. I’ve been told it’s a great game, but I haven’t had the time to check it out yet. Guess I should get to it, since the hands-on videos are already coming out for the sequel. The preview video that IGN published shows some basic gameplay, graphic examples, and some of the new combat styles. It’s interesting to see how they’ve overhauled the graphics engine, and added some combat options that weren’t available before. All in all, Bioshock 2 is looking to be very compelling game, and could end up being the hottest game of the holiday season.
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| Smartphone Showdown: iPhone 3GS vs Motorola Droid Posted: 30 Oct 2009 07:51 PM PDT  If hype were to be believed, the Motorola DROID is the pièce de résistance of the mobile world; the conclusive creation sent down by the Great Smartphone in the sky to rid us of our woes. It would prepare your breakfast promptly each morning, tuck you in at night, and, maybe -- just maybe -- knock the iPhone down a notch or two. Beginning about a week before its launch (largely due to Verizon's incredibly intense marketing campaign) I began getting calls and tweets from friends and colleagues asking about the Droid. They always had two questions: the first would be something like "What do you think of the Droid?", followed by "Would you recommend it over the iPhone?" Same questions, each.. and.. every.. time. I've been using the Droid as my primary phone for a few days now, and I think I'm finally ready to answer them.
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| Our 13.5-inch Radeon 5870 X2 will blot out the sun! Posted: 30 Oct 2009 06:00 PM PDT
There’s not a lot more to this story than “this is a freaking huge video card,” so just gaze in awe at this monstrosity and then move on to the next post. [via HardOCP]
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| RED updates its lineup, throws a bone to current RED owners Posted: 30 Oct 2009 05:17 PM PDT
Here is the revised spec list. Of note are the internal motion sensor (good for recording metadata for adding effects later), GPS sensor, and a touchscreen electronic viewfinder (good for adjusting settings, but it also supports… touch focus tracking? -that’s not what I think it is, is it?):
Jim also posted an actual picture of a brain with grips attached still-camera-style, with a Canon EF mount. Whether they’ll actually be able to take a bite out of established still camera makers is questionable, but we’ll see. The Scarlet also gets an update, a response to serious encroachments by cameras like the 7D. Much better audio capability, increased bitrates and color accuracy, 1080p at 60FPS, and a touchscreen LCD among other things. No word on pricing or how these changes might affect it, but it’s still going to be a professional camera, not a consumer or even prosumer one, so expect it to be at least $3000. Read the whole thread here; they’re still updating and adding pictures (they’ve added two since I started this post).
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| Review: Sanyo Xacti CG10 compact HD camcorder Posted: 30 Oct 2009 04:40 PM PDT
A while back I was at AMD’s overclocking challenge, and for shooting video I had a Kodak Zx1 and a Casio Exilim FC-100 for slow motion. Both are great cameras, but 720p on either one is a bit indistinct, and the Zx1 has a fixed focus lens, which makes up-close shots difficult. Vince from SlashGear had a pistol-grip Sanyo, which I had dismissed before as gimmicky, but having gotten a chance to handle it, I decided I liked it and would pick up the next generation when they came out. Well, they came out a while back and I’ve been using it since. And now I’m reviewing it. There are a few cameras like this one, so let’s be clear: I’m talking about the CG10, which is sort of the lowest-end Sanyo you can get. 720p is its maximum resolution, which is more than enough for any home video or web media. They make a big deal about how “It’s a Dual Camera! Photos & Videos” but really now, camcorders have been taking pictures for years and years, and I don’t advise doing it if you don’t have to. Build and layout The CG10 differs from many other cheap camcorders and pocketcams in that it actually has a real lens. It’s far from a real real lens, but it’s not the fixed-focus pinhole crap you see on Flips, Kodaks, and Nanos. This means it has a 5x optical zoom and better light sensitivity than those other options, at the cost of a slightly larger size. The CG10 is about the size of a large mouse, just to give you a general idea. It feels pleasantly weighty and is well-balanced. Remember, this isn’t a pocket camcorder, it’s merely compact; it’s certainly small enough to bring everywhere, but unlike a Flip (or an iPod Nano, I suppose) it’s not a front-pocket kind of thing. Though it does sit comfortably in your back pocket if your pants aren’t too tight. Just don’t sit down on it. As you can see in the pictures, it’s got a nice little 3″ flip-out LCD, which is bright and reasonably sharp. Controls are all situated for your thumb to operate; your other fingers have nothing to do but grip. This works pretty well once you get the layout down. The menu layout is the normal sort of thing, though I have to say I searched for ages for a way to delete things on camera before I realized that the “menu” button was taking me to the wrong place. The usual options are there, with several choices for exposure control, stabilization, and face tracking.
Quality and features One feature I found extremely handy was the manual focus mode. For keeping a device in focus while I or my hand move in and out of the shot, it’s invaluable. I used it (to great effect) in my Zune HD and Sleek SA-6 reviews. Its macro mode focuses down to 1cm, which is fantastic for getting close-ups of components, plus it gives a great depth of field effect. I found the autofocus to be a bit slow in general (though accurate), so I use manual whenever I can. For a $200 camera, I found color and sharpness to be good, though the small sensor and major compression mean motion will always be kind of smeary. Of course if you whip it back and forth you’ll get that wobbly skew action, but that’s something you can avoid. Exposure was pretty decent, and you can select center-weighted or spot, but not manual. Low light performance is nothing to write home about, but again we’re talking about a $200 camera here. Make sure you have your lights on or you’ll be seeing noise. Sound is pretty basic, and the microphones are located on the back of the LCD, which is good if you’re filming the thing creating the sound. Bad if you’re filming yourself and you have reversed the LCD so you can make sure you’re in frame. I didn’t have any issue with the sound other than the fact that it was about as medium-quality as you can expect from a budget device.
File sizes are manageable. I set it immediately to the highest quality and a 22-second video took up 25MB, for reference. 640×480 should be about half that, though it will also shoot 640×480 at 60FPS, which obviously will take up more space. It uses H.264 and the files are MP4. It has a tiny amount of internal space (40MB) so you’ll be shooting to SD. One annoying thing I found was that the SD slot can’t be accessed without flipping the LCD up and consequently turning on the camera. Not a big deal but vexing nonetheless. The Sanyo Xacti VPC-CG10 can be found for far less than $200, and I think at $200 it was already a good deal. It’s not pocketable, but in every other respect it bests the pocket-cam army. If you’re looking for a basic around-the-house camcorder, I highly recommend the CG10.
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| Asus’ U3S6: First USB 3.0 + SATA 6.0 PCI-E card Posted: 30 Oct 2009 03:30 PM PDT
Not that USB 3.0 will be useful anytime soon—how long did it take manufacturers to finally get behind USB 2.0?—but Asus’ U3S6 should be, provided it’s not cancelled, the world’s first USB 3.0 + SATA 6.0 PCI-E card. Better news: it’s only $30. The card comes with two USB 3.0 ports and two SATA 6.0 ports. And if I’m doing my maths right, so long as you have a free PCI-E slot you’re good to go. Like I said in the beginning, the card will mean little in the immediate future, given the lack of USB 3.0 products. That’s not to say I wouldn’t mind being able to sync my Zune HD using the zippy awesomeness of USB 3.0, but it’s going to be a little while before we see that. Never mind that that scenario would never happen, considering the Zune HD’s insides don’t know a darn thing about USB 3.0, but you know what I mean: a future media player that works with USB 3.0 would certainly be handy, especially as we move toward moving higher and higher resolution video to and from our various components. It should be out "soon." Nice and vague, yes.
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| Don’t forget to enter our costume contest Posted: 30 Oct 2009 03:23 PM PDT  Wait! Before you head off to that weekend costume party, snap yourself in your Halloween costume and enter our First Annual(TM) Halloween Costume Contest. We're offering one Xbox 360 Modern Warfare 2 Limited Edition Console to the winner of our First Annual CrunchGear Halloween Costume Contest. Here's how to enter.
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| CrunchDeals: Logitech Harmony 1100 Remote for $300 Posted: 30 Oct 2009 03:00 PM PDT
Ok, so the Harmony 1100 requires you to buy an RF module. It’s still a pretty cool bit of kit, and will definitely pimp out your pad if you’re looking for a remote with a screen. It’s also relatively easy to set up, and for $300? That’s a screaming deal on a high end, non-candy bar style remote. It’s available on Amazon.com, and shipping in free. [via dealnews]
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| Steve Jobs would be proud of this Ikea hack Posted: 30 Oct 2009 02:00 PM PDT
I’m a sucker for clever desks and organization objects. Sometimes you don’t need a massive Pottery Barn desk to email your parents pics of the kids. All you need is a place to sit and two little shelves from Ikea. (and some handyman skills) There are two parts to this creation. First, the iMac shelf is the Ludvig Router/ Modem wall cabinet. This gives you a little storage spot and a place to hid extra cables nonsense. Then the keyboard and mouse tray is the Ludvig Laptop shelf/ charging station. Add the two together and you get this wonderfully simple and elegant computer workstation.
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| Posted: 30 Oct 2009 01:30 PM PDT
Posted on instrutables.com by mrfixits just in time for the Halloween season, this non-powered radio unit will react to all sorts of stimuli. Sound waves, lasers, radio pulses, even lightning storms! And for output, you get all sorts of spooky sound effects that I’m sure you can find a use for. It plugs straight into your computer’s audio jack, letting you record and manipulate whatever crazy sounds this thing generates. Make one if you’ve got the time and electronics know-how. If it doesn’t end up working, you’ll have a really nifty steampunk paperweight.
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| Tread lightly re: GameStop’s Modern Warfare 2 pre-order $20 ‘deal’ Posted: 30 Oct 2009 01:00 PM PDT
So GameStop has what I can only call a scheme for Modern Warfare 2. (Have we officially decided to not call it Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2? Less words to type!) If you pre-order the game (Xbox 360 or PS3 version only) from there, and return it by December 13, you’ll receive a $40 in-store credit. In other words, if you pre-order the game, you’ll get to play it for one month for a grand total of $20. The problem is that the game just cannot be totally enjoyed in merely one month; multi-player will last for months beyond that. So you’d have to be cool with rushing through single-player mode, then only playing muli-player for a hot month. And you’d also have to be cool with considering $40 in GameStop credit worth as much as $40 cold hard cash. Never mind that you could rent the game from GameFly from $9 per month, for as many months as you want. I’d advise you to skip this "deal." via CNET
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| Wherein we talk about Tekken 6 Posted: 30 Oct 2009 12:30 PM PDT
It’s unusual playing Tekken on anything but a Sony system. (I’m not counting Tekken Advance for the GameBoy Advance, and neither should you.) And yet here I am with Tekken 6 on the Xbox 360, using the same combos, with the same characters (that would be Bryan Fury and Law, if you’ll allow me to consider Forrest Law and Marshall Law the same character because, really, they are), as I did back in 1998 with Tekken 3. I still can’t make heads or tails of the story, and I’m still fighting pandas and tree-men, but then that’s Tekken for you.
The other unusual thing is how other fighters have passed Tekken by over the years. It’s safe to say that Soulcalibur is now the premier Namco fighter, and it was Sega’s Virtua Fighter, once its ideological rival, that first showed us, three years ago, what a next-gen (well, you know what I mean) fighter should be. (Man I use a lot of commas. Sorry.) Tekken 6 tries to right many wrongs; it mostly succeeds, but it’s asking a lot to dethrone Street Fighter IV as this year’s best fighter. Tekken veterans will feel right at home, even if the last game you played was Tekken 3, which I have a feeling is going to be the case for many of you. (I actually just received an e-mail that says that Namco has already shipped some 2.5 million copies of the game since its release.) It uses the same control scheme as its predecessors, with each face button controlling a limb, and leaving you to juggle your friend in the air until he punches you in the face in real life. The frame rate, at least offline, never misses a beat, so people who play fighting games to the extent that they calculate frame data shouldn’t be too concerned.
(Breathless rant: this game, even so more than Street Fighter IV, shows how terrible the standard Xbox 360 controller is for fighting games. I just ordered that MadCatz controller from Amazon because I was tired of the absolute piece of junk that Microsoft thinks is a D-Pad. Know that there’s also that bundle that includes the Hori fight stick, but I’m not exactly made of $140 game bundles.) Online is another story, or at least it can be. I played a good number of matches online (we’re talking hours here… I really don’t have a life, to clear up any misconceptions that you may have), and the few times that the connection wasn’t up to par the game was unplayable. Whereas Street Fighter IV handled rubbish connections by stuttering like a car with bad gas that "knocks," Tekken 6 slows down, like you’re playing underwater. It totally kills off the fight when it happens, but I can’t sit here and say it happened too frequently. (Maybe the gentleman who wrote the 1UP review, which really hammered the game’s netcode, has a rubbish Internet connection?) Just know that the game isn’t immune to the occasional ruined online matchup. That’s physics for you. The online match-ups seemed fair, too. I jumped right into a ranked match after running though Arcade Mode once with Law, meaning that my kyu—sort of a ranking the game assigns you to signify your skill level—had only been bumped up twice. Once online, I was paired with people who were just as good (or bad, as it were!) as I was, and we proceeded to go the distance, all the way to round five, more often than not. You’re not going to hop online and be destroyed right out of the box. There are several offline modes. The main one that I figure most of you will play as soon as you open the box is good ol’ Arcade Mode, and it’s exactly as you’d suspect. I should note that all the characters, and there are 40 of them, are unlocked right from the word "go," so you don’t have to beat Arcade Mode five times just to fight as Anna Williams, pictured below dressed like a Bond Girl. (Never mind that Zafinais a dead-ringer for the Bond Girl in Casino Royale, Vesper. Just sayin’.)
(Exciting trivia: the woman who provides the voice for Anna is Pride FC’s former announcer, and the current Dream announcer, Lenne Hardt. You know, the woman who screams, like a banshee, every fighter’s name as he makes his way to the ring. She’s absolutely fantastic, and God almighty do I miss Pride. Dream tries so hard, but it just isn’t the same. None of you have any idea what I’m talking about, do you?) There’s another offline mode, called Scenario Campaign, and it’s a bit like Tekken Force mode from Tekken 3. It can best be described as a 3D beat-em-up, and will no doubt prove divisive. Personally, I have no time for beat-em-ups, as I’m of the opinion that they peaked with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time. You go around… beating up baddies. I’d be lying if I told you the story was coherent, but, frankly, we don’t play Tekken for the story, now do we? You get the feeling that Namco thinks it can’t "merely" release a port of the arcade game, so it goes ahead and adds this mode. There’s no point in complaining about it, since it doesn’t seem to have distracted the developers from making the core gameplay top-notch.
I suspect that in 2009 (nearly 2010!) the vast majority of hours will be sunk into online ranked matches, as it should be. So, is she worth taking home to mom and dad? Yes. Do I expect to see it top all the end-of-the-year lists that’ll be coming out soon as the best fighting game of the year? Let’s be honest: those honors belong to Street Fighter IV this year, if for no other reason that we waited years for Capcom to tack on a IV to the Street Fighter name. Nostalgia’s a cheap fighter.
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| Juniper wants to make the “iPhone of networking” Posted: 30 Oct 2009 12:00 PM PDT
Essentially what Juniper is doing is creating an app store for their routers, which is actually kind of cool. Sadly, things are a little rough for developers right now:
They also have a Droid-esque new logo, which is nice. Anyone work with Juniper’s SDK? I’d be curious to find out what kind of apps you can create.
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| Yes, the 27″ iMac’s screen is “better than HD” – kind of like most monitors Posted: 30 Oct 2009 11:43 AM PDT
That’s all. I just wanted to register a facepalm at this ridiculous talking point. I’m sure the new iMac screen is great (better than mine, to be sure), and actually it looks like a pretty good deal, but “better than HD” is just about the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. Update: Sorry if it wasn’t clear; by “at least that resolution,” I mean 1920×1080, i.e. HD. That’s why saying “better than HD” is meaningless, almost every monitor is better than HD. Also, I am not criticizing Apple, people. If you read the post, you will find I praised the monitor. I’m criticizing a phrase I’ve seen bandied about recently. Time to chill out.
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| Secret software turns Win 7 into a Wi-Fi access point Posted: 30 Oct 2009 11:30 AM PDT
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| ‘Hold you wee for a Wii’ family gets $16.5 million recompense Posted: 30 Oct 2009 11:00 AM PDT ‘Twas more than two years ago when some dopey radio show in California held a "hold your wee for a Wii" contest. Not the kind of publicity Nintendo wanted, no. A woman died, you’ll recall. Well, now a California jury has awarded $16.5 million to the woman’s family. That’s it, don’t click Read More because there’s nothing else. And there’s no pic because, come on, not necessary.
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![nosoliters[1]](http://www.crunchgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/nosoliters1.jpg "nosoliters[1]")
Guys! Guys! There’s a killer deal on the Logitech Harmony 1100 remote! It’s the great big one with the touchscreen, and it came out at the beginning of this year so you know it’s still cool, and looks impressive with your A/V setup. Plus, it’s only $300, which is a whole lot cheaper then the $500 it normally goes for. Plus, when we reviewed in back in March, 
I’ll make this quick. I’ve heard two or three independent sources saying that the new iMac’s screen is “better than HD.” Let’s examine that claim for a moment here. If HD is 1920×1080 and the iMac is 2560×1440, then yes, it is better than HD. But why would you make that claim when most monitors over 22 inches are at least that resolution? I’ve been using a fantastic Dell 2407WFP for five years or so, and it goes up to 1920×1200. Better than HD, before HD even came around!
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