CrunchGear |  |
- Buffalo Japan Announces Portable 3D Blu-ray Disc Drive
- Australian Court Sides With Sony In “Other OS” Case
- Review: LG 42LD450 LCD TV
- Next On Greenpeace’s Enemies List: Facebook
- Schools Now Tracking Your Kids’ Bus Rides Using GPS
- Sony Refreshes Reader Family With New Screens And Bodies
- HP Wireless TV Connect Streams Video To Your HDMI Laptop
- Corsair Launches The HS1 Gaming Headset
- HP Announces A Metric Gaggle Of New Laptops
- LG Rolling Out New Smart TVs At IFA
- Yes! A True Sequel To Bangai-O Coming To XBLA
- Buy Metroid: Other M And Get $20 Off MotionPlus Bundle
- Watch Tomorrow’s Apple Event Live
- Listen To A Drawing With The Rec & Play Pens
- Apple’s New TV Device Said To Have Netflix Access
- Very Clever: USB Porto
- Ultimate Ears Releases $1000 In-Ear Monitors
- Archos Drops Five Android Tablets From 2.8 To 10.1 Inches
- Robots In Disguise Is A Must-Have Geek T-Shirt
- Skitterbot Is A Creepy Electronic Cockroach
| Buffalo Japan Announces Portable 3D Blu-ray Disc Drive Posted: 01 Sep 2010 04:41 AM PDT
It’s 3D everywhere lately. This time, it’s PC accessory maker Buffalo, which announced [JP] a portable drive for 3D Blu-ray discs today. Just plug the BP3D-PI6U2-BK into your computer via USB to view 3D Blu-ray movies (not that there are many at this point) or other 3D content, provided you have a 3D-enabled PC or display. The drive writes data on BD-R/RDL6 discs at 6x and on BD-RE/RE DL discs at 2x. The device measures 137×147×20mm and weighs 340g. It’s only compatible to Windows machines (XP/Vista/7). The BP3D-PI6U2-BK will hit Japanese stores within this month (price: $345). Buffalo sells quite a wide range of hardware in the US as well and given the current 3D hype isn’t Japan only, we can expect to see the drive to retail in other territories at some point in the future, too.
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| Australian Court Sides With Sony In “Other OS” Case Posted: 01 Sep 2010 04:00 AM PDT
Sony 1, Linux users 0. A court in Australia has ruled against a man who had brought suit against Sony for removing the Other OS feature from the PS3. (That was done ostensibly to prevent piracy. Hmm.) The court ruled that Sony was acting within its rights to remove the feature. The man had sued Sony for the price of his PS3, arguing that Sony had disabled the very feature he had bought the console for in the first place. And then the judge said, in effect, “Sorry, gotta side with Sony here.” The good news: while the man won’t get his money back, he won’t have to foot Sony’s legal bills. Let’s see if Sony is this lucky in a few days when it comes time for that other big Australian case!
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| Posted: 01 Sep 2010 03:42 AM PDT
You don't get much in the box except a pretty good remote, a manual and of course the TV set with the stand. The design of the TV is pretty dull: a black slab of plastic around a big black LCD. There is however an indicator light in the lower right corner showing if the TV is on or off. This can be turned off, and that's good. Buttons and connectors are all at the back and side; nothing can be seen from the front. There are two HDMI inputs in total and while that might not be enough for some, it's enough for me. Sound is decent with the 2X10W of the hidden speakers. There is only one optical output for audio connectivity and that might be a problem for sound junkies. Picture quality is superb even though this is a 50Hz set. Regular TV channels look good and HD is of course fantastic. The screen looks brighter than similar sized sets that cost $8-900. Setting up the picture is quite easy. I liked it as it was out of the box but if you want to set it for yourself there is a pretty straightforward wizard for that. There is an Eco mode to save the globe from certain doom which I instantly turned off because it dims the brightness of the screen. Input selection is done manually; unfortunately the set can't see which input has a signal on it. The TV keeps waiting for the signal on the input that was used most recently. You can choose from several picture modes such as the 24p Real Cinema and you can set up your own picture settings and save them.
The LG42LD450 is a great LCD TV for an unbeatable price. It may lack some features but if you don't like spending a lot of money and want to buy a new TV, this might be an option. With the added functionality to watch HD movies via USB this set becomes a fantastic deal that I can recommend to anyone. SUMMARY
VIDEO
AUDIO
SPECIAL FEATURES
CONVENIENCE FEATURES
SIDE INPUTS & OUTPUTS
REAR INPUTS & OUTPUTS
CABINET/ACCESSORIES
OPTIONAL ACCESSORIES
BROADCASTING SYSTEM
POWER
SIZE & WEIGHT
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| Next On Greenpeace’s Enemies List: Facebook Posted: 01 Sep 2010 03:00 AM PDT
Greenpeace, the organization with noble goals but a prickly way of going about things, has asked Facebook to stop using coal at its new data center in Oregon. Given Greenpeace’s history (seen here annoying Deutsche Bank), I should expect some attention-seeking prank if Facebook doesn’t comply. Watch out, Zuckerberg. Greenpeace’s main problem with Facebook is that its new datacenter will run on “dirty coal-fired electricity.” Being that burning coal throws a tremendous amount of CO2 into the atmosphere, you can imagine how much gunk a Facebook data center would generate. And given that Facebook, is, shall we say, influential, any decision to back away from coal could serve as a lesson or example to other companies out there. A sort of, “Well, if Facebook doesn’t need coal, then maybe we don’t either.” Some 500,000 people have signed Greenpeace’s petition asking Facebook to reconsider its stance here. Greenpeace: getting heat the hard way.
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| Schools Now Tracking Your Kids’ Bus Rides Using GPS Posted: 01 Sep 2010 02:00 AM PDT
Afraid that the almighty government will sneak into your driveway, attach a GPS device to your car, then track your every move? Perhaps you should be more afraid of what your child's school has in mind? A Chicago-area elementary school will keep track of students' bus rides using GPS. This a move to ease parents' concerns about the perils of bus rides! Children have been riding in school buses to school for how many years, and only now there's an issue? What a world. The technology in question here is called Z Pass, and it was developed by a Seattle company called Zonar Systems. It's nothing more than a "luggage tag-sized" GPS tag that's clipped onto the students' backpacks. Once activated, the unit then tracks the students' bus ride to and from school. One parent actually said "a little piece of mind goes a long way." It wasn't so long ago that pioneer families in the West were fighting bears to survive, but now we define "peace of mind" as being able to track the whereabouts of a school bus as it makes its 20-minute trip around the neighborhood. But, hey, if it makes some parents happy, so be it. I mean, I don't know what kind of privacy case you could make out of this. What, school kids should be able to go to school without having their exact location broadcast to their parents?
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| Sony Refreshes Reader Family With New Screens And Bodies Posted: 01 Sep 2010 12:56 AM PDT
The familiar three “editions” of the e-reader family are still around, but they’ve been improved with the new Pearl e-ink display for improved contrast and speed, and Sony says it’s improved the touch-sensitive layer as well. All of them come with styli, so you can make your marginalia right onto the e-book pages. They’ve also been slimmed down and redesigned (they all weigh half a pound or less). I think they look much better now, though I do still prefer the aesthetic of the Kindle 3. Each has 2GB of internal memory and an SD card/Memory Stick Pro slot. Only the Daily Edition, which won’t be out until November, has any kind of wireless connectivity: 3G and Wi-Fi, while neither of its little siblings has either. Inexplicable, really. The 5-inch PRS-350 Pocket Edition is $179, the 6-inch PRS-650 Touch Edition is $229, and the 7-inch PRS-950 Daily Edition $299. Kind of expensive, don’t you think? Yeah, I thought so too. I mean, they look like great devices, but the Kindle is really killing them on price, and I think price is the main driver of e-reader sales, not features. Brushed aluminum and touch navigation are great, but I just don’t see a big market for them when everyone else is racing down to under a hundred bucks.
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| HP Wireless TV Connect Streams Video To Your HDMI Laptop Posted: 01 Sep 2010 12:00 AM PDT
You send video, photos, or whatever from your home entertainment system to a base station box. The base station then sends a streaming HD feed to the connection box, which requires that you have an HDMI input on your laptop, as well as a free USB port to power the device. I don’t get it. If you have a setup that lets you see photos/videos/whatever on your home entertainment system, odds are you’re savvy enough to stream that stuff wirelessly through your network to your laptop anyway, without adding two dedicated boxes to your system to do it. The only possible use I can think of is streaming Blu-ray disks from your entertainment center, but that doesn’t make sense either because you can get an external Blu-ray play for around half the cost. That’s right, MSRP on the HP Wireless TV Connect will be $199.99. Sorry HP, I think you missed the mark on this product.
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| Corsair Launches The HS1 Gaming Headset Posted: 31 Aug 2010 11:45 PM PDT
Corsair says that their 50mm drivers are far superior to the typical 40mm driver, delivering a distortion free gaming experience. The HS1 also sports a unidirectional noise canceling microphone, and Dolby Headphone surround sound built into the closed back ear covering design. There’s also the standard in-line volume and microphone control, and memory foam earcups covered in leatherette. Corsair does promise that the Dolby Headphone technology will deliver a true surround sound experience, even when listening to a Blu-ray 7.1 stereo input. They’ll cost $100 and should be available in September.
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| HP Announces A Metric Gaggle Of New Laptops Posted: 31 Aug 2010 11:21 PM PDT
HP Mini 210  The familiar Mini line gets a redesign here: the body is redone to be more easily upgradeable, and they’ve improved the keyboard. You’re looking at a dual-core Atom N455 (you can get a N550) and a max of 1GB of RAM. Yeah, that sucks, but you’ve also got a 7200RPM 250GB HDD, which is great for storage, but bad for battery life (opt for the 6-cell). It comes in many colors, because you’re shallow. $329 to start. HP dm3    The new dm3 has a lot going on. It’s of the ultraportable variety, and at 13.3″ and less than 1″ thick, it’s pretty portable. It’ll come with a dual-core U5400, but you should be able to upgrade to a Core i3. That’ll make some heat, but fortunately the dm3 is sporting HP’s new CoolSense technology, which includes a totally new internal layout and fan setup, and software that keeps track of temperature and load to keep things frosty. Starts at $549 with 4GB of RAM and a 320GB HDD. I like it. I want it. I’m gonna review it. Envy 14 Beats Edition  This is really just the existing Envy 14, but with a menacing red and black look and some audio optimizations. It comes with a pair of Beats. They did this to the Envy 15 a while back. At $1249 I find this a hard one to recommend. Envy 17 with ATI 3D  I can’t be the only one who thinks this looks like a knockoff MacBook Pro. It’s the hinges on the screen, they make it look cheap. But! That is an illusion. It’s not actually cheap, and it’s a powerful piece of kit. Aluminum, baby. The biggest change is the display, though: it’s 1080p native, and goes to 120Hz, so it’s 3D compatible. The laptop comes with ATI 3D glasses of the active shutter variety. It’ll sport a quad-core i7, ATI discrete mobile graphics… and that’s pretty much all we know. Pricing and other specs are a mystery, though HP did say it would be under two grand. Wow, thanks a lot! It’s a pretty solid lineup; I think the dm3 is easily the best buy, as long as you upgrade the processor. I’d hold off on netbooks until I see whether the new crop of tablets is going to be a suitable replacement for them. As for the bigger laptops — well, you’ll have to decide for yourself whether 3D displays and Dr. Dre branding are worth the extra cash. I wouldn’t spring for them, personally. As usual, these laptops are buried deep in HP’s site. Go if you dare. I got scared.
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| LG Rolling Out New Smart TVs At IFA Posted: 31 Aug 2010 07:30 PM PDT
They seem to have some kind of Wiimote-like remote (the “Magic Motion Remote Control”), which you point at the screen to select this or that menu item or app. It’s not clear whether there’s a cursor or what, since all they sent out was a vague press release and the obligatory photo of a cute girl near the device. Look closely at those apps. “Fist-Aid.” Yeah, not really my scene, but thanks anyway, LG. We’ll see if we can get a hands-on once IFA kicks off. Here’s the full press release:
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| Yes! A True Sequel To Bangai-O Coming To XBLA Posted: 31 Aug 2010 06:46 PM PDT
It’s called Bangai-O HD Missile Fury, and the developers promise “sensory overload of thousands of missiles.” It should debut at PAX this weekend. Hell yes.
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| Buy Metroid: Other M And Get $20 Off MotionPlus Bundle Posted: 31 Aug 2010 05:21 PM PDT
Man, this is why I play Super Nintendo.
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| Watch Tomorrow’s Apple Event Live Posted: 31 Aug 2010 04:56 PM PDT
Apple doesn’t often do this, though, so either they’ve just upgraded their servers and feel like inaugurating them with a hundred thousand concurrent streams, or they’ve got a very interesting show planned. We are expecting the new iPods, of course — the improved iPod touch with Retina screen and possibly dual cameras, and the new Nano with its 3cm square touchscreen. The much-whispered iTV is also expected to make its debut, but your theory is as good as mine as to what exactly it will be. We’ve just heard it will have Netflix, but there’s very little these days that doesn’t have Netflix, so that’s not exactly enlightening. Feel free to post your expectations, hopes, prophecies, etc below. Play nice!
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| Listen To A Drawing With The Rec & Play Pens Posted: 31 Aug 2010 04:00 PM PDT
[via Design Boom]
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| Apple’s New TV Device Said To Have Netflix Access Posted: 31 Aug 2010 03:46 PM PDT
The fact is, though, that Netflix does have something Apple needs: a rental brand. People think of Apple, and they think “iPhone, iPod, iTunes.” None of those things are really applicable to the TV and Movie experience, although to be sure many people are buying shows and movies on iTunes. But with Netflix, people immediately think “rentals, streaming, movies.” It’s critical that Apple be able to make people think of those things when they promote the iTV (or whatever it’s going to be called). There’s also the more obvious benefit of an existing user base. True, Apple has a lot of people on the iOS bandwagon now, and if they were to start from scratch they would do better than they did last time, but if they can make themselves the premier Netflix device, then a lot of consumers may buy the device who wouldn’t have otherwise. Another one into the iOS fold. And of course, it would be plain strange for Netflix to be present on other iOS devices but not the one most suited for it. Not having Netflix on the iTV would have reeked of manipulation. Listen to me, talking as if in retrospect about a product that isn’t even announced. How surreal! As I said, I’m sure Apple would have liked to keep it all in the family, but they need to launch now and I don’t think they would reach critical mass for a non-Netflix launch for another year or so. Once they’ve got the users, a few million devices, and the content provider deals in place, they can start squeezing out Netflix in the usual Apple way: by neglecting it and providing better options with first-party apps and services. I’m sure we’ll hear all about this and the new iPods tomorrow, though. Be sure to tune in to our liveblog at 10AM Pacific.
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| Posted: 31 Aug 2010 02:52 PM PDT
Technically a “dessert zinfandel” (only certain Portuguese varieties can be called Porto), the USB features a chocolatey nose with hints of ruby cherry and spice. Or so they say. This delicious peripheral will run you $25. Might be a nice thing to share with like-minded geeky wine lovers. [via Laughing Squid]
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| Ultimate Ears Releases $1000 In-Ear Monitors Posted: 31 Aug 2010 02:02 PM PDT
Sadly (if you’re as poor as yours truly) your headphones probably will never be the Reference Monitors pictured. But you can dream. And of course Ultimate Ears has less expensive models.
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| Archos Drops Five Android Tablets From 2.8 To 10.1 Inches Posted: 31 Aug 2010 01:26 PM PDT
Archos 28 ($100) and 32 ($150) The 32 adds a little bit of screen space (it’s 3.2″, if you haven’t figured out the naming convention by now) and ups the storage to 8GB. It also adds a camera to the back that records in 720p. These will be available in September. Archos 43 ($200) Archos 70 ($275) Archos 101 ($300) While these can’t compete with the iPad on terms of versatility, they certainly beat it in terms of media playback. If you’re someone who watches a lot of video these could be a much more practical solution. The lack of apps sucks, though. To be honest I think buying an Android tablet right now is a sucker’s bet. If you really need a tablet right now, get an iPad. But if you wait a few months you’re going to have ChromeOS, webOS, and Android 3.0 tugging at your wallet. I can wait, personally, but I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to nab one of these right now. $275 for the 70 seems like a pretty decent deal. More information can be found at the Archos website, of course.
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| Robots In Disguise Is A Must-Have Geek T-Shirt Posted: 31 Aug 2010 12:45 PM PDT |
| Skitterbot Is A Creepy Electronic Cockroach Posted: 31 Aug 2010 11:30 AM PDT
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Televisions are overpriced. People spend thousands of dollars to buy the latest, fantastic TV with more features. For me it always comes down to picture quality and the price paid for it. This is where the LD450 beats all. Great picture, 
Another (the only) important feature is the USB input. You can plug in USB HDD or thumb drive and access pictures and music via the TV menu. Now if you are smart and get a simple universal remote you can enable video playback. Various formats are supported, including mkv. This means that all you need is an external HDD to watch HD movies on this set.
HP announced 
Corsair, more commonly known for their memory products, has apparently decided to 
One of the best games from the Dreamcast is 
How many of you out there have the scratch to pay a grand for your headphones? Raise your hands. None! But let’s be honest here. Look at your headphones. Now look at the picture to the right. Now back to your headphones — now back to the picture.
So the Skitterbot is a slightly creepy, mostly cool little remote control robot that’s being advertised as “the world’s fastest legged micro-robotic toy”. The Skitterbot is available in four different colors, each representing a different frequency so you can race, battle, or just torment your cat with them. I like the fact that they charge off of a USB port, and are quite reasonably priced at $19.99 each. The 5 function remote allows you to move the Skitterbot forward, back, left, right, and stop. Check out the overly dramatic yet slightly ominous video after the jump. | You are subscribed to email updates from CrunchGear To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
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