Wow, with no official announcement, the Xbox 360 Pro Bundle is already on sale at (at least) one Best Buy and apparently GameStops around the US. The $350 pack gets you a standard Xbox 360 Premium along with the excellent racing game Forza 2 and so-so action game Marvel Ultimate Alliance (*AU: Out here the second game is the wonderful Viva Pinata *). Essentially, you get the same Xbox 360 as before along with some free games. So while there’s no sexy free hardware in the pack, it all makes for better justification on the pocketbook. Cheapo.
Just make sure you don’t buy the old $350 Premium that’s still floating around at retailers like Amazon. Because there’s really no reason not to score some free games for the same price. [kotaku]
AU: We HAVE had an official announcement here in Australia for this bundle, though as mentioned above it features Forza 2 and Viva Pinata. The bundle is available from November 1, and is labelled as ‘for a limited time only’, so if you’re holding out for a Christmas purchase, next weekend is looking like a good time to get in before the rush. -SB
It’s a dark day, Apple fanboys. Installs of OSX Leopard have led to the dreaded Blue Screen of Death for many Mac users (sure, it’s sort of happened before, but the headline cracked us up…sorry). We can’t yet be certain just how widespread this problem is, but an Apple thread on the topic has 263 posts with several incidents documented through the responses.
The problem appears to occur only for users who are upgrading from old OSs, which is just one more reason that any computer owner should pony up, backup their files and do a clean install on any new operating system. Whether or not the software “works” either way, clean installs tend to be less buggy over the long run. The Apple-using segment of the Gizmodo crew has performed both types of installs without incident—but you know how it goes—you’ll be the unlucky one. [apple via fortune]
Update: As many comments have already pointed out, the error seems to be caused by Application Enhancer (APE). Happy installing.
Bad credit? No credit? No Big problem! In order to thwart iPhone reselling (and the seedy unlocked black market), Apple is reducing the former five per customer iPhone limit to just two—and cash will no longer be accepted on any iPhone purchases.
We can only assume that credit cards allow Apple to better track mass purchasers since, if anything, plastic allows people to spend more money on products than they have in their bank accounts. We’re guessing that neither of these new restrictions will impact 99% of consumers, but that perfumed old lady with her huge jar of change will just need to settle for a Prada. [nytimes]
AU: I’m pretty confident this sort of thing would be illegal here. No cash? -SB
Viewsonic is getting into the digital photo frame business and the first digital frames to launch will include an 8-inch widescreen frame with an 800×480 screen resolution that displays popular movie formats, has an integrated speaker for MP3 sounds and a remote control at a price under $200. ViewSonic will also have an 8-inch DF87G frame (pictured) with a resolution of 800×600 with similar features to the 8-inch widescreen frame. The price is expected to be under $200 for this model as well. Finally, we will see a 7-inch DP701W4 widescreen with a resolution of 800×600, 220 cd/m2 brightness and a 400:1 contrast ratio sporting a 30ms response time. The frame around the LCD will be silver with a white acrylic bezel at a price of under $150.
If you desperately wanted official shots of the T-Mobile Shadow, well, here they are. We have already given you the rundown on what the Windows Mobile smartphone will be toting, but to recap, the main goodies will be the two-letters-per-key SureType keyboard, 128MB on-board RAM and Wi-Fi connectivity. The pictures show two colour schemes (jump for a second picture), including silver/charcoal and brown/black varieties. We might add we are particularly partial to the sultry chocolate colour scheme, but then again we are particularly partial to anything chocolate. Mmm, chocolate. [Cellphone Signal]
