Thursday, November 22, 2007
Gadgets
Evergreen Headphones Double as Earwarmers
11:12PM Addy Dugdale | Those of you whose families disowned them years ago may find comfort on this, the bleakest of days, in Evergreen’s 18-buck toasty headphone-earwarmer combo. Then again, you may not. [Impress Japan] More »
Entertainment
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix DVD’s Portable Video Copy Locked Down Like Die Hard
1:00PM Matt Buchanan | Both Fox’s Live Free or Die Hard and Warner’s Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix come with digital copies of the flicks for your computer and portable media device. PC World’s reporting that Order’s DRM will be very similar to Die Hard’s except that it transfers to “your PC hard drive first and then moves to your portable unit.” It’ll work with “any device that supports Windows Media digital rights management.” Die Hard’s also PlaysForSure, meaning it totally doesn’t play for sure on your gear. More »
Gadgets
Stationoli Desk Set: A Wheel O’ Office Gadgets
12:45PM Sean Fallon | This translucent plastic wheel packs all of your office necessities into one fun looking desktop design. These ‘necessities’ include: a stapler, pencil sharpener, staple remover, sticky note and paperclip holder, calculator, and a digital alarm clock. There is even a magnet on the back of each of the parts so you can attach them in areas where you would need them the most. Just don’t be surprised when most of the components of your Stationoli go MIA inside of a week. Available for $US40. [Product Page via Chip Chick] More »
Cameras
New Firmware for Canon EOS 40D Fixes Adobe Problems
12:15PM Matt Buchanan | The new firmware for Canon’s EOS 40D—version 1.0.5—fixes file format compatibility sniggles with Adobe software like Photoshop and Lightroom, some language issues and sets photo review to resume where it left off before shutting down. [Canon via Crave] More »
Vehicles
Homemade Cocaine-Smuggling Sub: Party Time on Das Boot
12:00PM Sean Fallon | When it comes to the millions of dollars involved in smuggling drugs, even coked out dealers can tackle a big, complicated project. Recently, Colombian marines seized a homemade fiberglass submarine big enough to hold 4 crew members and 12 metric tons of cocaine —making it one of the largest such crafts found. Since the sub never saw action on the Pacific, there is no telling whether or not it would have actually worked. Still, if you had to die a slow death at the bottom of the sea, this would be the vessel to do it in. [Reuters] More »
Entertainment
Zune 80 to be Widely Available in 7-10 Days
12:00PM Adrian Covert | Cesar at Zune Insider says a full batch of Zune 80s are ready to ship and will be in most stores within the next week (give or take a couple of days). Apparently, Microsoft anticipated a greater demand for flash Zunes, leading to the Zune 80 shortage. Be afraid, iPod cassic. Be very afraid. [Zune Insider via Got Zune?] More »
Announcements
Afternoon News: Alltel’s Pearl 8130, $US6 Billion Ink Over-Charge and Broken Zune Song Tags
11:48AM Chris Mascari | • The American Consumer Institute estimates that consumers overpay for printer ink by $6 billion a year, since there is no competition in the market of printer ink. [Cameratown via Gadget Lab] • Alltel will be releasing its version of the BlackBerry Pearl 8130 just in time for the holidays, with a price of $149 after a two-year contract. [Alltel via Crave] • In response to a Zune song tagging problem, Microsoft has set up a support page with not so simple instructions for fixing incorrect song tags. [Microsoft via Gadget Lab] More »
Phones
11:19AM Seamus Byrne | It’s been almost two weeks worth of playing with the Samsung Widescreen phone and its super-duper support for the NextG Mobile Foxtel service. So what’s the story? Is it worth changing services / plans / phones for?
In the most basic sense, this isn’t a true enough mobile edition of Foxtel for my liking. It’s still made up largely of looped content rather than streamed live channels. I’m not as down on the concept as I have been in the past, as it does adjust shows to deliver entertaining 5 minute bursts of content you can dive in and enjoy. Likewise the 15 minutes at a time ‘rule’ seems more like a battery-life failsafe – when you’ve been watching a while you do get bumped, but it pops up a ‘resume viewing?’ query so you can jump back in. Of course, if that happens right in the middle of watching something it’s certainly a nuisance.
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Mobile Foxtel: the review (Verdict: far from real Foxtel, some merits)
11:19AM Seamus Byrne | It’s been almost two weeks worth of playing with the Samsung Widescreen phone and its super-duper support for the NextG Mobile Foxtel service. So what’s the story? Is it worth changing services / plans / phones for?
In the most basic sense, this isn’t a true enough mobile edition of Foxtel for my liking. It’s still made up largely of looped content rather than streamed live channels. I’m not as down on the concept as I have been in the past, as it does adjust shows to deliver entertaining 5 minute bursts of content you can dive in and enjoy. Likewise the 15 minutes at a time ‘rule’ seems more like a battery-life failsafe – when you’ve been watching a while you do get bumped, but it pops up a ‘resume viewing?’ query so you can jump back in. Of course, if that happens right in the middle of watching something it’s certainly a nuisance.
More »
Phones
More Touchscreen Blackberry 9000 Rumours
10:56AM Brian Lam | The Blackberry 9000-series phones are rumoured to have touchscreen keyboards, and Unstrung is reporting a series of quotes from analyst Carmi Levy about it. Levy could have good sources, or he could be giving us the analyst reach-around, repeating rumours first written about on blogs. I don’t know. But if such a device does work, it sure sits in contradiction to RIM CEO Mike Lazaridis’s negative comments about the iPhone’s touchscreen keyboard. [Unstrung via Crunch] More »
Cameras
