Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Games
PlayStation Home Arriving This Year…With One Caveat
11:39PM Mark Wilson | The good news: those of us still looking forward to Sony’s virtual world platform called PlayStation Home will be happy to know that it’s arriving in 2008. The potentially bad news: it’s arriving in “open, working beta” form. You know, like Google Everything. (To their defence, Sony actually fessed up to this obvious comparison, describing Home’s rollout as “similar to Gmail.”) My guess is that this beta angle is just a way to manage public expectations. And knowing that Sony is finally delivering Home should make us happy, even if a little sceptical. [Wired via Kotaku] More »
Peripherals
Brando BTM-118 Bluetooth Headset Squeezes in FM Radio, Display
11:35PM Gizmodo US Edition | I kind of like the BTM-118 from Brando, with its weird fusion of Bluetooth headset and FM radio in one gizmo. Maybe because I use a similar clip-on headset (partly to avoid fashion geekiness.) I guess this might be useful if you’re into radio but your mobile phone doesn’t do it: most ones with built-in radio use the earphone wires as part of the antenna circuit, don’t they? Anyhow, the BTM-118 will give you 12 hours of FM, 10 hours of talk and 200 hours of standby. It’s Bluetooth v2.0 and is available in black or white for US$53. [Brando] More »
Computers
Acer Aspire One: Also Priced To Kick Assus, Soon To Pack 3G
11:22PM Mark Wilson | Acer has just announced their new 8.9″ Aspire One ultraportable laptop. With a starting price of just US$379, configurations include an Intel Atom processor, up to 1GB of RAM and either 8GB of flash storage or an 80GB hard drive as well as a choice between Linpus Linux Lite and Windows XP. Nothing here is out of the ordinary for this new class of laptops except its competitive price and that future iterations are planned with 3G data support–yes, your computer may finally replace your smartphone. Read on for more details: More »
Robots
Robot Dog from Hell Is Terminator’s Best Friend, My Worst Nightmare
11:15PM Gizmodo US Edition | Although it’s not as scary as the spooky Big Dog—actually, it looks as friendly as the hilarious Fake Big Dog—I can imagine this prototype of a security robot dog developing into something capable running at 80kph behind you and tearing apart your thorax with pure steel fangs and claws. Fortunately, for now the rest of the videos show him to be friendlier than my own furry best friend. More »
Hardware
Nvidia GeForce 9M GPUs 40 Percent Faster Than Last Gen, Bring Hybrid SLI to Notebooks
11:00PM Matt Buchanan | And now for the real Nvidia meat this week: The GeForce 9M series. Besides promising 40 percent faster performance than its last gen of notebook graphics cards (8M if you’re keeping score), the 9M series brings Hybrid SLI to notebooks for the first time—the high performance GPU kicks in when needed, or it drops to the low-power one when things are chill. They go from the budget 9100M G to the top o’ the line 9650M GT (which delivers 132 gigaflops), though they all support Blu-ray 2.0 spec (with 1080p output and PureVideo HD processing), PhysX, HDMI 1.3, DisplayPort 1.1 and mo’. You’ll be seeing these puppies in “over a hundred notebook models beginning this summer.” More »
Computers
MSI Wind: Priced To Kick Assus
10:48PM Mark Wilson | The 10″ MSI Wind has just been priced at US$399 (Linux) and US$499 (XP). Asus just got some real competition. Here are the full details: More »
Gadgets
Scramble and Progression Tokyo Flash Watches Aren’t Totally Confusing
10:28PM Gizmodo US Edition | Just a few weeks ago I showed you the Infection watch, which was very much in the vein of befuddling time display that importer Tokyo Flash has become famous for. But now there’re the new Scramble and Progression watches from Nekura, and it looks like their LED-backlit LCD displays are slightly more straightforward, if still funky. You can even chose the illumination colour from a choice of six, or go for multicolor changing. Those straps are in engraved stainless steel too, and are “self-adjusting” somehow. Available now for about US$124. [Geek Alerts] More »
Phones
Samsung i900 Mobile Phone Hands-on Photos Leaked
9:29PM Gizmodo US Edition | We first brought you leaked mock-ups of Samsung’s upcoming i900 mobile phone in January, along with a single pic and some specs. Until now, that’s all we have to go on, but now Chinese site pconline.com.cn has got their hands on a real model and some more details on what the touchscreen phone will have inside.
Toys
Gigantic LEGO Tomcat F-14 Ready to Take Off
9:26PM Gizmodo US Edition | We have seen some amazing LEGO aircrafts in the past, but this F-14 Tomcat has to be the most awesome LEGO plane to date. In fact, it’s so technically complex—most parts, including cannons, swing wings, landing gears, brakes, flaps, air intake doors, are electric and pneumatically controlled—that builder Jeroen Ottens got a dream job in Denmark as a Technic designer. Looking at the list of features, we are not surprised:
Computers
