Regular arcade machines are neat and all, but if you have thousands of dollars worth of mahogany furniture in your mansion, they tend to clash with the environment. Luckily, Custom Arcades makes a gaming all-in-one that takes your expensive tastes into account. The Grand Daddy Arcade encases a 42-inch flat screen monitor, a 505W sound system, a two to four player control panel, and space to store other home gaming systems in an only slightly gaudy birch casing. Yours for just US$8000. [Custom Arcades via Born Rich]
Tesla Motors is finally rolling out its long-awaited single-speed transmission for the all-electric Tesla Roadster, which will pare down durability issues while upping torque and range. The new gearbox, made by transmission whiz kids Borg Warner, lets the Roadster hit its promised zero to 100 time of 4.0 seconds while upping travel distance to 392km per charge.
Blurring the line between single-lens reflex and standard point-and-shoot digitals, Panasonic introduces its first Micro Four Thirds-standard camera, the Lumix DMC-G1. At its unveiling, it’s the world’s smallest and lightest camera that takes interchangeable lenses. Here are the details on this incredibly cute not-quite-pro, not-quite-’sumer camera. galleryPost('PanasonicDMCG1', 3, '');
Not content with deploying their version of Apple’s Genius tech support lackeys, Microsoft is now biting on the iTunes Genius song feature as well and the initial previews make it look… really awesome, actually. Wired got a sneak preview of the Zune 3.0 software, to be released on Sept. 16, and found it much more intuitive and encompassing than Apple’s recommendation system.
Nothing brightens up a tech geek’s room like an awesome LED cube, and Hack n’ Mod has got a couple of do-it-yourself instructions for building your own glowy box thing. You can get started with a small, less ambitious 3x3x3 cube design, maybe step it up to a 4x4x4 design if you’re more confident, and ultimately build your own 8x8x8 cube (like the one after the jump)! Of course, you could always just buy one from LED Cube manufacturers like Seekway, but where’s the fun in that? [Hack n' Mod]
Is Photoshop CS4 coming earlier than predicted? A screengrab of NAPP Newswire shows that something is about to hit on Sept. 23… and that it’s something to do with Adobe’s Creative Suite 4. How disappointing would it be if whatever it is that’s supposed to be “brilliant” turned out to be like… an ad? [-Thanks mrquintano2u!]
In a recent interview, Zune PR head Adam Sohn told the New York Times that “babies are born every day without an iPod. We will get there.” There being, presumably, more than the measly 2% market share the player holds now. But babies? Really? Microsoft, I think I’ve figured out your problem–you’re going after a demographic with no buying power. And just like John Kerry touring elementary schools during the 2004 election season, I predict this fool’s errand won’t win you many more points.
In case you weren’t paranoid enough knowing that there’s a 22.5km particle accelerator complete with Black Hole Button currently operational on this, your most favourite of planets, here’s a dose of meta-reality that will make your palms even sweatier, a glimpse of live webcams monitoring the LHC Compact Muon Solenoid Experiment. Once you’re sufficiently freaked out, you can share it with your most skittish and/or ignorant friends and family members, and watch them squirm with palpable existential terror. [Cyriak - Thanks Josh!]
Who doesn’t love a Zip drive? With their sweet 100MB of magnetic memory, they used to save my arse back in the day. (My Performa 6400 even had an internal Zip drive.) And who doesn’t love a marionette? With their beady eyes and history of horror-film animation, they touch the heart of any child from 1 to 100, sometimes with a knife. Put the two together, and what do you get?
Someone at Qantas loves the iPhone. Not long after they announced that they had an iPhone friendly website available, they’re now unveiling plans to let travellers check in without paper, instead using their iPhone’s screen as their documentation.
From the sounds of the announcement, it will be available for a number of mobile devices and PCs – not just iPhones. They’re also planning on allowing online check-ins for international travellers (currently only domestic travellers can check-in online).
The process will involve having a 2D barcode sent to your phone after you check in online, which is aimed at speeding up the check-in process.
