Hasta La Gadget!

For those near and dear to ASUS’ Eee PC netbook line, the 1008HA ‘Seashell’ is definitely a breath of fresh air. It doesn’t look like an Eee, it doesn’t feel like an Eee and it doesn’t boast a replaceable battery like an Eee; needless to say, only two of those three facts were lauded by reviewers across the web. Much like Apple’s MacBook Air, the battery in this here machine is not user-serviceable, and while tests proved that it could last well over three hours with “normal” use, ASUS has yet to make clear what plans it has for offering replacements. In any case, most everything else about the machine was found to be on par or above, with performance being satisfactory for basic tasks and the keyboard / trackpad being exceptionally yummy. Still, it feels as if ASUS is charging a bit much for a familiar lineup of internals, but those willing to pay for style should definitely take a closer look.

Read – Trusted Reviews (“a very refined and classy netbook”)
Read – T3 (“a good all-round package”)
Read – CNET UK (“great styling and a relatively light chassis”)
Read – Bit-Tech (“definitely worth considering, but looks come at a cost”)
Read – WhatLaptop (“a compelling proposition”)
Read – PCPro (“If you don’t mind paying a premium for fine design, then the Seashell is a tantalizing prospect”)

Filed under: Laptops

ASUS Eee PC 1008HA ‘Seashell’ review roundup originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 May 2009 10:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The BlackJack II’s been looking a little long in the tooth for a while now, and it’s been made pretty clear that the Epix isn’t the direct replacement — so what is? Behold the i637 Jack (not to be confused with the… uh, Jack), which has just been made official with a 3.2 megapixel camera and video recording, AGPS, WiFi, microSD expansion, 256MB of RAM, triband HSDPA / quadband EDGE, and the all-too-typical QVGA display. Like its forebears, the Jack naturally features a full QWERTY keyboard; it’ll launch with Windows Mobile 6.1 but will be fully upgradeable to 6.5. Look for it in stores on May 19 for $99.99 on a new two-year contract after rebate. AT&T’s already got a unit (not to say that should come as any surprise) and they’re showing it off on video — check it out after the break.

Continue reading Samsung Jack comes to AT&T on May 19, $99.99 on contract

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Samsung Jack comes to AT&T on May 19, $99.99 on contract originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 May 2009 10:37:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Slowly but surely, those oh-so-juicy details are leaking out about Endless Ideas’ upcoming duo of e-readers. We’ve now learned that the BeBook mini will boast the same specifications as the original BeBook, save for the much more compact 5-inch display; if all goes well, it should be available for purchase this summer for €199 ($270). Moving on to the BeBook 2, we’ve learned that it will include both WiFi and 3G access right out of the box, and the company is currently working with mobile operators in Germany and France in hopes of providing Kindle-like data access for on-the-go book downloads. Unfortunately, it looks like the asking price of that one will hover in the €350 ($476) to €400 ($544) range, but you can check out a Dutch interview with the new announcements just past the break.

[Via Slashgear]

Continue reading BeBook mini and BeBook 2 priced, 3G added to the latter

Filed under: Displays, Handhelds

BeBook mini and BeBook 2 priced, 3G added to the latter originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 May 2009 10:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Okay, so there’s good news and bad news. Given that we just love to tease, we’ll start you off with the positives. HDMI 1.4 was just revealed, bringing with it an HDMI Ethernet Channel (HEC) that enables data transfers of up to 100 Mbps between supported connected devices. Put simply, this could allow a “broadband-connected television using its HEC-enabled HDMI port to provide internet connection sharing with another HEC-enabled device such as a game console or DVR.” Furthermore, the spec’s Audio Return Channel (ARC) enables broadcast audio to be easily streamed back to an external amplifier, and the Automatic Content Enhancement (ACE) provides support for “future 3D video standards, increased resolution support (up to 4,096 x 2,160 pixels at up to 30Hz), and content recognition that promises to automatically optimize the TV’s picture settings based on content type.”

The bad news? HEC will only work with new HDMI 1.4 spec cables, and those will be graded into two separate levels of performance: low- and high-data rate. We needn’t describe to you what kind of ball Monster Cable is going to have with that one, but even outside of that, we’re baffled by the decision to add one more complexity to a cable that should seriously be doing everything in its power to not be overshadowed by DisplayPort. At any rate, we’re told that Silicon Image is hoping to ship chip samples to manufacturers in Q2 2009, while HDMI 1.4-enabled products could arrive as early as next year. We aren’t holding our breath, but we’ll gladly eat crow if need be.

Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment

HDMI 1.4 brings internet sharing, dreadful tiers of quality originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 May 2009 09:43:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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A few weeks ago, Gadget Lab’s own Brian X Chen moaned about his dreadful experience using a hackintosh netbook for six months. The poor poppet whined on about the case falling apart, the Wi-Fi simply dying on him on a trip abroad and a whole range of other petty niggles.

As Chen mentioned, I agree on one point: The trackpad on the gen.1 Wind is truly atrocious, a tiny square of plastic with almost unusable buttons that you, inexplicably, need two hands to press. But on almost everything else, I disagree. Sure, the Wind isn’t perfect, as either a Windows or a Mac machine (although the Ubuntu Netbook Remix would be almost perfect if the Wi-Fi would work). But it has some great advantages, and a few tweaks down the road I have a tiny, portable machine that has proven very useful.

First, the obvious. The thing is tiny, and it’s a Mac. I don’t want to get into the whole Mac vs. PC thing. I just prefer to use a Mac, I’m used to it and everything is second nature. Now that the problems with certain drivers have been ironed out, it behaves exactly like my bigger Macs, even to the extent of switching automatically to line-output when plugging in headphones. The Mac OS has been rock solid on this machine since the very beginning. Maybe that’s because I didn’t steal my version off the internet.

Then there’s the battery. I replaced the truly awful three-cell that shipped with the machine with a huge, wrong colored nine-cell. It’s not pretty, but I get a true seven hours of use from the computer, and I still have the old one for an extra hour or so if I need it. This alone is reason to own a netbook, Mac or Windows, as it means you are no longer tied to a power source.

I took the Wind (actually, a Wind clone from Medion) on a weekend trip to Rome. I threw it in hand-luggage along with an external hard drive and turned the whole thing into a portable photo backup device. That there was neighbor-fi in the apartment helped, too, for checking out tourist spots, but for the main task — to clear my CF cards every day and do some basic editing (yes, it runs Lightroom, even with just a gig of RAM) — the netbook was perfect.

There’s more. At the kind of parties I host, there is always a need for the internet and, of course, music. The Wind acts as a great wireless front-end to iTunes sharing and Airtunes streaming, and you can pass it around the drunken guests without worrying. Sure, $400 is too much to lose to a spilled gin and tonic, but it’s better than $1600 for a replacement MacBook.

If you are aware from the beginning that a netbook is a cheap, low-spec, low-rent kind of computer, with the cheapest, most plasticky parts, then you won’t be disappointed. And if you hack it to run OS X, and you have similarly low expectations, you’ll actually be pleasantly surprised. I love my hackintosh netbook. It’s not perfect, but is sure is damn useful.

Six Months With a Hackintosh Netbook: It Ain’t Pretty [Gadget Lab]
It Lives! Gadget Lab’s Netbook Running OS X Leopard [Gadget Lab]

Photo: Charlie Sorrel