Hasta La Gadget!

TiVo said Wednesday that it will offer “dedicated customers” the chance to upgrade to a new high-def version of their TiVo DVR, and provide a $50 discount to boot.

“Beginning today, July 1st, TiVo will begin providing unique offers to dedicated customers that have owned a TiVo DVR for at least one year and are ready to upgrade to an HD DVR,” a company spokeswoman said in a note to reporters. “TiVo encourages customers to log onto their account through tivo.com as eligible customers can save $50 or more off of a new TiVo HD DVR.

“This program is ongoing and is designed to allow current and future TiVo customers access to great savings when upgrading to the best HD DVR with entertainment options no other DVR can match” including Netflix streaming, Amazon Video on Demand in HD, and advanced search features.

TiVo’s Series 2 DT DVR costs $149.99; the TiVo HD DVR costs $299.99. The monthly service plans for each box are the same. A factory-renewed HD DVR costs $199.99, but the discount only applies to “new” HD DVRs.

It’s possible that TiVo is trying to deplete inventories of its Series 2 DT DVR, and trying to move users over to its HD platform. It’s worth noting, however, that TiVo also lists its $599 HD HL DVR as “out of stock”.

If you’re a product recall specialist hoping for your relatives to bank it big on an airline disaster-related life insurance claim, this post isn’t for you. For everyone else who’d like a greater chance of walking away from a decidedly rough landing, here’s your ticket. New airline safety regulations going into effect this fall require that all airline seats stay intact even under an impact of 16 times the force of gravity — nearly double the old nine G requirement. As of now any aircraft model introduced after 1988 has the sturdier new seats, but starting October 27 all planes will. Additionally, a number of airlines are starting to have seats sporting airbags but, wouldn’t you know it, they’re largely found in first class. Ostensibly that’s because the greater gaps between seats means in an impact your calm, blank face won’t get restrained by the tray of the seat ahead, but you know the truth, don’t you?

Filed under: Transportation

Stronger airline seats with airbags might just save your life, even on a business trip originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 01 Jul 2009 10:41:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Energizer’s Energi To Go catalog just keeps getting sweeter. After introducing a new range of XPAL battery chargers last month, the company is evidently gearing up to reveal what’s likely to be its most convenient and altogether useful product yet. The USB clip you see above is designed to make contact with DSLR and camcorder batteries and provide juice via USB; in other words, it’s like a portable, highly mobile DSLR battery charger. OhGizmo points out that you may need one of Energizer’s USB-equipped battery packs to charge up the 7.4V cells, but at least we’re still talking about a non-proprietary charging connector. Per usual, there’s no mention of dollars and cents, but hopefully it’ll be rolled out for less than a song here soon.

[Via OhGizmo]

Filed under: Digital Cameras, Peripherals

Energizer USB clip to charge camcorder / DSLR batteries via USB originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 01 Jul 2009 09:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There isn’t much to say about the blog “There I Fixed It”, other than that you should add it to your RSS reader immediately. It’s a gallery of user-submitted hacks, the twist being that these hacks are disastrous, usually dangerously so, and many of them could quite possibly end in death.

The new car lock above is just hilarious, and the AT-AT caravan ladder mash-up is simply amazing. But the bike fire engine (below) is actually pretty handy-looking, for a small village at least.

Product page [There I Fixed It via Core77]

Designed for search and rescue missions – which, let’s face it, are only ever one loose word away from “search and destroy” – the SCRATCHbot uses its whiskers to detect disaster survivors in inhospitable or dangerous areas. The Bristol Robotics Laboratory developed the rat-inspired people searcher over the past 6 years and now hopes to find interest for it in underground and underwater projects where vision may be impaired. Far less heroic uses are also being contemplated, such as textile inspection and implementation inside intelligent vacuum cleaners that would be able to adjust their cleaning to the particular surface they sense. Video of the new bot coming to life is after the break.

Continue reading Video: SCRATCHbot hunts like a rat for those trapped like one

Filed under: Robots

Video: SCRATCHbot hunts like a rat for those trapped like one originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 01 Jul 2009 08:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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