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Feb 17

Third-party studio offers more confirmation of motion-sensing Nintendo DS2

We’ve already had a pretty clear indication that Nintendo’s inevitable DS successor would have at least some form of motion control, and an unspecified third-party studio has now offered some additional confirmation of that, and some downright glowing impressions of the device itself. According to CVG, an “insider” that’s currently using a DS2 development kit says that the DS2 is “genuinely the best thing I think I’ve ever worked with,” and that it has “a ’tilt’ function that’s not dissimilar to iPhone, but does a lot more.” The source further added that The Pokemon Company is getting “special attention” with it (rest easy, everybody), and that Nintendo likely won’t be showing off any hardware at GDC next month. Yeah, that sound you just heard was the rumor mill being cranked up a notch.

Third-party studio offers more confirmation of motion-sensing Nintendo DS2 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Feb 2010 13:46:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink iPodNN | source CVG | Email this | Comments

Feb 17

SmartBricks Create a Wallpaper of Digital Images

Posted in: Displays, Today's Chili

Wallpaper can quickly get boring. So how about a wall of digital tiles that can display an ever-changing mix of patterns?

New “digital surfacing material” could create a wall of colors and landscapes that changes every few seconds, says Unplggd. Think of an effect similar to that by a digital photo frame, but on a much larger scale.

Israeli company Magink, in partnership with Japanese firm Shimizu, is manufacturing these tiles. The digital tiles are fairly low-power, thin building blocks that can be stacked up to cover any size wall, says Magink.

“The product line offers a new set of applications that range from outdoor billboards to indoor video surfaces, as well as a new interactive digital tiling solution,” says Magink on its website. For instance, a museum or a building can display art on its walls without flooding the area with light, says the company.

The basic building block is a square panel that’s 6.7 inches in size and about 2.8 inches thick. The tiles have a refresh rate of 60 frames per second. Currently, the tiles can only handle still images, says Unplggd, since video consumes too much power.

Unlike backlit LCDs, Magink’s tiles, also called SmartBricks, are reflective, so they display images using only ambient light. That’s the key to their low power consumption.

So far, Magink has been selling the tiles to billboard companies and sports arenas. But it looks like this idea has a pretty good chance of creeping into the living room.

Photos: Unplggd

Feb 17

Hacked camera captures high-speed video

Posted in: Today's Chili

Two Oxford scientists used a regular, off-the-shelf digicam and a home cinema projector to create a high-speed image capture device that records still and moving images simultaneously.

Feb 17

Samsung gobbling up TV market share

Posted in: Today's Chili

The flat-panel manufacturer’s dominance of the market is approaching historic levels, according to a new report from DisplaySearch. pOriginally posted at a href=”http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-10454971-260.html” class=”origPostedBlog”Circuit Breaker/a/p

Feb 17

Shuttle outfits X50 V2 and J series desktops with Clash of the Titans regalia

Posted in: multitouch, Today's Chili

Are you a fan of epic, multidimensional cinema extravaganzas? Well, Shuttle wants to help you show off your fandom with these here limited edition Clash of the Titans tie-in machines. The new J series entertainment SFF PCs will come with the most appealing package, which includes the colorful front faceplate above, while the Pine Trail-packing X50 V2 will be preloaded with wallpapers and imagery from the forthcoming flick. We like to mock such blatantly commercial efforts, but if you really are into your Greek mythology and want a small computer that can fit Core i7 CPUs and dual-GPU setups (SX58J3), why not? Best of all, you can even win one of these, so after you’ve read the PR after the break, hit the source link to find out how.

Continue reading Shuttle outfits X50 V2 and J series desktops with Clash of the Titans regalia

Shuttle outfits X50 V2 and J series desktops with Clash of the Titans regalia originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Feb 2010 13:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | source Shuttle | Email this | Comments

Feb 17

Bishops: Give up your iPod for Lent

Posted in: Today's Chili

Church leaders in the U.K. believe something of a technology fast will save the planet, as well as our souls. pOriginally posted at a href=”http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10454922-71.html” class=”origPostedBlog”Technically Incorrect/a/p

Feb 17

Sanyo’s ICR-PS605RM Xacti stereo recorder features six mics… for recording lots of stuff

Posted in: Today's Chili

Sure, you can have your little voice recorders if you like, but when you’re ready to seriously up your game you have to talk to Sanyo. Indeed, the kids from Osaka have really gone and done it this time with their ICR-PS605RM Xacti stereo recorder. This bad boy features six microphones in a W-XY configuration, including an omni-directional stereo pair, an XY directional pair, and two directional mics for recording frequencies higher than 20,000Hz. Between this and its support for up to 96kHz / 24bit / 40,000Hz PCM sound files, we think that we can safely say that your extensive field recordings of Appalachian folksingers will sound better than ever (or, if you’d rather record MP3s, they have that covered as well). Also on tap is 4GB internal memory and a microSDHC slot. No word on a price, but you can look forward to seeing this one make its debut in Japan come April. Get a closer look at the break.

Continue reading Sanyo’s ICR-PS605RM Xacti stereo recorder features six mics… for recording lots of stuff

Sanyo’s ICR-PS605RM Xacti stereo recorder features six mics… for recording lots of stuff originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Feb 2010 13:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Akihabara | source Sanyo Japan | Email this | Comments

Feb 17

Bug Labs’ BUGbase 2.0 prototype hands-on

Posted in: hands-on, mwc, mwc 2010, Mwc2010, Today's Chili

At first glance, Bug Labs’ latest creation actually seems like a bit of a downgrade from the version it replaces — it loses the onboard LCD display and a handful of buttons, after all — but we sat down with CEO Peter Semmelhack today on the hustling, bustling floor of MWC to get the straight dope on what makes the BUGbase 2.0 a superior product. First of all, you can’t overlook the fact that they’ve moved to a Cortex A8-based OMAP3530, an appreciable boost from the ARM11 core it replaces, but it turns out there are a whole bunch of subtler changes too, like the inclusion of on-board audio out (pictured above toward the left of the base), HD video out capability through a module, and a second microSD slot. Why two, you ask? Isn’t 32GB of external storage enough? Probably, but Semmelhack points out that the second slot (covered behind a flap) is dedicated to loading the operating system, making it a trivial task to quickly switch between kernels or get unbricked.

Although the unit we saw today has functional guts, we’re told that the casing is pre-production — not to say that “production” BUGbases need to look amazing, anyway, considering that they’re frequently used for prototyping themselves. Though Android’s already been ported to the Bug platform, the company is really driving home the message in 2.0; when you think about it, this kind of makes any Android dev out there a de facto Bug dev, so that’s a nice angle to play. Look for it to ship by “early Summer,” so it’s time to scoop up that first-gen unit now if you’re jonesing for the integrated display.

Gallery: Bug Labs’ BUGbase 2.0 prototype hands-on

Bug Labs’ BUGbase 2.0 prototype hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Feb 2010 12:38:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Feb 17

MWC: MeeGo + LiMo = MeeGoLi? LiMeeGoMo?

Posted in: Linux, mwc, Today's Chili

The mobile world breathed a quiet sigh of relief Monday when
Intel and Nokia merged their mobile Linux-based OS platforms, turning Maemo and
Moblin into MeeGo. It’s not necessarily because the platform is great – it’s because all of these little, fragmented mobile Linux variants can’t survive on
their own.

At Mobile World Congress today, I asked LiMo executive director Morgan
Gillis if he’d be interested in joining forces with MeeGo. LiMo, or Linux
Mobile, is a mobile middleware platform run by a broad industry association
that’s been spinning out a range of phones recently, mostly in Asia.

In many ways, LiMo and MeeGo would be complimentary. MeeGo
is an X86-based platform focusing on MIDs and tablets; the only MeeGo phone we’ve
seen so far, the LG GW990, is pretty huge. LiMo is a low-footprint ARM-based
platform that scales all the way down to quasi-feature phones. Together, they
would have a solution for a full range of mobile devices.

“That could be very logical and beneficial for the market,”
Gillis said.

But MeeGo’s governance model may prevent LiMo from joining
up with them, Gillis said. MeeGo is basically shepherded by Intel and Nokia,
while LiMo goes for a much more open structure.

“If the governance model is properly open, if the decision
making rules are published and if the decision making outcomes are published,”
LiMo would consider joining forces, Gillis said. The two organizations would
also have to resolve their very different tool chains; MeeGo uses Nokia’s QT,
while LiMo uses GTK.

In any case, platform consolidation is coming to the
smartphone market, Gillis said.

“You have to ask, what is the ideal number of platforms? It’s
certainly no more than five,” he said.

Feb 17

Sherwood’s internet-streaming R-904N NetBoxx receiver review

Posted in: feature, Features, media streamer, MediaStreamer, review, Today's Chili

Why have two gadgets when you can have one that does two things? The answer, of course, is when that one thing doesn’t do either of its two tasks well — the Jack of All Trades Syndrome. When Sherwood told us last year it was making a receiver that had built-in network playback capabilities, meaning we could ditch our media streamers (tiny though they may be), we were naturally stoked. Many months on we’ve finally had a chance to put one through its paces and, if you click through, you can read our impressions of this slim and uniquely styled audio/video receiver — and find out why we’ll be reluctantly hooking our dedicated streamers back up.

Gallery: Sherwood R-904N NetBoxx receiver