Hasta La Gadget!

We’ve been hearing about the ET2010 model since CES, then got another glimpse at CeBIT a few weeks ago, and now the all-in-one machine is making its international debut — and ASUS has more than one to share with us. The five models range from the ET2010AG, with an AMD Athlon II processor, up to the ET2010PNT, with an Atom D510. All models have a 20-inch, 1600 x 900 displays, but only two of them sport multitouch. Storage ranges from 160GB to 500GB, 1 or 2GB of RAM is available, and graphics options include an integrated Intel GMA chipset, ATI’s Radeon HD 5470, or, most interestingly, Ion 2 graphics in the two Atom-powered options. All offer a DVD drive and all sport the same, wall-mountable and 1-inch thick design. What we don’t know is when these will be shipping or how much they’ll cost, but you’ll surely be the first to hear after we do.

ASUS’s 20-inch ET2010 EeeTop models with Ion power detailed originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 31 Mar 2010 09:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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So here’s the sales pitch: Amazon wants to film the packaging and preparation of your goods as they get ready to ship out in order to make sure your order is properly fulfilled and addressed. Stills or the whole video are then forwarded along to you, so you can check ’em out. Granted yesterday, the patent for this oh-so-complex monitoring system is actually quite specific — it’s only operative if your order includes “at least one book, food item, bottle of wine, flowers, or jewelry,” so it’s not like Amazon can keep everyone else from doing this — but hey, it also references verification of “collateral items,” which is a fancy way of saying it’ll be used to make sure third party fliers and advertisements make it into the box along with the stuff you actually want, so it’s not all roses and sunshine.

[Thanks, JagsLive]

Amazon patents packaging surveillance, says it’s for our own good originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 31 Mar 2010 09:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Did you know that more expensive gadget break less often? If you answered “Duh, of course,” then congratulations: You have a brain and can likely think and keep you mouth open at the same time. Nevertheless, a new study showing the reliability figures in the digital camera market has some interesting (and non-obvious) results.

First, the study was conducted over three years by SquareTrade, a company which sells warranties. While this could add a bias, it also means the company has plenty of its own accurate data to draw on. With that in mind, read on.

The study looked at failure rates of cameras based on both price and age. Around 7% of cameras will fail in the first two years (another 5% break due to accidents), rising to nearly 10% after three years. That doesn’t sound too bad, unless you’re in that unlucky minority.

If you spend a little more money, your camera is likely to last longer, because it is better built, although quality varies widely with brand (see below). So while the overall (2-year) malfunction rate of cameras is 11%, fully 7.4% of failures come from cameras under $150. Spend over $500 and the chance the camera will stop working falls to just 4%.

This is hardly panic material, though, and those extended warranties are probably still a lot more trouble than they’re worth (if they didn’t make money, nobody would sell them).

But one final tidbit of information is the breaking down of reliability by brand. This counts only for compacts: despite a sample-size of 60,000 cameras, SquareTrade hasn’t sold enough warranties to DSLR owners to get meaningful results. For cameras under $300, Panasonic wins, with a malfunction rate of 5.3% compared the Casio, coming in last at 13%. Between $300 and $500, Panasonic wins again, with just 1.9%. The big surprise? Canon loses, with 6.2% of its premium compacts failing in the first two years, making them three times more likely to break than those from Panasonic.

Should you base your buying decisions on these figures? Probably not. After all, with the exception of cheap Casio cams (and Polaroids, but who buys those anyway?) these figures are all pretty low. The upside? Tech actually seems pretty reliable these days.