Hasta La Gadget!

Messaging phones are on the rise thanks to the text messaging craze. Here’s a look at the top 10 messaging phones CNET has reviewed. pOriginally posted at a href=”http://www.cnet.com/8301-17918_1-20000826-85.html” class=”origPostedBlog”Dialed In/a/p

Oh Palm. Just a little over a year ago your future seemed so bright, so renewed. You walked away from CES 2009 reborn, held aloft by a completely innovative new mobile operating system, a striking piece of hardware, and a feeling amongst the press and investors that you were back in the game and playing to win. Now, less than a year and a half later, you’ve nearly returned to the dark and desperate place you’d found yourself in at the end of 2008; a rapidly declining mindshare, the bottom falling out of your stock, and bad dips in phone sales. All of it is leaving you backed into a corner where the common perception now is that you’ve got to sell to survive at all. So what went wrong? How did such a promising launch lead to such a disappointing reality? And how can you wrestle your way back from the brink yet again? Is that even an option?

In 2007 the editors of Engadget penned an impassioned open letter to the company, pleading for many of the changes we eventually saw at Palm. This isn’t a follow-up, but it’s very much in the spirit. We’re going to take a look at the missteps that put the company in its current spot, and talk about what we think can pull it back out. Palm, it’s time for a little tough love… again.

Continue reading Palm: this is your survival guide

Palm: this is your survival guide originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Both still seem to be a quite a ways from a release, but Microsoft has now announced a few details for its forthcoming Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 updates. The latter of the two actually seems to be the more significant, as it adds a so-called RemoteFX feature that Microsoft describes as the “special sauce” in its Remote Desktop Services. The short of it is that RemoteFX uses virtualized graphics resources and is able to function independently of any graphics stack, which Microsoft says will allow “any screen content” (including Silverlight and Flash) to be delivered to everything from full-fledged PCs to low-cost, thin client devices. Windows 7 SP1, on the other hand, is described as having “only minor updates,” the biggest of which is — you guessed it — an updated Remote Desktop client that takes advantage of RemoteFX. Dive into the links below for the complete details.

Microsoft dishes out Windows 7 SP1, Windows Server 2008 R2 details originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Engadget Spanish  |  The Windows Blog  | Email this | Comments

This week, Marvell unveiled a $99 tablet e-reader reference design that the company promises will do for the e-reader market what ARM-based notebooks have done to compete with netbooks.

The “Moby” contains a Marvell Armada 600-series microprocessor running at up to a gigahertz. the system-on-a-chip is powerful enough to be able to perform 1080p high-definition video encoding and decoding, some 3D graphics, and either the Google Android or Microsoft Windows Mobile operating system. It reportedly uses a 10-inch display, according to Technologizer. According to Marvell, the Moby’s Armada 600 processor can decode Adobe Flash-encoded video.

Marvell is pitching the Moby at students and other consumers who want the flexibility of a tablet, but don’t want to pay for something like a JooJoo or an iPad. Marvell will soon announce a pilot program in partnership with the
District of Columbia Public School system (DCPS) where the Company will
donate a Moby tablet to every child in an at-risk school as part of a
multi-year program in new media and learning, the company said.

Marvell did not announce the specs of the Moby, but said that the tablet should “weigh less than half of one typical textbook,” but have enough internal storage to be able to hold a “year’s supply of textbooks”.

(Picture via Technologizer)

Still wondering how the first live broadcasts for the new 3DTVs will work? Comcast Fellow Mark Francisco has been working on bringing 3D home for several years now, and was able to clear up some of the questions that you’ve been asking about what takes place before home viewers slip on those “beautifully styled” glasses for the first time. Whether you’d want to, can afford to with the first generation of compatible HDTVs, or why it’s expanding the use of that silly Xfinity name weren’t among them, so for that you’re on your own.

What format/compression will Comcast use on its Masters broadcast and going forward?

Just like DirecTV, Comcast is planning on a side-by-side 1080i (not sure what that is? Check out our breakdown of the different ways to send 3D) MPEG-2 transmission. Mark confirmed what we’d heard previously in our discussion with Bob Wilson from Motorola, on the backend, very little needed changing or updating to enable this transmission, which will take up a 6MHz channel, other than their frame multiplexers. There will also be an h.264 stream and VC-1 (for the Masters.com feed) and for broadcast within hospitality tents at Augusta National.

Will I need a new cable box or have to get a firmware update of some kind to watch 3D?

All of Comcast’s HD set-top boxes connected through HDMI are already capable of handling the signal, so don’t expect a firmware upgrade (unless you’re waiting for remote DVR features, of course) between then and now, although future upgrades will include 3D menus and guide information, which are currently still 2D.

Continue reading Comcast’s 3D Masters broadcast explained

Comcast’s 3D Masters broadcast explained originally appeared on Engadget HD on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments