Hasta La Gadget!

Let’s face it, holy texts just weren’t designed for the busy devotee on the go. Thankfully, modern technology has made it much easier to slip the word of God into purse or backpack.

Check out this product from Astorni, a nine inch touch screen eBook reader that features the full text from the Muslim holy book, the Qur’an. The device features 2GB of built-in storage and offers the holy text in 24 different languages, from Albanian to Urdu.

The device also features a “complete Islamic encyclopedia” and recitations of the Qur’an in five spoken voices. Really, it’s the perfect companion piece to Sabily’s Ubuntu: Muslim Edition.

I remember my days in a college dorm: space was always at a premium, and you had to come up with creative ways to make the best use of the space you had available. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the new Logitech Laptop Speaker Z305, or the Logitech Wireless Speaker Z515 back then. Regardless of whether you’re headed back to school or you just want to keep your desk as tidy as possible, Logitech’s new speakers are designed to deliver powerful sound with minimal footprint.

Hanging off of the back, the Z305 laptop speaker bar clips on the top of your laptop, and connects to your laptop via USB for both power and audio. It also features a stereo input jack so you can plug in your phone or an MP3 player and use the speakers with that as well. The design is compact — about 13-inches across — and designed top give you “360-degree sound” with speakers positioned at different angles so you can hear well even from the other side of the monitor. It’s available to pre-order now for $59.99 list.

The Wireless Speaker Z515 is a rechargeable speaker system that can function completely wirelessly: no cables for power or audio. You can plug in the AC adapter if you choose, and you can use the included 3.5mm stereo jack as an input source, but once you have the software installed and the battery charged, the Z515 can go in your bag with your laptop and sit up to 50 feet away from it. It uses 2.4GHz wireless to transmit audio through the air. It’s available for pre-order now at $99.99 list.

Well, what’s this? Our homey Avner Ronen from Boxee just posted up a little response to Apple’s $99 next-gen Apple TV announcement, and he’s letting it slip that the much-anticipated Boxee Box will be $100 more than Apple’s device, or $199. Avner says Boxee has a “different view of what people want in their living rooms,” and that while his device might be more expensive, it’ll let you watch anything you can watch on your computer on your TV in 1080p — the ATV is still limited to 720p. We certainly know a lot of passionate Boxee fans who agree — now all Avner’s got to do is ship the damn thing and let this play out in the actual market.

P.S.- Yes, we will cover almost anything that includes a YouTube embed of “Rudie Can’t Fail.” Well played, Mr. Ronen. Well played indeed.

Boxee Box priced at $199, Avner Ronen says it’ll give users ‘freedom to watch what you want’ originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Eager to get on the new Apple TV‘s cheap 99-cent TV show rentals but not so pumped to wait four weeks for it to ship? No worries: Amazon’s also now offering 99-cent rentals purchases of various ABC and FOX shows, which means a whole host of Amazon VOD-compatible devices just got some cheaper streaming options as well — and hey, Roku just cut prices on its entire lineup of Amazon- and Netflix- compatible players, so you can get in the game for as little as $60. Of course, the Apple TV also features day-and-date movie rentals, local streaming, AirPlay, and that slick iPhone / iPod touch Remote app, but only your heart truly knows if those are worth an extra few bucks and a month of fevered desire.

Update: As our astute commenters are pointing out, these are actually listed as 99-cent purchases, making this a far better deal entirely. We don’t know if that’s for real or just an error right now, though — we’re double checking and we’ll let you know.

Update 2: Yep, we’ve confirmed that these are 99-cent purchases, making this a much better deal than Apple’s rental model — although only you can decide whether you actually need permanent streaming access to Dollhouse Season 2.

[Thanks, Stephen]

Amazon streaming 99-cent ABC and Fox shows… right now (update: purchases, not rentals!) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Zune HD continues to rank among our all-time favorites in terms of industrial design, so it’s good to hear that Microsoft isn’t entirely abandoning the PMP sector for its new Windows Phone 7 hotness. Mary Jo Foley of ZDNet has consulted her tea leaves (and in-the-know tipsters) and emerged with the strong feeling that some new Zune hardware is brewing up in Redmond. Little specificity is available, beyond the obvious postulation that a new ZHD would probably be driven by an ARM CPU and take some software pointers from WP7, but we’re told to look toward to the early 2011 horizon and see if we can’t spot any sexy new media players emerging. A mirage is as likely as the real deal right now, but it’s always fun to look to that horizon, no?

Zune HD could have all-new model in the works originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 16:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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