AMD Radeon HD 6870 and HD 6850 officially pictured, coming this Friday

AMD said it’s bringing the new heat this week, but, in a classic act of showmanship, it’s teasing out only imagery today and insisting on making us wait until Friday to truly learn what the next generation of Radeon graphics is made of. For now, we have the full titles of its leading lights, namely the Radeon HD 6870 and Radeon HD 6850, along with plenty of pictorial evidence of their existence in a lab somewhere. We note with glee that the default output arrangement includes no less than five ports, including two DVI, one HDMI (1.4a), and two Mini DisplayPorts. We’d rather the latter two were full-sized, but it doesn’t look like ATI AMD had the room to fit them in. As to power requirements, the HD 6870 will need two 6-pin connectors to augment the juice it gets from the PCI Express port, while the HD 6850 will sate its needs with just the one. Anyhow, enjoy the gallery below and make sure to have your popcorn ready for the benchmark-heavy reviews coming up at the end of the week.

Continue reading AMD Radeon HD 6870 and HD 6850 officially pictured, coming this Friday

AMD Radeon HD 6870 and HD 6850 officially pictured, coming this Friday originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Oct 2010 02:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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NEC introduces 23-inch MultiSync EX231W LCD monitor, complete with DisplayPort

NEC’s new MultiSync EX231W may not be the sexiest LCD of all time, but it’s still decidedly sleek for a screen that’s all-business underneath. This 23-incher weighs just 9.3 pounds, has an ultraslim bezel (14.6mm) and a native 1920 x 1080 screen resolution, and it’s also packing 250 nits of brightness, 25,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio and a Mother Earth-approved ECO mode that consumes just 16 watts. There’s also DVI and DisplayPort options, not to mention a USB pass-through on the top of the monitor that enables quick webcam or flash drive connections. The usual extras are also in attendance, with an ambient light sensor, carbon savings meter, touch-sensitive on-screen controls, four-way adjustable stand and an intelligent power manager all making the cut. It’ll ship next month for $339, and that does indeed include the company’s three year limited warranty.

Continue reading NEC introduces 23-inch MultiSync EX231W LCD monitor, complete with DisplayPort

NEC introduces 23-inch MultiSync EX231W LCD monitor, complete with DisplayPort originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Oct 2010 02:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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AT&T offering a free month of Zune to folks who buy a Windows Phone 7 handset this year (update: 3-month Zune Pass from MS, and free Xbox 360s in Austria!)

We already knew AT&T was giving away ilomilo and a free month of U-verse Mobile to folks who buy one of its glorious Windows Phone 7 phones. What else? Well, AT&T is tossing in a free month of Zune Pass for good measure. Now, Microsoft already offers 14 day free trials to the Zune-curious, and there’s nothing stopping other carriers or Microsoft itself extending this deal to the rest of the world — we think the “first one’s free” method of addiction generation is particularly great for subscription music. Still, it’s nice to know AT&T has such an offer sewn up. Now that the Xbox is getting a native Zune UI at long last, how about a free month of Zune for Xbox Live subscribers as well? Microsoft can afford it.

[Thanks, Morgan G.]

Update: We just heard that Austrian carrier A1’s offering a free Xbox 360 4GB to everyone signing up for or extending a contract for a HTC Trophy on October 21st only, and there’ll also be a Xbox 360 raffle for 360 lucky pre-orderers. If you so desire, A1 will also let you sign up for two contracts and take two Xboxes home as well. Our tipster added that the company isn’t known for doing giveaways, so it’s very likely that it’s getting a little help from Microsoft. [Thanks, Ben M.]

And speaking of which, another eagle-eyed reader spotted that Microsoft is giving away three-month Zune Passes to those signing up for the WP7 pre-order notification and actually buying a phone. Go get it while it’s hot! [Thanks, Bryan]

AT&T offering a free month of Zune to folks who buy a Windows Phone 7 handset this year (update: 3-month Zune Pass from MS, and free Xbox 360s in Austria!) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Oct 2010 00:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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AT&T offering a free month of Zune to folks who buy a Windows Phone 7 handset this year

We already knew AT&T was giving away ilomilo and a free month of U-verse Mobile to folks who buy one of its glorious Windows Phone 7 phones. What else? Well, AT&T is tossing in a free month of Zune Pass for good measure. Now, Microsoft already offers 14 day free trials to the Zune-curious, and there’s nothing stopping other carriers or Microsoft itself extending this deal to the rest of the world — we think the “first one’s free” method of addiction generation is particularly great for subscription music. Still, it’s nice to know AT&T has such an offer sewn up. Now that the Xbox is getting a native Zune UI at long last, how about a free month of Zune for Xbox Live subscribers as well? Microsoft can afford it.

[Thanks, Morgan G.]

AT&T offering a free month of Zune to folks who buy a Windows Phone 7 handset this year originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Oct 2010 00:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Digital City 101: Apple event predictions and real guitars vs. game guitars

After 100 relatively trouble-free weekly episodes, it’s at number 101 that things really start to fall apart. Over the weekend, our entire video podcast studio was ripped out and replaced with a new high-definition version.

That’s great, and today’s video stream looked awesome, but unfortunately, the day one gremlins are also holding our video of this week’s show hostage.

Until we get that worked out, you’ll have to settle for the audio version, available below.

In actual news, Apple has a big press event this week, so naturally we’re in full-on prediction mode, especially when it comes to 11-inch MacBook Air laptops. We also debate the coming 4G/LTE wave in New York, and what it means for the iPhone/Android wars.

Finally, we take a look at the new deluxe Rock Band 3 Fender Mustang guitar, and compare it to a real-life guitar. Pics and a side-by-side video demo are here.

Don’t forget: You can download the show’s theme song as a free MP3 here for a limited time!

Related links:

>>
Five Apple predictions

>>
Sprint adds 4G in New York, Los Angeles

>>
Battle of the axes: Rock Band 3’s Pro guitar vs. real guitar

>> Watch the Digital City live every Monday at 3 p.m. ET on CNET Live!
>> Subscribe to Digital City on iTunes
>> Join the Digital City Facebook fan page

>> Need more? Follow the show on Twitter. Also check out Dan on Twitter, and Scott!

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Originally posted at Digital City Podcast

How Far is the MPAA Willing to Go?

This article was written on October 22, 2007 by CyberNet.

mpaa logo Stopping piraters from downloading movies illegally is at the very top of the MPAA’s task list.  Given that, they have gone to some great lengths to enforce their zero tolerance policy, and an exclusive article over at Wired today points this out.  The article starts out “Promises of Hollywood fame and fortune persuaded a young hacker to betray former associates in the BitTorrent scene to Tinseltown’s anti-piracy lobby.” This situation involving Robert Anderson is just one of many examples of what the MPAA is doing to try and stop piracy, but does it really do them any good?

Just a couple of months ago, a teen was arrested for a 20 second transformer movie clip that they recorded in the theater. The MPAA’s zero tolerance policy meant zero tolerance and the young 19 year old girl was arrested for recording the clip to show to her younger brother. While it wasn’t a wise decision to bring a video camera into the theater, she faces jail time. In this situation, is the zero tolerance policy really helping the MPAA?

Another great example of the lengths the MPAA will go was revealed back in July when they hired a company called MediaDefender to help them stop piracy. MediaDefender is the leading provider of anti-piracy solutions, and so to help, they set-up a fake video download site called MiiVi where users could download movies. The catch was that they were  infested with spyware that reported back on any stolen videos found on the users computer. The MPAA was caught red-handed when a whois search found that MiiVi was registered to the company.

The incident involving Robert Anderson who was recruited by the MPAA in 2005 with an enticing offer to become “rich and powerful” confirms that the MPAA is willing to spend big money and do whatever it takes to stop illegal downloading. They offered him a house, a car, a “good” paying job, and anything else he needed after he told them he could provide inside information on TorrentSpy. Part of the inside information that he had was the source code for TorrentSpy’s back-end software which Anderson said the MPAA wanted to use to create a fake Torrent site of their own.

Anderson obtained the information that he did illegally by programming TorrentSpy’s mail to relay email to a Gmail account that he created and accessed regularly is one of many problems in this situation, and he also “ratted out” his own colleagues that he was once a part of. This situation illustrates that the MPAA is willing to go pretty far to get back the “billions in lost sales each year” that they claim they lose from BitTorrent networks. Would those who download these movies actually go buy the movies if there was no other way to obtain it? At this point I’m wondering what else the MPAA has up their sleeve, and if the money they spend to entice people like Anderson ends up being worth it in the long run.

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T-Mobile myTouch 4G ROM leak includes teaser video, speed-enhanced moniker

We always thought it was peculiar that T-Mobile’s third myTouch phone would be simply called “myTouch,” especially when earlier leaks tacked on “HD” for good measure. Aspects of the device’s ROM leak suggests that isn’t necessarily the case — or, at least, it wasn’t always. A teaser video (presented in a phone-friendly, portrait resolution) was found wading through the lines of code, serving to both highlight key features (genius button, HD camcorder, video chat, screen sharing) and conclude with a differentiating designation: myTouch 4G. That 4G would be in reference to HSPA+, of course, whether or not its competition sees things as such. For all we know, though, this could be an earlier version of the footage and 4G has since been dropped from, rather than added to, its official handle. Then again, what’s in a name? That which we call a myTouch by any other name would surely run as swift. Video after the break.

Continue reading T-Mobile myTouch 4G ROM leak includes teaser video, speed-enhanced moniker

T-Mobile myTouch 4G ROM leak includes teaser video, speed-enhanced moniker originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 18 Oct 2010 22:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Japan, deflation, and other hobgoblins

I’ve been fighting the urge to write a giant missive about the Japanese economy for a long time, but it’s finally come to a head. There are many reasons I don’t write pieces like this:

1) They take a long time, and I’m a busy guy running a company
2) I can’t bother responding to critics (see #1)
3) Internal CScout disagreements about economics
4) Bright and cheery is good for business!
5) I don’t want to have a heart attack

It’s been well-documented that the Old Grey Lady is…well…old, grey, and behind the times, and shows no sign of being willing to retire to the nursing home anytime soon. The NYT is constantly on the case, discovering things in Japan that everyone has known about for years: QR Codes, internet cafes, and even complete bullshit like Japanese people dressing like vending machines.

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I’ve never met Martin Fackler (though I have had the pleasure of drunkenly arguing economics with NYT reporter (and LSE grad) Hiroko Tabuchi) and I’m sure he’s very intelligent and amiable. However, his latest piece on Japan entitled Japan Goes from Dynamic to Disheartened is a perfect representation of everything that’s wrong with reporting on Japan, economics, and general consumer trends all wrapped into one. More annoying is getting the story emailed to me by twenty different people just to show how fucked Japan is and, thus, how screwed I am.

It is undeniable that Japanese consumer culture has changed quite a bit since the good old days of bubble and boom, but I would argue that it’s a GOOD thing this is finally happening. Japan might just be on the way to the correction it’s needed for twenty years.

Being more interested in the philosophies underpinning political and economic thought (rather than “politics” and “economics”), my most difficult goal is in defining terms. After all, without defining our terms it’s useless to even begin such discussions without them devolving into nonsensical Ham Sandwich Fallacy (of four terms) squabbles:

Major premise: Nothing is better than eternal happiness.
Minor premise: A ham sandwich is better than nothing.
Conclusion: A ham sandwich is better than eternal happiness.

This may be a simplified example, but without defining the meaning of “nothing”, we can argue all day using the same vocabulary, but never truly understanding one another.

In the case of discussing Japan’s economic situation, we first need to define the meanings of “inflation” and “deflation”. Contrary to what you may have heard, neither term means rising or falling prices, but rather an expansion or contraction of the monetary supply which may or may not lead to price fluctuations. After all, computers and mobile phones have continually gotten cheaper over the last decade, but one would hardly attribute that to deflation. Lower prices, such as those Japan is experiencing, can be a consequence of deflation, but not always!

Back in the days when people carried gold coins for money, inflation was achieved through literal debasement of the currency. People would shake the coins in a bag, or shave off bits and pieces around the edges, in order to get tiny pieces of gold to turn into new coins. Thus, the ridged edges of coins were created to combat this (these days it’s just ornamental). This meant that the value of each coin became less, and prices would go up as a result. These days, in the same manner, central banks around the world create new money, but instead of shaving the coins they just add a couple of decimal points to a spreadsheet somewhere.

With all of the complaining about deflation and prices that are “too low”, I have to wonder, “Who are they too low for?”. God forbid that the rest of us living with budgets and expenses get to spend a little less on our beef bowls.

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Yes, Japanese consumers are saving more, but they’ve always been good savers. In fact, it’s a testament to the will of the Japanese people that they still save at all since they haven’t earned anything in interest for years! Rather than bemoaning the newfound frugality of Japanese youth, we should be celebrating it. Savings are a GOOD thing, just as having a currency that’s worth something is ultimately beneficial to an economy. An economy, I might add, that has to import nearly 50% of its food. Why on earth would we want a devalued yen? Sure, Sony can sell more televisions and cars to Americans who can’t afford them anyway, but the rest of us have to eat. Falling prices allow for falling wages as well, thus keeping companies profitable and the rest of the economy employed.

This new young generation of Japanese savers isn’t hoarding their money for the fun of it. They are scared for the future, and rightfully so. The Japanese economy has quickly shifted from an all-out consumer society where people would pay anything for any kind of crap, to a more sophisticated society of consumers who are careful with their money. The time preferences of Japanese consumers has become longer, but that doesn’t mean that they won’t be ultimately spending it. Savings are nothing but delayed consumption, and right now we’re in a rebuilding phase. The more the government tries to debase the yen the more we need to save to protect ourselves.

I’m just going to pull out some excerpts from Fackler’s piece that really caught my eye. It’s full of gems!

“Japan used to be so flashy and upbeat, but now everyone must live in a dark and subdued way,” said Masato, 49, who asked that his full name not be used because he still cannot repay the $110,000 that he owes on the mortgage.

I was thinking the same thing last weekend. Friday night I was having so much fun! Lots of drinking, partying, and craziness, but on Saturday I could barely move. Life is unfair!

Perhaps I’m missing something, but this passage from Fackler’s piece about “microhouses” makes no sense to me at all:

The downsizing of Japan’s ambitions can be seen on the streets of Tokyo, where concrete “microhouses” have become popular among younger Japanese who cannot afford even the famously cramped housing of their parents, or lack the job security to take out a traditional multidecade loan.

These matchbox-size homes stand on plots of land barely large enough to park a sport utility vehicle, yet have three stories of closet-size bedrooms, suitcase-size closets and a tiny kitchen that properly belongs on a submarine.

“This is how to own a house even when you are uneasy about the future,” said Kimiyo Kondo, general manager at Zaus, a Tokyo-based company that builds microhouses.

Is this opposed to the sprawling mansions that Japanese people used to build in Tokyo? Hell, Fackler doesn’t even say which part of “Tokyo” he’s referring to.

But, wait…what happened to deflation? Aren’t housing prices going down as well?

Anyone who has ever looked at real estate in Japan knows that it’s already a luxury to own land in Tokyo to begin with, let alone build a house on it, and the land itself is worth many times more than the structure. Besides, people worried about the future typically prefer to rent.

The rest of the piece is a tale of woe: Young Japanese who find it “foolish” to borrow and spend (umm…they’re right?), and the obligatory mention of suicide. Even this one I don’t get:

There are vending machines that sell canned drinks for 10 yen, or 12 cents; restaurants with 50-yen beer; apartments with the first month’s rent of just 100 yen, about $1.22. Even marriage ceremonies are on sale, with discount wedding halls offering weddings for $600 — less than a tenth of what ceremonies typically cost here just a decade ago.

  • 10-yen vending machines: Bullshit. I want to see a picture. If it’s 10 yen, it’s not for anything resembling a normal drink. 80 yen maybe?
  • 50 yen beer: First, I’ll bet you a real beer that what’s actually being served is happoshu. Second, it’s what we call a “loss leader”. Look it up.
  • 100 yen apartments: Again, it’s a marketing gimmick. You can buy a car in America for “no money down”, but it doesn’t mean that you’re getting them any cheaper in the end!
  • Discount marriages: Supply and demand, since there are less younger people and less people getting married. Perhaps the couples that used to just go to city hall are now “splurging” for a discount wedding? Context please.
  • Fackler goes on with his hard-hitting examples of Japanese retail down in the dumps:

    On Senbayashi, an Osaka shopping street, merchants recently held a 100-yen day, offering much of their merchandise for that price. Even then, they said, the results were disappointing.

    “It’s like Japanese have even lost the desire to look good,” said Akiko Oka, 63, who works part time in a small apparel shop, a job she has held since her own clothing store went bankrupt in 2002.

    So says the 63-year-old woman working in a clothing shop in a neighborhood full of shops for old people. I’m pretty sure it’s a universal truth that older people don’t buy a whole lot of new clothes. Instead of Senbayashi, try hitting up some young shop girls in Shinsaibashi and then we can talk. I’m not saying retail isn’t tough right now, but that’s a pretty bad example.

    However, for many Japanese, it may be too late. Japan has already created an entire generation of young people who say they have given up on believing that they can ever enjoy the job stability or rising living standards that were once considered a birthright here.

    Good! For fuck’s sake, who could possibly think that guaranteed lifetime employment makes any sense??

    Deflation has also affected businesspeople by forcing them to invent new ways to survive in an economy where prices and profits only go down, not up.

    It’s sloppy thinking to correlate falling prices with falling profits, and vice versa. I’m not saying that Japanese companies aren’t making less profits, but I’m also not going to jump ahead and blame it on the Phantom of Deflation. Profits, simply put, are the difference between the costs of production and the ultimate selling price of a good or service. In a deflationary environment where prices are dropping everywhere, it’s perfectly normal for companies to continue being profitable. In fact, it happens every day all around the world! If it’s really deflation, prices are dropping EVERYWHERE in the economy, including prices of labor and materials.

    Yoshinori Kaiami was a real estate agent in Osaka, where, like the rest of Japan, land prices have been falling for most of the past 19 years. Mr. Kaiami said business was tough. There were few buyers in a market that was virtually guaranteed to produce losses, and few sellers, because most homeowners were saddled with loans that were worth more than their homes.

    “If we only had inflation again, this sort of business would not be necessary,” said Mr. Kaiami, referring to the rising prices that are the opposite of deflation. “I feel like I’ve been waiting for 20 years for inflation to come back.”

    If anyone loves inflation, it’s people in real estate. Once nominal prices and wages go rocketing up (but not REAL prices or wages), consumers are temporarily tricked into thinking they’re richer than they are. Remember that bubble back in the 80’s? That was a BAD thing.

    Then, the scary, deflationary finale:

    “Deflation destroys the risk-taking that capitalist economies need in order to grow,” said Shumpei Takemori, an economist at Keio University in Tokyo. “Creative destruction is replaced with what is just destructive destruction.”

    No, no, and NO. Again, we need to define our terms. Is Takemori referring to “lower prices” when he uses the word deflation? Economies are perfectly capable of growth in an atmosphere of lower prices. It’s up to the entrepreneur to anticipate these changes and adjust accordingly. Miscalculations in deflation are far less harmful than miscalculations in an inflationary environment. In the case of the latter, money is misallocated and simply wasted.

    Japan definitely has a lot of problems, but “deflation” sure isn’t one of them. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go dress as a 10-yen vending machine and lay low with my Japanese bretheren ’til this recession blows over.

    Battle of the axes: Rock Band 3’s Pro guitar vs. real guitar

    We roll video on a side-by-side comparison of Rock Band 3’s new Pro guitar controller and a real guitar.

    iPhone 3,2 rumored to be in near-final testing phase, cue the CDMA speculation

    Apple’s all aglow with its fiscal triumphs, but that’s nothing new. Here’s something else that follows the Cupertino company like night follows the day: Verizon iPhone rumors. Boy Genius Report claims it’s heard from one of its “solid Apple sources” that iPhone 3,2 (seen previously in iOS code) has hit “AP testing phase,” which reportedly means final hardware and near-final software. Said source also claims it has a SIM card slot, which would be fine except for BGR’s assertion that 3,2 is the oft-rumored CDMA iPhone — you know, the one that Wall Street Journal is all but certain is coming next year. So how might these two apparently contradictory elements form some tangible paradox machine? One possibility the publication is suggesting is a CDMA / GSM dual-mode “global” phone that’d work on virtually all major carriers. Then again, it could just be a GSM iPhone 4 with some design finagling (antenna revision?). If any of this pans out, that is, but at least you can say you witnessed the Verizon iPhone rumor merging with existing iPhone 4 to form a mythical “carrier Voltron” device. Or something like that.

    iPhone 3,2 rumored to be in near-final testing phase, cue the CDMA speculation originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 18 Oct 2010 21:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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