Hasta La Gadget!

What’s in a PlayBook? No, literally, what is in that thing? Well, most of the specs were known ahead of today’s release, but there was a bit of confusion about whether RIM’s 7-inch tablet did or didn’t have a gyroscope, which has now been set straight (it does!) by the crew at iFixit. They did their usual study of what it’ll take to repair your own PlayBook should the need ever arise, and gave it a repairability score of 7 out of 10. Replacing the front glass would be a bit of a pain to do, but then that’s the case with most portable devices. The motherboard also got a thorough examination, with all the power management, wireless connectivity, and memory chips getting identified and recorded for posterity. If you want to check iFixit‘s work, feel free to visit UBM Tech Insights as well, who have their own component list and closeup photography of that dual-core TI OMAP4430 system-on-chip. Yes, closeup photography.

BlackBerry PlayBook pried open, gyroscope and other goodies discovered originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Apr 2011 16:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This article was written on July 07, 2009 by CyberNet.

Over the weekend I decided to download Windows 7 Build 7264, which is the latest build to have been leaked. This was considered to be an RTM escrow build, which meant that this would have been the version that gets shipped given that Microsoft didn’t find any show-stopper bugs. If Wikipedia is anything to go by there have since been 4 other RTM escrow builds since 7264 (now at 7268), but none of those have leaked.

Before you rush to download the latest leaked builds it’s important to know that they no longer accept your free Beta/RC product keys. This actually started occurring about a month ago when build 7229 was leaked, and users who decided to install the build were left with a 30-day unactivated copy of Windows 7. Should you manage to get it activated by other means, like a crack, it still doesn’t bypass the March 1st, 2010 expiration date.

Once I managed to get Windows 7 Build 7264 installed I wanted to see if the one activation crack I saw floating around actually worked, because if it did Microsoft would have a hard time trying to block it in the next week or two before RTM. If that were the case we could probably be running fully activated copies of the final Windows 7 release by the end of the month. Of course I’m going off the fact that it took merely a few days for the RTM copy of Vista to leak after it was complete.

So how well does the crack work? What’s nice about this crack is that it’s a one-click solution that doesn’t even require a restart. It took about a minute to work its magic, and after that my System properties were showing that I was running a fully activated and genuine copy of Windows 7 Ultimate:

That’s great news for the pirates of the world, right? Not so fast. I played around with it for a little while and everything was working great. I installed a program or two, and thought it was time to reboot. When my computer was starting up Microsoft decided it would be a good time to tell me that they caught me trying to steal a cookie from the cookie jar:

Man, that cryptic message is sure to scare some people. I think all that was missing from it was a line saying “the FBI has been notified. Do not run, we will find you.” It’s worth noting that you don’t have to actually “reinstall Windows.” You are still able to get into your machine by pressing the red “X” or clicking the Cancel button, but your computer is treated as though it’s not genuine. And now when you go to the System properties instead of it saying “Windows is Activated” it now says that the Product ID and Activation Status are “unavailable”.

Now I’m not saying that there won’t be a crack for Windows 7 available, but there’s a good chance it won’t be ready when the RTM copy is leaked. It’s inevitable that some sort of crack/patch will be released… it’s just a matter of time. Until then I wonder if Microsoft will be able to sway any pirates over to the legal side of Windows.

I can’t let you walk away without a party gift though. One thing I like in these recent builds is the new “Harmony” wallpaper. Here’s a 1920×1200 version of the wallpaper for those of you who want it.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Continue reading T-Mobile’s Bobsled brand launches with free Facebook voice calls, much more promised soon

T-Mobile’s Bobsled brand launches with free Facebook voice calls, much more promised soon originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Apr 2011 15:52:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It looks like that funky Acer netbook with the dented lid that we spied at MWC wasn’t a one-off. The company just released the Aspire One 722, an 11-inch mini with the same aesthetic (and a likely successor to the 721). Like the D257 we saw in Barcelona, its lid is made of molded plastic, sculpted to resemble a series of ripples. Spec-wise, it has the same innards as the more staid-looking Aspire One 522, pairing AMD’s netbook-class 1GHz C-50 Ontario processor with Radeon HD 6250 graphics. But the 722 improves on the 10-inch 522 with higher 1366 x 768 resolution, two speakers instead of one, and rated battery life of up to seven hours — a boost over the 522’s six-hour max. No word yet on pricing or availability, but for now you can content yourself with some official press shots.

Acer releases Aspire One 722 netbook, tries to make molded plastic happen originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Apr 2011 15:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Could Toshiba’s nameless Honeycomb tablet finally have a proper name? Thanks to a helpful tipster, we now have our clearest indication yet. Toshiba just filled a trademark application for the name “Thrive” last week and, as you can see above, it clearly describes the goods and services being trademarked as a tablet computer. What’s more, it seems that the company’s also gone on a bit of a domain name buying spree as of late, with it snapping up a number of “Thrive” variations including ToshibaThrive.com, ThriveTablet.com, ThriveToshiba.com and TabletThrive.com (none of which actually go anywhere just yet). Of course, this isn’t the first possible moniker for the tablet that’s cropped up. The name “Antares” surfaced way back at Mobile World Congress, which could account for the ANT model name we also spotted, although it certainly sounds more like a codename than “Thrive” does to our ears — and, as far as we can tell, Toshiba hasn’t attempted to register a trademark for Antares (or any other names recently, for that matter).

[Thanks, Babyfacemagee]

Trademark filing, domain names suggest Toshiba’s tablet might be named ‘Thrive’ originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Apr 2011 15:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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