Jan 09

Crapgadget CES, round 3: Moneual’s $45K HTPC

Posted in: HTPC, luxury, Today's Chili
There are some that might challenge the very idea of anything this expensive being a “crapgadget,” but closer inspection of this item leaves little room for doubt. Indeed, it looks like Moneual’s still around with its jewel laden “luxury” PCs, and we were fortunate enough to come across this delightful specimen on the floor of CES. The 701 Jewelry HTPC is handcrafted with gold and brass and adorned with 3500 Swarovski elements — as well as HDMI, Blu ray, and Windows Vista Home Premium. Your cost? A mere $45,000. “The price of gold is going up,” the helpful chap at the company’s booth pointed out. This isn’t a media PC, then — it’s an investment. Before you call your broker, take a closer look at the gallery below.

Gallery: Moneual 701 Jewelry HTPC

Crapgadget CES, round 3: Moneual’s $45K HTPC originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 14:16:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

LG CEO says about half of its new smartphones will run Android

Posted in: Android, LG, Microsoft, smartphone, Today's Chili, Windows Mobile, WindowsMobile
Well, here’s a tiny mystery of sorts that’s emerged amidst all the hubbub of CES. As the Korea Herald reports, LG CEO Nam Yong reportedly said yesterday that while LG will have smart phones running on Windows Mobile, “about 50 percent of our smart phone models will run on Android.” Now, that’s not so hard to believe considering the number of LG Android phones we’ve already seen or heard about, but it is fairly surprising in light of the deal LG and Microsoft announced back at MWC last year, which supposedly made Windows Mobile LG’s “primary smartphone OS.” Obviously, something doesn’t quite add up here, unless by “about half,” LG actually means “less than half” — which seems to be a distinct possibility.

[Thanks, Jules]

LG CEO says about half of its new smartphones will run Android originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 13:51:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5.3 shown off very, very quietly

Posted in: hands-on, Microsoft, Today's Chili, Windows Mobile, WindowsMobile, winmo

Say, for a moment, that you’re Microsoft and you’re on the cusp of releasing a version of the much-maligned Windows Mobile 6.5 that actually made it touch-friendly for once — but like all WinMo versions before it, you’re relying on carriers and manufacturers to wage an inexcusably slow, arbitrary, incomplete upgrade campaign. Wouldn’t you think that quietly burying its launch amongst a sea of more interesting (and less controversial) products might be a good idea? Indeed, that appears to be the angle Microsoft is taking at CES by discreetly showing off a Toshiba TG01 and Pharos Traveller loaded with the long-rumored 6.5.3 with “tiles” along the bottom and finger-friendly adjustments throughout the UI. As far as we can tell, this truly is what 6.5 should’ve been — in our quick look, we’re finally comfortable not having a stylus handy, even on a resistive display. It’s still not pretty, but this is a case where function is at least earning its money trying to trump form.

Gallery: Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5.3 shown off very, very quietly

Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5.3 shown off very, very quietly originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 12:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

Cannondale’s mind-blowing Simon electronic suspension system hands-on

Posted in: feature, Features, hands-on, Today's Chili
Cannondale's mind-blowing Simon electronic suspension system hands-on

If you’re a bicyclist or just a tech-minded person with a hankerin’ for cool suspension technology, you’ve got to check out the videos after the break. One is a short demonstration to whet your appetite, the other a rather longer explanation from Cannondale engineer Stanley Song of just how the thing works. What is this thing? It’s Simon, a fully electronic and nearly-instantly adjustable suspension system that does away with all the complex mechanical internals of a traditional high-end suspension system (shims, springs, valves, needles, knobs…) and replaces it with an electro-mechanical device that can near infinitely vary not only suspension strength but also ride height instantly based on road conditions. It even has an LCD on the bars. Interest piqued? Click through to see it in action.

Gallery: Cannondale’s Simon hands-on

Continue reading Cannondale’s mind-blowing Simon electronic suspension system hands-on

Cannondale’s mind-blowing Simon electronic suspension system hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 12:43:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

Touch Revolution puts Android in a microwave and makes an updated Nimble tablet, we go hands-on

Posted in: Android, feature, Features, hands-on, Today's Chili
Touch Revolution puts Android in a microwave and makes an updated Nimble tablet, we go hands-on
Last year’s Nimble tablet was approved by none other than MC Hammer. So this year’s version… well, you just have to expect great things, right? Awash in a sea of keyboard-free devices we weren’t really expecting anything shocking and we didn’t get anything shocking. It’s still a seven-inch capacitive-screened tablet intended for use at home, replacing a landline phone and connecting exclusively over WiFi, providing VOIP calling and of course all the goodness that Android provides — Android 1.5. That’s a few versions behind where we’d like it to be, but given the stock OS install here that shouldn’t be too hard to rectify if/when this device comes to retail. More interesting? A microwave with Android. Intrigued? Close the door, press start, and click on through.

Gallery: Touch Revolution Nimble Tablet hands-on

Continue reading Touch Revolution puts Android in a microwave and makes an updated Nimble tablet, we go hands-on

Touch Revolution puts Android in a microwave and makes an updated Nimble tablet, we go hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 11:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

USB 3.0 SuperSpeed gone wild at CES 2010, trumps even your new SSD

Posted in: feature, Features, hands-on, impressions, Today's Chili, usb, usb 3.0, Usb3.0
USB 3.0 gone wild at CES 2010, trumps even your new SSD

Just in case you didn’t notice the arrow, that’s a USB 3.0 cable up there, plugged into a USB 3.0 port, running in a Fujitsu laptop that is the first to pack integrated support for USB 3.0. How fast was it? On the other end of this one was a Buffalo external enclosure stuffed with an old-fashioned, platter-based hard disk, which still delivered perfectly absurd transfer rates of about 135MB/sec. When another, similar setup ran with an Intel SSD what happened the results were even more impressive: a few ticks over 200MB/sec. Yes, we’re about to enter another dimension. A time when external drives are as fast as internal ones. Where the speed at which you can fill up your MP3 player is limited only by the speed of the storage on that device itself. You are about to enter… the SuperSpeed zone.

Gallery: USB 3.0 displays at CES 2010

Continue reading USB 3.0 SuperSpeed gone wild at CES 2010, trumps even your new SSD

USB 3.0 SuperSpeed gone wild at CES 2010, trumps even your new SSD originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 10:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

Microsoft’s Mediaroom 2.0 running on the Xbox 360

Posted in: Microsoft, Today's Chili, xbox, Xbox360
Mediaroom running on an Xbox 360

Hearing about using an Xbox 360 as set top box for IPTV providers like AT&T’s U-Verse is one thing, but seeing it in action is another. As you can see from the video after the jump, the experience is very fluid and isn’t what we’d describe as laggy even in the slightest bit. The 360 can act as a full blown client to the Mediaroom DVR which provides a pretty complete multi-room experience. As far as we could tell the entire experience was there as well, but then again we’re not exactly experts on Mediaroom. Apparently one thing the 360 can’t do is be the only set top box in your house, which is probably a detail lost on many since we’d bet very few people who subscribe to pay TV only have one set top these days.

Continue reading Microsoft’s Mediaroom 2.0 running on the Xbox 360

Microsoft’s Mediaroom 2.0 running on the Xbox 360 originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 09:41:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

Jinke announces 6 and 9-inch SiPix panel e-readers

Posted in: e reader, e-book, Today's Chili
We’re certainly not wanting for e-readers this week, although we are definitely wanting for one that’s compelling enough to shell out good money for — which is fine, because company’s all over God’s green Earth seem to be working overtime to give us one. Take Jinke — the company’s switched from E Ink to SiPix panels for the A6 and A9 readers, both of which are planned to sport multitouch, 16 levels of grayscale, WiFi a/b/g, and optional 3G — as well as the usual compliment of formats (FB2, EPUB, PDF, most image formats, and MP3). The former is a 6-inch (600 x 800) device with 2GB of storage, an SD slot, and an accelerometer. The Jinke A9 features a 9-inch (1024 x 768) panel, and up to 4GB storage. Both the A6 ($275) and the A9 ($330) should be available in March.

Jinke announces 6 and 9-inch SiPix panel e-readers originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 08:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

GestureTek brings Eyemo gesture control to Android, Momo tracking engine for Windows Mobile

Posted in: Today's Chili, Windows Mobile, WindowsMobile
GestureTek was showing off some of its gesture-based options for controlling your TV at last year’s CES, and it’s now back again with a few more slightly interesting pieces of software. That includes a version of its Eyemo software for Android, which is already available for range of other platforms, and lets developers take advantage of a phone’s camera to add gesture control options to various applications — although that only involves gesturing with the device itself, not your hands. The company’s recently announced Momo software for Windows Mobile takes things one step further than that, however, and will indeed apparently let you control a game or other application with hand or body gestures — although that’ll likely work best on a device with a front-facing camera.

GestureTek brings Eyemo gesture control to Android, Momo tracking engine for Windows Mobile originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 07:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jan 09

ATI serves up DirectX 11-compatible Mobility Radeon GPUs, helps nerds fall in love

Posted in: AMD, ati, GraphicsCard, radeon, Today's Chili

DirectX 11 has been chewed up and spit out by desktop GPUs over the past few months, but until CES 2010, laptops at large were left out of the raving. This week, AMD has introduced what it’s calling the world’s first mobile graphics with DX11 compatibility, and the Mobility Radeon HD 5870 — which just so happens to be featured in ASUS’ recently revealed G73jh — is leading the way. The HD 5800, HD 5700, HD 5600 and HD 5400 series are all new at the show, and each one comes with baked in support for ATI Eyefinity multi-display technology and helping tech-adoring geeks find their soulmates (as is clearly shown above). Hit the source link for more details on each, and figure on seeing these filter out to new ultraportables, mainstream rigs and gaming lappies in the seconds, days and weeks ahead.

ATI serves up DirectX 11-compatible Mobility Radeon GPUs, helps nerds fall in love originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 09 Jan 2010 06:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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