Hasta La Gadget!

The Xbox One arrives with a 500GB HDD built-in, and in contrast to the PlayStation 4’s easily-accessed storage, it’s not meant to be accessed or replaced by the user, ever. While we’ll probably leave ours in place to keep from voiding the warranty or risk a ban from Xbox Live, a few folks have already cracked open the console to see what else will fit. iFixit noted during its teardown that there’s an off-the-shelf 2.5-inch Samsung HDD inside connected via SATA II inside, and swapping that out isn’t much of an issue. Brian Williams has already tried out the system with two alternate drives: a 500GB Samsung EVO SSD, and a Seagate 1TB hybrid SSHD. As you can see in his video (embedded after the break) boot time from off to the dashboard only improved slightly, with the SSD loading in 46.1 seconds compared to 50.5 stock. A test with Call of Duty: Ghosts revealed similar results, with the SSD loading up in 27 seconds and the hybrid drive close behind in 27.7, compared to 33.5 seconds stock. We’ll need tests with more games to be sure, but so far it’s not showing the improvements seen after swapping the PS4’s hard drive out for speedier options. The folks at Tested report doing so improved level load times in Killzone: Shadow Fall from 60 seconds to 39 seconds.

So, if it’s not a ton faster, why would you want to take the chance of prying Microsoft’s box open? To get more space. Brian’s drives were simply copies of the original transferred by Clonezilla, but an individual named Juvenal1 has already worked out how to get the system to actually recognize and make use of drives bigger than 500GB. By copying files from your original drive and using their Linux-compatible tool to repartition the new HDD, you can be up and running with more capacity after just a reboot or two. Of course, this carries significant risks and we don’t recommend it for most, as Microsoft’s Albert Penello has already revealed support for external drives is coming in a future update, along with the ability to do crazy things like see how much storage you actually have left. Still, if you just need to live on the edge (or store every game released so far and record hours of clean Upload Studio clips) the instructions can be found here.

Update: If you’re interested in performing the upgrade, Brian Williams has followed with a video walkthrough for the process of properly formatting a larger hard drive, even if you’re not familiar with using Linux.

Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment, HD, Microsoft

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Source: Juvenal1 (Github), Brian Williams

We’re getting more and more excited watching the Expand NY agenda come together. We’ve already announced our first set of speakers (by which we mean people on stage, not those kind of speakers) including legendary game designer Peter Molyneux, Pebble CEO Eric Migicovsky, io9 editor-in-chief Annalee Newitz and the man responsible for clogging the Internet’s tubes with funny cats: Ben Huh.

But wait, there’s more! Joining us at Javits Center this November will be:

• LeVar Burton, Actor, Director, Educator, co-founder of Reading Rainbow
• Chris Lewicki, President and Chief Engineer, Planetary Resources, Inc.
• Becky Stern, Director of Wearable Electronics, Adafruit Industries
• Ben Heck, Master Modder on element14’s The Ben Heck Show

Filed under: Announcements, Meta

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Love pinball? So does professional modder Ben Heck — he’s building a ghost hunt-themed pinball machine, and needs it to sound just right. Luckily, a local musician is happy to help, provided Heck can rejigger his midi controller into a guitar. Challenge accepted. With the help of his musician friend, Heck spends the first episode of a two-part Ben Heck Show disassembling the instrument, desoldering its components and reassembling them in the desired pattern — stitching together a few undersized circuit boards along the way. Ben lays out the key pattern too, which will dictate how large the axe’s case will need to be. It’s classic hardware modding, and a darn fine break to the deluge of CES news. Check out the first episode in the series after the break.

Continue reading Ben Heck mods midi controller into guitar enclosure, scores pinball soundtrack in return

Filed under: Misc

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Source: The Ben Heck Show

No one ever said a modded MacBook Pro was gonna be cheap. Last week Modbook announced that it would be going ahead with pre-orders on the Modbook Pro today, but didn’t really touch on pricing. As ordering begins, the company’s attached a $3,500 starting price tag for the honor of controlling your 13.3-inch Mac with a pen. The Modbook Pro, which is set to start shipping in the middle of next month, runs Mountain Lion and features a 2.5GHz Intel Core i5 processor (upgradable to a 2.9GHz i7) and memory and storage up to 16GB and 480GB, respectively. If you’re aching to get your hands on one of these Frankensteinian tablets, you’ll have to plunk down a $500 deposit.

Continue reading Modbook Pro gets priced at $3,500, as pre-orders begin

Filed under: Laptops, Tablets

Modbook Pro gets priced at $3,500, as pre-orders begin originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Oct 2012 17:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Atari games redesigned in HTML 5 may bring back a flood of nostalgia, but they leave out a key part of the gaming experience: the classic hardware. Hard Drives Northwest filled that void by gutting a limited number of authentic Atari 2600s and stuffing them with modern PC components. Packing a Core i7 3.4GHz processor, the retro console now boasts 22,857 times more processing power than it did in its heyday, according to Microsoft’s calculations — more than enough oomph to handle the recent remakes. Other internals include 8GB of RAM, a 120GB SSD and a Radeon HD 6570 graphics card with 1GB of video memory. With support for USB 3.0 and 2.0, eSATA, DisplayPort, DVI and HDMI, the system is well stocked on the connectivity front. Finally, the signature of Atari founder Nolan Bushnell acts as the cherry atop the faux wood grain-toting package. While the souped-up machines aren’t up for sale, a pair of them are slated for a giveaway. Glamour shots and the full set of specs await you at the source.

Filed under: Desktops, Gaming

Atari 2600s get PC innards, 22,857 times more processing power originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 13 Sep 2012 18:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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