Hasta La Gadget!

MSI’s new tablets felt like prototypes, but the device pictured above is truly far out — it’s the MSI Butterfly, one of several whimsical concepts the company teased about a week ago. We actually ducked into MSI’s booth right before it covered the whole display with a giant plexiglass box and got some reasonable snapshots, but nothing remotely resembling a proper hands-on, so you’ll have to make do with the gallery below and whatever dreams may come.

MSI Butterfly and Angelow all-in-one PC concepts, eyes-on originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 22:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Hey, so remember when building VCRs into TVs seemed like a good idea? And then how it turned out that is wasn’t? Yeah, connected TVs are basically just like that. More »

Clearwire’s talking more about some of the glorious numbers it’s seeing as it drives around the greater Phoenix area testing its trial LTE network, and we think one specific quote pretty much sums it up: “this isn’t your grandfather’s LTE.” That statement was made in comparing Clearwire’s results — bumping up against 90Mbps in some configurations — to the 5 to 12Mbps that Verizon is quoting for its first-gen commercial LTE network, though they’re quick to note in the same breath that Clear’s test is on an unloaded network without a deluge of users all trying to stream professional sports games in HD at the same time. What does that all mean for Clear’s existing WiMAX deployment? The company’s as noncommittal on the subject as ever, saying only that WiMAX continues to be “best for the customer” today but that “potentially in the future that could be WiMAX and LTE.” Needless to say, though, they’re taking the LTE option pretty seriously if they’re dumping serious cash into testing it out and publishing the results. Follow the break for Clear’s teaser footage — wouldn’t you like access to this action?

Continue reading Clear bullish on LTE trial results, says WiMAX is ‘best for the customer’ right now

Clear bullish on LTE trial results, says WiMAX is ‘best for the customer’ right now originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 21:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s always a shame we don’t have more time to play with every gadget at monstrous trade shows, and that goes double for cameras. So while we can’t give you more in-depth discussion on the image and video quality, we will say that Samsung’s NX11’s inclusion of the i-Function lens is a decided victory. For those who don’t know, it’s a special lens with a ring and i-Fn button you can use to manually adjust various settings (exposure, ISO, shutter speed, etc.), and it works like a charm. Looking at pictures of a picture-taking device is some form of awesome, right? Right.

Samsung NX11 hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 21:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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LAS VEGAS — Smartphones seem to get more powerful each day with apps and zippy processors. But why stop there?

Nvidia this week showcased some fancy cars featuring the new Nvidia Tegra 2 system-on-a-chip — the same dual-core brains that  are showing up in some of the fastest smartphones here at CES 2011.

Nvidia recently partnered with luxury carmakers Tesla and BMW to install Nvidia systems inside some of their cars. At the show, the Tegra 2 was powering in-vehicle computers that could potentially offer some interesting apps: high-quality 3-D maps for GPS navigation, car diagnostic services and street sign detection.

See the video above for a glimpse of what an app-powered car would look like. (Note these were demos, as the software is not yet complete).