Hasta La Gadget!

See that tiny little thing? That’s not just a CPU, it’s Intel’s next-gen Atom Pine Trail CPU / GPU hybrid, and it’s set to pop in all sorts of devices here at IDF. Intel was demoing it in a nettop running 480p video, but they assured us it was capable of 1080p playback — we’ll believe it when we see it, obviously. Also on display here at IDF: demo machines running 32nm Arrandale chips, with Intel’s Clear HD video playback system, and the next-gen Gulftown gaming chip, which has six cores and will slot right into your X58 mobo to provide more power than you possibly need sometime next year. Check it all in the gallery!

Update: So the first Intel rep we spoke to was a little confused — Pine Trail only supports 480p playback, although it can apparently do 720p if pushed. Native HD isn’t on Intel’s roadmap until the next generation of these chips, so If you want HD right now, Intel’s pointing manufacturers to the Broadcom Crystal HD video accelerator, which usually ends up costing about $30 extra at retail. So to recap: Intel’s integrating graphics into its CPU dies, but in order to play back HD content, you still need a separate video processor to handle the decoding. How very efficient.

Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

Eyes-on with Intel’s Pine Trail CPU/GPU hybrid and new Gulftown gaming chip (update) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Sep 2009 14:06:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Podcasts

Engadget Podcast 163 – 09.20.2009 originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 20 Sep 2009 16:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sony’s just handed us a shiny new, UMD-less PSP Go (or “PSPgo,” depending on who you ask) to run our greasy fingers all over, and while we can’t give you our impressions until later this month, we can let you live vicariously through us and our unboxing photos. Enjoy!

Update: Now with video, after the break.

Continue reading PSP Go unboxing (update: with video!)

Filed under: Gaming

PSP Go unboxing (update: with video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Sep 2009 21:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We played with the original Siberia headset from SteelSeries, which was specifically designed to emphasize “gaming noises” like grenade pin pulls and footsteps — but didn’t do much good for listening to anything else. The Siberia Headset v2 looks to solve some of that with slightly larger speakers, an enclosed design to reduce ambient noise, improved frequency response and increased volume. There’s also a built-in mic now. We took a listen and found the music listening capabilities much improved, especially in the bass end, but still no challenge for “regular” over the ear headphones. Still, serious gamers should get what they need out of the cans, which will be offered in models with and without a USB 7.1 virtual surround soundcard in November. No word on price until then.

We also got a quick look at the new Xai and Kinzu gaming mice. The ambidextrous-friendly nature of the pair is nice, materials are great, and mousing around briefly on a fancy SteelSeries mousepad certainly felt effortless and accurate, but mouse technology is so wild these days it’s hard to differentiate one multi-megapixel optical or laser sensor from another — to these untrained eyes, anyway.

Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals

SteelSeries takes another stab at gaming headsets with Siberia v2 originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve spotted an early prototype of an upcoming MID from Mitac powered by Tegra and running Windows CE, and we like where it’s headed. There are actually a lot of similarities to Mobinnova’s smartbook, though we suppose it’s more of a Tegra thing: CE with a custom interface on top, emphasis on 720p media playback and output (there’s an HDMI jack and TV tuner) and what promises to be an uber-competitive price and good battery life for the form factor. Mitac also plans on selling the thing with a fold-out case / keyboard combo to sweeten the deal. The unnamed device is quite thin, but unfortunately the unit we saw was out of battery — though NVIDIA assured us it was “really cool” while it worked. Sure guys, sure.

Filed under: Handhelds, Portable Audio, Portable Video

Mitac takes Tegra to MID-land originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Sep 2009 12:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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