Hasta La Gadget!

Not everyone has a 4GB USB key or SD card just lying around, which was required to run Hexxeh’s first build of Chromium OS, and we’d say that 8GB keys are exponentially more rare, which is what Dell requires with its build of the Chrome OS open source variant. Well, you can cancel that Fry’s run, because Hexxeh is back with a Chrome OS Diet flavor, which cuts the fat and gets the OS onto a 1GB drive. It supposedly doesn’t cut anything features-wise, and actually improves WiFi support since it’s based on a newer build — check out that compatibility list source link for the full story on that.

Chrome OS ‘Diet’ version fits on a 1GB USB key, brings more WiFi support originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you’ve got a Dell Mini 10v and you’ve been hankering to take Chrome OS for a spin in its proper environment — a netbook, that is — today just got a lot more interesting. One helpful tinkerer over at Dell has hacked up a USB-bootable version of the as-yet unfinished (and still quite rough) Chromium iteration of Google’s OS with a working WiFi component. As you’ll recall, in our tests wireless wasn’t happening, but that’s all changed now… for 10v owners at the very least. It looks like there are still some kinks to be worked out, and you’ll be cruising into the OS on a Dell Gmail account, but at least you’ll be able to walk around your house while screaming “I’m using Chrome OS!” unburdened by pesky wires or meddlesome sanity. Check out all the info at the source, and prepare for a crazy Friday night of netbooking.

Chrome OS hacked for Dell’s Mini 10v, WiFi and all originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 27 Nov 2009 16:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Even though Broadcom, Atheros, and Qualcomm have all been sampling phone-ready draft 802.11n chipsets for some time now, you’re still not seeing the tech swiftly overtake 802.11g in the mobile arena — in fact, we dare you to find a single phone in your carrier’s store that can do it. Odds are you can’t, but HTC HD2 owners can win a few quid off their skeptical (non-Engadget-reading) friends by enabling support after the fact. Looks like draft-n support got buried in the company’s WinMo monster — a fitting device to add such a rare display of raw, savage wireless power, if we do say so ourselves — but it got turned off in the shipping firmware for some reason, possibly concerns over increased battery draw, flakiness, or a stark realization that the benefits of 802.11n might not be fully appreciated in a device hamstrung more by a crappy browser than by slow WiFi. If you want to live on the edge anyway and flip the switch, xda-developers has the registry hack you need — and if you’re using an HD2 in the States without 3G right now, let’s be honest: you kinda need all the speed-boosting wireless hacks you can dig up.

HTC HD2 can be coaxed into doing 802.11n, if you know how to sweet-talk it originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 24 Nov 2009 03:51:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve thought before how nice it might be to have some powers of magnification on the iPhone’s cam… but are we going to go out and mod our unit? Probably not, but that doesn’t mean we can’t admire someone else’s work. Taking various lenses and attaching them to the lid of a jar, the modder quite carefully built a contraption that looks a little “hobo Steampunk” to us, but we’re still fairly impressed with this little gadget. Hit the read link for full, detailed instructions and more photos if you’d like to make one of your own.

iPhone camera mod for magnification: because you can originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:37:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Guess what, prospective Milestone owners, the Droid’s one major advantage over its Euro cousin has just been coded out of existence by those proactive, un-American XDA Developers. The free Google Maps Navigation service, whose US announcement was so shocking as to decimate the stock prices of satnav purveyors Garmin and TomTom, has now been ported to work outside the land of the free as well. Not only that, but you can use the app on other Android devices, meaning your old G1 can get a breath of fresh air for absolutely free. That is if you don’t count the time it takes you to learn how to insert all the code properly and the risk of bricking your device in the process. But we know our readers eat iron nails for breakfast and fashion elegantly optimized code before lunch, so we expect all of you to be using this by day’s end, you hear?

Google Maps Navigation hacked for extra-American use originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 23 Nov 2009 09:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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