Hasta La Gadget!

Hitachi-LG outed most of the major details for its forthcoming HyDrive last week, but the company just officially took the wraps off the world’s first SSD-equipped laptop optical drive. Frankly, it’s sort of astounding it took this long for such an obvious idea to come to fruition, but now that we’re here, we fully expect other outfits to follow suit. Put simply, the HyDrive is a standard form factor optical drive (DVD burner or Blu-ray will be available), but there’s a 32GB or 64GB SSD (not just a strip of NAND, we’re told) tucked below. When this gets stuffed within a laptop, you’re immediately able to access an optical drive, an SSD (for your operating system and critical launch applications) and a spacious HDD for storing music, media, etc. Previously, this type of three-drive arrangement was only available in beastly Clevo‘s and the like, but this solution is obviously tailor made for even ODD-equipped ultraportables. Another plus to the HyDrive is the integrated Defect Management technology, which essentially caches information from scratched discs (DVDs, namely) in order to play the content back sans jitters.

More after the break…

Continue reading Hitachi-LG goes official with HyDrive: SSD-equipped optical drives landing in August

Hitachi-LG goes official with HyDrive: SSD-equipped optical drives landing in August originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 May 2010 00:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We can practically hear the collective sigh of relief among Slingbox owners now that Sling’s finally just about ready to push out a version of SlingPlayer Mobile for Android — by far the biggest hole in the company’s lineup of mobile players ever since the iPhone version went live. This is no mere port, though; the company is boasting that it worked hard here to reduce load times, meaning the total wait you’ve got from app load to the time you’re actually seeing General Hospital should be less than you’re accustomed to, and that’s a big win in our book. Check out our quick impressions (and video) after the break!

Continue reading SlingPlayer Mobile for Android beta preview

SlingPlayer Mobile for Android beta preview originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Fri, 28 May 2010 13:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Roku originally told us its new Netflix channel would roll out in June, but it looks like things are actually happening a little early — the updated interface will go live starting tomorrow, and it’ll be rolling out to everyone over the next week. As promised, the new interface lets you search the entire Netflix Watch Instantly library directly from your TV, and you’ll be able to browse through Netflix categories like New Releases, Action, and Comedy as well, which definitely makes the casual turn-on-and-watch experience far easier and nicer. We do wish there was a filter for HD content, though, and we noticed some lag as titles and artwork loaded in when we clicked around a little too fast, but there weren’t any major hassles apart from the general annoyance of trying to type on an on-screen keyboard with a remote control. A little Bluetooth integration in the next revision would be nice — or hey, why not a smartphone app? Overall, though, the new channel is a nice solid update for Roku owners, and we certainly can’t argue with free.

Roku Player’s new Netflix channel rolls out tomorrow, we go hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 May 2010 18:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Barnes & Noble might be pushing the Nook as hard as it can, but the retailer has always said it wants to build a reading platform across devices, and it’s making a big step in that direction with the launch of its eReader for iPad app today. The app allows Nook users to download most of their content to the iPad — the books all work, but some periodicals like the New York Times and Wall Street Journal aren’t available yet — and there’s a nice bookshelf view with jacket art and a library search function, which the Kindle app and iBooks don’t have. As with the Nook and other B&N clients, the iPad client supports LendMe for certain titles, but there’s no in-app purchasing — selecting “add books” from the bookshelf view kicks you out to the browser, just like the Kindle app. We’re not sure if this is an Apple restriction or a design decision, but we were told B&N is looking into adding in-app purchasing in a future release.

As for reading, eReader is actually quite flexible — you can customize the page, text, highlight, and link colors any which way you want (we made some hideous combinations), and there are some nice presets themes as well, ranging from “The Printed Page” to an inverted setting called “Night Light.” You can also set books to display using the publisher’s settings, and there are the usual line spacing and justification options as well. The only issues we had were with page turns and rendering — flipping from portrait to landscape too fast would result in some brief wonkiness, and flipping pages too quickly would eventually stall the app and lead to a brief load time. Neither was a deal breaker, but there’s clearly some room for polish here — we’re sure B&N is planning to iterate this rapidly, so we’ll see what happens. All in all, though the eReader app is a worthy competitor for your iPad ebook dollar — as long as iBooks has the only in-app store it’ll remain our favorite iPad reader, but if you’ve already purchased Nook content this is a solid free addition to the ecosystem.

Continue reading Barnes & Noble launches eReader for iPad app, we go hands-on

Barnes & Noble launches eReader for iPad app, we go hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 May 2010 00:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Let’s all feign surprise now, as Dell has just gone official with its worst kept, though perhaps sexiest, secret ever. The former Mini 5 has been christened the Streak and is launching at the beginning of next month. The UK will be getting the first bite at this cherry, with the rest of Europe following soon thereafter and the US a disappointingly distant third with a launch “later this summer.” If you’ve been living under a (Round) Rock, this is Dell’s big foray into the smartphone market: a 5-inch supersized Android handset, housing a 1GHz Snapdragon, a 5 megapixel cam, 16GB of built-in memory (expandable to 48GB via MicroSD) and a customized UI. Curiously, Dell’s opting to market the Streak as “the ultimate portable tablet pc” and would prefer that this device, albeit fully equipped to carry out cellular calls like a phone, not be called a smartphone.

We got a chance to play with it during a briefing in London recently, and frankly, aside from the snazzier paintjob, there’s nothing new to report. Just like the prototype unit we’ve previewed to exhaustion, the device on hand was running Android 1.6 and Dell’s skinning team hadn’t yet laid on the goodies that we’ve been promised. The battery is the same 1,530mAh cell as before, and we even managed to get the browser to crash in the exact same fashion that our own Streak exhibits on occasion. Now that’s consistency. We’re not being told the specific Android version that the Streak will ship with, but a couple of flavors are being mulled over right now. Till we get more info, we suggest sitting back, relaxing, and perusing the gallery below for the roaring red number that’s currently on show. It won’t be available at launch — you can have any color so long as it’s black — but “a range of colors and designs” will swiftly follow to sate any aesthetic concerns. Video and full press release after the break.

Update: The Carphone Warehouse listing for the Streak shows Android 1.6 as the OS with an “OTA upgrade available soon.” Pair that with word direct from Dell that Android 2.2 and Flash 10.1 are coming “later this year,” and you can connect your own dots [Thanks, Azza].

Update 2: O2’s website now has a precise date for us: June 4.

Continue reading Dell Streak official: exclusive to O2 UK in early June

Dell Streak official: exclusive to O2 UK in early June originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 May 2010 05:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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