Hasta La Gadget!

Our trailer was just visited by an iriver rep bearing his company’s Kindle killer in waiting, the Story HD. This 6-inch e-reader touts a bodacious 1024 x 768 resolution, which contributes to an even better contrast ratio than on Amazon’s E Ink slate, while software optimizations between now and release are expected to make the Story HD the fastest-refreshing device of its kind. The display itself is built by LG Display and is accompanied by a Freescale Cortex A8 CPU, 2GB of onboard storage, and an SDHC card-reading slot. Sun rays are, as expected, absolutely no problem and we have to admit that on first sight we thought the device had a sticker affixed to its front — its that good at reproducing printed materials. Physically, it seems to have been constructed with the third-gen Kindle as its dimensional blueprint, albeit with quite a different control scheme. The hand-built proto unit we played with wasn’t really ready to have its ergonomics judged properly, but iriver has plenty of time until the expected May launch to iron out any kinks. Content distribution partnerships have already been sewn up for the US, so now it’s just a matter of patience until we get our e-reading on in gorgeous XGA resolution. Video hands-on after the break.

Continue reading iriver Story HD e-reader preview (video)

iriver Story HD e-reader preview (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 19:42:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We just finished up a meeting with the folks from Snapstick and came away surprisingly impressed with their foray into the increasingly cramped space of the connected living room. Snapstick’s concept isn’t that different from other mobile phone to TV systems we’ve seen, but it’s implementation is definitely more unique than most other solutions currently available. Read on past the break for a quick rundown of the tech that makes the Snapstick system work, as well as a video of the system in action.

Continue reading Snapstick preview and hands-on

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Media PCs

Snapstick preview and hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 11:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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So, Microsoft doesn’t have a press-ready demo of its new Avatar Kinect, but we at least got to see it in action today. To keep the unwashed masses lining up to try Kinect at the booth entertained, Microsoft has a comedian (dubbed “Mr. Kinect”) controlling an Avatar with Kinect, heckling the queued-up folks with his digital puppetry. The good news is that he’s working it from a seated position, the great dream of folks tired of standing up to get their motion gaming on. The bad news is that you only get control of your arms, face, and head — you won’t be walking around and punching your friends in the face, sadly. We saw a couple of settings — sadly, not the AA-style setup we witnessed during the keynote — which are pleasant but a little generic (like most of Microsoft’s Kinect titles right now).

The actual facial tracking and body tracking worked, but the motions seemed a little minimal. Kinect is obviously completely capable of great skeletal tracking, so we’re hoping for a bit more expressiveness, but we’re still early on, so things could always be tweaked a bit before launch. We did confirm that Steve Ballmer’s Avatar appearance last night was a canned recording, so we are looking at software that isn’t ready for prime time. Overall we think Avatar Kinect is a great idea, and an excellent way to show off Kinect’s exclusive motion control prowess, we just look forward to a future where we have even more control over our Avatars — isn’t that the whole point of Kinect, after all? Let us free, Microsoft. We just want to be free. Check out some video of the setup after the break.

Continue reading Avatar Kinect in action: prepare to be mildly diverted

Avatar Kinect in action: prepare to be mildly diverted originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 18:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Though it’s just being called the “Samsung 4G LTE Smartphone” at this point, rest assured: the Android-powered device is very much real and very much destined for Verizon’s airwaves. Though the inclusion of LTE is obviously a high point, the phone’s claim to fame might be that it’ll be among the first devices in the world to feature one of Sammy’s newfangled Super AMOLED Plus displays (4.3 inches, in this case) that offers even better contrast and outdoor viewability than the original Super AMOLED did. You’ve got TouchWiz-skinned Android 2.2, an 8 megapixel camera with flash paired to a 1.3 megapixel front-facing unit for video calling, and a 1GHz processor that seems to mirror what’s already being offered on most of the Galaxy S series today — no dual-core madness here.

We had a few fleeting moments to touch (but not photograph) the phone recently, and the screen is definitely a sight to behold — we’re not sure how Samsung managed to make a more contrasty display than Super AMOLED, but it did. We’ll admit, we didn’t love the tapered shape — we thought it looked a little strange sitting on a table, though some might like it and it’s certainly not a big deal either way. We also weren’t huge fans of the big physical buttons below the display, a surprising counterpoint to the recent trend toward capacitive buttons on high-end Android devices. It’s a heavy phone, though probably not heavy enough to bother folks who are in the market for a 4.3-inch display anyway — and hey, we won’t know for sure how it stacks up until we pit it head-to-head in a brutal deathmatch with Verizon’s other version-one LTE phones like the Droid Bionic. Follow the break for the full press release.

Continue reading Samsung sends Verizon an unnamed Android smartphone with LTE, Super AMOLED Plus display

Samsung sends Verizon an unnamed Android smartphone with LTE, Super AMOLED Plus display originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 16:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Whoa, Nelly! We just made a beeline to Razer’s booth here on the CES show floor, and were presented with a fairly technical talk surrounding the newly launched Switchblade. While officially deemed a concept, we came away with a serious impression that Razer’s not investing loads of time and money on this just for kicks. In other words, we’d cautiously expect to see this thing on sale at some point next year — but let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. We spent a good half-hour toying with this Windows 7-based mini netbook, and we came away seriously impressed by what’s happening here. Head on past the break for more of our impressions.

Continue reading Razer Switchblade preview: 3G, Intel Oak Trail, almost definitely going on sale

Razer Switchblade preview: 3G, Intel Oak Trail, almost definitely going on sale originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 15:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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