Hasta La Gadget!

While we might think of the $250 PSPgo pricetag in the States as a criminal act on the part of an out-of-touch and-yet-malicious multinational corporation, we can only imagine how our unfortunate counterparts in the UK felt, staring down a £225 list price (about $371 US). Luckily, that quickly dropped to £200 after a week of sales, and now the console can be had for as low as £149 at UK entertainment retailer HMV. That converts rather tidily to $245 US, which is unfortunately about as far as the console has been discounted around these parts. There’s no way to tell how many more months of dour faces and crossed arms pointed in the general direction of Sony Computer Entertainment America it’ll take to get that price down to something more realistic Stateside, at which point we can start this whole UK / US price disparity drama all over again.

PSPgo dips to £149 in the UK, have cooler heads prevailed? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Nov 2009 12:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The presenters of Top Gear, among the finer specimens of British television talent (Dr. Gregory House being another), were this past week engaged in designing and building an electric vehicle purportedly intended to compete with the likes of the Chevy Volt. Set a time limit of a mere 18 hours, they produced the marvel of rushed engineering and shoddy workmanship you see above. The Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust (believe us, you’ll have no reason to remember the name) was even put through its paces by Autocar magazine, whose video “review” can be found after the break. We won’t spoil the details for you, but if you want a conclusion, this one’s pretty unequivocal: “there’s a really good chance you could kill yourself” riding in this car.

Continue reading Top Gear team builds EV, shows how complex car production really is

Top Gear team builds EV, shows how complex car production really is originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Nov 2009 10:06:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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What are you thankful for today? If you live in Finland or the UK and pre-ordered a X6 then you might be obliged to Nokia for having just set your new handset free. That’s right pilgrims, Nokia’s new flagship Comes with Music handset is now shipping. The X6 you’ll recall, introduces S60 5th to a 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen riding 32GB of storage, a 5 megapixel camera with dual-LED flash, TV-out, and tweaked homescreen with a media/social-centric layout. The X6 lists for €450 (pre-tax and pre-carrier subsidies) — a price that ultimately includes the cost of Nokia’s struggling “all-you-can-eat” music service. Perhaps this is the device that finally gives the service legs? Maybe, but we’d start by following through on plans to strip the DRM.

Nokia X6 Comes with Music and capacitive touchscreen: shipping now originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Nov 2009 08:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve seen more eyesight restoration efforts than we could easily count, but rather than tooting their horn about some theoretical discovery, boffins at Kings College Hospital in London are actually putting their hard work to use on real, live human brings. The new process, which goes by the name brachytherapy, is a one-off treatment for macular degeneration. In essence, surgeons carefully light up a beam of radiation within the eye for just over three minutes, which kills harmful cells without damaging anything else. A trial is currently underway in order to restore eyesight in some 363 patients, and everything thus far leads us to believe that the process is both safe and effective. As for costs? The procedure currently runs £6,000 ($9,889), but that’s still not awful when you consider that existing treatments involving injections run £800 per month. Hop past the break for a video report.

Continue reading British surgeons using radiation beams to halt macular degeneration

British surgeons using radiation beams to halt macular degeneration originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 23 Nov 2009 07:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Let’s be honest, who here is actually surprised that underpaid and overworked data workers would sell on our details for a few extra quid? Given the number of uninvited calls to our unlisted phone numbers, we know for a fact that somebody has been dishing our personal contacts to those Nigerian princes and caring loan consolidators, so it’s no shock to learn that T-Mobile employees have been fingered for committing the deed and are now facing prosecution. We’re told that inappropriately leaked information made its way into the hands of brokers, who then “cold-called the customers as their contracts were due to expire” without T-Mob’s knowledge. Disappointed by the failure of current fines to discourage such illegal information trade, British Justice Minister Michael Wills has even called for “custodial sentences” to be levied against the poor slobs responsible. So, if you’re scoring at home, that’s now two black eyes for T-Mobile when it comes to keeping our data safe. For shame.

Filed under: Cellphones

UK T-Mobile customer data sold to cold callers, responsible staff to be prosecuted originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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