Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Wacom celebrates 25 years with Intuos3 Special Edition pen tablet

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Hard to believe that Wacom has been around for a quarter century, but this month marks its 25th year in business. To celebrate, the firm is introducing a trio of Intuos3 Special Edition pen tablets in a variety of sizes including 6- x 8-, 6- x 11-, and 9- x 12-inches. Each tablet touts "a refined and sophisticated black and gun metal gray color scheme," Wacom's Classic Pen to compliment the Intuos3 Grip Pen, an accessory kit, and a transparent overlay "to substitute with the traditional gray overlay." All three units play nice with both Macs and PCs and can be snapped up for $369, $409 and $489 from smallest to largest.

[Via PC World]

 

[via] Engadget

Sony disclaims reports of chip operations sale

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While quite a few reports seemed pretty confident that Sony was indeed looking to sell its PS3 chip production facilities to Toshiba, Sony has now hit back with denials. Reportedly, the firm stated that it was "looking at ways to improve its chip operations but had reached no decision on whether to sell it," and just in case you needed a bit of proof from the other side, a spokesman for Toshiba "also said that no deal had been decided." According to Sony spokesman Tomio Takizawa, "nothing concrete has been decided," so until we hear otherwise, we'll take his word for it.

 

[via] Engadget

Steve Jobs in Berlin tomorrow, France on Thursday?

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Now, we know how hot-under-the collar you guys get when we note El-Jobso's movements in Europe, but news is news, people. Just as speculated yesterday, it appears that the Apple honcho is working his way across Europe, moving nation-to-nation to spread the good word of iPhone wherever his New Balance touch ground. Not content with just launching the device in London for the O2 network, the company is taking this show on the road, traveling to Berlin on Wednesday where Jobs and his turtleneck will supposedly announce a partnership for the iPhone with T-Mobile. Expect EDGE, lots of screen touching, and Steve saying, "OH-, eine weitere Sache." Then, as we hear, it's off to France for some sightseeing. Just kidding... about the sightseeing.

[Thanks, Floris]

 

[via] Engadget

Switched On: Touched by a hacker

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Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about technology, multimedia, and digital entertainment:

I glanced at the clock, 1:36 PM. Perhaps I should not have gotten my hopes up. For weeks I'd been exchanging e-mail with an elite hacker who promised to speak with me about the latest attempt to free hardware from the shackles of manufacturers that bind it, sticking it to such companies by making their products more desireable.

Just then, Skype lit up like a flaming notebook battery. It was the notorious hacker 5m0kNcR4K. A shadowy figure in the videoconferencing window spoke in a disguised voice.

"I'm in ur Skype, grantin' ur interview. Do not try to identify me. By using advanced digital video effects, I have pixelated my facial image, put myself in silhouette, and added a big blue dot in front of my face."

"What video effect makes it look like you have bunny ears?"

"Oh, that's just a mask I picked up at Party City."

"We could have just spoken by phone, you know. Or just used VOIP. Besides, I thought we were set to talk at 1 PM."

"I thought 13:37 would be more appropriate."

Continue reading Switched On: Touched by a hacker

 

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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

[via] Engadget

US-based Segway polo team grabs gold in 2007 Woz Challenge Cup

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Nah, the Silicon Valley Aftershocks aren't the first team of nerds to form a polo team that ditched horses in favor of Segways, but they did manage to avenge last year's tie by shutting out the New Zealand Pole Blacks in this year's Woz Challenge Cup. 'Course, we could explain exactly how all five goals were scored and how well balanced these finely-tuned athletes were, but let's be honest, we're not here for that. What we are here for, however, is the video coverage of the event, which is at least good for a few chuckles. Go on, check it out after the jump.

[via] Engadget

Hasselblad rolls out 39 megapixel H3D II DSLR

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Hasselblad may have already hit 39 megapixels more than a year ago, but that doesn't make the company's new H3D II DSLR any less impressive, which hits that same mark with a few other improvements. Those include a new 3-inch display, which promises both a clearer view of images and lower power consumption, as well as an apparently revamped menu system that'll let you tweak settings using the thumbwheel controls on the camera. Otherwise, you can expect just about everything you could ask for in a $37,000 camera, including 48x36 mm CCD image sensors (the largest currently available), a Global Image Locator that tags photos with the exact geographic co-ordinates at the time they were taken, and an array of features that promise to keep your shots free of noise and moiré effects, to name just a few. What's more, if 39 megapixels and $37k is just a bit too much for you, you can opt for one of two lesser models that Hasselblad's also just introduced, including the 31 megapixel H3D-31II ($30,000) and the 22 megapixel H3D-22II ($25,000).

 

[via] Engadget

Iqua BH-702 Bluetooth pendant headset rolls through FCC

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Iqua, maker of fine Bluetooth equipment everywhere, has hopped into the Bluetooth-headset-as-weird-jewellery business with the BH-702. Featuring A2DP for your wireless stereo listening enjoyment, 9 hours talk, 7 hours music, and 150 hours standby time, all on a 2 hour charge. The BH-702 hangs about your neck while in use, and while we dig the convenience, we often find that this configuration puts the mic. too far from your mouth and increases noise as it shuffles about on your clothing. No word on pricing or availability yet, but we expect now that this leg of the journey is done Iqua may just see fit to announce the thing.

 

[via] Engadget

Fujitsu LifeBook U810 tablet reviewed

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Fujitsu attracted a fair bit of attention back in August with its $1,000 U810 convertible tablet PC, and it's now out to prove its worth when it comes to reviews, one of the first of which looks to have come from the folks at Laptop Magazine. While it's apparently not without its faults, they found quite a bit to like about the device, saying "you can't beat the price for a unit with a usable built-in keyboard and tablet functionality." They also especially dug the tablet's sharp 5.6-inch screen, and it's long battery life, which wound up around 5 hours and 14 minutes in their tests. On the downside, they were less impressed with the performance from the 800MHz A110 processor (no surprise there), and by the lack of integrated mobile broadband, not to mention the somewhat lackluster keyboard and mouse. That apparently wasn't enough to keep it from getting a decent 3.5 out of 5 rating, however, with that $1,000 price tag working considerably in its favor.

 

[via] Engadget

Two new Moto handsets outed: say hello to the RIZR Z10 and ROKR E8

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Motorola is expecting a couple new and rather glossy members in its family, namely the RIZR Z10 (pictured on left) and the ROKR E8. The E8's face will between various modes based on what you're doing, from keypad to music controls for example, it also has some tactile feedback so you know you've actually input something on its smooth black surface. The ROKR E8 has a multi function "Omega Wheel" for zooming through your tunes and navigating, 2GB of internal storage, expansion via microSD, and the sad word -- rumor of course, so we can hold out hope -- that it won't feature 3G connectivity. The RIZR Z10 is a Symbian 9.02 handset sporting the ever so lovely UIQ 3.2 interface, quad-band GSM / EDGE, HSDPA in some alien frequency, a 3.2 megapixel shooter, 90MB of internal storage with the old standby, microSD, if you need more space. The E8 should be landing Q1 of 2008, and the Z10 should be shipping Q4 this year for round about €400 (about $550).

[via] Engadget

Cobra debuts the US's first GPS-equipped radar detector

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Cobra, never a company to let you down when you need that special kind of radar that they provide (the ticket avoiding kind), has introduced the US's first GPS-locator equipped radar detector, the XRS R9G -- just like they said they would. What does a radar detector need GPS for? Well, this one holds a database of speed and red-light cameras, warning you when you're approaching so you can ease off the gas pedal, save a few lives, and not get yourself a nasty, nasty ticket. "Across the country, the number of speed and red light cameras is growing exponentially," says Tony Mirabelli, senior vice president of marketing and sales at Cobra, adding, "Now drivers can stay alert no matter where they travel." The company plans to further augment the detector's capabilities with alerts for "black spots" (high accident zones), as well as school and construction alerts. The XRS R9G is available now, retailing for $449.95.

 

[via] Engadget

IMOBILE's Flying C1000 phone / PDA / PMP / watch

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You wouldn't think you'd be able to fit a GSM phone, PDA (with stylus), and regular old "watch" functions into into a "stylish" package like the IMOBILE Flying C1000... but you'd be wrong. Dead wrong. Feast your eyes on the latest and greatest wrist-related marvel out of China -- a tiny phone with a touchscreen, Bluetooth support, 60MB of RAM, a video / audio player, a mini USB jack, and possibly a camera (though it's quite hard to tell from the photos). The watch seems to share at least guts (if not design) with SMS Technology's M500, and of course we've seen phone watches and PMP watches, but never before has it all been pulled together in such an "attractive" package. The C1000 also appears to be both 2G- and 3G-ready, thus allowing you to browse large, image-heavy webpages on the tiniest screen ever made. No word on price and availability, but you can be sure the Engadget staff is doing everything possible to get the team equipped with these.

 

[via] Engadget

Toshiba announces $1,000 TDP-PX10U projector

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While it likely won't cut it in a home theater, Toshiba's new TDP-PX10U projector looks like it should please quite a few business types, with it boasting a lightweight 2.9 pound carrying weight and an equally light $1,000 price tag. For that grand, you'll get a standard 1,024 x 768 resolution, along with a 2,000:1 contrast ratio, 2,200 ANSI lumens, a built-in two watt speaker, and a USB port to accommodate a flash drive for presentations without a PC. Toshiba's also promising a "50 percent increase in the brightness of colors" thanks to its trademark BrilliantColor DLP technology, and it's touting the projector's automatic setup feature, which promises to give you clear images in "even in the most unforgiving presentation situations." If that's enough to sway you, you can get your order in right away

 

[via] Engadget

LG intros LX97WH desktop with Blu-ray / HD DVD combo drive

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It looks like LG is putting its own Blu-ray / HD DVD combo drives to good use, with one finding its way into the company's new LX97WH desktop recently unveiled in Korea. While other specs unfortunately seem to be a bit hard to come by, the system will apparently boast a Core 2 Duo processor of some sort, along with an NVIDIA GeForce 8-Series graphics card and, as you can see, a fairly eye-catching paint job. No word on pricing just yet either, although you can probably guess where you'll have to go if you want to get one.

 

[via] Engadget