Remember that EZ1600 we peeked back in April? Seems its long lost cousin just got official courtesy of eMachines, as the EZ1601-01 all-in-one retains that same PC-in-a-monitor feel yet sports a clearly different model name. Or, you know, maybe eMachines just changed the label up on us. At any rate, the newest member of the EZ Series features a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 CPU, 945GSE chipset, 1GB of DDR2 memory, completely uninspiring GMA 950 integrated graphics, a 160GB SATA hard drive, 8x SuperMulti DVD burner, WiFi, five USB 2.0 sockets, built-in speakers, a bundled keyboard and mouse, multicard reader and a 18.5-inch LCD. Thankfully, the underpowered machine offers up Windows XP in order to keep resource demands in check, but the $399.99 price tag may be a bit much given the N270′s age.
The podcast is a little late this week, but for good reason — special guest Michael Gartenberg joins Josh, Paul, and Nilay this week as they sort through the Google-dominated week in news. We’ve got Chrome OS, the myTouch 3G, some more HTC Hero hands-on time (as well as a Magic flashed with the Hero ROM), and the leaked Sony Ericsson Rachael on tap — oh, and to top it all off, Sony backtracked huge and released its first true netbook, the VAIO W. It’s a bit of a wild one, we won’t lie — buckle up.
Hosts: Joshua Topolsky, Nilay Patel, Paul Miller Guest: Michael Gartenberg Producer: Trent Wolbe Song:No Rain
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Permalink | Email this | Comments The Next-Gen Console War The Next-Gen Console War Tokyo s Lifesize Gundam Robot Is Big Enough to Squash Your House Toy Story can suck it. The Japanese didn’t need computer animation to bring this toy to life. Pictured above, a lifesize Gundam robot in Tokyo stands at a gawk-worthy 59-feet tall. The robot looks even more impressive when it lights up at night (pic and video below the jump). Now all they have to do [...] Recyclable Head Protection Holy bajeesus did you know that there’s legislation that will be in place by 2015 in the European Union that says 95% of any vehicle produced needs to be recyclable? It’s called the EU ELV (End of Life Vehicle). In reaction to this as well as the last census of …
Trimble may make plenty of GPS-equipped devices of its own aimed at adventure-minded folks, but its Trimble Outdoors software has also made quite a few cellphones a bit more outdoors-friendly, and it’s now finally found its way to the T-Mobile G1. As with on some other phones, the app will let you plan your trip online and sync it up with your G1, and give you the ability to geotag pictures, log your trip and share it with others, take text and audio notes and, of course, simply use it as a full-fledged GPS navigator. That won’t come free, of course, but the $19.99 app price sure is a good deal cheaper than a separate outdoors GPS device, and you can grab it right now from Android Market.
While every other solid state drive maker is thinking of snazzy new model names to slap on their next-gen wares, OCZ Technology is actually breaking up the monotony with its Vertex Turbo SSD. While we won’t go so far as to say that these things are overclocked (’cause let’s face it, they aren’t), OCZhas bumped the core clock speed and the SDR DRAM cache to 180MHz (compared to 166MHz on the original). These drives also posses a custom firmware designed specifically for performance junkies, and the company claims that users will see read and write speeds of up to 270MBps and 210MBps, respectively. We’re still waiting to hear back on pricing, but you can expect capacities of 30GB (32), 60GB (64), 120GB (128), and 250GB (256) to hit the shelves in short order.
Face it, we’re not normal. Most consumers don’t want to convert their home PCs into media centers. That doesn’t stop them from wanting a single device serving as both their TV and PC, however. That’s where the 22- and 32-inch Bristol ViewSurfer PC/TVs carve out their niche. Each set features a FreeView tuner and an integrated, netbook-like, Atom-based Windows XP computer with 160GB of storage, 1GB of memory, 4x USB, and Ethernet. The PC lacks integrated WiFi, oddly enough, and the TV seems to function in complete isolation from the computer processing — so no integrated DVR, for example. The £500 (about $814) 22-inch model does feature a 1680 x 1050 pixel resolution, well above the 1024 x 600 display found in most netbooks. Not that you’ll be pushing Flash-based video from YouTube or BBC’s iPlayer full-screen as these ViewSurfers are undoubtedly saddled with Intel’s integrated 945GSE netbook graphics. Bristol remains mum about the specs on the 32 incher. Available in October if you’re still game.
Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments iRiver Clix iRiver Clix iPhone 3GS Discoloration Might Be Symptom of Faulty Cases A small number of iPhone 3GS owners have reported browning of their handsets presumably due to overheating. However, a report suggests the problem is tied to third-party cases. iPhone blog FrenchiPhone cites an Apple technician who laid blame at the covers of some iPhone 3GS units. “After numerous calls to Apple technical service and maintenance of contact [...]
LG eyes number two phone maker spot for 2012, premium brand in the works Sitting pretty as the number three cell maker in the world would make many of the bigger names happy — not to mention the usurped Sony Ericsson and Motorola a bit green — but not LG, as it’s now gunning for spot number two. In an interview with Yonhap, LG’s president of its mobile business, Ahn Seung-kwon, stated that the company hoped to bump Samsung to the wayside by 2012 with the help of a serious new set and a premium brand. While the gaudiness of really expensive handsets disturbs us at times, we’ll admit that mention that LG’s looking at a foray into the über high end of the spectrum — with the likes of Nokia’s Vertu — piques our curiosity a good deal. And what about that serious new set we mentioned? Apparently in Q4 of this year, LG will launch a new Black Label-branded device to compete directly with iPhone, which when coupled with dreams of more success from yet another Prada device (and if we’re super fortunate, some more Transformers-branded stuff) is part of the master scheme to start down the path. Will they crack it? Well, if we were betting types, we’d lean towards not likely as long as the Samsung juggernaut’s standing in the way — but we’re all for watching them try.
We’ve seen plenty of tiny UAVs (or NAVs — Nano Aerial Vehicles — as they’re also known), but none quite like the robo-hummingbird that’s been in development at DARPA-contractor AeroVironment for the past couple of years. While we haven’t heard much about it during that time, the company recently completed its most advanced prototype to date, dubbed Mercury, and it’s taken advantage of the opportunity to show off all the progress it has made. As you can see in the video after the break, the bot is able to fly about and hover in place by mimicking the wing movement of a real hummingbird and, of course, be controlled completely untethered. What’s more, the firm says that the final version will actually look like a real hummingbird as well, and be able to be controlled from up to a kilometer away — even inside buildings, where a hummingbird won’t look at all out of place.
After some rather impressive RC builds, Firefox 3.5 is all packaged up and ready for public consumption. Mozilla is saying its new browser is more than two times faster than Firefox 3, but what has us more excited is the support for plugin-free “open codec” video and audio playback using Ogg Vorbis and Ogg Theora– it’s still in its infancy, but the subtle glimpse we’ve seen so far of a world without Flash video reducing our CPU to jelly is rather compelling.
Although we get irked by all the names assigned to netbooks, smartbooks, or in this case, viewbooks, we are still pretty excited about the élan’s 1080p capabilities, and now the Netbook News crew are adding to our enthusiasm with a pair of videos investigating the machine’s chassis and software. The UI they looked at is notable for being supplied by NVIDIA, and may therefore give a good indication of what future Tegra-based devices of all shapes, sizes and naming nomenclatures may look and feel like. We like the media-centric approach, which complements the platform’s strengths well, and the chunky navigation icons avoid the pitfalls inherent in a screen of this size (8.9-inches). Click through for the vids, but be warned: super-glossy screens and pink laptop enclosures lay ahead.
