The Gadget Geek

Samsung Galaxy Tab headed to Verizon?

We’ve already seen a Samsung Galaxy Tab in the wild with a not-so-subtle CDMA sticker on it, and now BGR has a leaked screenshot that shows the seven-inch tablet headed to Verizon. That certainly sounds like it could be the Samsung i800 tablet we’ve seen on Verizon’s well-leaked roadmap, and we can also say that we’ve heard (but not confirmed) that the Tab will have 512MB of RAM, that the interface is quite smooth but still stuttery in areas, and that battery life is about six hours — but we’d take all that with a grain of salt, since anything can change before release. We’re definitely poking around for more, we’ll let you know.

Samsung Galaxy Tab headed to Verizon? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Aug 2010 22:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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CES 2009: Monster Beats and Turbine Ear Buds
CES 2009: Monster Beats and Turbine Ear Buds
The Best Gadget Is the One That Gets To Your House
New e-readers, new tablets, and new game console accessories are all wonderful, but even in a down economy, just keeping up with demand will be a serious challenge for many gadget retailers — especially as we get closer to the holidays. Over at Teleread, Chris Meadows looks at order-to-ship times for two hot gadgets, the Kindle [...]
Dust In Design

LG to unveil LEX8 3DTV at IFA featuring ‘Nano LED’ backlighting

Now that LED backlighting has trickled down to nearly every HDTV lineup, it appears the big manufacturers will have to find new ways to differentiate their products, like LG’s upcoming LEX8 television. Set to debut at IFA in Berlin before going on sale in Germany and Korea next month (no word on the US), LG claims that thanks to a ‘thin film of miniscule dots positioned in front of a full array of LEDs’ its Nano Lighting technology — perhaps of the Nanosys variety it licensed earlier this year — makes for a clearer, smoother picture, with the slimmest and narrowest outline of any LED TV, ever, at just .88cm thick with a 1.25cm bezel. Of course LG’s NetCast widgets and Magic Motion remote are along for the ride as well, while we’ll have to wait until the show opens later this week to get our eyes on this beauty, check after the break for a few more pictures.

Continue reading LG to unveil LEX8 3DTV at IFA featuring ‘Nano LED’ backlighting

LG to unveil LEX8 3DTV at IFA featuring ‘Nano LED’ backlighting originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Aug 2010 20:07:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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With Imation Link 5112 WUSB A/V streamer, KerliGirl13 can finally have her own TV show

Continue reading With Imation Link 5112 WUSB A/V streamer, KerliGirl13 can finally have her own TV show

With Imation Link 5112 WUSB A/V streamer, KerliGirl13 can finally have her own TV show originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 28 Aug 2010 11:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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SanDisk Sansa Connect MP3 Player
SanDisk Sansa Connect MP3 Player
Designer Creates Dress With Recycled Wires
Electronic waste can sometimes find a surprising second lease on life, as designer Tina Sparkles has proved by making a dress using recycled wires. “I read how e-waste is being shipped to developing countries and how people are melting it at homes there,” says Sparkles. “I was inspired to make this dress to address the issue [...]

Droid Pro is the global Droid 2: the evidence grows

We’d reported before our belief that the rumored Droid Pro is nothing more than the dual-mode version of the Droid 2, but the question remained: knowing that the Droid 2 has a model code of A955, what the heck is the difference between the model codes A956 and A957 that have been showing up in Verizon’s systems? Looks like we might have some clarification on that question this afternoon thanks to a new shot clearly calling out the A957 as the R2-D2 version of the Droid 2 that’s launching late next month. What does that mean? Well, it means that if the Droid Pro is a separate product with insane specs, it hasn’t shown up in any screen shots and we don’t have a model code for it. Our original tipster was pretty insistent that Verizon didn’t have any product on its 2010 phone roadmap with crazier specs than the Droid X — and besting it inside of six months would seem like an awful business move anyway — so now, the only question seems to be whether Big Red will go with the “Droid 2 World Edition” or “Droid Pro” branding when this thing launches in the coming weeks.

[Thanks, anonymous tipster]

Droid Pro is the global Droid 2: the evidence grows originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Aug 2010 16:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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CES 2010 – Demo of Toshiba s Motion Gesture Technology
CES 2010 – Demo of Toshiba s Motion Gesture Technology

Google responds to Android DRM breach, promises how-to on obfuscating code

Well, that was snappy. Just 24 hours after Android Police published a piece describing how easy it was to circumvent Google’s new Android licensing server, the Big G is hitting back with a brief response that it promises to elaborate on in the future. In order to address any doubts that developers may have, Google has noted that its new service is still “very young,” and “the first release shipped with the simplest, most transparent imaginable sample implementation, which was written to be easy to understand and modify, rather than security-focused.” Interestingly, the outfit doesn’t hesitate to pass some of the blame, saying that some devs “are using the sample as-is, which makes their applications easier to attack.” For those who’d like to better obfuscate their code, Google will be publishing detailed instructions on how to do so in the near future. We also appreciate the honesty in this quote in particular: “100 percent piracy protection is never possible in any system that runs third-party code.” As stated, the bullet points listed in the source link should be fleshed out in due time, but at least you hard working developers can rest easy knowing that Google isn’t standing by and letting pirates run amok.

Google responds to Android DRM breach, promises how-to on obfuscating code originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 24 Aug 2010 16:49:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pandigital Novel review

It’s our guess that the Pandigital Novel has been turning quite a few heads at retailers across the US during the last few weeks. How could it not? It’s got a full-color, 7-inch touchscreen, 2GB of on-board memory, runs a skinned version of Android and is priced around $180 (depending on where you’re shopping). Oh, and it’s got access to Barnes & Noble’s e-book store. About one-third the price of the iPad, we sure can see the attraction, but after attempting to read an entire novel on it we can’t help but wonder how it found its way past product development and into the stock rooms of Walgreens, Bed, Bath & Beyond and JCPenny, to name a few. Hit the break for our full review and to see just exactly we’re talking about.

Continue reading Pandigital Novel review

Pandigital Novel review originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 20 Aug 2010 14:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Power line inspecting robot isn’t afraid of getting juiced

Inspecting power lines isn’t the safest job we can imagine having, so we’re pretty happy to see that robots — which don’t have the same… feelings we do about getting injured — can be hacked to do the job. Hydro-Quebec’s LineScout can get past most power line obstacles by partially detaching itself from the line and then grabbing a hold of it again once said obstacle has been cleared. It can also easily get from one section of the line to the next relatively quickly, and of course, the best part of this bot’s ability is that it can pull all this off while the lines are powered. Check out the video below to see the bot in action.

Continue reading Power line inspecting robot isn’t afraid of getting juiced

Power line inspecting robot isn’t afraid of getting juiced originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 20 Aug 2010 08:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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E3 2009: MX vs. ATV Reflex
E3 2009: MX vs. ATV Reflex

T-Mobile offering Vibrant for $99, if you’re quick about it (update: one cent at Amazon)

If the Vibrant’s $200 price tag on contract was the only thing keeping you planted on the fence, you might want to head over to T-Mobile’s interwebs right this second seeing how they’re offering a one-day special — $99, online only — which makes it $100 cheaper than AT&T’s Captivate and $150 less than Sprint’s Epic 4G. Any way you slice it, that’s a killer carrier-direct price for a high-end Android phone with a 1GHz core and one of the best phone displays we’ve ever seen… and remember, it includes Avatar, which means you’re getting this for the price of a few Avatar Blu-rays. Yeah, that’s the way to look at it.

Update: Don’t want to drop even a single Benjamin on T-Mobile’s foremost Android? How’s a penny sound? We’re seeing the Vibrant for $0.01 (and two years of your life) right now at Amazon.

[Thanks, Aaron and Kevin L.]

T-Mobile offering Vibrant for $99, if you’re quick about it (update: one cent at Amazon) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 18 Aug 2010 19:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Vers 2X iPod Speaker System
Vers 2X iPod Speaker System
Deaf Students Test Sign Language on Smartphones
For most people, video chat on cellphones is a fun application. But for some users, video chat could make a huge difference to their quality of life. Engineers at the University of Washington have developed a system that helps deaf and hearing-challenged users communicate using video chat efficiently and at low cost over 3G networks. With [...]

Robotic yellow submarine finds massive river under the sea, tons of other trippy stuff

Researchers at the University of Leeds have employed a robotic yellow submarine to fund and begin documenting a massive river under the sea, known as a submarine channel — the first ever directly observed. The river is so large that if it were on land, it would be the sixth largest river in the world. The torpedo-shaped autosub itself is a 23-foot long, unmanned craft which can be programmed to stay just safely above the channels where they’d encounter damage. It’s equipped with an underwater speed camera which enable the team to observe in detail the flows within the channel. While little is known about what kind of lifeforms may lurk in these waters, the team’s research puts science a little closer to understanding these unique rivers, and its full report will be published later this year in Geology.

[Image credit: R. Flood, ]

Robotic yellow submarine finds massive river under the sea, tons of other trippy stuff originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 16 Aug 2010 12:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sharp Press Conference CES 2009
Sharp Press Conference CES 2009

App review: The Incident

Like its contemporary, Canabalt, The Incident is a game that knows exactly what it is — and is not — and plays to those strengths to a T. The basic premise of this iPhone title is simple enough, and in that simplicity (as with many great games) lies its power. You are Frank Solway, a lone man involved in a day that has gone completely out of whack — namely, objects have begun falling from the sky, and you need to get out of the way. That’s it. That’s the whole game. You dash and jump while all manner of items come hurtling towards you from above; Mini Coopers, Ikea bookshelves, bikes, fences, arcade cabinets… really just about anything you can think of. Your goal is to avoid what’s coming next (teased by a flashing white strip along the top of the screen), grab the variety of power-ups that happen by, and keep getting as high as you can to reach checkpoints. It’s amazingly fun, and the charm of the game is doubled by developer Big Bucket’s use of retro, 8-bit graphics along with a pitch-perfect chiptune soundtrack. The effect is terrific, blending the best of what we love from our NES years with the kind of gaming that’s perfectly suited to a mobile device. We can’t overstate how polished The Incident seems — the developers have made all the right decisions, and the result is a game you pick up quickly, but can’t put back down. If you’ve got $1.99 to spare, why are you still reading this?

Continue reading App review: The Incident

App review: The Incident originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 14 Aug 2010 21:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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CES 2009: S1 Audio NxSet Neckphones
CES 2009: S1 Audio NxSet Neckphones
Man Scrawls World s Biggest Message With GPS Pen
One man drove 12,238 miles across 30 states to scrawl a message that can only be viewed using Google Earth. His big shoutout: “Read Ayn Rand.” Nick Newcomen did a road trip over 30 days that covered stretches from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. First, he identified on a map the route he would need [...]