Archive for October 3rd, 2009

Who knows what it is about the PSP that engenders such a loyal following of hackers — both on the hardware and software side. Some of the hardware hacks we’ve seen are no doubt more impressive than others, but they’re all united in a common disregard for warranties and for the most part a deep affection for LEDs. The first PSP Go mod we’ve seen, done up by roro3030 over at AcidMods, keeps things simple with some strategic, tasteful white LED placement. It’s all internally powered and pretty seamless, and provides a nice jumping off point for a community that will be no-doubt eager to consume the PSP Go as a new challenge — even if the rest of us are busy making frowny faces at that endlessly derided price tag. Video of the lit-up Go is after the break.

Continue reading PSP Go scores its first mod job, a handful of white LEDs find a new purpose in life

Filed under: Gaming, Handhelds

PSP Go scores its first mod job, a handful of white LEDs find a new purpose in life originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 16:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/gaming_news/PSP_Go_scores_its_first_mod_job’; Who knows what it is about the PSP that engenders such a loyal following of hackers — both on the hardware and software side. Some of the hardware hacks we’ve seen are no doubt more impressive than others, but they’re all united in a common disregard for warranties and for the most part a deep affection for LEDs. The first PSP Go mod we’ve seen, done up by roro3030 over at AcidMods, keeps things simple with some strategic, tasteful white LED placement. It’s all internally powered and pretty seamless, and provides a nice jumping off point for a community that will be no-doubt eager to consume the PSP Go as a new challenge — even if the rest of us are busy making frowny faces at that endlessly derided price tag. Video of the lit-up Go is after the break.

Continue reading PSP Go scores its first mod job, a handful of white LEDs find a new purpose in life

Filed under: Gaming, Handhelds

PSP Go scores its first mod job, a handful of white LEDs find a new purpose in life originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 16:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The last time we ran past Dell’s Zino HD all we had to go on specs-wise was that it housed “desktop parts” and had some nice plugs around back. Now the folks at the appropriately named DellZinoHD blog have found a spec breakdown of the unit, which is apparently also going by the names of Inspiron 300 and Inspiron 400 — the latter of which seems to be slated for the Zino HD branding, or at least seems to mirror the original concept. The Inspiron 300 has more of a nettop slant, with an Atom processor and integrated graphics, and though it has a DVD burner and 3.5-inch HDD, there won’t be HDMI or eSATA ports. Meanwhile, the Inspiron 400 can handle an Athlon or Athlon X2 processor, with an option for ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4330 discrete graphics (not quite a “desktop” part, if you ask us) and all the other goodies like a Blu-ray option, HDMI, gigabit Ethernet, dual eSATA and so forth. Interestingly, the manual also mentions XP, Vista, Windows 7 and Ubuntu as supported options — though we’re not sure they’ll all be available as retail configurations.

Filed under: Desktops

Dell Zino HD spotted slumming it in Inspiron 300 and Inspiron 400 support docs originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 14:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Looking for a quick and easy way to become completely dissatisfied with your own PS3 rig? Maybe you could try tracking down Sony at one of its “sneak peak” stops, where attendees will be able to play through some of the upcoming, already-lauded Uncharted 2 on a movie screen powered by a Sony 4K digital cinema projector. Unfortunately, only four locations have been named, and two of them are in California, so not quite everybody is going to get a chance to spoil themselves for this generation of video games forever.

Filed under: Gaming, HDTV

Sony takes Uncharted 2 on tour, with 4K digital projection to make you forever loathe your home setup originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 12:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Remember the Spanish-borne Android device GeeksPhone One? It was late June when we got our first (and so far only) look at the phone. Of course we’ve been wanting some more time, but apparently Xataka‘s beaten us to the punch, and lo and behold, she’s gotten herself a shiny new physical keyboard. The site stresses that the user interface isn’t done and the icons temporary, but does note that the keyboard is comfortable and the total weight and size is apparently comparable to the HTC Dream / Ion / MyTouch 3G. Additionally, our compadres at Engadget Spanish have read that One’s release been pushed back from fall until sometime in January. We’ll certainly be keeping an eye out, but given the bevy of Android options on the horizon, we can’t promise we’ll be waiting.

Read – One in the wild
Read – One delayed until January

Filed under: Cellphones

GeeksPhone One in the wild, now packing a physical keyboard originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 10:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Good news for Canadians who can’t seem to get a decent internet plan for home. Rogers has unveiled a 3G station for residential use dubbed the Rocket Hub, and with it a number of jet propulsion-related puns that we’ll be taking painstaking measures to avoid. It boasts 7.2Mbps HSPA, WiFi and ethernet out, and voice calls over UMTS. Makes sense since it’s riding an Ericsson W3x core. The Upfront cost of hardware hasn’t been disclosed yet, but plans start at $35 Canadian. Launch date (okay, we couldn’t resist) is sometime later this month.

Filed under: Wireless, Networking

Rogers’ Rocket Hub disguises 3G data and voice as mild-mannered home modem originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 07:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The game’s back on. Palm just announced the availability of its 1.2.1 update to WebOS for the Palm Pre and, well, that’s it for the time being. It fixes Exchange mail syncing issues experienced by some users, which is nice, but for everyone else it re-enables media sync with iTunes 9.0.1, with or without the USB-IF‘s support. In fact, Palm has signaled its commitment to its rogue approach by improving synchronization with the Photos app to keep the album structure in tact while allowing lower-resolution images to be synced to the Pre. Oh happy day — enjoy it while it lasts Pre owners.

Filed under: Cellphones, Software

Palm WebOS 1.2.1 now available, ‘fixes’ iTunes media sync originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 04:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You know what’s better than a PK-101? A PK-102. You know what’s not better than a PK-101? A PK-100. Unless, of course, you’re focused solely on price. Quietly announced to hit the lower-end market, the PK-100 is described as a simplified version of its more sophisticated siblings, boasting the same DLP-based engine as well as 11 ANSI lumens of brightness and a 1,000:1 contrast ratio. Unfortunately, you’ll only find a single composite video input and a 480 x 320 native resolution, but hey, for an estimated retail price of $199, what else did you really expect?

[Via PicoProjector-Info]

Filed under: Displays

Optoma’s $199 PK-100 pico projector goes for the bargain crowd originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 04:12:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Man, Core i7 laptops just keep coming and coming (kinda like Arnold). The latest in what’s sure to be a torrent of companies upgrading their premier products to Intel’s finest quad-core battery killer is MSI, with the GT640. Though MSI hasn’t yet specified which of the trifecta of Clarksfield chips it has inside the machine, we do know there’s a 1GB NVIDIA Geforce GTS 250 taking care of graphics, as well as options for up to 4GB of DDR3 RAM, half a terabyte of storage and a Blu-ray burner. Other notables include a two megapixel webcam, HDMI, 7.1 channel audio output and an eSATA input. While we don’t yet know the wallet damage for that red-striped aluminum alloy body, its Windows 7 installation would indicate a release some time around, oh, October 22 perhaps? One more shot of the keyboard and screen after the break.

[Via Laptoping]

Update: The German announcement for this machine has been more forthcoming with the details. There’s a 1680 x 1050 resolution, 4,800mAh battery and a two-year warranty among the things we didn’t know about before, and the most important thing, the CPU model, is now revealed as a 1.6GHz Core i7 720QM. [Thanks, Johannes]

Continue reading MSI GT640 houses Core i7, claims to be ‘world’s most powerful gaming notebook’

Filed under: Gaming, Laptops

MSI GT640 houses Core i7, claims to be ‘world’s most powerful gaming notebook’ originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Oct 2009 01:41:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ah, Snow Leopard. It’s the same cat you’re used to caressing (or beating, as the case may be), but in a much, much colder climate. Or something like that. OS X 10.6 promised Leopard users a “refined” experience, and one that would only cost upgrading users $29. At that price, most Apple fanatics figured that picking it up on launch day was a no-brainer, but as we’ve come to sadly expect from Cupertino’s software labs these days, all wasn’t perfectly well with the big snowy cat. Even now, users are still kvetching about broken functionality and mental pains that are literally indescribable. Even if you’re not in that camp, we’re eager to hear how your Snow Leopard experience has been. Are you satisfied with the upgrade? Will you never, ever install an Apple update again before a million others try it first? Are you already looking forward to 10.7 Windows 7? Tell all in comments below — you never know who could be tuning in.

Filed under: Software

How would you change Snow Leopard? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 02 Oct 2009 23:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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