Archive for December 4th, 2009

FTC moseys into Intel / NVIDIA dispute originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Well we have to say we never saw this coming, but have dreamed of it for years, but it appears that the FCC is actually listening to the CEA and is asking for comments on how to replace CableCARD with something that would actually make the network open. For those just catching up, Congress mandated that cable had to be open with the Telecommunications Act of 1996 — yeah that long — and 3rd party CableCARD devices first became available in 2004 and five years later there are only 14 3rd party certified devices and 443k 3rd party devices in service. The fact that CableCARDs just don’t work is no surprise to anyone who has tried to use one — ok we’re exaggerating here, but we’ve had our fair share installed and every one makes for a funny story. Now obviously admitting you have a problem is the first step, but it also means we are years away from a solution. But since they asked, here’s ours. Instead of silly cards and middleware, just specify a two way communications protocol and embed signed certificates that CableLabs will control the distribution of in the box for authentication and encryption. It really doesn’t have to be any harder than that.

Hell freezes over, the FCC admits that CableCARD is a failure originally appeared on Engadget HD on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We already made it clear that the January 15th Nook date applies only to new orders, and while Barnes & Noble‘s retail outlets may not be getting any love (read: no units will be in stock for sale, as confirmed today), many of the faithful who pre-ordered early are receiving a happy note from the company right now with a not-quite-firm statement that “we expect to have it to you by December 9th” with free, upgraded overnight shipping. Another bonus? A $10 online gift certificate. Warm feelings for the holiday shoppers who thought ahead, and as for everyone else, at least rain checks save you money on gift wrapping.

[Thanks, Mona!]

Nook early adopters promised a December 9th shipment, $10 online gift certificate originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s a source code-palooza these days! Fresh off that huge HTC code name find, someone’s dug into the Motorola CLIQ‘s source code and found references to a new Motorola device dubbed “La Jolla.” Meaning “The Jewel” in Spanish, La Jolla apparently means “low-end Android clamshell” in Motorola-ese, with mention of a WQVGA screen, 528MHz processor and what seems to be a QWERTY keyboard. (What such a phone might look like is pictured above. Thanks, LG). In fact, a QWERTY Android clamshell (the clamshell bit was extrapolated from the display driver by the folks at AndroidandMe, but sounds reasonable) seems to be the perfect cure for the recent rash of QWERTY featurephones we’ve been seeing lately, perfect for the SMS / email junky that doesn’t want to bother with high-powered apps or a big price tag or the resistive touchscreen-only typing of the HTC Tattoo. Now, if only could find some device source code that could solve our trigger shyness brought on by this steady stream of Android handsets — not that we’re complaining.

Motorola prepping ‘La Jolla’ low-end Android clamshell? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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I remember the day AMD announced it was going to acquire ATI. NVIDIA told me that its only competitor just threw in the towel. What a difference a few years can make.

The last time NVIDIA was this late to a major DirectX transition was seven years ago, and the company just quietly confirmed we won’t see its next-generation GPU, Fermi, until Q1 2010. If AMD’s manufacturing partner TSMC weren’t having such a terrible time making 40nm chips I’d say that AMD would be gobbling up marketshare like a fat kid. By the time NVIDIA gets its entire stack of DX11 hardware out the gate, AMD will be a quarter away from putting out newly refreshed GPUs.

Things aren’t much better on the chipset side either — for all intents and purposes, the future of NVIDIA’s chipset business in the PC space is dead. Not only has NVIDIA recently announced that it won’t be pursuing any chipsets for Intel’s Core i3, i5. or i7 processors until its various legal disputes with Intel are resolved, It doesn’t really make sense to be a third-party chipset vendor anymore. Both AMD and Intel are more than capable of doing chipsets in-house, and the only form of differentiation comes from the integrated graphics core — so why not just sell cheap discrete GPUs for OEMs to use alongside Intel chipsets instead?

Even Ion is going to be short lived. NVIDIA’s planning to mold an updated graphics chip into an updated chipset for the next-gen Atom processor, but Pine Trail brings the memory controller and graphics onto the CPU and leaves NVIDIA out in the cold once again.

Let’s see, no competitive GPUs, no future chipset business. This isn’t looking good so far — but the one thing I’ve learned from writing about these companies for the past 12 years is that the future’s never as it seems. Chances are, NVIDIA’s going to look a lot different in the future because of two things: Tesla and Tegra.

Continue reading Core Values: What’s next for NVIDIA?

Core Values: What’s next for NVIDIA? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We know it can be tough scraping by with a measly 2.93GHz Xeon processor and 1TB hard drives in your Mac Pro, so you’ll no doubt be pleased to know that Apple has finally seen fit to add a bit of extra horsepower to its humble little desktop. That includes a new option for a speedy 3.33GHz Xeon processor, which will add a hefty $1,200 to the base price, and a new a 2TB SATA 3Gb/s 7,200rpm hard drive option (also now available on Apple’s Xserve server), which is a comparative bargain at just $350 — though you can, of course, add four of them. Unfortunately, anyone that’s thinking about doubling up on those 3.33GHz Xeon processors is still out of luck, as the 8-core rigs still top out at just 2.93Ghz.

Apple adds 3.33GHz Xeon, 2TB hard drive options to Mac Pro originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 14:41:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve got a couple special guests joining us live on the Engadget Podcast today: Michael Gartenberg and Chris Ziegler will be on hand to talk about Nokia’s present and future products and strategy. On top of that, we’ve got a ton of tablet talk coming at you — everything from the CrunchPad to the next-generation of magazines. It’s going to be a wild one — we’ll be live around 2:45PM EST, but the chat below is open now, so settle on in!

Update: It’s all over, but check back tomorrow for the regular podcast post if you missed it!

The Engadget Podcast, live at 2:45PM EST! originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 14:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Welcome to the Engadget Holiday Gift Guide! The team here is well aware of the heartbreaking difficulties of the seasonal shopping experience, and we want to help you sort through the trash and come up with the treasures this year. Below is today’s bevy of hand curated picks, and you can head back to the Gift Guide hub to see the rest of the product guides as they’re added throughout the holiday season.

Want a gift the whole family can enjoy? A brand new television is sure to do the trick and with more HDTV content available than ever from antenna, cable, satellite, Blu-ray discs or even the internet, there will always be something to watch. Whether it’s their first flat-panel or an upgrade, these picks come through in several price ranges selected to maximize your, we mean their, viewing pleasure. The only question left we can’t help you with? Who gets the first turn on the remote.

Continue reading Engadget’s Holiday Gift Guide: Televisions

Engadget’s Holiday Gift Guide: Televisions originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 14:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Early termination fees have always represented the flipside of subsidized pricing — the necessary evil that keeps free phones free. Thing is, they were tough enough to swallow at $175 or $200, but Verizon’s recently gone for the jugular in a hell-bent effort to keep subscribers locked in by upping the fee on vaguely-defined “advanced devices” (read: any phone a power user would ever want) all the way up to a mind-bending $350. Turns out the FCC is as confused and worked up as everyone else, though, having fired off a 4-page communique to Verizon’s veep of legal and external affairs today asking how customers are notified of the new ETF, how the prorating formula is calculated (hint: they don’t like that you still pay $120 after 23 months of a 24-month contract), and how an “advanced device” comes to be, among other things. Riding on the letter are a few extra questions about inadvertent mobile web charges for customers that aren’t signed up for a data plan, totaling nine paragraph-long queries that the feds want answered by December 17. Your move, Verizon.

[Thanks, Daniel P.]

FCC gives Verizon the third degree over $350 ‘advanced device’ ETF originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 13:46:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You might think MikroMikko is the name of some Asian fusion restaurant, but it was actually Nokia’s first computer line — and in 1987, the MikroMikko 3 was a state-of-the-art MS-DOS machine with 1MB of RAM and 20MB drive. It’s been about 25 years since Nokia’s made a computer bigger than an N900, but it’s back in the game with its first netbook, the Booklet 3G. Nokia’s pitching the Booklet as a top-of-the-line machine with an all-aluminum chassis, integrated connectivity and GPS apps, and at $699 it’s certainly priced that way — although inside it’s got a low-power Atom processor and 4,200rpm hard drive. The Booklet 3G is one of the best-looking netbooks out there, but is Nokia’s entry back into the market a winner? Click on to find out what we think of the entire system in our full review.

Continue reading Nokia Booklet 3G review

Nokia Booklet 3G review originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Dec 2009 13:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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