by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
By Andrew Liszewski
FINALLY! While I’m sure I wasn’t the first one to come up with the idea, I wonder why it’s taken so long for a laptop manufacturer to sidle up with Wacom and include a built-in tablet with their hardware. Back in the day (4 or 5 years ago) I even harassed the Wacom sales people about it while doing demos at their NAB and Siggraph booths, but nothing ever came of it… until now. The Lenovo W700 ThinkPad is a ‘PC Beast’ as the company refers to it, with a 17-inch widescreen display (hopefully 1920×1200) with a built-in color calibrator, NVIDIA Quadro FX mobile graphics card, Intel mobile quad core processor, dual hard drives with RAID configurations, up to 8GB of high speed DDR3 RAM and even an optional Blu-ray DVD burner/player. Very impressive.
Lenovo seems to be targeting the W700 at the professional graphics market, which is why it’s the first to include the aforementioned palm rest mini Wacom tablet. I can’t even use Photoshop without a tablet, and while I’m not sure how effective one this small would actually be, it’s about a million times better than not having one and having to rely on the touch pad or trackpoint nub for pixel pushing. Not surprisingly you’ll be spending about $3,000 for the base configuration of the W700, and depending on RAM or SSD hard drive upgrades, you’ll probably even be spending a lot more than that.
[ Lenovo ThinkPad W700 ] VIA [ Gizmodo ]
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
Yesterday Verizon Wireless introduced their new application Visual Voice Mail service, but only available on the LG Voyager at the moment.
As previously stated all over the net, Verizon?s Visual Voice Mail service will cost the user an extra $2.99 per month on top of their usual mobile phone bill.
With the new Verizon Visual Voice Mail service the user can store up to forty messages for forty days along with an option to create up to ten greetings and twenty distribution lists.
Executive director for marketing, Verizon Wireless, Mike Willsey says: “Verizon Wireless recognizes that voice mail plays a large role in how customers conduct business and manage the balance between their personal and professional lives. With Visual Voice Mail, we’re able to offer customers more options to help them better prioritize voice mail messages from family, friends, colleagues, and business partners in a more timely and effective manner.”
Unfortunately Verizon have neglected to state what other mobile phones are in-line for this service, but only say additional devices will be added in the ?coming months.?
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
Telus in Canada knows students need to keep in contact, and although college kids aren?t into chatting much this day and age, the one thing they do love is to surf the net waves and send text messages.
Thus Telus has come up with a twin set of student plans which are at least good until 30th September anyway.
Telus has introduced a plan for mobile phones on $35.00 per month, and another just for smartphones on $50.00 per month.
Both of these rate plans offer the student 200 minutes of talk time, but here?s the thing that is sure to catch their attention, nationwide unlimited talk, text, picture and video messaging with their favorite 10.
Furthermore they receive unlimited weekends and nights starting at 6.00PM and also unlimited web browsing, so it?s surely got to be a fab deal.
And if you are still not convinced, maybe the $50.00 GAP gift card you get on the $35.00 plan with an LG KEYBO mobile phone will convince you?
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
Could the tide have finally turned for beleaguered AMD who is suffering heavy casualties on both fronts in the war against Intel and Nvidia? Well, all of that might change with Advanced Micro Devices unveiling the brand new ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2. As at press time, benchmark figures have already been released, and this is now officially the fastest graphics card in the world, outperforming even the top-end GeForce GTX 280 from its bitter rival, Nvidia. This is good news for consumers, as they now have a new performance king to choose from, but it remains to be seen whether the software or game programmers will be able to match the performance and architecture of the ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 with the relevant, optimized code.
The ATI Radeon 4870 X2 will be priced at $549, and it will also have a less powerful counterpart rolling out next month for $349 – the ATI Radeon HD 4850 X2. Both cards will feature dual graphics processors which are linked together thanks to AMD’s CrossFireX technology and a dedicated bridge chip. Of course, if your motherboard and budget allows it, you can always hook up two of these cards for quad core graphics performance to match quad core computer processors from Intel. The graphics chips in the 4870 X2 is able to run at clock speeds of a whopping 750Mhz, while the slower 4850 X2 is no slouch either at 625MHz. The former will also come with 2GB of GDDR5 memory, definitely a class above the 2GB GDDR3 RAM found in the 4850 X2.
It is highly likely that the technology currently found in the 4870 X2 will also make its way into future AMD products. Some observations lean toward using a similar graphics processor in Fusion – the upcoming family of processors that AMD plans to roll out from next year onwards. Well, it remains to be seen whether the mainstream gaming market will give more momentum to the new 4870 X2, but I have no doubt Nvidia will sleep easy as they begin their quest of regaining the performance crown and bragging rights that come along with it back from AMD. Image courtesy of Joystiq.
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
Well it would appear Lindsay Lohan has a new love interest that she keeps close by wherever she goes; of course this new love interest is none other than the BlackBerry Bold 9000 mobile phone.
I got to say luscious Lindsay does look happy carrying the BlackBerry Bold 9000 with her everywhere; she must just adore its sleek styling, high resolution display and tri-band 3G data connection.
While us mere mortal of the everyday ordinary have to wait to get our greedy little hands on Research In Motion?s BlackBerry Bold 9000 mobile phone, it does appear that celebrity status does have it advantages with the likes of the luscious Lindsay Lohan and John Mayer getting to boldly play early with the BlackBerry Bold.
One can only say the BlackBerry Bold 9000?s high powered resolution is so deserving of luscious Lindsay?s love though. Oh to be a BlackBerry Bold.
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
Yesterday, Handmark announced the release of their GTS World Racing mobile game for the Apple iPhone and Apple iPod Touch.
With GTS Word Racing iPhone gamers can steer, break and accelerate their car simply by moving and turning the Apple iPhone or Apple iPod Touch device itself.
GTS World Racing for the Apple iPhone and Apple iPod Touch includes 64 track layouts along with a choice of multiple cars and difficulty levels.
GTS World Racing has been jointly developed by Handmark Game Studio, Aatraware and Pazzazz Games, and is available exclusively through Handmark via the Apple App Store at a one time purchase price of $7.99.
Furthermore, in addition to the use of the accelerometer feature and the unique interface, GTS World Racing also offers up a choice of music options of which the user can chose the music soundtrack or if they prefer use the music from their iPod to create their own purpose built game soundtrack.
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
If you are lucky enough to own an iPhone or iPod touch then you will probably know that there are thousands of applications you can download from the Apple Application store, but if you are worried about the possibility of downloading malicious or inappropriate applications then let me ease your mind slightly.
The chief executive of Apple, Steve Jobs told the Telegraph?s reporter Claudine Beaumont, that there is a ?kill switch? built into the iPhones operating system that would delete these malicious files remotely.
If you go to the Apple Application Store you can purchases additional software for your iPhone or iPod touch and you can also install some additional software for free.
Mr Jobs said that the ?kill switch? was just there as a precaution, and hopes they will never need to pull the lever. But he did add that if they didn?t have the lever then it would be irresponsible of them.
It was also reported by Beaumont that the Application Store has proved extremely popular since its launch. Around 60 million applications have been downloaded for the iPod touch and iPhone.
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
If you?ve only been expecting the Alexander from Motorola you?d be wrong because apparently Motorola are also cooking up the Motorola ?Atila? according to BGR.
The new Motorola ?Atila? mobile phone should be a touch-screen mobile device rather than a physical keyboard and run on Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional.
Spec wise you can expect the Motorola ?Atila? to pack full quad-band EDGE tri-band 3G, GPS, WiFi, Qualcomm 721a chipset, 1130 mAh battery, and measure 80 x 109 x 18.75 millimetres, which makes it at least comparable with the HTC Touch.
It is a shame the Motorola ?Atila? lacks a tad with only a 240×320 screen resolution, but that is offset somewhat by what looks to be a genuine trackball, so maybe it?s not such a bad mobile handset.
The Motorola ?Atila? mobile phone isn?t really going to revolutionise anything in the mobile arena, but it should be at the very least a cute little mobile handset, and is expected to be released from Motorola quite soon.
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
By Andrew Liszewski
Here’s another low-tech gadget for the spy who’s on a tight budget. If you’ve ever gotten a quote for a custom geosynchronous spy satellite, you’ll know that the price tag is usually well beyond what a non-government funded spy can afford. So here’s a decidedly simpler and considerably more affordable solution if you’re looking to do a little aerial reconnaissance. The Spy Kite features a delta wing kite made of fiberglass and ripstop material that’s capable of lifting a compact digital camera over 80 feet into the air. Presumably the camera can be remotely triggered using the kite’s handle, and I also assume the 80 foot altitude is only a limitation imposed by the wireless remote.
Once the kite is returned safely to the ground the digital camera can be connected to your PC via USB for downloading your shots, but I have no idea how many photos you can take or what the resolution is like. Though with a price tag of about $57 from Gadgetshop, I wouldn’t expect too much from it.
[ Spy Kite ] VIA [ Toyology ]
by Techno Witch on August 12, 2008
Hitachi has yet another camcorder fro the masses – the DZ-BD10HA Blu-ray Hybrid camcorder that is able to store all your favorite moments on a Blu-ray disc (theoretically able to hold up to 50GB of data in a double layer Blu-ray disc). As with every new device that rolls out, you can be sure that there will be its fair share of features and improvements. In this case, the DZ-BD10HA comes with a 7 megapixel CMOS image sensor that is capable of capturing both video and still images in 1,920 x 1,080 High Definition resolution without any problem whatsoever. More details to follow right after the jump, so stay tuned.
Despite the fact that Blu-ray discs are able to hold plenty of data, what happens when you’re at a event far away from any noteworthy electronic or computer store that carries blank discs, and you’re all out? Fret not – the DZ-BD10HA is here to save the day with a built-in 30GB hard drive that is more than capable of holding another 4 hours and 20 minutes of full High Definition video. Should you happen to be in a position where even all 30GB of hard drive space is used up, then you can always fall back on the third option – the integrated SDHC memory card slot. SDHC cards, as most of you are well aware, can hit a theoretical maximum of 32GB, but the more common capacities we see in the market these days range between 4GB and 8GB SDHC cards.
In addition to the three format hybrid compatibility, you will also find other useful features such as One-Touch Dubbing, Face Detection and Optical Image Stabilization to help you capture the perfect moment any time, every time. Hitachi has already released its DZ-BD10HA Blu-ray Hybrid for $999 in Japan last week, while folks living across the Pacific will be able to get hold of theirs this September.