March 4, 2008
Filed under: Desktops, Laptops
They've finally, really done it. Your good friends in the hacking community have apparently come up with a solution to get you
Vista -- should you want it -- activation free. According to a report, there's now a cracked, full version of Vista floating around that totally circumvents that cumbersome and costly activation process. The crack supposedly stems from OEMs (and end users) that were fed up with that process, and somehow persuaded Microsoft to pull an up-up-down-down maneuver and make the OS work, sans activation. The software utilizes System-Locked Pre-Installation 2.0, embeds OEMs BIOS files (signed by Microsoft), and passes all of the company's Windows Genuine Advantage checks. Of course, maybe it's possible that the folks in Redmond care more about users adopting Vista than they care about them paying for it. Nah, probably not.
[Via
Techdirt]
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: Storage
Not quite a year after Samsung joyfully brought the
Spinpoint MP1 into the world, the MP2 has arrived to rightfully take the baton. According to Sammy, the 2.5-inch drive is best suited in desktop replacement lappies, workstations and blade servers, and it's said to provide quicker read / write speeds than the
500GB M6 announced at CES. The 7,200 RPM drive is slated to land at $299, but an 80GB version will be available for a bit less cash, too. In less sluggish news, the firm has also
restated its plans to deliver a 256GB SSD by 2009, and if you were looking for even more bulletin board material, Jim Elliott, vice president of memory marketing for Samsung Semiconductor, proclaimed that it was "trying to double SSD capacity every 12 months." Music to our ears? You bet.
Read - Spinpoint MP2
Read - Samsung's SSD plans
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: Desktops
Last September, Lenovo tooted its horn quite loudly with the introduction of the environmentally-friendly
ThinkCentre A61e. Fast forward a few months, and it's the same song and dance once more -- with even
more
green this time, though. The ThinkCentre M57 / M57p machines won't blow anyone away in terms of raw horsepower, but they are the first desktops from any PC maker to garner GREENGUARD certification. Additionally, these power-sipping rigs are EPEAT Gold rated, Energy Star 4.0 rated, and the first ThinkCentres with recycled material from consumer plastics. Internally, you'll get to choose from a range of Intel Celeron / Core 2 Duo CPU options, up to 2GB of DDR2 RAM, integrated graphics, an 80GB / 160GB hard drive and not much else. 'Course, with prices on the M57 starting at $699 and an understandable focus on energy-efficient components, we wouldn't expect much different.
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: GPS
Thought TomTom was done after introducing the
GO 930 and 730 at CeBIT? Think again, as the company is also unveiling the GO 530, which is the reported successor the
GO 520. For starters, this one is slated to arrive and stay in Europe, and its map content will depend largely on what region it is purchased in. As with its higher-numbered siblings, this bugger will also boast IQ Routes and the Advanced Lane Guidance, and it'll also feature a 4.3-inch 480 x 272 resolution display, a 400MHz CPU, 1GB of internal memory, an SD expansion slot, built-in Bluetooth and a Li-ion cell good for around 5 hours. If all that's good enough for you, it'll be ready to grab this April for around £235 ($466).
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: Gaming
After Nathaniel's nostalgic Xbox 360 was quite literally
wiped clean when sent in for repair, we had a sneaking suspicion the powers that be would make sure things were rectified. Thankfully, the bigwigs at Bungie are already conjuring up a solution that it hopes will "come very close" to acting as a replacement. According to Bungie community director Brian Jarrard, his team is "rallying to help fix this unfortunate situation," and while no details beyond that have been divulged, we can't help but suspect that the resolution to all of this will be more than satisfactory.
[Thanks, Steve]
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment
Lots of news on the VUDU front today, starting with the announcement that the grossly overpriced
VUDU XL is finally shipping to all three people who forked out for one. Moving on to more important matters, the forthcoming v1.3 software -- which is hitting barely a month after
v1.2 was loosed -- will open up the VUDU Vault. Put simply, this feature will "enable consumer to move owned titles from the VUDU hard drive to a secure area on VUDU servers to free up space for additional purchases." As expected, the feature will only be available on "select titles," but hey, we suppose we'll take what we can get. Moving on, VUDU is also announcing the $39 IR receiver kit for both the original STB and the XL, which will "allow for the operation of the service using approved programmable remotes." Lastly, v1.3 will bring about a numerically listed Most Watched overlay as well as improved searching for TV episodes. No word on when the update will start being pushed out, but we'd guess it'll be sooner rather than later.
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: Tablet PCs
It may not look all that different from its previous
xTablet T8600, but MobileDemand still seems to have found plenty to brag about its new xTablet T8700 rugged tablet PC, which it says offers the "industry's highest performance" in addition to "superior ruggedness." That performance is centered around a 1.2GHz Core Duo processor and a standard 2GB of RAM, which certainly isn't much compared to consumer laptops and tablet PCs, but is pretty uncommon in a rugged tablet of this class, which are usually
saddled with a Celeron or the like. On that other, even more important matter (at least for anyone in the market for one of these), you can expect an MIL-STD 810F rating for ruggedness and an IP 65 rating for sealing, which you can see put to the test in video form on MobileDemand's website. Needless to say, none of this exactly comes cheap, with a hefty $3,795 required to call this one your own.
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: Laptops
You already knew those lucky souls over at
PC Perspective had a U2E of
their very own, but now that you're done gawking at the unboxing shots, how's about a bona fide review? Thankfully, ASUS' 11-inch ultraportable is indeed the latest lappie to be put through the proverbial paces, and as expected, it performed like a champ -- considering it's wee size, of course. The machine didn't blow by any benchmarking sessions or anything, but again, it was never meant to be your primary gaming rig when heading off to a LAN party. All in all, reviewers found very (and we stress
very) little to complain about, and even went so far as to call it "one of the best notebooks to hit the ultra-mobile market, ever." Not at all enthused about the
MacBook Air or
Lenovo X300? Then by all means, give that read link some love -- chances are the U2E is just what the doctor ordered.
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: Storage
No, this isn't the
first time we've heard of innocent consumers snagging some new kit only to find random bits of unwanted garbage in place of the actual product, and unfortunately, we've all ideas it's not the last. This go 'round, a couple waltzed into Best Buy, snagged a "brand new" $300 hard drive and zoomed home to start packin' those platters. Much to their dismay, no HDD was found inside the box -- rather, three bags of dried beans weighed it down enough to not seem suspicious. As expected, Best Buy wasn't about to refund any money for fear that the actual purchasers could be the culprits, and while that's certainly understandable, we're quite relieved to know that a little outside intervention netted the two a $300 gift card to the retailer. We bet they'll inspect that package a bit more closely before taking it home next time (sad though that may be).
[Image courtesy of
DKImages, thanks Craig]
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March 4, 2008
Filed under: Gaming
The
Rock Band drum kit continues to attract
modders of all stripes, and we're loving the crazy directions people are taking it -- like this beatboxing kick drum mod from Kevin Child. It's a simple hack -- Kevin simply used a Thumper vocal-percussion mike to activate the pedal trigger -- but it's pretty sweet in action, responding to nearly any noise he makes. We'd love to see this thing filtered through a computer with the different pads assigned to various frequencies so you could straight up bust out like Rahzel in your living room, but we'll take what we can get for now. Video after the break.
Continue reading Rock Band drum kit modded for beatbox control
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