Gadgets Base

Posted Feb 26th 2008 7:49PM by Darren Murph
Filed under: Desktops
If Stealth Computer’s LPC-450 was just a bit too diminutive for your tastes, you’ll be thrilled to know that the latest flavor has been opened up a bit to make room for a PCI card of your choosing. As was the case with the LPC-350PCI Little PC, this iteration includes PCI expansion slot capability along with a Core 2 Duo processor and an anodized aluminum chassis that could probably be dropped from the rear of a moving truck sans issue. Additionally, you’ll find Ethernet, USB (x3), FireWire, PS/2 mouse and keyboard connectors, a 160GB hard drive (or an SSD, if you choose) and an optional DVD burner to boot. Seems as if these are made to be customized, so feel free to give Stealth a ring if you’re interested in claiming one as your own.

Posted Feb 27th 2008 2:01AM by Chris Ziegler
Filed under: cellphones
What do you get when you cross LG’s Shine slider and Viewty full touchscreen candybar? If you guessed the “Vine” or the “Shewty,” well… no, you’d be wrong. If this ad posted over on Howard Forums turns out to be legit, you’d actually end up with the “Glimmer,” a phone that appears destined for Alltel (of all carriers) that combines a 2.8 inch capacitive touch display, numeric slider, 2 megapixel cam with flash, microSD slot, Bluetooth, and EV-DO. It’s unknown when the rather attractive metal-clad piece might launch, but the existence of prepared advertising leads us to believe it could be sooner rather than later, putting Alltel in the rare and enviable position of one-upping its larger counterparts with unique hardware. The Voyager proves that the touch / slide hybrid concept can work, so don’t be shy, Alltel, bring it on.

[Thanks, Bradley]

As you travel throughout your day, electrons are shifting all over your body. Sometimes, like when you pull your sweater off or slide out of your car, an excess of electrons attach themselves to your body (you are actually tearing them off of the other substance). When you next touch a piece of positively charged material (your car door, your computer, or perhaps a coworker), the electrons rush from you to the positive charge. The result: a static shock. Static shocks are fun, but only if you are zapping others. They can be painful and also quite destructive; once a static charge fries your laptop, you’ll know what we mean.

So we offer a very easy way to help painlessly get rid of unwanted electrons. Attach the Static Electricity Eliminator (SEE, for short) to your keyring, and you’ll always have it with you. If you think you are “charged,” simply hold the SEE and touch the rubber tip to a grounded object (a metal desk leg, your car door, a metal peg leg, etc). You will see a little face flash on the SEE’s screen, and you’ll know you are static free. It’s that simple. And with no batteries to worry about (because you are providing the electricity), you’ll be able to use your SEE for years to come. So shout with us, “I defy thee, oh daemon of static!” Come on, we said SHOUT!

Gimmie!

Suggested Price: $9.99

Posted Feb 26th 2008 2:54PM by Darren Murph
Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment
We’ve seen how Celrun does PMPs, and we’re equally impressed with how it has tackled media streaming. The Celrun TV (no kin to the Apple TV, we’re told) checks in with a 320GB hard drive, Ethernet / WiFi, a couple of USB ports, an integrated digital TV tuner and a slew of ports including HDMI, component and optical audio. The fun continues with support for AVI, MPEG1/2/4, DivX, ASF, XviD, OFF, FLAC, WAV, H.264, WMV and lots, lots more. No word on a price or release date, but we’ve all ideas this HD streamer won’t be straying too far from South Korea, regardless.

Posted Feb 26th 2008 12:27PM by Nilay Patel
Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video
Creative keeps slashing Zen prices — just a couple weeks after cutting the 32GB model to $299, it’s back with price cuts to the midrange. The 4GB Zen is now just $99, while the 8GB model falls to $149 — the same price as the 4GB ipod nano, for those of you keeping score at home. Not bad, not bad at all — but we’ll wait to see what comes of this Zen Share rumor first.

Solid Alliance, who have brought us many ‘far-out’ PC accessories have taken it back to the old school with these new Lego shaped USB disks.

The drives come in a 1GB size, in blue, green, yellow, red and black and you guessed it, are fully compatible with other Lego products. No price has yet been stated, but these are not exclusively for children!

Product [Solid Alliance] Via [Akihabara News]

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Choosing a college or university is no easy task.  There are so many factors to consider: social life, breadth of majors, sports reputation and gadgets.  Abilene Christian University (ACU) has become the first to offer iPhones or ipod touches to incoming students making the gadgets standard equipment for learning.  Almost makes me want to go back to school.

A matter of gadget faith
ACU will provide these devices to all incoming freshman.  The distribution of the converged devices will allow students to access several web apps the University has created to:

• receive homework alerts
• answer in-class surveys and quizzes
• access directions to their professors offices
• check their account balances
• and 15 more useful apps already developed

In fact, ACU is being held as a role model within the university circuit.  Apple flew ACU CIO Kevin Roberts to Cupertino for a presentation on where ACU is headed with its’ web application vision.  There is even a video.

And I call, “BS”
I am going to have to call this one out.  I am all for gadget proliferation, but these web apps sound more like a reason a student pitched why the University should buy the devices.  These are pretty weak reasonings to substantiate a gadget give-a-way. 

Maybe it will lead to advances in student behavior but I would have eBay’d the unit when I was a poor college student.  Now if you could access your text books via iPod/iphone, tests from previous years, answer keys, order Starbucks via WiFi…you get my drift.  Back when we were talking about a possible Apple tablet, the academic market would be a no brainer for Apple.  Maybe this is a baby step.

Is there anyone out there that wouldn’t have eBay’d this freebie in the first two weeks of school?

Read [ACU]

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Posted Feb 26th 2008 4:56AM by Nilay Patel
Filed under: Misc. gadgets
You know how we love wind turbines around here, but we love carnage even more — so we can’t get enough of this 200-foot tall Danish wind turbine shearing itself to bits after its brakes failed during a recent storm. The 10-year old windmill is the one of two different Vestas windmills to fail in Denmark in the past week — the company is launching an investigation, but might we suggest selling tickets instead?

[Via BoingBoing]

It looks like yet another competitor has popped up to take on the Asus Eee PC and the Everex Cloudbook. The latest UMPC is the Sungjut Tango X which has been announced for Korea only looks to be a nice offering. The Tango X is expected to feature a Via C7 processor, 1GB of RAM, 40GB or 80GB hard drive, Ethernet, Wi-Fi, USB, 4-in-1 card reader and perhaps most important, a 7-inch 800 x 480 touchscreen display. The Tango X also has a built-in Skype phone, which from the pictures appears to be set off to the side of the display. No word if or when we will see this hit outside of the Korean market.

Keep reading for a few more images of the Sungjut Tango X…

Via [jkOnTheRun] Images [akihabara news (french site)]

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Posted Feb 26th 2008 8:37AM by Joshua Topolsky
Filed under: Laptops

Aw snap. It finally, really happened… kind of. Apple has just dropped a nasty refresh on its MacBook and MacBook Pro lines, knocking the processor speeds up, and giving the Pros that tasty multi-touch the macbook air has been sporting. Still, they couldn’t break off an even slightly new form-factor for us? Both lines are sporting Intel’s downsized new Penryn chips, which should make your lap and / or battery quite happy. Right now we’re seeing updates to the GPU memory, an LED backlight (option!) for 17-inchers, as well as LEDs on all the rest of the Pros (sorry again MacBookers). New specs on the MBPs include a CPU boost to a base speed of 2.4GHz all the way up to 2.6GHz, that suspiciously new 3MB or 6MB L2 cache on the CPUs, added RAM to the graphics cards (up to 512MB for the higher-end 15-inch, and all 17-inch models), and of course the new trackpad. On the MacBook front, things look even more familiar, with only minor bumps to speed (2.1GHz up to 2.4GHz) and CPUs. Both new lines get hard drive increases, with the MBPs rocking 200GB or 250GB options, while the MBs range from 120GB all the way up to 250GB. Ports, weight, and size all appear to be just the same for both lines, undoubtedly to the chagrin of many readers, and Apple is skimping on the Apple Remote across the line; it’s now a $19 add-on. Full SKU rundown after the break.

Update: Just to make it totally clear, Apple confirmed to us that the processors are indeed Penryn, as noted above. As for future updates and notable omissions in this round, they had little to say.

MacBook

• $1,099 - (White) 2.1GHz, 1GB memory, 120GB HDD, Combo drive
• $1,299 - (White) 2.4GHz, 2GB memory, 160GB HDD, Double-layer SuperDrive
• $1,499 - (Black) 2.4GHz, 2GB memory, 250GB HDD, Double-layer SuperDrive

MacBook Pro

• $1,999 - (15-inch) 2.4GHz, 2GB memory, 200GB HDD, Double-layer SuperDrive, NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 256MB
• $2,499 - (15-inch) 2.5GHz, 2GB memory, 250GB HDD, Double-layer SuperDrive, NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 512MB
• $2,799 - (17-inch) 2.5GHz, 2GB memory, 250GB HDD, Double-layer SuperDrive, NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 512MB

Hi-res LED screen for 17-inch is $100 extra, 2.6GHz processor is another $250.