Samsung Galaxy S II Has More GPU Firepower Than Any Android Device

Anandtech benchmarked Samsung's refreshed Galaxy S II phone over the weekend and discovered that its Mali-400 quad-core GPU contained within its EXYNOS chipset is not only powerful, but nearly 2x faster than any other Android device—phone or tablet.

The Samsung Galaxy S II was tested using GLBenchmark 2.1, and scored a 42.5. By comparison, the Samsung Infuse 4G scored a 25.5 and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 scored a 20.8. Apple's iPad 2, which runs the company's most current chipset, scored an 85.7.

White PS3 Coming to Europe and Australia in November

There's nothing a like an (almost) fresh and exciting color variant to make us totally forget about thePS4. Besides, this little dazzler will come with a 320GB HDD and two equally white Dualshock controllers, which means you'll only have to spray-paint your PS3 Move, headset, external drive to match. Look out for it at GameStop in the UK, Germany and possibly other Euro nations too, as well as at Electronic Boutique in Australia from November 1st.

 

 

Acer Iconia Tab A501 with HSPA+ hits AT&T on September 18th: $330 on Contract

The carrier just announced it'll start selling the 16GB model next Sunday, September 18th for $480 -- or $330 with a two-year contract. As planned, it'll ship with Android 3.0, and 3.1 is coming via an over-the-air update. You can sign up for a monthly plan, if you so choose, though you can also pay as you go, with $15 getting you 250MB and $25 expanding your allowance to 2GB. Customers who commit to two-year agreements will have the same choices, to be honest, except they'll also have to contend with overage fees -- $10 per gigabyte or $15 per 250MB, depending on the plan.

Remastered HD Star Trek: The Next Generation Episodes Could Stream to Netflix This Fall

Well, this news is a long time coming for most Star Trek Fans. Apparently, CBS is hard at work remastering the Next Generation as an HD offering, and will beam it to you via Netflix this fall.

While no official announcement has been made, the rumblings got a Geordi-sized boost earlier this month when actor LaVar Burton, he of the visor fame, tweeted that the remastering progress being made on a few select TNG episodes was going very, very well. Also complementing all that was Netflix's pre-existing relationship with CBS, which saw the DVD and streaming service beaming all Star Trek series episodes to customers.

The remastered HD TNG episodes could arrive as early as this fall on both Netflix and Paramount's Epix station, which coincides nicely with the purported start of filming for the rebooted Star Trek movie franchise. Cross promotion is so 24th century!

Bit.ly Quantifies Internet Impatience, Old Links Get no Love

Oh internet, we love your animated GIFs and sad Keanu websites, but how much attention are we really giving each link? According to a recent study by URL shortener Bit.ly, a standard link is clicked for an average of three hours until traffic subsides by 50 percent, eventually fading away into oblivion. If we're talking about a super timely news story like an earthquake hitting the east coast, well, its half-life was a paltry five minutes. When URLs are shared on social networks, they last around 3.2 hours on Facebook and 2.8 hours on Twitter, but those on YouTube persist more than twice that long. There, link half-life is 7.4 hours -- probably because it's home to phenom bomb memes.

 

 

Ecko Zip Earbuds Pump Tunes Through a Functioning Zipper

These in-ear beauts will set you back just 30 beans -- or about a half-dozen servings of Ron Ron Juice. Other offerings include the $13 Zone earbuds, $15 Chaos II (that Chaos I was off the hook), the $20 Stomp, $25 Lace (which include a shoelace-inspired cord), and the $40 Chain, which, as you probably guessed, features a beaded dog-tag chain cord. At those prices we wouldn't expect stellar acoustics, but if you're rockin' out to any of these budz, you're probably most concerned with lookin' good. And nothing says six-pack like zippers and chains. Get them here or just search on Amazon.

Windows 8 Boots Up Faster Than a Bull Ride

What's Microsoft got to compete with the MacBook Air's near-instant on? According to a recent demonstration from its Building Windows 8 blog, the ability to take a machine from fully powered off to booted up in just under eight seconds.

The key change behind the improvement? In Windows 7, all user sessions are closed, as are services and devices in the kernel session. Windows 8, though, doesn't close the kernel session. It puts it in hibernation mode. By writing the kernel session to a disk—instead of having to restore it completely with every start up—Microsoft has seen improved boot times of 30-70%.

If you want a complete shutdown, you'll still have the option to revert back to Windows 7-style. But why drive a Volvo when you can roll in a... uh... 30% faster Volvo? More.

 

 

This Is How 9/11 Looked From Space

Taken by the Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus camera on NASA's Landsat 8, this image shows the 9/11 attack site. If you think that this is not impressive, think again: it was taken the next day, September 12 at 11:30am.

The image shows New York and the smoke from the World Trade Center in true color. More here.

 

 

How to View a Private Youtube Video

It’s just simple if you know the URL of the private YouTube video that you like to see. You can easily see some of the still frames of that video even without the permission from the owner. Example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Or7--7Ny16Q

Just copy the ID of any YouTube video from its URL (in the above case, Or7--7Ny16Q) and replace it in the following links.

* http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Or7--7Ny16Q/0.jpg
* http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Or7--7Ny16Q/1.jpg
* http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Or7--7Ny16Q/2.jpg
* http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Or7--7Ny16Q/3.jpg

What actually the reason is that YouTube creates thumbnails of every video that’s uploaded in their server and those images are made public even in the case of private videos. An image is worth a thousand words. So, its easy for you to know what’s inside a Private Youtube Video.

 

 

Viewsonic's $200 ViewPad 7e Android Tablet now Available for Pre-Order

Viewsonic has been at the low-cost Android tablet for some time now, and it showed no signs of letting up on that effort at IFA last week, where it debuted its newViewPad 7e. If that managed to pique your interest, you'll be glad to know that the device is now available for pre-order for $199.99 (though there's still no promised ship date). 

That will buy you a 7-inch screen, a 1GHz Cortex-A8 processor, Android 2.3 for an OS, 4GB of built-in storage, a microSD card slot for further expansion, and even a mini HDMI port that will let you output full 1080p video. Get it here.

The Next Version of Android After Ice Cream Sandwich Will Be Called Jelly Bean

The next version of Android after Ice Cream Sandwich will be called Jelly Bean. It's supposed to pack "game-changing stuff" that was originally supposed to be on Ice Cream Sandwich but didn't quite make it in time.

Ice Cream Sandwich so looking sounds kinda crazy at this point but at least we know the name! I'd have much rather seen Jello (probably nixed for copyright issues since they have enough of that) or just jelly (jelly sounds incredibly funny by itself) though.

And if you want to take a look back into history at how far Android has come, these have been the updates to Android so far: Cupcake, Donut, Eclair, Gingerbread, Honeycomb and Ice Cream Sandwich.

Twitter Doesn’t Give a Damn Who You Are

Twitter had a meeting yesterday to talk about how big it was. But what really came across was that while Facebook and Google+ value your identity, Twitter doesn't care who you are, as long as you've got something to say.

Google Facebook and Twitter now all have similar products. But Twitter CEO Dick Costello (somewhat inadvertently) made it clear yesterday that while all three have social networking features and make money from ads, they are in fundamentally different businesses.

At a very basic level, Google+ and Facebook are in the identity delivery business, and Twitter is in the information delivery business. That's a powerful distinction. It reflects a fundamentally different conception of what's more valuable: information or identity. It also gets at who is more valuable, advertisers or users.

Google and Facebook's social products are committed to a real names policy. Both can serve someone up to a network of peers or advertisers with some degree of certainty about identity.

Twitter takes exactly the opposite route towards building a network. You can be anonymous, or use a pseudonym, or even impersonate someone else as long (as you indicate that it's a parody). It will still connect you to others on its network, and allow you to both serve and receive data. And that's working well, for everybody.

Twitter has more than 100 million active users—that is a user who logs on more than once a month—and more than 50 million who log in daily. 40 percent of its active users don't tweet at all. They just log in to read. (In common parlance, they're lurking.) The ones who do tweet are sending more than 230 million tweets per day. It's big now. Very big!

In short, Twitter doesn't care who you are, it's still going to serve you an ad. And oddly, that may be the most effective tactic of all.

 

 

Dell Jams a Terabyte of SATA3 SSD Storage Into Precision M6600 Laptop

Dell is tweaking some of the options offered on its Precision M6600 and M4600 mobile workstations. You can now choose to add 512GB SATA3 SSD drives and (in the case of the M6600) a 4GB NVIDIA Quadro 5010M card. The interesting thing though, is that the 6600 has space for three drives: two full size and one mini-card slot. That means you could outfit this 17.3-inch beast with a pair of 512GB SSDs and one 128GB SSD, for a grand total of 1.1TB of solid state storage. Of course, with each half-terabyte drive adding a whopping $1,120 to the price of this professional lappy it's not exactly for those on a budget.

 

 

Sony Ericsson's Xperia Play 4G Hitting AT&T on September 18th

Sony Ericsson's Xperia Play has made the natural GSM shift in the States in order to grace Ma Bell's airwaves, and despite the "4G" naming convention, this fellow will be topping out at HSPA+. In other words, LTE lovers will need to look elsewhere. This marks the first launch of a PlayStation-certified smartphone for AT&T, and given that it's been around the block a time or two, the carrier is (smartly) pricing it at just $49.99 on a two-year contract -- a buck-fifty less than what it launched for on Verizon Wireless. 

It'll ship with Android 2.3.3, a 1GHz CPU, Adreno 205 GPU, a 4-inch display (854 x 480) and will arrive in an exclusive 'stealth blue' hue. AT&T customers will also be blessed with a gratis Multimedia Dock (DK300) and MC100 music cable, not to mention seven pre-loaded games at no charge.

 

 

The Father of the eBook Is Dead

Michael Hart invented the ebook. The idea that gave the Kindle a reason to exist, has helped float the iPad to its peak, and is currently killing bookstores. But before all that, he just wanted books to be $0.00.

There's a good chance you've used Project Gutenberg, one of the internet's great treasures. Among its 37,000 free texts, available in a multitude of languages, all for free, are some of humankind's greatest written works. F. Scott Fitzgerald, Moby Dick, Jane Eyre, the Declaration of Independence—all for free. It's an incredible, if somewhat dated looking resource.

It wonder what Hart, who died Tuesday at 64, would think of his creation. Ebooks are now an enormously lucrative commodity—enough to put expensive pieces of plastic into eager hands. But that seems to run a bit contrary to Project Gutenberg's ethos, that words should be available to anyone for no charge. Of course, Gutenberg's collection is all public domain stuff, and a lot of things flying into Kindles isn't.

But whether that's what Hart wanted or not, digitized text has become about a lot more than knowledge and opportunity. More.

 

 

Apple Already Planning Third Campus

In addition to their circular "spaceship" campus, because of company growth, Apple is already in the early planning stages of building a third campus.

Cupertino Mayor Gilbert Wong told the San Jose Mercury News that Apple executives had confided in him that they are already planning a third Apple campus after they finish the "spaceship" building, that has been dubbed Apple Campus 2. Additionally, Cupertino city officials have suggested that a sculpture of Steve Jobs be added to the Apple Campus 2 plans.

The location and design of the third office-park-that-iPhone built hasn't been announced, and Apple has declined to comment about it. We're guessing they told the Mercury News that "Apple doesn't comment of future products."

 

 

Electrified Bacteria Army Kills Uranium, Gives Captain Planet a Run for His Money

A certain type of "hairy" bacteria may just be the answer to cleaning up radioactive spills. Scientists at the University of Southern California found that under certain circumstances, Geobacter sulfurreducens could make metals like uranium less soluble -- essentially turning the metal into hard droplets rather than being absorbed. Researchers discovered that by lowering the bacteria's temperature, it caused hair-like pili to extend, which enveloped the poison uranium and ultimately reduced it through long-range electron transfer. 

The breakthrough could help deplete sources of uranium or other radioactive isotopes where bacteria normally can't survive -- like from the Fukushima nuclear plant that devastated Japan earlier this year. Scientists believe they've only scratched the surface with this development and are optimistic about the future of bacteria "electromicrobiology," which we can only guess grew in popularity after this '80s classic hit the airwaves.

 

 

How Old Are You In Venusian Years?

I just found out that I'll celebrate my next birthday at the end of September and I am old, at least in Venusian years. Curious about your own age if you lived on Venus and used its shorter calendar?

If you are, then you should point your browser to Nerdiversary, a light-hearted website that uses your birthday to list upcoming timely events in your life. You can calculate your age on Venus and Mars and find out how many seconds you've been alive (hint: it's an immensely large number). It's a fun distraction when you have a few free moments on your hand.

An Office Chair Worth Dying In

The Sayl Chair is Herman Miller's minimalist masterpiece. After long weekends, I'm overcome by the feeling that I'll die in my office. That's a disturbing thought, but I'd feel mighty comfortable dying in a Sayl—I'd look good, too.

The world first saw the Sayl office chair last year with a Y-Shaped support designed to hoist up your body much like towers and cables hoist a suspension bridge. The streamlined design looks great and saves on materials. I can see my epitaph now: Hard-working, comfortable, stylish AND eco-friendly. At $499 the Sayl's cheaper than other high-design chairs and seems like a worthwhile investment. The chair will probably last forever—and might turn out to be the last place you ever sit down. Get it here.

Velocity Micro Cruz T410 Gingerbread Tablet

Looks like the T408 has company. Velocity Micro today announced the Cruz T410, the bigger brother to the recently unveiled eight-inch T408. The 10-inch tablet rocks similar specs as its smaller sibling, including a 1GHz Cortex A8 processor, Android 2.3, a front-facing camera, WiFi, and pre-loaded Amazon content. The budget Android tablet will be available this month, running $299.99 -- $60 more than the T408, but still fairly affordable in the tablet world. Get it here.

 

 

What Does Instagram Do To Famous Photographs?

Instagram is great for spicing up plain photographs taken by your iPhone. It has several filters, unlimited uploads and lets you share your photos with social networks like Twitter and Facebook. No wonder it has 200 million hosted images.

But what happens when those plain photographs are replaced with famous images? Check out the picture above that shows the Instagram version on the left and the original on the right. Does Instagram improve or diminish the quality of these memorable shots? Get the app here.

BlackBerry Torch 9850 Officially Coming to Verizon September 8th for $200

After over a month of speculation and rumors, Verizon is ready to get the BlackBerry Torch 9850 into the hands of eager customers. At a cost $50 higher than its arch CDMA nemesis (not to mention a couple weeks behind), Big Red has jumped aboard to offer the touch-only smartphone for $200 with a two-year agreement. The devices will begin selling online September 8th, with units showing up in stores a week later. 

 

 

New Moon Landing Sites Photos Are So Sharp They Show Detailed Rover Tire Marks

NASA showed images of the lunar landing sites in 2009, punching all moronic conspiracy theorists a new stupid face, Buzz Aldrin style. Now they have released new higher resolution shots taken again by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.

These images were taken with the low-altitude Narrow Angle Camera, according to Arizona State University researcher Mark Robinson, principal investigator for the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC):

You can also clearly see the Lunar Modules' descent stages. Now, if they can get it any closer, we would like photos of Aldrin's used underpants.

Nokia Wants You to Create its Next Iconic Ringtone

On the streets, in crowded restaurants, and even in movies, you've likely heard the same song ad nauseam for the last seventeen years: the rockin' default ringtone used on virtually every Nokia device since 1994. And while it's evolved over the years, Espoo's always taken upon itself to choose the next version of the iconic tune. For the next iteration, however, the company is leaving it up to you to be the creative genius, and is offering a reward of $10,000 for the best one.

Five submissions will be chosen as runner-ups, each getting their entry offered in the Ovi store as well as a smaller cash prize for their efforts. So if you've always wanted to hear your own creation blasting out of millions of phones each and every day, now's your chance -- you have until October 2nd to get that spark of musical innovation.

 

 

Geeky Multi-Tool Clips to Your Belt Loop

The Guppie is basically a streamlined, stainless steel multi-tool combined with a carabiner. Need to open a bottle? There's the Guppie, hanging from your belt loop. Need to do something besides drinking? The Guppie packs a 2-inch blade, an adjustable wrench, a high-intensity LED light, and a hex driver with storage space for four bits into a 4 ounce package that's very flat. Not for every task, but it's a smart little tool for $40. Get it here

 

 

Netflix Lands in Brazil, 43 Other Latin American Countries Within the Week

Netflix promised our friends in Central and South America would soon be able to enjoy the pleasures of Watch Instantly. Starting today with Brazil, and with 43 other Latin American countries to follow before September 12th, the pioneering streaming video service is making good on that promise.

 Customers in the land of Carnival can enjoy a free one-month trial, after which a subscription will run $14.99 a month in Brazilian dollars. The roll out will be staggered over the coming days, with most areas getting a price point equivalent to $7.99 in American currency and some having both English and Spanish language options.

ASUS G74SX-A1 Gaming Laptop

The 1982 Lockheed Sea Shadow may be rusting away in Suisun Bay, but its Commie-spooking contours haven't been forgotten. They apparently inspired the design of the Asus G74SX-A1, which just won a HotHardware recommendation for its cheese-eschewing looks as well as its performance, efficient cooling and realistic $1749 price tag.

For once, the Core i7-2360QM CPU coupled with a GeForce GTX 560M and generous 12GB dollop of DDR-1333 RAM actually conspired to surpass the manufacturer's 3DMark benchmark claims. It wasn't flawless though: overall computing performance was middling compared to rivals; the speakers were shoddy when it came to producing music rather than explosions; and the 17.3-inch Full HD display was slightly wasted on some games that only ran smoothly with high quality settings at 1280x720. 

 

 

Apple’s Already Hiring New Product Security Managers

Apple has opened up a series of corporate-level jobs, reports observe. These include positions for two "new product security" managers, to be based in Apple's home in Cupertino. The people will be responsible for "overseeing the protection of, and managing risks to, Apple’s unreleased products and related intellectual property," according to a description. The company is known to go to extreme lengths to keep products secret, even requiring veils over hardware in its own secure labs.

It is also hiring three new iOS software developers to work with the Maps team. "We want to take Maps to the next level and rethink how people use maps, location and geo information," Apple says in one listing. The page mentions that a successful candidate will be responsible for "implementing high-level user interfaces, new and innovative features, fixing problems and enhancing the performance of Maps."

Apple has been hiring new help for iOS Maps and geolocation technology for several months. The company may be hoping to come up with its own alternative to Maps Navigation, a Google app common on Android smartphones but which hasn't arrived on iOS as originally promised. Apple has said it will roll out a "crowd-sourced traffic" service within the next two years.

 

 

Inflatable Bicycle Helmet or Unused Prop from an Alien Movie?

I really can't tell if this model's beautiful life is about to be saved or snuffed out by some kind of bulbous brain sucker.

The description makes it sound like an inflatable bike helmet but that could be because the writer had one on his or her head as well, and it was controlling their actions, because that's what these bulbous brain suckers do.

I'll err on the side of sanity and say this is a bike helmet, and that it was one of five projects that won an award at INDEX this year. Called Hövding, the design is the work of Anna Haupt and Terese Alstin, and apparently erupts from the scarf around your neck when "it senses abnormal movement."

Yeah, anyway, for some reason or another I have this little suspicion that this helmet could be an example of form over function. Just a tad.

Microsoft Confirms Media Center will be in Windows 8

Windows Media Center fans can finally breathe again. After seemingly endless will they / won't they speculation Steven Sinofsky, the President of the Windows Division has confirmed in a blog post thatMedia Center will return for yet another go 'round in Windows 8. There's no word on any possible changes, only that the company has "work to do" concerning the quality and compatibility of add-ins. Wondering why it hasn't been in some pre-release builds?

 Between the potential for multiple SKUs (no details until closer to release, but it seems like you'll be looking for an Ultimate pack or something similar again to get everything) and simple engineering decisions as features are added and removed that's just the way it is. Another factor is that WMC isn't exactly mass market, as he cites stats indicating only 6 percent of Windows 7 users launched the app in July, with over half of those sessions lasting less than a couple of minutes. Meanwhile, IE apparently pops up on 88 percent of Windows 7 desktops.

 

 

Facebook Is Getting a Translate Button for Your International Friends

According to Inside Facebook, Facebook is currently testing a translate button for international users to getting around the language barrier. Facebook will provide a button to translate users' comments on the fly.

Inside Facebook reports that only a few languages, including Spanish, French, Hebrew, and Chinese, are currently supported, but that's just the start. The benefit of such a feature is pretty obvious; the people you couldn't talk to because the spoke another language can now be brought into the conversation. Cool. You potentially have the opportunity to broaden your circle of friends. But what about the privacy issue? Supposing you don't want people to translate the conversation you have with family members in your mother tongue? No word on that just yet. Hopefully Facebook gets it right.

 

 

Audi Announces A2 Electric Concept car, Uses Lasers to Ensure Safety of Future Humans

Lasers make everything better, including (but not limited to): microphones, kidneys and Audi's electric A2 concept. This newest flight of fancy uses a laser diode as the rear fog lamp, which projects a red triangle onto the road to let other drivers know you're there. The German car-maker has tricked out the rest of the EV's lighting system as well by implementing matrix beam technology using LEDs and microreflectors -- giving it high resolution, non-glaring beams and intelligent tail lights that change in intensity based on weather conditions. Claiming other state-of-the-art features like gesture controls instead of keys, and brake lights that glow brighter the harder you press, it sounds like this would be a pretty sweet ride -- if it ever makes it to market.

 

 

Amazon tablet coming in November for $250?

Much ink has been spilled in the rumor mill about a coming Amazonian tablet, and now those rumors look to be confirmed. Amazon is making the last few software tweaks before it goes on sale this November. The tablet is running a heavily skinned version of Android that was developed without any help from the folks in Mountain View. It apparently has a Cover Flow-esque UI, and is deeply integrated with all of Amazon's services (Cloud Player, Instant Video Player, Appstore, and of course the Kindle app). Best of all, it will reportedly cost a scant $250 -- not quite TouchPad territory, but well underneath the iPad's $500 price. Let the next great tablet war begin.

 

 

Mobee Magic Numpad for Your Magic Trackpad

Is the act of crunching numbers a daily task for you, and do you use a Magic Trackpad? Well, if actual keys or a calculator / mouse hybrid just aren't magical enough for you, then Mobee's Magic Numpad may just be. Despite its name, the Numpad is a $29 set of films that allows you to morph your Trackpad into one of three numeric "keypad" layouts, with software for enabling an on-screen calculator and setting macros. Adding Splenda to the strawberries, you'll also get a cleaning kit and erasable marker to customize your films even further. The Magic Numpad is available for pre-order now and should ship come this October.

 

 

Sony's Golden 'Magical Edition' PlayStation 3 Heads for Japan

The edition available will boast a 160GB hard drive, a single Dual Shock controller and a glorious icon on the lower-left of the machine. It'll be available in Japan this November for ¥33,780 ($440), but only in "limited quantities." So much for magic that lasts forever, huh?

 

 

Toshiba’s Wireless SD Goes Both Ways

Wireless SD cards are a smart product for forgetful/lazy/busy people. Toshiba's new FlashAir card is the first which allows you to transfer data both to and from the card—an idea that's got a lot of potential.

Eye-Fi's wireless cards are awesome. They allow you to automatically beam photos to your computer over Wi-Fi, and in the absence of a wireless network, to blast them directly to any device that can connect to Wi-Fi. Toshiba's FlashAir card does the same, but can both send and receive data wirelessly. If the technology catches on and there are two compliant devices—cameras for example—in range, they'll be able to exchange data as well.

The FlashAir is a logical evolution of wireless SD. The question is what exactly would you use it for? Toshiba clearly envisions people sharing photos between cameras, but that's actually not the best idea. Pro photographers will tell you that shooting photos with multiple cameras on one card can lead to corrupt files. Wireless hard drives already exist. Perhaps these cards could be useful as more tablets with expandable memory are released. Get it here.

 

 

I Hope These Philips Headphones Sound as Good as They Look

Philips hasn't really been a high-end manufacturer of anything for awhile now, so who knows how good they'll actually sound. But the company says that their semi-open-back headphones will have 40mm drivers that were designed and calibrated by the Philips Golden Ears panel of specialists. 

But there's a bit of a conceptual issue with these things: the inline iPhone remote/mic suggests they're to be used outside of the house. But unless you enjoy the general public hearing everything spilling forth from your phone, who would use a semi-open headphone anywhere but the privacy of one's own home? Expected to retail in the UK soon for somewhere around £250.

 

 

Toshiba's Glasses free 3D TV Launches in Europe This December

If you've been waiting for someone to take the glasses part out of the current 3D TV viewing experience, Toshiba has finally put a launch date on its glasses-free 3D TV.

The world's first to be available to the public at the size, the ZL2 will take its place at the top of the company's range of sets when it launches this December in Germany complete with an LED-backlit QuadHD resolution (3,840 x 2,160) LCD panel and Cell-processor basedCEVO engine technology within. The set will cost 7,999 euros when the 55-inch version launches. 

 

 

Facebook to Launch Music Service on September 22

CNBC is now confidently reporting that Facebook is set to launch a music service of some sort on September 22nd, which conveniently lines up with the company's F8 developer conference. Could that service also include a dash of Spotify? Maybe some Vibes?

 

 

The Sony Reader Wi-Fi

The Sony Reader isn't all that much presence in the States, where the market is largely dominated by Amazon, and, to a lesser extent, Barnes & Noble. The Sony Reader Wi-Fi does go a ways toward keeping up with the competition, offering up WiFi, an touchscreen, and the Pearl E-Ink display seen on past versions. 

The hardware is nice, though it doesn't feel quite as natural in the hand as the Nook or Kobo. The software also zips along quite nicely, and pinch to zoom functionality is certainly a welcome addition in the e-reader market. Unlike many other Sony Readers, the thing also does well for itself pricewise, at $149.

 

 

Samsung Launches YP-R2, YP-Z3, MP3 HD Compatible PMPs

Samsung has had its sights set on a PMP with MP3 HD support for some time now -- first announcing (and later killing) the IceTouch in 2010, and now launching the YP-R2 and YP-Z3 in markets including Russia and Korea. Claiming that the lossy/lossless HD MP3 sound is five times better than the standard variety, the company will put it to the test with access to Melon, Korea's largest 2.2 million song music store.

So far, Samsung has only confirmed the R2 has a 3-inch WQVGA full touch display, is .3-inches thick and weighs around 52 grams, while the Z3, on the other hand has a 1.8-inch display and measures in at 36 grams. The music players also support photo and text viewing, FM radio and 5.1-channel surround sound. 

The R2 comes in black and silver and costs 149,000 KRW ($140) for 4GB, and 169,000 KRW ($160) for 8GB. The Z3 comes in white, pink and blue and costs 89,000 KRW ($83) for 4GB, and 119,000 KRW for 8GB ($110).

Razer BlackWidow Stealth Keyboards Keep the Mechanical Keys, Ditch the Noise

You know what's great? Mechanical keyboards -- what with their satisfying clicks. You know what's less awesome? Having to listen to that obnoxious racket all day. Razer claims you can have your cake (in this case, tactile feedback) and eat it too (blessed silence!) with its BlackWidow Stealth Editions.

These are, more or less, the same boards that debuted last August, but with quieter switches and a matte finish. Both models are available now, with the same programmable keys and on-the-fly macro recording, while the Ultimate version adds "extreme anti-ghosting" to its already impressive noise pwnage. The standard model will run you a cool $80, while the Ultimate weighs in at a hefty $140.

Sony MDR-DS7500 Headphones Promise 3D Sound

Are you settling for non-3D sound to go with all of your 3D movies? You should be ashamed of yourself. Thankfully, Sony's looking out for you. The company's new MDR-DS7500 headphones promise 3D surround sound, thanks in part to the inclusion of Dolby Pro Logic IIz technology. 

The headphones have a number of different sound settings, serving different audio needs, including Cinema Mode, Game Mode, and Voice Mode. Also, that extra padding assures that they'll play nicely with your 3D glasses. The headphones will be hitting Japan on October 10th, running ¥49,350 ($643) for the full package and ¥24,675 ($321) for additional headphones. Extra dimensions don't come cheap, after all.

 

 

Windows 8 Explorer Tweaks Adds ribbon User Interface

Lots of things are getting tweaked, if not completely overhauled, for Windows 8. That includes the ever-present Windows Explorer. Just like many other Microsoft apps, the file manager will be adopting the slightly more finger-friendly ribbon interface.

But don't freak out about your precious screen real estate, the next version of Explorer will actually display more files than Windows 7 could by moving the details pane to the right-hand side and tweaking the padding. The up button has also returned and a slew of new keyboard shortcuts are being introduced.

Another Purported Chunk of the iPhone 5 or Is It the iPhone 4S?

Someone could cobble together a solid DIY iPhone 5 kit with all the purported next-gen parts leaked. The latest? A front panel part labeled N94, like previous supposed prototype parts. It looks just like the iPhone 4.

Which keeps the question alive: Is this for the true iPhone 5—which'll bear striking resemblance to the iPhone 4, at least from the front—or the expected cheap-o iPhone 4?

 

 

GScreen's Spacebook Begins Shipping this November, Doubles Your Laptop Editing Fun

Twins, like cupcakes, are universally regarded as a good thing. So, it stands to reason that GScreen's attempt to double your laptop's screen size would be an equally appealing idea. Turns out, duping a display took the Alaska-based company a wee bit longer to fully flesh out, but the time has finally arrived for its debut. Shipping this November, the aptly-named Spacebook will bring a capacious, portable desktop solution to on-the-go creative professionals.

The girthy, 10-pound rig won't be winning any style points from the svelte is better crowd, but that's easy to overlook given its dual 17-inch 1920 x 1080 screens, choice of a Core i5 or i7 processor, up to 8GB DDR3 RAM, 500GB of storage, NVIDIA's GeForce GTS 250 (1GB) and DVD burner -- all encased in a magnesium alloy frame. You can grab the entry level model for $1899, but the higher-end, two-headed beast will cost you $2099. Get it here.

The 9/11 Memorial App

The ten-year anniversary of the World Trade Center bombing is approaching fast and writer-director Steve Rosenbaum is preparing his 9/11 Memorial app to commemorate this occasion.

Rosenbaum made a semi-controversial decision to develop the 9/11 Memorial: Past, Present and Future app for the iPad only. Rosenbaum believes the iPad "was simply the best device on which to display it." Apple may have appreciated this exclusivity as Rosenbaum's app made it through the App Store approval process in a record 36 hours.

The 9/11 Memorial app will be free from September 1st to the 12th and will jump up to $9.95 when this promotion is over. It has hundreds of photographs and hours of video that details the event itself and the creation of Michael Arad's World Trade Center Memorial and 9/11 museum.

 

 

Galaxy S II LTE and Galaxy Tab 8.9 LTE Announced

Well, if you thought Samsung was done tweaking the Galaxy S II, you were very mistaken. The Korean company is getting ready to unveil the Galaxy S II LTE at IFA in Berlin this week, alongside an LTE version of its still elusive Galaxy Tab 8.9 -- and we'll be there to get some hands on time. Both devices are sporting an updated dual-core processor running at 1.5GHz, while the S II is also getting a size bump and moving up to a 4.5-inch screen. The Tab remains otherwise unchanged, rocking the same 1200 x 800 screen and super-svelte (8.6mm thick) design.

 

 

Diamond Planet Catches Astronomers' Eyes

If you thought Kim Kardashian's engagement ring was a ridiculous rock, you haven't seen the ludicrously large diamond planet, J1719-1438. Scientists at the Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne recently spotted this celestial body that's so dense, it's believed to be crystalline carbon -- i.e. a ginormous diamond similar in size to Jupiter. Since the 60s, astrophysicists like Marc Kuchner have theorized that carbon-heavy stars can burn out, crystallize and form diamonds under the right pressure.

Supporting the idea, a white dwarf star spotted in 1992, BPM 37093, had cooled and crystallized over the course of 12 years -- even copping the nickname "Lucy" after the Beatles jam. Although astronomers in Australia, Britain and Hawaii have all identified the newly spotted precious planet J1719-1438, they are still unsure if the crystallized carbon rock will be all sparkly mountains up close -- dashing the hopes and dreams of material girls everywhere.