SlashGear » James Allan Brady

Clari-Fi Review – for the betterment of your audio experience

James Allan Brady — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 14:05:10 +0000

So, I’ve had the Clari-Fi for almost two weeks, I know it’s only been a couple of days since I posted about it, but I wanted to get a feel for whether it was working or not before I said anything. Bottom line, it is working. It is also worth the extra dough.

I went back to just my headphones and iPod earlier today, and the sound wasn’t horrific, because I try and rip my music at 320kbps, but it was decidedly worse. Now I want my Clari-Fi back. So, one concern I had about it prior to receiving it was that it was going to be constantly coming disconnected since it added an extra connection between me and my music, however that is not the case, I can assure you that, so, if you were having the same doubts, I assure you that won’t be an issue.

One thing I tested out and found that it worked was that my FM Transmitter, an admittedly generic unit, would constantly have spikes in it while using it, and it would always have this quiet, but high pitched ringing sound in the background whenever using it. I attached the Clari-Fi to my FM transmitter and tried it again, thinking it might help, and sure enough it did, in fact it was so clear it was almost like as if I had a direct line-in into my stereo. So, if you have an FM transmitter already, and you are going to buy a Clari-Fi for your headphones, I definitely recommend using it with your FM transmitter as well.

Overall my time with the Clari-Fi has been pretty great. It does exactly what it says it does, it will clear up your audio, and I busted out the original headphones that came with my iPod and didn’t notice as much of a difference, so, if you’ve got $60 and are looking to improve your listening experience and you are still using the stock earbuds, I’d recommend spending it on some new headphones, they’ll have a similar effect on your audio as the Clari-Fi. On the other hand, if you’ve already got a nice pair of headphones, and you’ve got $60 that you are willing to spend on enhancing your audio, I’d definitely recommend the Clari-Fi, for that reason, I give it 3 out of 5 gears.

Rating:

3 out of 5 gears

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Corruption Abroad: Prominent prosecutor in case against The Pirate Bay hired by Warner Brothers

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 18:38:14 +0000

So there is still an open case against the TPB, with several companies listed as plaintiffs, but one of the major ones being Warner Brothers. The lead investigator of the case throughout this trial has been Jim Keyzer, well it turn out he recently became employed by the Warner Brothers.

This investigator was the lead over the entire preliminary investigation, had a case cancelled where TPB was suing several of the same companies for data trespassing, and has fairly extensive involvement overall. Then all of the sudden he goes and changes his employer to one of the Plaintiffs?

Seriously, how is this case still going on? I really didn’t want to do another story about the Pirate Bay a second day in a row, but this is a little bit much to be ignored. The whole case is nothing but an exercise in court theater, they still haven’t even managed to get around to determining whether what TPB is doing is unlawful or not, they are too busy digging in other areas that are totally irrelevant trying to find something to bust TPB on.

The bottom line is that what TPB does is not unlawful. However what Mr. Keyzer did very well could be, and if it’s not it should be, I mean talk about having a clear bias against the defendants. I already recognize that 90% of the time or more officers already have a bias towards the plaintiff or the defendant, but they usually manage to keep it at least somewhat objective, I’d say receiving a paycheck from either party kind of puts a nix on any level of objectivity.

[via thepiratebay]

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BenQ MID – more info coming out of the woodwork

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 18:11:38 +0000

The more specs we get the more I think this might be an Asus Eee shrunken down to fit in an MID package. It has an 800 MHz Silverthorne processor, Poulsbo chipset, half a gig of RAM, and a 4GB SSD.

For connectivity you get your choice of HSDPA, WiFi in 802.11 b/g varieties, and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR. This MID will obey your every command, almost literally, it will as long as it recognizes the command.

There is also an option for GPS so you can knock that extra device out of your life with this thing. It uses BenQ’s G-Sensor for direct touch and free movement on the screen. Plus it looks like it has a custom MID OS, not some dumbed down version of Windows, which is actually kind of nice because it makes it easier to do the things that it’s actually convenient to do on these devices.

[via ITechNews]

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Navigon 2100 Max – thin, light, and easy to use and I’ve got it for review

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 17:51:03 +0000

Navigon is quickly rising to the top in the Personal Navigation Device market, even superseding TomTom and Garmin in many areas. Their latest PND is the 2100 Max, which is coincidentally one of the few upgradeable GPS units on the market. It also has a 4.3-inch Widescreen, Text-To-Speech functionality, lane guide assistance and speed warnings along with a fairly comprehensive list of Points of Interest; I mean there were more than a couple points listed in the little town I live in.

With the 2100 Max you get Reality View which gives you a 3D photo-realistic view of difficult intersections and things like that. You also get DirectHelp which will give you quick directions to emergency facilities and/or contact numbers for those same agencies, so you can find the police station, hospital, pharmacy, or car service station that is closest to you.

You can also get live traffic information via an accessory for the 2100 Max, on top of that you can sign up to get FreshMaps which are 12 quarterly map pack updates, and ZAGAT Survey Ratings and Reviews for hotels and restauarants, those are the upgradable options and cost $99.99, $79.99, and $39.99 respectively. The Unit itself has an SD card slot which is occupied by the Maps card, a mini USB port which is only used for charging, a car charging cable and a USB charging cable as well as suction cup mounting brackets.

I recently got this unit in for review, and I haven’t had a chance to actually put it to use, but it is extremely small for a GPS unit, not in a bad way, like the screen is unreadable, because it’s not, its 4.3-inches big and the voice reads off any and all directions to you so you don’t really have to look that much. Its small as far as weight and thickness go, I mean it’s about as thick as my Motorola Q9h and no thicker and it’s about as heavy too, it’s extremely easy to hold and use. The best part was that I handed it to someone who I don’t consider tech savvy, nor do they have any experience with GPS units, and it had a charge fresh out of the package and this person was able to use it and navigate the menus with ease, and most importantly without bugging me with a bunch of questions. So, without even having used it for navigation I can already say it’s worth the $300 asking price but I’ll report back with more.

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Clari-Fi Music in for review – it’s really small

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 16:43:09 +0000

So I wrote this article the other day regarding the Clari-Fi and suggested that it might be a waste of money. Well, the company contacted me and promptly shipped me a unit for review; I am pleased to say that it is not a total waste of money as previously suggested.

I can’t quite confirm that its worth $60, but the documentation that came with it said you wouldn’t really notice the difference until you’d been using it for a couple weeks and then switched back to just headphones. However some initial tests did show a favorable correction of the audio from my iPod Touch.

By the way, the documentation also said that the better the headphones you are using the more likely you are to hear the difference so I am using my Bose Tri-Ports, which will hopefully be sufficient. Like I said, I have so far noticed a difference, it does in fact lower the volume, and it also has saved me a marginal, yet noticeable amount of battery life. So, I’m going to give it a couple of weeks and report back with my findings, but if you considered buying one, I definitely would not argue with you regarding the purchase.

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Mophie Juice Pack for iPhone in for review at iPhone Buzz

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 16:27:04 +0000

The Mophie Juice Pack on its own weighs in at 3 ounces and measures at 2.4×4.75x.75 inches and latches on to your iPhone. Once connected you get 250 more hours of standby, 24 more hours of audio playback, 8 hours of additional talk time, and 7 hours of Video playback time, according to Mophie.

Initial impressions are good, Vincent says that it doesn’t make it any less comfortable to hold or carry the iPhone upon first impression, which is good. One thing Mophie advertises is that its units are sold with a fully charged battery, but Vincent’s unit arrived with only about a 75% charge.

One thing Vincent really liked, and I like from the photos, is that just like your MacBook Pro there is a battery meter on the back with LED lights representing the charge and a test button, so you can quickly check how much battery life you have left. The Mophie Juice Pack leaves the buttons on the side open, doesn’t cover the top, and has a cut out for the camera. Furthermore, the speakers are left open and it connects to charge and to sync via a standard dock connector, so you don’t have to remove the Juice Pack to charge it, your iPhone, or to sync the iPhone with your computer.

[via iPhoneBuzz]

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Sony XEL-1 broken down – shot from the dissection at the Embedded Systems Conference

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 16:12:52 +0000

For some reason the announcement of a newer, thinner OLED TV by Sony and the attention of an event gave someone cause to disassemble an 11-inch OLED TV that costs $2500. It’s 3mm thick, so reassembly was probably harder than disassembly.

Anyways, something interesting to find out was that the mainboard, which seems disproportionate to the rest of the TV, is in fact the same board as those found in Sony’s Bravia line of TV’s, just shrunken down to fit into this amazingly thin TV. I must admit when I first saw the above picture I thought it was a weird motherboard with a lot of hard drives plugged in, but nay, it’s the back of the opened up XEL-1.

OLED is an amazing technology, and if you’ve never seen an OLED screen I assure you they are simply amazing to look at. Hopefully they can stop working on the thinness of the televisions and work on making them a more practical size for an affordable price, like something above 11-inches for something less than $2500.

[via HackADay]

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Cizmo CX15 notebook computer – has GeForce 8800M GTX inside

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:54:06 +0000

Other than the fairly amazing graphics technology that is packed inside of this notebook, courtesy of NVIDIA, it also has a Core 2 Duo Processor. Add to that the 4GB of RAM and the SATA hard drive running with a 15.4” screen and you’ve got a pretty amazing machine.

You get your choice of processor speeds ranging from 2.26GHz, 2.4GHz, 2.53GHz and that’s it. On the Hard drive side you get your choice between a 32 and 64GB SSD drive.

Also, that 15.4” display isn’t your standard 15” display; it is FullHD with a 1920×1200 resolution. You also get WiFi in the form of 802.11n, sadly there are no pricing or availability details on this notebook, but I can tell you that this news comes from an Italian notebook website, so I wouldn’t really expect to see this outside of that region.

[via itechnews]

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Energy Saver Bar – a power strip with a giant off switch

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:46:18 +0000

The Energy Saver Bar is a lot like that gadget that Belkin came up with, but far less cool. Essentially you plug in all of your home theater equipment, preferably the kind that won’t suffer drastically from having its power completely cut, and then when you are done, you turn ever thing off, and then hit the button on this power strip and watch the energy savings go up.

The wire on the switch is 1.5 meters away, but for that “luxury” you pay 20 Euros instead of the 3-4 Euros of a normal power strip where you have to bend over to flip the same switch. It does, however, appear to also have straps built in so you can easily mount it, it appears a bit sturdier than most power strips, and it seems to have rotating receptacles so you can fill up the strip instead of wasting ports because the plug is too large, so, it could be worth it.

Belkin’s design on the other hand came with a wireless switch that also looked cool, it also had more plugs on it, and it even had a pair that weren’t shut off, so you’d have the option to leave some things running like your TiVo and SlingBox or your Router and Modem. However the Belkin option probably costs even more.

[via RedFerret]

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Sanyo Xacti DMX-CA8 – the waterproof Xacti you’ve been longing for

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:32:53 +0000

This new Xacti is waterproof, to an extent. The thing is, its not some weak extent like you can splash it and probably still be safe, no, you can take this thing up to 1.5 meters deep and hold and use it there for up to an hour.

It has an 8MP CMOS sensor, new “face chaser” technology that even works underwater. It records in MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 at up to 60 frames per second at a VGA resolution. You also get a 5x optical zoom so you can get close up to the things you really care about in a photo.

Word is, this camera is almost exactly like the DMX-CA65 but waterproof. Akihabra News said they’d like to see a 16:9 and 720p version in the future, and they just might get it, but only time will tell. No word on price or availability but the guys over at Akihabra said they were only just now even allowed to talk about it, so it could be a while.

[via AkihabraNews]

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Audioengine AW1 Premium Wireless Audio Adapter – no more messing with speaker wires

James Allan Brady — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:20:53 +0000

Well, actually you still have to mess with speaker wires between the speakers and their power source, but the audio input source can now be connected wirelessly. This wireless audio adapter was made for use with Audioengine’s A5 speaker system, which after reading this guy’s review of those, I’d love to get my hands on a pair, anyways, you can use this with any speakers or sound system, so it’s not exclusive to Audioengine’s equipment.

So, there are two bricks, each has a male USB connector and a female headphone jack on them. The USB port on both is used to power the devices and that is all, the headphone jack on one is an input, on the other, an output.

These two devices work on the 2.4GHz band, but use a protocol that isn’t affected by WiFi, microwave ovens, Bluetooth, mobile phones, cordless phones, or any of that other stuff that normally buggers things up. You get one USB charging block for your home outlet to plug one of them into, the speakers they are intended for have powered USB ports on them, so presumably you’d plug the other one into that, then you get a pair of headphone cables with male connections on both ends and one Y-splitter with RCA jacks on the other end.

So, setup is pretty basic and almost completely self explanatory which is nice. So, you hook one end up to your speakers or stereo and the other up to your iPod, computer, cell phone, whatever you want as long as you can jack it into a headphone jack, the downside of this system, and there is pretty much only one considering the range is 100ft. and it can transfer data at up to 340Mbps, is the price which is $149.99.

[via the-gadgeteer]

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Are product ship dates affecting sales numbers in the tech industry?

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 17:39:01 +0000

Back in the day buying something and it being outdated the day you got it wasn’t out of the norm. However it also wasn’t that big of a deal since by the time the next big product was announced you already had your new stuff and you were happy with it, because you had it now unlike all your friends who had to wait on the next greatest thing to actually arrive. These days the game is a lot different though.

With ship dates being pushed back at an alarming rate in today’s tech industry, be it due to production issues, shipping delays, or quality assurance problems, almost every major product that gets a release date along with its announcement gets that date pushed back. That’s not even the real issue at question here, what do you do when you pre-order the latest, greatest, and best product there is and then a similar product comes out before your pre-order is shipped?

Things are actually happening that fast, gone are the days when the next best product is announced around the same time as the product you ordered is being delivered. Now new products are being shoved out the door so fast and so competitively that in some situations, due to delays, the next best thing is already being sold at brick and mortar stores by the time your product gets shipped.

Take for example the CloudBook, it was hyped up to the hilt all the way until its release date, then less than a week later, while shipments were still suffering delays in China, it was already being made old news by the new HP 2133. How do manufacturers deal with such adversities?

My best recommendation is to make launch dates and announcement dates a lot closer so your product doesn’t lose all its hype before you can actually sell the damned thing. On the consumer side you are stuck with the same dilemmas, how do you as a consumer determine whether you should go ahead and get what is possibly the subpar product or do you cancel your order and go with the new widget?

I can no longer base my major electronics purchases on the actual products because they get bested by competitors so quickly. These days I’ve been driven to base my decisions on which product I think more other people will buy or which product will have the largest community of users behind it or which one is from the more reliable, consistent Company. No longer can I make my purchasing decisions based on such arbitrary things as which product is actually the better product.

What do you think manufacturers could do to solve or help eliminate some of this overlap? Or, do you think this type of overlap is better for the market and shouldn’t be ended, but encouraged? Most importantly, if you were put in a situation where you had to choose between going with the product you’ve already ordered and the one coming out in a couple weeks, what would/have you do(ne)?

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Corsair FB-DIMM kits hit 2GB and 4GB with new High-Density memory line for Mac Pros

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 17:19:27 +0000

Both kits have two sticks each in them operating at 667MHz. You have your choice of 2×1GB sticks or 2×2GB sticks. The Memory is fully buffered and is 100% compatible with your Mac Pro and comes with a lifetime warranty.

So, all in one day Mac Pro users get a new graphics card option from NVIDIA, the best graphics card manufacturer there is on the planet, and a new memory upgrade option from Corsair, the best memory manufacturer on the planet. I’d say any Mac Pro user must be feeling extra important today, all things considered they are already using the best desktop computer there is on the planet.

Corsair also has a Mac notebook memory line as well, if you are a Mac Pro and a MacBook Pro owner looking to upgrade the RAM on both. These two kits however were tested at Apple’s laboratories in California to make sure everything works and is up to snuff, and they do work, the price isn’t bad either at $165 for the 2GB kit and $225 for the 4GB kit.

[via Corsair]

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Fujitsu working on new wood-shelled notebook – tree-hugging hippies beware

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 17:08:36 +0000

The laptop, from top to bottom, is covered in wood. Then there is the semi-creepy hemp bag that is either part of the laptops wooden casing or just comes with the laptop, it would be cool either way.

Personally I think both of these notebook look simply amazing, however word on the streets is that wood isn’t the most lightweight component you can make something out of, so I don’t want desktop replacement weight with Eee like performance just for the sake of what looks good. Also, that green keyboard and trackpad is rather ghastly.

The bamboo design that Asus has was along the right idea as I hear that wood is extremely lightweight. Maybe Fujitsu should look to them for guidance, but if Fujitsu can fit a decent laptop inside a wooden shell for a remotely reasonable price I’m sure they’d sell like hotcakes.

[via geekologie]

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3D-R1 robot scanned entire silver mine in 3.5 days, on its own

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:57:38 +0000

Robots are picking up quickly, just take a look at this little bugger which managed to go into a more or less unexplored silver mine in San Jose and scan the whole thing. It was equipped with a laser scanner and made more than 80 scans a day creating over 100 million data points that formed the map.

The purpose of the exercise was so that if the heights or shapes of certain parts of the cavern changed, a precursor to collapses or other trouble, the people running the operation would be able to notice it ahead of time and either support the area or keep everyone away from it. So basically this robot has the potential of saving lives.

This is just one use for this particular machine though. I’m sure now that its proven itself worthy its uses will be greatly expanding, it may not be an R2 unit or C3-PO, but its nice to see robots being used in places where you never thought you’d see them.

[via DVICE]

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Onkyo spits out three new HD home theater receivers – they’re a bit on the affordable side

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:49:22 +0000

Starting with the TX-SR606, then the TX-SR576, and lastly the TX-SR506, all packing 7.1 capabilities, HDMI ports, Dolby and DTS technologies, and not a single one prices below $500. For Onkyo, the $800 price tag of the most expensive of the three is comparatively affordable.

They make some of the best audio components on the market and as such most of their kit hits well over the thousand dollar price point for each component. Occasionally you can catch one of their cheaper HTIB systems for a reasonable price but those only give you a small taste of what the company’s entire offerings are capable of.

Now, back to these three units, they all push out either 130 or 140 watts per channel which should be more than enough to drive your speakers, they all have 3 HDMI inputs, and they support the following audio technologies: Dolby Digital EX, Dolby ProLogic IIx, DTS-ES, DTS 96/24, and DTS Neo:6. The top of the line of the three, the TX-SR606 also supports Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio as well as Dolby Digital Plus, DTS-HD, Bi-Amping capabilities, and video upscaling to 720p or 1080i.

All of the receivers are optimized for MP3 and AAc tracks and include Audyssey Dynamic EQ loudness correction, so your audio sounds less crappy when compressed. All of them are also iPod-Compatible and the TX-SR606 also has RIHD functionality. All three will be available next month in your choice of Black or Silver, for a quick price recap, the 606 is about $800, the 576 is about $600, and the 506 is about $500.

[via TechDigest]

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Samsung and Armani partner up for new LCD Television – for the brand-whore in you

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:36:36 +0000

The screen stats are as follows: they are 1080p LCD panels, they come in 46 or 52 inch sizes, and they have a 100MHz refresh rate, HDMI ports, and a color changing logo on the TV. They also come with two remotes, a small pebble-shaped one that does the basics of changing channels and upping the volume, the second is a larger backlit one that controls everything, hence-forth referred to as the Uber-mote.

So, basically the TV’s themselves aren’t that big of a deal. However, they were designed to match Mr. Armani’s upcoming 2008/2009 furniture line, so if you plan on investing in that stock, this TV would help your entertainment room match completely.

As I said, the logos of both Samsung and Armani are on the front of the TV and have 4 different colors they can be lit to that you get to select. The 46-inch model will be dropping in Europe sometime this summer; the larger model won’t be seen in your local retailer until later in the season. So they aren’t bad TV’s by far, but they are best suited in rooms with one or more of Armani’s other pieces in it.

[via reghardware]

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Iomega Xporter external hard drive – for Xferring media from your computer to your Xbox 360 and PS3

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:14:44 +0000

If you don’t already have a large flash drive or an external hard drive for the purpose of playing the media from your computer on your game systems, then this wouldn’t be a bad purchase. It looks good, can pack up to 160GB on its tiny 2.5” disk, and it will fit in your pocket.

Best of all is that it comes with pre-loaded software that you can use to convert your media into more game console-friendly formats. It will save you the trouble of searching the same torrent sites you got the content from for an app that will do just that for you.

Plus, for a 160GB USB bus-powered external hard drive, the $120 or 99 Euro asking price isn’t too terribly bad, it’s about on par with other major HDD manufacturers. The difference being that if you really are going to use this drive solely for its intended purpose it’s color scheme will blend with any game console and it comes with some software that will be useful to you.

[via Pocket-Lint]

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HP MediaSmart SL4282N, SL4782N Media Center Extender TV’s up for sale now

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:00:27 +0000

HP has apparently been working on these televisions for quite some time now and they have finally arrived. The TV’s connect to your home network and then subsequently to whatever XP MCE PC, Vista Home Premium, or Vista Ultimate PC that you have them setup to connect to and from their can stream music, pictures, and even video directly to the TV.

Normally such an operation would require your choice of putting the compute next to the TV to directly connect it, a separate Set-Top-Box that is a Media Center Extender, or and Xbox 360. Now none of those things are needed, you just set up your TV pair the two together by adding the Extender to the Media Center PC, and you are off and on your way streaming the best of what you have downloaded to your new TV.

The two TV’s come in 42 and 47 inch models and have both Ethernet and WiFi connections. The downside is that the TV’s are priced respectively at $1900 and $2400 for their meager sizes, sure they have 2000:1 contrast ratios and are 1080p capable, but you can do better than 47-inches for $2400. For those with older MediaSmart TV’s, HP has put out a firmware update that will magically grant you the same capabilities.

[via Gizmodo]

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eMachines catches budget computing bug – coughs up T5254 and T3646 desktops

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:49:13 +0000

These two new machines from Acer’s subsidiary Gateway’s subsidiary eMachines are squarely aimed at users that will never use the max capacity of a quad-core processor with 13GB of RAM and 657GB of HDD storage in RAID 0 using SAS or some other junk like that. They are prices at $299.99 and $399.99 just to give you a hint, but neither of them is systems to scoff at.

The first, the one that goes for $300, is the T3646 and has 1GB of RAM, and AMD Sempron LE-1250 processor, a 160GB HDD, and it comes with Vista Home Basic. That might be a bit of a stretch on the hardware side for Vista, but an upgrade to XP or Linux should pull a premium with that configuration.

The second one, the T5254 which retails for $400, comes with a dual-core Athlon processor, 2GB of RAM, a 320GB HDD, and Vista Home Premium. So basically it doubles everything, and is far more likely to actually be capable of running Vista smoothly than the previous system. Since you were wondering, neither comes with a monitor, but it has NVIDIA’s 6100 graphics chips integrated to output video.

[via i4u]

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HP 2133 Mini-Note PC coming with a new Windows XP option

James Allan Brady — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:37:34 +0000

The 2133 is still being hyped up and I am sure that a lot of future owners of the machine will be happy to know that your two options aren’t the unfamiliar Linux and the likely slow-booting Vista; you’ll now be able to get Windows XP installed. The reason is quite obvious; XP is loads faster on systems with such limited resources.

No word on what hardware configuration the XP system will come with though. So there is a chance it will be available as an option across the board, and at the price Microsoft is offering it to manufacturers of these “Budget” PC’s it would be a smart move to do so.

I have to admit though, the 2133 was hot a while ago, but it may already be losing its flame by some of the other new notebooks being announced. That’s to say just prior to the actual announcement of the notebook and all of its details I definitely would have bought one, but now I’m waiting for something else, they are taking too long.

[via laptoping]

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The Pirate Bay going on the offensive – to countersue IFPI (international version of RIAA)

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:40:53 +0000

First of all, I was told I should preface this article with the fact that SlashGear does not condone piracy or any other illegal acts. Now that’s out of the way, let’s get to the real meat of this story. The Pirate Bay is being sued by the IFPI, which is basically the international version of the RIAA, for 1.6 million Euros.

First off, it’s funny that a Swedish-based branch of IFPI is suing Swedish citizens yet not referring to the amount of the claim in Swedish currency. So, clearly the IFPI is just doing this as a publicity stunt, much like the RIAA (it’s like they’ve exchanged notes).

You might be curious to know how the IFPI got their numbers, well, that’s an interesting story all its own. Basically what they did was they went to all of the download pages on TPB for the files that they are responsible for defending and looked at the download counter (number of downloads: xxxxxx ; you know, that thing) and added them all up to get their mythical figure. Some things they didn’t consider are the sources of those numbers and how reliable those counters are, and the fact that on several occasions the torrents were uploaded by the artists who created the content.

In some cases, the content IFPI is suing for hasn’t even been made available for purchase, so the only option was to download it “illegally”. Then there is the fact that all studies and cases have shown several things starting with the fact that file sharing has, in almost all cases, increased the amount of money made by the industry, so if anything IFPI should be paying TPB. Then, IFPI’s whole case is based on the idea that each download is a lost sale that TPB should have to pay for, that logic has been proven ill-founded as well in studies where it was shown that most of the time, a person who downloads something isn’t entirely likely to purchase it if given no other choice, and at the same time, several people who download music listen to it once, if that, and then ignore it, which means that wouldn’t have been a sale in the first place.

The best part of all of this has to be that TPB will be countersuing, and if they win, which they likely will since they don’t actually serve up the files themselves, they are going to use the money to start a fund. The fund will be used to compensate artists who put their music up on TPB, thus sticking it to the IFPI in two ways.

I personally am a big fan of The Pirate Bay, mainly for what they are doing in the industry to change the way things are looked at, and to make things more freely available. Lastly a quote from another one of the TPB’s crew’s websites “We do whatever we want, whenever we want. If it doesnt suit you, you can start your own empire.” If you’d like to fact check any of this yourself BrokeP’s blog would be a good place to start.

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Sony OLED TV – its .3mm thick, that’s 10 times thinner than the XEL-1

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:16:58 +0000

If the 11-inch XEL-1 was too thick for you at 3mm for an OLED screen, Sony has a new on up their sleeve that manages to almost be more anorexic than paper. For reference, and average sheet of paper is roughly .1mm thick, so stack three sheets together, push down on it to remove an extraneous space, and then you’ve got yourself the thickness of one of these displays.

The new .3mm display is the same 11-inch size as it’s really, really pricey predecessor. It has a resolution of 960×540, an infinite contrast ration, and brightness provided by the display itself instead of a back light which usually causes some ugly bright patches on the screen.

Now, if they could blow that up to about 42-inches or larger, the resolution would obviously follow which would probably put it near Quad-HD resolutions and a reasonable price and I’d be happy. They haven’t even named this new display, so there is no price or availability info, but its 11-inch XEL-1 brother is selling right now for $2500, so this new model, right now, would probably fetch five figures for an 11-inch model.

[via Gizmodo]

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LapStrap – carry your notebook on your shoulder without a case

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:59:12 +0000

This is quite possibly the dumbest idea I’ve seen in a very, very long time. Essentially what this product suggests is that you lay part of this long ass adjustable strap across your laptop’s keyboard, then close it, and sling it over your shoulder leaving it open to the environment, being banged around, or worse, stolen.

So, this might not be a bad idea for say and Asus Eee where the loss would be felt, but not that big of a deal. However putting one of these on a thousand dollar plus notebook would likely be one of the worst ideas ever.

What does the company offer up as reassurance, they more or less say since it’s a multi-thousand dollar notebook dangling from your arm you are going to be really anxious and paranoid that it might get damaged or stolen that you’ll take extra care to make sure it doesn’t. So, the strap costs $25, but you might also want to go get an insurance policy for your notebook while you are at it.

[via Wired]

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Coway Megasonic SWV-08AM dish cleaner looks fashionable

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:50:10 +0000

I am not entirely sure how this thing works, but apparently the gist of it is soap-less dish washing. Somehow it uses sonic waves of water to remove even the deepest particles of dirt without the slightest amount of soap necessary.

Word is the little record player thing, which is coincidentally what I thought this was at first glance, shoots water out and an alarming rate, a sonic rate if you will, and cleans stuff. I have no idea how well this little bugger actually works, but I do know, that as far as dish washers go, this is by far one of the best looking ones I’ve seen that wasn’t human.

The only downside I could see is that depending on the number of dishes you are doing at a time, this could be a real water waster, and the other is that if it sprays water hard enough to clean dishes without soap, it could probably quite easily hurt someone. Lastly, most machines I know of capable at pushing water out at rates fast enough to clean things are really loud, and that’s highly unattractive.

[via ShinyShiny]

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DIY Electric off-road skateboard

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 16:15:43 +0000

Some guy put together and instructable on how to make an electric mountain board or whatever those off-road versions of skateboards are called. It’s pretty ingenious too taking most of his parts from electric scooters.

The two batteries, motor, motor controller, and thumb throttle are all from an electric scooter, not the same one as some of those parts he ordered off the Internet and others he picked up at a local scooter shop, but none the less from an electric scooter. The board he bought new and from the same place he bought a brake kit for the board.

He used the brake kit for brakes obviously, but he also used it for the hole pattern for the sprocket and to run the wires for the throttle control as the brake kit included a handle and cord that ran from the brakes up to it so the guy just used the handle to mount the throttle and the cloth tubing that came with the brake kit to run the throttle wires up through. It’s pretty ingenious if you ask me, he couldn’t give us exact speed, range, or battery life numbers, but he said he’s ridden it for 45 minutes without having to charge it, he also said he would have made it a bit faster in hindsight, but it’s still pretty nice as is.

[via HackADay]

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Parrot PARTY Black Edition first commercialized speaker system to use Near Field Communications

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:54:40 +0000

I saw some of these speakers at the Parrot booth at CES and they were pretty amazing and managed to overpower the hundreds of people that were crowded into what was a fairly small room. However the ones I saw didn’t use NFC to negotiate the Bluetooth connection between your device and the speakers, they did it the old fashioned way.

With the new NFC technology integrated into these speakers all you have to do to connect your device is to touch it to the speaker and viola! You are good to go. Inside there is a Class D amplifier, which is the class that brings you some of the best quality audio, and the pair operate at around 6 watts maximum.

6 watts may not sound like a lot, but my 12 watt Altec Lansing 2.1 system overpowered my 500 watt home stereo, it’s all about how you apply it and Parrot is quite ingenious with their audio equipment. The 650 gram weight of this little pair of speakers includes a rechargeable battery that’s built in and will last you roughly 8 hours of playback before needing a charge. The cost will be £79 sometime this summer when it’s released.

[via Pocket-Lint]

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ViewSonic pushing out two new monitors and a new projector – me wants

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:44:06 +0000

Starting with the projector, it has a 2000:1 contrast ration and 2220 lumens, which means it can be used just about anywhere. Add to that the 720p and 1080i support with its native 800×600 resolution and you’ve got yourself a nice projector. For those with more of an eco friendly mind it also has an ECO mode that saves power, lowers noise pollution, and extends the lamp life, the cost will save some paper too at a meager $499.

Up next is the new VA1903wmb 19” LCD monitor with a widescreen aspect ratio. The downside of this monitor is its relatively low 800:1 contrast ratio, but it has a snappy 5ms response time and a native resolution of 1440×900. Then there is the VA903mb, which is a standard letterbox LCD monitor coming in with a 1000:1 contrast ratio, 300 nits of brightness, and a 1280×1024 native resolution on 19-inches of screen real estate.

Lastly there is the VA703mb with its 17-inch LCD, 1280×1024 resolution, 8ms response time, and 700:1 contrast ratio. The monitors, in order, are priced at $245, $235, and $209. All of these products are targeted at government and educational uses, but they might find a place inside your home as well.

[via ViewSonic]

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Aigo MID – looks good and performs well

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:29:35 +0000

It’s a basic mobile Internet device. It has a rubberized bottoms, touchscreen, and slide out full keyboard, a very simple user interface, and a stylus. On the back is the battery and a 3MP camera for taking photos.

There is also a camera on the front that you can use for video conferencing. There is a microphone jack, and antenna jack, dedicated camera button, headphone jack, USB host port, microSD card slot, and mini USB port.

It can play videos; do navigation, which means it will likely have GPS built in. For a size reference, the screen alone is slightly larger than the entire iPhone. It has WiFi and will have a 3G internet connection. It uses Mozilla for the web browser. That’s pretty much it for info on this device right now, the version shown was a pre-production version so they’ll probably add and/or subtract features from it as they go.

[via UMPCPortal]

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JavaBot at the Roasting Plant

James Allan Brady — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 15:18:30 +0000

The JavaBot is, as you guessed, a robot that makes you coffee. The thing is, it’s not your usual fare of inserting pre-ground coffee that sucks and then it brewing and pouring it, this robot does it all short of picking the beans itself.

It starts with raw or green coffee beans, it roasts them, and then it sends them to the grinder and grinds them. From there it uses water, presumably at least filtered if not purified, and brews you your coffee, quite literally from start to finish.

The best part is that it does all of that, from start to finish, in roughly the time it would take you to get your coffee at Starbucks, probably less. There are 13 glass tube-shaped bins for the beans, 6 hold green beans, the other 7 hold roasted beans, and each one has a scale built in which is probably used to let the employees know when the green beans need refilled and to keep the machine from roasting more beans than are being used so that they are fresh as possible. Pneumatic tubes are used to move the beans to the grinder, kind of like your bank, it’s all a pretty cool system just to get you your coffee.

Welcome to the Roasting Plant from michael galpert on Vimeo.

[via BornRich and Micheal Galpert]

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