For instance, despite popular thinking, normal visual acuity is not in fact 20/20 – the ability to discriminate two points separated by one-sixtieth of a degree (or 1 arc minute) – but, at its maximum, around 20/16 to 20/12. In fact 20/20 is at the lower limit of regular acuity. Taking that lower limit and working out the visual angle of 1 arc minute from a foot away gets you a roughly 89 micrometer dot, or 286.5dpi.

Dr. Soneira bases his calculations on the angular resolution of the eye being 50 cycles per degree (cpd), which in more familiar terms is 20/12; Dr Beaudot pointed out to us that this is pretty much the maximum theoretical resolution of the human eye. In terms of range, 20/20 vision is equivalent to 30 cpd. Based on holding your phone at the average distance – that is, around 18-inches away from your face – at 50 cpd the Retina Display’s 326ppi matches the visual acuity of the 20/12 eye. Dr Beaudot told us that Apple’s claims about Retina Display basically remain valid – in fact get stronger – for any viewing distances beyond 10-inches (and limited to a reasonable near reading distance, around 20-inches or arm-length).

We asked Dr. Beaudot (who produced retina models used to make silicon retinas for computer vision and prosthetics, among other things) whether Retina Display was really as close to human retina resolution as Apple suggest, and he told us that “this is the closest thing ever done in display technology that matches [the eye's resolution].” That resolution is naturally limited by the spacing between photoreceptors in the retina at its densest point, the fovea at the center, which can reach at most 60 cpd; the iPhone 4′s maximum 50 cpd at 18-inches is not far off that theoretical limit of the “perfect” eye.

Both experts agree that the iPhone 4′s display delivers the best visuals in a mobile device to-date; these new figures suggest you’d not just need 20/20 but also truly “perfect” vision to differentiate pixels in normal use. Every iPhone may come with 960 x 640 resolution, but every eye is different. In the end, the proof of the pudding is in the iPhone 4 experience; something we can ourselves confirm is incredibly impressive from our hands-on earlier this week.

Unfortunately – and unsurprisingly – Rubinstein wouldn’t be drawn on the contents of that roadmap, nor the sort of timescales it covered. Still, he maintains that Palm are looking to “continue to enhance the family” with a small handful of clearly related devices and a “great webOS experience in every product we do.” Just as Microsoft have targeted their new Kin platform at the mass-market, Rubinstein sees the Pixi – which he uses as his daily phone – as positioned for entry-level smartphone users, while the Pre Plus occupies the flagship spot. We pushed him on whether the company plans to flesh out the top-end next or somewhere else along the line, but he refused to be drawn; what we can expect, however, is a faster, more responsive delivery of new devices. Rubinstein blamed the lengthy delay before the GSM Pre’s launch on the company’s relatively small size and limited resources, paired with the difficulty in prepping the first UMTS device running webOS; now that’s been done, however, relationships with operators cemented and testing gone through, the company can “move more rapidly in future.”

It’s not just hardware that Palm recognises it needs to work on; the sales experience is also a point they’re keen to address. Rubinstein has previously criticised Verizon’s handling of the Pre Plus and Pixi Plus launch, and it’s something he reiterated today. Palm ensured there was plenty of Verizon inventory – certainly enough to cover the Chinese New Year shut-down period – and they “would’ve liked [it] to move quicker.” There’s anecdotal evidence that the steps both parties took in the aftermath – bringing in Palm employees to better train Verizon salespeople on the nuances of webOS, preloading devices with tutorial videos and tips – have been working, Rubinstein insists, and that the experience has already helped them in launches with other carriers. He agrees that perhaps the core issue is demonstrating webOS’ strengths better; it’s “a matter of giving people training” on the platform, both those selling it and those considering buying devices based on it.

Part of that is emphasising the potential of the hardware on offer. Rubinstein reckons that the Pre Plus is faster than the iPhone 3GS in terms of raw hardware, and webOS is the only other platform on the market capable of immersive 3D gaming. Now that the App Catalog in Europe finally has paid software support, and together with the recently announced Unreal engine on the platform, Palm are looking to promote the Pre Plus among developers and buyers alike as a gaming device. Part of that is certainly looking at what Apple are doing with Game Center in iPhone OS 4.0, and “watching closely” the movement in iAd too.

Mobile advertising is an “evolving space”, Rubinstein agrees, and one Palm is certainly looking into. Still, the focus now is on the push into Europe, with O2, SFR and Vodafone partnerships to offer the Pixi Plus and Pre Plus in various markets. webOS’ growing App Catalog is definitely a part of that, and Palm are working with developers not only in the US but Europe to make sure the 1,000+ titles in there are soon joined by others. While he wouldn’t comment on the buy-out speculation, Rubinstein did tell us that keeping webOS to itself was “not something we’re religious about.” Palm is chasing objective scale when it comes to platform market share, and if they were approached by a company, could build a good working relationship and business model, licensing webOS “would make sense.”

With the iPad fresh to the market, and talk of a Google-branded rival running Android, we also asked about Rubinstein’s opinion on the burgeoning tablet segment. While Palm are focusing on smartphones right now, he did tell us that webOS was designed to be a “mobile device OS” rather than solely a smartphone platform, suited to a broad scale of devices up to tablets and even larger. Describing larger-scale touch computing as “an exciting area,” Rubinstein said that Palm were watching the tablet market and that “we – or licensees – could look at entering that in future.” Since we reckon webOS’ interface – especially its background notifications system – bests those of iPhone OS 4.0 or Android, that’s a direction we particularly hope somebody chooses to follow.

Is Palm going to turn around and announce a partnership deal, a buy-out or a licensing arrangement in the next days or weeks? You’d better believe that Jon Rubinstein is far too media-polished to let that slip. Still, he describes Palm’s current path as a “transformation story”, suggesting that while commentators love to presume that the smartphone market – and Palm’s place in it – is settled, in actual fact it’s in its infancy. “Everyone wants to go “it’s over”,” Rubinstein says, “there are all kinds of rumors. But we’re at the beginning of the mobile device story.”

The basic functions of the phone were decent as expected. Calls were clear enough, and reception was ok, though I received a bizarre hissing sound just before callers would speak, and the volume of their voices would increase subtly during the conversation. I’m not sure if the phone was doing this on purpose to adjust for ambient noise on my end, but it got annoying after a while. The one feature I wish I could have tested but never got to work was the video calling functionality (partially because I don’t know anyone with a video-call capable phone).

Web browsing on the device was hindered by the inability to browse in landscape mode. I’m used to every new Samsung phone having an accelerometer in it that the Tocco’s lack of one made the experience a little less enjoyable. There’s nothing WRONG with portrait, it just doesn’t give you as much screen real estate as you would like.

The dedicated widgets on the homescreen make accessing Google or Facebook super easy, and the TouchWiz UI was implemented beautifully on the AMOLED display. The screen is gorgeous and bright, with amazing viewing angles.

Of all the camera phones I’ve ever used, including Samsung’s own Memoir, this one is the nicest and highest quality I’ve seen. The 8.0MP really feels like you’re using a point and shoot, and the photo quality isn’t soft from noise reduction, or overly harsh from not enough of it. The LED flash is very bright, but sometimes washes out the picture with too much white light. There’s a healthy stock of photo editing features too, but the really impressive inclusion here is the video editing features. You have a mini studio built into the phone that is easy to use and understand, and doesn’t inundate the user with too many options. It keeps it clean and simple to use, and produces relatively quality cuts for short film clips on your mobile device.

The S8300 is attractive and feature rich, with many positive aspects that will make it a great phone to use (especially when video calling gets popular in the U.S.). The version I was sent is a UK phone, unlocked for use wherever. We can hope to see the S8300 Tocco on our shores…well we don’t know. But you can count on us to tell you when we find out!

What’s new with the S30 that warranted an update? There’s a new, sleek form factor. We also have some color additions, including Copper and Cobalt. The expanded microSD card capacity to 16GB is nice for those of you who want to carry around all your music, and the .1-inch screen size increase well, isn’t terribly noticeable. The camera is still the same 2.0 MP and the operating system is almost exactly the same as the previous model. I say almost because Sprint says that they’ve opened up the API’s to developers so that the GPS, music, and other phone functions can be accessed by third party applications. This is a little late to the game, but maybe it will satisfy some users.

Other than that, we have Opera Mini pre-installed, and it works well enough, just like on the previous Instinct. Browsing the internet on the Instinct isn’t as painful as it used to be, but the browser just doesn’t pack the punch that other phones do.

The basics of the phone worked as expect. Call quality was clear and the speakerphone seemed to be a little louder and clearer than my old Instinct. The phone feels less bulky, and fits better in the hand. Battery life will get you through the day and then some, depending on if you use Bluetooth and all that. I miss all the nice little accessories that Sprint included on the last Instinct to make it compete with the iPhone: the extra battery, carrying case, stylus, etc.

The thing to keep in mind here is that the Instinct S30 isn’t meant to change much. It’s a feature phone that’s meant to introduce users to the capabilities of the mobile web and GPS, etc. The price point of the Instinct ($129.99 w/ contract) is meant to be a lower level entry into the world of touchscreens, and a phone with smartphone-like capabilities for users who don’t need smartphones such as the Palm Pre.

Everyone who has a current generation Instinct is going to be upgrading to the Palm Pre. You can bet on that. Users who want to dip their feet into the world of social-networking, mobile browsing, and GPS-capable applications. The phone is still a solid device; capable and fully functional. Sprint just might want to consider lowering that price point to oh, $49.99 or so, just so they can entice the lower-end user into getting a quality phone with a nice Simply Everything Plan.

The Instinct was Sprint’s most popular device last year, so it’s natural that they’d bring on a follow-up. The S30 makes a few big changes and a few small ones. The biggest-small change is the screen size, changing from 3.1″ to 3.2″ of resistive touchscreen goodness. The form factor is different, incorporating rounded edges and a slimmer profile. The color addition is nice. Black is the new beige after all. The microSD card slot supports up to 16GB of music now instead of the 8GB that the previous generation Instinct did.

Other small changes are open API’s for developers to make better applications for the Instinct that can take advantage of GPS and whatnot (it’s a little late in the game for that, but whatever). The phone also includes all of the java based applications that every user wants: Opera Mini and the Sprint Instant Messenger program and some other games and applications. Other than that, there’s nothing different about this phone at all. The menus are all the same, and the screen is just as responsive as before. I’ll get a full review up soon, though I have a feeling it’ll be just like using my current Instinct (which is pleasant enough mind you).

Here’s the unboxing video for you to enjoy!

Update: Video now added – and in HD!

To recap on the specs, the HTC Touch Pro2 has a 3.6-inch 480 x 800 WVGA resistive touchscreen, dualband 3G/HSDPA, WiFi b/g and Bluetooth 2.0, together with GPS, a 3.2-megapixel camera with autofocus and a touch-sensitive zoom control.  There’s also a slide-out five row QWERTY keyboard, and the display tilts up and can be positioned at any angle across its range.

The Pro2 uses a 528MHz processor, like the Diamond2, and has 512MB of ROM and 288MB of RAM; onboard storage can be augmented with a microSD card.  In addition there’s an FM radio and accelerometer, together with HTC’s latest version of TouchFLO 3D, and a new dual-speaker, dual-microphone speakerphone.

To understand the key differences to HTC TouchFLO 3D, check out the Diamond2 demo video.  Software across both devices is the same, with greater integration between the different GUI tabs: you can now do more communicating – whether by voice, email or IM – without dropping into Windows Mobile,

The obvious hardware difference is the physical QWERTY keyboard.  Eric told me that the Pro2 was in no small part prompted by user requests for a handset with the display of the Touch HD but the keyboard of the HTC Kaiser.  The end result is a very impressive input offering, with large, well laid-out keys that have decent travel and good tactile response. 

Less obvious, but also impressive, is the integrated speakerphone technology.  HTC have given the Pro2 dual microphones and dual speakers, which, together with some home-grown DSP software, Eric assures us gives the best audio quality on a smartphone to-date.  Turning the Pro2 screen-down onto the table automatically kicks in the speakerphone; there’s a small pause while the DSP works its magic, and then we’re told it’s crystal clear.  That wasn’t something we had an opportunity to try in the demo, but we’ve high hopes for it; not only might it make impromptu conference calls easy, it could also be useful in a car when you don’t want to wear a Bluetooth hands-free.  There’s also a dedicated mute button underneath the camera.

Like the Diamond2 compared to the original Diamond, the Pro2 will get a larger standard battery than the first Pro; Eric estimated two days between charges, even with regular use.  Being further down the roadmap than the Diamond2 though – the Pro2 is due in the second half of 2009, while the Diamond2 should land in Q2 – there’s more work to be done finessing the larger device.  HTC are still flushing out the last bugs, but of most interest to us is Eric’s promise that the final build will be faster and more responsive.  That’s something to bear in mind when you’re watching the demo video: the Pro2 you’ll be able to hold in your hands will be another degree slicker than the pre-production unit I looked at today.

If I had any grumble about the Touch Pro2, it’s the smartphone’s balance.  When opened up, and sat on a table, touching the display can cause the device to rock backward; to get around it you have to support the back with your fingers, or steady the base.  It’s not a deal-breaker, by any means, but it’s a mild frustration all the same.

For those addicted to messaging, the HTC Touch Pro2 could just be their fingers’ salvation.  They keyboard really is that good, and HTC’s improvements to TouchFLO 3D turn what started out as an attractive launcher into a real GUI alternative to Windows Mobile.  We’ll have to wait until our full review device arrives before we can make any real conclusions, but just like the Touch Diamond2 we’ve got very high hopes.

Update: Video now added – in HD!

To recap the specs, the Touch Diamond2 has a 32.-inch 480 x 800 WVGA resistive touchscreen, dualband 3G/HSDPA, WiFi b/g, Bluetooth and GPS, together with a 5-megapixel camera, FM radio and accelerometer.  There’s 512MB ROM and 288MB RAM, together with a touch-sensitive zoom bar and microSD port, all in a package 107.85 x 53.1 x 13.7mm in size and 117.5g in weight.

In terms of physical design, the one of the more obvious changes from the original Diamond is the newly-flattened back panel.  According to Eric, customer feedback didn’t score as highly as HTC themselves felt about the faceted design, and as such the phone is flat – and also sits flat on a table.  Up front there are four hardware keys – send and end, Windows and back – while there are volume controls along the top left side and a lock key on top.

HTC have used the two new Touch smartphones to debut the latest version of TouchFLO 3D.  There’s now greater integration between different tabs, so that you can for instance go into a recent contact, immediately see emails and IMs you’ve exchanged, and trigger any of a number of responses.  It’s much easier to watch and understand than it is to explain in text, hence our hands-on demo video.

Something we’ve certainly wondered about is what difference users will notice after the transition from Windows Mobile 6.1 to 6.5, especially given the latter’s more obvious changes are in the launcher and new lock screen.  According to Eric, the device will offer the choice of using the new Microsoft GUI or the existing TouchFLO 3D GUI; otherwise there’ll be little obvious difference.  HTC had no real input into Microsoft’s GUI development; when I suggested that this might be to the detriment of both companies, in terms of time and duplicated effort, Eric countered that in fact HTC see it as offering greater flexibility to the end-user rather than a one-size-fits-all product.

What HTC have done, in fact, is design the Touch Diamond2 with 6.5 in mind.  There’s a Windows flag key, just as required for the new version, and even in 6.1 it now calls up the TouchFLO 3D Programs menu, rather than the drop-down Start menu, to preview what 6.5 users will see with the new launcher.  As for the upgrade process, according to Eric it will be “as simple as flashing a new ROM”; whether that’s something most Windows Mobile users have ever done, we might argue with, but we imagine there’ll be a more streamlined upgrade path once the new OS arrives.

Headed for a Q2 2009 release, the Diamond2 will still get some fettling before its launch.  That should make it even faster, though I noticed very little lag in the pre-production unit today.  The touchscreen is even better than that on the Touch HD, which if you’ve read our review you’ll know was a revelation in resistive panels; when I asked HTC about this, they told me that they’re at a point where they can produce resistive and capacitive touchscreens with pretty much the same responsiveness and finger-feel.  Therefore the decision goes beyond simply technology, and instead asks which is the right panel for the implementation; since Windows Mobile is not fully finger-friendly, that means a resistive display is the obvious choice.

Also carried over from the Touch HD are the camera and optics, a 5-megapixel unit with autofocus but no flash.  Rather than change the hardware, HTC have tweaked the software to improve quality; we discussed the absence of a flash, but according to Eric the company believes it can make a bigger difference at this point by refining code rather than anything else.  HTC admit that, thanks to their enterprise background, they’re playing catch-up in some consumer functionality, such as imaging, so they prioritized their development as to what would make the biggest difference in the timescale available.  We’ll have to wait and see what image quality is like, but taking a shot was certainly quicker than it was on the Touch HD.

Overall, it’s hard not to like the HTC Touch Diamond2.  The screen quality is superb, and we imagine the Diamond2 will make for a great media player during your downtime.  The latest incarnation of TouchFLO 3D might not match the interconnected intelligence of Palm’s webOS Synergy, but it’s finally more than a glorified launcher and you can now do many common tasks without dropping into Windows Mobile.  It’s still pretty rare to see a device in which the software usability has been as well developed as the spec sheet.  We’ll obviously save our final judgement until we get the HTC Touch Diamond2 in to review – it’s expected in around a month, HTC tell us – but we’re already confident that it’ll be a strong performer.

In the box, ASUS include a wired keyboard and mouse, stylus and a printed manual, together with recovery DVDs and a microfiber screen cleaning cloth.  Two color versions of the Eee Top are available, white and black, with otherwise identical hardware specs.

First impressions are positive.  Despite the relatively budget price for the Eee Top, ASUS have managed to eke out more than a little style from its plastic casing.  Held upright by a strong, spring-loaded metal leg, the body of the Eee Top is white gloss-finish plastic sitting in a transparent tray.  Stand (and carry handle) aside, the nettop is just 4cm thick; along the back run gigabit ethernet, four USB 2.0, power, microphone, line-in and headphone ports, plus a Kensington lock hole.  On the left-hand side there are a further two USB 2.0 ports, plus a multiformat memory card reader.

Underneath the touchscreen there are buttons for brightness and volume on the left, while the power and screen toggle are on the right.  LEDs indicate WiFi and hard-drive activity, and in the bottom bezel there are stereo speakers.  A webcam and microphone are at the top above the screen.  The Eee Top has vents running across the top and in the center on the back.

Using the included peripherals and a WiFi internet connection, you can reduce cabling to just two wires: power and one USB for the keyboard.  The mouse, not entirely necessary if you’re devoted to the touchscreen, can plug into a USB port on the keyboard; on the opposite side there’s a pop-out stylus in a spring-loaded bay.  ASUS’ keyboard is surprisingly weighty and pleasant to type on.  It follows the same isolated keys as first seen on some Sony laptops, and although lacking a separate numeric keypad the rest of the keys are full-sized.  Several have Fn-triggered secondary features, including volume and music control, backlighting, sleep and WiFi, launching the webcam app, toggling through performance modes (more on that later) and changing the Eee Top’s blue underlighting.

The mouse is less impressive, a lightweight blue LED model with scroll-wheel.  It’s usable, and the design echoes the white & transparent plastic of the Eee Top’s build, but nothing special.  As for the stylus, it’s a basic 14cm stick of plastic with a tapered nib; the only thing worth noting is the strength of the bay spring, which is enough to launch the pen across the desk.

Despite looking a whole lot more grown up than any netbook (and taking up more of your workspace), the guts of the Eee Top are in fact on a par with any of the company’s more recent budget ultraportables.  That means a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 processor, 1GB of RAM and a 160GB hard-drive.  WiFi is b/g/n, but the graphics still use Intel’s GMA 950 onboard chipset and there’s no optical drive.  Of course the primary difference is the 15.6-inch touchscreen display, running at 1366 x 768 resolution.

The display uses a resistive touchscreen, rather than either a capacitive panel such as on recent Tablet PCs from HP and Dell, or an active digitizer as on most other Tablet PCs.  That means the screen responds to any touch, rather than requiring a finger or a special stylus, but only one point of contact rather than multitouch.  Responsiveness in the Eee Top’s case is good, with only a light touch required, and it soon becomes second nature to stab at the screen rather than reach for the mouse.

Of course, the usefulness of finger-input depends largely on software, and here the Eee Top is a mixed bag.  ASUS preinstall Windows XP, the  Home version rather than the Tablet PC edition, which is not known for its touchscreen-friendliness.  To solve that, you get Easy Mode, a large-icon launcher which runs automatically when you start the PC.  Four tabs – Communication, Fun, Work and Tools – give access to the preloaded apps, including StarSuite for office tasks, Skype for VoIP, and both Internet Explorer and Opera.  There are also a number of ASUS-specific apps, including games, and software for on-screen keyboards, handwriting recognition and other touchscreen-control.  Unfortunately there’s no apparent way to add new apps to Easy Mode, nor to change which tab each shortcut is in.

Easy Mode certainly makes loading software straightforward; however the apps themselves vary in their usefulness with the touchscreen.  As is usually the case, the ASUS-specific titles are most user friendly, with large buttons and straightforward drag & drop usability.  Others, such as the calculator, drop you into XP’s standard GUI: controls sized for mouse use.  There’s a sense of ASUS stopping development when Easy Mode was just usable enough: the Eee Memo app, for instance, which lets you drag down virtual Post-It notes and write reminders and messages on them, would make far more sense if the notes were visible all the time.  As it is, leaving a message for someone relies on them starting up the Eee Memo app.

ASUS’ could also do with making common tasks like screen calibration more straightforward.  There’s a “Touch Utility” listed in the Tools tab, but users will have to guess that “9 points linearity” actually means “calibrate the screen for your finger”.  An option underneath that, to test the touch panel, is cryptically labelled “Please drawing”.  Motorola’s SoftStylus is preinstalled, for handwriting recognition and an on-screen keyboard.  The latter works as you’d expect, with a resizeable, translucent window and shortcut keys for things like www.; however the handwriting recognition is barely usable.  Only individual letters are recognized at a time, rather than full words, making for a painfully laborious experience.  We’d much rather have seen XP Tablet Edition, with its surprisingly adept handwriting and voice recognition, though Microsoft licencing issues probably prevented that.

In use, the 1.6GHz Atom processor means the Eee Top is not going to threaten machines with similar form-factors, such as HP’s TouchSmart or Apple’s iMac.  Nonetheless, it’s perfectly capable of sustaining a couple of web browser windows, each with multiple open tabs, without unduly slowing.  The absence of an optical drive means the ASUS is unlikely to be asked to do any serious media lifting; however it happily played back a 720p high-definition video from the hard-drive (anything higher resolution caused stuttering).  Screen quality is fair, although the panel tends to look washed out when viewed from the top.  One point of concern was a pixel-width blue line that appeared down the left-hand side of the display after the Eee Top had been switched on for a while, and which only a reboot would dismiss.  It’s unclear whether this is a graphics problem due to heat build up.

As on their netbooks, ASUS has given the Eee Top three different power modes: super performance, high performance and power saving.  These can be switched between either through the Easy Home interface or by the Fn+Space shortcut.  In practice, there’s little noticeable difference between the three; nothing can disguise the fact that the Eee Top is no media editing or 3D gaming machine.  As a media extender though, with a high-speed network connection, it comes into its own; another of the ASUS apps is Eee Cinema, a media-center style GUI for accessing audio and video.  It’s here you’ll most miss an optical drive, as Eee Cinema even has an option to watch DVDs.  Still, sound quality from the built-in speakers is reasonable.

Also preloaded is a webcam app, that lets you record video and take photos using the Eee Top’s 1.3-megapixel camera.  Image quality is as mediocre as you might expect from an integrated webcam, but the app has a number of effects and animated overlays to brighten things up.  These range from frames and color-effects, such as sepia, through Batman-style “Pow!” flashes, to being able to draw onto video and images. 

In the end, though, we’re surprisingly impressed by the Eee Top.  The display may be relatively small compared to what many people have on their desktop nowadays, but given you need to be sitting within comfortable prodding distance it’s less of an issue.  It also makes the Eee Top more portable; toting it between rooms is no hardship, and the next-generation model, tipped to have an internal battery, should make that even more straightforward.  Even sucking up your mains power, its frugal 27W demands mean the Eee Top is more economical than a standard desktop PC.

Similarly, as long as you’re not looking for high graphics performance, the Eee Top handles web browsing, office chores and media playback with little complaint.  ASUS, incidentally, are planning a separate ATI Radeon HD 3450 video option in the next-gen machine.  The touchscreen implementation may not be perfect, but it’s certainly usable and the price is far less than HP would ask for a TouchSmart PC.  For the same cost as the Eee Top you could obviously find a higher-spec standard desktop PC, but the ASUS’ design charms, touchscreen and general usability still make it a tempting buy.

The ASUS Eee Top ET1602 is available now, priced at around £400 in the UK; the US price is expected to be around $450.

Unboxing Video:

To be the very first Android-driven phone, the HTC Dream from T-Mobile slides, has big clear buttons and looks amazing. And the real plus here is the product picture looks pretty much done. The big T-Mobile brand confirms it as the carrier and Android looks to be nearing completion, if not all the way done.

These new images confirm all that we’ve suspected and seen so far. The Dream has a full QWERTY keyboard, a curved slide mechanism, shortcut keys and a trackball. We’re expecting the first Android phone ever before the end of the year. Check out more pictures below.

[Via Android Community, Gizmodo]

For the Treo Pro, Treo-Pro.com Accessories online store offer an entire list of accessories; everything from Treo Pro backup batteries to car accessories, chargers, cables, headphones, cradles, bluetooth accessories, and much more. The list goes on and on, but basically, the primary purposes of Treo Pro accessories are to add functionality, such as where you can use it and what you can use it with, make some features easier to use, and extend the use of the Treo Pro.

Take a look at the competition. If a QWERTY keyboard is a priority, the BlackBerry Bold delivers a more spacious one together with more WiFi support (a/b/g compared to the Treo Pro’s b/g), a higher resolution screen (480 x 320 versus the Treo Pro’s 320 x 320) and nifty trackball navigation. If you’re looking for a combination of simplicity and features, Apple’s iPhone 3G literally roasts the Treo Pro. With a slick, capacitive touchscreen, already legendary user-friendliness and fresh enterprise support, the iPhone 3G makes the Treo Pro look like an anachronism.

The Windows Mobile smartphone market has accelerated over the past few months. HTC, always a strong player, has delivered two knock-out touchscreen handsets in the shape of the Touch Diamond and the QWERTY-blessed Touch Pro. Not only do they deliver on functionality, they also have HTC’s brilliant TouchFLO 3D that banishes clunky WM6.1 underneath a gesture and finger-friendly GUI. Samsung’s Omnia, when it reaches the US with official 3G support, will be a popular seller among both the business and home users Palm is so desperate to court: however the Omnia’s metal casing, haptic feedback and TouchWiz GUI put the Treo Pro into the shade.  Finally, lets not forget Android Platform – it’s going to eat Palm’s lunch hands down.

Palm had a chance after the Treo 800w. They could have read the reviews, listened to the feedback, and recognized that its users were no longer satisfied with a slight case redesign around the same old sad Treo. What they’ve delivered with the Treo Pro is a laughable mixture of predictable hardware, little attempt to commercialize Windows Mobile and an almost arrogant assumption that the Palm name will blind users to the fact that they lost their mojo three generations of smartphone ago.

Right now, customers are rightly expecting revolution, not evolution. The iPhone shook up the market, and the iPhone 3G shook it a bit harder: HTC, Samsung, RIM and the others have stepped up and delivered their own twist on what makes a smartphone. In comparison, the Treo Pro is a smartphone by numbers, and the most insulting number is the price: $549 unlocked. The one lesson we thought the company had learned – from its pile ‘em high, sell ‘em cheap Centro – it squandered.

Wake up and smell the smartphones, Palm. Software delays, mediocre hardware… perhaps it’s time you put the Treo out to pasture.  That being said, this concludes my final article pertaining to Palm and any future related products by the company.

Brenda: Netbooks, also known as nettops, are not just  “mini-laptops.” In fact, they serve a different market than laptop users and act as a smaller, more portable, more convenient means of carrying around files and information and accessing the Internet. These sub-notebooks are prepped and primed for Internet access, making them more portal than powerhouse tool. While a laptop is basically a complete portable computer, netbooks are the streamlined version for those that don’t need to carry the world with them–just the essentials.

Chris: Laptops, or notebook computers, don’t need much introduction.  In fact when it comes to computing, desktop sales are on the decline while laptop sales keep climbing.  Unless you’re comparing to a particularly powerhouse desktop, a laptop can do pretty much everything its stationary brethren can, and there are desktop replacement laptops that will take over all the heavy grunt processing tasks 99-percent of people will ever be asking for.

Brenda: Sure, laptops can do just about everything a desktop computer can, but what if that’s not what you need? What if all you need is something lightweight to carry around that contains your important information, files, and lets you look up information on the fly? A netbook would be ideal. The real benefit of netbooks, however, is their ability to keep you connected. Sure a smartphone can do that but the functionality isn’t quite there yet to make mobile computing on your phone a breeze. Enter the netbook. With one of these minicomputers, you can blog, write emails, social network, finish proposals, browse the Internet and more from anywhere you can get a WiFi signal. And the real plus? The price. You can expect to pay just a few hundred for a netbook whereas a good laptop can run you $400 and up. 

Chris: You might not need everything your desktop can do today, but how about a few months down the line when something unexpected and more processing-intensive comes up?  And who’s to say that there’s even a desktop waiting at home for you; most people I know haven’t bought a stationary PC in years, and rely on their laptop for all their computing.  A single machine, that does everything you need, means there’s no issue with synchronising files across multiple devices, no remembering to charge everything before you leave the house, and at the end of the day is cheaper than buying a “main” computer and a portable one.  You can browse the internet, blog, do everything you’ve mentioned – but you can also crunch video files to share on that blog, you can run multiple apps like Skype, IM and a browser full of tabs to really communicate.

Brenda: Certainly a laptop is the choice if it will be your only computer, but if you’re merely looking for something to take with you, a netbook is the way to go. The simple fact of the matter is not everyone can afford to buy a full blown laptop. They can be quite expensive, so if you know you don’t need all of that high processing power, why not get the best of something smaller? Netbooks are ideal for students as well and act as a great introduction to computers for children. Since they weigh less, kids can tote them easier and their  focused functionality better serves those newer to computers without overwhelming them. They are often sturdier as well. Netbooks may not be for everyone, but they are a great laptop alternative to those seeking the basics in a portable, easy to use format.

Chris: I’ll admit that the price of the cheaper netbooks stands them apart from current low-end notebooks, but you pay a significant penalty on specification.  Most people are going to want to step up at least a couple of rungs if they pick, say, a basic 700-series ASUS Eee PC, and even then you’d do far better – in performance and flexibility – going for a second hand laptop.  In fact eBay would be where I’d turn every time before opting for one of the cheaper netbooks; why introduce new users to a slimmed down (or even compromised) system, when they could get used to a full system based on last-year’s hardware?

Brenda: eBay may be a good place to get used or restored laptops with last-year’s hardware, but with a netbook you’ll get this year’s hardware without the bells and whistles. And let’s face it: it’s the bells and whistles that amp up the price on laptops. With a netbook, you get exactly what you need at an affordable price. If you’re just going to answer emails from the local coffee shop or write reports in the library, a netbook will do the job and then some. If you need some guidance as to which netbook is the prime choice, you can’t go wrong with the Acer Aspire One. This mini laptop has an 8.9-inch display, a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N2770 Processor, 512 MB RAM, an 8 GB SSD and runs Linux. What’s really great about this one is that you don’ t really have to sacrifice power for sleek and minimized design. The Acer weighs less than two pounds and is optimized for the Internet. This is the ultimate keep-in-touch device and is perfect for travel. And what will it cost you? Just $379.99. You get the portability of the laptop without the sky-high price. If you ask me, that makes this a great buy.

Chris: I won’t argue that the Aspire One is a tempting machine, but even a cursory check on eBay throws up some full-sized notebooks for the same price but offering much more in terms of their spec-sheet.  A 2GHz Dell D410 with a 12-inch display, 1GB of RAM and 60GB HDD just went for ten bucks less than the Aspire.  Or how about a 2.1GHz Toshiba L300 for a bigger display: 15.4-inches, 160GB HDD, 2GB of RAM and a DVD burner; that just went for $381.  Both running Windows XP, so there’s no Linux learning curve; both offering far greater performance, with someone else having already paid the premium Dell or Toshiba wanted for the “bells and whistles”.  Fancy something with an Apple logo?  Take your pick of MacBooks or iBook G4s going for the same as Acer ask for their netbook.

So do you trawl eBay or do you bypass all that searching and head to the new shelves with your credit card in hand?  Brenda and I can’t quite agree – she loves the netbook simplicity, while I’m a cranky Brit who wants the most grunt for his money – but we’d both love to hear your views.  Netbook or notebook: let us know where you stand in the comments.

The email came in last night around 9pm EST, so if you haven’t checked your mail since then, you might want to do just that. I then was able to upgrade my current account, create a new temp account for the beta and then select one of my characters to copy over to the beta server.

Unfortunately last night was rather busy, so after the nearly 3 hours of waiting for the new client to download from Blizzard and install, I’ve had little time to do more than wander around briefly with my favorite mage. I’ll be covering the beta until it closes, so if you have any questions feel free to leave a comment below and I’ll do my best to answer it.

So pulling out the Sentry LX, we can see that it has a rather large LCD screen, which will take up two of your 3.5” drive bays. Since it tracks 5 temp probes and can control up to 5 fans, bigger is certainly better in this case. For testing purposes, I figured that the NZXT Tempest would be an appropriate case. The Sentry LX almost seems like it was made just for the “Airflow King” since it can handle almost all of its 6 fans.

When you’re putting in the Sentry, you’ll notice that there are a ton of cables. You’ve got 5 temp probes and 5 3-pin fan connectors (not to mention the molex power cable) which can seem a a bit overwhelming. Well every one of those cables is useful (and well labeled), and each is more than long enough to reach every corner of your case, so buck up and bust out those awesome cable management skills.

Normally I would install temp probes on the CPU, GPU and my main HDD first, however, since the Sentry also controls my case fans I thought I’d change things up. The Sentry has auto and manual modes for controlling the fans. When in auto, it will adjust the fans according to the temp readings from the closest probe. Since I can’t control my CPU or GPU fans, it’s a little bit harder to do. I ended up putting one probe on the back side of my GPU (which still gets a good reading), one on my hard drive (there’s a fan directly in front of it) and the other three I placed strategically throughout the case.

After everything was installed, I fired up my system and was greeted with a beautiful LCD readout of temperatures, fan speeds and the date/time. Setting the clock was a breeze, and without even touching any buttons, the system sorted out my temperatures and adjusted the fan speeds accordingly. I could then manually select an individual fan to control (the rest would stay in auto mode) or I could manually set each fan to the speeds I liked. Being the lazy person I am, I left it in auto and was pleased with the results.

One thing I will note about the LCD is that it can be difficult to read from certain angles. Like many LCD screens, it doesn’t look the best from high angles, though just leaning back in my desk chair is enough to distinctly read the numbers. One thing I would do differently is to move my optical drive down, and put the Sentry in the first two bays. This would likely take care of the viewing issue.

Overall, I loved the Sentry LX. Enthusiasts will love the control it gives you over the fans to not only keep your system running cool, but to also keep it quiet. Many times your fans are spinning up much faster than what is necessary, so slowing them down can cut down on noise considerably. Your best bet as far as temp probe placement goes is to actually place one on the GPU and another on the CPU. Due to the amount of control that the Sentry LX gives you, you’ll just want to manually set the fans associated with those two probes, which will allow you to keep it partially on auto (or some of you may not even have 5 fans, so you wouldn’t need these extra connections).

The Sentry LX is going to set you back $59.99, which I think is more than reasonable for what you’re getting. You’ll be hard pressed to find a similar piece of equipment for a better price.

First impressions are reasonable.  The IS6110 comes in two sections, the handset itself complete with charging cradle, and the base-station which plugs into your phoneline and, via USB, into your computer.  Here, then, is the first flaw for VTech: you need to have your PC turned on if you want to use the IM functionality, but we’ll come to that later.  The handset looks a little like an older Treo, albeit with a smaller display, and feels pretty plasticky.  Made from hard plastic, the keys are quiet and relatively tactile, and the spacing is fair; they’re backlit for messaging in the dark.

Sadly while VTech looked to Palm for the case design, they seem to have picked Motorola for their GUI.  Navigation is via the D-pad and two soft-keys under the screen, but fonts are blocky and the whole thing feels cramped.  For voice calls there’s a directory with space for a mere 50 numbers, Caller ID/Call Waiting and a log that records the last 50 calls.  There’s a voicemail indicator too, if your carrier supports it, and should you be lazy or have your hands full there’s a standard 2.5mm socket for a wired headset.

Before you can log into any IM service - and the IS6110 supports MSN Messenger, Windows Live Messenger and AOL Instant Messenger – you’ll need to install the VTech phone software.  The company provides a CD with all three of the IM clients and its own app; our install went without a hitch, and from then on the program started up whenever Windows loaded.  Still, it’s a pain having to have the PC switched on, plus it assumes your computer is next to a phone socket since the base station requires both.  We’d much prefer to see it plug directly into a spare ethernet port on your router, although we suspect that would push the IS6110′s price up significantly.

Once everything is connected and the software running, three homescreen icons on the handset indicate whether you’re logged into MSN, Windows Live or AOL.  You can store up to three IM accounts as different “profiles”, switching between them from the handset; one frustration is that you can only change the account details on the PC, not from the handset itself.  That’s fine if you’re the only one using the IS6110, you can have your three different IM accounts under three different profiles, but if there are multiple people in the house wanting to have their own settings you’ll have to constantly be changing them on the PC.  Once you start chatting on the IS6110 you can no longer access that messenger on the PC.

Navigating the buddy list is straightforward, and incoming messages from other people are indicated by a flashing face ion.  Hitting the ‘Buddies’ softkey takes you back to the list and lets you switch between conversations, but that’s about it: you can’t add, modify or remove contacts or groups, respond to new buddy invitations nor block unwanted contacts, and emoticons aren’t sent or displayed.  Offline messages don’t work either.  The IS6110 does support voice chat through each of the IM networks, though; we found voice quality about the same as when using a headset on the PC.

VTech suggest you’ll get either 7hrs use of the IS6110 as a phone or 3hrs messaging; standby is up to 96hrs.  In our tests we never reached those figures, and they’ll be impacted by walls being in-between the handset and the base station.  Only you know whether you can successfully carry out multiple long-term IM conversations on such a compact device; we gave up long before the 3hrs VTech said a full battery would last for, but we’ve a feeling that teenagers would be more dedicated.

In fact, that’s the obvious market for the IS6110: letting your kids chat on IM while you use the computer yourself.  With most young people glued to their cellphones, they’d probably find the VTech system pretty straightforward, albeit basic.  For instance, it supports custom ringtones – in fact you can record your own, either with the handset’s microphone or by plugging in the supplied audio cable – but you can’t assign them to individual contacts, only to incoming ‘voice’ or ‘VoIP’ calls.  If they’re not already using an IM app on their cellphone, kids would probably be better served with something like Sony’s Mylo communicator, first-gen examples of which have gone for as little as $66 on eBay recently.

As a phone, the VTech IS6110 does what you’d expect.  Call quality is typical for a DECT handset and range is the usual 50m or so, assuming walls.  As a messenger, the IS6110 is inevitably let down by its need to be plugged into a computer.  If you’ve a single kid who usually ties up the PC chatting to their friends then you might be able to placate them with the VTech, but a house with more people (or simply a person with more IM accounts) will find it all too limiting.  With free IM apps for cellphones freely available, or dedicated messengers such as the Mylo that use WiFi, the IS6110 begins to look, like many landline phones, too little too late.

The VTech IS6110 is available now, priced at $99.95.

Rating:

3 out of 5 gears

The Z uses the same individually-framed keyboard design that has so often been mis-credited to Apple, and in fact the whole notebook looks a little like a grown-up TZ-series.  There are a full array of ports clustered down the left and right sides of the notebook, including that all important HDMI for pumping Blu-ray media out onto a big display, but you’ll be pretty content enjoying playback on the Z’s own LCD.  It may be relatively small, and is certainly very glossy, but video is as crisp as you could want it.

Larger, but arguably no less attractive, the FW carries more heft than the Z - in fact you’d be happiest, we think, leaving it on a desk – but it makes up for it with a magnificent 16.4-inch display.  That’s not a size you hear of regularly; the reason Sony picked it is because it achieves the all-important 16:9 aspect for video playback, while other screens fudge it with 16:10 aspect.  It sounds like it shouldn’t make sense, but we felt that the FW’s screen is actually better to watch than, say, a 17 or 18-inch panel since it avoids the black bars.

Sony are concentrating on the unboxing and first-use experience with the new lineup, and part of that will be offering buyers the chance to de-clutter their machine with “Fresh Start”.  That basically axes all the crapware that often slows new VAIOs to a crawl.  There’ll still be a “Startup Assistant”, which the company believes fresh users will appreciate, but it’s at least one further step toward a day when there’s zero crapware on a new notebook.

The new VAIO models will be available from late July and early August.  Starting at $1,000 for the FW and BZ models, prices rise to $1,400 for the SR and $1,800 for the Z.  The SSD version of the Z, that we were so impressed with, will be priced from $2,300.

Check out the full gallery of live pictures from the Sony VAIO event here

Remember, you can see a better resolution version of the video by clicking over to YouTube and choosing “watch in high quality”

One of the guys had decided to bring their 360 and a small projector to the store, in hopes to keep us entertained. We were excited to find two available outlets on the wall we were going to use, however, they were dead. Someone else had brought their power inverter, but alas, it was not enough. I rushed off and came back with a heavy-duty 750-Watt inverter, which was more than enough to handle the job.

We spent probably 3 hours playing a variety of sports games (not my thing, but it was still a blast). Once we got bored with that, someone broke out a real football and we tossed it around for an hour or two. There were other shennanigans which included bets on whether or not someone could run to McDonald’s and back in under 5 minutes. I have to say, the dude ran pretty far (and across 4 lanes of traffic) and made it back in under 3. It was nuts.

I have to say that was the most fun I’ve ever had camping out for something. I packed my DS and a PSP in case I got bored, but I really didn’t end up playing either one very much.

The PP800 is, as you might have guessed, an 800-watt power supply, which should be enough to power many of the high end machines out there. The unit runs at 78% load efficiency, features four +12V rails and is perfect for SLI or CrossFire setups. It’s actually been certified by Nvidia for SLI. You’ll also find that the power supply will fit in both ATX and BTX cases.

This supply is actually one of the larger, and heavier ones I’ve used, which is usually a good indication of quality. There are certain electrical components that you can almost make a quick judement based solely on their weight. While I wouldn’t say that a heavy one is definitely going to be great, I can’t think of a particularly light one that was ever that great.

Unfortunately it is not a modular supply, which is by far my favorite kind due to the ability to remove clutter by reducing the number of cables in your PC. It does have a plethora of SATA (6) and standard 4-pin molex connectors (8) for those of you with a lot of drives in your PC. You also have both 6 and 8-pin PCI-e connectors for the latest graphics cards.

The cables themselves are extremely long, which is always good. Sure, you might have some excess cable, but that’s nothing a few ties can’t fix. Luckily the case I installed it in (the NZXT Tempest) has great cable management built-in, so I was able to hide most of my excess cabling.

You’ll find an 80mm and 120mm fan inside the unit, both of which are surprisingly quiet. I honestly can’t hear any increase in sound being emitted from the case.

I put the PP800 into our main gaming rig last week, and have been monitoring the voltages during my gaming sessions and even while running benchmarks and never noticed any drops. My system can be fairly power-hungry at times, so it was good to know that the supply kept up even after several hours of gaming. The specs on the machine used are as follows:

CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3.0GHz
GPU: VisionTek Radeon HD 3870X2 Overclocked
OS: Windows Vista Ultimate
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
RAM: Corsair Dominator 2GB TWIN2X2408-8500C5DF
HDD: Western Digital Caviar SE 160GB SATA
Case: NZXT Tempest

The supply provides plenty of power without faltering, plenty of connectors, extremely long cables and quiet fans, which leaves little room for complaint. Modular supplies are showing up more and more, which would have certainly been nice, as it makes things easier during installation. Looking around I saw prices right around $140-$150, which makes it competitively priced. Overall, I give the NZXT PP800 four out of five gears.

Rating:

4 out of 5 gears

The box was surprisingly small, it made me think of the boxes you find low-end budget cards in. Of course we all know that size isn’t everything. The box has the usual suspects, with plenty of cables, connectors and CDs to get you started. The card itself was also rather small. I actually can’t remember the last time I had a mid to high-end card that took up only a single PCI slot. I’ve pictured it with the single-GPU VisionTek 3870 for reference.

Yes, I know, looks are great and all, but you want to get down to business. How does it measure up? Well I’ve brought back both the VisionTek 3870 and 3870X2 OC for reference. I suspected that it would easily surpass the single-GPU card, but with it being the lower-end of the 48xx series, I figured that my X2 would still reign supreme. Let’s see how it turned out.

First, here’s our gaming rig setup. It’s still the same as the last benchmarks I ran, but  for reference, here are the specs.

CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3.0GHz
Cooler: CoolIT PURE
OS: Windows Vista Ultimate
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
RAM: Corsair Dominator 2GB TWIN2X2408-8500C5DF
HDD: Western Digital Caviar SE 160GB SATA
Case: Ultra m998 Mid-Tower

Crysis and World in Conflict are still two of the top games for working the higher-end cards, so I’ve decided to stick with them. I’ve also included the 3dMark06 results as well.

To be perfectly honest, I was blown away here. I expected this card to fall short of the 3870X2 OC, however, it scored the exact same in the two higher-resolution tests. Even more, it bested the dual-GPU card by a slight margin at the lower setting.

Once again, the 4850 surpassed my expectations. With Anti-Aliasing turned on, it actually had more than a 25% increase over the 3870X2 OC. The other two tests were pretty much a tie, which is still incredible.

Here are the 3dMark06 scores for the card. Surprisingly, the card scored lower here, but higher when actually running through game benchmarks. How strange.

Right now, if you’re buying a graphics card, don’t bother spending the extra money on the 3870X2 OC. Sure, it’s a great card, but you’re going to get the same, if not better performance out of a card that costs half the price. You’ll find the VisionTek 4850 on store shelves for around $199.

Overall, I give the VisionTek Radeon HD 4850 a solid 4.5 out of 5 gears.

Rating:

4.5 out of 5 gears

When opening the box, I was pleased to find an adapter for my old original DS. It’s good that they understand that some people haven’t upgraded to the Lite. Just a few quick turns of a screwdriver made it possible to use the older device. Of course I quickly switched it back so I could play the game on my white Lite.

The guitar accessory was a lot smaller than I thought it would be, which does make it easier to carry around. Unfortunately, smaller is not always better. When you fire up the game you are greeted by a warning to take frequent breaks in order to prevent cramping and discomfort. That troubled me slightly, but I quickly tapped the screen to get onto the good stuff.

I figured I would just go ahead and jump into the career mode. After playing just one song I knew that I was in for a rough time. First, strumming on the touch screen is not fun, especially anytime you go to chug several notes in a row. You do this by rubbing the pick back and forth on the screen, which works fine sometimes, but other times I’ll have a whole series of notes just cut out. If this happens, I have to lift off of the screen and press back down before I can start rubbing again. Not fun.

I tried various ways to hold the DS, and adjusted the hand strap more times than I care to mention, and have yet to find a position that I can describe as comfortable. I have rather large hands, which very well may be a good part of the reason why I have so much trouble with this game. It seems to be made for people with much smaller hands. About 10 minutes of playing is all it takes, after that it’s pain city. I’ve seriously had 5 or 6-hour rock marathons with GH and Rock Band, and only towards the end of those does my had begin to feel like this.

Even before my hand begins to ache, I still have issues just playing the game. When you switch between which buttons are pressed down, your hand inevitably moves. That’s no big deal when the notes are coming slowly, however, if you have a lot of notes coming at you that require different buttons, the screen can shake so badly that you’ll have trouble seeing the upcoming notes. Oh, and don’t shake it too much, or else you’ll accidentally tap on the Star Power meter and activate it at a bad time.

The peripheral itself seems to fit rather snugly into the GBA slot, however, once you get to rocking, you might notice that it comes out a bit. You might notice it because you get this wonderful message that tells you to power off the DS and re-insert the device. That’s right, you can’t just pop it back in and keep going.

The game isn’t all bad news, but its redeeming qualities are far from making up for the negatives. I actually really dig most of the music on the setlist, with Ozzy, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Santana, and Stevie Ray Vaughan topping the list. There are plenty of these songs that I hope to play on GH IV.

I also enjoyed the way the allowed you to activate Star Power. You can tap the Star Power meter (I wish this could be disabled, due to frequent mis-taps), press the X, Y, A or B button and also by yelling into the mic. I would never be caught dead yelling “Rock Out” into the mic of my DS, however, if you just simply blow at your DS, it will register and activate Star Power.

Overall, I was disappointed with the game to say the least. I can attribute some of my issues to the fact that I have large hands. This is unfortunate, as my hands aren’t gargantuan, and there are plenty of people out there with even larger ones. The fact that even playing for 20 minutes would make my hand ache for the rest of a day was enough to make me think twice about picking it back up. Could this game be fun? I’m sure that eventually after plenty of practice I would have some fun with it. I had no issues working my way from easy to expert on the original Guitar Hero. However, I just have no desire to get better at this game. It is seriously the least amount of fun I’ve had with a Guitar Hero title since the 80′s. Looks like it’s up to Aerosmith to quench my thirst for a new way to rock. I give Guitar Hero On Tour 3 out of 5 stars.

Rating:

3 out of 5 gears

This week, we discussed in random order a number of different products ranging from the new Motorola ROKR E8 to a new screen cleaner called Surface.  There’s a little bit of everything for everyone including a review of the ASUS Eee PC 901, Kyocera KR2/KPC 680, Toshiba Satellite Pro U400, and first look of the Samsung Z400 and T-Mobile @Home.  We also discussed the purchase of Helio by Virgin Mobiles for $39M.  This in my opinion is a sad thing because my friends will be out of a job soon.

Ashley was thrilled with the Voodoo laptop and really like the Wiimote concept.  I on the other hand got an exclusive first hand look HTC Touch Pro, but am not too impressed with its thickness.  It’s a big shame HTC ruined it by not slimming the handset down closer to the thickness of the HTC Diamond.  And speaking of being impressed, I was totally blown away by awesomeness of the Sony Ericsson C905 8.1 Cybershot 8.1-megapixel camera phone, Blackberry Bold and Nokia E71.

Since this card is essentially two GPUs built onto one card, we get a total of 4 DVI inputs, which I have been taking full advantage of. I’m really not sure if I can ever go back down to just 2 monitors per PC. Of course when it’s time to game, I turn on CrossFire, which only allows me to use two monitors (most games only utilize on monitor anyway, so it really doesn’t matter).

The card comes with the usual adapters, a pair of CDs and a small manual. I really like the look of the card itself, though when it’s stuck inside your PC, you really aren’t going to be looking at it very much.

Not much has changed on our gaming rig since the we tested the original 3870, but for those curious, here are the full specs of our test machine.

CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3.0GHz
Cooler: CoolIT PURE
OS: Windows Vista Ultimate
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
RAM: Corsair Dominator 2GB TWIN2X2408-8500C5DF
HDD: Western Digital Caviar SE 160GB SATA
Case: Ultra m998 Mid-Tower

For our benchmarks I’ve chosen to run Crysis and World in Conflict, as they seem to push even the latest graphics cards to their limit. You can also see how the card stacks up to the single-GPU version.

I was hoping for a little more of a gain on Crysis, but I was definitely happy to be able to finally play the game on High at my screen’s full 1680×1050 resolution. You have to sacrifice Anti-Aliasing, but 31fps is definitely playable.

I was seriously impressed with how the card handled World in Conflict. The bas 3870 card was only able to really play the game at the lowest resolution while still keeping the graphics set to high. The X2 OC really shined, especially at max resolution with AA 4x enabled.

Of course no review would be complete without a look at the 3dMark06 results. There really aren’t any surprises here, as most of the results are just a little over double what the single 3870 card scored.

The card did well, making Crysis and World in Conflict seem very playable even at high resolutions. Of course you’ll pay extra for the speed increase. You’re looking at about $400, which is a little more than what you’d pay for two single 3870 cards. The benefit here is that you only need a single PCI-e slot, and the card comes overclocked from the factory.

I give the VisionTek Radeon HD 3870 X2 Overclocked four out of five gears

Rating:

4 out of 5 gears

Multiple videos from the event after the cut!

We’ll have to wait to find out those exact details, but Vincent has been spending more time exploring the app functionality on Surface as well as meeting the team members behind the project.  As we’ve said before, the system really comes into its own when working with media; the geotagging video and the photo app demo are particularly impressive.

Microsoft are playing their cards close to their chest with regards the upcoming OS, but their enthusiasm for MultiTouch and the sample apps they’ve been showing speaks volumes about what the software will be able to do.  Vincent tells me he has plenty more video from the event that is currently going through editing and processing, so we’ll be bringing you more hands-on footage later.

Previous coverage on Microsoft Surface here.

Pete Thompson welcomes bloggers to Surface Blogger Day (apologies for the poor light video on this one):

Microsoft Surface Paint demo:

Surface Photo App demo:

Geotagging demo:

Microsoft Surface Team Members:

Check out the exclusive hands-on video with Microsoft’s Surface after the cut

While the glitzy stuff is all very impressive, what’s most interesting to me is the general use of MultiTouch – that’s what gives hints as to how it might be implemented in the Windows 7 OS.  The virtual dial used to browse through multiple photos is particularly neat, and while the ability to zoom and pan with fingers is already in use on the iPhone, it really seems to come into its own on a larger-scale display.

Of course there are plenty of questions: what sort of hardware and minimum spec will recreating this sort of MultiTouch experience in the home require, and what do Microsoft consider the “killer app” to persuade the many doubters that the technology has a place in the home?  This is only day one of the event, and Vincent is promising more video and hands-on photos of what Microsoft have up their sleeves for Surface.

Remember, you can click over to YouTube and select “watch in high quality” to see the full-resolution version

Meet the Microsoft Surface team:

The game isn’t due out for the Wii until the 22nd, which is far enough out that they weren’t able to ship mine out with the full retail boxing. The game itself and the instruments are exactly the same as you’ll find in stores next week, so I though that instead of a traditional unboxing, I’d just give you a good look at the instruments.

The guitar is very similar to the other versions of the game, just as one might expect. The only real difference besides the button layout is the inclusion of a wireless dongle. Much like the PS3 version, your connection button is located where the USB cable would come out on the 360 guitar.

The drums too look very similar to the other versions, with only a few minor details changed. Obviously they’ve changed the overall color to Wii-white and altered the button layout for the Wii as well. For some reason it seems that Harmonix has decided to change the two bars connecting the feet from metal to plastic. In addition to being plastic, they have flattened one side of the bars, allowing it to rest more flush with the ground which seems to provide a little extra support.

These are really the only hardware changes to note. They don’t appear to have changed the mic, and I was shipped a standalone retail USB hub, though I would likely expect to find one of the regular Rock Band USB hubs in the retail kits next week. Tomorrow I’ll be bringing you my impressions of the new hardware and let you know how the game plays on Nintendo’s latest console.

Check out the exclusive videos from the DreamColor event after the cut

Traditionally, animators, digital film-makers and photo editors have needed to rely on CRT monitors for the best color reproduction, as LCD displays simply weren’t precise enough.  The DreamColor LCD, however, can show more than 64 times the colors a normal LCD is able to, and has convenient push-button access to seven different color space presets: sRGB, Adobe RGB, Rec. 601, Rec. 709, DCI-P3 emulation (97%), and full gamut. 

The LP2480xz is the first display to be introduced under the HP DreamColor Technology initiative, a two-year technology collaboration between HP and DreamWorks Animation that aims to deliver accurate color that remains consistent from application to application, device to device, and medium to medium. 

The 30-bit display has an RGB LED backlight and a contrast ratio of 1,000:1. Black luminance is an astonishing 0.05 cd/m2 (typ. black level at minimum white level): normal LCDs, even those claiming to be for color-critical applications, usually manage 0.5 cd/m2. Native resolution is 1920 x 1200, but it’s also happy with 1920 x 1080 @ 60Hz high-definition. Connectivity includes two DVI-I, DisplayPort 1.1, HDMI 1.3, Component (YPbPr), S-Video and Composite, plus there’s a four-port powered USB hub.

It’s tough to describe just how rich the colors are, and even harder to photograph or video! This is, as you might expect, the best quality image I’ve ever seen on an LCD display, and to be honest it’s probably the best on any screen, no matter the technology, that I’ve come across. The display is now shipping worldwide for a US list price of $3,499. 

Our full gallery of live DreamColor photos from HP’s event is here.  You can find out more information at the LP2480zx’s official page here.

Introduction to the DreamColor partnership:

Animators and DreamWorks pros discuss the DreamColor LCD: 

In production from Fall 2003 to Spring 2008 – a total of 4.5 years! – the film demanded 391 animation artists and, including voice talent (Kung Fu Panda also stars Dustin Hoffman and Angelina Jolie), in excess of 857,680 hours of work altogether.  Artists from around the world converged at DreamWorks two California studios, the 350 miles between them linked by HP’s “Halo Collaboration Studio” video telepresence system, and used more than 400 workstations provided by the company.  Animators primarily used xw9300 and xw9400 workstations, while HP constructed a server-farm of ProLiant DL145 servers and BL465c server blades; in rendering the whole film, the farm churned away for in excess of a whopping 24 million hours, four times as many as the original Shrek film.

The reason for all that processing is the degree of flexibility DreamWorks required for the feature.  Normal film-makers can move their cameras around as much as they like, but in computer animation your system has to be able to cope with the extra 3D modelling that demands.  Kung Fu Panda utilizes the largest number of moving cameras on any DreamWorks title to date; for instance, in a scene where Po rides a spitting, sparkling fireworks chair into a stadium, it took a total of 54 different systems working together for the panda and chair effects alone.  When Po goes on to blow the chair up with fireworks, the explosion requires 953,593 individually-animated particles.

We had an opportunity to sit down and talk about the animation process, and being fans of traditional cartoons it was good to see that paper-based pitches are still very much part of things.  Multiple storyboards are produced – unsurprisingly using HP color printers and scanners! – and then the artists create preliminary 2D choreography on the computer systems.  What particularly pleased them, we found, was the new ability to work on multiple shots simultaneously courtesy of the extra CPU cores and upgraded memory of the HP machines; the xw9400 proved, in some tasks, to be 50-percent faster than its predecessor.  The 2D is then rendered into CGI courtesy of Animation running on the server farm.  In a cute tradition, every time a scene was finalized the animator responsible was given a fortune cookie with a customized fortune inside.

We were lucky enough, along with the group of journalists and industry analysts, to be treated to a pre-release screening of the film, and all I have to say is WOW!  We’re not film reviewers (they don’t usually have enough USB ports for our liking) but despite the average age in the room being way above the audience DreamWorks are expecting there were plenty of laughs and the visuals are top-notch.  HP may have been more excited about their quad-core BL465c blades with dual-gigabit networking and space for up to 32GB of RAM, but we can guarantee that you won’t be able to miss Kung Fu Panda and its tie-in marketing over the Summer.  DreamWorks tried to tell us that Po’s “Panda Dance” is easy to learn, but we’ll leave it to the kids; there are only so many times you can stumble into a ProLiant server before you get escorted from the premises!

Kung Fu Panda by DreamWorks is released on Friday June 6th at theaters all over the US.  You can find out more about the film by visiting the official website, and more about HP’s involvement here.  Click to view the rest of the image gallery.

Kung Fu Panda Behind the scene video

Check out the Wii Fit unboxing video after the cut

Nintendo include the necessary batteries and a copy of the Wii Fit companion game, together with a thin printed manual.  It hooks up wirelessly to your Wii, and when you first start you need to enter your height, tell it whether you’re wearing particularly heavy clothing, and then go through a weigh-in and a test for your centre of gravity.  After that, the software works out your BMI (Body Mass Index) and tells you whether you’re fat or not (Nintendo are keen to point out that this is aimed at adults, and that children’s bizarre and lumpen bodies may not be correctly represented by the calculated BMI).

Tell Wii Fit what weight you want to lose, and how long you’ve got in which to achieve it, and it’ll set you weekly goals and offer up the different exercises.  They’re broken down into four categories: yoga, muscle workouts, aerobic exercises and balance exercises.  Aerobic, for instance, includes a virtual hoola-hoop, a “step” class and jogging on the spot; under balance there’s a particularly tricky game in which you have to guide a virtual ball around a table covered in holes, by shifting your weight on the board.  All the achievements are recorded under your Mii profile, and doing particularly well at a certain activity unlocks new exercises.

We’ve not long had the Wii Fit in the office, but already we’re impressed.  It’ll be interesting to see how long the batteries last, and whether it’s actually a good way to lose weight or more of a gimmick, but – misrepresented BMI aside – anything that gets kids off the couch and moving around has to be A Good Thing.  If it does some good for some lazy tech journalists too, all the better…

We’ll bring you more on the Wii Fit when we’ve put it – and ourselves – through its paces.

We set out to bring you the best in consumer electronics, and we haven’t finished yet. As ever, if you’ve any suggestions please do leave them in the comments section below, or check out the SlashGear forums and join in the conversation there.

Aerogel was developed by Aspen and used on the Mars Rover and StarDust interplanetary probe. A low-density solid-state material, it’s created from a gel in which the liquid component of the gel has been replaced with gas. The result is a very successful insulator. LapLogic then add standoffs to increase the air-gap to 0.5-inch, transparent pockets for CDs, DVDs or business cards, and – in the case of the W800 – a ScotchGuard-coated ballistic nylon mouse pad. The G800 measures 11 x 16 x 1-inches and weighs 16oz; the W800 at measures 11 x 20 x 1-inches and weighs 26oz.

Anyone with a MacBook Pro – even the newer, cooler Penryn versions – knows that after extended use they can get particularly hot on the underside, to the point where using one on a lap can be uncomfortable. It seemed the ideal opportunity to test out the LapLogic pads, and we came away particularly impressed. Even with the MacBook running processor-intensive tasks over a long period, we felt no heat change through either LapDesk. Touching the bare base of the laptop showed that it was hot enough that using it on our legs would have been an impossibility.

Quality of both LapDesks is very good with well-finished seams, and we would have no qualms about stashing it in our bag. The extra mouse space on the W800 is an obvious choice for anyone not keen on their machine’s trackpad, though the more compact G800 would be easier to transport. As for the non-slip coating, it successfully gripped both thighs and notebook despite using it at various angles. In fact our only mild concern would be the effect of temperature on the laptop itself; unlike normal pads, which do transfer some of the heat away from the machine, the Aerogel pair leave this to the air gap formed by the risers. Still, this is arguably better than you would see using a MacBook on a desk.

Compared to a basic foam pad, the LapLogic pads are obviously more expensive: $69.95 for the G800 and $79.95 for the W800. Their performance, however, recommends them despite the cost. If you regularly use a laptop away from your desk, you owe it to your knees to test the LapLogic Aerogel LapDesks out.

Check out the full LapLogic gallery here

Rating:

3.5 out of 5 gears

Of course if you’ve never actually set up a liquid cooling system, it probably looks a bit overwhelming. There are several different components you’ll need to carefully assemble, not to mention the cost of actually acquiring said parts. To the novice, it can seem like much more work than it’s worth. That’s why this PURE from CoolIT can be quite appealing. It’s a self-contained liquid cooling system that is supposed to be simple install. I’ve had a chance to test one out, and I’ve shot a video of the installation process. Hit the jump to see the results.

You can see from the video that there isn’t a ton of work required. Sure, you’ll need to remove your motherboard, but if you’re even thinking about overclocking, or have assembled your own computer, it won’t be anything you can’t handle.

The total time for installation was just under 20 minutes. That’s not too bad considering that I now have a liquid cooling setup. If I chose, I could easily disable the rest of my fans (save for the GPU) and have an almost completely silent system. However, for the sake of testing purposes, I left everything in tact, which included a single 120mm fan in the front, and the twin fans over my Corsair Dominator memory.

It should be noted that while the PURE can easily be used for good overclocking, its primary function is to provide a mostly silent PC. With that in mind, I’ve decided to not do any overclocking to my system this time around. However, I will be putting together a special OC piece sometime in the near future where I’ll push this to the limit.

For those wondering, here is my configuration for the test system:

CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3.0GHz
OS: Windows Vista Ultimate
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
RAM: Corsair Dominator 2GB TWIN2X2408-8500C5DF
GPU: VisionTek Radeon HD 3870 512MB
HDD: Western Digital Caviar SE 160GB SATA
Case: Ultra Products m998 Mid-Tower

You can see that with the computer sitting at idle it knocks a full four degrees off of both the system and CPU temperatures.

This is where a CPU cooler is really going to show its true colors, the load test. The PURE managed to keep the CPU temperature at a nice 36 degrees under load, which is a full 6 degrees under the stock cooler. It didn’t do much for the overall case temperature, but since it’s only cooling a single component, that’s to be expected.

Overall, this is a great product for someone that wants either a silent PC, or just needs it to run a bit cooler. The installation is a bit more complicated than just removing the heatsink and slapping on a new one, but far easier than any liquid cooling setup I’ve ever used. The price is another great factor here. The CoolIT PURE is going to run just under $100 at most places I looked. Honestly, I’ve seen regular fan/heatsink combos that go for only a little less than that.

There are a couple of minor downsides. One is that due to the size of the unit and length of the hoses, you may have some difficulty getting it situated while attaching the cooling block to the CPU. The other is really minor, which is that the nice metal cover that hides the radiator is a pain to clean once you’ve handled it. It took me a few minutes of trying different things to get rid of my fingerprints and such. It’s not a huge deal because once the installation is complete, you won’t have to mess with it again.

In the end, I give the CoolIT PURE 4 out of 5 Gears.

Rating:

4 out of 5 gears

My copy came with a few extra goodies from Rockstar that I thought I’d show you. These aren’t the ones that came with the Special Edition of the game, but are very cool in their own respect. First, we have the Stature of Happiness. It bears a striking resemblance to something, but I just can’t seem to put my finger on it. I know it’s a major landmark in the game, but I think I’ve seen it somewhere else.

I also got a pack of stickers in the box. I’m not the kind of guy that normally likes stickers and all, but these are awesome. I’d spell out the references in a few of the stickers, but seriously, if you’re playing a game like this, you should already be laughing.

You’ll note that the quality of the footage isn’t great, and the position of the camera is even worse. I really do apologize for this, but we were short on time, and weren’t able to properly setup our equipment before rocking out.

I’m over on the right rocking bass, my brother Eric is on the left covering your view of his lead guitar stylings and John Drake is rocking the drums. I don’t know if you guys have met John (you can see a previous interview with him here), but he actually plays the drums for a couple of bands, and will rock your socks of if you get the chance to play with him.

I loved playing this song, it’s been one of my favorite songs since Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness came out and it’s a blast to play. There’s one other song that we were able to play during our visit to the Star Chamber, however if I told you what it was, John would have to kill me.

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]

The screen will be able to be rotated converting the notebook into a tablet, and it will be a touchscreen, it will respond to a stylus and the software will include handwriting recognition software for taking notes. The whole system will be powered by an Intel ULV processor with Intel’s 945 GU Express chipset.

Other features of the notebook include a 1.3MP camera, 1GB of DDR2, a built-in touchpad, two mouse buttons, scroll, directional pads, dedicated softkeys for things like WMP, speakers, WiFi, Ethernet, and a full sized keyboard. This is shaping up to be the Tablet PC I’ve been dreaming of but with the price of a budget PC at about $425 when converted. I hope to God this thing makes it to US shores, I know I’d buy one if it works half as well as it sounds.

[via techtree]

You also get the DTS-HD Master Audio support for Blu-Ray movies that allow the PS3 to output audio in high-bitrate form to up to 7.1 channels. Obviously that was a feature pushed by Home Entertainment geeks, not so much gamers.

Other updates are likely to include bug fixes and performance tweaks that aren’t exactly listed by Sony. The new firmware is available for free and coincides with the release of GT5 Prologue which can be bought through the online service or as a physical retail copy.

[via Electronista]

Then they added some little features that make a big difference including adopting the touch sensitive LED backlit keys of some of the XPS systems. The notebooks are now noticeable thinner and lighter and have some other features that road warriors are likely to appreciate, but they still maintain the same low price and they come crap-ware free.

The 1310 is a 13.3” notebook that you can get with up to a Core 2 Duo chip or as low as a Celeron processor, base price is $749. The 1510 and 1710 are 15.4 and 17 inch notebooks respectively and cover the same choices in processor as the 1310, the differences being that they are larger laptops with the 17-inch model aimed at users seeking a desktop replacement solution, the 1510 has a base price of $599 with no base price for the 17-inch model given. The 1310 and 1510 are available today throughout Europe, the Middle East, and Africa; North American and South American markets will get these two notebooks come May 1st with Asia getting them on May 5th, later in May the 1710 will launch globally.

[via notebook review]

It has a large high-res LCD screen on the phone as well as a full keypad which can be used to type your messages. No longer will you have to choose between sitting at the computer all day and using the precious capacity of your mobile’s data plan, you can now go outside and enjoy the weather and not miss the message from your friend you are waiting on.

The phone is ENERGY STAR rated, RoHS compliant, and comes with 100% recyclable packaging. It has caller ID, call waiting, recordable ring tones, voicemail indicator, a 50 name/number programmable phonebook/directory, and works with your choice of headsets. This amazing home phone is a mere $99.95 and can be bought online or at Best Buy.

[via VTech]

However, it’s still really, really hard to swallow a $2999 price tag on anything with a 500GB HDD inside. On the upside it does support all types of DRM, supports quick sync with Windows Media Player, and supports non-compressed files as well as WMA, MP3, and WAV.

There is a USB port on the back so you can connect the server to your computer, there is also an Ethernet connection, as I said, three audio outputs, but not in HDMI or digital audio out, just the standard RCA jacks, it also has a capacitive touch interface on the front next to its OLED screen and it of course works with all of NuVo’s other products. Sadly though, there still isn’t a single feature that screams out to me this is worth the asking price, however, if you are already using any of NuVo’s other products, the interoperability is sufficient enough to tip me.

[via NuVo]

It just wouldn’t make sense for mobile phone manufacturers like HTC to make the exact same phone twice just offering your choice of Android or Windows Mobile, it would kind of be nice, but exclusive handsets tipped to one OS or the other are what really moves units. For example, would the XPERIA X1 be such a big deal if it wasn’t running the next generation of Windows Mobile software? Maybe, but I’d guess not.

At the same time, the HTC Dream, when its released, will likely be the pinnacle of HTC’s design and manufacturing capabilities, but will never officially see the Windows Mobile OS on its precious little ROM chips. So, how does that make Microsoft feel that occasionally, their top manufacturers are going to choose to put and open source mobile OS on their phones instead of opting to install Windows Mobile on the device?

Personally I could care less if Windows Mobile got any more attention until the release a completely new version of the mobile OS that isn’t complete shite, however, my personal opinion matters little. So, do you the readers think that Microsoft will stop working with vendors that manufacture Android handsets, or if they will Coexist peacefully in natural harmony together? Lastly, how many of you would like to see an OS option on the mobile handset purchases negating the need to choose a phone based on OS instead of features?

Next up, a new guy and/or company landed on the scene, the name, Van Der Led. So far we’ve heard about the new Asus Eee look alike from the company called Jisus, and then later this past week we wrote about a new cell phone watch from the same name, it’s all kind of fishy, but we’ll see. Speaking of Asus Eee-like computers, we first saw some reviews of the new HP Mini-Note coming from various sites, then later this past week we discovered that they’d gone on sale on HP’s site with an advertised ship date of April 15th. Lastly, in line with budget PC’s, Everex pushed out a new one, their MyMiniPC small form factor desktop PC that had a new version of gOS Space with the whole package being customized for MySpace users the world over.

Still on the topic of Notebooks, Toshiba released several new models including the A300, M300, P300, and U400 series’ of notebooks and extended the X205 SLI line by two new models. Toshiba also pushed out some new REGZA television sets ranging from 52-32-inches in size with most of them packing hard drives and built in DVRs as well as a ton of ports including 3 Ethernet NICs making these TV’s more connected than my computer. In other TV news Mitsubishi announced the name of its line of upcoming laser TV’s, thusly dubbed LaserVue.

In other news, Buffalo expanded their LinkStation line to include one of the first remotely portable models, it uses two 500GB laptop hard drives, a quite, small, fan-less case design, it offers up all of the lovable features of their LS line including the 1TB of storage space in a package small enough to fit in your hand. RedPost has upgraded their product lineup from the RedPost/Kit to the new RedPost SignBeta. Also, the BBC’s newest iPlayer has been expanded from the computer, to the iPhone/iPod Touch, and now to the Wii and is causing considerable network strain over in the UK leaving Internet providers looking to the BBC to cough up all or part of the estimated 831 million pounds needed to upgrade the network.

In Mobile news, we got an invite to go to an event being hosted by HTC in London on May 6th where we believe they’ll be unveiling their first Android Phone, rumored to be called the HTC Dream. Speaking of Android, we spotted a Nokia N810 that was running Android, and I must say it looked pretty amazing; hopefully they finish up the coding on the project so more N810 users can adopt the new Android OS.

Lastly in gaming news, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed got a release date of September 17th, World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King has entered alpha testing. Microsoft is rumored to be working on a Wiimote-like controller for their Xbox 360 system which would be great for games much like the upcoming Star Wars title. There was also lots of news regarding Grand Theft Auto IV; the most interesting is that a shortage of the game is expected in the UK, who would have thought they’d enjoy frolicking around killing anyone and everyone in some random city.