Monday, July 21, 2008
General | Hardware | Microsoft,
Did you know that Microsoft makes hardware, besides the Xbox360 and Zune. Well they do and it’s quite a bit of amazing hardware. They used to make routers even, and their were rumors of things like Microsoft branded PC’s and LCD’s that even I had hoped would come to light, small rumors of HDMI cable and other pieces of hardware. But all in all the hardware division from before even the Xbox360 was mainly known for making some of the best keyboards and mice on the market, only comparable to Logitech in quality.
Rumor has it after the release of a SideWinder mouse, the SideWinder branded peripherals might be making a gaming revival. The latest rumor is the SideWinder X6 might be seeing the light of day coming in September, featuring some pretty wicked features. Unfortunately the keyboard itself and it’s features all remain rumor for now. But for those of us that love crossing our fingers and praying for them to come true.
Glowing red key’s, a detachable number pad that can snap to the right or left side of the keyboard depending on user preference. It also has programmable buttons and 2 large knobs located at the top which are thought to also be programmable for doing things like rotating through guns in an FPS, rotating through your playlist in iTunes, stuff like that. The sad thing is we’ll have to wait until September to find out if this really is a 79$ SideWinder X6, or just another rumor for the great rumor cloud of nothingness.
Source: PCInpact
Monday, July 21, 2008
General | Microsoft,
You know there’s rumors that Apple is making a play for the big league and Microsoft might be in trouble. But if you look at the numbers it’s kind of like saying Hydroxycut was the solution to obesity and then looking at the percentages of the population that are overweight still. But hell even those numbers don’t go to show just how big of a lead Microsoft continues to have on a daily basis over it’s nearest desktop competitor.
The latest numbers from Microsoft are, and I quote, “the fastest annual revenue growth since 1999”. How big exactly, $60.42 billion dollars big in this past fiscal year, but that’s not the “big number” that matters. The Vista licenses sold since it’s launch 18 months ago is the number that’s astounding. For an OS that's been poorly received and with XP still hanging on and people still buying XP in droves, the fact that Microsoft reported surpassing 140 Million licenses since last April.
Ok at the rate Vista is moving it will be several years before it catches up to XP, but then again XP was one of Microsoft’s biggest operating systems of all time. That’s a pretty major amount of software to have moved especially considering how poorly reviewed and received Vista has been.
Source: Microsoft
Monday, July 21, 2008
General | Hardware | Innovation,
Yes you read it correctly this is not your average CPU cooler. Now don’t go hiding your gold anklet and other jewelry just yet as it isn’t gold flowing inside this amazing littler cooler. No this new company Danamics’ has a bit of magic up it’s sleeve and no they didn’t grab a liquid terminator for it’s inner liquid either. This isn’t the first liquid metal cooler we’ve heard of as it was rumored to be coming soon to closed loop GPU coolers soon. But this is the first of it’s kind to actually hit the market is of itself quite an achievement.
The actual internal metal blend is still unknown as they aren’t releasing it to the public. But there are only so many metals that it could be especially when very few liquid metals are non-deadly. Just to make things a bit cooler is the fact that the metallic liquid is pumped through the heatsink completely without moving parts via the use of a “multi-string” electromagnetic pump. On the sad part of the news is the fact that the pricing and availability haven’t been released yet. On top of that theirs no performance data on it’s dissipation yet. But after the previous liquid-metal GPU cooler discussions it might just be one of the best coolers you can buy. Then again it might be filled with liquid terminator metal and try to take over the world.
Source: Engadget
Monday, July 14, 2008
General | Hardware | Microsoft,
No your not looking at the Next-Gen cutting edge DNA testing Star Trek Tricorder. No this little space age looking gadget is the Microsoft Wireless Arc Mouse. Microsoft has had one of the most extreme range of hardware products. Especially when it comes down to mice and keyboards. But this latest Arc Mouse is one of the most extreme and amazing looking ones I’ve seen to date.
It’s set to go on sale for $59.95 and will combine some awesome features to make it extremely portable, including the ability to fold up and the fact it’s completely wireless. The mouse will be available in two color, the red as shown above and a black model for those that prefer the simple less flashy colors. While an exact release date isn’t known, it’s expected to hit before this holiday season. I think the only thing that would make this more amazing to me is if they told me it was part of their laser line sensors.
Source: MaximumPC
Monday, July 14, 2008
General | Hardware | Media,
The Valuable Group may not be a name that you know from the past but it’s owner Sanjay Gaikwad thinks he can make the now defunct MovieBeam service a worldwide phenomenon. As a bit of a refresher course, MovieBeam is a set top box from which you can stream some pretty heavily compressed HD content as well as SD movies on demand.
It’s a big move from this Indian Conglomerate to take MovieBeam that failed in the US after Disney and other media giants poured over $100 million into it. Somehow Mr. Gaikwad want's to use that same amount of cash not only to relaunch MovieBeam, but to launch it in 3 markets consisting of North America and the UK as well as “other overseas markets”. But they might be able to do it, why? Experience for one, as they already offer digital movie delivery in India and South Asia via satellite. So with them planning to roll out all 3 markets and relaunch the MovieBeam vision within the year, who knows maybe we’ll all be streaming exercise movies working out on ellipticals from our brand new cutting edge MovieBeam (Made in India), set top box.
Source: Variety
Monday, July 14, 2008
General | Wierd,
Well the next time your hanging out on your oceanfront property and you see a bright light floating in the sky, it might be a UFO, or it might be a very identified art project dreamt up by artist Peter Coffin and constructed by the London based Cinimod Studio. As you can see below it’s a pretty big piece of “art”.
The unit measures a whopping 7 meters across and is constructed of aluminum covered in 3,000 ultra-bright programmable LEDs. What really kicks things off is the fact it has a builtin 6kw generator to provide it’s power making it a completely self contained UFO. On top of that the fact it’s also remotely controlled via SMS just makes it more amazing. What’s a little bit more obscure is the fact their trying to say that on July 4th it “flew” along the coast of Sopot, Poland… Now unless it was in a plane I don’t forsee that being true, but then again they did post the video below as “proof” but then again I’ve seen flying Honda civics on youtube.
Source: Engadget