Reg Hardware

29th March 2006 Archive

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  • Flash price plunge heralds cheaper MP3 players?

    NAND falls as DRAM rallies

    iPods and other MP3 players look set to become much cheaper thanks to a dramatic decline in the price of NAND Flash chips. According to memory industry watcher DRAMeXchange, NAND Flash prices on the spot market have fallen by more than 50 per cent since the start of 2006. It said 2GBb and 4Gb NAND Flash chip prices fell by 63 …

    Bits 'n' Chips 29 Mar 2006, 09:22

  • We're not merging, say MSI and Gigabyte

    Have pondered it, though

    Motherboard makers MSI and Gigabyte have denied claims they've been talking about a merger - even though, by their own admission, they have discussed the possibility more than once. A report, published by Chinese-language media this week, alleged the two companies were talking about getting together, a process begun five …

    Bits 'n' Chips 29 Mar 2006, 09:37

  • Toshiba pre-announces next-gen Nvidia mobile GPU

    GeForce Go 7900 GS available now, apparently

    Nvidia hasn't announced its GeForce Go 7900 GS mobile GPU yet, but Toshiba yesterday said it has begun shipping a gaming-oriented notebook which delivers "state-of-the-art graphics" thanks to the new chip, 256MB of graphics memory and a 17in TruBrite display. The Centrino-branded Satellite P105-S921 is powered by a 1.83GHz …

    Bits 'n' Chips 29 Mar 2006, 10:06

  • Palm's low-end Treo spotted on web

    Lowrider, Hollywood... or hoax?

    Tantalising images that are claimed to show Palm's upcoming low-end Treo smart phone have been posted on the web. The shots show a blue device with a screen and keypad not unlike those featured on the current Treo 650 and - crucially - no external antenna. The pictures appear on fansite Treonauts here and here. In the two …

    Phones 29 Mar 2006, 10:28

  • Dell unveils D820, D620 'super 3G'-ready notebooks

    HSPDA card not available yet, though

    Dell has begun taking orders for its anticipated Latitude D620 and D820 business-oriented notebooks - and has said the higher-end machine will sport an Nvidia graphics chip as yet unannounced by the GPU maker. It also said the machine will be offered with an HSDPA 3G data card - but not yet. The part in question is the Quadro …

    PCs 29 Mar 2006, 11:34

  • iPod Nano gets slimline stand

    Dock holiday

    US iPod accessory maker Marware has unveiled a docking cradle that's almost as minimalist as the player it's designed to support. The iPod Nano Stand is sculpted to fit the player perfectly, with a dock connector and a back plane to make fitting and removal painless. There's a standard USB port to cable the cradle to the …

    Media players 29 Mar 2006, 12:05

  • Motorola changes mind on Q ship date

    Shipping "soon", apparently

    When will Motorola ship its Q smart phone? Last week, the company's website added a page promoting the slimline would-be Blackberry beater. It said the 1.2cm-thick, keyboard-equipped handset will be "available April 2006". Now Moto has changed the page to read "shipping soon". Is it simply being cautious or is it signalling a …

    Phones 29 Mar 2006, 12:34

  • Dell extends Precision portable workstation line

    Status Quadro

    Dell has upgraded its Precision family of mobile workstations, adding a pair of new models to the line-up, both equipped with mobile-oriented Nvidia Quadro FX GPUs and Intel dual-core microprocessors. The Precision M90 and M65 both use Intel's 945PM chipset and ship with up to 4GB of 667MHz DDR 2 SDRAM. Dell is offering the …

    PCs 29 Mar 2006, 13:06

  • Ulead yanks Blu-ray support from week-old app

    MovieFactory 5 not fully verified for Blu-ray recording it seems

    Media software maker Ulead has dropped Blu-ray Disc support from the latest release of its DVD MovieFactory video capture and disk-mastering application - even though the software has only been shipping for just over a week. DVD MovieFactory 5 went on sale on 20 March complete with BD-R support. Today, Ulead said it would be …

    HD 29 Mar 2006, 14:09

  • WD unveils 6GB pocket drive

    HDD on USB

    Western Digital (WD) has announced its take on the USB-driven external microdrive, launching a bus-powered 6GB hard disk drive under its Passport Pocket brand. The 6 x 4.5 x 0.9cm, 45g unit contains a 1in, 3,600rpm HDD with a 2MB cache. It has a mean read seek time of 11ms, WD said, and a nominal average latency of 8.3ms. …

    Gadgets and Gizmos 29 Mar 2006, 14:31

  • Panasonic Blu-ray player to cost 'under $1,500'

    Ah, $1499.99, then...

    Panasonic's Blu-ray Disc player, the DMP-BD10, will set consumers back a whopping $1,500 when it ships in the US in September - up to $500 more than Sony's offering. Actually, Panasonic said the DMP-BD10's price will be "less than $1,500" - so our money's on a $1499.99 price tag... The company didn't provide much in the way …

    HD 29 Mar 2006, 14:54

  • Asus to ship Ageia PhysX add-in boards

    First CPU, then GPU, now PPU

    Asus will begin shipping a dedicated physics processing board based on Ageia's PhysX PPU in May, the company said today. The card contains 256MB of memory dedicated to environment calculations designed to make virtual worlds feel more real to game players. Ageia announced PhysX last week. It claims that 60 developers - …

    Bits 'n' Chips 29 Mar 2006, 15:25

  • NTT DoCoMo preps army-style music phone

    Music Porter X unveiled

    NTT DoCoMo will next month ship a music player capable of downloading songs from its 3G FOMA mobile phone network. Yes, it's a phone too, but unlike music-friendly mobiles like Motorola's Slvr and Rokr, the Music Porter X is designed to spend as much time hooked up to a hi-fi as placed in a pocket. Kitted out in a …

    Phones 29 Mar 2006, 15:58

  • Apple adds noise limit to iPod firmware

    Volume discount

    Worried Junior may be listening to his or her iPod too loudly? Apple has added a user-definable volume limit to its latest iPod Nano and 5G iPod firmware. iPods sold in France and other EU countries have a mandatory volume limit, so it will interesting to see whether the update allows Euro users to turn their iPod 'up to eleven …

    Media players 29 Mar 2006, 16:07

  • Apple, Beatles spat about logos not music, says lawyer

    Apple vs Apple Beatles' trademark case comes to court

    It's the logo, stupid. That, at least, is what the Apple vs Apple case centres on if opening arguments made by Apple Corp. lawyer Geoffrey Vos QC are anything to go by. It's not about Apple Comp. selling recorded music, it's about the Mac maker promoting the business with its logo, Vos said. "Apple Computer can go into the …

    Mac 29 Mar 2006, 16:52