15th January 2008 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site. Or try the full archive of all our sister sites.

PS3 component cost halved in 12 months, analyst claims

Console's parts now cost $400, apparently

Sony's PlayStation 3 costs just $400 (£200) to make these days - about half of what the console cost to produce when it was launched in November 2006. So claims Nikko Citigroup analyst Kota Ezawa, BusinessWeek reports. Ezawa puts the reduction down to increased volumes, cheaper components but most particularly much-reduced …

Consoles 15 Jan 10:55
Intel readies 15 CPUs for Centrino revamp

Count 'em...

How many new and updated 45nm mobile microprocessors is Intel planning to launch alongside 'Montevina', the next generation of its Centrino laptop platform? It's going to launch 15, industry insiders claim. Count 'em... Core 2 Extreme X9300 - 12MB of L2, core speed unknown, FSB 1066MHz, TDP 45W Core 2 Extreme X9100 - 6MB of …

Bits 'n' Chips 15 Jan 11:20
AMD rewrites four-core Phenom roll-out timetable

9700 and 9900 delay confirmed

AMD has confirmed that the release of two of its Phenom processors, the 9700 and the 9900, has slipped from this quarter to the next. It claimed the move had been made for marketing reasons not manufacturing issues. The 9700 and 9900 clock at, respectively, 2.4GHz and 2.6GHz. They're based on the same core as the troubled ' …

Bits 'n' Chips 15 Jan 11:36
Microsoft develops 'intelligent' shopping trolley

Does it yell out when it's been nicked?

Supermarket trolleys have always been pretty basic - until now. Microsoft is co-developing a new one featuring an integrated display that tells you what to buy, what aisle it’s in and how much you’ve spent. MediaCart's shopping trolley features a colour display Dubbed MediaCart, hungry shoppers swipe their loyalty card …

Gadgets and Gizmos 15 Jan 11:46
Toshiba pitches HD DVD players as... DVD machines

So why buy HD DVD discs then?

A week after the battle with Blu-ray Disc swung further toward that rival format, Toshiba said it will promote its players on their ability to upscale standard-definition content for HDTVs. "Major initiatives... are designed to spotlight the superior benefits of HD DVD as well as the benefits HD DVD brings to a consumer’s …

HD 15 Jan 12:07
Sony talks up MP3 dictation gadgets

Memo: buy milk

Sony is literally talking up its latest MP3 player, because the gadget's also a handy dictation unit. Sony's ICDUX70 and ICDUX80 units come as 1GB or 2GB units respectively The 1GB ICDUX70 and 2GB ICDUX80 each have built-in microphones for recording up to 290 hours and 581 hours of chatter, respectively, which is definitely …

Gadgets and Gizmos 15 Jan 12:11
Samsung's F700V to be all-white on the night?

Vodafone shows off new handset colour

Samsung has stayed true to its word and created a white-edged version of its F700 smartphone. Samsung's F700V: now with white trim When the original black-edged handset was released late last year, the Korean giant said it also planned to create several different colour versions of the handset. Until now, consumers had seen …

Phones 15 Jan 12:25
Netgear EVA8000 network media player

Review Now with Matroska support

The EVA8000 was a high-end product when it was announced, bundling HDMI with 1080P HD playback. But the video encoding world moves quickly. It may have been suitable when HD standards were emerging, but a few months later the situation looks decidedly different. H.264 has emerged as the HD codec of choice, although you'll also …

Media players 15 Jan 13:07
Polaroid pops out ink-less photo printer

No ink? No problem!

Polaroid has unveiled a handheld printer which it hopes will have us all printing out copies of our terrible New Year’s Eve snaps directly from digital cameras and mobile phones. Polaroid's Digital Instant Mobile Photo Printer: inkless Dubbed the Polaroid Digital Instant Mobile Photo Printer, or PDIMPP for short, the unit …

Gadgets and Gizmos 15 Jan 13:14
MWg touts Atom handset duo

Based on CPUs, not particle accelerators

The Mobile and Wireless Group (MWg) has created two new smrtphones: the Atom Life and the Atom V. MWg's Atom Life... MWg was created last year when Telefonica O2 ditched its device business in Asia, leaving it to be run by the existing Asian management team and UK online retailer Expansys, which came on board as a private …

Phones 15 Jan 16:02
Storage is still sexy, claims Iomega

Catwalk capacity

Iomega has updated its svelte range of designer 2.5in portable hard drives with a larger capacity model and a better connected interface. Provided you have the eGo to match. Iomega's eGo drive, in sexy, supermodel silver The eGo range, which first hit the catwalks high-street back in June, already offered a hip flask-esque …

Storage 15 Jan 16:31
Google tidies up iPhone apps for Macworld

Showing what's possible online

As the Macworld show starts in San Francisco Google has speeded up its iPhone applications, as well as improving its customised homepages and providing quick links to users' favourite Google applications. Google has long endorsed the idea of online applications, and until the iPhone SDK becomes available (due in February) the …

Phones 15 Jan 17:13
Apple to charge $20 for iPod Touch update

Macworld Expo But latest iPhone firmware will be free

Apple has sold more than 4m iPhones since the handset was launched in June 2007, CEO Steve Jobs said today - an average of 20,000 a day, he said. That was a prelude to the announcement of the phone's latest firmware - and one for the iPod Touch that comes at a price Unfortunately, the Macworld keynote was short on up-to-date …

Phones 15 Jan 17:42
Apple looks to movie rentals to revive Apple TV box

Macworld Expo Price cut, new system software coming

Apple is to re-launch its Apple TV set-top box as a movie rental system, offering HD content for $4.99 a pop as a direct download. The hardware's getting cheaper too. Regular, DVD-quality programming will be on offer to, CEO Steve Jobs said, at a lower price: $3.99 for new titles, $2.99 for old ones. Viewers will have just 24 …

Media players 15 Jan 18:05
It was the MacBook Air sub-notebook

Macworld Expo The world's thinnest notebook, Apple claims

For once the rumour mill was right. "There's something in the air," said Apple CEO Steve Jobs. And then he hit us with the MacBook Air. It’s aluminium, has black keys, is super, super thin, and Steve held it easily with his fingertips. Thinnovation “It’s the world’s thinnest notebook,” he went on. It has a 13.3in widescreen …

Mac 15 Jan 18:36
Apple NAS box ties in to Leopard's Time Machine

Macworld Expo Time Capsule launched

Apple today renewed its AirPort Extreme BaseSation Wi-Fi router, adding in a "server grade" hard drive to convert it into a network-attached storage box dubbed the Time Capsule. Apple's Time Capsule: 500GB or 1TB NAS box As the name suggests, it's designed to work with Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard's Time Machine automatic …

Storage 15 Jan 19:17
Qualcomm and Intel go head-to-head in mobile internet devices

Killer phones or kill-a-phone?

The convergence of PC and cellphone architectures has brought Intel and Qualcomm increasingly into conflict, and at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last week, both showed prototypes of their platforms for next generation mobile devices. Both silicon giants, along with device makers like Nokia, see the current …

Phones 15 Jan 22:33
Caught on camera: the Downfall of HD DVD

NSFW Art imitates life...

Act 3. Scene 1. The enemy forces are moving ever closer. Trapped within the bunker, the minds behind a daring attempt to win world domination ponder their final downfall... Can't see the video? Download Flash Player from Adobe.com Hilarious. YouTube poster Sacolton, we salute you.

HD 15 Jan 22:42