Archive for October 2006

According to this post over at Kotaku, the Sony Playstation 3 will only include a crappy composite video cable when it’s released in Japan. Apparently, even though the Playstation 3 is all about high definition gameplay and movies, you’re expected to go spend even more money to get it to output onto anything other than a crummy old TV.

Real Snail Mail is an art and technology project being conducted by the technological artists collective of Boredom Research. The project has real snails delivering electronic messages via tiny RFID tags attached to their shells. The messages are delivered literally “at a snails pace.” to their destinations.

The new Epson EMP-TW1000 is a front projector which features a native 1080p (1920×1080) resolution LCD panel. The projector features HDMI 1.3 inputs for digital signals, and supports true 1080p inputs. In addition Epson’s new color engine is said to produce a color gamut that’s 115% broader than NTSC standards.

Boy, the reasons to NOT get a PS3 keep piling up. The folks over at Opposable Thumbs have made the astute observation that since the PS3 has no IR receiver port and only a Bluetooth remote control.

A couple of weeks back, I reported on dumb quotes by Sony execs and I thought for sure that I had heard every ludicrous comment possible about their upcoming Playstation 3 release. I guess Sony Australia’s boss, Michael Ephraim, wanted to make sure we didn’t run out of choice sound bites.

This amusing commercial for the Xbox 360 HD-DVD add-on has found its way to YouTube: Now is it just me, or is the dancer who does the DVD dance better than the main HD-DVD dancer?

These little dektop toys feature bite-sized reproductions of a couple of classic arcade games. Each machine features authentic arcade sound effects and a color LCD screen with a stylized remake of either Frogger or Space Invaders.

Logitech’s unique NuLOOQ navigator has been available for over a year now for Mac OSX users, and now software is available for use with Windows XP too. The NuLOOQ plugs into your USB port and provides quick access to frequently used functions in popular graphic design and multimedia applications, with the greatest productivity enhancements available for Adobe’s Creative Suite products.

Ever wanted to play detective? Are magnifying glasses too old school? Well now you too can own the high resolution digital microscope featured on CSI. The ProScope HR is a USB-connected handheld microscope that can capture images and video at a magnification level of up to 400x depending on the lense selected.

The new Onkyo CBX-Z1 AERO Sound System is an all-in-one stereo system featuring a built-in iPod dock. The system will offer a feature set and look that’s very similar to the popular BOSE Wave Sound System.

You can now pre-order the MadCatz ArcadeStick joystick for the Xbox 360 from Gamestop. While not cheap at $59.99 USD, the controller looks like just what the doctor ordered for playing all the classic arcade games that are available for download on Xbox Live Arcade.

Samsung has shown the sweet looking new X838 mobile phone for release in China. In addition to being a GSM phone, there’s an onboard MP3 player with an iPod-esque click wheel interface and 1GB of memory for storage of tunes.

[UPDATE 10/31/2006: The Kondo KHR-2HV Robot is now available from importer AudioCubes.] For those adventurous types, the Kondo KHR-2HV is a complete kit to build your own autonomous walking robot. The robot features 17 servo motors to control arm, leg and head movements and a lightweight aluminum alloy frame.

While there are plenty of hard-disk based music streaming systems available these days, none is quite as schmancy as the Sooloos. The Sooloos is a complete home media management system in a very elegant package. There are three components to the system, the Store Series, The Control Series and the Source Series.

Can’t wait to get your new Nintendo Wii so you can download and play classic NES games? Over at vNES, you can get a head start by playing 395 games from the old Nintendo online, right now.

PLEN, the Desktop Hobby Robot is a little (9-inch tall) robot from Japan which is capable of balancing itself on a mini-skateboard or to skate on its own included rollerskates. Here’s a video of the robot in action: PLEN’s 18 joints can be controlled remotely using a Bluetooth phone and can run for about 25 minutes on a single charge.