End User

Something Small This Way Comes

Smaller. Sleeker. Cooler. More dependable. More efficient.  These are just some of the things that come to mind when I think of this new camcorder being released on June 4, 2008. Stay tuned... you're gonna flip out when you see it. -JB Storey

Antec Ups the Ante With the Twelve Hundred

Antec scored a hit with enthusiasts when they released their Nine-Hundred case, with its oversized fan and intelligent layout, it's no wonder it became the center of most gaming PC builds. However with demand for even greater cooling in multiple video card systems, the Nine-Hundred started to feel a little cramped.
Now Antec has has released their Twelve-Hundred case. A larger, leaner, and meaner case, that still insists it's name be spelled out in letters. Featuring twelve external five and a quarter inch bays, seven expansion slots, and more one-hundred twenty millimeter fans than you can shake a stick at. Not satisfied to stop there, Antec adds a two-hundred millimeter fan that sits on top of the case acting as a monstrous exhaust. The Twelve-Hundred is available now.

--Ken H.

Google's I/O Conference Shows Off Android Mobile OS

Google took Android, their mobile phone OS due for release later this year, out for a stroll yesterday at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco.  Vic Gundotra (Android's VP of Engineering) led a keynote bringing various developers on the project onstage to discuss the status of the mobile OS.

Highlights of the keynote include Android's HTML5 offline integration, AJAX calls for rich media, and Java 5 support.  If that sounds like Greek, what it means is that the mobile phone web browsing experience will start looking much, much more like your desktop browsing experience, with particular focus on social media sites (like MySpace and YouTube) and blogs.

Check out the Android OS in action in this YouTube clip taken from the keynote, and read more about the conference here.

[via TechCrunch]

--Aric A.

Sneak Peek at Windows 7 Multitouch Features

Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates showed a glimpse of Windows 7's new multitouch features at the All Things Digital conference yesterday evening.  Check out the video below from the Vista Blog that shows elements like pinch zoom, flicking, and more.  It looks like the integration will feel like an intersection between Microsoft's Surface table and Apple's iPhone OS, but it's still too early to say anything final about the design decisions.

One thing I definitely like that was carried over from Surface is the radial menu that you can open on a touch.  I tend to use custom shells like BlackBox or LiteStep on my Windows installations because I like being able to right-click and open a program/context menu wherever my mouse is, and it seems like a natural add to a touchscreen interface rather than dragging your finger between the taskbar/program menu and an active application.

It definitely seems like Microsoft is playing their cards closer to their chest with this glimpse, since the transparency they showed during Vista's development cause frustration with customers who saw one promised feature after another disappear in order to make the launch window.  Windows 7 is going to be teased out a little more between now and its launch date next year, which might be wiser this time than inflating expectations. 

In the meantime, check out the cool multitouch map functions and Surface-like photo management in the video filmed last night at the ATD conference:

 

Video: Multi-Touch in Windows 7

--Aric A.

Discovery Channel Slideshow of a Young Gates, Jobs, Woz

The Discovery Channel website posted a slideshow of the giants of US computing in their much younger days--Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Steve Wozniak (or "The Woz")--as well as a basic bio of each.  Pretty cool if you just want a quick overview of these guys through the years or, more likely, if you want to know the story behind this mug shot:

--Aric A.

BlackBerry Tips

                               

Being new to BlackBerry devices not too long ago myself, I thought it may be beneficial to get some pointers for your BlackBerry that can help get you rolling with your new device quickly. Hopefully these help and I will have more soon!

• To switch to another program you should hold the ALT key and press the escape button. Keep holding the ALT key and select a program. Let go of the ALT key to switch to that new program.

• To insert a period, press the space key twice.

• To insert an @, press the space key twice while in the e-mail field.

• To capitalize a letter, hold the letter key until the capitalized letter appears.

• To move the cursor in a different direction, hold the ALT key and roll the trackwheel.

-Aaron S.

Use Twitter to Control Your Home Lighting

Check out this hack from a guy named Justin Wickett (found via Hacked Gadgets), where using iLink software and an INSTEON automated lightswitch you can control lights in your home via instant messages to the Twitter microblogging service:

Control Lights with Twitter from Justin Wickett on Vimeo.

This is a pretty easy project but might not be for first-time do-it-yourselfers--get the full skinny on what you need and how to do this hack yourself here.

--Aric A.

Bites from the Apple: Come What May

As I seem to be on my death bed with consumption (a la Nicole Kidman in Moulin Rouge), I'll keep this week's round-up of Apple-y goodness brief and to the point.

• Here's a shocker--the announcement of the 3G iPhone is confirmed by anonymous sources to Gizmodo to be happening on June 9, the opening day of the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). Who could have guessed?

• Piper Jaffray senior analyst Gene Munster believes the upcoming 3G iPhone will be fairly identical to the original model, though a bit thicker to accommodate the 3G chip. He sees more "dramatic changes" (i.e., multiple models) next January (via AppleInsider)

• Fortune paints the globe apple red, noting the countries that the iPhone will be invading soon

• Will we see over-the-air (OTA) music downloads when 3G comes to the iPhone? Will anybody care?

• And the latest iPhone OS 2.0 beta hints at geotagging support (via IntoMobile)

• Dan Frakes at Macworld sets out to build his own DIY iPod stereo system (complete with dock, amplifier, speakers)

• If you're interested in hacking your Apple TV in order to watch non-supported video codecs like DivX, but you're not too adept at hacking, TUAW points us to the aTV Flash, a USB flash drive that can be inserted into the Apple TV and does all the dirty work.

• If a Twitter user tweets when your screen saver comes on, how will you be able to respond quickly and pithily? With the Status Screen Saver, you can follow along with your Twitter feed as you twiddle your thumbs watching your screen saver. It can also display RSS feeds and show how many unread emails are piling up (via TUAW).

• Wired reports on Forrester Research's look into Apple's future (2013, to be exact) and sees digital frames and a networked clock orbeting the "venerable Macintosh."

• I'll leave you with this extended mega-mix of the recently released Sad Song commercial in the Get a Mac ad series. I'll be back next week. Hopefully.

--Agen G.N. Schmitz

Home Audio: What $1.1 Million Will Get You

Are you serious about your home theater?  Maybe not as much as this guy:  Ivan Messer, a financial planner, has spent 25 years and $1.1 million dollars building his dream home theater, which includes almost exclusively Richard Gray and McIntosh products.

According to Electronic House, Messer's system isn't just for show--it gets daily use with his collection of over 6,000 Blu-Ray movies, and Messer gives private demos about once a week.  He gives the demos because he's become such a huge fan of Richard Gray and McIntosh over the years that he became a dealer for them, née Legend Home Video, which he runs out of his summer home in Cape Cod. 

From the article:

The family uses this room every day, with Ivan logging in private demos at least once a week. If you’re one of the privileged few, you might be one of the partygoers at his end-of-May gala, which invites about 150 potential clients and close friends to experience the room and all of its glory. “Once again, we’re going to get a whole routine of just how varied and how widespread this system can handle anything from just subtleties to bone-crunching rock ‘n roll,” he says. “It really is better than front-row-center. It really is just an experience. You have to be there.”

Read more about Messer's $1.1 million home theater system here.

[image via Electronic House]

--Aric A.

 

Remarkable Jawbone 2 Video Demo

These days, it seems that wireless Bluetooth headsets are a dime a dozen, but Aliph's Jawbone 2 stands apart from the pack due to its unique look and some seriously amazing NoiseAssassin, noise canceling  technology. Originally developed for DARPA (The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) to create a communication headset that would pick up voice in hostile environments, the Jawbone offers up some of the best technology for your jibba-jabba.
The Aliph Jawbone 2 is available now for pre-order in black for $129.99 at the Aliph site, though silver and gold versions are coming soon.

--Ken H.