Archives for June 2010

Cisco Cius Android Tablet Unveiled

Cisco [CSCO] has unveiled a new Google Android based tablet called the Cisco Cius. The Cius is Cisco’s first attempt at an Android based tablet. It features a front facing HD video camera that can capture HD at 720p at 30 frames per second.

The front panel has a 7 inch high res screen Super VGA touchscreen (800 x 600 probably). On the back is another camera that has a 5 megapixel sensor that captures still images and VGA video. With the HD camera being on the front of the device it appears that it will be aimed at mobile HD video conferencing.

For connectivity it connects to all wireless networks which includes 802.11a/b/g/n and Cisco will also be adding 4G connectivity in the future for high speed mobile connections. [Read more…]

iPhone 4 Gyroscope Teardown

One of the new features of the iPhone 4 is the built in gyroscope that brings a new level of control to the phone. iFixit along with Chipworks have decided to open up the iPhone 4 and look at the gyroscope in detail. As the gyroscope is digital, it’s a little different than the 3-axis spinning disc that you might have seen in the past.

The gyroscope inside the iPhone 4 is described as having superb accuracy. They work by vibration and when movement is detected the vibration is translated electronically and passed to the iPhone 4. [Read more…]

HTC EVO 4G Update Put on Hold by Sprint

HTC EVO 4G owners yesterday started receiving an OTA update for their smartphone that fixed a few issues. Issues fixed seem to be related to screen performance, battery performance and wireless connectivity performance. However, in some cases some users were seeing their EVO 4G being bricked… ie, dead.

Some of the people updating had modified their phones which can sometimes cause a problem. However, owners of unmodified EVO 4G’s were also seeing problems with their handsets being dead after the update was performed.

The update has now been pulled off line and wont be back till the problems are identified and the update is safe to re launch. [Read more…]

Seagate 3TB External Desktop Drive

Seagate has launched a new external desktop hard drive with a huge 3 Terabyte capacity. The drive is called the FreeAgent GoFlex and is the first drive of it’s kind to be capable of storing this amount of data.

The 3TB capacity of the FreeAgent GoFlex allows 120HD movies to be stored or 1500 video games, thousands of pictures and a lot of hours of music.

“Consumer capacity demands are quickly out-pacing the needs of business as people continue to collect high-definition videos, photos and music”

[Read more…]

Blogshelf RSS Reader for iPad

Blogshelf is an RSS reader app that gives the feeds you read a book like appearance. The software is built for the Apple iPad and makes use of the large screen to make feed reading more comfortable and easier to read.

The app looks similar to Apple’s [AAPL] own iBooks application in that it puts all your feeds on a bookshelf system where you can easily scroll through and tap to open the various feeds. [Read more…]

iPhone 4 Gresso Case Replaces Glass with Wood

For those who have an iPhone 4, the biggest worry is dropping it. Due to the tension on the back sheet of glass and no real protection it easily shatters. Gresso has created a luxury back cover for the iPhone 4 that is made of 200 year old African Blackwood along with 18K gold detailing. The back cover aims to make your iPhone 4 look a little different although it isn’t clear if the wood used is a replacement or cover for the current glass used.

Either way, it should add a little bit of protection to your iPhone 4.

Two versions are being created. The first is for women and contains an Apple logo in 18K gold along with Swarovski crystals. This version costs $3500, so dropping it really isn’t an option anyway. [Read more…]

Google Me – More Details Confirm it to be Facebook Competitor

Yesterday, Kevin Rose the CEO of Digg, announced on Twitter that he heard Google [GOOG] was out to be a competitor of Facebook by launching Google Me. This information has been further strengthened by Adam D’Angelo who worked at Facebook as the CTO. He says…

* Here is what I’ve pieced together from some reliable sources: This is not a rumor. This is a real project. There are a large number of people working on it. I am completely confident about this.
* They realized that Buzz wasn’t enough and that they need to build out a full, first-class social network. They are modeling it off of Facebook.
* Unlike previous attempts (before Buzz at least), this is a high-priority project within Google.
* They had assumed that Facebook’s growth would slow as it grew, and that Facebook wouldn’t be able to have too much leverage over them, but then it just didn’t stop, and now they are really scared.

[Read more…]

iPhone 4 Short Film Captured and Edited with iMovie

The iPhone 4 has quite an amazing camera for a smartphone. It’s both responsive and can capture HD video at 720p. Mixed with iMovie, you have an amazing HD video editing package.

The movie below was captured and edited with only an iPhone 4 for the camera and editing tools. The video is captured in HD 720p and was edited and uploaded to Vimeo in HD.

Many people have been skeptical of this, and whilst the iPhone 4²s video camera feature seems pretty good, we didn’t think it would be capable of shooting and editing a movie in good enough quality until we saw this short film by Michael Koerbel called ˜Apple of My Eye An iPhone 4 film.

[Read more…]

iWork for iPhone Hinted at Again by Apple

Just a few weeks back when Apple [AAPL] announced the iPhone 4 the Apple website made mention of iWork for the iPhone. This information was quickly pulled and replaced with iBooks. Rumours started at that point hinting that we might see the iWork Suite hit the iPhone.

When visiting the iPhone UK site now and pre-ordering an iPhone 4 you are presented with several options to add to your purchase. One of those is for Apple care and when you click on the Learn More link, you are presented with the screenshot found below which indicates iWork for iPhone 4 is indeed coming. [Read more…]

HTC Desire, Legend and Wildfire to get Android 2.2 Froyo by October

Google [GOOG] just rolled out Android 2.2 Froyo to the Nexus One yesterday. HTC are now working on launching Android 2.2 Froyo on to the HTC Desire, Legend and Wildfire although it appears the update wont be available till Q3 this year.

“We are working hard with our partners to update the HTC Sense experience on Froyo [2.2] and distribute it to our customers as fast as possible. We expect to release updates for several of our 2010 models including Desire, Legend and Wildfire beginning in Q3.”

[Read more…]

Acer Aspire 1551 with 1.5GHz Dual-Core Turion II Now Available

The Acer Aspire 1551 is now available to buy. The 11.6 inch laptop has a 1.5GHz Dual-Core Turion II CPU inside along with 4GB of DDR 3 memory, a 320GB hard drive and wireless 802.11n.

The 11.6 inch screen is backlit by LED. At all places we have found it, namely Amazon, BHPhoto (slightly cheaper), Tiger Direct, New Egg and CompUSA it is $549.99 and is available right now to buy. $549.99 is a nice price for what you get considering it’s very portable, powerful with a lot of RAM and storage. [Read more…]

iPhone 3GS running iOS 4 gets iMovie Unofficially

When Apple [AAPL] announced iMovie, it was released as an iPhone 4 only application. If trying to install the official version on the the iPhone 3GS or any other iOS 4 (other than the iPhone 4) device it simply doesn’t work.

If you have a jailbroken iPhone 3GS though, you can now actually get it to run by making a modification to the info.plist file. There are two changes that can be made to get it working on a 3GS. The first is to make a change to the front facing camera and simply set it to false. This allows it to work on iOS 4 on the 3GS. The other option to get it working on iOS 3 is to change the minimum system version to 3.0.0 which also forces it to work.

According to those who have tried it appears that it works fine despite the lower amount of RAM available. Something to note is that it does not work on the iPad if making these modifications which could be related to having no camera at all possibly. [Read more…]