I’m going on a cruise tomorrow. I’ll be back next monday. In the mean time, check out the links to the right. When I get back I’ll have plenty of new stuff.
TweetArchive for February, 2008
SmartSleep 1.0 is a Mac preference pane designed for the MacBook or MacBook Pro that will help your computer get the most
from its Da Vincian cat naps. It also allows you to choose any one sleep setting as the default, useful if you want your computer to always sleep and hibernate, or hibernate only, etc…
SmartSleep is a free download, Mac OS X only, and is best suited for MacBooks and MacBook Pros (trust us, you won’t get much out of the program if you’re on an iMac or Mac Mini). Get it here
A few days ago I posted my predictions for the new MBP’s I was a little off, but here they are:
More powerful versions of the MacBook Pro have been released today with up to 2.6GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Penryn processors, and the MacBook Air’s trackpad, which allows for multi-touch gestures. The 2.5 and 2.6GHz models come with a new NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT with 512MB of GDDR3 RAM. The MacBook has also been upgraded (yay!), but no multitouch (boo!), probably to make a distinction between them and the MacBook Air. New Core 2 Duo versions across the board, which are supposed to be about 50% faster and more power efficient.
• New GeForce 8600M GT with 512MB.
• Multitouch pad on MacBook Pro.
• New LED option on top of the line 17″ screen.
In the weeks ahead we’re all expecting to see a new and improved MacBook Pro. I’m sure you all have your own ideas on what to expect when the revamped MBP comes out. But this is what my insider info tells me. We will of course be seeing the new Penryn CPU’s in the MBP’s. The lower end MPB will be sporting the T8300@2.4GHz with the T9300 and the T9500 as Build to order options. The high end MBP will have the T9500 as the stock configuration with the X9000 as a Build to order option. As much as you wanna see it, you won’t be finding Blu-ray in any of these. However, I do expect to see them added to the Mac Pro next time they are updated. The hard drives will be feeling a nice bump. The low ends will come stock with 160GB models with the high end starting with 250GB and 500GB as a BTO option. Ram will stay at 2GB across the board. The high end model will see the new GeForce 8800 with 512MB Standard. The lower end models will keep the 8600′s.
So that about sums it up. Be sure to leave a comment with your thoughts on the matter
TweetAn array of classic TV shows from CBS are now available online, the network’s CBS Interactive division announced Thursday.
Full-length episodes of Star Trek, Melrose Place, Hawaii Five-O, MacGyver, and The Twilight Zone have been added to the lineup of the company’s CBS Audience Network, as well as its central streaming-video site. All of it is free and ad-supported; only select seasons of each show are currently available, but CBS has hinted that more episodes, as well as additional TV shows, will go up in the near future.
They can all be found here: CBS Community
TweetYou think that dvd player is just a bunch of parts? It’s so much more. Each DVD player not only has equipment costs but also royalties for using the technology. Anywhere from $4-6 per drive and up to$.15 per disc.
Forget about customer satisfaction or superiority of image quality. The real issue in the war between Blu-ray and HD DVD was about royalties. It will also get studios and disc makers to deliver Blu-ray discs to consumers. And every time one of those drives or discs leaves a factory, the Blu-ray Disc Association will get a royalty. The numbers add up quickly. Look at DVD, for example. To make a DVD player legally, manufacturers recently had to pay around $4 per player or drive, according to some estimates. A few years ago, those fees were around $15 to $20. Fees get paid every time a DVD drive gets included in a PC. Nearly every PC in the world has a DVD drive these days and roughly 250 million PCs get shipped every year. Companies that legally make DVD discs also pay fees. Then there are verification fees. The royalties, in fact, lead to what Chinese leaders call the “DVD mistake,” said Zhisheng Niu, vice dean of the school of information sciences at Tsinghua University, in an interview with CNET News.com last year. Chinese manufacturers often got around the licensing issues problem by making illegal players. (The DVD Forum eliminated the royalty for DVD players made and sold in China for a few years, but a lot of those systems ended up overseas.) The royalties are one of the prime reasons China has pushed for its own optical standard. “We have to develop our own standards so that we can have our own industry,” said Niu.
Read more over at cnet.com
TweetSometime I wonder, will there be days where a computer will actually use a terabyte of memory? I mean, just think about it. Computer used to have 128K for memory and it was blowing people minds. I believe someone the Microsoft camp once said no
computer will ever need more the 4mb of memory. But yet, we continue to get bigger and bigger. There was they day were we hit 1GB hard drives and 1 meg of ram. And that was more then enough. It seems like it is just a matter of time before we have petabyte hard drives and terabytes of ram. Games 50GB big requiring no less then 25GBs of DDR14 RAM. Laptops with 25GHz cpu’s and GPU with 20GB’s of ram. A story from zdnet claims that we will have 100GB memory chips by 2009. And I believe it. The future of Personal Computing will only expand exponentially. 3d printers are set to hit the consumer market by the end of this year, projects like OLPC are spreading tech to everyone. Its exploding.
Amazon already has an online download store from which you can buy Music, Software, and books, But soon it seem they will be adding one more to the list. Video games! Certain companies already allow thier games to be purchased and downloaded via the internet. However that has mostly only been an option for smaller games. Amazon hopes to offer up full downloads of the most recent games. This really isn’t a surprise to anyone as Microsoft and Sony have been doing something similar for awhile now.
Get the full article here
TweetNvidia is planning to bomb the airways with their new ad campaign for 2008. Whats the big deal? Well, think for a second, when was the last time you saw an ATI commercial on TV? How about an Nvidia one. Thats right, you haven’t have you? Nvidia is planning a $30 Million ad campaign for the *best year ever. Mainly because of Intel’s increasing sales when it comes to integrated graphics in mobile device, a market that Nvidia is trying to conquer.
*best year ever based on HD format war winner, the rise of thePS3, and the end of bush.
TweetIt’s about that time, maybe that time has already past for most of you. But if you haven’t yet, I’m sure your about to. I’m of course talking about taking the plunge and buying a High Definition TV
1.) Types: There are 3 main types of HDTV’s. LCD, Plasma, and Projection. All of them have their pros and cons. LCD’s are
most common, mainly because of the cost to quality ratio. Although not cheapest. LCD TV’s offer an excellent picture for a manageable price. Good contrast ratio, ok viewing angle, and good size range. Plasma TV’s start big and only get bigger. Although their prices have dropped, They are still higher in price, but they do offer excellent contrast ratios and even better viewing angles. Last but not least is the projection TV. It offers up a huge screen with a small price tag. However its viewing angle can be improved upon.
2.) The contrast ratio. This never, never gets enough credit. You got the rich old guys going into BestBuy buying a huge ass tv not realizing it’s gonna look like shit when they get home. If you want a TV thats gonna look crisp and clear you need the highest contrast ratio you can find. (The contrast ration is the number of shades between white and black, a contrast ration of 1600:1 is gonna offer you 1600 shades of black, red, green, and so on, resulting in a more realistic picture.)
3.) Have a good source lined up. There is nothing more disappointing then getting your TV home and realizing you got no HD content. I’m sure most of you have a 360 or PS3 at home. If not, an up converting dvd player will be better then nothing. You can also pick yourself up a DVI to HDMI and just stream some computer shit to it.
4.) Plan it out. Get some comfortable furniture. And most importantly, make it look big. Don’t let your TV get lonely. Don’t but your TV up against a wall with nothing else on it. Try and put it in the smallest area possible. As always, looks can be deceiving
5 .) Make it sound nice. The picture has a lot to do with it….but thats not all. You gotta make it sound nice. This is an area where overkill really isn’t possible. It’s called sensory overload. Tantalize your eyes and your ears.
Well, I hope this helps you on your ways. Good luck and happy buying. Check back for more useful content.
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