Tivo rolls out Picasa, Photobucket integration

Tivo owners with Picasa or Photobucket accounts just got another way to view their photos on their TVs — everyone’s favorite DVR company announced deals with both services today that will allow users to access their photos from any Tivo device. Photos will be pulled down at the highest resolution your Tivo supports, so Series3 and Tivo HD owners will get HD-res images displayed, and what’s more, users can also access friends’ photo albums.

Zune users complain of fast-draining battery with latest firmware

looks like there’s another issue brewing, with a number of users complaining of battery problems with Zune 30s and 80s loaded with the most recent firmware. Apparently, the Zunes have the unfortunate tendency to rapidly drain their batteries, even when the player is not in use. Judging from the discussion on the Zune.net message boards, that particular issue seems to be due to some unknown difficulty the Zune has with entering hibernate mode which it, seemingly, doesn’t do at all.

Fix : (For Zune 3.0 ) To get things started, you’ll have to first drain the Zune until you get the exclamation point, and then fully charge it again (leaving it overnight, if necessary). After that’s done, you then reset the Zune by pressing up and back simultaneously, which should set things back on track . Not a perfect solution, obviously, but it seems to be the best option for now.

Microsoft shows next version of Windows Mobile

Nope its not windows mobile 7 or anything its just an update to current OS but with lots of features that were long overdue.

gDisk coming to reality

We all had used the famous gDisk software to used up our free space at gmail account, now it seems that google has finally heard our pleas and will be launching an online storage service (soon) .By the looks of it we should be getting somewhere around 5gb atleast 🙂

 Btw we all knew it was coming when MS launched skydrive 😛

iPhone 2.0 ??

iPhone 2.0 (supposedly) has the ability of the Multi-touch surface to recognize and simultaneously track multiple finger and palm contacts and movements as hands approach, touch, and slide across it.

The new Multi-touch 2.0 will be able to track and recognize all the movements of your hands and fingers on and near the touch surface. Then it will interpret them and transform into intuitive commands:

• Need to move a cursor across the screen? Just slide your finger and it goes.
• Want to enter text? Just start typing and the text is there. You even get the touch feedback as if really pressing the keys.
• Need to erase some text? Use the backspace or just slide the finger backwards
• Have to write or draw something? Just pretend you hold a stylus or pen in your hand and start writing/drawing.
• If that is still not good enough, pick up the real stylus and start writing with it.
• All these cool touch gestures that Apple has implemented in iPhone and is exploring further? You know, scrolling, zooming, rotating & moving objects, etc; They are here too
• 3D object manipulation? Select a few 3D objects on the screen and use all 5 fingers on both hands to play with them.
• Want to take a break to relax and afraid to put your hands on the touch surface? Don’t worry Multi-touch 2.0 thingie knows that and does not pay attention to your resting palms or fingers

From the patent application, it looks like Multi-touch 2.0 technologies can be applied both to touch surface data input devices like keyboards/touchpads and touch-screens as well.

What new Multi-touch 2.0 devices will be actually implemented is for the Apple to decide

Source: pcjoint.com

Samsung’s BlackJack II

 

Samsung USA has announced that the BlackJack II (SGH-i617) will go on sale on Friday, which is known in much of the USA as Black Friday, the traditional start of the holiday shopping season. Initially the BlackJack II will be available in black only, but the red wine colored unit will go on sale on December 12th. The BlackJack II will be available from AT&T online and retail locations for US$149.99 with a new two year contract, after a mail-in rebate.

Source : Mobileburn.com

1GB write-once SanDisk memory cards

SanDisk had earlier mentioned about their cheap-archival storage based on their new “3D memory’ a few months back, well the rumor has it that they are going ahead with the production of these chips. It would cost you $6 to buy a 1Gb card, that will be around 300- 400 of photos stored away nicely in the card for the next 100 years 🙂

Nintendo on the roll

Potentially more interesting than sony’s meesely price cuts on dev hardware is Mr. Harrison’s assertion that the firm is currently producing some 1.8 million Wiis per month, and it’s having to make decisions of where to send shipments to “nearly every week.” ‘Course, the chat couldn’t end without some reference to the rivals, and the exec concluded by proclaiming that Nintendo “doesn’t focus a lot on the competition,” as “its performance seems to be independent of those two.”

AMD launches quad-core Phenom

AMD has gone live with Phenom. With it, we’ve got an entire new platform, codenamed “Spider.” The Spider PC platform combines AMD Phenom quad-core processors, ATI Radeon HD 3800 series graphics, and AMD 7-series chipsets with CrossFireX and AMD OverDrive software for what AMD calls the “Ultimate visual Experience.” That’s the hype. Early reviews, however, are pretty much “underwhelmed” by the launch. Oh, the HD 3800 cards are ok (for mid-range graphics) and the 7-series chipset “is in good shape.

Concept phone from Sony Ericsson has a USB Port

You know, industrial designers seem to love conceptualizing what future Sony Ericsson mobiles will look like. Designer Vincent Palicki is just one of many but his design actually looks like it could be made today and fit right in with the SE family.

It’s a slim candy bar style phone complete with a big screen, standard SE key layout but touched up with stainless steel buttons. Yes it’ll do music, movies, text, email, blah blah and blah so where’s the innovation here? It would be the full size USB port, perfect for any thumb drive. Of course it’s not meant to have a “sore thumb” sticking out at all times, but it’s a way to transfer files like music, videos, and pictures to and from without the need of a computer.