Computer Information - myOddPc
NAB, Congress react to merger approval; XM and Sirius let haters hate, watch money pile up
Filed under: Portable Audio, Wireless
Well, it's only been a couple hours since the DOJ
officially approved the XM / Sirius merger, and while we're a little surprised at how low-profile the two satellite radio services are being about the decision, there's nothing at all shocking about
NAB's reaction -- the organization says it's "astonished," and that the Justice Department's decision to "propose granting a monopoly" to the two companies is "breathtaking." Yeah, they're not happy. Same goes for various members of Congress: Rep. Ed Markey, head of the House telecom subcommittee, expressed his disappointment that "the Bush administration has apparently never seen a telecommunications merger it didn't like," and suggested FCC approval would have to come with strict conditions, while Sen. Herb Kohl flatly said the deal would "create a satellite radio monopoly" and encouraged the FCC to block it. That's a lot of haterade -- but XM and Sirius are apparently too busy looking deeply into each other's eyes as their respective stock prices soar, because the only post-decision statement either company has made is a rehash of a months-old list of organizations and people that support the merger. Ah, young love -- so innocent, so oblivious.
Read - NAB statement
Read - Bloomberg article with Congressional reaction
Read - XM list of supporters
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Raytheon Controlled Impact Rescue Tool pulverizes concrete to save the day
Filed under: Misc. Gadgets
Sure, we've got devices that can
see through concrete walls, but why get all complicated when there's some good ol' fashioned bashing to be done? That's the poetic question posed by the Controlled Impact Rescue Tool, developed by Raytheon as part of a Department of Homeland Security program. The 100-pound rescue device uses specially-designed ammunition to create shock waves that can shatter through concrete walls in just 13 minutes, compared to nearly half an hour for conventional methods. Although the rig can create a hole big enough for a person to crawl out of, it's designed to be held up and operated by just two people, and as the video below shows, it doesn't look like it's too much of a bear to handle. Raytheon hasn't set a price for the CIRT yet, but it's aiming it at fire departments, rescue services and the military -- but we're always ready for a demo if anyone's interested.
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Lifelites' eLite LED kits add pizzazz to those humdrum LEGO models
Filed under: Misc. Gadgets
Toy blocks infused with LEDs aren't items that your youngster isn't
familiar with, but implanting hints of light into existing LEGO kits just adds an element of satisfaction not bundled with pre-fabricated alternatives. Enter the Lifelites eLite kits, which enables builders to wire LEDs within LEGO models fairly discretely, and given the option, you can spring for models that actually let
you control the flashing action. Available now, the kits range from $30 to $50 sans a 9-volt battery box and cell, and you can tempt yourself further by checking out a finished product after the jump.
[Via
BoingBoing, video courtesy of
BrickJournal]
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Panasonic Toughbook 19 gets Core 2 Duo, expanded memory
Filed under: Laptops, Tablet PCs
While Panasonic's rugged Toughbook 30 has been strutting its stuff with a Core 2 Duo within, the poor, poor
Toughbook 19 has been going without. No more, however, as Panny has just announced that it'll be boosting the speed and expanding the memory available in the beastly convertible tablet. Available now, the 5.1-pound rig is stuffed with a 1.06GHz U7500 processor (2MB L2 cache), up to 4GB of SDRAM, 80GB shock-mounted HDD, 10.4-inch daylight-readable display, a battery good for around seven hours, optional integrated WWAN / GPS / 2-megapixel webcam and a magnesium alloy case that won't mind getting trampled. So, what's the price for such an (almost) impossible-to-destroy machine? $3,199 and up, we're afraid.
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Shuttle's Linux-based KPC desktop gets reviewed
Filed under: Desktops
It's not often we see a desktop surrounded by hordes of folks just waiting for reviews in order to pull the trigger (or not), but Shuttle's Foresight Linux-based
KPC is one of those machines. The Celeron 430-powered box actually managed to hold its own, and oftentimes best, an overclocked 3.2GHz Pentium 4 rig in a number of everyday tasks (read: Office use, web browsing, etc.), and of course, accessing the internals in order to load in upgrades of your own was a lesson in simplicity. All in all, the KPC seemed to be a bargain for the price, particularly if you've got a spare mouse, keyboard and monitor already collecting dust and scouting a new partner in crime. Check out the read link to see precisely how this bugger scored an 8.0 out of 10 from
Computer Shopper.
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PSP turns three, sniff
Filed under: Gaming
Whoa, has it really been three years since the PSP had its
glittery North American debut? It seems like just yesterday we were watching UMD movies on our chubby first-gen unit -- and now here we are, with the
PSP Slim all grown up,
multicolored, and in a serious relationship with the PS3. (All we're missing is built-in storage.) You know the crew at PSP Fanboy's doing it up right, hit the read link to join the fun.
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PS3 2.20 update is out, get your BD-Live while it's fresh
Filed under: Gaming, HDTV
Nothing beats that straight-from-the-oven firmware smell, and Sony just hit the internet with its PS3 2.20 firmware update goodness. The big win here is BD-Live interactive Blu-ray compatibility (Blu-ray 2.0), but there are
some other minor tweaks as well, mostly multimedia and web browsing related. Unfortunately,
portable copy didn't make the cut, but there's always 2.30, right?
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
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Cubicle Security For Laptops, Electronics?
kamikasee writes "I recently found out that I'm going to be moved from an office to a cubicle. The cubicle area is not very secure, and I'm worried about things wandering off. My boss has offered to buy some equipment to help me secure things, but so far I haven't found anything that fits my requirements. Google and Amazon searches are overwhelmed by lockable key cabinets and larger pieces of furniture. Here are some of the requirements: The main issue with traditional solutions (e.g. locking things in a drawer) is convenience. I use a laptop with a second LCD monitor. There's also an external keyboard and mouse and a USB hard drive. I leave my laptop on at night so I can remote-desktop into it, so I'm not really happy about putting it in a drawer (no ventilation), plus I don't like the idea of having to 'unharness' everything every time I want to put it away. I don't trust cable locks. Besides, cable locks won't help me secure my the USB drive and other electronics that might wander off. The solution I imagine is a lockable, ventilated metal box that would sit under the monitor and house most of the electronics. If it was big enough, I could stick my laptop into it at night (while leaving it running) and feel confident that it would still be there in the morning. I'd be open to other types of solutions. Surely someone else must have dealt with this problem."
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Salasaga Fills Flash Creation Hole for Linux
Linux.com's Bruce Byfield is reporting that Salasaga, the renamed Flame Project, is attempting to fill the functionality gap of Flash creation for Linux in addition to being a cross-platform tool. While it still lacks the spit-shine of more mature apps, it is going a long way to filling yet another hole in Linux software. "Opening Salasaga, you could easily think you are in a slide show program. Individual slides display on the left, and the current slide appears on the bottom right. On the top right is information about the layers on the current side. Menus are logically laid out across the top of the editing window. From the editing menu, you can set the defaults for new projects, including the default display size of finished projects, the preview width, and the default background color. After adjusting these settings, you proceed logically from the right as you develop a project, progressing from Screenshots for importation through Slide and Layer to Export. This progression is so logical that few viewers should have trouble teaching themselves the basics of the software and producing a test project in less than 20 minutes -- and saving it in native .flame format or exporting it to Flash or SVG formats."
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Ringside Networks To Unveil Social App Server
eWeekPete writes "Ringside Networks tomorrow will formally launch as a company and also launch what it calls the first open-source social application server that seamlessly integrates Facebook applications with any Web site. The Ringside Social Application Server includes a Social Application Engine that enables Web site developers to quickly build, customize, and deploy their own social applications as well as the included set of standard social applications such as user profiles, friends, groups, comments, ratings, favorites, and events. Ringside also delivers support for federated social graphs for integrating Ringside-based social graphs with other social networks, such as Facebook. In addition, the product features an extensible API and tag library to enable developers to extend Facebook's API and markup language, as well to as define their own application-specific APIs and tags to handle custom behavior and improve Web site integration." Matt Asay had an advance look at Ringside a few days back.
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