Gadgety News

It’s all official now people!

Sony has now taken the wraps off their new ultra compact laptop packing built-in GPS for added satnav sweetness. 3G broadband, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth being the hook-up options.

Yup, the Sony VAIO P Series Lifestyle PC notebook is launching in February, featuring that 8-inch ultra wide LCD screen and weighs in at just 1.4 pounds.

It will be available in garnet red, emerald green, onyx black, crystal white and classic black.

It’s nice - but don’t you think it’s a tad expensive at its £849 starting price?

While all here has an idea of Sony’s new netbook’s specs the price was still somewhat of a mystery.

I knew that this mini Vaio wasn’t going to be a budget buy but new leaks put the Vaio Pocket somewhere around the €700 mark (which at the moment is £700 near enough)!

That price point would give it the title of one of the most expensive netbooks on the market.

The leaks confirm the 1.33 GHz processor, and specifies it as a Z250 Atom, as well as the ultra-sharp 1600×768 8-inch screen.

It’ll be packing 2GB of memory as well as GPS, which suggests it’ll at least have an option of Windows Vista.

Please keep in mind that none of these facts are rock solid yet and we all have to reserve judgment until Sony releases the official announcement.

UMPC Portal

OCModShop have published their guide on overclocking the PSP’s CPU.

Why would you want to?

Well, because you can!

Apparently the MIPS R4000 CPU inside your PSP was actually……

“……designed to run faster than it does out of the box. By default, the CPU runs at 222Mhz, but the MIPS R4000 processor was designed to run at 333Mhz with a 166Mhz bus”.

So, why not unleash its full potential? - unchain the CPU from its factory underclocking - you owe it to your PSP.

Well there is some in-game tinkering already as Sony allowed developers to change the clock speed from within the game, starting with Bios 3.5, which Gears of War takes advantage of.

Slink over to OCModShop for the guide

Sony Style has leaked some specs of the netbook which is said to be Sony’s big reveal at CES 2009.

Its name is Pocket!

The pic is probably just a mere placeholder but the Pocket is said to soon become the smallest notebook in Sony’s line.

It will be rocking an unspecified 1.33Ghz processor which will likely be an Atom.

More groovy is its “razor-sharp” 1600×768 pixel screen on an 8-inch LED backlit screen  (those that can do maths will conclude that the figure is almost too many pixels per square inch).

It’ll also have the option of either a 60GB HDD or, the quirky offering, a 128GB SSD module.

IS this the first notebook where the optional SSD is larger than the traditional drives?

Battery and pricing are filled in as “X’ and “NaN”, still yet to be determined.  I’m thinking “not cheap” as the price point.

Colour-ways are red, silver-painted plastic (MMmmMmmm - not!) and black.

Sony Style via Sony Insider

Sony’s Walkman series of media players has done its best to keep pace but generally, sadly, fall by the wayside as young upstarts such as Creative and Apple lure us all away.

Sony have (finally) realised that touchscreens is where it’s at and now seem ready to break down and get all touchable.

According to Sony Insider there will be 16 and 32GB touchscreen Walkman players at CES 2009 this coming January.

The new machine is said to be rockin a 3-inch OLED display (praps even that 3.3-inch panel making the rounds, or something more Sony specific).

Also planned for the Touchy Walkman is WiFi, enabling a YouTube app, over the air podcast downloads, built-in access to Amazon’s MP3 store and an unspecified web browser.

The shots of the player above are obviously mockups, and the real hardware is supposed to have physical music control buttons and will be drawn to scale.

All this info is exclusive to the Sony Insider know-alls so it’s still not hard n fast truth til Sony says so but hey - I’m sure lots of the Sony faithful will be looking forward to the verification of such a beast.

Sony Insider

Instead of getting a mobile blower that will play your fave choonz how about when Walkman goes flip-reverse?

Most people would see the little player and think to themselves that it’s pretty cool.

But slide it open and you get a keypad and a working phone!

This is a Walkman phone. The Sony Ericsson Xmini has been added to KDDI’s (the Japanese telecom company - Kokusai Denshin Denwa Co., Ltd) lineup.

It measures a tiny 75 x 44 x 18mm and ignores all the usual phone gadgetry such as cameras, etc and rocks a mere 320 x 240 screen and 4GB of on-board memory.

When closed the bottom of the face reveals music controls; then, when opened, the whole thing morphs into a tiny handset.

Well, I think it’s cute.

KDDI

Imagination Technologies are being a little coy at the moment and will only own up to saying that it’s signed a licensing deal with a “major international consumer electronics company”.

EETimes.com, however, has spilled the beans by reporting that the company in question is, in fact, Sony, and that the deal concerns Imagination’s PowerVR architecture being used in the successor to the PSP!

According to EETimes sources, the PSP 2 will use Imagination’s SGX55x core - something else that IT hasn’t officially announced yet.

As EETimes says, if this is all on the level it’s going to be pretty cool for Imagination - especially when you throw in the fact that their PowerVR MBX technology has already found its way into the iPhone, among other devices.

EETimes.com - Thanks to Laura for the heads-up

This vid from Sony explains a new bit of gear that should make watching your telebox a lot nicer.

In the new BRAVIA Z4500 televisions there’s something called Motionflow 200hz (standard tele is 50hz).

So to cut to to the chase - the clever kit will insert some “transitional” images (3 in this case) in between each frame to make it even smoother.

Check out the vid as it explains it a lot better than I can

This is a glimpse into the mobile handset future through Sony Ericsson’s eyes - date: 2012.

Ignore todays cutbacks to R&D budgets and the global economy shuddering to a halt

Whilst LTE and fast CPUs are no real surprise and Japanese superphones are already not to far from that 1,024 x 768 XGA screen resolution.

What is most interesting is the embedded camera sensors: Between 12-20 megapixels and capable of recording Full HD video.

Stacking on the MPs is all very well as long the optics and image processing are there and up to the job of supporting this resolution.  I also think that we’ll be needing a hefty bit of built in memory as well!

Anyone else think that a lot of these projection will be seen before 2012?

I’ve seen double-adapters for headphones plenty of times but if you’re anything like me you’re gonna end up leaving them at home.

Some bright spark has had the brains to shove a splitter on a keyring - genius!

Now a pair of friends can happily share tunes safe in the knowledge there will be an acceptable earphone to ear ratio - although I’m not sure how it affects sound quality and/or volume.

Buy it here: Gadgets.co.uk for under 7 quid!

The Sony Rolly has always been an enigma to me.

Ok, it’s cute - It’s probably one of the cutest small speakers around.

But.

It’s a portable, trundling, dancing speaker - but the sound isn’t great for £250.

It’s a music player able to stream via A2DP Bluetooth or play from its internal flash but there’s no place to shove your 3.5mm lead.

 Sony are now updating it - and it will be controlled by YOU!! MWAHAHAHAHH!!!

Ahem.  Next month, Japanese Rolly buyers will be able to get the new SEP-50BT version complete with Bluetooth controls thus allowing them to make Rolly dance and spin like a performing monkey-bot all directed via their mobile phones.

I can imagine the high jinks and thoroughly wicked japes to be had through controlling the egg-shaped dancing speaker under somones chair and then unleashing a choice cut from ‘Cannibal Corpse’ as the little mp3 player starts its own circle pit :) 

The new system will actually give you control of up to seven of the little blighters at the same time using a mobile phone or laptop.

I reckon it’s time for some synchronised dancing……….

Gizmodo

We all know that the Sony PSP 3000 isn’t due to be launched until next Tuesday but the PSP-3000 Ratchet & Clank Entertainment Pack has managed to slip into at least one Best Buy a few days early.

An Engadget friendly tipster, namely Aaron G, sent them a few unboxing shots.

It’s good to share - so for all of you that enjoy the voyeurism of vicarious unboxing………

Slip quietly over to Engadget and peek at the unboxing gallery

Play.com, the online store, has just bitten a chunk out of Apple.

Their range of DRM-free music now includes artists from Sony BMG, Warner and Universal joining EMI and a host of independent labels. 

At 65-pence-per-track, that’s 14p less than the iTunes variety and you don’t need an iPod to play them either.

Smugness abounds in the Play.com camp as they also beat HMV, Amazon and Tecso to signing with the big four.

PlayDigital head Wendy Snowdown says: “It’s great for us to get this service live before Amazon, HMV and Tesco and it’s showing in the sales results.”

They’re not the first, however, 7digital pipped them six weeks ago, but Play says the ability to purchase from DVDs, books and everything else, in the same shopping basket gives them the upper hand.

A bit of modesty please Play

PlayDigital

Ok tightwad!

Yeah, you know who you are.

Perhaps you see yourself more as being frugal - no matter.

You opted for the 40GB PS3 and have discovered that the number of USB 2.0 ports isn’t enough.

In strides the Nyko Media Hub+ like a cheap mercenary.

In addition to adding some much need USB ports it has a memory card slot that reads both SD and Memory Stick cards, further expanding its media capabilities without looking out of whack when connected to the PS3.

And, even better, it’s self-installing and requires no additional power.

Yeah, yeah, I’m getting to the price!

Can you spare $19.99?  Of course you can

Source: IGN

The PSP-3000 may not seem like a great deal different to the PSP-2000.

Ok, there’s a few cosmetic changes, but apparently it’s the firmware that makes all the difference according to Eurogamer.

So, if you’ve only recently bought a PSP there’s no need to kick yourself!

Yeah, the new screen is much “richer, warmer and deeper than the PSP-2000.”

The third brightness setting is brighter than the current gen’s fourth brightness level, says Eurogamer.

Does the PSP-3000 screen fare better in glaring light than the PSP-2000? You’ll have to wait and see since EG wasn’t able to get a day of sunlight over here in Autumnal England.

The D-pad and other buttons are more pronounced and feel much firmer according to Tom Bramwell.

The built-in mic performed well during Skype calls.

Regarding firmware v4.2, a “USB Auto-Connect” option will automatically revert the handheld into USB mode when plugged in but not during gameplay and it won’t charge during gameplay either. It will charge when in USB mode like the current gen does.

So, some changes but not much.  If, like me, you have the 1st Gen model it might be worth the change.

Sony is feeling pretty smug right now as it celebrates the 85,000 PlayTV units sent to retailers over the two weeks since the PS3 Freeview recorder accessory started shipping to the shops.

Not to dampen their touchpaper but units shipped doesn’t equate to units sold.  What this might show is that they’re expecting the Sony faithful to be all over the £70 device this Xmas.

To add some more perspective to Sony’s smugfest:  Freesat, the UK’s relatively new free-to-air satellite service featuring high definition programming as well as most of the same channels that Freeview offers - is celebrating its own milestone this morning.

Freesat has now reached 100,000 unit sales - it has taken them five months to get to this stage!

PlayTV does seem to be an excellent add-on for any PS3 console so watch this space for news about actual sales (eh? Sony?)

GamesIndustry.biz

Come and find out who this Johnny X fellow is and win a rather natty gadget
Click the link - watch the film and then read the comp.

Enter said comp and praps win

Who Is Johnny X?

All thanks to RocketXL.

When I saw Sony’s new all-in-one desktop lineup spotted at CEDIA 2008 even I could see that Sony’s designers must have worked long and hard.

The reviewers over at CNet managed to grab a VAIO VGC-JS190J (near the lower end of the range) and put it through the paces.

It seems that it pleased the critics who exclaimed that it was the “best deal” going for an all-in-one desktop with an inbuilt Blu-ray drive.

They were also rejoycing over the fact that they found it “relatively free of software clutter.”

One point that they brought up was that 20″ is not enough to be watching Blu-ray on.

To finish they underlined the review with ”no other all-in-one, including Apple’s iMac, could do as much, as fast, for the same price.”

Sounds impressive to me.

CNet Review

Well, little or no surprise that Apple’s 3Gesus phone has appeared as this year’s best gadget as chosen by readers of Stuff magazine in its annual Gadget of the Year awards.

Stuff described the iPhone 3G as “a faster, cleverer version of an already remarkable phone.” It makes it as a neat 1-2 as the phone’s first incarnation won the coolest gadget prize last year.

The 3G beat some stiff competition in the form of Sony’s PlayStation 3, Microsoft’s Xbox 360, Nintendo’s Wii Fit and the B&W Zeppelin iPod speakers dock.

Stuff’s Editor, Fraser Macdonald, said the nominated products were judged on their performance, design and value, as well as “that elusive cool factor.”

“Having our readers vote for a number of the awards has been fascinating,” he said. “They are the ones out there on the street buying gadgets and so they are a great barometer.”

The magazine’s own gadget of the year prize, chosen by its editorial staff, went to the Asus Eee Pc, the sub £300 lappy that’s started a strong competitive market noone knew existed.

The judges said it had made more of an impact than any other device and marked the start of a “laptop for everyone” era.

Here are a smattering of the other winners that were announced at the ceremony held at the Dorchester Hotel in London yesterday:

• International brand: Nokia
• Innovation: Sony Reader
• Design: Apple MacBook Air
• Game: Grand Theft Auto IV
• Green gadget: Ego Electric Street Scoota
• Retailer: Firebox.com

Details of all the winners are at: http://awards.stuff.tv

Sony has announced two new VAIO notebooks today that both have optional Blu-ray drives - The VAIO NS and the VAIO CS.

The NS Blu-ray drive can also write DVDs and CDs.

The NS has a 15.4-inch LCD and uses Sony XBRITE-ECO LCD technology, an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU and has 3GB of RAM.

The Blu-Rry version will sell for about $1000 and it can be had in blue, white, and silver.

The CS comes in four colours including the boozy sangria and cosmopolitan - The Blu-ray version will go for about $1070.

The screen is a 14.1 inch number and uses the XBRITE-ECO LCD. The computer uses an optional Intel Centrino 2 CPU and up to 3GB of RAM.

“With these new units, Sony is now offering consumers a host of multi-media PC options to choose from,” said Mike Abary, senior vice president of VAIO product marketing at Sony Electronics. “And with a starting price of around $1,000 for the NS model, we’re expecting a new audience to experience HD entertainment on their computers.”

Sony