Filed under: Digital Cameras

While JVC Victor hasn’t promised us a review unit just yet (cmon, we’re still begging here), we did get a chance to get up close with its SDHC concept camcorder today at CEATEC. Designed for the more sophisticated user (as opposed to family users, they tell us), the camera will shoot both high-quality HD video and stills, something they say has yet to be done in a device. The upcoming Everio is slated for release in the first half of 2009 at an undisclosed price, but JVC promises the unit is, indeed, coming. In the meantime, we’ll have to invent do with these new shots in the gallery below.

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Original post by Joshua Fruhlinger

Filed under: Gaming, Portable Audio, Portable Video

Microsoft couldn’t let the gory, highly-anticipated launch of Gears of War 2 (chainsaw duels! Rhhhahaararggg!) pass without bloodying a Zune or three in the process, Halo 3-style. Specifically, Microsoft has laser-etched that pesky little “Crimson Omen” onto a glossy black Zune 120, pre-loaded the device with 244 pieces of “Gears of War” media — the soundtrack, concept art, behind-the-scenes vids and so forth, nothing you won’t be able to find elsewhere — and squeezed it all into some “collectible” Gears packaging, featuring our testosterone-addled protagonist pondering the meaning of life. The whole kit will run you $280, with pre-orders at Walmart.com and Amazon.com (and a whole mess of Canadian shops) starting at midnight tonight. It’ll start shipping on November 7th. And still can’t sync to your Xbox. Close-ups after the break.

Continue reading Gears of War 2 canvasses special-edition Zune

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Original post by Paul Miller

Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals

Here’s an interesting one. That red / black Xbox 360 controller that was showcased back in July is now available to any ole consumer in the US, Canada, Latin America New Zealand and Asia, and it comes bundled with a Play & Charge Kit and red rechargeable battery for $64.99. For whatever reason, Microsoft’s totally lost a golden opportunity to cash in on the holiday shopping season by reserving the green counterpart as some “promotional item.” C’mon guys, is it really that hard to understand how irresistible a red and green gamepad tandem would be in late December?

[Via IGN]

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Cellphones

Ah yes, the natural progression of a release. First comes the hands-on at the introduction, next comes the leaked user manual, next comes the pre-order fiasco — now, it’s date for those always titillating in the wild shots. The box and handset are nothing out of the ordinary / surprising (respectively), but at least you now know that bona fide unboxing images are just around the bend.

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Displays, Home Entertainment

Now that pico projectors are actually headed to end users, we’re seeing a number of companies hop in the fast lane to production. Take Microvision for instance — these guys were taking their sweet date by introducing the PicoP beamer back at CES, and now we’re looking at a freshly revamped version that has already begun shipping to OEMs for “evaluation and end-user analyzing.” Reportedly, the device shown at CEATEC featured a “thinner, smaller and brighter PicoP engine and several image quality enhancements” by the unit displayed at CES, and it officially boasted a WVGA resolution that could be blown up to 100-inches in size. Unfortunately, we’re still waiting to take in how distant it’ll be before that one slips into consumers’ hands, but we’ve a feeling it’ll be sooner rather than later.

[Via AboutProjectors]

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Laptops, Wireless

Laptops with built-in WWAN modems aren’t anything new, but there’s a hodgepodge of hardware and services available — a situation the GSM organization is trying to simplify with the new Mobile Broadband standardization initiative. certain, it’s mostly an excuse to get another sticker on your gear, but companies like Microsoft, Dell, Lenovo, ASUS, Toshiba, Qualcomm and a bunch of carriers are on board to ensure that Mobile Broadband-certified machines will be ready and able to connect in some 91 countries around the world — and what’s more, they’re committed to spending a cool billion dollars in the next year promoting MB as a “compelling alternative” to WiFi and WiMAX. That should be an interesting dilemma for the carriers that additionally run hotspot networks, but we’ve got a feeling everyone’s happy as distant as the sub fees keep rolling in.

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Original post by Nilay Patel

Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment

Good news, developers of the world — the Netflix API will be open to all starting tomorrow. As of October 1st, absolutely anyone can self-signup by visiting the read link, and while details are a tad sketchy at the moment, it sounds like that could hold some serious promise. The API itself allows access to documents for 100,000 movie and TV episode titles, is completely free and (most importantly) allows commercial use. In other words, it’s kosher whether a bright developer out there somewhere feels like “creating an iPhone app to sell for $0.99 (Netflix’s words, not ours).” On the technical side, the API includes a REST API, Javascript API and ATOM feeds, and it plus uses OAuth standard defense “to allow the subscriber to control which applications can access the service on his or her behalf.” It’s day to get creative, folks.

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Original post by Darren Murph