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Cyrus Farivar Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
Were not really sure how many people need a $50 piece of laser-guided artillery to arm their workspaces with, but when your adversaries have regular USB missile launchers and circus cannons, we feel that its important to stay on top in the office space arms race. Fortunately our buddies at Engadget Chinese have found the Striker II, which comes with a Level 3 precision guidance system (whatever that means). It may have something to do with accompanying 3D software (pictured), although we dont quite get what that city in the background is all about, nor why the missiles are pointed toward the user -- so you may want to get that guidance system looked at before you aim it at your nearest enemy.
[Via Engadget Chinese]...
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Darren Murph Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
For those who are (understandably) strapped for cash, but have a hankering for a talkative robot to befriend them, E-Revolutions latest creation is just the thing. While its certainly not a voice-activated R2-D2, nor a channel-flipping R100, the Communication Flower pulls double duty by sprucing up your living room and adding a bit of chatter to break up the depressing silence. Although you cant wirelessly cater to its every need, this device sports a colorful motif and packs an integrated
speaker to randomly belt out "200 words and phrases" whenever you speak to or touch the connected bouquet. Although we arent sure how quickly the novelty factor would wear off (or how repetitive its bound to become), the Communication Flower can be picked up next month for ?4,179 ($36).
[Via Ak...
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Darren Murph Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
If you thought your portable gaming options were all but limited to Sonys PSP or Nintendos DS / DS Lite (or those Korean-based all-in-one gizmos), a group of Swedish programmers are hoping to change all that in drastic fashion. Concocting an "in-car gaming system" that utilizes a GPS receiver, handheld computer, headphones, and a laptop in the trunk of the whip, the Backseat Playground would eventually turn real world "sights, attractions, and locations" into in-game characters and events for the lucky passenger(s). The basic idea is to start the game off in a primarily audio-based murder mystery scenario where "actual forests, skyscrapers, and rivers" become
part of the story, giving children (or adults, too) a way to virtually interact with their surroundings while traveling. The la...
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Paul Miller Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
Well that was fun. Hardly a week ago we still believed in Santa Clause and that magickal properties lay within the Wii sensor bar. Now it turns out that not only was NORAD lying to us all this time, but the Wii sensor bar can be replaced by a couple of candles without throwing off our Zelda spin attack one bit. Those brave souls over at Joystiq dusted off their candelabra to give it a shot, after rumors of such doings emerged on the internets, and it appears that those rumors were not exaggerated. Of course, having a couple of candles obstructing the screen isnt quite an optimal Wii-ing situation, but its always good to know that instead of reading a book by candlelight when the power goes out, we can just fire up our Wii and... wait. Damn. Well, its kind of cool anyways. Peep the vide...
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Darren Murph Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
Since good things come to those who wait (or pre-order, sometimes), were thrilled to see our patience has paid off while waiting for Epsons EMP-TW1000 to head stateside. As predicted, the svelte new projector rocks the PowerLite moniker, while maintaining the bevy of impressive specs and curvaceous design. Beneath the hood of the PowerLite Pro Cinema 1080 is Epsons own C2 Fine 1080p 3LCD chips, OptiCinema optics, E-TORL lamp, an AccuCinema lens, and "Absolute Black Technology" which provides a 12,000:1 contrast ratio. While you wont be able to grab this US-bound beauty until January 2007, you can use all this extra time to start
pinching those pennies, as this bad boy will run you $4,999 when it finally lands....
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Darren Murph Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
Heres one record thats not likely to be shattered anytime soon (or at least we hope not). While its no secret that USB drives have been gradually getting smaller and smaller (thats what we all wanted, right?), this trend has apparently led to an increasing amount of lost flash drives from folks who cant keep up with minuscule property. In meretricious fashion, Chris Spurgeon actually went so far as to "embed his flash drive" into a regulation sixteen-pound Galaxie 300 bowling ball in order to keep it from vanishing while out on the town. While attaching this
device to laptops and PCs within cramped confines probably isnt desirable, it should definitely keep that precious data out of the washing machine, but we doubt this bad boy lands a strike anytime soon with such an extrusion.
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Ryan Block Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
Just a reminder to everybody, our first seasonal charity auction, Gears of Peace, is over this Wednesday. We know you might feel a little silly about plunking down a few hundies to play some Gears with Engadget and Major Nelson, but if you split it up between a few friends it wont seem as bad. Plus its 100% deductible and 100% of the proceeds go to Save Darfur, so let the bidding begin!
P.S. -To those who bid but dont win -- dont let that stop you from donating to the charity of your choice this holiday season....
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Paul Miller Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 5:34PM Source Site:engadget
There really hasnt been a whole lot of love lost between Apple Computer and Apple Corps over the years -- especially since that whole "we wont sell music" debacle -- but it seems that Stevie J and co. might finally be getting through to the guardians of all things Beatles, and could be on the verge of an exclusive iTunes launch of the elusive catalog, reports Fortune. From the sound of things, plenty of millions are set to change hands if the deal goes through, with Apple Computer potentially providing a good bit of advance cash for the marketing push and prospective sales. The Beatles havent been incredibly receptive to the use of their music in marketing so far, though there was word recently of a downloadable offering somewhere, but it sounds like Steve is hoping theyll make an exce...
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Darren Murph Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 10:15AM Source Site:engadget
While we initially felt Wal-Mart was being a bit old fashioned by not allowing Wii demo kiosks to be setup in stores due to "safety concerns," Walton and friends apparently had a good bit of foresight that we werent aware of. After numerous reports of television sets getting the axe, and an innocently bystanding HP iPAQ getting all cracked up, were wondering if folks arent just staging their own Wiincidents at this point. Apparently warning everyone of how jeopardous these free-flying Wiimotes can be wasnt really taken to heart, as now a butterfingered gamer has quite an interesting tale to tell to the presumably skeptical insurance adjuster. While busting a few moves in Wii Sports, the nonsensical user let the controller fly, but instead of landing softly (and harmlessly) on the couch...
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Thomas Ricker Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 10:15AM Source Site:engadget
Well hot damn, looks like Motorola went and sprung their smokin, linux-based ROKR E6 upon China today. Better yet, we now know that this 14.5-mm thinster delivers the much appreciated GSM 900/1800 bands in addition to the 1900 band we saw tested and approved in the FCC filing. That makes it of limited use (but use nonetheless) here in the US as long as you stay within the T-Mobile network. The phone delivers a 2.4-inch, 260k color QVGA touch-screen with stylus, a 2 megapixel camera and push-to-talk capabilities in addition to handwriting recognition, a QR code (barcode) scanner, business card reader, and document viewer for PDF and the most common MS Office apps. And unlike the first gen ROKR, this
pup drops iTunes in favor of RealPlayer which means support for MP3, MPEG4, AAC+, WAV, ...
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Thomas Ricker Year:by , posted Nov 27th 2006 at 10:15AM Source Site:engadget
Looking every bit the competitor to Epsons P-5000 or Canons M80 portable storage solutions for photogs, is this, Aigos UH-P706. Instead of maxing out at 80GB like the others, Aigo slams up to 160GB of disk in their version of the video / picture viewer. They do however, skimp on the screen a bit at just 3.6-inches and 16 millions colors but then make a mends with support for RAW and TIFF, AVI and MPEG4, and slots for SD, MMC, Memory Stick, and CF card formats. Oddly, no audio codecs are listed in the press release, not even the ubiquitous MP3. For the moment, these are only available in Aigos home country of China for about 9,977 Chinese yuan or a whopping $1,248.
[Via c|net Asia, thanks Imish]...
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