Best computer news

The Samsung’s YP-T10 is an evolutionary upgrade to the YP-T9 – the first Bluetooth-enabled MP3 player. Now the T9′s successor will carry once again 4GB flash with five colors (black, red, white, green & purple) to choose from. The back of the T10 is wrapped with aluminum, and the rest is hard scratch-resistant plastic. The T10 is now upgraded to 2″ 320×240 QVGA from 1.8″. It also inherits the Bluetooth headphone support from T9, and adds phone profile so you can talk through the T10 as if it were a Bluetooth headset. Samsung claims November firmware will bring caller ID as well.

As for the interface, the Samsung T10 adopts K5′s touch-sensitive buttons, and fills the GUI with all kinds of animated eye candy. Anythingbutipod’s review unfortunately didn’t have any screenshots of the T10′s. Video compatibility is restricted to Samsung’s SVI (MPEG-4) and WMV9 SP (320×240, 30fps). So, there you have it. Would someone compare the T10 with 3G nano please? Interview after the jump.
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During the warm months, many geeks prefer cold ways to get their caffeine intake. When the weather starts to get cold, some change to coffee or hot chocolate from cold drinks. We have looked at USB powered refrigerators before that only cool, which won’t help you if you like hot drinks.

USB Geek has a new USB powered refrigerator just big enough to hold one can of soda or a cup of coffee or other hot drink. The thing not only keeps your soda cold, but also keeps your coffee hot. Supposedly, the gadget can cool down to 54 F in 5 minutes and warm to 116F in 5 minutes. The device measures in at 19.5 x 9 x 8 CM and weighs 385gm. The fridge is available now for $32.
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Linutop is a complete Linux computer running on a USB flash drive. All of the OS software and other software as well as storage or the computer is on the 1GB USB drive. The system is completely silent since it has no hard drive and it consumes low amounts of power.

The entire Linutop computer weighs only 9.9 ounces and consumes 5W of power. The USB portion also comes with a box of some sort featuring additional hardware. The CPU is an AMD Geode LX700 x86 processor, 256MB of RAM, four USB ports, audio in and out, 10/100baseT Ethernet, VGA output all wrapped in an aluminum case measuring 3.66×1.06×5.9 inches. Software bundled on the flash drive includes Firefox browser, Gaim IM client, and Abiword word processor. The Linutop with USB key costs 280 EUR or about $397 USD. This isn’t the first time we have seen Linux on a USB drive.
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Back in 2005, we talked a bit about the rCard, which is a sort of digital business card. The rCard is now shipping and as the name suggests is about the size of a business card with dimensions of 3.6″ x 2.03″ x 4.3mm thick.

The device is a small media player with a 2-inch display that has two side buttons for navigation. Companies can store data to the device like text documents, images and video and the device can be updated from your computer via USB. USB also recharges the battery as well, which is good for about two hours of use. The 1GB rCard isn’t cheap, so don’t expect to come home with bags of them from trade shows. The MSRP is about $40.
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• I4U News is reporting that the Nokia N95 8GB phone due to ship soon will come bundled with the full copy of the new Spider-Man 3 movie. The new version of the phone will retail for around $800.
• CNN is reporting that British citizens are resorting to pulling their own teeth with pliers because they can’t find a dentist willing to see them on the publically subsidized dental plan. Most citizens can’t afford to pay a private care dentist for services.
• A story over at Digg says that if you bought $50,000 in Apple stock in 2003 that it would now be worth $1 million. That is a serious rate of return amounting to about a 2273% return on your investment.
• TidBITS is reporting that the 3G iPhone most of us have dreamed of is closer to reality now thanks to a new Broadcom chip announced recently that allows for higher data speeds with reduced battery consumption.
• New Scientist is reporting that the US Military is supporting a plan to gather solar power form orbit and beam it back to earth via satellites. The scheme sounds a lot like the replicator beam weapon from the season finale of Stargate Atlantis to me.

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I looked at the new OCZ ATV Turbo flash drive over at I4U News this week. The drive performed very well with some of the fastest read and write speeds I have seen, even faster than the Corsair Flash Survivor GT I looked at before.

Like Corsair promises with its Flash Survivor, OCZ promises that the ATV Turbo is water and shock resistant. The drive stood up to shocks well, but I found that the cap came off easily when I ran the drive through the washer and dryer. At the end of the testing, even though the cap came off the drive in the wash and dryer, the ATV Turbo still worked well. The problem with the cap coming off could make the ATV less than ideal for use in some conditions though. CustomPC Recently ran a story saying you need the NVIDIA 680i mainboards to hit the top speeds possible with the OCZ drive.
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A guy by the name of Chris Lomaka came up with a fairly gross and disturbing mouse design concept that would look right at home in a Halloween haunted house. The body mouse looks like it is covered in skin, complete with hair.

The two main mouse buttons are thumbs and under the mouse sit lips, gums and teeth. Who knows if something like this would ever make it to market, but I could see some strange folks being really into the idea. I much prefer the clickable hooters of the other body mouse to the thumbs of Chris’ body mouse. This would be a good gag gift for Halloween parties though or just to mess with coworkers as they walk by your desk.
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PhotoVu introduces a giant digital picture frame this week that measures in at 22-inches diagonally. PhotoVu also allows you to customize the frame with multiple choices for frame color and matboards. A hidden USB port allows you to display photos stored on a flash drive directly without needing to insets a photo card or transfer the photos to your computer.

The frame also has WiFi connectivity and included software allows you to send photos wirelessly from your computer directly to the frame from online services. Compatible online image services include iPhoto, Google Picasa, and RSS feeds. The screen resolution is 1680 x 1050 and the frame is VESA wall mount compatible. A tripod mount is located on the bottom for displaying the frame. At 22-inches in size, you might imagine the frame is costly with prices starting at $1299. I’d go for the 15-inch Gigantor frame for over $1000 less, but that’s just me.
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A company called Coagent Int’l Co. LTD. Has a set of USB bus powered speakers called the SP001U Music Can USB Speaker System. These speakers are totally USB bus powered and require no external AC adapter or sound card. The manufacturer says they are perfect for any mobile worker looking for quality sound in a portable package.

The company says that they have worked with Senheiser for a long time and the SP001U speakers are equal to Senheiser sound quality, which is saying a lot. A USB 2.0 port is required to provide enough power for use. Max power output is 1W for each speaker and the system stacks like a can for storage closing the cable inside the speakers. this makes the system much more compact than other USB speakers. There is no word on pricing or availability of the item at this time.
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Seattle Post Intelligencer has posted the best video yet of the second generation of Zune PMP – the 80GB hard drive-version that is. The first thing I noticed is that the text labels the root menu are huge. That alone dominates the entire 3.2″ screen. There are two new items – social and podcasts. The ‘social’ apparently replaces ‘community’ of previous Zune for tune sharing, and ‘podcasts’, well, is pretty self-expanatory.

To get around, you can either hold down a direction on the D-pad to scroll up or down the list, or move your thumb in a circular motion. Then you can swipe your thumb horizontally, push the center button, or press on a direction on the D-pad to start playing back a file. The playback screen generally looks familiar with the album art occupying most of the screen. You can check out the 12 observations eagle-eyed ZuneRama discovered on the new Zune. Video of the interface after the jump.
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