Best computer news

The sheer number of choices for USB sound cards tells us there’s not much room for innovations, but someone manages to teach the old dog new tricks. Rather than a dongle form factor, the USB Tube Delight Audio is a vacuum tube-lookalike whose LED glows in blue when plugged in. 3.5 mm headphone jack and mic-in are elegantly placed opposite to the mini-USB receptacle, and the mic-in can be disabled to switch to line-in via software.

Granted, this isn’t exactly designed for portability and the fade-in and fade-out effect is also a minor annoyance when watching movies. The “sound tube” deserves credit for bringing us a small surprise. Like many USB gadgets, the USB Tube Delight Audio is sold exclusively at Brando for $32.
Permanent Link

Even after Open Mobile Terminal Platform and GSM Association had agreed to switch to micro USB as standard connector for smartphones, Apple still didn’t bow, and insisted on milking its iPod dock connector. Now top mobile phone suppliers have agreed with European Union to standardize micro-USB on smartphones, and hope to achieve this by 2012.

EU said this the move is strictly voluntary, but since Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, RIM and LG have pledged support and they together command over 90% of market share, the rest will likely follow suit due to peer pressure. Interestingly, the defiant Apple now also makes the switch, in its own way. The fruit company has confirmed while it intends to support micro-USB connection, Apple will likely provide a dock adapter to meet the compatibility goal. So we won’t be kissing Apple’s dock connector goodbye in the next iPhone 3G ‘whatever’.
Permanent Link

Having a big screen laptop without Blu-ray is kinda like missing an opportunity to cruise down an empty highway. Granted, you can download HD content, but if you are geeks like us, there’s an urge to fully leverage the full potential of the notebook. For whatever reasons you are getting Blu-ray, the USB-powered Asus’ slim & sleek drive has you covered. It has upped the max. read speed to 4.8x for BD-ROM/RE which should relieve the agonizingly slow Blu-ray disc loading time. This however doesn’t help with writing Blu-ray as the Asus SBC-04D1S-U is only a BD reader, a tray-loading one.

What we also like about the BD reader is the big glowing ‘X’ on the side, making it far more aesthetically pleasing than the FastMac. A copy of CyberLink is bundled for movie playback. Keep in mind you can only output the HD content given both the laptop and the LCD screen have either HDMI or DVI (HDCP).
Permanent Link

There’s a rumor circulating in the blogsphere that MS is planning to offer Windows 7 on a flash drive which would make it third way to get the OS without buying a new PC. The other two are through download & retail DVD. While the decision is still being made, this move is being considered in the first place to appeal to the ever growing netbook crowd whose under-powered machines usually lack any optical media drive.

Having said that, thumbdrives logically become the easiest, not to mention fastest route to get Windows 7 running on a netbook. In fact, they have already become the unofficial install method for XP, Vista and now 7 if you are comfortable with command prompt. If tweakers can teach newbies to do it in 10 minutes, it should be dead easy for MS to get a Windows 7 thumbdrive package ready.
Permanent Link

Razer’s much anticipated USB gaming headset Megalodon – named after a prehistoric shark – will begin shipping on June 30th at 10am; that’s approximately 10 months after the product was first announced last year, and that maybe how long it may take to excavate the real Megalodon (if complete fossils were to be found). We aren’t certain why Razer waited this long, perhaps to wait out for the economy to recover.

What separates the Megalodon from the rest of the pack is its ability to virtualize 7.1 channels, and its Maelstrom audio processor to make simulated surround more believable. There’s the remote control, which combines the Megalodon’s on-audio processor with volume controls, a noise gate, and a mute button. The same pod also allows switching between 2.0 stereo and 7.1 surround mode for applications that don’t need the extra directional sound. The direct competitor to the $149.99 Razer Megalodon is obviously the Logitech G35 headset which relies on Dolby Headphone 2.0 to create the tricks and is equally expensive ($120 street).
Permanent Link

RCA Small Wonder EZ300HD 720p camcorder is a nice try, but it just isn’t as aesthetically pleasing as all the other ones, and that seems to be a problem for all the company’s gadgets, which appear to be designed by someone from the 1980s.

Not repeating the same mistake, the new Small Wonder EZ209HD is really slim and sleek – measuring roughly a half of an inch thick. The LCD display is downsized to 2″ due to the camcorder’s new form factor. 256MB internal memory gives you a head start, and if you need to capture everything into 720p, Micro SD slot is at your disposal. With a 16GB card, the EZ209HD can record up to 8 hours of HD content in YouTube-friendly H.264 format or 40 hours in web quality. You can jump between modes with the flick of a switch. This Small Wonder also has a dedicated photo shutter button for up to 8MP still picture capture. Internal battery isn’t USB rechargeable; instead it has another charging adapter. Last but not least is the HDMI interface. MSRP is $120, but there is discount everywhere that brings the price to around $90.
Permanent Link

As convenient and versatile as laptops are, they aren’t far from perfect, especially in the ergonomic department. Back pain, stiff necks, sore shoulders and alike are often bad side effects associated with prolonged laptop usage. This nifty Thanko articulating laptop riser (a.k.a. Easy Desk Cool 2) with fans should be just what you need to eliminate those problems.

You could refer this ergonomic gadget as a desk, which comes with three joints and folding legs so you can adjust the viewing angle of the notebook to the most comfortable position whether you are lying flat or sitting upright. When not in use, you can fold the legs together, and store it anywhere. A pair of built-in USB fans and the aluminum desktop surface work together in active and passive cooling method respectively to dissipate heat better from a notebook. If the $92 Thanko is a little overkill for you, you can check out these coolers from Antec, Belkin and Logitech.
Permanent Link

Samsung S2 mobile hard drive series is unique in its own right. The S2 is different from other portable drives in that it relies on on-board USB technology to reduce the length of the chassis, making it very compact (smaller than a typical passport, according to Samsung). We have to assume the engineers have taken out the SATA native interface and replaced it with USB. So this doesn’t look like you can gut the S2’s shell to remove the drive for other applications.

Available in 4 different colors (piano black, snow white, wine red, chocolate brown, sweet pink & ocean blue), the S2 is also anti-slippery with leatherette back cover. Other features include auto-backup, software data encryption & capacity gauge. It would appear Amazon has started carrying the S2 at around $109 for 500GB; $85 for 320GB; and as low as $65 for 250GB.
Permanent Link

OLED applications aren’t just limited to photo frames and MP3 players as you may think. Recent novelty gadgets such as fingerprint flash drive and keypad also make use of OLED. And now, OCZ finds new use of OLED to sell its pedestrian keyboard, Sabre.

OCZ Sabre is touted as a professional gaming keyboard, but oddly, the keys here aren’t backlit like that of G19, G15 or even OCZ’s own Alchemy Illuminati. The 9 customizable OLED buttons also have an amber color scheme. The bundled software will convert any digital image into icon for the OLED hotkeys, and the best part is that you can store as many sets of icons as you see fit for different applications. That is of course, if you bother finding icons closely associated with the functions you often need quick access to. Those OLED hotkeys will also change on-the-fly as you alternate between programs. Lastly, the Sabre is complete with a blue LED side-lighting. Check back for the MSRP as OCZ could be still trying to figure out the price in this troubled economy.
Permanent Link

Designed to stick on the undercarriage of your laptop, these pink balls are the easiest and most sexually ambiguous way to keep your computer cool.
Product Page ($6)