Filed under: Fiber Be still our hearts! The rumors were indeed true, and U-verse TV has at long last arrived in the Triangle to combat the monopoly that is Time Warner Cable. A breaking report from WRAL has it that the carrier is "offering its U-verse TV service as well as high-speed internet service in the Triangle," but fails to elaborate on specific service areas. We've heard from locals that Cary, NC will be one of the first locations with access, but until AT&T issues its own confirmation, it's hard to say for certain. Obviously, those who sign up will...
We're not too sure what's up with New England-based institutions and inspiration from the depths, but the two seem to have some kind of intrinsic connection. The latest company to prove such a wacky assertion true is Boston's own Scallop Imaging, a Tenebraex subsidiary that has developed a "low-cost" security camera that sees 180 degrees of view without fisheye distortion or the lag present in pan-and-tilt alternatives. Additionally, the multi-eyed cam automatically stitches and downsamples images, and can capture a new 7-megapixel still to transmit over Ethernet "every second or two." It's small enough to be placed into a light...
Filed under: Cables, Ports, Switches It's rather difficult to say whether or not DSP within a matrix switcher is -- how do you say... necessary? -- but regardless of want versus need, Extron Electronics is providing the ends. The MPX Plus 866 is hailed as a "a revolutionary new multi-format matrix switcher with integrated audio digital signal processing," the industry's first to wed VGA, video and audio signal routing with ProDSP. Said audio processing platform is based on a 32 / 64-bit floating point DSP engine, which offers up "an extensive selection of audio DSP tools designed to facilitate audio...
Filed under: Fiber Well, wouldn't you know it? Another one year birthday for another locale in AT&T's admittedly small U-verse TV family. As of now, the fiber-based programming service is available to over 355,000 living units in the St. Louis region, including sections of Arnold, Florissant, Manchester, Maplewood, St. Peters and Wellston. As always, the operator has promised to continue expanding the service on an ongoing basis, though we're beginning to wonder when "expand" will refer to something more than just a few miles out of cities already covered. Yes, that's jealousy on our breath -- so?AT&T's U-verse TV goes...
Filed under: Industry, Cable, SatelliteVirgin Media's in a pretty big hole compared to Sky on the HD front. As it stands, VM has a single linear high-def station (BBC HD), while Sky delivers 29. Pretty easy choice, right? Virgin Media's CEO Neil Berkett, in a presentation to the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference in New York, noted that it was looking to "level the linear content playing field versus Sky," and also mentioned a "plan to add linear high-definition channels." Unfortunately, he failed to elaborate on a quantity or time frame for delivery, but at least we know it's...
Filed under: Blu-ray Oh the cat and mouse game of DRM, how we love it -- as long as content owners make these unsuccessful attempts to protect their business models, we'll have this great game to watch. As you'd expect if you've been following this up until now, it is Fox that is once again doing whatever it can to prevent you from having your way with its content. The latest BD+ application has already successfully locked down 16 new Fox releases (not all in the US) and according to a SlySoft developer, it'll probably be February before the latest...
Filed under: Displays, Mitsubishi, Projector Mitsubishi's HC7000 1080p projector just started leaving the docks not too, too long ago, and now the kind folks over at BigPictureBigSound have published a thorough review after spending a decent bit of time with it. Installation and setup was said to be "a simple affair," and one of the first things they noticed upon firing it up was just how quiet it was while operating. In fact, critics deemed it the quietest projector they had tested in this price range. Testers fired up an upscaled DVD after calibration procedures were done, and what they...
Filed under: Cable, New contentReady or not, High Fidelity HDTV is now vying for your attention on Rogers Digital Cable in Ontario, Canada. The so-called HD Nature & Adventure Package will bring along Oasis HD, Treasure HD, Equator HD and Rush HD, all four of which are currently in "free preview" mode for customers with an HD set-top-box. Conveniently, there's no mention of what happens after the three month window of free viewing closes, but you can phone up Rogers to find out how much it'll cost you to keep looking.High Fidelity HDTV channel suite hits Rogers in Ontario originally...
DisplayLink USB monitors are starting to trickle out a little more frequently now, but USB graphics cards based on the tech are still somewhat rare -- we've seen a couple, but VillageTronic's ViBook box is the only one that comes with software to span an image across up to six screens at once. That's right, the bundled VT MultiDisplay software will let you create a single giant Windows desktop out of six 1600 x 1200 22-inch displays if you buy enough of the $130 dongles -- Mac users can do the same with four screens. The dongle can be outfitted...
Filed under: Reviews, Blu-ray Sometime between the third crescent moon and a witch's equinox (or early last week, to be specific), Criterion began shipping out its long-awaited Blu-ray Disc collection. The question remains, though: are these much ballyhooed discs worth their weight in gold, or what? We've rounded up a number of reviews from around the web covering a wide range of the first wave titles, and generally speaking, critics were floored. Almost every single reviewer had a difficult time hitting the "stop" button on their praises of the visual / auditory qualities, and while the plots of each film...
Online shoppers looking to spend the holiday season firmly planted on the couch can add the iPhone 3G back to their lists -- we've just confirmed that Apple and AT&T have quietly brought back in-home activation. Sure, it's been available in limited circumstances before, but now it's here and for real, just like with the first-gen unit. Would-be unlockers looking to score a phone for $199 flat can't start celebrating just yet, though -- you'll still have to provide your billing details and face an ETF if you don't activate within a set period of time. Oh well -- at...
Filed under: Tuners Tired of those vanilla USB tuners, are you? Not really getting the performance you deserve when tuning into your HD locals? Then have a glance at K-world's USB Lamborghini UB385-T -- but look quick, else you might miss it. Terrible jokes aside, this wicked quick DVB-T tuner is unnecessarily flashy, but early reports suggest that it works remarkably well. Setup was lightning fast, reception was world-class and the design was really something special. And heck, with a price tag like this (S$140; around 93 greenbacks), you won't even have to pony up too much for the branding.K-world's...
At first glance, you may wonder if Chumby is simply too lovable to rock a version of Quake, but after peeping ChumbyLurker's port of the game, we'll be darned if the two aren't perfect for each other. He's been gracious enough to make it available as both source code and a disk image, and installing the game is as easy as plugging in your USB drive and turning the machine on. On the video we've seen, the 350MHz device appears to keep up with things quite well, but the best part would have to be that the mouse and...
Filed under: Industry, Tuners, Satellite File this one in the category of "Oh, no they didn't!" Sadly, it seems they really have. DirecTV has sent out an email stating the following: "DirecTV has suspended the development of the HDPC-20 tuner project that was designed to integrate DirecTV service into Windows Media Center after assessing the impact of missing the August 2008 release of Windows Media Center update and considering timing of the next release." The note goes on to say that both the satcaster and Microsoft understand that folks are clamoring for an easy way to get DirecTV content on...
Filed under: Industry, Cables, Other formats A full year after we expected wireless HD to really take off, we're barely in a position different than the one we started in. If we can point to any initiative in particular that has grown legs over the course of 2008, it'd be AMIMON's WHDI. Today, the company has shipped its 100,000th Wireless High-Definition (WHDI) chipset, a milestone that's pretty impressive given the general ignorance of wireless HDTVs in the consumer space. As of now, these chipsets are shipping in ultrathin LCD TVs by top-tier brands (think Sony, Mitsubishi and Sharp), and they're...
Filed under: Blu-ray, DVRs, Recorders, Mitsubishi With all the talk of Blu-ray stalling out, it's easy to see why Blu-ray DVRs haven't been something that manufacturers have even tried to sell the American public. Over in Japan, things are a little different -- just take Mitsubishi's DVR-BF2000 Blu-ray DVR model, for example. The hefty sum of ¥178,000 ($1900 US) nets you a DVR with a 500GB hard disk, dual tuners and a disc burner that can write out on BD-R/RE media and DVD-R/RW for when you don't need such capacious archiving. The unit also has some automatic editing features for...
After putting those nasty Bluetooth 2.2 rumors to bed, the Bluetooth Special Interest Group has directly informed Wireless Week that it will indeed look to come out with a "high-speed specification next summer." Of course, we've been waiting on such a thing for, like, ever now, but Executive Director Mike Foley has asserted that when the spec arrives in summer 2009 it will likely be sitting at 3.0. What's 3.0 promising? Faster overall transmission speeds and quicker connections, namely. So, what's the over / under on the Bluetooth SIG actually delivering?[Via phonescoop]Filed under: WirelessBluetooth SIG promises high-speed specification next summer,...
Engadget is reporting that the Acer Aspire One might be the first carrier subsidized Netbook to hit the US. It looks like the carrier would be AT&T and it arrives via Radio Shack. The subsidized price is $99 (without the subsidy $499). Of course with the subsidy you’re on the hook for 2 years at least $60 a month. Here’s a pic of the ad Engadget is showing....
Impact gear isn't exactly the hottest peripheral out there for game consoles, but TN Games is apparently finding plenty of hardcore gamers willing to splurge on its FPS Vest. Now, the outfit is finally getting official with its HTX Helmet, which we first heard about as the year began. Utilizing the company's 3rd Space technology, it's designed to be used in conjunction with the 3rd Space Gaming Vest and will enable wearers' to feel blows to the head when fired upon. We're talking bullets whizzing by, impacts of shots -- the works. If, for some incredibly odd reason, that...
