http://www.ecoustics.com/latest/news Latest news, updated every five minutes http://www.ecoustics.com/pcw/news/151382 Is the physical music format still relevant in the 21st century? SanDisk is betting on it and plans to bring a new form of physical music format: the microSD card. Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:40:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17941 If there's one thing digital photographers and videographers know well, it's the agony of running out of storage. To that end, Taiwain's Pretec has introduced 64 and 100 GB 233x Compact Flash cards with access speeds up to 35 MB/s. Pretec is no stranger to the high-performance CF market: its 48 MB card was the previous "world record holder," and its 33X 32 GB and 50 GB cards can handle up to 50 MB/s.If 100 GB of storage isn't enough for a single CF card, Pretec has a solution for that too: configure four 64 GB CD cards to create a 2.5-inch, 256 GB SATARead | Permalink | Linking Blogs Tue, 23 Sep 2008 13:15:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17913 Making a pitch to athletic iPod Shuffle users sick of fighting with tangled headphone cables, RCA on Friday released its new S2501 Jet Stream portable media player. The smallish PMP discards both wires and Bluetooth for proprietary Kleer wireless audio transmission technology, which RCA claims offers better battery life and audio quality.The thin, 3.63-inch tall player offers a 1-inch color LCD for browsing music, viewing photos and playing video, a splash-proof body with a clip, and 1GB of flash mRead | Permalink | Linking Blogs Fri, 19 Sep 2008 13:45:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17837 Although rumors keep swirling that SanDisk is on the verge of being acquired by tech giant Samsung, SanDisk today announced a new 32 GB edition of its Extreme III CompactFlash card. The new high-capacity card is aimed squarely at professional and high-end digital video and photography users, and the card maintains the same 30 MB/s transfer rate that's made the Extreme III series popular with the high-resolution crowd."High-definition camcorders require high-capacity memoRead | Permalink | Linking Blogs Thu, 11 Sep 2008 13:10:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17834 Break out the webcam and begin honing your finest acting skills: Digital Trends on Monday announced its Favorite Gaming Memory Contest. The contest is sponsored by iBUYPOWER and the winner will take home a Video Pro PC and $2,000 in American Express gift cards. We're looking for fun and creative videos that are less than three minutes long about your favorite video game memory or experience. Act it out, speak to the camera, or even animate your favorite video game memory for a chance to win. For the full rules, head to the Digital Trends contest page.The contest, hosted on YouTube, encourages amateur filmmakers to create their ownRead | Permalink | Linking Blogs Thu, 11 Sep 2008 12:29:22 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17831 AMD's ATI graphics unit has introdued a new HD 4600 series of graphics cards, aiming to offer decent gaming performance and high-definition video experiences at prices that won't scare off even the most hesitant buyers: both the ATI HD 4670 and HD 4650 cards come in well under $100."Today, AMD is providing mainstream users—one of the largest segments of the market—with superior graphics products and performance at previously unheard of prices," said AMD's graphics group senior VP and general manager Rick Bergman, in a statement. "The success of the ATI Radeon HD 4000 series validates that AMD's shift away fromRead | Permalink | Linking Blogs Thu, 11 Sep 2008 11:30:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17663 Feel like swinging your Wii remote madly around in the air while trying to defeat a yellow, spike-wearing snaggle-toothed monster? Then Nintendo really wants you to know that Mario Super Sluggers is now available for the Nintendo Wii. The game, rated E for "Everyone," enables players to swing the Wii remote like a bat or use it to make pitches in a Mario baseball game that sees Mario, Luigi, Daisy, and other Mario characters take on Bowser for control of Baseball Island. The game offers single- and multi-player modes, and online baseball cards found on Internet Web sites unlocks features in the games like screensavers and special videos. Mon, 25 Aug 2008 13:30:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17536 Giving HD cam users a chance to trash their tapes and move up to a faster media, Sony on Tuesday announced three new professional-grade storage solutions for use with its pro HD camcorders, like the HVR-270U and XDCAM EX series. The new options include two solid-state memory cards and a capacious plug-in hard drive.   The 32GB SxS Pro memory card posts the fastest data transfer rates, with speeds up to 800 Mbps, and a price tag to match: $1,500. It Tue, 12 Aug 2008 11:40:00 -0400 http://ecoustics-cnet.com.com/1606-2_3-50003302.html?tag=rsspr.6244902&part=ecoustics-cnet The technique is called wardriving, and it allows hackers to detect vulnerabilities in a retailer's wireless network in order to lift credit and debit card information. In Wednesday's edition of the Daily Debrief, CNET's Kara Tsuboi and Dan Farber discuss the latest charge against 11 people accused of this multinational crime. Wed, 06 Aug 2008 15:35:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/pcw/news/148452 The consumer electronics giant puts its weight behind Tru2Way, which uses a small card in the TV to communicate with your cable provider. Tue, 15 Jul 2008 20:00:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17271 Taiwan's TUL Corporation has announced its new PowerColor PCS HD4850 2GB graphics card, which claims to be the first graphics controller on the market to offer two gigabytes of dedicated video memory. TUL launched the HD4850 series back in June—512 MB and 1 GB versions are also available—and decided to push the line forward to 2 GB based on customer feedback.TUL manufactures AMD graphics cards, and the HD4850 is based on the RV770 chip and sports 800 stream processors and up to 57.6 GB/s of memory bandwidth. The PCS HD4850 also features a unique fan technology that adjusts fan speed on the fly to adapt to ambient temperature. Dubbed the Professi Mon, 14 Jul 2008 13:00:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17222 Accessory and peripheral maker Turtle Beach has rolled out another entry in its line of gaming headphones in the form of the Ear Force X4 headset for the Xbox 360. Billing the cans as the most advanced wireless headphones ever build for console gaming, the X4s promise to bathe users in 5.1 Dolby surround sound while offering unique features like the ability to duck game sounds during chats."The addition of Dolby 5.1 channel surround sound in our new X4 expands the game action all around you," said Turtle Beach marketing manager Mike Carducci, in a statement. "Unlike stereo headphones, you can hear every 3D sound cue Tue, 08 Jul 2008 12:45:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17135 When chipmaker AMD took over ATI back in mid-2006, one of the first things it did was cancel the ATI All-in-Wonder, a moderately priced video card that combined graphics acceleration with an integrated television tuner. Now, AMD is bringing it back, announcing the ATI All-in-Wonder HD, a PCI 2.0 card that combines premium graphics and high-def playback capability with an HD television tuner."Never before has this level of HDTV and graphics performance been seen in an all-in-one PC multimedia solution," said AMD graphics group VP of ma Fri, 27 Jun 2008 11:30:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/17075 Diamond Multimedia has announced the immediate availability of the ATI Radeon HD 4850 graphics card, offering 512 MB of graphics memory, 480 stream processors, a 625 MHz clock speed and a 993 MHz memory bus, all on a single-slot PCIE 2.0 card that supports ATI's CrossFireX technology for upgrading to up to four GPUs. The HD 4850 also wraps in ATI's TeraScale engine for pushing high frame rates, and ATI's Unified Video Decoder 2 for handling high-definition H.264, VC-1, and MPEG-2 video without taxing the CPU.The HD 4850 also supports features like Blu-ray picture-in-picture, along with DirectX 10.1 games and (of course) Windows Fri, 20 Jun 2008 13:00:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16837 Boutique media center developer Cannon PC has announced an OEM agreement with Microsoft that will enable it to offer dual CableCARD-equipped media center PCs in its Home and Pro A/V product series. And if two CableCARDs aren't enough to meet your viewing and recording needs, the company says quad-CableCARD versions will be available in the "near future.""We are excited about our partnership with Microsoft and the opportunity to offer our customers Digital CableCARD" said Gregg Cannon of Cannon PC, in a statment. "Cannon PC has worked hard over the years to establish itself and major player in the media center market and CableCARD will allow us to bring the next level of this exciti Thu, 29 May 2008 13:45:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16821 Sony and six major U.S. cable operators—Comcast, Time Warner, Cox, Charter, Cablevision, and Bright House—has signed on to an agreement to use CableLabs' Java-based Tru2way technology to enable two-way communication on CableCARD-based services. The agreement will, in theory, make two-way communications possible between cable operators and CableCARD users, enabling services like interactive program guides, on-demand services, games, and even Internet-based features like Web browsing and email."This marketplace agreement is good news for consumers," said Sony Electronics' Wed, 28 May 2008 12:30:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16734 It’s no secret that YouTube played a major role in popularizing the ultra-cheap Flip camcorder, which was practically tailor-made for jamming videos to the site, but for those with more serious YouTube ambitions, the Flip falls a little short. JVC hopes to cater to this crowd with its new Everio S-series camcorder, the GZ-MS100, which combines a fuller camcorder feature set alongside specialized YouTube functions.Although styled close to the Everio G-series HDD camcorders, the MS100 uses SD cards for recording to keep costs down & Mon, 19 May 2008 10:20:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16675 When news outlet widely reported over a month ago that the Flip compact video camera had captured a whopping 13 percent of the camcorder market on its own, executives at Creative must have been listening – or at least rubbing their hands and waiting to show off their own version. The company’s latest release, the Vado, bears an uncanny resemblance to the Flip in both form and function.The Vado takes on the same deck-of-cards-sized f Tue, 13 May 2008 09:35:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16518 Graphics developer Nvidia has quietly rolled out its GeForce 9600 GSO video card, offering strong performance at a price that should appeal to both mid-range consumers and system manufacturers looking to put a little extra bump in their graphics offerings without significantly raising their products price tags.The 9600 GSO is designed to compete with AMD's still unreleased Radeon HD 3830 graphics controller. The 9600 GSO shares the same architecture as Nvidia's current GeForce 9600 GT graphics card.The Nvidia GeForce 9600 GSO features 96 proce Mon, 28 Apr 2008 13:45:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16438 Adding a second monitor to your desktop for a dual display setup is usually can be as easy as plugging it in – if you have dual video outputs to begin with. For those who don’t, a video card upgrade is usually needed, and installing an internal card can be downright impossible for people in business environments using machines that don’t belong to them, or with certain laptops. Iogear attempted to alleviate this problem with its USB 2.0 External DVI Video Card, released Monday, which adds an ex Mon, 21 Apr 2008 09:00:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16360 Having only one DVR during television prime time can be tough: there might be three different shows airing in the time slot that you would like to record, but most recorders can only record one and show one live. ViewCast eases this indecisive TV viewer’s dilemma with its latest video capture card, the Osprey-450e, which can capture up to four channels simultaneously.Designed for commercial applications, and Mon, 14 Apr 2008 08:35:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16316 Snip:"The N95's music player supports MP3, AAC, AAC+, and WMA files, as well as Real's OM-DRM and Microsoft's WM DRM 10. We had no problems loading music onto the device via an 8GB microSD card, and the music player found our files quickly. The audio quality is good, though the bass output could be stronger. We're extremely happy that the phone has a standard 3.5-mm jack, and the built-in speakers are surprisingly loud and clear even at max volume. The FM tuner's sensitivity is excellent: We picked up even fringe stations like 88.3 (WBGO) in New York City -- as long as we had the headphones plugged in, since they act as the antenna.The video player supports MPEG-4, H.264/AVC, H.263/3GPP, RealVideo 8/9/10 fo Tue, 08 Apr 2008 15:51:01 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16296 Snip:"We reported on the first wave of 2008 camcorders with our recent review of the very good JVC GZ-HD6. That hard disk drive 1080p video maker did a wonderful job recording accurate colors that really popped off the screen of our plasma HDTV. In keeping with the trend away from DVD- and tape-based models, the new Canon Vixia HF10 saves video to 16GB of internal flash memory as well as optional SDHC memory cards (up to 32GB, the current maximum for the format; it will handle even bigger sizes once they’re available). Given there’s not even a HDD—God forbid a tape or disc—to weigh it down, the Vixia HF10 is unbelievably small and compact. In fact it’s just a shade smaller than the Sony HDR-CX7 Mon, 07 Apr 2008 12:29:55 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/pcw/news/144109 Sony's HDR-TG1 weighs only 10.6 ounces and records 1920-by-1080 digital video to a memory card. Thu, 03 Apr 2008 10:10:00 -0400 http://www.ecoustics.com/dt/news/16226 Graphics developer Nvidia has officially launched its GeForce 9800 GTX graphics card, bringing both full-bore graphics capabilities and power management to serious gamers.The GeForce 9800 GTX features 128 cores with a shader clock running 1,688 MHz, a 256-bit memory interface, and 512 MB of GDDR3 memory. The cards support Microsoft DirectX 10, have a max memory bandwidth of 70.4 GB/s, and incorporate Nvidia's PureVideo HD engine for playback of high-definition video content. Serious games, of course, will want to double up on GPUS: the 9800 GTX supports Nvidia's SLI capabilities for as much as doubling graphics performanc Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:45:00 -0400