Slashdot Mirror

In June, already taking preorders. Since I never was at a fries, I can't comment on that part.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/02/touch-book-from-always-innovating-harbors-removable-tablet-netb/

For a short while people were willing to forgo Windows for the form factor and price of a netbook. Then Moore's law ticked over and Microsoft was able to enter that market - same price for the machine but with the specs that XP needs. Next iteration they'll be selling units with Vista on them. The only way to keep Microsoft out is to race to the bottom and there's no economic incentive for the hardware manufacturers to do that.

I'm thinking Linux is down because the offerings are. I'm one of those people who want a linux eeePC and can't get the model I want. I don't want a 1000HA, I want the upgraded chipsets from a 1000HE or 1004DN, but right now both only come with Windows. One nice thing the 1000HA did was if you went with Linux, they upgraded your harddrive from a mechanical 80GB to a 64GB SSD. Not too bad.

As it stands, I would almost have gone with a Windows netbook simply for the hardware I want and be forced to install linux on it. But I decided on the ARM based Always Innovating and it will undoubtedly run some type of linux:
http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/02/touch-book-from-always-innovating-harbors-removable-tablet-netb/

It has a really nice 15 hour battery life, which for a true portable one of the top considerations. Even if you can get real Windows on ARM (not Windows Mobile), good luck with finding any programs. With netbooks, my entire family wants linux. They don't want to run A/V for a thing they'll only browse/email with 99% of the time.

Also, I would go with SSD drives. Intel makes theirs to last 5 years under heavy use, so I wouldn't be surprised to get 15 of light use.

Some ARM chips these days go far beyond what one would expect from a RISC micro-controller.

Two great examples are the BeagleBoard, which also uses the same hardware as the OpenPandora gaming platform. Both of the aformentioned devices are running a fully open-source Linux-powered stack, complete with a fully-functional Desktop environment. For developers, you can program for these devices using the standar GNU tools (c,c++), and of course several JavaVM's are already ported to the OMAP (JamVM,OpenJDK,Kaffee,etc)

.

The TI OMAP 3530 chip that powers the BeagleBoard and OpenPandora has a 3D graphics acceleration unit, a 2D (video) graphics acceleration unit, and a built in DSP for audio and general-purpose number crunching.

Without question a large majority of users do little more with their mobile computers than browse the internet, write email, and occasionally stream video - all things that are fully achievable with today's ARM chips.

ARM chip manufacturers are also starting to put multi-core chips on the market, and while the transistor complexity is nothing like Intel's out-of-order logic, multi-core, still means serious multi-threading. With clock frequencies approaching and exceeding 1GHz, I would not be surprised to see ARM take over the mobile and netbook markets, especially considering how little power they actually consume.

Furthermore, even high-end x86 laptops could benefit from having an ARM co-processor for instant-on and mobile operation, while the x86 processor could be used for more compute-intensive applications such as CAD or video processing. Imagine battery power extended by a factor of ten for everyone!

YouTube Videos:
BeagleBoard
OpenPandora

According to Engadget they're gone. Wikipedia says they were pronounced dead on June 2, 2008. I'm not sure what an Akimbo-based video service means if the content-delivery end of the service is defunct. Maybe someone acquired what was left of the company, but even in their prime, Akimbo had a pretty underwhelming collection of offerings.

Engadget is saying the terms have already been retracted

The language added on March 30 to AT&T's wireless data service Terms and Conditions was done in error. It was brought to our attention and we have since removed it. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

I remembered this, but it turns out it was the CTO, and it was a little less encouraging that you characterize it:

From http://www.engadget.com/2008/09/23/t-mobiles-cto-on-g1-unlocking-and-tethering-plus-a-few-detai/:

When asked about what T-Mobile's reaction would be to users creating tethering or unlocking apps for the phone, he was surprisingly even-keeled, noting that while the company didn't encourage the practice, they wouldn't lock down the OS or update the software to break those applications. Our impression was that as long as their use was relegated to a small percentage of owners, T-Mobile likely wouldn't take action, though he did voice concerns over tethering apps and their effect on the network, with a clearly guarded eye to letting users have free reign.

How's it working now?

I have the exact same laptop but it's the 'love edition' with hearts on it. Guess what? Girls find it cute and come tell me about it all the time (which I really enjoy). Guys, however, seem to be somewhat intimidated by my lack of caring about the hearts on my laptop.

Love edition

So my suggestion : don't make the 'problem' go away, make it worse by getting the love edition.

the news: seem to work over 3G and EDGE as well as Wifi. iPod Touch included. Chat included. Looks pretty decent to me. Some photos here: http://www.engadget.com/photos/skype-for-iphone-goes-live-in-japan/1460639/

"I don't feel badly for a person who upgraded and XP install to Vista without first checking to see if their hardware was supported, that is the users' fault, not Microsoft's."

s/Vista/Linux/. Why do you expected Linux to work out-of-the-box in your T6, if you say people shouldn't expect perfect behavior with non-OEM operating systems? Have you tried a computer with Ubuntu pre-installed?

"Reduced security problems versus Windows I will give you, but not versus OSX."

On the other hand, PWN 2 OWN over: MacBook Air gets seized in 2 minutes flat

Agreed. People who will sit and tell me with a straight face that Vista, in their experience, is unstable are either very unlucky, or liars. Windows stopped being generally unstable years ago. Get with the times.

By years ago do you mean 2007 ? Because millions of unlucky Vista owners consistently blue screening due to NVidia drivers doesn't exactly sound rock solid to me.

asus does it with the Eeeeeeeee-Keyboard, the touchscreen's even an LCD.

For starters in order for the 360 to be a Ferrari it shouldn't die just from looking at it funny and it should host the best selection of games rather than a very narrow selection of games featuring either WWII guys shooting each other in a first person view or homo-erotic space marines shooting each other in a first person view.

Hey now! Mass Effect has homo-erotic space marines shooting each other in a THIRD-person view.

MS is losing the multimedia angle too especially with it looking like Netflix may come to the Wii. http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/21/netflix-headed-for-the-wii/

So Netflix *is* on the 360, and *may be* coming to the Wii, and therefore "MS is losing the multimedia angle?"

The Wii also has better peripheral suport and support for real keyboards by just plugging your existing USB keyboard rather than selling some ugly keyboard thing to attach to your controller.

You could just plug a USB keyboard into the Xbox, too. The "ugly keyboard thing" is optional, you know, it works fine with off-the-shelf keyboards.

The fact is Nintendo's hardware runs like a Ferrari and will last while the 360 is the cheap Yugo option that will fall apart in 6 months. ;)

Ferrari's can go fast. Wiis barely beat the original Xbox, graphically.

It's amazing how many people repeat that BS from MS and Sony about how the Wii is something completely different to them and thus making Nintendo's monstrous lead invalid. They should be embarrassed that Nintendo can tape two Gamecube's together and beat the crap out of both Sony and MS.

The Wii isn't something different and it's not a toyota to MS's Ferrari. For starters in order for the 360 to be a Ferrari it shouldn't die just from looking at it funny and it should host the best selection of games rather than a very narrow selection of games featuring either WWII guys shooting each other in a first person view or homo-erotic space marines shooting each other in a first person view.

MS is losing the multimedia angle too especially with it looking like Netflix may come to the Wii. http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/21/netflix-headed-for-the-wii/

The Wii also has better peripheral suport and support for real keyboards by just plugging your existing USB keyboard rather than selling some ugly keyboard thing to attach to your controller.

Then when you look at the arcade version, that's not even a Toyota let alone a Ferrari. Which is also cheaper than the Wii which sort of ruins your joke about the Wii being the cheap option. :P

As much as Microsoft would like people to think they're in some higher league of gaming than the Wii and that they some how offer something Nintendo can't; they are wrong. Sure they can offer better graphics but at a higher price through actual financial costs and lack of innovation.

The fact is Nintendo's hardware runs like a Ferrari and will last while the 360 is the cheap Yugo option that will fall apart in 6 months. ;)

Logitech is releasing a dongle to play nice with PS3s. Apparently powers off and on too. iirc, you don't have to occupy a PS3 USB port either. http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/19/logitech-harmony-adapter-for-playstation-3-answers-a-million-pra/

When it was initially released, that was the price.

engadget
and ballmer

Something like that was/is? to be done to warm a swimming pool in Switzerland:
http://www.engadget.com/2008/04/03/heat-from-data-center-used-to-warm-swiss-swimming-pool/

You'll get a better answer from Apple soon, but at 11:22 in Engadet's coverage there is a 'Revoke certs' feature (along with proxy support), so I would hope that also means adding certs is possible.

Honest to god, I can't tell real audiophile reviews from the parodies anymore :-(

I bet you're reading it on a cheap LCD display that discards all the engrams in the article so it is impossible to spot parody, irony or sarcasm. If you really want to be able to appreciate this sort of thing you need to read the page on a real man's display

And me. I remember the videos: http://lasecwww.epfl.ch/keyboard/ Engadget reported it last October: http://www.engadget.com/2008/10/20/keyboard-eavesdropping-just-got-way-easier-thanks-to-electrom/

The fact that AMD is not planning a successor to the Geode processor used in the XO-1 probably influenced this decision, at least in part. In 18 months, there may not be any Geodes remaining.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/08/asus-eee-pc-t91-and-t101h-touchscreen-tablet-hands-on/

Starter edition is aimed at netbooks. Home basic is for emerging markets.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/03/windows-7-skus-announced-yes-your-worst-nightmare-has-come-to/

okay's there's a couple of caveats to this comment.. 1. it relies on my failing memory. 2. it mentions something i don't really condone (and has probably already been fixed). 3. its anecdotal evidence to support your possibility 2 - totally anecdotal.

I swear that i recall an article on engadget that said you can bypass the transaction fees on a coinstar machine machine by: depositing your coins, reaching around an unplugging the phoneline at the back, and selecting 'itunes gift card'. the machine gets confused, and dispenses your cash without subtracting any transaction fees. so why would they machine need a phoneline if the card is totally hash based.

caveat 4. the phonecall is a fake or a 'future feature'?? 5. itunes gift cards operate differently in china.

this could be article i'm thinking of: http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/07/hacking-a-coinstar-machine-to-bypass-transaction-fees/ - which has since been 'corrected'.

Actually calls for his firing have already started. When you see that The Win7 hype is just that, and when it comes to enterprise, which is where the big bucks are and where MSFT has always made boatloads of cash, that Win7 doesn't cut it anymore than Vista, I can't say that I blame them.

We have seen that under his watch he has gone from one idea to another like the whole company has ADHD, with Zune(trying to be Apple), trying to shell out WAY too much money for Yahoo(trying to be Google) and finally his very own Spruce Goose Vista, which even MSFT board members couldn't get to work with programs written by MSFT. His tenure has frankly been nothing but one failure after another, and mark my words, when Win7 comes out it will be just as bloated and slow and sell just as badly as Vista.

What the company desperately needs is a new leader that will focus on their core strengths instead of trying to be Apple. Their big money comes from corporations NOT home users who frankly as long as it doesn't crash and runs their games are happy little campers anyway. Yet instead of releasing a low resource backwards compatible enterprise OS it looks like with Win7 they are AGAIN releasing this giant bloated pig of a multimedia OS with more bling per square inch than something off of "pimp my ride". There is a REASON why you find lots of articles including on MSDN giving step by step instructions on turning Win2K8 into a workstation OS. Because WinVista is too damned bloated to be a good enterprise OS and frankly Win7 will most likely be more of the same.

They had better change their direction, starting with a good firing for Ballmer and the bringing in of someone from Office or Win2K8 that knows business. Because I have never seen this kind of mass abandonment of a MSFT OS ever, even when WinME came out. My customers happily pay me chunks of money to make Vista go away, and more and more SOHOs and SMBs are asking me "what do you know about this Linux thing?" and yet Ballmer still tries to force everyone into this multimedia nightmare of an OS instead of keeping business/home separated like it was for WinNT/Win9x. But he ain't Steve Jobs and Win7 ain't no OSX. If they don't change their direction, which I seriously doubt will happen under Ballmer, then their stock price and sales are going nowhere but down. I mean have you EVER seen companies BRAG about giving you the previous MSFT OS THREE YEARS after the new version came out? Nope, me neither.

If you really need a second monitor for the old Mini, you can add one through a USB monitor adaptor.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/09/pegatron-and-freescale-team-for-low-power-ultra-cheap-netbooks/

http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/touchbook/

Or for something smaller than a netbook:
http://openpandora.org/

Thats actually a fairly interesting idea. There already exists a robot that does automatic brick laying, http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/15/rival-robots-prepping-to-automate-home-building/ The only problem I could see is the abrasiveness of the moondust but I'm sure the idea could be adapated.

The Japanese phone of choice, the Panasonic P905i, would be a tough sell in the US. Sure, a big screen and TV tuner are nice features, but it's big and ugly. Americans spend their time in their cars and homes, surrounded by televisions. A handheld TV may be useful in Japan, but I doubt many people in the US would waste their time uploading videos to their phone. The iPhone has a thin case, simple interface, and applications Americans want on the go (email, web, youtube, etc). Surprise, people in Japan and the US have different preferences.

It'll set you back between 3000 and 8000 cool US dollars.

I'm personally waiting for ThinkPad Reserve Edition of this: http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/15/thinkpad-reserve-edition-unveiled/

What? $8000? . . . that's chump-change.

So the engineers at Lenovo have pretty much crammed more "computer" into this laptop than any laptop has had crammed so far. Two screens, nearly full keyboard, two pointing devices, a digitizer tablet, along with a metric crapload of CPU, video, disk, memory, along with the usual gamut of notebook options.

But wait . . . if you order NOW, we will include the Spiral Slicer (tm) as well!

. . . and a Ginsu:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginsu

Actually Mr too cowardly to even have an account, I am a Windows repairman who has made his living with MSFT products sine the days of Win3.1 and am pretty fucking tired of seeing the company whose products I service and support pissed down the drain by Mr. "I want to be Apple so damned bad it hurts!" Ballmer. Of course I am not the only one that think Mr. Ballmer should be righteously fired for his incompetence, and as it gets closer to relase date we are seeing that Win7 is looking more and more like "Vista SE" instead of the new direction which was sorely needed in the company.

What we NEED is to go back to the division we had during the WinNT/Win9x days, where the business OS was a low resource backwards compatible OS with low system requirements so you don't need a gamer rig for your secretary. What it appears we will get AGAIN is another bloated as hell giant pig of an OS with more bling than you can shake a stick at because Ballmer wants to be Steve Jobs. But news flash, Steve Ballmer ain't Steve Jobs and Windows ain't OSX. You can run Leopard just fine on 5 year old machines, in fact according to my Mac friends they even run a little FASTER with the new version.

Compare that to Windows where you need a dual core with 3GB of RAM just to keep Vista from feeling like a 486 struggling to run Win98. I mean it is pretty fucking sad when I have WinXP running smooth and easy on a 733MHz with 384MB of PC100 RAM and Vista ran like a dead elephant on my 3.6GHz HT enabled P4 with 2Gb of RAM. The Vista codebase either needs to be stripped down and rebuilt or tossed over their shoulder into the trash. The consumer has spoken and they don't want it. Putting lipstick on the pig ain't gonna turn pork chops into steak and it ain't gonna sell Vista SE...errr Win7 either.

If they are determined to be Apple then put out the "Apple extra bling" edition for the home users and give us "Win2K10 Professional" for the business users that just want to get their work done without the bloat. Otherwise all of the businesses who got burned with Vista are going to start looking elsewhere. Why do you think there are all these sites including on MSDN showing how to make 2K8 into a desktop OS? Because for the enterprise Vista ain't cutting it and neither will Win7.

But believe what you will, but mark my words: Win7 will fail,just as Vista did. Then maybe Ballmer will be fired and we will have a decent OS by Win8. But I can't keep buying copies of XP for my customers for forever and they have made it clear there will be NO Vista for them.

It's labeled "Gamma" for a reason

What is that reason? Usually if a product is in final testing it is labeled "Beta", if it is earlier than that in the development phase it is labeled "Alpha". If it not yet Alpha it is "pre-Alpha" or "in development". Gamma would imply that it is past Alpha and past Beta and instead of going into production it is gone into some new development phase.

This thing looks just like the MSI Hetis 915 and it has similar specs. I don't know if they sell the Hetis anymore, but I bought one several years ago for a MythTV frontend and it cost about the same. Neuros is selling oldish tech at fairly high prices for what you get.

This box is only going to be useful for a HDTV, since it doesn't seem to have a S-Video or composite output. I don't know how well it will serve as a HDTV box since it has an ATI graphics adapter. I don't think the ATI linux drivers allow any offloading of the decoding (like XvMC or NVidia's new VDPAU. It has no hard drive thus can't serve as a media storage or recording box. It doesn't appear to have an optical drive and you control it using a clunky keyboard rather than a remote. This doesn't look like a very good HTPC to me.

Hopefully boxes based on the ION platform will be coming soon and will bridge the divide between cheap, attractive and capable.

The only downside is that since it's from Sony, it installs a rootkit on your cellphone that keeps you from copying pictures you take on it to your computer...

I believe that Verizon Wireless already has prior art on that one ;)

Signal-To-Noise

If only there were a few million people out there willing to filter through this stuff and decide what was good and what wasn't.

Yeah, you're right, blogging will never take off.

Looks like Shuttle also offers Linux pre-installed http://www.engadget.com/2008/01/08/shuttle-launches-199-kpc-linux-box-99-barebones-kit/

I caught this article the other day and it seems like Windows Mobile 6.5 isn't anything to get excited about or a serious threat to any of the other mobile OS's. Seems like more wishful thinking and promises from Microsoft. They're really not making any headway in this area and probably end up throwing more money into it than they'll get back out. Why don't they abandon some of their non-core businesses and find some uncharted areas to expand into instead of throwing money into non-profitable areas where they have no chance of gaining marketshare or mindshare?

Yeah exactly, wouldn't it be better from a marketing standpoint to release it as Windows Mobile 7, thereby cementing in the minds of the people that all things 7 are new and good?

Windows Mobile 6.5 apparently doesn't even support Capacitive touch screens. It is also lacking in anything really interesting, according to one engadget reporter. It IS kind of pretty.

Think about it though, in the history of computing, what competitive advantage has Microsoft ever had? Nothing, except momentum, starting with momentum given to them by IBM. It has always been enough for them to make a cheap copy of someone else's technology at a later date, making it 'good enough.' That is there only competitive advantage. And it's worked amazingly well for them. So it is understandable that Balmer would think a product that does nothing other than what their competitors already do would give them a competitive advantage. It always has before.

Here you go, wiki is your friend! I would ask you to please note the following part, quote:"n order to prevent users from copying DRM content, Windows Vista provides process isolation and continually monitors what kernel-mode software is loaded." Please note the words CONTINUALLY MONITORS. You DO know that you can't get something for nothing right? And that everything has a cost? The ONLY way for the "protected path" DRM to work would be for it to monitor you 24/7/365, otherwise you could simply hack it or load an Alcohol 120% style virtual device with hacked keys BEFORE you loaded the DRM content. So to ensure you "filthy pirate you" that you don't pull any fast ones it HAS to monitor you 24/7.

So while all the Vista fans(all 6 of you) would love to think that they have invented some magically "resource free" DRM, sorry to burst your bubble. Everything costs, and DRM doesn't really have a prayer in hell if it can actually be turned off for ANY reason, even if you are not doing anything to actually NEED DRM. And if you want to know why you are being boned with this crap, please read Comes VS Microsoft to see where Jim Allchin and Bill Gates talk about DRM and their need for "scenarios" to try to shut down the iPod. pretty much ALL they talk about is how to lock in the users. And for those that work in business here is a view of Win7 from the enterprise perspective, and here is a view of Win7 from the performance POV.

I hope this illuminates readers and helps your realize that complaint about DRM are NOT FUD, but simply complaints about performance robbing crap that does ZERO for the user. I myself saw it with Vista Beta 1, which ran damned fast on this 3.6GHz P4 with 2GB of RAM, but when RTM rolled around and I got my free copy for Beta testing it was like those car commercials where they dump the ton of sludge on the race car. It sucked so bad I gave my copy of Vista away and last I heard it was being passed from person to person like an unwanted fruitcake.

The new Palm Pre has inductive charging called "Touchstone".

Connector conschmector!

> How many cars have internet service?

Most posts on the topic rail against the lack of universal 3g coverage: part yourselves on the back---you are spot on!

You know what I want to hear? ONE PANDORA-3G PHONE USER DECLARATIVELY STATE: I DRIVE 80 MILES AN HOUR ON $METROPOLIS AND THE FREAKING EXPERIENCE RATES A PASS, HERE'S WHY. XYZ123!

Do everyone a favor Pandora-3g-user-dude, quantify!!! Whenever sat vs. Net radio rears its head we always read the Pandora-type blissful testimonials. In this thread not one 5-score post describes other than in passing how Pandora/3g/65+mph Just WorksTM. Everyopne else is saying, BS it does not.

Anyhow. Quit your whining and start your pining! Net radio ready automobile stereos are here in the immediate future. Yea, yea, they depend on 3g/bluetooth but the freaking interface is integrated to the screen (Blaupunkt's miRoamer-powered TravelPilot New Jersey 600i internet car stereo." Double DIN, single DIN Hamburg).

Here's how I see it. 3g is sparse, but the market^W^Wme/you/they are/am ready for options, and the tech is here. Sure the monopolist, obstructionist carriers can't see an opportunity staring them in the face, but we have worldwide works projects en route, in the billions (1.000 millions). The USA passed stimulus package has broadband improvement provisions, a President that is aware of alternatives routes other that SOP for telecommunication.

So there were cds and slowly players were bought. So there were an mp3s and less slowly players were bought. So there were dvds and players were much less slowly bought. So there were smart phones, and then there were really smart phones that could play mp3, cd, dvd, game, web, app content! Velocity, momentum, desire is here majorly. Now I hear there's this depression type thing going on, I hear it's globally sucky, but, people will die, get sick, need to eat, be clothed. Shelter themselves. And they want better. That's apparent.

I think it's a chicken thing. I am crowing, now gimme the egg dangit!!! Multiply that sentiment by a thousand, exponent it mildly, compound it by the make jobs, make tech, make green, make hay circumstances and ubiquitous 3g in less than a handful of years is not far fetched.

Oh. Check out Blaupunkt's Internet radio car units:

http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/13/blaupunkt-shows-off-miroamer-powered-internet-car-radios/
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/15/automobiles/15WEBCAR.html

robie

tell that to kyle williams...
http://www.engadget.com/2006/08/31/janus-project-pc-can-scan-300-wifi-networks-at-once/

Take a modern smartphone, with physical buttons for every letter. A blind person could feel his way around the buttons to type something, but how often are they going to? Why send SMS back and forth, only to have the phone use text-to-speech to read it out, why not just call the person in the first place?

Someone who's merely visually impaired might actually be better served with a virtual keyboard; the iPhone's keys are not only larger than the Blackberries I've seen, it zooms in on the key you're pressing so you see what's about to be typed (if it's wrong, keep pressing while you move your finger to the correct key).

There are lots of impaired people with great potential, not just the blind, but not everything can be adapted for every impairment. In most places blind people also cannot drive a car. Stephen Hawking will never be able to use an iPhone or other smartphone practically.

The size limitations of the typical smartphone, never mind the all-visual iPhone, severely hampers their utility to the truly blind. And there are already mobile devices specifically for them

I have been kicking around the idea of doing the Appalachian trail and although I obviously want to get off grid, it would be nice to have a phone in case of life or death emergency.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/13/digicel-launching-ztes-coral-200-solar-phone-in-emerging-market/

"It may not have the glam or the flash of the Samsung Blue Earth, but ZTE's Coral-200-Solar takes solar power to a side of the market that needs it far, far more urgently -- the side without power outlets. The Chinese manufacturer is teaming up with Jamaica's Digicel Group to roll out one of the world's first mass-market solar cellphones to folks with "limited or no access to the power grid," which represents some 2 billion people around the globe."

Samsung's phone is just a shiny lifestyle phone.
ZTE's Coral-200-Solar actually embodies what you'd expect from a solar phone.

First off, this is coming now not because of some perceived "recent flood of iPhone cracked applications," but because the Copyright Office asked for exemption proposals to the DCMA on December 28, 2008, and the EFF filed one for jailbreaking. RTFA and RTFlegalbrief.

Second, while not effectively the same, what Apple is doing is trying to prevent jailbreaking from being ruled legal, not trying to have it ruled illegal. Being a non-lawyer, I'd at first say this is the same thing, but it is different. Just because something isn't ruled explicitly legal doesn't make it illegal, but would definitely help if some day someone wanted to sue over a jailbreak.

Engadget has a nice write-up on this from someone who has legal training if the three or four of you out there who don't just read the summary and post would like another perspective - http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/13/apple-and-eff-spar-over-iphone-jailbreaking-and-the-dmca//

when someone talks about obama keeping his "blackberry", i think they are using the word "blackberry" the way some people use "xerox"

He most definitely uses a blackberry 8830. A sectera is not a blackberry, not in the usability sense. I wouldn't even want to see the operating system of that thing. That doesn't mean that the NSA didn't go through the internals and added some of their black magic

DEKA has been doing this for some time now. http://www.engadget.com/2008/05/29/dean-kamens-luke-arm-now-has-mind-control-and-3d-spatial-interf/

Then put your name down for one of these.

ARM licensed Java from Sun years ago, and include hardware acceleration for Java apps via Jazelle. In addition, Adobe have said they will have a version Flash 10 for ARM sometime this year. So get your wallet out.

At $199, these netbooks won't cost you and arm and a leg...

Engadget has confirmed it with Microsoft. Link