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Pictures of iPod-like interface

I just called Comcast and it seems the silver chassis are HDTV or PVR, and I have neither. Is this counter to the FCC saying they have to give me a firewire box if I ask?

http://www.gizmodo.com/archives/fcc-requires-firew ire-on-all-cable-boxes-015708.php

Or just strap this on the back...

Some people are aiming higher - trying to solve the problems of cheap computing and world hunger simultaneously.

That's nothing, Apple managed put a G4 mac into a Sonos case!!!

http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/images/iProduct.gif

That's what subclassing is all about. And if you can't (for some reason) fix it with subclassing, you can replace methods wholesale at runtime. This is not C++, where the black box can't really be touched - it is objective-c, where you can replace methods or even classes at runtime.

Gosh, thanks, I've been doing OO programming in four or five different languages for more than a decade; I don't know how I missed this subclassing thing until now.

Seriously, I agree that in some cases it was possible to eventually hack around some bugs or issues. But only some bugs are easily amenable to that, and even those are only overridable once you figure out exactly where the bug is. And that only applies to the parts where you're dealing with Objective C development; if it was an issue in their closed custom apps or their custom OS or, in the beginning, their custom hardware, you were yet more screwed. Which, on regular occasions, I was.

My point is that with a more open attitude from NeXT, hopefully including source access and a willingness to occasionally listen to their customers, it would have been much easier to do development and systems administration with their gear.

I have to grin when read that statement. If you think NeXT is dead, you haven't looked at Apple recently.

It seems you weren't a NeXT developer or NeXT owner. After the merger between Apple and NeXT in early 1997, they promised a release of the new merged OS in early 1998. It was actually the end of Q1 2001 before they got it out the door. In the meantime, NeXT and users developers were pretty much screwed.

I agree that some the technology lives on, but what NeXT was, including a cross-processor OS and a cross-platform development environment with Windows and Unix support, died with the Apple merger. What emerged was the the standard Apple we'll-tell-you-what-you-like routine. That seems to work for some people and I'm glad they like it, but it's a small fraction of the potential that NeXT had.

To put one of these babies in my car.

Then put some wicked cool Red LED Lights in the front of the car, and whenever the car talks to me, the red lights act like a visualizer of sorts. Knight Rider here I come!

Well, here you go. Someone's already doing that! Looks like it's the dashboard of a Subaru just in case you're wondering.

Gizmodo

here

Here.

From Gizmodo, and a rebuttal. There is also a way to do it, albeit with a hack.

Engineer Dastardly Slaphapple took a break from his day job as a hardware and firmware designer at Bumbrubbley Audio Studebakery (maker of the iPod competitor Slompet player, among other things) to give us some more info on the OGG-on-iPod plausibility, including why the iPod mini (and future iPods) might have a better shot at getting OGG support than the older, whiter iPods. There's even information about why Apple may have chosen to implement their 'Lossless AAC' instead of the more widely adopted FLAC lossless format.

Dastardly's analysis after the jump:

Firstly, CPUs:

The current iPod gen3 has a PP5002D CPU, the same as the gen1 and gen2. The gen1/2 stored their code from flash, not SDRAM, meaning they had a more limited codesize, and their SDRAM took more power to operate.

The iPod mini has a PP5020 CPU

The Rio Karma (developed in Cambridge UK) uses a PP5003 CPU. It plays OGG (and FLAC and MP3 and WMA).

The old 5002:

The 5002 has a "broken" cache (1 wait state per access for program or data, meaning you effectively have half the effective clock rate when running code from external memory). This means that running code that doesn't fit in the internal 96kbyte SRAM of the player is very inefficient, both in terms of CPU cycles and power. MP3 and AAC just about squeeze into the internal memory (one at a time, obviously!), but anything that didn't would result in a big power hit - my guess is 30-40%+. This would be a bad user experience, considering the already short gen3 battery life.

The newer 5003:

The 5003 in the Karma has this particular silicon deficiency fixed. The Karma plays OGG, though it's still a resource hog - you get about 25% less battery life - about 11-12 hours compared to 15+ for MP3 due to the extra cycles and memory requirements when compared to the more svelte codecs. We didn't do a lot of optimisation, so it's running the Vorbis-supplied tremor decoder with only a few tweaks.

The even newer 5020:

The 5020 is based on the 5003, and so has the cache bug fixed. It's capable of playing OGG with 25% or less hit on power (depending how much optimisation is done). I would suspect the 5020 will find its way into the next iPod, as it's cheaper and integrates both the firewire MAC and the USB2 mac/phy blocks which are separate chips on the gen3.

So in summary:

gen3 - In theory possible, but unlikely. mini - Very possible. gen4 (or my guess at what a gen4 would have in it) - Very possible.

Dastardly Slaphapple is not speaking for his employer Bumbrubbley Audio Studebakery or Slompet Heavy Industries or anybody else. He's just sharing.

put a down payment on this.

Found something on Gizmodo that will make you laugh.

http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/images/iProduct.gif
Apple bashers only please, no fans.

Overlooked at the MacWorld show was the new Apple product introduced, the iProduct

http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/images/AppleHaters. gif

and mac mini first pictures

Look, shiny iHome pictures.

Gizmodo is now linking to (possibly fake) leaked pictures of the headless iMac.

This is already being done today. GSM/GPRS and CDMA phones are in development. The network operators want to off load their free nights and weekends. I have also seen a Bluetooth version. Gizmodo http://www.gizmodo.com/archives/motorola-cn620-sea mless-wifi-to-gsm-voice-calls-017270.php on the Motorola CN620. I guess that is what Moto means by seamless mobility.

Of course, if you all bought one of those nifty new TOYOTA RIDING ROBOTS to ride on, you would not need to converge all your toys. You could carry them all with you, right at your fingertips.

Ref: http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/robots/toyoto-ifoot -and-iunit-026866.php

=)

Regards,
Roger Born
writing.borngraphics.com
"Sorry. No Refunds"

Given what an addiction handys are here in Austria, I'm really thinking of making some auf Deutsch.

The link you provide (CDMA site) while a useful list of CDMA-2000 operators, it is not at all the same as the list of 2G CDMA operators (which is less extensive).

And while you find GSM networks in almost all countries which have CDMA or CDMA2000 (e.g. in the US it is now about 50%-50%), the opposite is by far not true. Both by coverage, by countries and by number of users, GSM is the standard (e.g. over 1000M GSM vs. 226M CDMA)

Even where CDMA operators exist, you can't bring your phone to one of those countries and swap a SIM, because there is no SIM... you need a new phone anyway to use their service at local rates (while any unlocked GSM phone can accept a SIM from any GSM operator in the world).

Finally, GSM is vendor-independent - not tied to a single company like CDMA with Qualcomm...

I'm laughing at you, Gizmodo, because just a couple of months ago you told us that Blu-ray has already won. Disney must agree with you, but four other big studios don't. Care to hedge your bet?

A few sights picked up leaks from Sirius and Apple over a deal to make Satellite Ipods:

Satellite iPod Rumors

What's Next For The iPod?

I wish to remain anonymous on this post but give it a change......because it sounds friggin Awesome

Maybe we'll even get a Howard Stern signature ipod.

Here's the link - E Ink used the gumstix in their prototype, and joined with Philips and Sony to make the LIBRIé.

I'd think it would be cheaper to buy a blu-ray or HD DVD recorder. Or even a few of them. Or one recorder and several read-only drives. 50GB on one disk is a *lot* of storage and would work well for music, videos, etc.
Oops. Just checed prices. I was wrong. Looks like a recorder is $3K right now. But this is a stanalone device, not an internal (IDE) one. I would expect the internal ones will be less. http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/home-entertainment/ sharp-bdhd100-first-bluraydvdhard-drive-recorder-0 25428.php

Sometimes I wonder if the editors even read the stuff they pick for the front page. This is one of the most empirically worthless slashdot stories I've seen in a while though.

This "story," submitted by an "anonymous reader" (ie the author of the review), was a complete waste of time. It's nothing but a collection of PR gibberish copied from the product pages of the players being reviewed. There is nothing of any interest in ANY of the blurbs, no evidence that the author has even seen the players he's "reviewing," and to top it all off, no links to the products he's "reviewing." (I googled one of the players he "reviewed" and got a bunch of garbage on the first page.

I don't mean to insult Michael here, but I think he probably picked this one based on the headline (the writeup is better than the "story" linked to, and not supported by the story.)

Obviously, people are indeed hoping to take some marketshare from Apple, but
(1)none of the players reviewed in this story are going to take it (they're all obscure 2-bit companies which will be lucky to move 10k units.) and
(2) Others (http://cnet.com/, http://wired.com/, and (don't laugh) even NYT's Circuits do a better job of reviewing gadgets). My advice though: just do a search for MP3 Player on http://engadget.com/ and http://gizmodo.com/.

I am not trolling here. Please read the story yourself before moderating me.

i just bout an Airport Express to stream my music from the house server (upstairs) to the home theater stereo. works great, easy set up and optical out. i usually have my laptop in the theater with me and use that to control the server's playlists, etc. also, just ordered the new keyspan remote that can control the AE, so i won't really need the laptop as much.

link to keyspan remote info:
http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/wireless/keyspan-di gital-media-remote-for-airport-express-025352.php/

I know of exactly ZERO people who get their news from blogs.

You should get out more :-)

People rarely get their world-event type of news from blogs, true. But for news about latest gadgets, weird stuff, or a niche area blogs can't be beat.

And if you can't trust Microsoft, who can you trust?

Apple, I guess?

Asshat.

http://www.gizmodo.com/archives/ipod-costume-02455 5.php I like this one better

Beloved Slashdot? Pfeh. But seriously try Gizmodo or Lawrence Lessig's blog.

Gizmodo pointed out that they didn't mention any depth information in their press release, so it probably isn't designed for diving.

Gizmodo pointed out that they didn't mention any depth information in their press release, so it probably isn't designed for diving.

More info on the Foxhole Radio is here.

I know!

But atleast there's a tool to convert XM Radio stuff into mp3.

A little more info:
Advertised 15 hour battery life
65k-color screen
220 x 176 pixel resolution
Same click wheel as previous generation
Not mentioned (at least in my first pass) is that, the dock will connect to tvs and display a slideshow.
Includes AV Cable (supposedly 3-plug RCA) The new ipods are slightly thicker. Each of the new ones is .75 in compared to .57 and .69 in for the 20GB and 40GB previous model. The weight about the same however, 6.4 ounces compared to 5.6 and 6.2.

Does anyone else think that this a bit overkill. 60Gb is a LOT when you are just talking about music and pictures. It would be one thing if this generation included video playback, but ... it doesnt. Not to mention $600 (and $500 for that matter) is really reaching, considering we are just talking about music and pictures

In other apple news Apple Launches 9 Euro iTunes Music Stores

A little more info:
Advertised 15 hour battery life
65k-color screen
220 x 176 pixel resolution
Same click wheel as previous generation
Not mentioned (at least in my first pass) is that, the dock will connect to tvs and display a slideshow.
Includes AV Cable (supposedly 3-plug RCA) The new ipods are slightly thicker. Each of the new ones is .75 in compared to .57 and .69 in for the 20GB and 40GB previous model. The weight about the same however, 6.4 ounces compared to 5.6 and 6.2.

Does anyone else think that this a bit overkill. 60Gb is a LOT when you are just talking about music and pictures. It would be one thing if this generation included video playback, but ... it doesnt. Not to mention $600 (and $500 for that matter) is really reaching, considering we are just talking about music and pictures

In other apple news Apple Launches 9 Euro iTunes Music Stores

Who declared Gizmodo the authority.

I dont think that they have won the Gizmodo vs. Engadget debate.

I do like them both.

Who declared Gizmodo the authority.

I dont think that they have won the Gizmodo vs. Engadget debate.

I do like them both.

If Gizmodo is so biased, how did they get the pretty Excel graphs to prove their point??

If Gizmodo is so biased, how did they get the pretty Excel graphs to prove their point??

See also this post at Gizmodo on the same thing, slightly different take on it though.

Who needs a tent when you can have your own little room?

I know this isn't *exactly* what you're talking about but this is close enough
2x2.5" drives + a raid controller in the space of a 3.5" drive.
english gizmodo.com link here

These are laptop IDE drives though, so imagine them with the SCSI drives!

Check out this one from toyota.

That said, I don't think that while not ground breaking, making a drum playing robot would still be a lot of work, especially one that was easy to program.

> You can go to bed and wake up the next morning with several hundred mp3s on your machine all labeled correctly and ready for distribution.

You just assume that everyone who uses TimeTrax does so for the purpose of distributing music.

Let me ask you .. what is the point of this? Do you really think people get a CD and go, "ooh, I can rip all of these songs and UPLOAD them to thousands and thousands of people I don't even know! W00T!" No. The point of TimeTrax was so people can listen to what they want whenever they want on whatever they want .. PC, Linux box, MP3 player, sunglasses, what the hell ever. They're paying for the music by subscribing to XM .. by using TimeTrax it gives them more control over the music than the RIAA wants them to have, so ipso facto it must be a "crime"?

The electronics industry are more and more doing their damnest to limit and restrain the freedom of their customers to use their products however they want. By assuming every customer might actually use their brain and think of a new way to apply the product, they work on the assumption therefore that each customer is a potential criminal.

In a nutshell, the transparent ceramic lens can be thinner and lighter than a glass lens because it has a higher refractice index (bends light more). It's also stronger, they say. Nifty, just what you need to make a smaller camera. Of course, if you put that tiny lens in front of lousy electronics, you get a lousy camera. As another post mentioned, the review said there was a lot of noise, which sounds like a lousy camera to me.