Posts by Andreas

Gigabyte passively cooled Radeon 4850 card

Doh!!!

The heat should be vented **out** of the case and **not into** the case!

iPhone SMS error bug won't go away

@They took my ringtone away

Simple: because **you** chose to support Apple by buying/using products that regulate "your" digital media.

Cryptic colour clock

What?

"You can also display the time in the usual format, if you want." "Usual format" would be digits or dial - I see neither.

Man trademarks ;-) emoticon

Copyright Symbol

I'm going to copyright the copyright symbol...

...Trademark Symbol

...and trademark the trademark symbol, of course!

Apple files 3D-interface patent

Yawn...

Wake me up when this has passed (like M$ BOB did)...

Netbook SSD usage to fall under 10% in 2009

All you ever wanted to know about SSDs

It appears the following guy knows what he's talking about, if so, the SSDs that they are likely to put into cheap systems are not worthy your data...

http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1059211&cid=26078325

Nikon unveils flagship DSLR

Dear Santa...

...GIVE ME ONE!!!

Ford to drive green motoring with 'leaves and vines' dashboard

Environmental impact of Mechanical vs LCD

Wouldn't simple, old-fashioned, mechanical dials displaying basic information use less power and hence be more environmentally friendly?

Thieves snatch PS2 pile while courier kips

Inside job or just some lucky thieves?

Some lucky thieves: Yeah right!

Inside job: Hmm, let me see...

OK, I'm leaving now.

Fujitsu intros gesture-control laptop line

Tochpad or driver feature?

Surely it's the driver that's performing the feat meaning that any touchpad should be able to perform these features as long as someone cares to write support for for these "oh so wonderful" features?

Boy band sings praises of Windows 7

Pirated CDs?

Those CDs don't look very legit...

Renault looks to wee-hued windows to cut car power draw

Mirrors vs Cameras

Real mirrors are safer for people on the **outside** of a vehicle as it helps them establish eye contact with the driver, i.e., you know when the driver has seen you! Cameras on the other hand are one-way devices and as such do not provide this vital piece of feedback.

Spice up your swim, with music

Shark! I said SHARK! For @#$% sake: SHARK!!!

I cried shark but he didn't appear to hear me...

Elgato EyeTV DTT Deluxe 'world's smallest' USB TV tuner

Windows solution

For those asking for a Windows solution, try one of the following Pinnacle products...

http://www.pinnaclesys.com/PublicSite/uk/Products/Consumer+Products/PCTV/PCTV/

If you want a small USB tuner then I would recommend the Pinnacle PCTV nanoStick, but forget the aerial, it's pure junk as is the software.

If you need a TV viewer then I would highly recommend DVB Viewer (well, it's more than just a viewer, it's a full-featured PVR)...

http://www.dvbviewer.com/en/index.php

P.S. Just yesterday I saw a (hardware-accelerated) system running nanoStick and DVB Viewer and the quality was absolutely stunning!

Wireless pen options?

Hmm, sorry...

I thought my Googling had found what you had asked for but it turned out it has to be docked...

http://www.g4tv.com/techtvvault/features/40497/Review_Logitech_io_Personal_Digital_Pen.html?article_key=40497

Nokia's Tube touchphone to be out in time for Xmas?

Useful pictures link...

The link to the additional pictures is extremely informative - not! It points to another El Reg Hardware article with the same picture as in this article. Was the intention to point to something a bit more useful than this?

Google, here I come...

Aussie school goes high-tech

@steogede

I went through university barely taking any notes, and, whenever I did, I never referred to them.

And yes, I did end up with a degree at the end of the course.

Paris Hilton - you decide why.

HP borgs Voodoo

Great. Not!

Great, now these systems will come bundled with more crapware than anyone ever thought possible! (Although, this probably happen as soon as HP laid their hands on them.)

P.S. Why does an HP scanner's "driver" have to occupy more than 50MB (or was it 100MB, can't recall, it was so long ago?) of space! And then why does both the hardware and the software suck more than the previous versions ever did? Probably because people see quantity before quality...

Photos fool cigarette age-verification software

@Dr Patrick J R Harkin

OK, so now kids will be carrying chairs as well!

The things kids will do for a pack of smokes...

@Kevin Johnston

Not advanced enough as kids would start carrying aged mannequins or blowup dolls... :)

Boffins invent 42GB DVD

Now here's a novel idea...

... What if they applied the same technique to Blu-Ray Disc?

AMD rolls out line-leading four-core Phenom

Comparing apples with apples?

"AMD is pricing the 9150e at $175 and the 9350e at $195 - when sold in batches of 1000 processors - and was quick to point out that Intel doesn't have a quad-core that costs less than $200."

Is AMD comparing a batch of 1000 Intel CPUs with a batch of 1000 AMD CPUs or simply 1 off-the-shelf Intel CPU with a batch of 1000 AMD CPUs?

Paris Hilton - because she's easy to confuse

Canon EOS 450D digital SLR

WTF!?

"We certainly didn’t notice any deterioration in performance with SD cards - from either a writing speed or a picture quality point of view."

Picture quality point of view? What did the reviewer expect? Loss of pixels or what?

Paris Hilton - because she might as well have written this review.

Linksys revamps WRT54G wireless router

Versions

There have been many versions of the WRT54G, as can be seen from the following link...

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices#Linksys_.28all_the_rest_that_is_not_re-engineered_til_today.29

Yes, newer version don't run Linux, but that doesn't mean one can't re-flash them with custom Linux-based firmware like DD-WRT, Tomato, etc., although, as can be seen from the link, the much needed flash (and the less but still useful RAM) size has been reduced in newer versions, limiting their usefulness.

To overcome this, Linksys came out with WRT54GL (note the "L" meaning "Linux") which is basically version 4 with a slightly different CPU.

Call me whatever you want, but somehow I doubt that the new WRT54G2 will provide more flash (or RAM for that matter) than the earlier models.

VIA takes tiny mobo spec to second generation

Now we're starting to get somewhere...

This is more in line with what I had in mind when I originally set out to build an home entertainment PC. But (and there always is a but) it needs an extra PCI slot for that dual TV tuner card...

Solar powered PMP shines down

Or get a more generic solution

Team up **any** portable device, such as a COWON PMP, with one of these...

http://www.coolest-gadgets.com/20060807/phone-and-usb-solar-charger/

http://www.proporta.com/F02/PPF02P05.php?t_id=1520&t_mode=des

http://www.stuff.co.nz/4362448a24520.html

Paris - because the sun shines out of her a***...

Nvidia to acquire ray tracing startup

NVIDIA Gelato

NVIDIA Gelato is a renderer with raytracing support...

http://www.nvidia.com/page/gz_home.html

Gelato, is a production quality non-interactive "final-frame" render. (In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if Gelato uses mental ray from their mental images acquisition.)

RayScale on the other hand appears to be a different beast in that it aims for interactive (i.e., real-time) raytracing.

My guess about NVIDIA's acquisition of RayScale is that they are hoping to benefit from the RayScale technology/knowledge to improve future GPUs with real-time raytracing support.

Microsoft winds down smart wristwatch

STOP PRESS

Microsoft is planning a mobile-in-a-watch replacement for SPOT but has not released many details of the new watch other than that it will be running a new version of the Windows Vista operating system called Windows Vista Ultimate x64 Mobile Edition. The watch is said to have a battery life of about 1 hour.

Blue-laser alternative to Blu-ray, HD DVD launched

WTF!!!

WHY???

Netgear EVA8000 network media player

Archaic Connectivity

The review didn't mention that the unit provides an archaic 10/100 Mbps Ethernet port. Personally I would have expected a unit for HD content to have a 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet port. eSATA 3Gb/s connectivity would be nice too.