May 26, 2005

iMuffs wireless iPod Headphones


Imagine having wireless headphones, no tangles or snags! Now imagine leaving your iPod in your backpack and controlling it right from buttons mounted on your ear. Okay it gets better: if you have a bluetooth cell phone these guys are also a bluetooth headset! They can automatically pause your ipod, ring in your ears, and allow you to pick up the call without touching your iPod or your phone!! Amazing...unfortunately they're not priced or even technically available. The company is accepting order "signups" though.

More Airport Technological Updates

Biometrics is the identity checking future. From fingerprints to fresh-from-sci-fi retinal scanners will be making sure we are who we say we are. Older methods are way out-dated and too easy to fake. The article is from Reuters.

Lexi's Art 1

I plan to bring more pictures from this wonderful young artist. Sorry about the quality of this one, but surely you can get the idea

May 25, 2005

Teen Hacker changes grades

But accidentally gave everyone at the school an "A" due to a "feature" in the northern California school district. Officials noticed a problem when an A grade was given to "all 18,697 students in the district".

Damn wish I was that good when I was 17.

Prepare to be X-posed at the airport.


New X-ray technology can see through your clothes, straight to your naked body. Of course the intention is to see ceramic knives and metal-less explosives. But it can see us too, and besides creating a coveted job for teenagers across the country of watching these exposing X-ray screens, I'm sure they'll make alot of people upset. News.com has the story.

Voyager 1 leaves our Solar System


Voyager is just at the edge of our solar system, the place where the sun's gravitational pull dissopates. Space.com has a great story, and a cool animation.

May 24, 2005

Want to lose iTunes but keep your iPod?


If you use windows, not only can you be free of iTunes, but now you can take music back off your iPod and copy to your hard drive all with the help of a winamp plugin called "ml_iPod". It replaces the need for iTunes completely. Also there is a way around the protection inbedded in songs from the iTunes Music Store from the hymn-project

May 20, 2005

Gadget Boy Saw the Sith, Says it was Sweet

Yes I saw the movie at 12:01 Thursday morning, yes there were costumed nerds with lightsabers, and yes they forgot to rip my ticket!


Personally I liked the movie, great effects, Hayden Christensen (Anakin Skywalker) learned how to act, and it tied the stories together. The thing to remember when watching it is that this is not the last movie in the double trilogy, so it doesn't have that final feeling to it. But I beleive it completes the series. What did you think?

Prison for Pirates of Pilfered Pre-Releases of Motion Pictures

Roughly translated that means all the costumed, lightsaber-toting, boot-leggers could be going to jail or facing up to $250,000 fines if a new bill is passed. The bill makes "a federal felon of anyone who has even one copy of a film, software program or music file in a shared folder" and that work has not been released.

Cnet has the story

Google HomePage

Google offers Wired news, Google news, and Slashdot news articles, Gmail inbox, Movies, stock info and more on your Google Homepage. More will be added soon!

Teacher fired for lecture about Peer2Peer

Jorge Cortell explains in his blog that after giving a lecture on the LEGAL uses of P2P networks he was fired from his University in Spain.

Pimp your Firefox


First of all, if you still you use Internet Explorer, get Firefox.

Firefox users are hacking the web by using a browser extension called Greasemonkey. Theres already a huge collection of scripts for both site specific modification and scripts that will function on all sites

May 19, 2005


The details on the 3 new consoles are emerging. Just in time for the final Star Wars episode starting in theaters tomorrow the 18th.
Information is surfacing on all 3 consoles and I've compiled as much as possible for yall.


Xbox 360 - Xenon



System -
Three 3.2ghz processors c-odesigned by Microsoft and IBM
Custom graphics chip from ATI with 512mb memory and claiming 500 million triangles per second
Overall 1 teraflop (1 trillion floating point operations per second)
Removeable 20gb Hard Drive

Communication - Built-in Ethernet and Wireless network capability
Ability to stream videos/music/TV/movies from Media Center PCs
Wireless controller support (rumored 1 included)
3 USB ports (supporting existing Microsoft game controllers for PCs, cameras, streaming media from portable devices...)



FREE XBOX LIVE

I heard from several sources that Microsoft will be giving away X-Box Live for free with their new console

Release Time - Thanksgiving 2005


Playstation 3

(more images at ign.com)

System-

CPU Cell Processor running at 3.2Ghz with 7 special purpose 3.2Ghz processors, capable of 218 gigaflops of performance
Backward compatible
GPU RSX at 550MHz 1.8 teraflop floating point performance
256Mb XDR main RAM at 3.2 GHz
256Mb of GDDR VRAM at 700Mhz
Memory Stick Duo, SD, compact flash memory slots
Detachable 2.5 inch hard drive
Support for seven Bluetooth(wireless) controllers
Six USB slots for peripherals
System Floating Point Performance of 2 teraflops
Communication Ethernet, Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11, Bluetooth
Output in HDTV resolution up to 1080p as standard
-BBC News
Cnet also has a slightly more detailed list


Sony's Cell processor is a new type, it seems to harness the idea of multiple processors working together to create a LARGE amount of computing power.
A word on IBM and Sony's new CELL Processor straight from IBM, that is, if you can understand it. Here is the version we can understand.

Release Time - Spring 2006


Nintendo - Revolution


Nintendo hasn't released too much information yet, but when it does I'll update it here. So far this is what we do know:

Graphics - IBM and ATI are in as "development partners" so Revolution is probably gonna be a speedy little powerhouse just like its rivals.

"wireless internet ready out of the box", backwards compatibility with gamecube 8cm discs (new discs will be 12 cm)
two USB 2.0 ports
slots for DS memory cards
Nintendo has prototype colors are being showcased during E3

"The secret weapon: The console also will have downloadable access to 20 years of fan-favorite titles originally released for Nintendo 64, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) and even the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). " -Nintendo.com
What I'm wondering here is will this be free!? THAT would be one real secret weapon alright.

Release Time - "Sometime in 2006"

Initial Thoughts
Well this is an interesting race here.IBM appears to be the technological slut in this race, working on all 3 consoles, and ATI so far has the graphics chips for 2 outta 3. The claims made about Sony's processor are boasting unreal performance. Of course we haven't seen a Cell processor perform yet, so its hard to say how it will hold up against 3 proven 3.2ghz PowerPC-based CPUs in the Xenon, but there is a lot of Cell Hype. So Playstation has the most (theoretical) computing power, X-Box live for free is Microsoft's gimmick, and although Nintendo hasn't announced their detailed hardware specs yet, even if their '20 years of fan favorite' downloadable games really aren't free, I see alot of people interested in that. Even I'm a lover of the classics, and I would pay a few $ a game to play all the oldies-but-goodies.

More info on these when it's available.


What console are you rooting for at this point?

May 16, 2005

Google hacking explained

The latest and greatest to utilize the resources of all that is GOOGLE are called google hacks. Now don't get confused, remeber there is good hacking and there is bad hacking (cracking). Google hacks utilize the power that this search engine has given us, in ways we may not have thought of: One hack lets you input poetry and outputs for you a series of images (from google image search). Another lets you see news articles projected on a world map based on where the article talks about. A new hack I just found lets you use google maps to lookup houses for sale, rent, and even rooms-for-rent that is additionally powered by Craig's list.

Google Hacks - A collection of interesting hacks
HousingMaps - Real Estate + Google Maps
Google search for "google hacks" - ( minus "book")

A text-messaging pill dispenser?

SIMpill can send you a text message if you forget to take your medication!

How do you lose FAT? Eat it.

Wired News Has a story that explains a study done on mice shows that unless their liver had new fat to proccess, the old fat would stay. Translation: cutting out fat intake completely will not neccessarily make you lose your existing fat.

Bottom line people, extremes are bad, eat a balanced diet.

May 12, 2005

Nokia competes with 4gb


The first hard drive phones are here. Nokia introduces the music playing and picture taking N90 which sports a 4gb hard drive for mp3s and 2 mega-pixel camera. Of course its compatible with bluetooth and wifi, but the new wireless technology is 3g, high speed internet connectivity enableling video calling, streaming video, email, and web browsing even if there is no wifi or bluetooth networks.

May 09, 2005

neXt X-BoX to be MEDIA-centrix


The new X-Box Xenon will be even more of a pc hybrid then its predecessor, think X-Box meets Windows Media Center. In This story on Yahoo News, Gates taks about its similarities to Media Center:

"If you're used to that menu, when you use this Xenon you'll see a menu a lot like that that lets you get photos, TV, music and all those different things."

www.XBox.com has a counter on their main page counting down to their "Announcement" on MTV.

Solar Power Backpack

Power your mobile devices with solarpanels built in to a backpack. Itll cost yah tho, $200.

The Juice Bag from Reware


May 06, 2005

Google's Image

As a good friend once said "Google is the coolest evil coporation ever."

This post really made me think a little about the image Google projects to the public.

May 04, 2005

Photo

Taken stopped at a redlight out my car window. These are what I like to call "god rays"

Tech Sightings - Best Buy

About once a month I like to make it to Best Buy to check out gadgets and technologies that my tech news sites and TV programs might miss. Here is the highlights from my latest journey.



LCD
The first sighting is just that LCD Monitors are really coming down. This 15 inch is just under $200!



2Way Radio=>internet adapter
The second certainly an intriguing gadget, okay bear with me here: Apparently, this little guy will allow you to use a walkie talkie-to-computer-to-internet-to-walkie-talkie.

This is an explanatory diagram from their site.
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May 03, 2005

TV on your Cell

No I'm not kidding. On demand style TV is expected to become available on mobile phones by the end of the year. --=Reuters Story=--

I'm speechless. Technology is moving too fast man. What's next, a computer in the size of a watch?

Dick Tracy shit I'm telling yah

May 02, 2005

What a Weekend!

That was a crazy one guys. Started out on friday and hung out with my friend Ryan and his friend Mark. We drank some beer while playing some guitar and digereedoo. Fun fun.

Then on Saturday around 2pm, I received a call from a friend (Mike) of mine that was planning a bachelors party for another friend (Alan) that I was planning on going to around 6pm. He asked me if I could pick him up, drive him around Framingham, while he did a scavenger hunt and video record him in the process. Afterward we went to an apartment and drank some more beer. There were strippers and fun was had all around. I then attended another party in Boston with Drew, my brother. T'was a house warming party for some very good friends of ours. I enjoyed a fine hard cider, and by the end of the night we were feeling quite High Spirited.

Sunday I worked a double at the restaurant. Made some tips, learned some more portugese, and actually had a great time.

Well that was my weekend, WHAT DID YALL DO?? (*hint* press the "comments" button)