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So you want Skype High Quality (HQ) video, but aren’t willing to shell out for a nice dual-core processor and a high-end Logitech camera, eh? Well, no worries - Nodewave has a Force ‘Skype’ HQ Video app that allows you to Enable/Disable (and even configure) High-Quality Video in Skype, and even High-Definition Video regardless of your camera or processor.

So if Santa doesn’t stick a high-end Logitech Orb AF webcam (my favorite webcam) in your stocking for Christmas, then this hack might just be the way to go!

Tags: hq video, Logitech, Orb AF, Skype, voip, webcam

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Original post by nafiz

Filed under: Digital Cameras

We know you want a pro-friendly medium format digital camera — so do we — but they′re awfully expensive, aren’t they? You might have to think about dropping as much as $30,000 one of these babies if you’re the discerning type, but Mamiya is trying to convince you that you can save a few thousand dollars and still get results. Enter the DL28 digital camera system, which combines the body of the well-established 645 with Leaf’s Aptus-II 6 digital back. It’s got 16-bit capture, a 12-stop dynamic range, an ISO range of 50 - 800, and a fancy 3.5-inch touch screen at price of $15,000, appropriate for cash-strapped professionals and financially comfortable hobbyists — unless Nikon has something to say about it.

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Original post by Samuel Axon

Filed under: Cellphones

Boy Genius is fleshing-out those next-gen BlackBerry rumors this morning. According to the very early buzz from his sources, BGR says that we should be looking at a new Storm capable of riding US HSDPA frequencies after its expected unveiling at the WES2009 show which starts May 5th. RIM’s also rumored to be working on a Bold-like QWERTY of Javeline / Curve 8900-size with an honest-to-goodness touchscreen baked right in. Mmm, baked BlackBerries.

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Original post by Thomas Ricker

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Just when we’re all geared up to get crazy corporate with a bunch of Bold purchases, RIM has to go and make our lives difficult by reminding us that the Javelin / Curve 8900 is out there — lurking — just waiting to make a grand entrance sometime in the next few months. A new video posted to CrackBerry goes through the 8900′s finer points, noting that the handset clocks in just a bit more compact than its big brother, features a slightly smaller, higher dot pitch display, and carries over an original Curve-style keyboard with spaced keys rather than the flowing design employed on the Bold (for what it’s worth, the narrator seems to like both styles equally). Interestingly, it’s noted that this prototype employs an older trackball design that’ll allegedly be replaced with a more bulletproof design by the time it launches. The lack of 3G is going to be a dream killer for many, but we could see this one getting some retail legs underneath it if the price is right — it’s got WiFi, after all.

In fact, T-Mobile Germany is saying that it’ll have the 8900 next month — a claim we actually believe, since Germany is from the future. The trackball shown on its version of the handset is distinctly different than CrackBerry’s, so it’s looking like the claim of a redesign might hold water.

[Thanks, Alex]

Read - CrackBerry’s Curve 8900 hands-on video
Read - T-Mobile Germany’s Curve 8900 product page

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Original post by Chris Ziegler

Some perceptive (literally and disciplinary) scientists have scientifically proven something obvious: cars that are designed to be quiet inside make people drive faster.

In their study Horswill and Plooy presented participants with pairs of video-based driving scenes and asked them to judge their speed.

The participants heard either in-car noise at the level it occurred in the real world, or reduced in volume by 5 decibels.

Full article available here.

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Original post by Rico

Filed under: Laptops

Sony’s string of new VAIOs continues today with the NS series, slick little numbers that can be ordered with a Blu-ray drive under that magic $1000 price point. The 15.4-inch laptops come in blue silver and white and all run Vista Home Premium with special Sony media features on 2GHz T5800 Core 2 Duo processors and integrated X4500 graphics, with prices starting at $650 for 3GB of RAM and a 250GB drive. Release date is unclear, but Sony’s got them up on its web site, so we’re guessing it’ll be soon.

[Via Electronista]

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Original post by Nilay Patel

Filed under: Laptops

HP’s 8.9-inch 2133 Mini-Note is apparently a raging success, so it makes sense that the company would want to expand the line, and it looks like we might be getting a preview of what’s in store with the Digital Clutch, a bright red 10-inch netbook that debuted last night during designer Vivienne Tam′s fashion week show in NYC. Not much is known about the internals, but the case sports an Asian-inspired peony flower design, and the screen fills the entire lid with very little bezel. If we had to guess, we’d say that it’s more likely that there’s a VIA Isaiah chip in there instead of an Atom, given the C7M found in the current Mini-Note, but we’ll see — and hopefully soon, since at least one HP rep apparently confirmed that the machine is the next generation Mini-Note. Hit the read links for tons more pics.

Read - First set of Laptop pics
Read - Second set of Laptop pics

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Original post by Nilay Patel

Filed under: Displays, HDTV, Home Entertainment

Not a huge fan of the LCD HDTV? Is plasma more your style? Fantastic, because Samsung just took the (official) lid off of the already spotted 7 Series plasma lineup. Featuring the outfit’s Touch of Color design, a 1,000,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, daytime / nighttime calibration options and a DNIe Pro video processor, this trio makes no bones about which rival it’s gunning for. The entire crew also features InfoLink RSS access, a USB 2.0 port (WiseLink Pro), DLNA compatibility, four HDMI-CEC jacks and 1080p panels. Read up on the full rundown of specs in the read link, and prepare to hand over $2,799.99 for the 50-inch PN50A760, $4,499.99 for the 58-inch PN58A760 or $5,499.99 for the 63-inch PN63A760 sometime next month.

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Home Entertainment

ESPN’s unleashing The Ultimate Remote, developed by tvCompass, complete with 2.2-inch QVGA LCD screen and 802.11 b/g WiFi stuffed in a 6.5 oz package. It’s certainly a serious contender with the Harmony One — and priced like it, at $300. The marketing info claims no PC is required for setup, recharging via USB, an internet browser with real time access to scores, fantasy info and TV listings for broadcast, cable and satellite from click365’s wireless partners. There’s even a messaging feature for texting from remote to remote, email, or to a cellphone. We got a glimpse of it at Microsoft’s booth during CES, and while it claims “Advanced Microsoft Windows operating software” it’s not talking about SideShow. It reminds us a lot of the Ricavision VAVE100 MCE/SideShow remote, but with a slightly different feature set. Father’s Day is coming up and suddenly walking over to the computer (or keeping a laptop or PDA/phone on the couch) is sounding like a lot of unnecessary work. Check after the break for a bigger pic with keypad breakdown, or head to Amazon to preorder.

[Via Electronista]

Continue reading ESPN unveils The Ultimate Remote, is WiFi worth $300?

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Original post by Richard Lawler

Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment

Nothing like washing down an all new WiFi-enabled digiframe with an all new home media server, right? Apparently Sony is firmly in agreement, as it’s also launching its latest multimedia server / NAS drives today in Japan. The 1TB VGF-HS1 / 1.5TB VGF-HS1S would stack nicely atop your VAIO HTPC, and aside from boasting gigabit Ethernet, DLNA compatibility, an integrated display, USB connectivity and a hidden multicard reader behind the front panel, this unit plays nice with AVCHD, MPEG2, HDV, JPEG, BMP, PNG, WAV, MP3, ATRAC (saywha?), AAC and WMA file formats. Word on the street has these shipping on May 17th for &yen60,000 ($570) / &yen80,000 ($760) depending on capacity, but only time will tell if Sony sees fit to send ‘em Stateside.

[Via Impress]

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Storage

We’ve seen a couple viruses make their way into the manufacturing process and onto shipping products, and it looks like HP Australia and its enterprise customers are the latest victims. USB keys shipped with some HP Proliant servers are infected with the Fakerecy and SillyFDC viruses, and the company’s issued an alert saying that any up-to-date virus scanner should be able to tackle the nasties. It’s a pretty low-grade threat — the key is only used to install floppy disk drivers and neither virus is particularly destructive, but all you server admins Down Under might want to check your rigs just to be sure.

[Via The Register]

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Original post by Nilay Patel

Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video

iPod cases with built-in speakers have amazingly been around the block a time or two before. We’re guessing the reason shelves aren′t flooded with ‘em today has quite a bit to do with the presumably lackluster sound quality / output potential. Nevertheless, those hoping to find just a case for their precious new iPod classic need look no further, as the rotating speakers case for iPod is here to make your dreams come true. Reportedly, the $60.72 enclosure works just fine with 80/160GB iPod classic models as well as 30/60/80GB 5G iPods, but considering that each of the stereo drivers pumps out under 1-watt per, you should probably plan on tossing this bad boy over your right shoulder like we did back in 1985 in order to hear anything.

[Via popgadget]

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video

Believe it or not, the deluge of iPod sound systems has died down in the past couple of months, but that’s not to say newcomers won’t join the absolutely oversaturated market. Case in point: Boston Acoustics is offering up an AM / FM Stereo Radio with iPod dock, which packs a pair of 3.5-inch full-range drivers, BassTrac low-frequency processing, twin auxiliary ports for connecting other DAPs / PMPs, line and stereo headphone outputs and a fancy display that automatically adjusts to ambient light. Furthermore, you′ll find dual independent alarm clocks, a “touch” (slam?) sensitive snooze bar and a wireless remote to keep your derriere planted. As for pricing, this one’s pretty much par for the course at $199.99.

[Via Tech Digest]

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

If you haven′t already, Telsa Guitar is a must see video. It features a lethal Scopeboy modification to a Tesla coil for guitar amplification. Click on through for 250,000 volts of axe slinging distortion. Huzzah!

Continue reading Video: Tesla guitar amp sparks the Great Radio Controversy

 

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Original post by Thomas Ricker

Filed under: Cellphones

It’s pretty clear HTC customers and Engadget readers both are none too impressed with the manufacturer’s decision to omit the drivers necessary to enable hardware video acceleration on a number of their Qualcomm MSM 7xxx-based devices. We heard a little bit from HTC on the topic earlier this week, but we wanted to know more specifically: do they plan to meet consumers’ requests and release drivers for these devices? (And if not, why?) Finally, what’s going to be done about this video acceleration driver issue in the future? Here’s the response we got to these questions (and the reader poll we posted):

“HTC does plan to offer software upgrades that will increase feature functionality, over the air wireless speeds, and other enhancements for some of the phones being criticized, but we do not anticipate including any additional support for the video issues cited in customer complaints. It is important for customers to understand that bringing this functionality to market is not a trivial driver update and requires extensive software development and time.

HTC will utilize hardware video acceleration like the ATI Imageon in many upcoming products. Our users have made it clear that they expect our products to offer an improved visual experience, and we have included this feedback into planning and development of future products.”

More after the break.

Continue reading HTC further responds to video driver issue, will improve future products

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Original post by Ryan Block