GrantBlog » Gadgets

Video Game Sales No Longer a Billion-Dollar Industry

Grant — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 13:09:20 +0000

According to new industry numbers released this month, sales of video game consoles are down last month by 30% compared to May of last year. While experts say that the sales of games might follow shortly, they noted that for the first time since August of 2007, the video game console industry is no longer a billion-dollar one.

Spying On Printers Via The Sound They Make?!?!?

Grant — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 20:27:33 +0000

At Saarland university, students and researchers now say they can, with up to 70% accuracy, detect what a printer is printing only based on the sounds that they make while they print. That’s scary. Although it took a while because they had to match word in the dictionary to words that could be printed, they say that in their demo (with an anonymous patients), they were able to tell what perscription was being printed at a doctor’s office.

[Via Lifehacker on Google Blogscoped]

Recap of Today’s iPhone Developments

Grant — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 21:20:50 +0000

Wow, what a day for Apple, their products and the iPhone! Today, at the Worldwide Developers Conference hosted by Apple in San Fransisco, we saw a new iPhone’s release, new 3.0 iPod Touch and iPhone OS update as well as other product announcements from Apple on topics like their new and improved MacBooks. But, in all of their new announcements, Steve Jobs was still not there

Let’s start with the iPhone. Apple first introduced the iPhone in June of 2007 and since then, it’s been a complete hit and has almost dominated the smartphone and gadget-lover market. Apple demonstrated this today in their release of a new iPhone, the 3GS, and the release of their new 3.0 operating system for it today. In brief, Apple announced the new and much awaited 3.0 OS, which introduced features including MMS support (which AT&T’s network currently does not support for the phone), copy & paste, the ability for the iPhone to support various attachable devices, a new lost-phone find-me feature, a voice memo and landscape keyboard app, faster performance as well as streaming audio and video. The software upgrade will be free for iPhone users and $9.95 for iPod Touch users.

The new iPhone 3GS was also released, which added voice command, more RAM and internal improvements to the phone, an improved camera and a compass. Another shocker was the price- $199 for the new 3GS and only $99 for the iPhone 3G itself. Wow!

Apple also had a major release of their new, but anticipated Snow Leopard operating system update, which introduced Microsoft Exhange Server support, many internal performance upgrades and tweaks (including powerful 64-bit OS support), Quicktime 10, and Safari 4, which Apple claims is the fastest browser-all for the stunning upgrade price of $29- a big “take that Microsoft!” from Apple.

Apple also announced a $700 price drop on the Macbook Air, as well a new specs and integrated SD card slots for the 13 and 15 inch Macbook Pros.

What do you think about today’s developments? Want a new iPhone 3GS?

The “Netbook” Trend

Grant — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 19:31:53 +0000

More and more in the past two months or so, I’ve seen people with and commercials for a semi-new tech-gadget, the netbook. While that’s not a specific brand or anything, netbooks, are in essence, tiny computers, smaller than a laptop, but not as small as a UMPC, a trend back around Q3 of last year. In the last month, I’ve seen 3 commercials on TV for netbooks (Verizon Wireless’’s HP version) and have also seen 3 of my friends get them.

I must say though, that they are pretty neat. Most have around 10 or 8-inch screens, wi-fi (and sometimes a mobile broadband card with Sprint, AT&T or Verizon) and a full keyboard- all on a tiny little think like that. Dell’s Mini 9 and 10 are good examples of netbooks, as well as the well-known Asus Eee-PC. Oh, and the devices are cheap too! Depending on who you buy them from, they start at around $500 and go upto around $1750.

So, do you have a netbook or want to talk about the buzz? Join in in the comments below and vote in the poll about netbooks!

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.