Tech News Updates

We weren’t particularly impressed with the IdeaPad U160 when we recently reviewed it , giving it a score of five out of 10 thanks to disappointing battery life and a high price. Lenovo, it seems, looking to bridge that gap to a perfect score has announced the U165, which is apparently five more. It ditches the U160’s Intel internals, going for AMD Athlon II processors and ATI Radeon HD 4225 graphics. Other specs remain similar, including the 11.6-inch, 1366 x 768 display, up to 4GB of DDR3 memory, 802.11n WiFi, and Bluetooth. The U165 is shipping now, but curiously it appears to be only available in the Czech Republic, where it’s selling for 9990 CZK — about $520. Compared to the $1,149 U160 that seems like a smoking deal to us. Lenovo launches AMD-packing IdeaPad U165 ultraportable in Czech Republic, nowhere else? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 10:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

The Cray-1A first made the scene in 1976, weighing 5.5 tons (including the refrigeration system) and running at 80MHz — with a whopping 8MB RAM. Who wouldn’t want to own one — or a miniature version of one, for that matter? Chris Fenton would, apparently. Yes, it’s that Chris Fenton — the electrical engineer who once made a $50 laptop out of a PICAXE 18X Microcontroller and 96 bytes of RAM (and some wood). And he’s back with a 1/10-scale Cray-1A. And unlike a similar project we’ve seen in the past, this bad boy runs a custom Cray emulator (too bad there doesn’t seem to be any Cray software floating around). Wild, huh? Get the whole scoop (and some pointers if you want to roll your own) after the break. Homebrew Cray-1A emulates the iconic supercomputer, to no useful purpose originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 31 Aug 2010 15:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

The Cray-1A first made the scene in 1976, weighing 5.5 tons (including the refrigeration system) and running at 80MHz — with a whopping 8MB RAM. Who wouldn’t want to own one — or a miniature version of one, for that matter? Chris Fenton would, apparently. Yes, it’s that Chris Fenton — the electrical engineer who once made a $50 laptop out of a PICAXE 18X Microcontroller and 96 bytes of RAM (and some wood). And he’s back with a 1/10-scale Cray-1A. And unlike a similar project we’ve seen in the past, this bad boy runs a custom Cray emulator (too bad there doesn’t seem to be any Cray software floating around). Wild, huh? Get the whole scoop (and some pointers if you want to roll your own) after the break. Homebrew Cray-1A emulates the iconic supercomputer, to no useful purpose originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 31 Aug 2010 15:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

AGPS capability on various versions of the Galaxy S — including the Captivate and Vibrant released here in the US — has been deeply hosed since launch, the apparent result of a bunk positioning server being used to associate towers to geographical locations. In practical terms, that’s made apps like Google Maps nearly useless indoors and in urban canyons where line of sight to the birds up in orbit is dicey or impossible, and for European users where the phone’s been out even longer, the wait’s been an especially excruciating one. Fortunately, Samsung’s finally come out with some concrete details on Twitter today, saying that updates are expected next month with “details and download to follow.” No word for Euros specifically, but we imagine (er, make that “hope”) they’ll all be fixed around the same time. Samsung commits to September updates for Galaxy S GPS woes originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 13 Aug 2010 20:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

LG’s official Application Store — not to be confused with an App Store , App World , or App Catalog — just went beta is 23 countries with the aim of serving up 4,000 apps to 33 countries (including the UK, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain) by the end of the year. Sorry US netizens, you’re seemingly out of luck for 2010. It launches with significantly less than 4,000 apps today (about 3,000) targeting LG feature and smartphones in countries that you, dear reader, likely don’t care about. Oh, did we tell you that it’s launching without any Android apps? Those won’t arrive until sometime later this year. Continue reading LG’s Application Store launches in places you don’t live for devices you don’t care about LG’s Application Store launches in places you don’t live for devices you don’t care about originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 28 Jul 2010 05:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

While there’s still no ( official ) word on when we’ll get any BlackBerry OS 6 hardware, much less that 9800 Bold , RIM has seen fit to provide us another glimpse at the software front. This time round we’re looking at multimedia features, including the photo gallery, a brand-new podcasts app and YouTube, alongside extra camera controls (including a face detection mode) and roundabout confirmation that at least some new BlackBerries will support pinch-to-zoom . Oddly enough, there’s no video showing off the new multimedia functionality, just a set of stills, but we suppose RIM realizes it’s all been done before and Crackberry addicts will take whatever they can get. RIM shows off BlackBerry 6 multimedia experience, in pictures originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 21 Jul 2010 15:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

As anyone that’s been to a mall recently is no doubt well aware, the back-to-school season is upon us, and so is the usual batch of hardware aimed directly at students (and their parents). Among the latest is a pair of computers from Velocity Micro , including the T30 Italia thin-and-light laptop, and the Vector Campus Edition desktop. Those opting for the$999 laptop will get a 13.3-inch display, a 1.3GHz Pentium SU1400 processor, 3GB of RAM, and 120GB hard drive, all wrapped in a 0.8-inch thick casing “inspired by the rolling curves of fine sports cars.” The desktop, on the other hand, is your usual blue LED-lit fare, and starts at $899 for a Core i5-750-based system with NVIDIA GeForce GT 220 graphics, 4GB of RAM, and 1TB hard drive. Velocity Micro rolls out T30 Italia laptop, Vector Campus Edition desktop originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 15 Jul 2010 17:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

We thought we had another week or so to get ready, but no, the Popbox is on sale already, with some preorderers reporting they got shipment notifications as early as yesterday. In case you’ve forgotten since CES, the $129 box takes the Popcorn Hour into a more general consumer friendly form with an all new interface and SDK , YouTube access , support for 100Mbps bitrate 1080p video and more — just not the Netflix access ( at least for now ) we were originally promised. According to the official Twitter account — also accessible with a new “Popapp” — a quicker than expected route through customs is to thank/blame for the launch, but whatever, we’re one step closer to the 2010 media streamer battle we’ve been waiting for. It’s your move, Boxee Box. [Thanks, Jason] Gallery: Syabas Popbox hands-on Syabas Popbox surprises everyone, including Syabas, by going on sale today originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 15 Jul 2010 17:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

Is it possible we’ve been so busy we didn’t notice our Android app getting a handful of totally fresh new features? Maybe, but hey — you still win. If you’re an Android user, you might like to know that some time last week we flipped the switch on an update to our app that includes some pretty sexy new features, such as search and video playback inline (for Froyo devices). Additionally, our webOS app was recently bugging out, but that issue has since been fixed. Of course, the iPhone and BlackBerry apps are still available and as fly as ever — so go grab a copy right now! We’re including the changelog for the Android app after the break, too. Feel free to nerd out on that. Continue reading Engadget app updated for Android and webOS Engadget app updated for Android and webOS originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Jun 2010 19:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

You might have missed it if you were sleeping, but we broke open a huge treasure trove of leaked Dell mobile devices last night, including the high-end Lightning Windows Phone 7 slider and Thunder Android set. We also got wind of the mid-range Flash and Smoke Android phones, as well as the Looking Glass seven-inch Android tablet, and to round things out we scored more details on the Aero and Streak . Yeah, it was a hell of a night, but we’ve got it all rounded up for you right here, so click on through if you missed anything! Lightning: the ultimate Windows Phone 7 Thunder: 4.1-inch OLED, Android, Hulu app Flash: Android Froyo in ‘dramatic’ package Smoke: ‘Like a Pixi but awesome’ Looking Glass: 7-inch tablet with Tegra 2 Streak: Android 2.1 in September Aero: Spec’d Dell’s mobile outlook Dell’s Lightning, Thunder, Flash, Smoke and more: rounding up a storm of mobile leaks originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 22 Apr 2010 15:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink