Portables
From the View-Master to the iPhone, 14 memorable gizmos that exude a style all their own.
The popular little Bluetooth speaker/speakerphone now has a bigger, louder brother.
Pop quiz: What’s the easiest way to wire up your entire home for smartphone and tablet controls? Unless you’re quite tech-savvy, chances are you haven’t the slightest idea. It’s a problem that Microsoft Research wants to solve with HomeOS, an experimental operating system for home automation.
Microsoft and Barnes & Noble are joining hands to form a new Barnes & Noble subsidiary that’ll be dubbed “Newco” (get it?) until someone comes up with a better name. The “strategic” venture, into which Microsoft says it will pour $300 million, is designed to “accelerate the transition to e-reading,” as well as symbolically lay to rest a patent dispute that’s been ongoing since March 2011.
If you chance on an original PlayStation game called Buzz Lightyear of Star Command while browsing Sony’s PlayStation Store with your PS Vita, just click on by, because it doesn’t work — not yet, anyway.
Well-done, built-in illumination makes this the E Ink reader to get if you want to read in bed.
I’m not sure I’d call it the killer app the PS Vita’s looking for, but if you’ve been waiting for a video chat option that lets you avail yourself of the Vita’s dual cameras, it’s finally here, as in right now, courtesy Skype.
Conventional wisdom: Launch strong, show your best hand, win hearts and minds. Actual wisdom: Stagger your triple-A releases, because forklifting out everything you’ve got off the block and leaving a black hole of game-space between the launch window and holiday lineup is a surefire hardware sales-killer.
The bookselling giant’s new Nook adds a front-lit screen that makes it legible when light is a scarce commodity.
What’s better than a blog post based on a single sketchy iPhone rumor? A blog post about three iPhone rumors, of course, with a side of iPod Touch speculation for good measure.
Google’s video makes me less excited about Project Glass than I was when it was a mysterious rumor. After all, nobody releases these movies about stuff that’s very nearly here.
