Nine Baud Tech News

Windows Vista is coming out shortly and there is a bit of an oops factor involved. No one thought to try and get Zune to work with the new operating system.

“This operating system is currently not supported by Zune,” reads an error message when trying to install Zune software on the latest versions of Microsoft’s own Windows Vista operating system.

In an official Zune support document, Microsoft, which will begin selling Vista to business customers in two weeks, confirms that the system “is not supported at this time.”

Caption: “Gawd DAMMIT!”

Link

Tags: Zune, Vista, Ballmer, Zune Problems

Here is a scary/interesting piece about a killer robot that was developed by Samsung to guard the Korean border.

Click the link below to see the video of this robot in action.

Link

Tags: Robot Sentry, Killer Robot, Samsung Robot, Korean Robot Sentry

A remote West Texas spaceport being built and bankrolled by Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos launched a test rocket Monday for the first time.

“There was a launch, a one- or two-minute event,” Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Roland Herwig said from the agency’s office in Oklahoma City. He had no details.

The exact nature of the 6:30 a.m. launch or the type of spacecraft was not immediately known.

A Houston-based spokesman for Blue Origin, the Bezos-owned firm developing the private commercial space venture, did not immediately respond to a telephone inquiry from The Associated Press.

Cool stuff! Hopefully this worked. The space race needs more players.

Link

Tags: Space, Rocket, Jeff Bezos, Test Launch

Damn, that’s a lot of cake.

Sony Corp. sold 88,400 units of its PlayStation 3 game console in the first two days after the launch in Japan, leaving most stores without any stock, video game magazine publisher Enterbrain said on Monday.

Link

Tags: Sony PS3, Sales Figures

What the f? According to an article over on eWeek the latest models shipping from Apple contain a TPM chip. Amit Singh, a researcher with Google’s tech staff made the discovery. However the Mac OS X does not use the chip. Singh speculates that this was simply part of a delivery from Intel.

However, said Singh, it is possible for individual users to take advantage of the TPM in their Intel-based Macs; Singh has written a TPM device driver for that purpose.

Uses for this, Singh said, could include tying data to one machine by encrypting it so that only the machine with the user’s unique TPM can decrypt it.

Or the machine’s owner can encrypt the hard drive so that it only decrypts when connected to the owner’s computer. Both of these could be useful, or even mandated, in certain government or military situations.

Some other researchers agree that the TPM is not in use now, but wonder about the future.

For the full article read on.

Link

Tags: Apple TPM, Mac OS X, Trusted Computing, Amit Singh, Google

This is an interesting piece. This guy, Toby McKeys, wrote a script that he entitled “WalkingStudy” app. The crux of it was for it to snap a pic everytime it was awaken. The pics would then be uploaded to his Flickr account.

The really interesting part is the pics that he got when the MacBook was sent in for repairs. From Toby’s Flickr page

So, my little WakingStudy app did something unexpected. It caught images of what I think is the inside of one of Apple’s authorized repair facilities, Flextronics International in Tennessee, and uploaded them automatically to Flickr. What a surprise!

Link

Tags: MacBook, WalkingStudy, Apple Repair Shop, iSight Spycam, MacBook Repair

As the VoIP technology spreads ever quicker we see companies such as Vonage gaining ground on the Ma Bells of the world. One of the best clients out there is the Skype client. Now they have released the latest version of their client for the Windows platform.

Skype now has browser extensions for Internet Explorer and Firefox. You can choose at install time if you want to install these or not. They automatically convert phone numbers on web pages into Skype links. You can simply click them and Skype starts a SkypeOut call to that number.

Link

Tags: Skype, VoIP, Skype 3.0, Windows, VoIP

Oooh, Daddy like. This is too cool. Soyo Group has a dual 19″ monitor offering. Very nice.

To whet your appetite here are the tech specs.

Panel Specs		Type: Dual 19.0” color TFT active matrix SXGA LCD Display Area: 2 X 14.2” (vertical) x 11.85” (horizontal); 19.0” Optimum Resolution: 2560 x 1024 @ 75Hz Contrast Ratio: 700:1 Viewing Angle: 160 degrees horizontal 140 degrees vertical Light Source: 35,000 hours (typ) Response Time: 8ms Brightness: 300 nits (typ) Display Colors: 16.7 million Pixel Pitch: 0.294mm Frequency: Fh: 30 kHz – 80 kHz; Fv: 50 Hz – 75 Hz Bandwidth: 135MHz
Connectors		Analog: RGB (Connector: 15-pin mini D-sub) Digital: DVI
Picture Control		Brightness/Contrast: Yes Color Temperature Control: Yes
Sound		Audio Output Power: 4 x 1 watt
Power		Voltage: AC 100~240 Volts, 50/60 +- 3 Hz via external AC Adaptor (each) Consumption: 38W (typ each)
Other Features		Auto Adjust, Menu, Up, Down, Power OSD: Brightness, Contrast, Auto Adjust, Phase Clock, H. Position, V. Position, Sharpness, Color, Temperature, Language, OSD H/V Position, Video Select, Recall, Volume OSD Language: English,Spanish, German, Italian, French
Dimension		Physical (W H D): 30.8 in x 16 in x 10 in (with Stand) Carton(W H D): 22.5 in x 19 in x 17 in
Weight		Net: 28.66lbs Gross: 11.34kg/ 25lbs
Package Content		VGA Signal Cable DVI Audio Cable User Manual
Operating Conditions		Operating Conditions: Temperature: 32 degrees F - 113 degrees F; 0 degrees C - 45 degrees C; Humidity: 20% - 80% (non-condensing)
Regulations		FCC, CE, UL, TUV
Warranty		SOYO S.A.F.E. Program

This TFT disp

Link

Tags: Soyo, Monitor, Dual Head Monitor, Dual Head Display

It’s 4:53 am in Tokyo and I’ll bet people are lined up around the corner in some locations. Apparently some shops opened at midnight. Today Sony launches their PlayStation 3 offering.

The console officially went on sale on 11 November but reports suggest few stores opened at midnight to let fans get the long-awaited gadget.

Instead stores are organising lotteries to decide who in the queue gets a PS3.

Many gamers could go home disappointed as Sony has only made 100,000 machines available on launch day.

Only 100K of them? A rather nasty way to run up the hype.

Link

Tags: Sony PlayStation 3, PlayStation On Sale, Release Date November 11 2006, Sony, Tokyo

Here’s a cool time waster that will allow you to map out the countries that you have visited in the world. Sadly, this is the best I have done so far.

Where as my wife…

Slighty more worldly.

Link

Tags: Cool Stuff, Online Tools, World Travel, Time Waster