Dr. Augustine Fou's Online Scrapbook

Tuesday, April 07, 2009

Samsung Impression now on sale at AT&T

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/07/samsung-impression-now-on-sale-at-atandt/

If you were waiting for a big-ass OLED display before pulling the trigger on a new North American handset, go ahead and get your wallet (or coin purse, or piggy bank, whatever) ready. The Samsung Impression has now officially launched on AT&T, bringing HSDPA, microSD expansion, landscape sliding QWERTY keyboard, and a 3 megapixel camera -- but the headlining feature clearly has to be that gorgeous 3.2-inch AMOLED screen clocking in at 400 x 240 resolution. $199.99 on contract after rebate makes it yours, if you think you can really handle everyone within a 50-foot radius being dazzled every time you turn it on.

Filed under: Cellphones

Samsung Impression now on sale at AT&T originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Apr 2009 02:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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iTunes Store now infected with variable pricing, Amazon still $0.99

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/07/itunes-store-now-infected-with-variable-pricing-amazon-still-0/

As promised, variable pricing has now been implemented at the iTunes music store. Already, we're seeing most of top 10 singles and 33 of the top 100 hitting the top price-point of $1.29 (encoded as DRM-free 256kbps AAC). Interesting as Amazon's uncomfortably similar top 10 list has all these tracks priced at $0.99 (encoded as DRM-free 256kbps VBR MP3). A handful of tracks (nine in the top 100) do hit the higher $1.29 price further down Amazon's list. Now, if you believe Steve (someone who originally postured against this price structure), then it appears that the music labels are charging Apple more for the rights to sell its music than Amazon based on this quote attributed to Jobs in the Apple press release from January:

in April, based on what the music labels charge Apple, songs on iTunes will be available at one of three price points-69 cents, 99 cents and $1.29-with many more songs priced at 69 cents than $1.29.

Regardless, we know where we'll be purchasing our Miley Cyrus from now on.

[Thanks, Jesse]

Read -- January "Changes Coming to the iTunes Store" press release
Read -- iTunes top songs [Warning: iTunes App link]
Read -- Amazon top songs

Filed under: Portable Audio

iTunes ! Store no w infected with variable pricing, Amazon still $0.99 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Apr 2009 04:34:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Netgear EVA 9150 Digital Entertainer Elite unboxed, previewed, well loved

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/07/netflix-eva-9150-digital-entertainer-elite-unboxed-previewed-w/

When we last got some hands-on time with Netgear's EVA9150 Digital Entertainer Elite at CES, we found it to be a pretty impressive media streamer. The aptly-titled MyDigitalEntertainer's managed to get an early unit -- packaged and everything -- and has provided ample unboxing pictures and some hands-on impressions. It's love all around, with a faster interface, extended support, and a new buffer ability that makes it a lot smoother than its predecessors. The RSS feature is functional enough, but any video podcast streams you subscribe to should be great. YouTube HD support is an added plus, but we've got no word on CinemaNow and we're admittedly a bit bummed by no Netflix. Hit up the read link for the full preview.

Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment

Netgear EVA 9150 Digital Entertainer Elite unboxed, previewed, well loved originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Apr 2009 07:18:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Data Robotics goes large with 8-bay DroboPro

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/07/data-robotics-goes-large-with-8-bay-drobopro/

Not sure if you've been keeping tabs, but it's been just shy of a full year since we've seen a new piece of hardware from the labs of Data Robotics. 60,000 Drobos later, we're being formally introduced to the bigger, stronger and more capacious DroboPro. As the name implies, this 8-bay beast is truly aimed at small businesses and creative professionals, but there's nothing here that the average consumer can't fall in love with. Generally speaking, everything here has remained the same as the second-gen Drobo: it looks similar, it uses the same genius BeyondRAID intelligent data storage technology and it's not really meant to be used on networks. Interested to hear more? Hop on past the break for all the dirt.

Gallery: Data Robotics goes large with 8-bay DroboPro