We mentioned back when the first release of software to backup your HD-DVD came out—there was some dispute over just how cracked that was, but as the first pirated HD DVD movie has since showed up, it seems that it was legitimate enough.
But while the Blu-Ray camp might have been laughing, feeling secure in their own copy protection scheme, those of us who know the real truth—that it's pretty much impossible to create an uncrackable system—were sure it was only a matter of time.
So I'm hardly surprised that Blu-Ray has been reported as cracked—by the same person who reputedly cracked HD DVD, too. BackupBluray is provided for the stated purpose of being able to backup your Blu-ray discs onto your computer. Like BackupHDDVD, this first version only works with version whose keys are known, but full decryption is supposedly forthcoming. Let this be a message to you, content providers, people want their media unencumbered, okay?
There are cameras everywhere these days: ATMs, airports, casinos, even in your necktie. Don't look—they'll know. The Spy Tie consists of a tiny pinhole camera that can be concealed in an average everyday necktie. It connects to a tiny digital video recorder, about the size of a pack of cigarettes, that includes a 2.4" LCD display. Battery life lasts for 60 minutes on this sucker, allowing you to capture all the fantastic spyworthy stuff that I'm sure just fills your life. No offense.
Resolution on the camera is a decent 720x480; via the SD card interface, you can store roughly 280 minutes at the maximum supported 4GB (the SD card is sold separately). The price for this marvel of modern espionage? Just £645, or ~$1273.
Tie not included.
[via Red Ferret Journal]
Okay, look, I'm with John Gruber on this one: you companies abusing punctuation, please just stop. I'm talking to you, Hey!Watch. First off, you've got an exclamation point in there, and second of all, you're totally missing spaces. When the English sentences become one long word in roughly 2025, I'll be blaming you. Whocouldreadasentencelikethisanwyay? It's annoying.
That said, your service is still pretty cool. Upload a video to the site and you can convert it into pretty much any format you like (DiVX, MP4, TiVo, DVD, WMV, Flash, etc.) for any device you like (iPod, Zune, PSP, DS, Wii, etc.). Pretty snazzy, and they're adding more all the time. Another handy feature is that they put all of your converted videos into an XML feed, so you can subscribe with iTunes and have it automatically download the videos when they're done. I'm not sure whether it takes longer to upload, wait for the convert, and download it then to just run the conversion yourself, but I suppose it depends on your hardware and net connection. The free plan is pretty good, but for $5/month you can add more monthly encoding sessions, longer videos, and more features.
Just get rid of the wacky name, okay?
[via Lifehacker]
I've shot a few video podcasts using my MacBook's built-in iSight. While it's not the greatest camera in the world, it works pretty well, and it's hard to beat the fact that it's right there, no fiddling required.
But one issue I have is that even though the camera is just above the screen, I sometimes need to refer to something on my display. And even that brief flick of the eyes to the screen looks clunky and unprofessional. Professional newscasters, of course, have a teleprompter for their cameras: using reflection, the scripts are overlaid on the camera lens, allowing them to read the scripts while looking at the camera.
Bodelin's See Eye 2 Eye is a contraption that attaches to your webcam and uses a series of mirrors to allow you to look at both your screen and the camera at the same time. Not only does this let you use it as a teleprompter (using special software), but it also means that when having video chats, you can look at the person you're talking to and the camera at the same time.
It runs $99, and you have your choice of models compatible with standalone webcams or built-in webcams such as the iSight.
[via The Raw Feed]
There's a whole lot of fighting to see who can make the biggest, bestest HD display. Among the contenders I've seen on the floor are offerings from Sharp, Panasonic, and LG, all of which are weighing it at over 100 inches. They vary in technology: Panasonic's model is a 103" plasma, while LG's 102" and Sharp's 108" are both LCD screens. At the moment, Sharp and Panasonic hold the world's records for largest plasma and LCD screens respectively: expect that to change before too long.
While hundred inch screens have a lot in the way of wow factor, I wonder if it's a size that is really only practical for the crème de la crème. I made a crack about not having a 103"-compatible wall, but as I started to think about it last night, I realized that it's actually true: there really isn't any place in my house that I think I could easily fit a one hundred inch screen. Then again, the pricetags are probably out of my reach as well. Of course, now that there's the AppleTV...
Word of LG's hybrid player first trickled down last week, but I got a chance to glance at it and talk to an LG rep last night. He answered one of my burning questions: what happens if you put one of Warner's hybrid Blu-Ray/HD DVD discs into the hybrid player? Turns out the hybrid discs have HD DVD on one side, Blu-Ray on the other, so it'll play whatever you put in.
The player, dubbed the "BH100 LG Super Multi Blue Player" (not an ounce of hyperbole, I'm sure), not only boasts compatibility with both HD formats, but also plays standard DVDs. All the features you'd expect to find on an a high def optical player are present: HDMI out, composite and component, optical and 5.1 channel audio, et cetera.
The real question is how this will affect the format war? With a list price of around $1200, the player is significantly more expensive than HD-DVD players, and slightly more expensive than Blu-Ray players (while still being much less expensive than buying one of each). Where LG has gone, others will likely follow, but hovering over this entire war is the dark cloud of downloadable HD video. Could the HD optical formats be DOA? Expect to see the hybrid player in this quarter, though the fallout might take years.
I just walked out of the Samsung press conference, having had so much information pushed down my throat that I'm actually suffering from indigestion. Sammy's president and CEO Gee Sung Choi (pictured) dragged out the pom-poms to cheer on Samsung's #1 position in the worldwide TV market, and then ran down what to expect from these guys this year.
The bottom line: a lot. Most of the time, unsurprisingly, was spent on Samsung's TV lines, but mentions was given to their music player line, Blu-Ray, and IT products (monitors, printers, etc.). New versions of pretty much everything abound, so let's do a quick rundown.
Continue reading "CES '07: Samsung gives it the full court press"
I'm not sure if I should be rechristening "Format War '06" to "Format War '07" or something more specific, like "High-Def Disc Format War." It just doesn't have the same ring to it. How about "Wars fought by big companies in which the loser in the average Consumer"?
Two companies have thrown up white flags in an attempt to quell the rising hostilities. Electronics maker LG has announced a hybrid Blu-Ray/HD DVD player that will appear at CES next week, and will be widely available in early 2007. Both LG and Samsung had toyed last year with the idea of a hybrid player, though reports went back and forth as to whether such a device would appear. The question now is its price: will it be in the range of HD DVD players (~$500), Blu-Ray players (~$1000), or perhaps somewhere in the price range of the two combined? We'll find out soon.
Meanwhile, as we reported last year (admittedly, it feels funny to say "last year" when this year is only four years old, but I digress), Time Warner will unveil their hybrid disc that would contain both Blu-Ray and HD DVD content (and, at some undefined point in the future, standard def DVD content) also at CES.
Hybrid players or hybrid discs? Sounds like we have a new format war on our hands. Can they coexist peacefully?
[via Gizmodo]
