Suffire.com | Geek Stuffs, Technology Related

So, here’s a conundrum for ya. Sony’s PlayStation 3 has been all but universally hailed as a stellar Blu-ray player and a respectable part of any home theater. But Sony forgot to include an IR receptor on the thing, making it incompatible with the vast majority of universal remotes on the market. Solution? An Infrared-to-Bluetooth converter. For the longest while, the original IR2BT was the de facto choice for handling the conversion, but now that it has been replaced with the more expensive (and versatile, in fairness) IR2BTci, CNET decided to roundup three other viable options so you, the almighty consumer, could make the choice that serves you best. Hit the read link for a gathering of the reviews, and don’t forget to curse Sony for making you go through this exercise in the first place.

Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment, Peripherals

Infrared-to-Bluetooth converter roundup: get universal control of your PS3 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 Nov 2008 07:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Oh noes, here we go again. At the risk of becoming RED’s marketing pawn, we’d be remiss to the gadget community by ignoring Jim Jannard’s latest attention begging tease. Titled simply, “Big Change…,” Jannard writes, “New announcement on Dec. 3rd. Everything has changed… just as we promised.” This comes after revealing “several nice breakthroughs” related to Scarlet and EPIC in the REDUSER forums. JJ then amps up the hype by calling the November 13th announcement of RED’s Digital Still and Motion Camera (DSMC) system “insignificant” by comparison. Ok Jim, we’ll be at your beck and call. But you’d better show up on the 3rd with something priced more competitively to Canon’s EOS 5D Mark II if you expect us to consider your modular SLR / HD video camera anything other than a novelty for the consumer or prosumer markets. In other words: please, with sugar?

[Thanks, Ben H.]

Filed under: Digital Cameras

RED making “Big Change” announcement on December 3rd originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 Nov 2008 06:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

You probably recall that two days ago, when the new Xbox Experience launched, sadly, about 300 Sony Pictures films were unavailable for Netflix Watch Instantly on NXE, thus quashing your hopes of streaming The Karate Kid series. At the time, it seemed possible that missing titles were due to the fact that Xbox 360 manufacturer Microsoft and Sony are direct competitors. Well, according to a Sony spokesperson, the problem isn’t specific to the Xbox, nor is their beef competition-related in any way. Sony also says it is in talks with the several “relevant parties” to work out these vague licensing issues, though there was no word on when the issue would be resolved. We really do hope it’s soon because we’re dying to see how everything turns out with the Cobra Kai.

[Via Joystiq]

Filed under: Gaming, HDTV, Home Entertainment

Xbox 360’s lack of Sony Pictures films streaming on Netflix “unrelated” to competition originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 20 Nov 2008 21:41:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

FED (or Field Emission Display) hasn’t quite caught on as quickly as some other display technologies, but Sony’s still out there doing its best to move things forward, and it certainly looks to have turned more than a few heads with its latest demo. Apparently not content with simply showing off a new 19-inch display from its spin-off, Field Emission Technologies, Sony went so far as to demo it with a customized version of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue that’s playable at 240 fps. To do that, Sony used four PS3s to increase the frame rate, something it had previously done to run the game at quadruple the resolution of 1080p on a Sony SXHD projector. While that setup is out of the reach of most folks, Field Emission Technologies says that FED displays are now finally heading to market, and that some high-end professional FED video monitors up to 32-inches in size will be available sometime next year.

[Via OLED-Display.info]

Filed under: Displays

Sony demos 19-inch FED display running Gran Turismo 5 at 240 fps originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 20 Nov 2008 18:46:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

(Credit: CBS Interactive)

As someone who’s never been a big fan of AM/FM radio, I never really saw the advantage of HD Radio. At first, the all-digital format promised little more than CD-quality digital transmission of existing stations. Then the broadcasters added multicasting, offering “HD2″ stations that weren’t available at all on analog hardware. They even sweetened the deal by temporarily reducing or suspending commercials on those HD2 stations (though that program has recently ended).

But the thing that most retarded the growth of HD Radio adoption was the price of the hardware. The earliest tabletop HD Radios, for instance, cost upwards of $500–not exactly an impulse purchase. In the years since, prices have tumbled: tabletop and in-car models hit $200 last year, and newer HD-enabled clock radios can be found for under $100 now. Still, as far as in-home options none of the models we’d tested had really blown us away.

That’s finally changed with the Sony XDR-F1HD. …

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Peripherals, Portable Audio

Rather than just introducing these five items individually, Sony reckoned the world at large may pay more attention if they were unveiled in one fell swoop. To that end, we’re left staring at a new pair of noise canceling headphones (MDR-NC7; $50), travel speakers (SRS-M50; $50), a universal remote (RM-VL610; $30), EX Series earbuds (MDR-EX36V; $30) and stereo Bluetooth headphones (DR-BT160AS; $160). While the first two are pretty self-explanatory, color lovers will appreciate the three swappable back plates for the remote, and the water-resistant BT ‘phones pack a built-in microphone, rechargeable Li-ion cells and A2DP support. Everything should be available now if you look hard enough, and the full release with all the gory details is waiting just after the break.

Continue reading Sony unveils five new audio accessories: headphones, speakers and remote

Sony unveils five new audio accessories: headphones, speakers and remote originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Nov 2008 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

Remember when Microsoft was hit with a lawsuit over its “Vista Capable” stickers? How about when the judge unsealed emails revealing that after a long battle to promote Vista’s graphics-intensive Aero UI, it capitulated and lowered the requirements for the sticker so Intel could keep on selling its graphically-challenged (i.e., WDDM noncompliant) 915 chipset? Yeah, that was awesome. Connoisseurs of corporate drama should appreciate the latest development — the judge has made public a second batch of emails revealing that MS execs were at odds about that decision. Senior VP Will Poole apparently made the call to appease Intel, but co-President of Platform & Services Jim Allchin (along with many others who had been fighting for the other side for months) was “beyond being upset,” saying “this was totally mismanaged by Intel and Microsoft. What a mess.” The mess he was referring to: an unhappy partner in HP, which had spent millions to meet the old standards… and presciently, the lawsuit we’re watching now. Alright, maybe not so awesome for everyone.

More “Vista Capable” emails unsealed, revealing sassy civil war originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Nov 2008 09:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Click to view the full Sony NV-U44 GPS review.

(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)

As the entry-level model in the Sony NAV-U line of portable GPS devices, the NV-U44 has a fairly basic feature set. There’s no Bluetooth hands-free. There’s no traffic information. There’s no multimedia playback. …

Originally posted at The Car Tech blog

In any collection of similar laptops, the one with the Sony Vaio logo is likely to be the most expensive in the group. So, imagine our pleasant surprise to find the Vaio AW125 to be less expensive than the other 18-inch, Blu-ray equipped laptops we’ve seen.

Our Blu-ray HP HDX18 …