It truly was a battle of the consoles this Christmas, with big-hitters Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony all looking to set the Yuletide cash tills ringing.
According to analysts at the US research firm NPD, Santa’s bags were mostly straining with Xbox 360’s over the festive period, closely followed by the Nintendo Wii, with the PS3 trailing in third place.
Preliminary findings from NPD revealed that the Xbox 360 outsold both the Wii and the PS3 in the US, with around 2 million Xbox 360s shifted between the start of November 2006 and Christmas.
Not far behind was the eagerly awaited Nintendo Wii which registered 1.8 million sales, while the PS3 could only muster a mere 750,000 Stateside sales.
According to NPD, these figures represent a huge leap from November’s figures which saw 511,000 Xbox 360s, 476,000 Wiis and 197,000 PS3s flying out of the stores.
It’s worth noting that Nintendo’s Wii didn’t launch in the US until 19th November – nearly three weeks behind the Xbox 360 – with the first batch of stock reported as selling out in hours.
It was a similar situation in the UK, with Nintendo Wii’s near-impossible to find in the shops (yes, we were looking too and someone’s still waiting for their Christmas present!).
One of PC World’s flagship stores in the West End told Digital Lifestyles that their consignment of Wii consoles went almost as soon as they came through the door, although we noted no shortage of XBox 360s in the store.
NPD is expected to release the complete figures for December later this month.
Samsung has launched what it claims is the first mobile phone in the known universe to come with an optical joystick.
The slide-open phone also comes with an illumination sensor which automatically controls the brightness of the LCD screen and keypad, so you won’t be dazzled if the phone goes off in the middle of the night.
Christmas is certainly the time to be purloining down Lagos way, with the Digital Lifestyle office receiving an upsurge in deceased relative scams, phishing emails and the usual “YOU HAVE WON 2,575 TRILLION DOLLARS” nonsense.
First off, a rummage through the headers revealed that the email was a better-than-average forgery, with the obfuscated email originating not from the company themselves, but from an 
Naturally, we reported our experience to Amazon, but were unable to resist replying to his email thus:
T-Mobile UK has announced the launch of the T-Mobile Sidekick 3, the number one accessory for users who can’t get enough of email and instant messaging on the move.
Jet-setting socialites will appreciate its tri-band support (850/900/1800MHz), enabling them to keep up their vital text messaging on both sides of the pond, with EDGE offering extra nippy Web surfing.
The GSM Sidekick also comes with Bluetooth connectivity 1.2 for wireless headsets and vCard transfer and 64MB of SDRAM/64MB Flash memory.
Rock Bottom: Nikon D40 £400 (with lens)
Budget: Canon EOS E400D (£500 body-only)
Enthusiast: Nikon D80 (£600 body only)
We can always rely on our gadget-fruitcake chums at Brando to dream up a thoroughly daft gizmo or two, so we were delighted to find that they’ve just released a ‘Mobile Phone Telescope’ for Sony Ericsson phones.
According to Brando’s site, users first have to manually focus with the unattached 6x lens, and then clip the lens onto a Sony Ericsson handset using the included lens mount (unless the image is clear enough on the camera’s screen to focus accurately).
MySpace and Cingular Wireless have pressed the flesh and announced an exclusive partnership to offer enhanced MySpace functionality to all Cingular mobile users.
MySpace Mobile also lets users post to their MySpace blogs when they’re on the move, as well as add friends to a contact list for quick bookmarking.
The iPhone has been revealed, but it’s not coming from Apple, but network and router specialists, Cisco.
Back to the kit, Cisco’s new range includes a $180 (£92) iPhone Dual-Mode Internet Telephony Kit for Skype CIT400 which plugs directly into an Ethernet port and a $200 (£102) iPhone Wireless-G Phone for Skype WIP320 which offers Skype and landline calls.
According to a report in yesterday’s Observer, Google has been cosying up to mobile giants Orange with a multi-billion-dollar plan to knock out a ‘Google phone,’ offering easy Web searches on the move.
The Observer reported that the phone could access Google’s databases to offer a wealth of location-based searches, including personalised listings of local cinemas, restaurants and other amenities, and maps and images from Google Earth.
Santa’s sleigh bells are in danger of being drowned out by the ringing of virtual cash tills, with a new report revealing that UK Internet retail sales hit £3 billion for the first time during November.
Looking back to 2004 reveals just how dramatic the increase of online sales has become, with the year only averaging a comparatively feeble growth rate of just £16 million per month.