Now available for early Christmas shoppers is the rather curious iLuv i1055, a portable tablet-style DVD player with a built in 7-inch TFT LCD and twin 2 x 0.5W speakers.
Nothing too unusual about that until you spin the thing around to see that it’s also got an iPod dock bolted on the back.
The idea is that you slap in your 5th generation iPod with video (30GB, 60GB, 80GB) and then play back movies stored on the player via the 7″ widescreen (16:9 aspect ratio) active-matrix LCD.
The media player comes in two colours (black and white, so you can match it to your iPod), while those with older 1st or 2nd-generation iPods can use a line-in jack on the back of the unit.
The unit also comes with an S-Video output for external TV viewing, OSD (On-Screen Display) and supports multiple subtitle/angle/audio functions and slow/fast motion play and zoom operation.
The iLuv i1055 can be powered by a 10V AC Power Adapter, 12V Cigarette Lighter Adapter or its built Ni-MH Rechargeable Battery, serving up a claimed 2.5 hours playing time (which means you may come unstuck if you’re trying to watch one of those ultra long arthouse movies).
The unit has recently appeared on Amazon UK’s site priced at £150, but be advised there’s a 1-2 week shipping wait.
UK PC vendors Evesham have rolled out what they’re claiming is the smallest and lightest notebook on the market to feature an optical drive. 
What makes this wee laptop unusual is the fact that Evesham’s engineers have managed to wedge in a DVD/CDRW/Dual Layer DVD-RW drive, instead of offering the usual external optical drive bundled with most small laptops. 
There’s also onboard audio and speakers and a battery life claimed at a healthy five hours, with an optional extended battery ramping uptime to a day-spanning ten hours. 
Microsoft is giving the Universal Music Group (UMG) a per-unit fee for each Zune that they sell, in addition to the money that they’ll make out sell music tracks on it too. 
Users of Palm Treo smartphones will already appreciate the pop up that appears onscreen after a call from a new caller, making it easy to add fresh contacts to the address book. 
Depending on whether the contact is a new one or not, these buttons let you view the contact’s full profile, create a new contact from the received phone number, add the number to a current contact or add the contact/phone number to the Palm’s daily journal application. 
Using YourCall
The program was easy to set up and use, we liked the friendly interface and integration with other Palm apps, and for power users who rely on their phone for their working life, we could see that YourCall could prove an invalble addition. 
Nvidia are extending their expertise in providing the chippery for portable devices by buying PortalPlayer, who are responsible for the controlling chips for the hard-disk-based iPods, or “powers some of the world’s most recognizable portable digital music players,” as they chose to describe it. 
A new survey has revealed that UK consumers are way down with streaming and downloading audio-visual content into their living room, but they’re not so keen on paying for the stuff. 
The report found that half of those questioned weren’t prepared to pay a single Goddamn bean extra for streamed/downloaded content, with a further 18% only willing to cough up £2 per month for content, and 22% only happy to pay between £2 and £5. 
According to Olswang’s research, easily-distracted, multi-tasking consumers are paying less attention to watching programmes, with 46% of respondents busy emailing and 43% web surfing while watching television. 
If you’re having problems thinking of that perfect technological widget to make your Christmas go with a seasonal swing, look no further than Brando’s fabulous feast o’ festive trinkets. 
USB Fibre Optic Christmas Tree II
USB LED Music X’mas Tree
USB Drumming Santa
Apple has announced that the updated version of their teensy-weensy iPod Shuffle will be ready to tempt your wallet from today. 
The Shuffle comes with a 1GB capacity – enough for around 240 tunes – and users can elect to play songs in sequence or randomly. 
Apple has sold more than 
Windows system requirements
With the evenings drawing in and artic breezes circulating around your workstation, it may be time to invest in some handy USB-powered warming devices. 
USB G-Gloves for girlies
Musicians today, eh? Spolit rotten. 
The pint sized marvel offers four simultaneous playback tracks (plus 32 V-Tracks), MP3 compatibility, onboard multi-effects, built-in rhythm patterns, a tuner, USB connectivity and SD expansion card slot. 
The Micro BR is essentially is a four-track studio with four simultaneous playback tracks and two simultaneous record / input tracks, but with each of the four main playback tracks having eight companion V-Tracks, users can record multiple takes and then pick the killer version for the final mixdown. 
Due to start shipping at the end of the year, the price looks pretty competitive too, with one US site offering it for just $230 – a price that wouldn’t even buy you a half-decent drum machine back in our day (mumble, moan, ‘kids have it too easy these days,’ etc etc zzzz).