Platforms – Page 156 – Digital-Lifestyles

JOYTECH release first handheld Tablet-style DVD player

Claiming to be first of its kind, the PlayScreen from JOYTECH, includes a 7inch 16:9 WideScreen TFT monitor and a DVD player, all in a ‘Tablet Style’. There’s been lots of portable DVD players around before, but they all have a clamshell form with the screen in the upper lid.

It’s looks pretty versatile – it is able to play back CD Audio, DVD Movies, CR-R, JPEG Files, and MP3 Files. Audio playback though the integrated stereo speakers and utilise full Dolby Digital™ and DTS™ compatibility.

Portability comes via a rechargeable Lithium-Ion battery and in-car adaptor or for static use the unit can be desk mounted, wall or car mounted.

It will be available exclusively for £299.99 through play.com from October until January 2004 after which it will be freely available.

Looks fun and we look forward to get our hand on one.

JOYTECH

D-Link announce 1st UPnP standalone home network storage unit

D-Link have released a device, the DSM-602H, that they are call a Storage Media Central Home Drive. We think there are a couple of things about this product that are of note and are a signpost to the future.

Utilising an idea from business computing, where networked hard drive storage is separated from the server – a Storage Area Network (SAN) – this device is just for file storage. It doesn’t perform any other function. It just receives files, holds them and dispatches them on request of the processing machine, be that a Digital Media Adaptor, computer or another device.

While it’s not the first device to do this, the Martian NetDrive has been gathering fans for a while, it’s the first from a major manufacturer. We feel this will be a continuing trend – as consumers digitise and hold greater amounts of media, they will just add storage units to cope. There are two models for this, single standalone units like this the DSM-602H, and units that have a empty drive bays for a number of hard drives to be held.

The other significant development is that this is the first storage device that utilises Universal Plug-n-Play (UPnP). UPnP allows the user to just plug the device into any UPnP-friendly network, and without any manual configuration, it will sort out it’s own IP address, network name, announce its capabilities and make itself available to any other device on the network. UPnP or Apple’s similar Rendezvous are great advances for the home user, removing the unnecessary complexity of setup.

We imagine the only extension that this type of device will require in the future would be an interface to handle the drives contents Digital Rights Management (DRM). Rights holders of content won’t be distributing their products onto home networks that store their content without this.

It is disappointing to see that this first release is only 20Gb, which when put in the perspective of the Apple’s 40Gb iPod, sound pretty feeble. It’s no surprise that D-Link don’t mention storing video.

Available from mid-October at a surprisingly high $249.99, it’s interesting to see it comes with free 24/7 technical support – one of the essential features for Digital Lifestyle products.

Expect plenty more devices like this in the future.

Links: D-Link, Martian NetDrive, Apple Rendezvous & UPnP

Sony US announce details of PS2 hard drive

Following the long running rumours Sony has just confirmed that in March 2004 they will be releasing an 40Gb hard drive for their PlayStation 2 games console priced at $99. This gives them not just the ability to enhance game play, but to treat the PS2 as a media adaptor.

The hard drive will ship with a customised media player which includes the ability to play MP3’s, copy audio CD’s on to the PS2 and manage digital photos. As yet there is no detail about the handling or the playing of video files.

Since Microsoft announced the Xbox would have a hard disk, Sony has been concerned that the Xbox would be able to access digital media and display it on the connected TV. This, combined with the already available network adaptor, is the start of their response. In their words

“The Hard Disk Drive is a further step toward a new era of digital in-home entertainment, creating a total living room experience that includes games, movies and music.”

On the gaming side, users will be able to save their game progress as well as download new content – levels, missions and characters for their bought games. It will be sold pre-installed with Square Enix’s highly anticipated massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), Final Fantasy XI and pre-released demonstration of other upcoming games. One of the first games to utilise the Hard Drive will be the soon-to-be-released SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs and Syphon Filter: The Omega Strain, which probably needs the hard drive just to store its extraordinarily long title.

If you’re really desperate to get your hands of a hard drive for the PS2, one has been available since May 2002 as part of the Linux development bundle. Even though the drive in this kit is also 40Gb, it’s not expected that it will with the games.

PS2 Linux developer kit

Palm Introduce New Accessories

Our iPaqs were getting a bit old and scratched anyway, and we’ve had them for ages – and these new accessories make a Palm even more interesting.

The first accessory that caught our interest was the foldable infrared keyboard. People have been getting excited about Palm foldable keyboards for a couple of years, but being able to use the device without connecting the keyboard to it definitely has advantages. We wonder if a Bluetooth one will be next, though.

Somewhat cheesy, but we’re sure someone will love it, is the multifunction stylus: it’s a stylus and a pen. And a laser pointer. And a torch. The first three functions we can kind of see the point off, but the torch has us baffled. Definitely an “Executive Gift”.

Palm have also announced a 1.3 mega pixel camera card that will take 1280×1024 24-bit colour photographs and store them on a Palm in JPEG format. The camera is fully functional and isn’t just a pin hole lens with a CCD: it has a digital zoom and adjustable lens for close ups.

Palm Store

New Wireless LAN Chips Promise Low Power Consumption

Even with the Centrino specification, laptop and notebook battery life is still limited to a couple of hours – less if you’re using a wireless network connection. Broadcom have introduced a range of 54g chips that consume 75% less power than standard WiFi solutions.

The energy saving equates to this: a typical Pentium M notebook can run for about 20 minutes longer than the same one with a Centrino set up.

Broadcom

54g

Game Boy Advance Video Phone

You’ll probably need an SP to see what’s going on but a Japanese-only, $110 add-in for the GameBoy Advance has been announced by mobile and internet hardware manufacturer Digital Act.

The Campho Advance will go on sale in December and will allow you, and a friend who also has a GBA and Campho, to chat face to face down an analogue phone line – sadly the device isn’t wireless yet.

USA today on the Campho Advance

IBC News: Sony Announce new Version of SoundForge

SoundForge 7.0 will be the first new version of the popular digital audio package since Sony bought all of Sonic Foundry’s desktop production assets in July this year. Aside from an improved, more informative interface, automatic time-based recording and many other usability features, the new release includes Windows Media 9, QuickTime 6 and RealMedia file export. This updated content creation feature will make it extremely useful for rich-media website creation, as well as in the package’s more traditional applications in recording studios and broadcast environments.

Sony on SoundForge

IBC News: Autonomy and Virage Announce First Integrated Products

Autonomy and Virage have chosen this year’s IBC to announce the integration of the two companies’ key technologies.

Virage’s SmartEncode/VideoLogger/ControlCentre software is a leading platform for the automated capture, encoding and indexing of video. Autonomy’s Dremedia technology integrates structured and unstructured data by processing text, voice and video and then orders it by concept.

Autonomy acquired Virage in early September, for $24.8m, specifically with this sort of integration in mind: to enable customers to search and visualise their media stores. Given that many of Virage’s customers are large corporations or governments these media archives are likely to be vast.

Gartner on the Acquisition

3D Displays for Laptops – No Silly Glasses Required

Incorporating the new 3D LCD*1 technology developed by Sharp, their new PC-RD3D (sounds a bit Star Wars, really) is a high-performance workbook with a 2.8GHz processor and a GeForce 4 440 graphics chip.

The 3D display has very exciting applications: CAD, medical imaging, playing Star Wars Galaxies … but how does it work?

The display is switchable between two modes, standard 2D and a mode optimised for 3D applications. In 3D mode, light leaving the display is polarized by a filter into one of two different directions, so each eye sees a different image. This "parallax barrier system" has been used in things like those LCD switching glasses you get handed at the IMAX cinema, but this is the first time it’s been employed on a display.

Sharp explain how their 3D display works

Motorola’s Mini GPS Unit

The tiny FS Oncore module from Motorola consumes just 70mW whilst providing one position fix per second, and is designed to operate even with weak GPS signals.

To make the chip simpler, and therefore easier and cheaper to produce, the firmware is stored on the host device and retrieved when the chip is powered up.

Applications could include PDAs and maps that show real time navigation, position “stamping” in digital cameras, theft recovery, and mobile phones that can locate their position and find contacts and services nearby. The size of the unit means that it manufacturing companies will be able to use it in inventory tracking applications, and the low cost will help in making GPS units in cars more affordable.

FS Oncore User Manual

Synergy GPS