Analyst: US 3G growth pulls even with Europe
The US has finally caught up with Western Europe in 3G wireless adoption, according to one analyst group, citing an 80 percent market surge over the past year. And Asia-Pacific, other research says, may actually be lagging behind.
As of June 2008, a total of 28.4 percent of US mobile subscribers (64.2 million) were equipped with 3G devices, in comparison to 28.3 percent across the largest countries in Europe, says a new report from ComScore released today.
Korea Times: Sony home video at the tail end of a Korean exodus
Korea Times reports that Sony's DVD distribution arm in Korea has decided to stop selling discs in that country, making it the last of the major studios to do so.
A request for confirmation by BetaNews with Sony went unanswered as of press time. If the news is accurate, Sony would actually be the last of the major Hollywood studios to pull out of the South Korean market over the last two years, following Paramount, Disney (Buena Vista), Universal, and 20th Century Fox. It seems as if Korean consumers just aren't interested in DVDs any more.
Toshiba debuts 'SRT' upconverting LCD TVs
Toshiba's new functionality -- dubbed Super Resolution Technology -- makes its debut in the company's Regza line of televisions, and promises to upconvert standard definition television to HD-like quality.
Toshiba has made several moves over the past few months following HD DVD's collapse that almost make it seem like it wants to sabotage Blu-ray, and this latest play could be considered one such move. It also announced plans in June to add firmware to SD DVD players to improve picture quality of regular DVDs.
Google's Chrome is gaining users, especially in the wee hours
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Less than day after its beta release on Sept. 2, statistics show Google's Chrome became the fourth most used browser on the Web, well above Beta 2 of Internet Explorer 8.0 -- another browser that had shown big gains in recent days.
Blu-ray gets more high-end consoles
Today at the Custom Electronic Design & Installation Association (CEDIA) expo in Denver, Colorado, The Blu-ray player market got bigger by a fraction as Sony and Pioneer debuted new hardware.
Sony introduced its BDV-IT1000ES and BDV-IS1000, single-disc "theater-in-a-box" systems that feature Sony's S-AIR wireless 5.1 channel audio, and up to 1080p video quality.
Samsung UK exec: Blu-ray's got five years to live
An official with one of the format's principal supporting companies gives it a rather short life span, saying another technology would replace it.
If Samsung UK consumer electronics chief Andy Griffiths is correct, the format would have spent only seven years as a commercially viable format. Compare this to DVD, which has been available to consumers for well over a decade.
Dell launches its Inspiron Mini 9 ultra-portable
Officially launched by Dell today, the Inspiron Mini 9 isn't exactly the only Netbook out there, but Dell is selling it in some very interesting ways, including as a $99 extra if you buy it along with another laptop.
Weighing in at 2.28 pounds, the Mini 9 represents just the first in a series of ultra-portable from Dell, said John New, Dell's senior product line manager, in a pre-briefing for BetaNews at a Dell press event in New York City last month.
The Google Chrome EULA debacle: Whose content is it, anyway?
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Yesterday, Google made some quick changes to the terms of service for its new Chrome Web browser beta, to alleviate users' fears of misuse of their data. But how many other similar EULAs cast suspicion on the services they cover?
Amazon Video on Demand leaves beta
Amazon's Video On Demand, which began beta testing in July, was officially released in its working form yesterday.
Movie, TV, and Web-exclusive content can now be streamed or downloaded using Amazon Video On Demand. While downloading still requires the Amazon Unbox Video Player, it does make purchased content available for later viewing on PCs, portable devices, as well as media center-connected Xbox 360s. Sony Bravia Internet Video Link and certain TiVo boxes will also enable customers to peruse and purchase Amazon Videos On Demand directly on their TVs.
East coast iPhone 3G users report data service outages
11:04 am EST September 4, 2008 - After iPhone 3G customers were informed yesterday by AT&T at about 10:30 am yesterday that a problem affecting their 3G data use had been resolved, an AT&T spokesperson informed Reuters that it had resolved the issue at about noon yesterday.
AT&T spokesperson Mark Siegel told Reuters that the telco had traced the problem to "a routing issue in the way data is routed to and from wireless devices," though no further information on the cause was revealed.
Sony recalls hazardous Vaio notebooks
Sony this morning announced the recall of certain Vaio TZ series notebooks after a number of consumers reported overheating, with one even resulting in minor burns.
The notebooks, according to Sony, contain "irregularly positioned wires near the computer's hinge and/or a dislodged screw inside the hinge [that] can cause a short circuit and overheating."
TiVo debuts a super-sized 1 terabyte HD DVR
One day after announcing its new DirecTV deal, the DVR manufacturer announced its highest capacity HD DVR yet, with the ability to record up to 150 hours of high-definition programming.
Appropriately named the TiVo HD XL, the new device's storage capacity at "basic quality" is about 1,350 hours, and at "best quality" about 332 hours. These are estimates based on information disclosed to BetaNews by TiVo; and as current TiVo users may point out, few users prefer to record at "basic quality."
Microsoft extends Xbox 360 price cut to the US
With the unmistakable thunder of another shoe dropping, Microsoft announced Wednesday evening that it is dropping the prices of its three Xbox 360 bundles -- the Arcade, "Console," and Elite -- in the US.
The basic 256 MB "Arcade" game console package drops to the $199.99 mark, in a new pricing initiative that begins this Friday. The 20 GB hard drive unit sinks in price to $299.99, and the Elite 120 GB model drops to $399.99.
Analysts: Cable broadband growing faster than telcos and DSL
The current growth of DSL in the US remains less compelling than that of broadband cable, say the latest industry surveys. What may be more compelling, though, is that cable is now overtaking telcos.
Four years ago, only 20 percent of US homes subscribed to a broadband service, compared to 57 percent this year, according to a recent report by Leichtman Research Group (LRG) entitled "Broadband Access & Service in the Home 2008."
Linden Labs' Second Life adds VoIP client
At the Virtual Worlds conference in Los Angeles this week, entrepreneurs have gathered to discuss the big business that online worlds have become. Linden Labs' successful Second Life received some noteworthy "fourth wall breakers" today.
Linden Labs and Vivox partnered to create SLim, a messaging client scaled to the massively multiplayer world. SLim is a discrete VoIP/IM client that is meant to run alongside the Second Life viewer. It can complement onscreen interactions, or it can communicate with others not necessarily running the Second Life application.
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