Sony Erricsion Mobile Phones: Introducing That Which Is The Best

The latest Sony Ericsion mobile phones have very good designs and users find it extremely beneficial to use them for connectivity as well as business use. People find it convenient on their part to buy the handsets as they are available at a cheap price.

In the diaspora of the mobile world, the latest Sony Erricsion mobile phones have achieved a lot of importance. There importance is palpable and can be felt in every nook and corner of the world. People buy the latest phones from the house of Sony in huge numbers. This is the reason why it is increasingly felt that the handsets leave a deep scar in the mind of people. These handsets play a vital role in keeping people abreast with the latest entertainment options.

The user-friendliness of the gadgets are also admirable. It is the user-friendliness that makes people fall in love with the device. The devices are very impressive and that leaves people overwhelmed with them. The user-friendliness of the device is the reason why these handsets are liked so much.

These mobile phones, have maximised the chances of seamless connectivity. The users find these widgets one of the ideal forerunners in mobile business. It is this idealism that makes it possible for people to find handsets of their dream.

The latest Sony Ericsson phones are known to play a very dominating role when it comes to business. People can make use of handsets to start up business of their own. The user-friendliness of the device is what draws people toward it and make them feel good about it.

They have a lot of success stories to tell. The users find these handsets awesome with lot of innovative features. They are incorporated with the best mobile features.

Then the latest sony erricsion mobile phones, are also priced very low. It is possible for people to buy the handsets at a very reasonable price. Thus opens up avenues for people to buy handsets at low cost. Information about these handsets are available on the internet. It is the information, available on the internet that allows people to find gadgets that are the best. People just need to make use of information available on the internet and choose the gadget that fits them right.

The phones of Sony Ericsson are also known for their unrelenting entertainment options in the form of music player, camera, Fm radio and others. People can depend on these options for capturing sharp pictures and videos and listening to mind soothing music. Users also make use of the FM radio to listen to songs and other radio programs that are captivating. The battery of these handsets are capable of delivering long hours of stand by time and talk-time. So, people are capable of making good use of the handsets and their various features.

The sorting out of Sony Ericsson phones as outstanding gadgets, in comparison to other mobiles like Nokia, Motorola and others, has paved the way for people to buy the best handsets. It is now possible for people to buy their dream handsets and also stay tuned to the latest innovations in technology. This is because every handset of Sony Ericsson is incorporated with the latest technology.

Source : http://www.itworld.com/

AMD Powers Up Its Graphics Biz

SUNNYVALE, Calif. – When AMD went looking for a graphics partner in 2006, so the rumor in the Silicon Valley goes, it initially courted nVidia. Such a pairing made sense; nVidia was only a few miles away in Santa Clara, it had outstanding graphics and made chipsets and was a market leader.

But the deal never came together, for any one of several reasons. Whichever you choose to believe, AMD (NYSE: AMD) had to settle for what many observers believed was its second-best option, ATI Technologies. Not only was ATI across the continent, it was in another country, Canada.

Now, instead of a local partner, AMD had to pick up a third major office, in ATI's native Toronto, on top of its Sunnyvale headquarters and Austin, Texas, where many executives are based. Plus there were all of the cross-border headaches.

Two years later that deal is paying off handsomely for AMD. Graphics are about $1 billion of AMD's $6 billion in annual sales, and growing. It now has its first mobile platform to compete with Intel's Centrino, it's working on a CPU-GPU combination technology called Fusion, and ATI has come roaring to life, making significant gains on nVidia in the market thanks to a strong new product offering.

That success comes from basically adopting a multi processor strategy. For its most recent video cards, ATI decided not to follow its typical course of using one large, bleeding tech GPU. Instead, ATI put two GPUs, with perhaps less than bleeding tech performance, together. When running in parallel on the video card, the duo more than made up for any lags in individual performance.

"It was a big risk, because it was a departure from what worked for 10 years," said Rick Bergman, senior vice president and general manager of the graphics products group.

It paid off. ATI's business grew 55 percent from Q2 to Q3 of this year, and 40 percent over Q3 of 2007.

Source : http://www.internetnews.com/

Analysts: Shanghai puts AMD back in the fight with Intel

With this week's early release of its first 45-nanometer chip, Advanced Micro Devices Inc. has taken a big step toward putting its troubles behind it and giving Intel Corp. something to worry about.

On Thursday, AMD released its next-generation Opteron quad-core chip, code-named Shanghai. AMD's quad-core debut in 45nm manufacturing is about a year behind Intel's move from 65nm to 45nm technology, but the switchover brings the company up to speed with a rival that has been outpacing it on both technology and marketing fronts.

"This shows that they are back on track and have regained their footing," said Jim McGregor, an analyst at In-Stat in Scottsdale, Ariz.

"This is critical for AMD. They're rebuilding credibility. … This makes them more competitive at a critical time -- right before Intel comes out with Nehalem."

AMD is hoping the new Opteron chips can help it rebound from the struggles that bogged it down after delaying the release of its Barcelona chip. The eight-month delay, caused by a glitch in the processor, lost the company market share, as well as mind-share, prior to Barcelona's ultimate release last spring.

The chip maker's troubles didn't end there.

AMD went through a series of executive shake-ups this summer, culminating in Dirk Meyer replacing Hector Ruiz as CEO, just as the company was reporting its seventh consecutive quarterly loss. And then last month, AMD announced that it is splitting off its manufacturing operations into a separate company to cut costs and get an infusion of capital. The new business, which is being temporarily called The Foundry Co., will assume about $1.2 billion of AMD's debt.

Intel has scheduled the launch of its first Nehalem chip for Nov. 17, which also will be the day several PC makers begin shipping desktop computers running the new processor. Officially named Core i7, the Intel chip is a quad-core designed for high-end desktops for power users and gamers. Intel has been shipping previews of the chips to hardware vendors since September.

And while Intel continues to push out new products, AMD is putting itself back on track with its early release of Shanghai, which had originally been scheduled for release in the first quarter of next year.

"AMD was very smart in not only delivering Shanghai around two months early, but they also delayed the big announcement until they had units in hand and [were] shipping," said Dan Olds, principal analyst at the Gabriel Consulting Group. "I'm always saying that AMD has to execute, and they did it with this product. I believe this gets them back into the game with Intel. This chip should be competitive from both a pricing and performance standpoint and puts AMD at parity with Intel, at least for the short term."

Continues : http://www.computerworld.com/

Netbooks, mini-notebooks, ultraportables and semantic fun with AMD

AMD is targeting what Intel calls the netbook market, but not completely. Here’s a tale of semantic fun on Friday night.

When I read Brooke Crothers report on how AMD wasn’t entering the netbook market I was shocked. After all, I was one of those people that interpreted AMD’s musings Thursday as an indicator that it was going to take on Intel in at least part of a category the chip giant basically created–netbooks. And if I was so off-base I figured I would have heard from AMD right away. I thought I captured most of the nuances AMD was tossing out to analysts. In most cases when I’m wrong I hear from a vendor within minutes, may be a half an hour max. So what’s going on here? A lot of definition disagreement with a dose of marketing spin.

First, let’s cue the definitions. Here’s how AMD’s Pat Moorhead, vice president of advanced marketing, is defining things:

Netbooks & Mininotebooks (these terms are interchangeable, IDC and Gartner prefers to use the term mininotebook):  Generally weigh less than 3 pounds, are 10” or less with a small keyboard, are capable of browsing the Internet, sending and receiving email, viewing online photos and videos.  They are not ideal for multitasking, multimedia (recording TV; creating, viewing or editing HD video; Photoshop), downloading music, streaming music and video and playing games.  They are usually priced below $500.  FYI:  netbook is an Intel marketing term, visit www.netbook.com to see.

Ultraportables:  Still sleek and stylish, but in the 3- 5 pound range and are generally 11 – 13” screens.  They provide a fuller PC experience (so are capable of running Windows Vista and Windows XP), are capable of rich multimedia (including watching HD Web video) and are capable of gaming (obviously those with discrete graphics even more so).  A current example of an ultraportable on the market is the MacBook Air or the Fujitsu Lifebook P8020.

To be clear, Yukon is targeting ultraportables and not netbooks/mininotebooks.

But clearly, AMD isn’t going to complain if it gets a few netbook/mininotebook designs. From AMD spokesman John Taylor:

The notebook PC market is increasingly varied in form factor. Most industry analyst firms are working to create better definition of categories. Simply stated, we are primarily targeting ultra portable notebooks with Yukon. Emphasis on 10-12 inch screens, full PC functionality and thinness. We think some mini notebook design wins may occur, though. Netbooks or mini notebooks are smaller screens and targeted at full web capability.

The difference between a netbook/mininotebook and an ultraportable is an inch. Simply put, AMD is looking to skim the high end of Intel’s netbook market. That’s why you get charts like this from AMD (click to enlarge):

Add it up and I conclude the following:

• AMD is “ignoring” the netbook market, but not really. It wants to create an alternative that competes with what Intel has laid out. AMD is hoping to make netbooks a PC market slum.


• AMD isn’t going to use the term “netbook” because it is deemed an Intel “marketing term.” Memo to AMD: If you create a new category you get dibs on cooking up the cool names.


• AMD is trying to redefine the category and messaging so it can better compete. And that’s smart business. If AMD can portray mini-notebooks and netbooks as weak devices with too many compromises it will find itself in a sweet spot of the market.

If you’re interested in this mumbo jumbo and don’t believe anyone about this netbook, err mini-notebook, fiasco I encourage you to check out AMD’s analyst meeting replay. That said, I can think of better things to do on a Friday night.

Source : http://blogs.zdnet.com/

Nvidia cutting prices to counter AMD gains?

Has AMD’s recent gains in GPU sales got Nvidia spooked?

The latest rumors are that Nvidia has a GPU price cut planned. With AMD’s recent gains in the discrete graphics card market, Nvidia is planning to cut its graphics card prices in an attempt to curb further loss of market share, according to unnamed sources at graphics card makers via Monica Chen at DigiTimes.

AMD’s market share was about 40 percent in Q3 2008, according to a recent report, and it’s the ATI Radeon HD 4000 series that has Nvidia in a twist: AMD anticipates taking 50 percent of the market after reducing prices for that product series.

To counter, Nvidia may cut prices for its GeForce GTX 200, 9800 GT and 9600 GT series, according to the article.

Performance-wise, both companies’ high end cards are comparable. Without an apparent technical advantage, price has clearly become the next ground to fight over.

Which means good news for gamers around the world.

Source : http://blogs.zdnet.com/

AMD's New Focus on Fusion

AMD used its financial analyst day today to not only introduce its long awaited "Shanghai" processor, but also to position the company going forward. President and CEO Dirk Meyer positioned AMD as one of only two companies that develop and deliver x86 processors in volume, and one of only two that creates leading edge graphics; and the only company that does both. This seems to be integral to both AMD's product strategy and marketing messages, and although he didn't directly point it out, it's now part of AMD's new tagline: "the future is fusion."

But Meyer more specifically said the company would be focused on three basic marketing messages - promoting virtualization on the server, balanced platforms for the client business, and pervasive HD computing.

Fusion was also a big part of the vision discussed by Chief Marketing Officer Nigel Dessau. He wants to be seen as the "enabler of the next generation" applications, building on what he sees as the company's history of being first at multi-core technology, first at 64-bit computing, first in some graphics areas, and first in a number of architectural changes. He wants fusion to be seen not as just a technology, but also as the way it works with its customers and partners.

However, he said, the fusion campaign was mainly aimed at the 20-25 million "processor aware" customers, while for consumers, they message was "See for Yourself," pushing the message that benchmarks don't sell the experience, but looking at visual quality does. This makes sense, particularly given that AMD CPUs in particular, haven't been doing as well on the benchmarks, but its integrated graphics are significantly better than Intel's.

Randy Allen, senior vice president of the computing solutions group talked about how 82 percent of the gross margin in computing was in the mainstream, value client, and server areas - not in performance computing. And he said consumer and SMB represent 74 percent of gross margin. This, he said, has driven AMD's new focus on consumer and small business market, and on mainstream clients and servers. Again, this makes a lot of sense, given AMD's performance characteristics. Recall that on the performance end, Intel has been shipping 45nm quad core products for about a year, while AMD is only just starting that now. (One thing that he did say was that while the microarchitecture hasn't change, Shanghai represents enough of a change that it is effectively a new core.)

In questions, Meyer and Allen pointed out that they weren't playing in the lowest-end space competing with Intel's Atom, focusing its upcoming Yukon platform on mininotebooks and ultraportables that were full-function machines.

Rick Bergman, Senior Vice President for Graphics Products, talked about the big wins AMD had in graphics in 2008, with the ATI Radeon 4000 series gaining market share and revenue . In particular, he talked about the company's plans to follow to those products with a move to 40nm and a new focus on professional graphics under the FirePro name. One thing I'm looking forward to seeing is the company's planned release next month of a free transcoding download for ATI Radeon solutions. He talked about how they looked at graphics both from the PC perspective and the console perspective, which lets them claim a higher market share than nVidia. But even on the PC side, it's clear that ATI had a much better year in 2008 than in 2009.

Again in questions, Allen pushed the idea of traditional CPUs plus traditional graphics cores making more sense than multiple x86 processors used for graphics, at least in the near term.

Finally, there was a lot of discussion about AMD's upcoming split into a "product company" and "the Foundry Company" http://blogs.pcmag.com/miller/2008/10/amds_big_move.php with Chief Financial officer Bob Rivet saying the product company would now be positioned to be free cash positive starting next year, the first time he could say that in years. Rivet said the milestones on completing the split include getting approvals from the U.S. govenrmetn, from the German sponsors who are subsidizing the Dresden plant, the NY government which has plans to subsidize an upcoming New York foundry, from bondholders, and shareholders. Meyer said he did not believe that anything here would be an issue with the company's agreements with Intel. Rivet declined to update the company's financial guidance in this economy, saying he would do that in early December instead.

Again, I think a continuing and competitive AMD is good for the industry; and its plans to compete in more segments but focus mainly on its current strengths makes a lot of sense. Of course, it all comes down to how well the specific products compete when they actually ship.

Source : http://blogs.pcmag.com/

The Summit Above 8000

Market recoveries often feature a re-testing of previous lows, followed by dramatic turnarounds. And while this can cause indigestion for some, plenty of traders are aggressively using this to their advantage.

On Oct. 10, the Dow Jones Industrial Average hit 7882.51, establishing a five-year intraday low for the index, then bounced to close at 8451. On Oct. 27, the index hit its five-year closing low of 8175.77, only to jump more than 600 points in the next session. Thursday, outlook warnings from Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Intel Corp. pushed the Dow once again below that key 8000 level, before stocks rallied.

All told, from intraday bottom to closing top, the market tacked on more than 900 points on the session, with that 8000 hit from the Dow being the catalyst.

Barry Ritholtz, chief executive of FusionIQ, wrote on his blog during the session that each of the major sell-offs eventually hits a point where the market becomes deeply oversold, causing a rally he expected to trade on. “We are buyers as markets approach those levels again,” he wrote. “The October 10th intraday lows remain our line in the sand as far as trading stops go.”

Other traders take it a step further, noting that during the early-morning declines, they kept buy orders on hold and waited for the market to hit 8000 before coming back in. Walter Prendergast, a portfolio manager for Paradigm Capital Management, said all levels of technical support can be important, but certain more psychological ones can hold more significance. He said the 8000-point area on the Dow is particularly noteworthy as it hits directly at how dire things have been in 2008.

“When the Dow goes into 8000, you’re looking at levels from the early part of this decade. Almost all the progress of 10 years is gone in 10 months,” Mr. Prendergast said. The last time the Dow closed below 8000 was March 31, 2003.

And while for many a push that low is further evidence to keep out of stocks, the vast majority of traders see that as a buying opportunity. When sentiment hits bottom, stocks typically find a bounce traders can ride for the short term.

Among the areas Thomas Lee of J.P. Morgan Chase highlights is 818.7 on the S&P 500, which marked an intraday low for the index in October. Mr. Lee notes that retests are an important part of any recovery but cautions investors that not every retest produces a bounce on the exact same support level — often, a new low is reached before a rebound occurs.

During Thursday’s move, the most buoyant names were some of the most heavily shorted areas going into the session: consumer cyclicals and energy stocks. It’s likely subsequent bounces will include moves from the names most hurt going into that brief time period.

Kevin Kruszenski, director of equity trading for KeyBanc Capital Markets, said a lot of the recent moves have nothing to do with fundamentals. As investors have flooded out of the market during October’s swoon and are yet to return, much of the action continues to be short-term moves and portfolio repositioning — as opposed to value-based buying.

And while he prefers focusing on broader indexes over the 30-strong Dow, Mr. Kruszenski said the 8000 mark has become a psychological level for many. “We are in a very technically driven market,” he said.

Source : http://blogs.wsj.com/

Review : Asus EAH4870X2 Graphics Card

The Asus EAH4870X2 is a powerhouse video card that uses ATI's new Radeon HD 4870 X2 design, which places two top-of-the line 4870 GPU chips on a single board and is backed by a whopping 2GB of video memory. The 4870 X2 puts ATI back in competition at the top end of the 3D-gaming market in terms of both performance and price.

The EAH4870X2 is the functional equivalent of a pair of HD 4870 cards running in CrossFireX mode, but on a single card. Each GPU is backed by 1GB of dedicated GDDR5 memory, and an onboard PCI 2.0 bridge chip allows the two subsystems to talk to each other. Both the GPU and memory run at the frequency of a single HD 4870 card, which is an improvement over the HD 3870 X2, which ran chips slightly slower than single 3870 cards did.

Because everything's on one card, you don't need a CrossFireX-compatible motherboard to use the EAH4870X2. (If you have one, though, you can team the card with additional Radeon 4870 X2 cards for even better performance.)

You do need a beefy power supply and plenty of room, however. Asus recommends a 600-watt power supply, and the card requires both a six-pin and an eight-pin PCI Express (PCIe) power cable, as well as room for a 10.5-inch long board that blocks an adjacent slot. In smaller cases, such as the Antec P190, you won't have room to mount a hard drive behind the long video card. ATI didn't position the power connectors at the back of the card as it did on the single-GPU HD 4870, so you won't need additional clearance for those. The card runs quite hot—around 90 degrees Celsius at load—and though the dual-slot heat sink vents the hot air out the back of the case, the fan gets noticeably audible when the GPUs start getting a workout. It's much louder than the single GPU HD 4870, so if noise is a concern, you might be better off with a pair of HD 4870 cards in a CrossFireX configuration.

The board includes a pair of dual-link DVI connectors, an HDMI adapter with onboard audio, and an analog component-video/S-Video output. Unlike Nvidia's dual-GPU GeForce cards, you can use dual monitors with the EAH4870X2 without having to disable the second GPU. The card supports DirectX (DX) 10.1 even though most games require only DX10—a status quo that isn't likely to change until the in-development DX11 is released.

In almost all of our tests, the EAH4870X2 was the fastest single video card we've tested to date. At 2,560x1,600 resolution, the EAH4870X2 turned in 41 frames per second (fps) in World in Conflict, 54.7fps in Company of Heroes, and 116fps in F.E.A.R., compared with 30fps, 46.5fps, and 77fps for the GeForce GTX 280. In fact, the GTX 280 beat the EAH4870X2 only in our lower-resolution World in Conflict tests, and the results indicated that the issue was probably due to World in Conflict capping its performance at 60fps on the EAH4870X2, even after we disabled the Vsync limiter. (The single-GPU HD 4870 card encountered the same issue with this game.)

Keep in mind that dual-GPU solutions like the EAH4870X2 require the drivers to support the game you're playing with a CrossFireX profile. Though the vast majority of commercial games are supported, a few titles, such as Microsoft Flight Simulator X or games running on the Windows desktop, don't benefit from the second GPU, and newer titles might not get a profile until weeks after launch.

Meanwhile, image quality is excellent. ATI's Avivo HD technology is able to decode the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD DVD and Blu-ray. New in the HD 4800 series is the ability to decode two streams at a time, allowing the card to accelerate the picture-in-picture mode present in Blu-ray 2.0. The EAH4870X2 supports HD audio over the HDMI cable.

Asus includes a bundle of exclusive software with the EAH4870X2, such as Splendid, a video-enhancement technology that lets you alter color or contrast so that the images look best in your viewing setup. You also get a GamerOSD package that lets you overclock the card, as well as capture video and screenshots.

The EAH4870X2 offers such phenomenal 3D speed that you'll need to crank the latest games up to their highest detail levels on a 24-inch-or-larger monitor to take full advantage of its performance. You can also break out your older games, max out the resolution, anti-aliasing, and filtering, and see them with unprecedented image quality. If you want unmatched graphics performance—and you play with the sound turned up loud enough that fan noise won't bother you—it's hard to go wrong with this card.

Review By : http://computershopper.com/

ASUS Receives Innovation Award of Excellence 2008—Global Brands IT Hardware Category in Taiwan

The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ Excellence Award for 2008 includes four categories: the Innovation Award of Excellence, the Personal Achievement Award, the Enterprise Innovation Award and the Most Innovative Enterprise Award.

Jonney Shih, Chairman of ASUSTeK Computer Inc., says “This latest accolade further strengthens ASUS’ commitment to delivering rock-solid quality, superior aesthetics and leading-edge technology in its products, in a bid to win the hearts of consumers and establish itself as the most admired enterprise in the new digital era.”

The constant stream of awards bestowed on ASUS bears testament to the fact that it has not only achieved premier status in Taiwan, but that it also commands a leading position in Taiwan’s list of prominent global brands.

ASUS’ recent successes on the world stage have drawn rapt attention to Taiwan’s IT industry. Of particular note is the immense popularity of the Eee PC™ on a global scale. By pioneering an entirely new netbook segment with the Eee PC™, ASUS showcased its ability to create solutions that resonate with a global audience. The Eee PC™ is currently the bestselling notebook on the United States. On the other side of the Pacific, the Eee PC™ has been experiencing excellent sales in Japan and South Korea. In Europe, the Eee PC™ has proven to be much more than just a fashion fad, with sales in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and Russia hitting an all-time record high.

“ASUS’ market share has grown substantially in these markets, and the brand now enjoys a significant lead in sales. The Eee PC™ perfectly encapsulates the spirit of the Innovation Award of Excellence, and ASUS will continue to work towards more technological and design breakthroughs, mentions Jonney Shih

About ASUS
ASUS is a leading company in the new digital era. With a global staff of more than eight thousand and a world-class R&D design team, the company’s turnover for 2007 was 6.9 billion U.S. dollars. ASUS ranks among the top 10 IT companies in BusinessWeek’s “InfoTech 100”, and has been on the listing for 11 consecutive years. ASUS was also selected by the Wall Street Journal Asia as No.1 in quality and service in Taiwan.

For more information, please contact:
ASUS Service Center, ASUSTeK Computer (Thailand) Co., Ltd
Tel: 02-679-8367-70 Fax: 02-679-8371 or www.asus.co.th
ASUS PR Team: Professional Media Business Co., Ltd.
Khun Kridsadaporn Chuaybamrung
Tel: 02-934 6718 # 18 Fax: 02-934-6720-21
Email: kridsadaporn_c ( @ ) pmb dot co.th

Source : http://www.1888pressrelease.com

Can Blu-ray save Christmas for Hollywood?

Movie studio executives on Friday presented the best-case scenario for a winter holiday surge in the purchase of high-definition Blu-ray players as their best hope to keep the U.S. home video market's decline from accelerating past 3 percent or 4 percent this year.

The executives hosted by The Digital Entertainment Group, a consortium of movie studios and electronics manufacturers, forecast that 10.5 million households would be able to play Blu-ray videos by the end of the year — with about 2.5 million standalone players and 8 million PlayStation 3 game consoles.

That estimate is much lower than the 14.4 million households that Adams Media Research said in June would be playing Blu-rays by the end of the year. But if it is to come true, about 1 million more standalone players and 2.3 million more PS3s must be sold through the holidays.

Prices have dropped in recent months, and Blu-ray players can be found online for less than $200, encouraging hope for adoption of the format.

"The only dark cloud is the economy," David Bishop, president of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, told a panel. He said the consumer products side of Sony Corp. is "showing no slowdown in the adoption of the PlayStation 3."

There are 5.7 million PS3s installed in the United States now, and Sony and expects to sell 4 million to 5 million more by March.

"We remain pretty confident that we'll meet our targets for the fiscal year," said Julie Han, spokeswoman for Sony Computer Entertainment America.

These so-called "early adopters" of video technology are especially important because they tend to buy more movies than consumers who join a trend later.

"These are the heavy buyers, the heavy collectors," said Craig Kornblau, president of Universal Studios Home Entertainment.

Executives agreed it is still the early days of Blu-ray because it was only February when the high-definition format beat out Toshiba Corp.-backed HD DVD. Last week, the consortium kicked off a $25 million TV ad campaign to push Blu-ray, acknowledging in part that half the people it polled in a recent survey didn't know the format war was over.

Gains in Blu-ray revenues, including rentals and sales, are expected to counter some of the expected 6 percent decline in regular DVD revenue in the U.S. in calendar 2008.

Through the first three-quarters of the year, video rental revenue in the U.S. was down 1.2 percent at $5.6 billion and sales were down 3.5 percent at $8.6 billion, according to the industry tracker, Video Business.

Economic headwinds remain a concern.

In a survey the consortium conducted in late August and early September of 2,200 owners of high-definition TV sets in the U.S., U.K. and Japan, just 12 percent said they were likely to buy Blu-ray players in the next six months.

Another 30 percent were open to purchasing them, it said. How potential Blu-ray consumers will respond to lower prices isn't clear.

"This was done before prices started to come down and before the economy started to hit," Chris Lang, senior vice president of research firm SmithGeiger LLC, told the panel.

Those who don't yet have high-definition sets are not expected to be large contributors this season, said Bob Chapek, president of Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment Worldwide. Purchasing a $1,000 high-definition TV and even a moderately priced Blu-ray player may not appeal to some buyers in the slowing economy, he said.

"It's only logical to expect there'd be some economic impact," he said. But he added, "We've been pleasantly surprised so far."

The consortium said a growing proportion — now about 10 percent — of home video sales comes from Blu-ray. In October, as the U.S. financial crisis came into focus, sales of Blu-ray discs more than quadrupled to 2.2 million units, it said.

A number of upcoming titles are riding on the format, including Warner Bros.' "The Dark Knight" due out in December.

Previous top-selling titles, such as "Iron Man," "The Incredible Hulk" and "Hellboy II: The Golden Army" have had a strong appeal among PS3 owners, and that raises hopes for a December turnaround.

"Every week as the next title comes out, we're all holding our breath," Kornblau said.

Source : http://www.google.com/

Review : Pure Digital Flip Minohd

The MinoHD brings high-definition video to the world of minicamcorders, and does a good job of it.

Pure Digital Technologies' $230 Flip MinoHD brings high-definition video recording to your pocket. This tiny 720p-resolution minicamcorder doesn't have enough advanced features to replace a standard HD camcorder, but it will do an admirable job of capturing spontaneous moments and allowing you to post them online.

The MinoHD is extremely compact and pocket-friendly, and feels good in the hand. It measures 4 inches tall by 2 inches wide by 0.62 inches thick--slightly larger than an iPod Nano. The MinoHD's plastic shell is a fingerprint magnet and may be prone to scratches, but Pure Digital includes a soft microfiber pouch to carry the device around. The camcorder comes in glossy black; the company also offers designed cases (and lets you create your own custom design) at the Flip Web site.

Using the MinoHD is ridiculously simple thanks to its minimalistic user interface and easy-to-understand controls. Seven buttons control the MinoHD: record, play/pause, delete video, volume up/zoom in, volume down/zoom out, previous, and next. With the exception of the record button, all of them are touch-sensitive; they work reasonably well but are easy to press accidentally. The MinoHD also features a 1.5-inch display, integrated speakers, and a tripod mount.

Flip a slider on the MinoHD's side, and out pops the USB connector. While that means you have one less USB cable to carry around, it causes the camera to dangle awkwardly off the computer when connected, and as a result the MinoHD may block other ports. Overall, I think the flip-out USB connector is a good thing, annoyances aside. Additionally, the MinoHD can output to a TV, and comes with a cable for linking to a TV's composite video and audio jacks.

The Flip MinoHD stores up to 4GB of video, which is enough for about 1 hour of recording. It has no media card slot, so you can't add more storage. The lithium ion battery will power about 2 hours of use, according to Pure Digital. Unfortunately, the battery is not user-replaceable.

I found the video quality to be pretty good, especially considering the MinoHD's diminutive size. The camcorder handles low-light and indoor situations well, shooting smooth-playing video. Colors are fairly accurate, though they have a noticeable yellowish tint. The video quality is good enough that you could use the MinoHD as your main camcorder for home movies that you would burn to DVD, but the device does not excel at close-ups. Its lens has a fixed focus (1.5 meters to infinity), and its 2X zoom is weak relative to that of typical camcorders. These limitations aren't a severe drawback if you use the MinoHD for video that you'll just post online. But YouTube doesn't support high-definition video, so if sharing on that site is all you want a minicamcorder for, you might instead consider the MinoHD's standard-definition sibling and save $50.

The MinoHD comes bundled with FlipShare, an application for transferring videos onto your computer, playing videos, sharing them online, burning videos to DVD, and more. FlipShare works with both Windows and Mac OS X. Pure Digital conveniently loaded the application's installer on the camera itself, saving you from having to futz around with a CD. FlipShare is pretty easy and straightforward to use; you have a sidebar listing your camcorder and folders containing videos you have already transferred to your PC. A toolbar along the bottom of the main window contains the various commands, such as saving videos to your system, sharing videos with friends, or creating a DVD or movie out of video clips.

FlipShare's movie-creation tool takes you through an easy four-step process and makes stringing together clips a snap, though with limited flexibility and options (you can't add transitions, use effects, and so on). However, you can use the MinoHD's video in just about any home-movie creation application that supports high-definition H.264 video. Uploading video to YouTube or similar sites is an equally simple process.

Given its size, the Flip MinoHD stands out with its good video quality, and it's downright handy. Although the Flip MinoHD won't suit everyone, if you're like me and you enjoy keeping a camera on you at all times for whatever may come up, the MinoHD is for you. If you're looking at buying an ultracompact camcorder and you want to do more than post clips on YouTube, the MinoHD deserves your attention.

Source : http://www.pcworld.com/

Videogame makers predict jingle bells at registers

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Videogame sales are expected to be strong this year and in 2009, despite the economic troubles that have hurt some retail stores that sell the games, industry executives said on Thursday.

Speaking at the BMO Capital Markets interactive entertainment conference in New York, they said their optimism is fueled by solid sales of advanced game consoles made by Nintendo Co Ltd, Sony Corp and Microsoft Corp.

"I think it's going to hold up a lot better than other industries," said Mindy Mount, chief financial officer of Microsoft's entertainment and devices division. "We remain cautiously optimistic."

Reggie Fils-Aime, president of Nintendo of America, said its Wii console continues to sell out, while sales of the pocket-sized DS game machine have risen almost 20 percent year on year. For that reason, Nintendo has no plans to cut the price of the $250 Wii, he said.

Microsoft in September cut the entry level price for its Xbox 360 to $200, and Sony last year lowered U.S. prices of the PlayStation 3, which comes with an 80-gigabyte hard drive and a Blu-ray video disc player, to about $400.

"If I look at this from an industry perspective I think cautiously optimistic is quite appropriate," Fils-Aime told Reuters in an interview. "If I look at it from a Nintendo perspective, I would say very optimistic.

The outlook for videogames is rosy in contrast to many other industries that are suffering from the global financial meltdown and rising unemployment, which has prompted shoppers to curb spending.

This week, Best Buy Co Inc, the No. 1 U.S. electronics chain, slashed its profit forecast and Circuit City Stores Inc filed for bankruptcy.

Yves Guillemot, CEO of France's Ubisoft Entertainment SA -- maker of the hit "Splinter Cell" franchise -- said video games are selling well at low-cost retailer Wal-Mart Stores Inc and game-seller GameStop Corp.

"In general, there's a lot of competition (from other publishers), but we see that software is selling well, just due to the fact there are a lot of machine owners who need software," Guillemot said.

He said he still expects 2008 North American and European video game industry software sales to grow by more than 20 percent, and added that 2009 "will also be a great year."

Ubisoft's shares jumped 9.55 percent to 38.07 euros in Paris.

ATTRACTING NEW GAMERS

BMO analyst Edward Williams estimated that there are 50 percent more video game consoles installed now than a year ago, and that will spur robust sales as their owners shop for games during the holiday season.

But the challenge for future growth is to draw in consumers unfamiliar with video game systems, who may already be too concerned about their wallets to buy into games.  Continued...

Review: Sony NV-U84 GPS device

Depending on how you look at it, the NV-U84 is either the second or third highest device in the Sony NAV-U GPS lineup. There's no question that the NV-U94T is the flagship, but determining the NV-U84's value compared with its siblings is a tricky affair.

For one, it has the big 4.8-inch touch screen and higher price that imply it's a step up the ladder from the 4.3-inch screen of the NV-U74T. On the other hand, it lacks most of the advanced features of the NV-U94T and U74T--such as Bluetooth and traffic data--which puts it at a huge disadvantage.

Read the full Sony NV-U84 GPS review.