Technologizer

Sony Getting the Antitrust Eye Over Optical Drives

Monday, October 26, 2009

It’s not quite clear why it is happening, but Sony disclosed Monday that its Optiarc division in the US is under investigation by the Justice Department for possible antitrust violations. Sony Optiarc is one of the larger manufacturers of optical drives, including DVD and Blu-ray. The DOJ is not the only government agency worldwide looking into [...]

Playstation 3 Gets Netflix. What About the Wii?

Monday, October 26, 2009

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Starting next month, the Playstation 3 will be able to stream Netflix Instant Watch movies, and just like that, the Xbox 360 and Netflix are no longer an exclusive couple. But does this open relationship signal a similar offering for Nintendo’s Wii? Doubtful, for now at least. The details thus far: PS3 owners will be able [...]

Note to Rude Gamers: You Don’t Have the Right

Friday, October 2, 2009

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I got a chuckle today reading about the failed lawsuit of Playstation 3 owner Erik Estavillo, who tried to sue Sony after getting banned from the Playstation Network for bad behavior. If you’ve ever played a competitive online game, you know the type: Loud-mouthed, cussing, insulting, maybe even racist, sexist or homophobic. It’s not clear which [...]

Sony Prototype Powers TV Wirelessly

Friday, October 2, 2009

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During the 1890’s, inventor Nikola Tesla toyed with the possibility of transferring electricity (safely) through the air. Tesla’s vision has become reality in laboratories within the past decade, and today, the IDG News Service is reporting that Sony has devised a wireless prototype to power its television sets. The technology, called magnetic resonance, achieves power transfer [...]

Sony Stumbles With Blu-ray to PSP Copy

Thursday, October 1, 2009

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Starting in November, Sony will revert to its old, closed-system ways by packing a PSP-ready digital copy on its Blu-ray discs. The reasoning is obvious: If you’re an owner of one device, you’ve got a reason to pick up the other. Why buy an iPod for video when the PSP gives you a chunk of your [...]

Sony’s PSP Go is Go

Thursday, October 1, 2009

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Sony’s new $250 PSP Go gaming handheld debuts today. With its slide-out control pad, it’s the first PSP that’s truly pocketable (closed, it looks and feels a little like a BlackBerry Storm). It’s also dumped the tiny UMD optical disc drive of early PSP models, making it the first digital gaming portable from Sony or [...]

Gaming in Theaters Sounds Cool, Won’t Be Easy

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

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As a gamer, I’m enamored with the idea of playing a shoot-em-up on a 50-foot screen, surrounded by Dolby audio. And I can’t be the only one. Unfortunately, these incidents are rare, but on Monday and Tuesday, the stars will align, and Sony will let people in four U.S. theaters try the upcoming (and universally lauded) [...]

Sony: No UMD Transfers for PSP Go

Friday, September 25, 2009

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Those who want in on Sony’s download-only PSP Go will have to leave their disc-based games behind, as there won’t be any way to convert games from UMD to digital form. Delivering the bad news to Kotaku, Sony said that “due to legal and technical reasons we will not be offering the program at this time.” [...]

Good: ESRB Pre-Loads PSP Go With a Ratings Guide

Friday, September 18, 2009

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Let’s just assume for a minute that it’s an ideal world, where parents keep a watchful eye on the video games their kids are playing. If that’s the case, it’s great news that Sony plans to load a video game ratings guide directly onto the PSP, through a partnership with the Entertainment Software Ratings Board. The guide [...]

PSP Go Retailer Backlash Begins

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

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When the PSP Go launches next month, the Netherlands’ largest video game retailer won’t be selling it, according to Eurogamer. Nedgame says the biggest reason it won’t carry the PSP Go is the price of 249 euros ($250 in the United States), which isn’t justifiable when the existing PSP-3000 costs 169 euros ($130 here). The retailer [...]

Calling It: 2009 is the Year of the Playstation 3

Friday, September 11, 2009

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Even with the reduced-price PS3 Slim arriving at the tail end of August, Sony’s console gained considerable ground on the Xbox 360 and the Wii according to the NPD Group, coming in just behind the former by 5,400 sales, and the latter by 67,400 sales. Indeed, the stage is set for the PS3 to top both [...]

Video Streaming Box Announcements of the Week

Thursday, September 10, 2009

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Netgear Entertainer Live ($150) The new Netgear Entertainer Live (EVA2000) was originally announced as a VuNow platform device at Netgear’s CES press conference back in January. At that time, I saw the unnamed Netgear product demo-ed using VuNow’s non-distinctive hardware, but has since been repackaged with some left over Netgear router enclosures. In addition to YouTube and CinemaNow [...]

TV in 3D: To Be or Not to Be?

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

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I’m not at the IFA consumer-electronics exhibition in Berlin this week, but Sony Chairman Sir Howard Stringer is–and the Financial Times is reporting that he’s going to announce an ambitious initiative to build 3D products–everything from HDTVs to laptops. It’s the latest bit of 3D boosterism from an entertainment and electronics industry that’s increasingly gaga [...]

Sony Adds a Little Chrome to the VAIO

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

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If you buy a new Sony VAIO computer, you’re going to get a new browser. No, Internet Explorer isn’t going anywhere. But Financial Times is reporting that Sony has signed a deal to preinstall Google’s Chrome on its PCs. Chrome-equipped machines are making their way to customers even as we speak. I’m not sure whether Chrome [...]

Okay, Sony, Now You’re Definitely Competing With the iPhone

Monday, August 31, 2009

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Remember in March, when Sony Senior Marketing Vice President Peter Dille dismissed the iPhone? “The iPhone games and apps are largely diversionary, whereas we’re a gaming company and we make games for people who want to carry a gaming device and play a game that offers a satisfying 20+ hours of gameplay,” he said in [...]

Building a Kindle Killer. Or Several of Them

Friday, August 28, 2009

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Slates Farhad Manjoo has a good story up about how Sony in particular and e-reader makers in general can build an e-book device that’s better and more popular than Amazon’s Kindle. One graf that left me mentally applauding: I’d counsel Amazon’s competitors to embrace openness even more. In particular, they’d be wise to let people trade [...]