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Pogoplug: Put Your USB Drives on the Web

Posted by Harry McCracken on April 14, 2009 at 12:45 pm

PogoPlugExternal USB hard drives and thumb drives are so cheap and useful that they pop up everywhere–except, for the most part, on the Internet. Enter Pogoplug, a new $99 gadget that lets you attach drives to your home network, then get access to them from any computer with a Web browser, and (soon) from iPhones and iPods Touch.

The Pogoplug itself looks like a slightly bulky AC adapter with Ethernet and USB ports. Here it is (it thoughtfully lets you remove the plug and attach a power cord if you like, so it doesn’t block access to your power strip or wall outlet–much like Apple’s laptop power adapters):

PogoPlug

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E74: Microsoft Recognizes the Xbox 360's Other Problem

Posted by Jared Newman on April 14, 2009 at 11:38 am

redringofdeath“Red Ring of Death” has worked its way so thoroughly into gamer lexicon that it’s comical to watch Microsoft work around the terminology. Perhaps the company’s talking heads will have an easier time with “E74,” a different system killing hardware issue whose moniker is so succinct it’ll probably stick. But I digress.

Microsoft’s Larry “Major Nelson” Hryb acknowledged this new hardware issue today, announcing that the infamous three-year Xbox 360 warranty will extend its coverage to include E74 along with the “three flashing lights error,” as Hryb calls it. The warranty began in the summer of 2007 in response to Red Ring issues and is good for three years from the purchase of an Xbox 360 console. In addition to covering new E74 repairs, Microsoft will retroactively reimburse anyone who has paid the company to fix the problem. Checks will go out before July 1.

Joystiq has been covering the E74 issue since complaints emerged in greater numbers this year. They believe the problem stems from a faulty solder on the ANA/HANA scaling chip in HDMI models. Lines across the screen or snowy interference typically preceed the fatal error message, which is accompanied by one flashing red light (Quadrant of Death?). Microsoft has not described the nature of the problem except to call it a “general hardware failure.”

Chances are, the company won’t elaborate. Microsoft has claimed that the Red Ring of Death debacle hasn’t hurt the brand, and was reluctant to come clean on the problem for some time, so I imagine the company is tackling this issue with the same bravado. Maybe brand loyalty is okay for the Xbox 360, but Sony would be wise to store these issues in its memory banks for the next round of console wars.

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Facebook Rots Your Brain!

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 14, 2009 at 8:41 am

Facebook LogoNo doubt we’ve heard from our grandparents how television appartently makes us stupid. Enter Facebook, the latest scorn to our intellgence. A study from Ohio State University of 219 students gauged their school performance against their Facebook usage.

While 79 percent of students expressly denied that Facebook was interfering with studying, there may have been some tangental evidence it does. Users of the site generally studied less (1-5 hours a week), and averaged GPAs between 3.0 and 3.5. However those that didn’t use Facebook studied more (11-15 hours), and had GPAs above 3.5.

Call me crazy, but researchers may have only found the obvious: the more you study, the better grades you’ll get. But continuing on…

“There’s a disconnect between students’ claim that Facebook use doesn’t impact their studies, and our finding showing they had lower grades and spent less time studying,” co-author of the study and a doctoral student Aryn Kapinski said of the study.

Kapinski and crew also found that students were less likely to use Facebook if they had a job, and more likely to if they participated in extracurricular activities.

Science, technology, engineering, math and business majors were most likely to use the service above other discliplines.

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Happy Birthday, Game Boy. You're Weird!

Posted by Harry McCracken on April 13, 2009 at 11:49 pm

Game Boy OdditiesYou think the iPod’s iconic and enduring? Let’s talk come 2021, when it’ll have been around as long as Nintendo’s Game Boy, which turns twenty next Tuesday. To mark the occasion, Benj Edwards found an array of peculiar variations, offshoots, add-ons, and tributes. Never has one pocketable plaything been so many things to so many people.

Click here to view Game Boy Oddities slideshow.

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Game Boy Oddities

Posted by Benj Edwards on April 13, 2009 at 11:36 pm

Game Boy Oddities

When Nintendo released the original Game Boy twenty years ago next week, wheels of capitalism and creativity immediately started turning in noggins across the globe.  From artists mesmerized with the gaming gadget’s iconic status to inventors who saw it as a way to make the world a better place to folks who just wanted to cash in, the Game Boy has inspired weird accessories, variations, and tributes.  After seeing the items I rounded up for this extravaganza, you’ll probably agree that the public’s infatuation with this classic handheld has grown far beyond Nintendo’s wildest dreams.

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HP's MediaSmart Servers to Crunch Video, Stream to iPhones

Posted by Harry McCracken on April 13, 2009 at 11:33 pm

HP LogoMicrosoft’s Windows Home Server platform has only one major booster among PC manufacturers, but it’s a doozy: HP, whose MediaSmart Servers pack sizable quantities of redundant storage, Microsoft’s software for backing up, restoring, and sharing data, and HP’s own tweaks and additions, such as support for Macs. And today HP announced a software update for its EX 485 and EX 487 models with two significant new features: automatic conversion of videos for streaming and viewing on computers and mobile devices, and a new app called iStream that gives iPhones and iPods Touch remote access to the videos, music, and video you have stored on the server.

The software update, which HP plans to release late this month, can automatically generate high-resolution and low-resolution MPEG4 H.264 video files from multiple formats (including unprotected DVDs–but not, of course, copy-protected ones). I’ve spent enough time tending to computers that were slowly crunching away at video files to find the idea of a sever silently doing it in background mighty appealing.

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Downloadable Games, With the Inconvenience of the Store

Posted by Jared Newman on April 13, 2009 at 2:43 pm

pspslimA solution for the digital download squeamish: Go to your local video game store, buy a boxed version of a digital download voucher, go home and use the Internet to install the same product that’s being sold cheaper to those who don’t want to leave the house.

Ars Technica’s Ben Kuchera has word from a “reliable” insider — with a proven track record of breaking stories — that this will happen for the upcoming PSP game Patapon 2. Kuchera suggests that Sony is testing this retail download model to gauge whether it will work for other games, maybe even setting the stage for a UMD-less PSP.

Why would Sony hang on to retail at all with this release? Because as much as video game publishers would love to kill the middleman, they need that shelf space. Digital distribution doesn’t share equal footing with hard copy sales. Besides, cutting out Gamestop and other retailers could potentially force them to drop the PSP in retribution. Despite the strained relationship between publisher and retailer, no one wants to rock the boat.

As a result, we might have this bizarre solution in which consumers can pay $20 plus a trip to the store for a $15 game that they can download at home. You pay more for the luxury of an empty box.

Whether the rumor is true or not, I can’t imagine retailers lovingly embracing the idea in the long run because they’d be digging their own graves. Once enough retail shoppers realize they’re getting duped at retail, they’ll abandon the store. GameStop also loves the used game market, and won’t give it up without a fight.

Retail downloads might work in the present simply because of shelf appeal, but Sony and other game publishers can’t have it both ways forever. Eventually, they’ll have to commit to a download-only future — brick-and-mortar be damned, consoles can be distributed other ways — or commit to physical media and all the retail baggage that comes with it.

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Times Isn't Just Your Everyday RSS Reader

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 13, 2009 at 11:00 am

Ed OswalLet me start by welcoming you all to a new weekly feature here on Technologizer. We’re calling it Mac Monday, and each week I’ll tackle a new piece of software, hardware, or other topic related to the Apple community.

I’m a visual person…which means that I’m not a big RSS fan. To me, the whole RSS revolution has taken the style out of the Web: while the content remains, the design that encapsulates it is taken away. Sometimes the way information is presented is just as important as what it says. So I’ve preferred to keep my routine of actually visiting Websites in lieu of using a RSS reader. Until now.

Enter Times, a new RSS reader from the folks at Acrylic Software. This software aims to put back into RSS what got taken out: a sense of design. Instead of the bland list design used by competitors, Times lays out RSS in a more visual format, akin to that of a newspaper website.

Times Screenshot

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