Skype for iPad leaked in promo video (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/skype-for-ipad-leaked-in-promo-video-video/

If you've lost sleep over the lack of a dedicated Skype app for your iPad, you can rest easy tonight knowing somewhere out there it does exist -- or at least a promo video does. Earlier today, someone over at Skype unintentionally (we assume) posted what looks like an ad for a real-deal app for the iOS slab. Of course, the evidence has since been pulled, but you can check out a ripped version (sans audio) after the break. It looks like the days of blowing up ye ole iPhone Skype are numbered.

Update: The folks over at TUAW had a chat with Skype's Rick Osterloh about the iPad app, and he says you can expect most of the functionality to carry over from the iPhone. There are, unfortunately, a few desktop features, like file sharing, that won't make an appearance. Sadly, Osterloh didn't spill the release-date beans.

Continue reading Skype for iPad leaked in promo video (video)

Skype for iPad leaked in promo video (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 16:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Camera-equipped hexacopter turns summer vacation videos into aerial masterworks (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/camera-equipped-hexacopter-turns-summer-vacation-videos-into-aer/

Wakeboarding is so 2005. Wakeboarding with a camera-packing six-rotor MikroKopter tracking your every jump and belly flop? Now that sounds like something we can get behind. The folks over at MikroKopter have renewed our interest in the sport by mounting a FollowMe transmitter (which lets the drone track your every move), along with a GoPro camera to one watersportsman's helmet. They then sent a hexacopter drone, equipped with a Canon T2i, into the air to follow the boarder as he rode across the water. The resulting video definitely puts any and all of our family vacation videos to shame. High-flying video evidence awaits you after the break.

Continue reading Camera-equipped hexacopter turns summer vacation videos into aerial masterworks (video)

Camera-equipped hexacopter turns summer vacation videos into aerial masterworks (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 23:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Updated Time Capsule opened, server-grade hard drive nowhere to be found?

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/25/updated-time-capsule-opened-server-grade-hard-drive-nowhere-to/

Well, fancy that -- a teardown of last week's refreshed Time Capsule has revealed a regular, non-enterprise drive lurking within. Curious, as Cupertino's website lists a "Serial ATA server-grade hard disk" as standard equipment on the device's official spec sheet. It's generally assumed that for a drive to be qualified as "enterprise," it must sustain a mean time between failure -- MTBF for short -- in excess of one million hours. So what's the MTBF for the Western Digital's WD20EARS (Caviar Green) in HardMac's Time Capsule? Conveniently, the hard drive maker wouldn't say. Of course, we guess the definition here is up for interpretation, but given past experiences with the wireless backup gizmo, we'd certainly hope this improved revision fares better.

Continue reading Updated Time Capsule opened, server-grade hard drive nowhere to be found?

Updated Time Capsule opened, server-grade hard drive nowhere to be found? originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 25 Jun 2011 06:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple has lovely ads. But lovely people would still buy their lovely products even if Apple did no ads, lovely or not - http://bit.ly/kWC9Sa

LaCie's CloudBox 'hybrid HDD' doubles your backups in the cloud (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/lacies-cloudbox-hybrid-hdd-doubles-your-backups-in-the-cloud/

Tempted by the allure of the cloud? Still not quite ready to give up that local backup at home? Fret not, as LaCie's new CloudBox gives you a pinch of both. The gizmo pictured above may look similar to the company's Wireless Space NAS, but it's actually a 100GB "hybrid HDD." The device connects to a router exclusively via its single Ethernet port, enabling it to handle local backups while also automatically mirroring an AES encrypted copy to a cloud server daily -- even if your computer is off. Using LaCie's Online Restore software, the offsite copy is accessible by up to ten previous volumes should the box ever become inoperable. The CloudBox comes with a one year subscription for online backups (mum's the word on future fees), and will be available in July priced at $200. You'll find more details in the PR past the break, as well as a video showcasing a variety of unfortunate -- mostly baby induced -- situations it's intended for.

Gallery: LaCie CloudBox hybrid HDD

Continue reading LaCie's CloudBox 'hybrid HDD' doubles your backups in the cloud (video)

LaCie's CloudBox 'hybrid HDD' doubles your backups in the cloud (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 08:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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EVO 3D and EVO View 4G now available to the non-Premier masses

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/evo-3d-and-evo-view-4g-now-available-to-the-non-premier-masses/

No longer must you be a member of Sprint's Premier Club to get your hands on the EVO 3D. At long last, the poverbial floodgates are open allowing you, dear reader, to rush to your local shop and acquire one for $200 -- provided you're willing to commit to a two year contract. Arriving on shelves alongside the glasses-free 3D handset is the HTC EVO View 4G, the Taiwanese company's 7-inch tablet that (for the time being) comes packaged with the fancy Scribe stylus for $400. You'll find PR after the break but, who are you kidding, there's no time for reading -- there's shopping to be done.

Continue reading EVO 3D and EVO View 4G now available to the non-Premier masses

EVO 3D and EVO View 4G now available to the non-Premier masses originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 08:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Zinio brings Tegra hardware acceleration to Honeycomb tablets

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/zinio-brings-tegra-hardware-acceleration-to-honeycomb-tablets/

Zinio's smartphone and tablet apps make it easy to bring a lifetime's worth of magazine content with you on the go, but performance has been inconsistent, especially when navigating through pages or zooming into photos and text. The company's latest app improves upon both critical elements, however, taking advantage of the Nvidia Tegra chip in your Mototola Xoom or Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 to smooth out page transitions and pinch-to-zoom. Nvidia posted a side-by-side comparison video demonstrating the improvements on a pair of Xooms, and there's clearly a noticeable difference. You can try it out for yourself by downloading Zinio version 1.10.3641 from the Android Market, or jump past the break for the demo.

Continue reading Zinio brings Tegra hardware acceleration to Honeycomb tablets

Zinio brings Tegra hardware acceleration to Honeycomb tablets originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 09:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple sues Samsung again for copying the iPhone's design, this time in South Korea

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/apple-sues-samsung-again-for-copying-the-iphones-design-this-t/

As if Apple and Samsung's patent infringement catfight weren't distracting enough, Apple is recreating the legal spectacle in Samsung's home country of South Korea. Apple just filed a suit against Samsung Electronics in Seoul Central District Court, with Cupertino alleging that the Samsung Galaxy S copies the third-generation iPhone, according to a report from the online news site, MoneyToday. That closely matches the claims Apple made when it it sued Samsung back in April for "slavishly" copying the iPhone and iPad. Since then, Apple's expanded its case to include additional Samsung devices, including the Droid Charge, Infuse 4G, Nexus S 4G, Galaxy Tab 10.1, Galaxy S II, and a handful of others. Meanwhile, Samsung has attempted (in vain) to subpoena prototypes of Apple's next-gen iPhone and iPad. We wouldn't be surprised if Samsung abandoned its efforts to peek Apple's forthcoming products, but if this is, indeed, destined to be a case of déjà vu, Samsung might well strike back with a suit of its own.

Apple sues Samsung again for copying the iPhone's design, this time in South Korea originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 09:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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BlackBerry Bold 9900 preview! (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/blackberry-bold-9900-preview-video/

RIM's BlackBerry 9900 is the device that the BlackBerry diehards have been hoping, wishing, and waiting for since the original Bold launched way back in 2008. However, this time around the company has added in a capacitive touchscreen, swapped the trackball of yesteryear for an optical trackpad, and slimmed the whole thing down into a 10.5mm thick package. We were lucky enough to get a prototype device from our friends over at Negri Electronics, and have manhandled the thing till we were blue in the face. Head on past the break for an exclusive preview of the device RIM is praying will stalwart its competitors until the first round of QNX-equipped devices lands in 2012.

Gallery: BlackBerry Bold 9900 preview!

Continue reading BlackBerry Bold 9900 preview! (video)

BlackBerry Bold 9900 preview! (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 14:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Card.io SDK takes swipe at competition with camera-enabled mobile payments (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/23/card-io-sdk-takes-swipe-at-competition-with-camera-enabled-mobil/

In an attempt to edge its way into the crowded mobile payments market, a new credit card scanning system is saying "ah, hell no!" to typing and swiping. Card.io is billed as an SDK that takes advantage of smartphone cameras to let devs accept credit, because, as its creators point out, "typing on mobile phones is slow, and most consumers don't have a separate hardware attachment." When it's time to pull out the plastic, Card.io gets your phone's camera going, and up pops a little green rectangle, in which you frame your card and snap a pic. Your credit card info is then processed by a third-party merchant, and the details are subsequently deleted from your phone. Can you hear that? That's the sound of our chubby thumbs breathing a sigh of relief. The Card.io SDK for iOS is now available at the source link below, and an Android version should be close behind. For now, hop on past the break for a video demo.

Continue reading Card.io SDK takes swipe at competition with camera-enabled mobile payments (video)

Card.io SDK takes swipe at competition with camera-enabled mobile payments (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Jun 2011 23:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Quake turns 15, ready to be ported to a learner's permit

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/quake-turns-15-ready-to-be-ported-to-a-learners-permit/

In the ever-changing world of gaming, a 15-year-old title is downright ancient, so there's a lot to be said for the fact that we're still talking about Quake a decade and a half after its release -- and what a packed decade and a half it's been. The game has spawned a still thriving convention and has made an appearance on pretty much every platform, ever, including, recently, Android, webOS, Chumby, BUG, and, of course, a maze for lab mice. So, happy birthday, old man. Now how about playing on something more your age? Like, say, the Jitterbug? Got a favorite Quake moment? Be sure to share it with us in the comments below.

Quake turns 15, ready to be ported to a learner's permit originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 01:38:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nokia's Android flirtations revealed

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/24/nokias-android-flirtations-revealed/

We don't know if this device is "super confidential" or not, but we've just come across yet another Nokia N9 lookalike with a non-MeeGo operating system on board. Well, it looks that way, anyhow. There's no way to verify that the Android homescreen we see above is a legitimate Gingerbread installation and not a mere screenshot (the resolution looks all wrong, for one thing), but the source of this image is the same Chinese fellow that posted a picture of Nokia's Windows Phone prototype, the Sea Ray, way back in May, so we're inclined to believe he's got an inside line on these things. Additionally, the undersized Android UI elements on the screen actually encourage us to believe that this is indeed a Nokia testing device -- if we were going to fake something like this, we'd use a regular screen grab for our tomfoolery -- and Stephen Elop has openly admitted that Nokia spent a couple of wild seconds contemplating a switch to Android. Well, folks, here's what that alternate future might have looked like.

Continue reading Nokia's Android flirtations revealed

Nokia's Android flirtations revealed originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Jun 2011 03:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pottermore Is the Ebook's Beatles on iTunes Moment [Video]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5814906/pottermore-is-the-ebooks-beatles-on-itunes-moment

Well, that rumor about Pottermore being a smartphone was completely wrong. But that's okay, because that was an idiotic prospect, and the truth is more interesting: Harry Potter will sell as ebooks for the first time ever. And that's huge.

The Harry Potter print saga's sold more than 400 million copies across the world. That's an incredible number of books, but an incredible number of books that've only been sprayed onto tree carcasses—J.K. Rawling's mint hasn't gone digital until the debut of Pottermore.

Harry Potter doesn't need your iPad to be legitimate. Its sales numbers and (hordes of crazed fans) speak for themselves.

Ebooks don't need Harry Potter to be legitimate. Kindle and iPad numbers (and hordes of crazed users) speak for themselves.

But the union of these two, with Pottermore not only offering e-Harry, but being the only place on the internet to get it (though no word on formats), might turn the format into a media event.

Remember when The Beatles finally brought their mops over to iTunes? The fact that I say finally says it all. Their catalog, despite being almost half a century old, was a big deal again. This was music that almost anyone with even the slightest bit of interest in the group had purchased or stolen years ago, and yet, the iTunes debut made headlines. Our headlines! Not so much for the music, but for what it meant: a legendary, and legendarily stubborn artistic entity caved. Fine, this computer music thing is for real. It was a mainstream zenith.

So too with Rawling. She could live in her golden palace paid for by the joyful screams of tweens and adults for the rest of her years without selling a sidewalk hot dog, let alone a fleet of ebooks—and yet she's digitizing Potter. Putting the series online and onto our tablets and Kindles and Nooks and all the rest indicate a big-time cultural hegemony for the ebook realm—We've got Harry Potter, it can scoff at skeptics. And there's no retort against that.

LulzSec Leaks Hundreds of Classified Arizona Police Documents in Attack Against Border Patrol [Hackers]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5815031/lulzsec-dumps-classified-arizona-police-documents

Lashing out against the "racial profiling anti-immigrant police state that is Arizona," LulzSec has released their newest data dump: "hundreds of private intelligence bulletins, training manuals, personal email correspondence, names, phone numbers, addresses and passwords belonging to Arizona law enforcement."

The release, entitled "Chinga La Migra" (Fuck the Border Patrol) is the first time LulzSec's purported to release personal information of government agents, rather than just disrupting their websites (see: CIA, US Senate). This is a powerful move. Home addresses are home addresses—about as personal as personal data gets. LulzSec's also clearly placed a political motive behind this thrust, as opposed to the HACK HACK LMAO ethos we've seen before.

And LulzSec says this is just the start:

Every week we plan on releasing more classified documents and embarassing [sic] personal details of military and law enforcement in an effort not just to reveal
their racist and corrupt nature but to purposefully sabotage their efforts to terrorize communities fighting an unjust "war on drugs".

A politically radicalized LulzSec is a big step away from the crew that was pissed off about videogames. [LulzSecurity]

Prototype dual-screened 2-in-1 Android smartpad from Imerj preview

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/23/prototype-dual-screened-2-in-1-android-smartpad-from-imerj-previ/

From the front it looks like yet another plain smartphone -- dark, nondescript, and maybe a little like an iPhone 4 that's had its right-most extent sliced off. Pick it up, though, and you realize this little thing isn't so nondescript. In fact, it feels oddly substantial, with a strange bevel cutting around the edge and a curious amount of heft. And then you flip it open. Suddenly it's a little tablet, two screens forming one 6-inch slate bisected by a few millimeters of bezel.

Shades of the Echo? Sure, but this is actually a very different device to hold, and a very different device to use. The software customizations built over Android 2.3, the bezel gestures, the proper multitasking, all make this into a unique device that feels incredibly familiar yet altogether different. It's a prototype device from Imerj and Frog (formerly known as Frog Design) something that's months away from production and hasn't even been blessed with a model designation more specific than "2-in-1 smartpad." So, is this poncho-clad Phone with No Name a legitimate threat to the established families of devices that own our little wireless San Miguel? Or, will it ride straight off into a sunset of obscurity when it launches? Read on to find out.

Gallery: 2-in-1 smartpad prototype from Imerj and Frog Design

Continue reading Prototype dual-screened 2-in-1 Android smartpad from Imerj preview

Prototype dual-screened 2-in-1 Android smartpad from Imerj preview originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Jun 2011 14:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google code reveals inner Circles, a social secret weapon?

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/23/google-code-reveals-inner-circles-a-social-secret-weapon/

Nothing livens the day like a blurry screen grab of some Javascript, especially when it hints at the ghostly form of a social networking tool that doesn't officially exist. The code was spotted hiding in plain sight at Google Profiles by Austrian blogger Florian Rohrweck, who fortunately enjoys browsing computer-speak more than playing in the park. Rohrweck noticed the word "circles" used repeatedly in the context of people adding and maintaining groups of contacts, and made the connection to the Google Circles social networking platform that was feverishly rumored and then vehemently denied earlier this year (a saga fully recapped at the More Coverage link). It's impossible to know whether these few lines of code represent a forthcoming service, another social layer on top of existing services, or just pure experimentation on the part of Google devs. In any case, the circular references have apparently now been zapped, leaving us with nothing more than that screen grab -- oh yeah, and Facebook.

Google code reveals inner Circles, a social secret weapon? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Jun 2011 11:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Archos intros 80 G9 and 101 G9 Android 3.1 tablets: 1.5GHz CPU, 250GB HDD, 3G-ready

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/23/archos-intros-80-gb-and-101-g9-android-3-1-tablets-1-5ghz-cpu/

Angling for a new Android 3.1 tablet, are ya? If so, Archos has a new pair emerging from Paris today, the 80 G9 and 101 G9. Predictably, the biggest differentiator between the two is the screen size, with the former offering an 8-inch panel with a 1024 x 768 screen resolution and the latter stepping up to a 10.1-incher (1280 x 800). Both of 'em are proudly using Seagate's 7mm Momentus Thin in order to scale to 250GB, but of course, only time will tell how a power-hungry HDD will do in tablet form factor.

Under the hood, you'll find a dual-core OMAP 4 processor (1.5GHz ARM Cortex A9), support for Flash, access to the Android Market and a full-size USB port -- one that's good for accepting the outfit's new G9 3G WWAN stick ($49). You'll also get an HDMI output, support for 1080p playback and a pay-as-you-go option with the aforesaid 3G dongle. The duo is scheduled to go on sale at the end of September (you know, just a month or two before Ice Cream Sandwich makes Honeycomb look like old hat), with the 80 G9 going for $279 and the 101 G9 for $349. Don't ever say Archos' accountants didn't look out for you.

Gallery: Archos 80 G9 and Archos 101 G9 press images

Continue reading Archos intros 80 G9 and 101 G9 Android 3.1 tablets: 1.5GHz CPU, 250GB HDD, 3G-ready

Archos intros 80 G9 and 101 G9 Android 3.1 tablets: 1.5GHz CPU, 250GB HDD, 3G-ready originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Jun 2011 12:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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