Dr. Augustine Fou's Online Scrapbook

Thursday, July 30, 2009

3 pocket-sized digital cameras for the enthusiasts' toy-box - http://bit.ly/mJ3e5 - love! want!

This Is How You Sell Wide-Angle Lenses [Photography]

It's extremely rare to find a tasteful ad campaign that uses sex and clever humor to perfectly define the qualities of a technology product. This series of print ads for Omax wide-angle lenses is one of them:

The campaign was created by Publicis India, showing alternative uses for the wide shots that these lenses can get. I, on the other side, just point and shoot with no shame whatsoever. [Advertolog—Thanks Eduardo Lozano!]

Windows 7 RTM Cracked (What Took So Long?) [Windows 7]

I mean, it's been six days since the RTM first leaked on BitTorrent. SIx days! That's like an eternity. At any rate, it is true—Windows 7 RTM Ultimate has already been cracked using a Lenovo OEM product key.

The key and OEM certificate were extracted from Win 7 Ultimate's .wim files. A similar method was used to bypass Vista, and those vulnerabilities were never addressed so there is no reason to suspect that Microsoft will do anything about it now (but there are no guarantees). Supposedly, the crack works with 32-bit and 64-bit Ultimate versions and can be implemented on HP, Dell, and MSI computers in addition to Lenovo. Of course, you would need to engage in a little BIOS magic to fool the OS that you are using an OEM machine before any of this would work in the first place. [Softpedia via Download Squad via Lifehacker]

Google Dumps Another Half-Million Free Titles Into Sony's eBook Store [Ebooks]

Sure, their authors are all dead, and they're already technically free anyway, but another 500,000 properly formatted, lovingly .EPUBed public domain titles have arrived in Sony's ebook store, courtesy of Google, earning their catalog a deserved—if slightly dubious—claim to the title of the "largest source for eBooks." Mazel tov. [Sony]

Kanex Mini DisplayPort Adapter With Audio Review: Someone Finally Gets It Right [Review]

The Kanex Mini DisplayPort and USB audio to HDMI adapter, which one-ups the previous Monoprice adapter because there's audio.

The Price: $40

The Verdict: It works. IT WORKS! Playing back 1080p trailers in Quicktime, powered by a MacBook Pro, on our plasma TV was fantastic. And the part where it actually has audio? Yes please.

It's quite easy to use. The USB and Mini DisplayPort goes into the MacBook Pro (or Mac Mini), and the other end takes an HDMI cable. Your Mac should automatically detect the new display, but you have to manually switch the audio output to the USB audio device. If you're planning on using a new Mac Mini, this is the way to go. The video quality is pretty much what you'd expect from a clean 1080p source, and those trailers look good.

And with the problems Apple's own Mini DisplayPort to DVI adapters are having, using this and an HDMI-capable monitor might be a smart idea.

The adapters will be available later in the week. I suggest you pick one up if ! you have any kind of Mini DisplayPort-capable computer you want to throw up onto your TV once in a while. Also, Monoprice has a unit coming up soon as well that's pretty similar. [Kanexlive]