Hi-tech Frontier

HP Pavilion dv7t gaming laptop While HP's dv7t provides a much more subtle way to game on-the-go compared to say, the HDX crew, we don't see the necessity in keeping these updates all hush-hush. For whatever reason, it seems that said laptop has been updated overnight from 17- to 17.3-inches (we're talking LCD size, by the way), and the NVIDIA graphics option has been replaced with a pair of ATI selections: the 512MB Mobility Radeon HD 4530 and 1GB HD 4650 . The newfangled 17.3-inch panel sports a somewhat deflating 1,600 x 900 native resolution, though there is good news to be shared. The previous $1,229 starting point has dropped to a decidedly more manageable $799.99 , though it'll cost you extra to equip this beast with the 2GHz Core 2 Quad CPU that it really deserves.

Dell Inspiron Mini 10 starts at $399 It's been a rocky road, paved with hardship and confusion, but Dell's finally ready to let us at its colorful collection of Inspiron Mini 10 netbooks -- at least the order page. You can (slightly) configure them to your hearts content, but any color outside of black comes with a $30 price premium. We upped a Mini 10 to "Jade Green" and threw in a 1.6GHz Z530 Atom processor (1.33GHz is standard) and ended up at $479, but there's no expanding beyond the 1GB of RAM or the 160GB HDD, as per the international netbook treaty. The order page is quoting a "preliminary ship date" of April 2nd, up from the March 31st we saw two days ago, so we hope that's just a rough estimate.

Dell Studio XPS 435 Yeah, we're smitten. We couldn't tell you what Dell's doing here that they haven't managed in the last 100,000 XPS desktop designs, but whatever it is we want to buy it flowers and CryEngine 2-powered games. The new Studio XPS 435 landed on Dell's site a couple days ago, and is now available for configuration and sale. The "base model"(at $1099) sports a 2.66GHz Core i7-920 processor, 3GB of RAM and an ATI Radeon HD 3650 256MB graphics card. Things of course rise dramatically from there -- you can add another grand to the pricetag by bumping the processor alone, and the 24GB of RAM option is a nice $1,500 addition -- but we'd say the base model is a pretty solid start. Dell's quoting a March 19th ship date, but that's just "preliminary" at the moment.

PlayMad PSOne portable Clearly, this is the month to be making portable PSOne mods. Just weeks after checking out Bacteria's totally bodacious IntoPlay comes a formidable opponent from G-force. The aptly named PlayMad gets its label from the innate ability to handle original PlayStation titles and its uncanny resemblance to Sega's own Nomad.

LCD Bluetooth Vibrating Bracelet Brando tried here, it really did, but the crucial omission of a watch just kills the deal for us. Still, for those nowhere near ready to give up their Sea-Dweller, the LCD Bluetooth Vibrating Bracelet makes for a perfect complement. Essentially, this here piece of jewelry pairs up with your BT-enabled cellphone in order to display caller ID information and vibrate whenever someone rings in. If you're tied up at the moment, you can simply hit a button on the bracelet that will reject the call and potentially kill friendships. At $49.90 , though, we'd hope the whole "stainless steel" claim is true -- wouldn't want any yellowing going on at this price point, now would we?

Canon new PowerShot D10 Well, we dug up some hands-on pics of that new waterproof Canon PowerShot D10 we've been hearing about recently. Obviously, since it's aimed at the "sport" set it has to be available in "camouflage," and since it's waterproof it has to be sort of bulky. As for the stats, this guy rocks a 12.1-megapixel sensor, DIGIC 4 processor, 3x zoom, image stabilization, and a 2.5-inch PureColor LCD II display that's said to be twice as bright as the company's standard LCD II . In addition, the camera is waterproof up to 10 meters, shock resistant, and the display sits behind a 2mm shield -- if you should happen to drop this off the roof of an evil genuis's high-tech lair (or into a pitcher of beer), no worries. Going for about $329, available at the end of April.

22-inch SX2210 widescreen LCD monitor That enigmatic monitor that's been strutting its stuff in Dell 's Studio XPS 435 glamor shots has been unmasked as the 22-inch SX2210 . A product page and online manual for the widescreen LCD have surfaced on the company's site, and here's what we know so far: it's got 1080p resolution, a 2.0 megapixel embedded webcam, 1000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, 2 millesecond response time, 160 degrees horizontal / 170 degrees vertical viewing angles, and 300 cd/m² brightness. Unfortunately, mum's the word on pricing or availability, but with an estimated March 19th launch for the new XPS, our fingers are crossed for a double feature.

Epson R-D1x digital Rangefinder There's something undeniably sexy, romantic even, about modern digital rangefinders. Perhaps it's the bevy of tactile controls that stand in such stark contrast to the button-less touchscreen trend infecting consumer electronics. Perhaps it's nostalgia. Whatever it is, the Epson R-D1x just created a momentary pause of reverence amongst Engadget editors. Not much has changed since the R-D1 (followed by the R-D1s) was introduced four years ago: that 6 megapixel APS-C CCD sensor, RAW and JPEG support, and Leica M and L glass compatibility remain. Epson just modernized things a bit by adding a handgrip (model R-D1xG), a bigger 2.5-inch LCD, support for the SDHC card format (up to 32GB), and improved EDiART image processing . But this shooter isn't about the specs, it's about emotion. Ships April 9th for an undisclosed price estimated to be around $2,000 .

Kindle 3 rumor with touchscreen 8.5 x 11-inch display Now that the Kindle 2 is out, it's time to get back onto the Kindle rumor mill. You might recall that in addition to the early leaks of the device that become the Kindle 2, a bigger screened Kindle mimicking an 8.5 x 11-inch sheet of paper for students was rumored. According to DigiTimes' sources apparently within Prime View International (PVI), the makers of the Kindle's electrophoretic display (EPD), Amazon's next Kindle will launch by the end of this year and will be "larger in size and equipped with touch functions." Of course, that's no big stretch to the imagination -- Plastic Logic has been kicking around its 8.5 x 11-inch touchscreen eBook reader ('Shopped with a Kindle logo above) for months now with a plan to launch in 2010 . Let's just see if Amazon can get this out in time for the back to school selling season.

DualShock Vortex concept controller In the halcyon days before dual analog sticks, when gamers had only D-pads and buttons and that's the way we liked it, serious PlayStation drifters had one weapon of choice for 'Ridge Racer' battles: the neGcon from Namco. It and its twisting mechanism never really caught on, but it hasn't been entirely forgotten, reborn through the DualShock Vortex pictured above, a controller extending the same concept to the PS3, offering the 45 degrees of twist you'll want for Gran Turismo 5 (if it ever ships) plus the analog sticks you'll need for Killzone 2. Alas, it's just a rendered concept from Israeli designer Tamar Fleisher at this point, and is rather unlikely to show up at a game retailer near you, but maybe if enough of you e-mail the kind folks at the now Namco Bandai they'll think about making it a reality.

Dels 22-inch LED-backlit G-Series LCD After teasing its entries last month and offering up the 24-inch G2410 a couple days ago, Dell 's officially rounding out its eco-game on the desktop panel scene with the 22-inch G2210, a display so energy efficient it can only display pictures of windmills and solar panels. The 22-incher has an extremely miserly 18 watt power consumption rating, compared to the G2410's 20 -- impressive, but you're probably more interested in the 1000:1 contrast ratio (dynamically boosted up to 1,000,000:1), 250 nits of brightness, and 5ms response rate over a resolution of 1680 x 1050. At $239 , it's actually a little cheaper than anticipated, which might just give you some extra incentive to pick one up with your tax refund -- you environmentalist you.

Dell Inspiron Mini 9 Been brushing the idea of a netbook off for months now? Let's see you ignore this. Hot on the heels of the Inspiron Mini 10 going on sale, Dell has lowered the barrier to entry on its marginally smaller Mini 9 to a rather amazing $199. For under two bills, you can now grab yourself an Obsidian Black 8.9-inch netbook with a 1.6GHz Atom CPU, WiFi, a 4-cell battery, GMA950 graphics, 512MB of RAM, a 4GB SSD and a copy of Ubuntu Linux . Of course, that price heads up a hundred bucks if you just can't live without Windows XP, but if there's ever been a time for learning how to deal within an open source environment, we'd say this is it. Good luck with that whole "resisting the temptation" thing.

Gresso Skeleton Gold Phone OK, OK, perhaps beautiful is stretching it a tad, but Gresso's Skeleton Gold Phone is definitely interesting, most notably the "polished 42k sapphire glass" see-thru back. While, essentially a twin to the Gresso Sol, it eschews wood for titanium, ceramic, 18K Gold, steel, leather, and baby seal eyelash shavings. Under the hood it 's a fairly vanilla tri-band GSM / GPRS (really, only GPRS) Windows Mobile 6 handset with 64MB of memory, 2GB of external storage, and Bluetooth. If you're in the mood to cha-ching your way into Gresso's world, you'd better act fast as this limited run only reaches 50 devices at a price of about $4400 each .

Samsung dual-SIM GT-C5212 The Samsung GT-C5212 (sounds fast, doesn't it?) seems to be the candybar twin to the Samsung B5702 we mentioned a little earlier in the month -- but lacks the wowee factor those SIM indicator lights brought. Featuring dual-SIM slots -- also apparently has a button to choose which to use for data, calling, and so on -- a 1.3 megapixel camera, Bluetooth, 64MB of internal memory expandable to 8GB, and dual-band GSM . So, yeah, no awards for innovation here, but knowing Samsung, it'll likely be a workhorse and at only $194 we suppose that's a fair shake. The C5212 it expected to ship by the end of this month, though, pricing is listed in Rubles so we expect Russia may well be its only home.

OWC Blu-ray burner So much for staying atop the pile, eh? Just four months after OWC introduced the world's first external Blu-ray drive with a quad interface , the company has already outed the next iteration. Spec-for-spec, it's exactly the same as the prior version save for the drive speed, as this one will toast BD-Rs at 8x, blank DVDs at 16x and writable CDs at up to 32x. You'll still find USB 2.0, FireWire 400, FireWire 800 and eSATA ports 'round back, and if you're certain you won't be angry when the 16x model ships by Fall (just a hunch, really), you can hand over your $399.99 right now.

Paradigm SUB 12 and SUB 15 subwoofers Replacing the well-regarded Servo-15 and Seismic 12 subwoofers, Paradigm has brought in the SUB 12 and SUB 15 to bring joy to your HT room. Borrowing some tech from the positively scary Signature SUB 25, the two new models are able to do away with the servo feedback-control while posting better performance across the "three Ls" -- louder, lower-frequency and lower-distortion. How does extension to 12-Hz on the SUB 15 and 16-Hz for the SUB 12 sound to you? Yeah, we thought so. Still, those last few hertz cost some money -- $1,999 and $2,799 for the Sub 12 and SUB 15, respectively. Still, few things in your HT will put a stupid grin on your face like bass you feel in your gut.

Palm Treo Pro We're still waiting on a solid bit of subsidized US availability on Sprint, but Canada's got things all figured out -- how typical. Palm's Treo Pro is doing the EV-DO Rev. A thing on Bell Mobility up there, going for $99.95 on a three-year contract -- 1 and 2-year contracts are $0 and off contract is only $49, so we'll likely be updating when things settle down. That sounds like a silly amount of time to be tied to Windows Mobile 6.1, but we're temporal pessimists like that. Bell Mobility customers can pick up the phone as of today.

Mitsubishi LDTV146 and LDTV152 1080p LCD monitors Mitsubishi may be having some trouble with its LaserVue set, but those in the commercial realm probably aren't too concerned. What they may be interested in, however, are these two. Mitsu has introduced the 46-inch LDTV146 and 52-inch LDTV152 at the Digital Signage Show in Las Vegas, both of which boast 1080p 10-bit LCD panels . These were designed to last and last (and last), with a backlight estimated to survive 30,000 hours -- or around seven years when turned on for 12 hours per day. Other specifications include a 10,000:1 contrast ratio, 500 nits of brightness and $2,995 / $3,995 price tags, and if you're into either, you'll be glad to know they're available now.

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic There was a bit of a false alarm at the flagship stores yesterday -- Nokia's New York and Chicago stores got inventory, but didn't start selling the 5800 right away, causing much anguish in the hearts of American plectrum lovers and our very own Chris Ziegler. Well, all has been rectified, and now you can pick up Nokia's touchscreen pioneer, the 5800 XpressMusic, for $399 , unlocked and unsubsidized. If you aren't so much into retail stores you can head to Nokia's online store, though the phone is still inexplicably listed as "pre-order" there -- we're sure things will be rectified soon enough.

NTT DoCoMo BlackBerry Bold It's apparently not quite the same fire hazard that the truth in advertising standard-bearer Quickfire is, but NTT DoCoMo doesn't seem to be taking any chances with its newly-launched BlackBerry Bold , with the Japanese carrier now suspending sales of the smartphone after some reports of it getting a bit too toasty for comfort. Apparently, some 30 users reported that the keyboard "heated up" while the phone was recharging, although it's not clear if that's due to the charger or the handset itself. For its part, RIM says that the issue "appears to be specifically limited to the BlackBerry Bold devices sold in Japan," and that expects to be able to fix the problem and resume sales of the Bold "shortly." In the meantime, stay frosty, Japan.

Verismo VuNow internet TV platform Ready or not, Verismo Networks' VuNow internet TV platform is making its way out. After ambushing the OEM market earlier this year, the company is now proudly announcing new praise from an unlikely suspect: CableLabs. As the story goes, executives from the CableLabs Forum voted VuNow as the "best new product idea" during so-called "informal polling" at a meetup in Colorado Springs. At first glance, one might wonder why cable proponents would be supporting a platform that needs no subscription, but considering that Comcast and Time Warner Cable (and likely others) are already looking to wrap internet content into pay-TV bundles, we suppose it's no longer a shock. The whole cable-internet media relationship is about to get a lot more interesting.

LG 21.5-inch W2261VG LCD TV with 50,000:1 There's something about LG's latest LCD that seems strangely familiar, but we digress. The 21.5-inch W2261VG LCD boasts 50,000:1 contrast ratio in a special mode (1000:1 otherwise) with full HD resolution. It's also got a 2 millisecond response time, HDMI, VGA and a HDCP compliant DVI-D ports, and a 22,000 yen (about $227) price tag. Care to give the monitor a spin? It's available now... in Japan .

EQD AURIA HDTV As the HDTV mainstays teeter on failure, drop lines and consider consolidation, newcomer EQD is hoping to exploit the situation by hitting the big guys where they simply can't compete: price. As we've already learned from VIZIO, price is king in the TV world right now, so when a new firm comes out swinging with 720p / 1080p HDTVs at "up to 20 percent less than other TV brands," we pay attention. Furthermore, EQD is slapping a two-year warranty on its entire AURIA line and pledging a portion of each sale towards charity. We're told to expect sets ranging from 16- to 47-inches in size, and each of the models should include an integrated ATSC / NTSC / QAM TV tuner along with HDMI 1.3 inputs. EQD is expected to make its HDTV debut when its first models ship in March or April, though only time will tell exactly how "low" these MSRPs will be.