Review LaCie was among the first hard disk manufacturers to produce high capacity, multimedia storage devices designed for media playback. These hard drives, equipped with A/V interfacing, enabled you to take your digital music and video files away from your computer and play them on a decent hi-fi and a full-size TV screen. With its new LaCinema Black range, LaCie has gone a step further and produced a full-scale set-top box.
Screen idol? LaCie’s LaCinema Black MAX
There are three models in the Black range, starting at around £280 for the Black PLAY, which is essentially a straightforward media server. However, we decided to test the top-of-the-range Black MAX, which costs a hefty £420 with 500GB hard disk or £505 with 1TB. That’s expensive, but the Black MAX does make an ambitious attempt to combine a network media server and a set-top DVR in a single unit.
The glossy black box measures around 9in wide and deep and a little under 2in high. It’s larger than an ordinary hard disk, but still only about half the size of our Sky+ box. A quick look around the back reveals a good selection of input and output options, including a digital TV tuner. However, at this price you might have expected two separate tuners, so that you could record one programme while watching another. Read the rest of this entry »
Review Nokia’s touchscreen user interface has not had many outings. We’ve seen it before in the original Nokia 5800 XpressMusic and in the much more highbrow, Qwerty keyboard toting N97. Now we have a third appearance in the shape of another XpressMusic handset, the 5530, currently an exclusive offering from Carphone Warehouse from £130. To reach that price some compromises have had to be made. So, while Wi-Fi is here, as well as the ubiquitous Bluetooth, the handset does not support 3G and there is no GPS.
Nokia’s 5530 XpressMusic: touchscreens shouldn’t go any smaller than this
The 5530 XpressMusic isn’t all that different to look at to the 5800 XpressMusic. It takes a candybar shape, is mostly screen on the front, and has an array of three buttons beneath the screen: call, end and menu. Like the 5800, it is narrower than the standard touchscreen fare.
The 640 x 360 resolution screen delivers clear, sharp viewable information indoors, but outside it was a bit of a pig to see in bright sunshine. The resolution is the same as the 5800, but the screen size is reduced from 3.2in to 2.9in. That reduction might sound slight, but it makes a big difference in terms of usability, and we think it is about as small as a touch screen can go. Overall the phone measures 104 x 49 x 13mm and it weighs 107g. Read the rest of this entry »
Review After a little less than a year on the market Sony has decided to give its Gigajuke wireless music system a bit of a facelift and make a few modifications. Evidently, the company intends to capitalise on the fact that, within the same twelve months, its Walkman range has gone from being a bunch of also-rans to a collection of some of the best personal music players on the market.
Sony’s NAS-SC500PK Gigajuke HDD
Open the Gigajuke box and you will find a plethora of kit with Sony bundling a NAS-S500HDE hard-drive based server unit complete with built-in CD player and a pair of rather fine bookshelf speakers. There’s also the NAS-C5E wireless music player with built-in speakers – think Logitech Squeezebox Boom – a small wireless router, a dock for your iPod, two remote controls and enough cables to re-wire a three bedroom semi. Read the rest of this entry »
Bandai’s been busy in their genius labs brewing up some “high tech” amusement, and they have the newly announced Tamagotchi Music Stars to show for it. You’ve probably been dying to create a digital diva or virtuoso all your own, and now you can, with six different options such as Glam Rock, Techno Sound, and Rising Star to choose from. Your character gets to join a band, go through hours of practice, auditions and rehearsals before making it big. Sound exhausting? Well fame comes at a price, kid. No word yet on price or availability, but you can check out their site for lots of info and a few shots of the designs. Oh: and rock on. Read the rest of this entry »
