Sony to release ‘affordable’ 35mm digital cinema camera to fend off RED and Panasonic

While RED ushered in the revolution, the camera wars are really just starting for the film industry, with Sony showing off at NAB today one of its upcoming 35mm (full frame) digital cinema cameras after ARRI hogged the spotlight last week. Sony’s 35mm roadmap already had the industry atwitter, but news that the camera will be “affordable” is news indeed. Of course, affordable is a relative term: think in the $10k to $20k range, for a rough guess. What’s great is that, with the addition of the Panasonic AF100 unveiled yesterday, it’s clear that manufacturers are finally starting to glom onto this idea of taking these wonderful DSLR-style sensors and putting them into camcorder bodies. The 5D Mark II is great and all, but it was really just pointing to a bigger trend. The Sony camera is due to be released around this time next year, and you can check out a video of the unveil after the break.

Continue reading Sony to release ‘affordable’ 35mm digital cinema camera to fend off RED and Panasonic

Sony to release ‘affordable’ 35mm digital cinema camera to fend off RED and Panasonic originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Apr 2010 20:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Day in the Life: Kin-less

digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/microsoft/Day_in_the_Life_Kin_less’; If you were near an internet display terminal yesterday, you might’ve tragically stumbled upon one of Microsoft’s Kin promo videos. Sure, the product might be slightly condescending to its supposed target market, but the promotional videos are outright MTV-gone-bad, full of hipster shorthand and fake “reality” bits. The “Day in the Life” videos are particularly egregious, featuring a guy on a road trip to burn a box of mementos from his ex while accompanied by his two new girlfriends, a terrifying parade comprised of facial hair and Williamsburg-esque terror, and a tragically-near-30 couch surfer trying to remember a drunken night of excess through pictures. Strikes a bit close to home, we must say. So, in case you missed the spots you can check a couple out after the break, but to wash the palate we’ve also provided our very own “Kin-less” spin on the concept, with the help of a Windows Mobile 6.5 handset we just happened to have lying around.

Continue reading Day in the Life: Kin-less

Day in the Life: Kin-less originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Apr 2010 13:26:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple refreshes MacBook Pro family with Intel Core i5 and Core i7 processors… at long last!

digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/apple/Apple_refreshes_MacBook_Pro_family_with_Intel_Core_i5_and_Co’; This transition from the last crop of Core 2 Duo chips (which Apple introduced in June of last year) to Intel’s Core 2010 chips has caused quite the unprecedented wait, but at last we’re staring down a fresh crop of MacBook Pros and all is right with the world. The 13-inchers are sticking with Core 2 Duo, but the 15.4-inch and 17-inch models are now Core i5 and Core i7 through and through. The higher end models are nabbing NVIDIA’s GeForce GT 330M graphics with something akin to Optimus switching (though Apple just calls it “automatic graphics switching technology,” and claims to be using its own tech), while the 13-incher get NVIDIA GeForce 320M scraps. Along with the faster 2.4GHz and 2.66GHz chips in the 13-inch, Apple claims to be able to squeeze 10 hours of battery life from the machine, but the real meat is in the Core i5 2.4GHz (520M), Core i5 2.53GHz (540M), and Core i7 2.66GHz (620M) processors in the larger models. The 330M graphics are twice as fast as the 13′s 320M, but thanks to the magic of Optimus, er, “automatic graphics switching,” which switches the GPU on and off on the fly based on the needs of the task at hand, Apple still thinks you’ll manage 8 to 9 hours of battery life on these big guys.

All machines come with 4GB of RAM, and while hard drives are standard (320GB and 500GB in the higher end), you’re free to add a 512GB SSD to your machine if you so choose, for a mere $1,300. Interestingly only the 15-incher is getting that top Core i7 chip, with the sole 17-inch model is consigned to the 2.53GHz Core i5 (though you can choose Core i7 in the build to order options). Prices range from $1,799 on the 15 (up from the last-gen’s $1,699 base price!) to $2,299 on the 17, with a $1,199 starting price on the 13. On the 15-inch you can pick between a 1440 x 900 “glossy” display, a 1680 x 1050 glossy display for $100 more, and an anti-glare hi-res display for another $50 on top of that (you 17-inch users are stuck with 1920 x 1200 and glossy). The biggest tweak outside of these beefy internals is “inertial scrolling” support for the trackpads, à la iPhone, though we’re not sure why this couldn’t have been added with just a software update. Everything’s up on the Apple Store right now for your perusal, with the bigger models shipping “within 24 hours” and a 2-4 day delay on the 13-inch.

Update: Ars Technica confirms that the autonomous graphics switching is indeed from Apple. The boys in Cupertino wrote their own code in order to extract the longer battery life. Unlike Optimus, Apple’s solution powers down the integrated graphics when the discrete GPU is required — something that happens automatically whenever an application requires advanced graphics frameworks like OpenGL, Core Graphics, or Quartz Composer. Optimus works off a master list of GPU intensive apps that NVIDIA maintains. Yeah, we can definitely see Apple not going for that.

Apple refreshes MacBook Pro family with Intel Core i5 and Core i7 processors… at long last! originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Apr 2010 08:34:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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myTouch Slide found in the wild, looking good in red

Yeah, we saw the myTouch Slide back in January, but it certainly seems to have come a long way in the past few months. For starters, the phone is on now, showing off a slightly custom Android UI and that 480 x 320 screen. The handset also looks to have gotten a fancy red (or is that form of pink?) paint job, and doesn’t look half bad for it. Our guess is we’ll be seeing this in a number of colors, just like the myTouch 3G, but that’s just speculation. There aren’t any other details about the phone on offer here, or knowledge on exactly how this shot managed to leak out, but we figure we’ll be learning more soon enough.

myTouch Slide found in the wild, looking good in red originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Apr 2010 17:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HTC EVO 4G shows up in Sprint inventory, shots of the accessories surface

Need something to wash that Kin marketing out of your mouth? How about some new tidbits on the superphone to end all superphones? For whatever reason, the HTC EVO 4G has showed up in Sprint’s inventory, a couple months early by all accounts. It’s carrying a completely reasonable $5,555 pricetag, and the appropriate HTC A9292 model number. If that doesn’t quite satiate your EVO 4G thirst, LeakDroid has managed to get shots of those EVO 4G accessories we’ve been hearing about, including a home dock, extended battery case, colored silicon sleeves, and a car dock. Hit up the source link for the shots.

[Thanks to an anonymous tipster for the inventory screen]

HTC EVO 4G shows up in Sprint inventory, shots of the accessories surface originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Apr 2010 15:26:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Microsoft Kin UI walkthrough

If you’ve managed to pull your eyes away from our no-holds-barred liveblog of Microsoft’s Kin announcement, you might’ve noticed that there are videos up on the official Kin site depicting the UI in all its hipster-lite, storytelling glory. Still, in case you’re not a 20 something living in Brooklyn on your parents’ money while pursuing a career in the arts, we’ve turned those motion video picture things into regular stills for your staid perusal. We even added little descriptors below the galleries, which due to your acute lack of ADD you might even find time to read. We upped the videos after the break as well, just in case you wanted to try your hand at the young-and-hip life.

Kin Spot is a little hot spot at the bottom of the screen almost akin the virtual “binding” in Courier. You can drag pictures, addresses, web pages, and other media into it, and then drag the faces of friends who you want to send the stack of stuff to. Once you tap the spot you can preview your message, add some text, and choose from MMS or email to send it out.

Haven’t had enough? Check out our hands-on and the official announce post! Videos and the rest of the features are after the break.

Continue reading Microsoft Kin UI walkthrough

Microsoft Kin UI walkthrough originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Apr 2010 14:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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