Category Archives: features

Ask Engadget: What’s the best budget NAS?

Friday, December 12th, 2008
Posted by Darren Murph from Engadget.

Yeah, we’ve seen a similar question before, but this one’s looking specifically at NAS devices that won’t force you to liquidate half your assets to afford. We’ll let David take it from here, and once you’re done reading / responding, send in a question of your own to ask at engadget dawt com:

“I’m tempted to buy a NAS that centralizes all of my shared media, as well as act as a central backup. Redundancy is not a necessity as RAID0 will eventually fail and I’m not inclined to go RAID1 and waste the valuable disk storage space. I already have a few that I’ve been looking at, Buffalo’s LinkStation and D-Link’s DNS-323. What’s people’s opinion nowadays?

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Filed in Computers, ExternalHardDrive, ExternalHdd, HardDrive, NAS, NetworkStorage, Storage, external hard drive, external hdd, features, hard drive, network storage | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

How-To: Build a ‘Guitar Hero’ foot pedal controller

Thursday, December 11th, 2008
Posted by Benjamin Heckendorn from Engadget.

Benjamin J. Heckendorn returns from a vision quest of Xbox 360 laptop-building and Jasper-hunting to share a new how-to project with Engadget readers. In this episode, he’ll describe how to build one of his Guitar Hero foot pedal controllers, which allows those with physical limitations to play their favorite guitar rhythm games using a foot pedal! Read on for the complete how-to.

Continue reading How-To: Build a ‘Guitar Hero’ foot pedal controller

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How-To: Build a ‘Guitar Hero’ foot pedal controller originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:26:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed in BenHeck, BenjaminHeckendorn, Computers, DIY, FootPedal, Guitar Hero, Guitar Hero Foot Pedal Controller, GuitarHero, GuitarHeroFootPedalController, PhysicalLimitations, ben heck, benjamin Heckendorn, features, foot pedal, hack, mod, physical limitations | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

Inside an Xbox 360 Jasper: Ben Heck dissects the mythical console, then tells you how to find one

Wednesday, December 10th, 2008
Posted by Benjamin Heckendorn from Engadget.

“Gentlemen! I give you… JASPER!” [lightning crackles, thunder sound FX]


Ace modder Benjamin J Heckendorn (aka “Benheck”) has found — and immediately dissected — an Xbox 360 Jasper. As widely reported, it was inside an Arcade unit. In the following story, he not only details what he finds inside, but will also clue you in on how you too can find this model on store shelves. Read on for the exclusive Engadget look at the guts and the glory!

Continue reading Inside an Xbox 360 Jasper: Ben Heck dissects the mythical console, then tells you how to find one

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Inside an Xbox 360 Jasper: Ben Heck dissects the mythical console, then tells you how to find one originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:05:00 EST.

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Filed in BenHeck, BenjaminHeckendorn, Computers, XBox 360, Xbox360, Xbox360Jasper, ben heck, benjamin Heckendorn, dissect, dissection, features, xbox 360 jasper | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

Engadget’s Holiday Gift Guide: for mom


Posted by Engadget staff from Engadget.

You know that no matter what gift you end up getting for your mom, she’ll love you just the same. Still, it would be totally bodacious to get her the kind of present she’ll really be over the moon about, right? When it comes to gadgets and moms, there’s not a ton of crossover, so unless she’s a hardcore geek, tech shopping can be a minefield. That’s where the Engadget Holiday Gift Guide comes in, of course. Let us take all the pain and worry out of your shopping experience, so you can focus on the important things — like calling your mother when you say you will.

Click here to read more.

Filed in Computers, EngadgetHolidayGiftGuide, ForMom, HolidayGiftGuide, HolidayGiftGuide2008, engadget holiday gift guide, features, for mom, hgg2008, holiday gift guide, holiday gift guide 2008 | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

NVIDIA dishes about OpenCL

Tuesday, December 9th, 2008
Posted by Nilay Patel from Engadget.

We spent some time on the phone with NVIDIA today in the wake of last night’s official release of the OpenCL GPU-processing spec, and we learned some interesting things. NVIDIA thinks OpenCL is going to bring a lot more attention to general-purpose GPU computing, and it’s planning on stoking the flames — not only is it accelerating the CUDA release schedule, it’s planning on working with Microsoft on DirectX 11 Compute. Hit the break for some more highlights!

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NVIDIA dishes about OpenCL originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Dec 2008 20:03:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed in Computers, Nvidia, OpenCL, cuda, features, gpgpu | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

TiVo Netflix hands-on

Sunday, December 7th, 2008
Posted by Nilay Patel from Engadget.

TiVo was nice enough to hit us with the Netflix-enabling Fall Service Update a little early, and the going’s been pretty good — this is probably our favorite Netflix streaming implementation yet. Although it’s not as flashy of an experience as the Xbox 360’s Netflix implementation, it’s faster to start streaming, and to our eyes it looks a lot better — the 360’s output is really dark, while the TiVo looks bright and crisp. On top of that, we’ve never been able to get our 360 to hit more than two bars when playing HD-capable content, while the TiVo instantly spooled up and started streaming full-quality 720p video — and it can drop back to SD during network slowdowns and then pop up to HD again, while the 360 is stuck at whatever res it started the movie at.

Click here to read more.

Filed in Computers, FallServiceUpdate, HandsOn, NetFlix, VideoOnDemand, fall service update, features, hands-on, tivo, video on demand | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

How would you change the Slingbox Pro HD?

Friday, December 5th, 2008
Posted by Darren Murph from Engadget.

Sling Media’s Slingbox Pro HD arrived with lofty expectations, and while the box handled its core tasks reasonably well, we found it to have some issues on the software side. The good news there is that software is modifiable, which means Sling could definitely improve matters in the near future. To that end, we’re interested to see how you’d change the high-def-capable placeshifter. Any bugs you want knocked out? Any particular hardware traits you aren’t fond of? Is it simply too difficult for your mother-in-law to get working? Sound off below! You never know — someone important may be listening.

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How would you change the Slingbox Pro HD? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 05 Dec 2008 19:30:00 EST.

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Filed in Computers, HowWouldYouChange, SlingMedia, SlingboxPro, features, how would you change, hwyc, placeshift, placeshifting, sling, sling media, slingbox, slingbox pro | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

iPosture review: it ain’t no slouch!


Posted by Laura June from Engadget.

The iPosture is a button-sized device designed to help you self-correct your posture by vibrating every time you slouch. We were lucky enough to score one for review, and we spent three solid work days (10+ hours each) and some relaxing time wearing the annoying reminder of our ill-postured ways. Here’s our epically long-winded opinion of the device.

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iPosture review: it ain’t no slouch! originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:42:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ask Engadget: What’s the best webcam for my PC?

Thursday, December 4th, 2008
Posted by Darren Murph from Engadget.

It happens every year — the holidays roll around, and you realize that you’ve missed out on chatting with some of your loved ones. They offer to video chat, and you have to politely decline while resorting to the not-nearly-as-personal telephone call. Trey’s ready for a change:

“I’m looking for a webcam to connect to my desktop, preferably one with great video quality and at least decent capture abilities in low light. Size isn’t too much of a factor, though I would obviously prefer it to be as small as possible with sacrificing quality. What’s the best one out there?”

Don’t deny it folks, we know you’ve got a favorite webcam when it comes to chatting with your undercover SO.

Click here to read more.

Filed in AskEngadget, Computers, ask, ask engadget, camera, features, webcam | | Link inside C.I.A.G. | Comments Off

Nokia E63 hands-on


Posted by Paul Miller from Engadget.

While the N97 was free to fondle, the slightly less exciting E63 was decidedly bolted to a table, so we had to take what angles we could get. The phone is basically a cheap-o version of the E71: Nokia figured it had a good thing going on in that QWERTY candybar, and decided to spread the love at a lower price point, with a slightly thicker, plastic handset. The good news is that no matter what you do to cheapen the phone, the E63 comes from good stock, and is really a compelling form factor. The slight bump in thickness is negligible, and while the cheaper materials are easily distinguished from the luxury feel of the E71, the phone by no means feels cheap.

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