Analyst firm iSuppli,which runs an interesting Teardown Analysis of new IT toys and gadgets, has put together a preliminary analysis of the Apple iPhone, speculating that each one of the shiny little things will generate nearly 50% gross margin.
By any standards, that’s a lot of cash but then Apple is used to pulling down a healthy 45% on the iMacs and iPods. iSuppli has created a functional Bill of Materials (BoM) estimate for both versions.
“iSuppli estimates the 4Gbyte version of the Apple iPhone will carry a $229.85 hardware BoM and manufacturing cost and a $245.83 total expense, yielding a 50.7 percent margin on each unit sold at the $499 retail price,” said Andrew Rassweiler, teardown services manager and senior analyst for iSuppli. “Meanwhile, the 8GByte Apple iPhone will sport a $264.85 hardware cost and a $280.83 total expense, amounting to a 53.1 percent margin at the $599 retail price.”
Check out the BoM here. Oh, and if you’re in the market for a music phone but can’t decide, things are only going to get more confusing with 835 music phones – yes 835 - due for launch in 07.-Martin Lynch
We're not sure how long they've managed to keep this under the radar, but it looks like Vizio has been working on a wireless speaker set up dubbed the Jive. It's still a little unclear how it works, but it appears that the TV (perhaps a new Vizio TV?) will have built-in wireless and transmit audio to a receiver embedded inside a subwoofer, which in turn will have connections for your rear speakers (the TV's built-in speakers will double as the front speakers). With the exception of a few Aquos models, I haven't really been impressed by most TV's built-in speakers, but Vizio's concept sounds intriguing. Pricing and availability are up in the air, but we'll have more details as soon as we get 'em. – Louis Ramirez
If ripping shows and re-encoding them into iPod format so you can watch them on the road sounds like too much hassle, this Any-Media iPod Uploader should be just the thing for you. All you have to do is plug in an RCA connection—TVs, VCRs, and DVD players have them—hit record, and the iRecord will automatically store them immediately onto the iPod.
It's available now for $159. Beats having to call the neighborhood nerd over every time you want to work your iPod. Speaking of which, I think I'm being paged. – Jason Chen
There will be a lot of media coverage on this later today no doubt but, for now, Toshiba has announced the creation of a 51GB blank HD DVD disc. Whoopee, as it manages to creep past the biggest Blu-ray blank disc by a mere 1GB. The only problem though is that the new disc might not actually play in existing HD DVD players. This sort of dampens the excitement, doesn’t it? A spokesman for the company told BetaNews:
“Since the disc is not standardised yet we are researching whether it is applicable to the current HD DVD players.”
My condolences go out to all those early adopters. For those of you sitting on the fence or still saving, this is what you’ll be getting.
The 51GB read-only disc can store up to 7 hours of high-def content. It’s a triple layer disc with each layer storing 17GB of data. This still lags behind the 25GB that Blu-ray discs can cram into each layer but at least it’s a step in the right direction.
Don’t hold your breath though since Toshiba does not expect approval for the new disc by the DVD Forum until the end of the year.-Martin Lynch
Those lucky Japanese shoppers. From next month they will be able to get their grubby little mitts on the world’s first laptop with an integrated HD DVD burner.
There are already HD DVD readers in some laptops, like the Qosmio G30 but the new G30A/97A will have the first HD DVD writer. Other notable features are dual 160GB hard disk drives, 1GB of Ram and a big 17in widescreen display with a resolution of 1920 x 1,280 pixels for showing off those high-def movies.
It will also sport the all-important HDMI input and a digital TV tuner. It is priced at over £1,600 in Japan which means you can easily add another £500 to the tag by the time it gets here later in the year. 15Gb write-once discs will be out there for around £6 - again, that's there, not here.
One last thing, don’t fool yourself that this will be suitable for mobile working as it weighs in at nearly 5Kg.-Martin Lynch
World of Warcraft may be taking over the real world, but there is still a lot happening in the games environment.
The London Science Museum ran its 'Future Playground' exhibition last month, looking at the future of gaming and some of the things on show were both wacky and wonderful. Take the Puffer Sphere above.
This is an inflatable display measuring anything from 2 metres to 10 metres across and can be hung from the ceiling. Developed by student, Ollie Collier, the sphere can have images projected on its curved surface to improve the immersive effect and opens up a lot of possibilities for anew type of 3-D gaming with gamers able to stand around the sphere and interact with it. This is what the blurb says:
PIMS is a portable synthetic environment for fully immersive collaborative visualisation.
The PIMS is still in development. Once finished it will be a fully immersive, portable environment in which small groups can view, explore and interact with 3D data sets, virtual reality models and remote or inaccessible spaces.
The PIMS display system will not only be robust enough to use outdoors, but also quick and easy to setup and operate. It will provide a full 360-degree panoramic in which users can navigate and interact with accurately spatialised visual content.
If you happen to be in Birmingham between now and January 24 you can catch the Puffer Sphere, by Pufferfish, in action at the NEC, as part of the Interiors Event.-Martin Lynch
We're not sure how long they've managed to keep this under the radar, but it looks like Vizio has been working on a wireless speaker set up dubbed the Jive. It's still a little unclear how it works, but it appears that the TV (perhaps a new Vizio TV?) will have built-in wireless and transmit audio to a receiver embedded inside a subwoofer, which in turn will have connections for your rear speakers (the TV's built-in speakers will double as the front speakers). With the exception of a few Aquos models, I haven't really been impressed by most TV's built-in speakers, but Vizio's concept sounds intriguing. Pricing and availability are up in the air, but we'll have more details as soon as we get 'em. – Louis Ramirez
If ripping shows and re-encoding them into iPod format so you can watch them on the road sounds like too much hassle, this Any-Media iPod Uploader should be just the thing for you. All you have to do is plug in an RCA connection—TVs, VCRs, and DVD players have them—hit record, and the iRecord will automatically store them immediately onto the iPod.
Editor and Contributor | Martin Lynch
Contributor | Tamlin Magee
