Bang & Olufsen’s Budget HDTV April 30, 2007
READ MORE Gizmodo UK , HDTV , Home Entertainment , TV
Bang & Olufsen, purveyor of high-class home entertainment porn, has added another sleek model to its stable of high-def tellys. And, with a price tag of just £1,800 [excluding stand – this is B&O, after all] this 26in HDTV is considered to be the ‘affordable’ model.
That sleek black and silver finish surrounds a display with a 1366x768 pixel resolution, contrast ratio of 1200:1, a 6ms response time and brightness of 500cd/m2. There’s only one HDMI input though, which I think is just plain stingy for a luxury TV these days. Hell, most other makers offer two now, and some, even three. There’s also no digital TV tuner.
You can expect the BeoVision 8 to sound great though, thanks to two, 2in midrange/tweeter drivers and one 4in center bass loudspeaker driver. The company says that it can even be used as a dedicated PC monitor – jump now for a photo.
Still, you don’t go for B&O for a bargain, and this is a pretty smart looking HDTV from a company with a pedigree in design and quality. You can even get that funky stand if you shell out an extra £200.-Martin Lynch
[B&O]
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Creative’s 2-Megapixel Web Cam April 30, 2007
READ MORE Digital cameras , Gadgets , Gizmodo UK , PC , Peripherals
With so many rubbish Web-cams out there, Creative thinks there’s a few quid to be made at the quality end of the spectrum.
The Live! Cam Optia AF is an auto-focusing cam which sports a 2-megapixel CMOS sensor that the company claims is a world’s first – don’t they all? It’s certainly a looker with that glossy piano-black finish and will take photos up to 8Mp, albeit interpolated. The automatic focusing technology promises to track any movement so that your ugly mug stays in sharp focus all of the time.
It comes with dual-microphones to improve sound by reducing ambient noise. There’s also a handy password control feature to let parents ensure that their kids don’t become naked Web-cam hotties - at least at home. There’s no UK price or availability on this yet but it is coming, probably this summer.
The Asian price is around £56 but we all know that that’s about as much use as a third nipple. Full feature list after the jump. -Martin Lynch
Middle Earth Says ‘No’ To Gay Marriages April 30, 2007
READ MORE Games , Gizmodo UK , Online , PC
You may be able to lop heads off with gusto in the new online RPG, Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar, but getting all Brokeback with the Hobbits is just not cricket.
Turbine, makers of the latest World of Warcraft contender, decided early on that taking male bonding beyond the realms of a bit of extreme violence was just not on. Gay marriages and inter-species mingling were therefore nipped in the bud, according to Turbine game designer Nik Davidson, speaking to Salon.com.
They felt that giving Middle Earth a kind of, liberal Second Life marital feature would have detracted from the game and ran afoul of millions of Tolkien booklovers – not to mention old J.R.R. himself who would have dragged his desiccated corpse back out of his grave at such blasphemy. Andersen explains:
“The rule that we tried to follow across the board was: if there's an example of it in the book, the door is open to explore it. Very rarely will you see an elf and a human hook up, but it does happen; the door is open. Dwarves don't intermarry with hobbits; that door is shut. Did two male hobbits ever hook up in the shire and have little hobbit civil unions? No. The door is shut.”
“Tolkien was a conservative Catholic. He went out drinking with C.S. Lewis every night, and the two of them had a worldview that was - well, let's just say it clashes a little bit with the sensibilities of East Coast liberals who make up the largest population of Turbine.”
If you think the fans wouldn’t have over-reacted then check this out. Fans noticed a grey squirrel in some early forest screenshots and promptly complained to Turbine that Tolkien once wrote in a letter that he hated grey squirrels. It was changed.
Just imagine the reaction to Gimli and Frodo skipping up the aisle?-Martin Lynch
games lord of the rings online
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