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Windows XP SP3 Release Candidate Now Available

December 19th, 2007 by iDunzo

Microsoft has released to the public a near-final version of a major update to its Windows XP operating system.

As of early this morning, the ‘Release Candidate’ for Windows XP Service Pack 3 was available as a 336 MB download from Microsoft’s Web site. The software had previously been available only to participants in Microsoft’s official test programs.

Microsoft says it considers the Release Candidate for Windows XP SP3 to be trial software and warns users to download with caution and at their own risk.

This pre-release software is provided for testing purposes only. Microsoft does not recommend installing this software on primary or mission critical systems.

Microsoft recommends that you have a backup of your data prior to installing any pre-release software.

For the adventurous, however, Windows XP SP3 Release Candidate offers a number of enhancements over the current version of the OS. It includes all updates issued since Windows XP Service Pack 2 was released in 2004, and some new elements.

Among them: A feature called Network Access Protection that’s borrowed from the newer Windows Vista operating system. NAP automatically validates a computer’s “health,” ensuring that it’s free of bugs and viruses, before allowing it access to a network.

Windows XP SP3 also includes improved “black hole” router detection — a feature that automatically detects routers that are silently discarding packets. In XP SP3, the feature is turned on by default, according to Microsoft.

Windows XP SP 3 also steals a page from Vista’s product activation model, meaning that product keys for each copy of the operating system doesn’t need to be entered during setup.

The feature should prove popular with corporate IT managers, who often need to oversee hundreds, or even thousands, of operating system installations.

Microsoft is in a bit of a Catch-22 with XP. The more it strengthens the OS, the less reason users have to upgrade to the newer Windows Vista, which by many accounts has failed to catch on with computer users in both the home and office since it debuted in January.

A final version of Windows XP SP3 is expected to ship early 2008.

Posted in Microsoft + Security Patches + Software + Technology | 1 Comment »

Bone Conducting Headphones: Cum On Feel The Noize

December 19th, 2007 by iDunzo

The Zelco Outi bone conducting headphones comprises a pair of vibrators and a four-level amplifier which together send the sound waves into the bone and cartilage behind the ear.

Input is via a standard 3.5mm jack, and the set comes bundled with a USB charger and AC adapter: fully charged you’ll get up to eight hours listening time.

I have a hard time believing this kind of sound delivery will give anything like the fidelity of normal headphones, but it won’t batter your eardrums quite so much.

Apparently when Popular Mechanics tested the kit, the reviewer noted that the bass feel is much more speaker-like: “both intense and felt through your entire body”.

Now if you want to really rattle your bones, turn your volume up to 11 (insert Spinal Tap reference) and Cum On Feel The Noize:

Don’t you just love the smell of metal in the morning? \m/

Posted in Music + Technology + Toys & Gadgets | Comments Off on Bone Conducting Headphones: Cum On Feel The Noize

Ike’s Greeting the First Recorded Message From Space

December 19th, 2007 by iDunzo

December 19, 1958: The first radio broadcast from space is transmitted to Earth, with President Eisenhower sending greetings to an international audience.

The technology wasn’t new (a tape recorder was used) but the delivery method was and Ike sounded suitably impressed:

“This is the president of the United States speaking. Through the marvels of scientific advance, my voice is coming to you from a satellite circling in outer space.”

He went on to convey his best wishes, and those of his country, to “all mankind … for peace on earth and good will to men everywhere.”

Eisenhower’s message was prerecorded, then launched into orbit with the U.S. Army’s first Project SCORE experimental satellite.

The primary recorder failed during the satellite’s first orbit but on the second pass the message was successfully transmitted using the backup recorder. Indeed, having a back up plan can be the best life insurance of an important endeavor like this.

Despite the cheery message on board, the satellite’s real purpose was to hang tough with the Russians, who had already put two satellites into orbit — Sputnik 1 and 2 — more than a year earlier.

The satellite, built earlier that year by the Army’s Signal Research and Development Laboratory at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, was launched aboard an Atlas ICBM provided by the Air Force. It was intended for a low trajectory orbit, meaning a short life.

After 12 days in space the batteries failed and the satellite burned up upon reentering earth’s atmosphere on January 21, 1959.

Source: Space Policy Project

Posted in Geekipedia + Technology + Trivia | Comments Off on Ike’s Greeting the First Recorded Message From Space

$19,000 Speakers Are Taller Than You

December 18th, 2007 by iDunzo

The Nucleus Reference 5LS speakers from Anthony Gallo Acoustics will cost you around $122 USD per inch. The catch?

The speakers are six and a half feet tall.

The pair weighs in at $19,000 USD, and each cabinet has 12 subwoofers at the back and a combination of eight mid range and seven tweeters at the front.

I almost fell asleep reading the specifications.

Like all high end audio gadgets, there is plenty of nonsense to get any audiophile excited: “spherical enclosure technology”,”carbon fiber” and my personal favorite: “rear-firing 4 inch drivers”.

I almost want to try these out, if only for the perverse pleasure of hooking such monsters up to a tiny Apple iPod Shuffle.

Posted in Apple + Music + Technology + Toys & Gadgets | Comments Off on $19,000 Speakers Are Taller Than You

Eight top-of-mind innovators to watch in 2008

December 17th, 2007 by iDunzo

They’re all passionate about an idea, an approach, or a technology, and they’re focused on driving it to the next level.

Watch for each of them to be a force for change in their own corner of the tech world.

Meet 8 people who will help shape the business technology world in the coming year:

Steve Jobs and Eric Schmidt
With very different approaches, this duo’s dragging the stagnant phone business into the Internet age. Jobs’ Apple iPhone embraces a closed network, and Schmidt’s Google Android platform envisions a wide-open one. Both are forcing change for the better.

Mark Zuckerberg
It’s not Facebook that matters, it’s Facebook thinking. IT will feel growing pressure to provide social networking functions–to customers, along the supply chain, and inside their workplaces.

Mark Hurd
He’s got Hewlett-Packard back atop the PC market. How big a splash can he make in business software? The year ahead will tell.

Ray Ozzie
For a Microsoft exec, Ozzie sure is quiet. That’s fine, but it’s time for his vision of software-plus-services to make some noise. That means delivering some surprising products businesses can put to use.

Sam Palmisano
IBM can’t afford to stand pat in software. After making the company’s biggest acquisition ever this year, count on IBM’s CEO to keep dealing in 2008.

Diane Greene
Microsoft storms the virtualization market next year, along with a growing horde of Xen-based rivals like Sun and Oracle. The VMware CEO is a leader, and this is her toughest test yet.

Charles Phillips
2008 needs to be about new products, as Oracle promises to deliver the first of its Fusion applications, which draw together software from past acquisitions. But don’t expect Oracle’s president, a former Wall Street analyst, to lay off the deal-making.

Posted in Technology + Toys & Gadgets + Web + Wireless | Comments Off on Eight top-of-mind innovators to watch in 2008

Disappearing Car Door

December 14th, 2007 by iDunzo

I’m still trying to figure out if this is real or a fake but either way it’s a really cool concept.

Ladies and Gentlemen, The Disappearing Car Door:

Taken from the official Disappearing Car Door website:

The original inventors and designers of the exciting Disappearing Car Door technology are now in a position to equip your favorite automobile with our cool, sexy, safe and convenient automatic door or design an original vehicle body incorporating this unique technology.

Our vehicle architecture offers an attractive rethink for car design and adds greatly to overall vehicle safety including our structural integration of the door with the unibody and our cruciform door frame technology.

What do you think? Is this car door technology real or fake?

After looking over the video and checking out the website, I’m still on the fence. If it’s not real, someone really needs to create it as I believe it would be well received.

Posted in Geekery + Technology + Toys & Gadgets + Videos | 3 Comments »