Crave

iPod battery replacement kits are nothing new. Manufacturers like Sonnet Technologies have offered reasonably priced do-it-yourself battery replacement kits for the past few years. What distinguishes the latest line of Blue Raven iPod batteries from previous efforts is a boast of 30 to 50 percent better battery life over the factory original (depending on your iPod model). The Blue Raven batteries are also much more attractively packaged than other replacements I've seen, which seems silly to mention, but I think packaging can have a huge effect on how intimidating a DIY project appears. Kits are available for around $30 … Read more

A PC with a twisty screen you can write on almost always=cool, and Thursday Gateway will release its latest take on the concept with the E-155C Thin & Light Convertible Notebook.

This one is aimed at students. The E-155C looks like a notebook, but works like a tablet PC with digital pen and touchscreen capability, with a screen that swivels 180 degrees in both directions. It has a 12-inch wide screen, Core 2 Duo processor, biometric fingerprint reader for security, and an alarm and flashing LED light should someone try to break in. All of this weighs in at … Read more

There have been plenty of Zune 2.0 rumors recently--flash memory, a "watermelon" version this summer, and what-have-you. Now here's another one to add to the pile; Engadget recently pointed us to a "Zune phone" interface patent application unearthed by Mad4MobilePhones. It appears to be a sort of "tiled" setup for for "improved user interface for mobile devices such as smartphones" and "personal digital assistants." Looks like a fancy Bingo card to me.

Engadget pointed out that some of the icons appear to point to weather, music, and the … Read more

Talking to the cable or phone company isn't anyone's idea of a good time. A new partnership between Sling Media and GetConnected Inc. (GCi) will help Slingbox users bypass both while upgrading cable or satellite services and connection speeds.

GCi is a behind-the-scenes service whose business is managing transactions between service providers--like Verizon, Comcast, AT&T--and other companies' end users. Dell customers can, for instance, use GCi, probably unbeknownst to them, to set up broadband services on a new PC.

Customers can use the SlingPlayer interface, and GCi's software will be able to tell in real … Read more

Car audio veterans Blaupunkt have plans to release a new iPod-ready portable music system that can double as a subwoofer for your car. It's a decent bet that the sound quality will be quite good, but to be effective as a car subwoofer, it will likely weigh a ton. It uses a rechargeable battery with an optional in-car dock and is said to deliver 60 watts of maximum power (30 watts RMS). The MP3 player input is simply a stereo minijack input, so don't expect this thing to actually charge or integrate with your iPod.

Along with … Read more

It's UMPC day at the Intel Developer Forum in Beijing, and Intel offered plenty of examples of devices that would be built on the just-announced Ultra Mobile Platform 2007. The Fujitsu pictured here, spotted on UMPC Portal, particularly caught our attention: it looks like a consumer-electronics version of the LifeBook P1610 tablet, which has long been a niche product marketed to business travelers. It begs the question: will UMPCs ever move into the mainstream?

To help answer that question, check out our full slide show of prototypes (assembled by CNET News.com's man on the scene, Tom Krazit), … Read more

Toshiba announced today that it has created a 16GB flash memory chip intended for consumer products such as cell phones and MP3 players. This is the highest capacity NAND flash memory chip to date, doubling the existing ceiling of 8GB. The 16GB chip is set to ship in the fall, just in time to make Apple's flash memory-based 8GB iPhone seem cramped.

The chip is designed around eight 2GB elements and boasts a copy speed of 6MB per second, with a 15MB per second read speed. Expect a wave of tiny 16GB flash MP3 players for the holidays.

Via … Read more

Sony's network audio streamer should be hitting store shelves soon. First unveiled at the January Consumer Electronics Show--and no stranger to Crave--the VGF-WA1 is the baby of Sony's VAIO PC division, not the consumer electronics side of the company. While we've seen similar Wi-Fi boom boxes in the past--the Roku SoundBridge Radio comes to mind--the VGF-WA1 is the first I've seen with a rechargeable battery, so you can go truly wireless (for up to 4 hours, according to Sony). In addition to streaming a variety of audio files (MP3, AAC, WAV, and, of course, Sony'… Read more

Intel announced today the winners of its Intel Core Processor Challenge, a competition with a total of $1 million in prize money that encouraged computer manufacturers to use its Viiv processor technology to create a high-performance, media-savvy machine. The winners, well, aren't particularly earth-shattering.

You do have to keep in mind that these are legitimate working PCs, not trippy concept designs created under the influence of what-have-you. So when Intel talks about the "best mix of style, acoustics, functionality and features for digital home entertainment," you have to take that with a grain of (pragmatic) salt.

The … Read more