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The 404 429: Where we'll never use that one again

Now that I've moved into a new mouseless apartment, I can finally settle down and live the dream of digital cable television. First things first, though: I need a new TV. Since it's been eights years since I've even considered buying a new box, needless to say I need all the help I can get. Luckily I've got Jeff, Wilson, and CNET's HDTV World to help me decide on a size, resolution, and brand! Feel free to send me your shopping advice or hot deals at the404(at)cnet(dot)com or @the404 on Twitter.

Everyone's talking about the latest gossip: Attack of the Show stole our show motto! In light of this controversy, our buddy Blake Stevenson drafted the amazing fight announcement poster you see to the left.

With so many awesome fans like Blake on our side, we're sure to win this Battle for the Brow. And if you think that Kevin Pereira and Olivia Munn can even occupy the same air as our low brow-itude, you're on the wrong side of the ring. D-Topping, pearl necklaces, bean bag chairs, buzz-outlouding!? We DARE Attack of the Show to step to us and find out what happens when you mess with the Nerdy Dirty (please don't steal that one).

Jeff brings a great first story to the table about Best Buy's Geek Squad charging $130 to set up a PlayStation 3! This story is so ridiculous that it actually prompts Jeff to bring back the classic "ARE YOU KIDDIN' ME!?" and sadly...they aren't. Neither Best Buy nor Geek Squad have the best customer service reputation, but this might as well be a crime. We understand that there are some fairly techno-inept folks out there, but setting up a PS3 literally requires one plug. Save your $130 and buy some games.

Finally, much thanks to Brian from Pittsburgh--the first winner of our "Take-a-photo-of-yourself-in-a-hockey-rink-with-a-404-sign" competition! Click on the thumbnail over yonder to see him in all his hockey-garb glory. A copy of NHL 10 is on its way to your doorstep, Brian! There's still time left to submit YOUR photo to the404(at)cnet(dot)com, so don't sleep on your chance to win!

EPISODE 429 Subscribe in iTunes audio | Suscribe to iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video… Read more

Can the Donkey Kong world record be broken?

LOS ANGELES--Steve Wiebe is at it again.

The star of the documentary, "King of Kong: Fistful of quarters," Wiebe's past attempts--and failures--to break the "Donkey Kong" world record have been well documented and discussed.

But now, here at E3, Wiebe is taking another shot at the record--currently 1,047,200 points, and held by the other star of the documentary, Billy Mitchell--courtesy of the TV network G4, which, even as I write this, is hosting Wiebe's record pursuit on its stage at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

Already today--while most of the E3 world … Read more

AT&T plans to double wireless broadband speeds by 2011

AT&T announced Wednesday plans to double the speed of its wireless broadband network by 2011. The move to HSPA technology, and eventually LTE networks, will begin later this year.

AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson outlined the carrier's plans at the D: All Things Digital conference in Carlsbad, Calif. "We are going to go ahead and deploy some rather aggressive wireless broadband," Stephenson said.

HSPA, which stand for High Speed Packet Access, is the next evolution in the carrier's 3G wireless broadband network. Though it promises peak data speeds of 7.2Mbps, slower speeds … Read more

AT&T tests speedier 3G network

AT&T's 3G wireless network will soon be twice as fast.

An executive at the company told Telephony Online this week that the company is running trials of its upgraded 3G network in two markets. And the company plans to expand the upgrades across its nationwide network once the trials are completed.

The upgrade to the company's HSPA network will provide peak download speeds of about 3.6Mbps. The company's current generation of technology offers peak download links speeds of 1.7 Mbps. Of course, real world data speeds are much lower. Most wireless subscribers get … Read more

Report: 3G and 4G market share on the rise

Global wireless subscriptions for 3G and 4G networks are expected to account for 30 percent of the market within the next five years, according to a report released Wednesday by In-Stat.

That's a substantial increase from the 11 percent slice of the global market that 3G held at the end of last year, the report noted.

The increase is expected to come by 2013, as wireless carriers upgrade their cellular networks to 4G from 3G, and network equipment makers roll out their commercial 4G products toward the end of the year.

4G technology Long Term Evolution (LTE) is expected to give WiMax stiff competition … Read more

The 404 179: Where we're all getting some action

Sometimes things just don't go the way they were planned. Such is the theme of today's show; although we have a full rundown of stories, we digress in typical 404 fashion and get sidetracked by Street Fighter 4, the social climate, and subsequent death of the American video game arcade, Spaceballs cartoons, and superhero fandom. Don't worry, we'll reheat the leftover stories for tomorrow's show!

There are two very specific video games that stick out in my memory as quintessential to my adolescence; games that took up a majority of my time after school and helped form bonds of friendship that continue to remain strong in adulthood. Those two games are Street Fighter 2 for Super Nintendo and GoldenEye for Nintendo 64. Since we only talk about the former on today's episode, I'll take this opportunity to speak a bit about the latter. GoldenEye pretty much ruled. I can't even begin to count how many hours I spent sitting in my buddy Konrad's living room eating 39 cent Del Taco tacos and staring at a single square within a crosshatched television screen. Proximity mines, timed mines, golden guns, double RCP-90s, and secret sniping spots dominated my youth. Some unspoken rules of the game that needed to be reinforced from time to time: don't look at my screen, you can't choose Oddjob (short=very cheap), and absolutely NO SNIPING! Wow, what I wouldn't give to get my hands on another N64 and a copy of GoldenEye. That, and my blissfully ignorant youth.

EPISODE 179 Download today's podcast … Read more

The MacBook Air is the Cube 2.0

When I saw the MacBook Air in person this week at Macworld Expo, I was having a hard time figuring out what about it seemed so familiar. Then I remembered. The G4 Cube. "Overpriced and underconfigured" were the words we used to describe it in our review in 2000, and many of the same complaints could be applied directly to the MacBook Air.

Where the Cube had no PCI slots or additional drive bays, no standard audio input or output jacks, and wouldn't accept full-length graphics cards because of its diminutive size, the Air has no Ethernet … Read more

Record shortwave radio as MP3s

California-based Eton makes a wide range of radio-related products, but it started off as the exclusive distributor of Grundig shortwave radios in the U.S., and shortwave is still at the company's heart.

At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the company is showing off the Grundig G4 World Recorder, which not only lets you listen to just about every kind of radio broadcast available (including shortwave from 3,000 to 29,999 KHz), but also lets you record those broadcasts to MP3 files. (There's also a built-in mic for voice recording.)

The device comes with 2GB … Read more

Are there too many social networks out there?

Last week, I had the honor of being a guest on G4's Attack of the Show with Forbes deputy editor David Ewalt, as host Kevin Pereira grilled us on whether we're reaching a tipping point when it comes to online social networking. I think the general answer was "yes and no"--yes, we're reaching a point where most new entries into general-interest social networking sector (hello, Pownce, Flux, and Mash) have a rather uphill climb ahead, but no, this stuff's not going to go away altogether.

P.S.: Do I look like I'm … Read more