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Ice Cream Sandwich flavoring Acer A100, A500 next week

Owners of Acer's Iconia Tab A100 and A500 tablets can look forward to a dollop of Ice Cream Sandwich in another week and a half.

An Acer support document confirmed that the two tablets are scheduled be on the receiving end of Android 4.0 in the U.S. on April 27. Other countries, including Canada, Mexico, Brazil, and Latin America, will also receive the update on or around the same time, but all updates should be out and about by the first week of May.

Released last summer with Android 3.0 Honeycomb, the Acer A100 is a … Read more

Challenge yourself with T-Crisis 3 100% A.I.

If you, like us, used to spend hours sitting in front of the TV playing Tetris on your Nintendo Entertainment System, you're going to love T-Crisis 3 100% A.I. It's not a clone of the original, but that's OK; we daresay it's even better.

The program's interface is easy to navigate, but we had to do some experimenting to figure out all the game's features; there's not much in the way of instructions or descriptions. T-Crisis supports up to three players, and when you don't have friends playing along, the computer … Read more

Can cool-running amplifiers sound good?

I admit it, most of my favorite amplifiers produce enough heat to warm up a room and consume a lot of AC power. "Green," they are not. Class D amplifier designs (the "D" does not stand for digital) are vastly more efficient, and run cool to the touch.

For example, my Bel Canto REF500S power amp ($2,495) puts out 250 watts per channel, and it's a bona fide audiophile quality design. Bel Canto doesn't specifically refer to the REF500S as a Class D amp, but its low-heat, ultraefficient, heavily regulated switch-mode power supply … Read more

CES: MSI shows WinPad 100A

LAS VEGAS--MSI was fairly coy about sending out pics of its Android-based tablet, the WinPad 100A. Luckily, the device was on display at the company's CES booth.

The WinPad 100A has a 10.1-inch capacitive touch screen and runs on Android 2.3. It wasn't clear whether the device will be upgradable to Honeycomb when the new OS launches, however.

Other specs and details include an ARM processor, a USB port, Mini-USB, HDMI, an SD card reader, a front-facing camera on the upper-left side, and a headphone jack.

Additionally, the device includes a G-Sensor gravity-detecting device, a GPS … Read more