natal

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded:

Amazon is buying the parent company of Diapers.com and Soap.com

Google tests a product to let you record Google Voice calls in Gmail

Google disallows Facebook from pulling Gmail contacts to find friends

The BlackBerry Torch is now available for $99 in black, red, or white

A Chinese company is set to unveil a color e-ink eReader

November 17 will be the day to unfriend your undesirables on Facebook

But don't unfriend the Queen of England because she just joined Facebook

The Hex band gives you a way to be … Read more

I was already planning to spring for an Xbox 360 and Kinect add-on, when it comes out this holiday season. I've even been trying to figure out which messy room in my house is best suited to give me the space I need to move around.

I've been wanting something like Kinect since I played with an early precursor a few years ago and used GestureTek's setup early last year. I love sports and games, but am not much for having to map natural actions to a couple buttons on a controller. Traditional console gaming held little … Read more

If you're interested in adding Microsoft's Kinect to your Xbox 360, which comes out November 4, you might want to check out Walmart.com's $199 preorder option that it's serving up until July 23.

The bundle includes the Kinect ($150 value) along with your choice of one of six Kinect launch titles and a $30 Walmart.com e-gift card that you can apply to a second Kinect game (or not). The list price of most Kinect games is $60, so if you do the math, the whole thing works out to a $10 savings plus that … Read more

Both Microsoft and Sony finally showed their respective motion-controlling hands earlier this week at E3 2010. Of course, we'll have full reviews of these products as their release dates approach, but first we're comparing their basic specifications head to head. Here's how they stack up:

news analysis LOS ANGELES--If one thing was clear in the lead-up to the Xbox 360 E3 press conference, it was that hard-core gamers felt threatened by Microsoft's obvious move toward casual gaming with its forthcoming Kinect motion control system.

But while the company is indeed hoping Kinect and its ease of use and accessibility to just about anyone can help it capture a much larger audience, it also wants its longtime loyalists to know they haven't been forgotten.

That much was evident at the press conference, which took place here Monday morning. Before Kinect was ever mentioned, those in the audience were blasted with demos of purely hard-core titles like Call of Duty: Black Ops, Metal Gear Solid: Rising, Halo: Reach, and Gears of War 3. The new Call of Duty, from the developer Treyarch, rather than Infinity Ward, which made the record-breaking Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, will be released on November 9, while Halo: Reach is expected in September. … Read more

LOS ANGELES--Microsoft on Monday gave its Kinect for Xbox 360 motion control system its coming out party, and there's a lot to be excited about.

The device will be released on November 4 in North America, but the company has not yet announced pricing. Rumors have the price in the $100 to $150 range, and Microsoft clearly wants to make Kinect accessible to the mass market so it can successfully take on Nintendo's Wii in the coming battle for the whole family.

The company hasn't talked much about its specifications, but it has unveiled the first six … Read more

Editor's note: We used Cover It Live for this event, so if you missed the live blog, you can still replay it in the embedded component below. Replaying the event will give you all the live updates along with commentary from our readers and CNET editors Daniel Terdiman and Josh Lowensohn. For those of you who just want the updates, we've included them in regular text here.

Ready to get your E3 news fix? CNET is there, live in Los Angeles, to cover the biggest show in videogaming. We'll be using Cover it Live to bring you photos and news as it happens at each of the big three's press conferences.

First up is Microsoft. The company teased its newly named Kinect peripheral (formerly known as Project Natal) at a Sunday night launch party, and we expect it to remain a focal point at today's press conference (10:30 a.m. PDT/1:30 p.m. EDT).

10:09 a.m. PDT: Good morning, everyone. We're here at the Microsoft Xbox 360 E3 press conference. Everyone's still filing in, so it will be a little while before this thing gets going. So please stay tuned.

10:10 a.m. (from reader TyFrank): How many people are at this press conference?

10:11 a.m.: It's hard to say how many people are here, but I'd say right now there are probably about 2,000...And I can't see the upstairs seating. So probably half again that many. … Read more

Microsoft should start working on a good line of sports bras to bundle with Kinect, the motion-controlled gaming system formerly known as Project Natal.

I'm sorry if that sounds crude but someone's got to say it.

Microsoft showed off the system at an E3 press event in Los Angeles on Sunday night. Impressive but high impact, ladies. The event was produced by Cirque Du Soleil, although none of the circus performers did any contortionist performances on the gaming system. They mostly just rallied the crowd in preparation for fantasy. The system itself was played by a family of … Read more