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shockwave

Alcatel's Shockwave eats Gingerbread for U.S. Cellular

If you thought that we were long past the era of new Gingerbread phones, then U.S. Cellular has a surprise for you.

Today, the carrier announced the Alcatel Shockwave, a starter smartphone running Android 2.3. Yes, that means it comes almost a year after the first Ice Cream Sandwich handset, the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, went on sale.

Though its design appears to be standard issue Android, Alcatel promises a "shock resistant casing, super tough" construction with Dragontrail glass (that's an alternative to Gorilla glass) over the 3.5-inch HVGA display. The water-resistant casing should stand … Read more

Flash videos on the Mac, albeit with a few hiccups

Most people know about the lack of support for Flash on the iPad and iPhone, but Flash is alive and well on Mac OS X with the Adobe Flash Player for Mac. As the app name suggests, this is a player for Flash 11 videos for Mac OS X 10.6 and higher. Adobe Flash Player for Mac is a browser plug-in and allows viewing of Web sites with Flash videos embedded in them to appear on the Mac OS. You won't find Adobe Flash Player for Mac on the App Store (thanks to the dispute between the two … Read more

Get Adobe Shockwave Player to see what you're missing

Adobe's Shockwave Player is a free program that displays multimedia content created with Adobe Director. Shockwave Player is installed on hundreds of millions of computers worldwide. With it, you can display advanced Web content such as video and games, presentations, advertising, and interactive materials. This free plug-in is compatible with most major Web browsers.

We downloaded and installed Shockwave Player. The installation wizard included an optional download of an unrelated program, but we declined it, and Shockwave Player installed normally. This simple plug-in is self-contained and requires no settings or options, though you can see if it's been … Read more

Faster, faster Adobe Flash Player 11

There should be no doubt that Apple's decision to block Flash from iOS in favor of HTML5 has spurred Adobe to make sure that its media-rich content-building tool and player Flash remains competitive. Flash Player 11 brings hardware-accelerated graphics support to the platform.

According to Adobe, the new Stage3D technology in the new Flash Player brings combined 2D and 3D acceleration that is up to 1,000 times faster than the previous Flash iterations. While currently Stage3D is supported only for personal computers, it should make its way to mobile devices in future Flash releases. The advancements offered by … Read more

AT&T introduces first LTE, HSPA+ devices

SAN FRANCISCO--They're not phones, but AT&T has announced its first HSPA+ and LTE-compatible devices: the USBConnect Adrenaline and USBConnect Shockwave mobile broadband modems.

The Adrenaline, which is made by LG, will be the first LTE-upgradeable device. A software update will be made available for the USB modem when AT&T rolls out LTE in mid-2011, which will allow it take advantage of the faster speeds. Till then, you can use it on AT&T's current 3G network.

It also offers built-in GPS and a MicroSD slot, so you can use it as a storage … Read more