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Best extreme-definition 27-inch monitors

While most 27-inch monitors you'll find at your local Best Buy sport the perfectly capable resolution of 1,920x1,080 pixels, there's a growing contingent of monitor enthusiasts, like myself, who understand the real reason for the existence of 27-inch displays.

If you've never seen a 27-inch monitor running at 2,560x1,440-pixel resolution, then you've yet to be touched by a particularly affecting higher power.

Also referred to as "extreme definition" or "XD," this branch of higher-tier monitors will melt your face and not look back. However, as much as the impressive resolution benefits all aspects of computing, it is in games that it provides a particular advantage.… Read more

Turn iPhone into wide-angle action sports camera

There's a more secure way to capture your skateboarding and mountain biking exploits than by duct taping your iPhone to the top of your helmet.

Optrix, a company that once ran over one of its own cases with a very large Dodge truck, has now taken on the task of protecting your iPhone during extreme sports activities.… Read more

Pioneer intros smallest, lightest Blu-ray burner

Pioneer's new BDR-XD04J contains a mind-numbing array of disc burning and playback options that should cover you for the next several years.

Perhaps the biggest highlight is support for BDXL BD-R discs, which means you can burn those fancy triple-layer 100GB and quad-layer 128GB Blu-ray discs in a tiny package. This is supposed to be the world's smallest BDXL-compatible portable drive. … Read more

Roku announces $50 LT box, adds HBO Go

Just a few months after Roku introduced a $59.99 entry-level streaming video player, the company has lowered the bar further with a new $49.99 player, the Roku LT. That's half of the price of an Apple TV, which retails for $99.99.

The new player offers the same 720p high-definition video and built-in wireless of the $59.99 Roku 2 HD but leaves out the Bluetooth and microSD card slot (meaning that you can't add the Wii-like remote to play games).

Roku also offers the Roku 2 XD ($79.99) and Roku 2 XS ($99.99). … Read more

Neat tweaks

XdN Tweaker is a freeware system utility that bundles together a wide range of useful tweaks and tools for Windows. Most of its tools are built-in Windows capabilities that XdN Tweaker collects into a single interface that makes them easier to access. It's got something for nearly every Windows user, too: Vista and Windows 7 users can restore features from previous versions, such as the Windows 2000 user control panel icon, while those users who prefer time-tested versions like 2000 and XP can add some up-to-date features.

Many of XdN Tweaker's tools require Administrative privileges, so we right-clicked … Read more

Netgear-branded Roku box now available

Editors' note: As of July 2011, this product has been discontinued and replaced by the Roku 2 XD.

A Netgear-branded Roku XD box is making its way to several retailers.

Dubbed Netgear Roku Player NTV250, the device is the Roku XD featuring Netgear branding. It enables users to access several channels from Roku's service, including Amazon Video On Demand, Netflix, Pandora, and others. The offering also includes the ability to view Flickr photos and UFC content. Unlike the competing Apple TV, which boasts 720p video content, the Roku XD supports 1080p content.

Netgear isn't selling branded versions of … Read more

Car Tech Live 187: Distracted driving, what's the real story? (podcast)

Distracted driving: what's the real story? Jaguar looks into an exotic sort of hybrid; BMW slaps an iPad behind your head; new app lets you slap lousy drivers upside the head, and we drive the 2010 Scion xD.

Subscribe with iTunes (audio) Subscribe with iTunes (video) Subscribe with RSS (audio) Subscribe with RSS (video) EPISODE 187 SHOW NOTES

• Distracted driving deaths fall 6% in the U.S.

• Chevy shows off Cruze EV

• BMW first with factory iPad mount?

• Modern electronics for vintage Porsches

• Take a ride in the 2010 Scion xD

Roku takes on Apple TV with new streamers

It seems hard to believe, now that Netflix streaming video is available on nearly any Internet-connected home video product, but back in the spring of 2008, the only Netflix-compatible device was a tiny streaming media box called the Roku Player. In the two years since its release, a series of firmware upgrades has expanded the program offerings on the Roku, even as the company added step-down and step-up models to the lineup as well.

In its latest incarnation, the company has made its little black box even smaller, while retaining the same onscreen look and feel and "channel" … Read more

China to get new plastics research center

"One word ... plastics," Walter Brooke's character says to Dustin Hoffam in the 1967 movie "The Graduate." "There's a great future in plastics," he adds. Four decades later, there's still a great future in plastics.

China XD Plastics Company, the largest Chinese manufacturer and distributor of modified plastics for use in automotive applications, today announced the company will establish a new plastics research center named Harbin Xinda Macromolecule Material Engineering Center Co.

According to the company, the new research center will provide technical support for the Company's recently expanded modified plastic … Read more

Taking a kitchen sink approach to Scions at SEMA

Last year, Scion's booth at the SEMA Show was jam-packed with some of the craziest cars at the show. 2009 saw the continuation of that grand tradition.

This year, Scion brought out an xB with a built-in kitchen (sink and all!), another with its own dancefloor, and yet another that had been stretched into a pickup toting a matching custom scooter. Scion's other models also got some modding love in the form of a rally-prepped xD and a loud-and-low tC that seemed to have forgotten its roof.

Check out some of the wildest Scions of 2009 in our gallery.… Read more