theVooner's weblog

A weblog for theVooner.com where the best cool gear and gadgets get reviewed.

last modified Jul 15, 2003 at 1:45

Monday, February 28, 2005

Sony Blu-ray commercial product

Sony has brought out to the market the first Blu-Ray commercial player. With the potential fight on the way, I know why Sony was quick to come out to the market. THe BDZ-S77 is priced at 450,000 yen or just under US$4300. That's a lot but from some of the sample images I've seen in Japan, it's really the next generation of images. I wonder which format will eventually win? HD-DVD or Blu-Ray?

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 6:53 | 0 comments

Sunday, February 27, 2005

Magpix Small Pocket Photo Album

A company called Magpix has a small pocket photo album product that looks like a really small digital camera (but without the camera). Except its designed to playback photos with its 1.5" screen. While it has an SD card slot for expansion, with just 16MB of built in memory, I don't know how much portability this will offer. While I understand the appeal of carrying around your photos, why not just get a 30GB/60GB iPod photos. SD card is limited to 1GB now (with higher capacity on the way). Even if it's just US$99.95, it just doesn't offer enough.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 0:23 | 0 comments

Saturday, February 26, 2005

Sony W7/W5 Cybershot updates

More Cybershot digital camera upgrades. This time the W-series sees two new modesl, a 7.2 megapixel W7 camera and a 5.1 megapixel W5 model. There seems to be an upgrade of the battery life from the older W1 model. I'm not too enthusiastic but some people might like these updates.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 23:59 | 0 comments

Thursday, February 24, 2005

iPod updates

The iPod mini and the Photo iPod got a few new upgrades this week. The iPod mini now comes in a 6GB model in addition to the 4GB model and has 18 hours of battery life. In addition to silver, it now comes in three updated colors. Of course, it's just my luck that this comes out barely a few months after I bought my own iPod mini. The original 4GB iPod mini has also been reduced by US$50 in retail price. The Photo iPod comes in a 30GB and 60GB model. That's pretty weird because the older Photo iPod was a 40GB model so I wonder why they dropped it back to 30GB? Anyway, the smaller capacity drops the price down so the Photo is now pretty affordable. Meanwhile, I've been looking pretty hard at the iPod Shuffle. It's small, cute, and looks pretty darn cool. Maybe I'll just have to get one.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 0:12 | 0 comments

Wednesday, February 23, 2005

Nokia 6680 -- fixing the 6630

I guess Nokia was listening to alot of the complaints because while I thought the new 6630 3G handset was pretty decent, it had a pretty silly design in not incorporating a camera on the front of the phone for video calls. Well the 6680 was quickly introduced and it looks very similar to the 6630 with the key upgrade being the add on of the camera on the front for video calls. Now users finally have a Nokia choice for 3G.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 2:40 | 0 comments

Friday, February 18, 2005

New Casio Exilim Cameras

Just a few days after I complained about the lack of innovation in new digital camera "updated" models, Casio has come up with a few new Exilims. To turn up the innovation, they have come up a small 7.2 megapixel camera in the familiar Exilim-style shape, in the Z750. Better yet, I like the new Z57 which is very similar to the Z50 series but adds an additional .2" to 2.7". Casio has one of the better screens available on digital cameras and it will be neat to see if this makes a difference and how the other manufacturers will react. Although I guess it will test the design of cameras, could a 3" screen be far off?

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 8:39 | 0 comments

Thursday, February 17, 2005

Sony Net Juke

Sony has a new mini-compo with a built in 40GB hard drive in addition to the usual CD player setup. The NAS-A10 is a new breed of mini-hifis that incorporate HD. Too bad as I just bought a new one for my place that only really had a DVD player. The A10 also accomodates the Memory Stick, as typical of many Sony products.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 8:21 | 0 comments

Tuesday, February 15, 2005

Sony P200 Digital Camera (are all Sony cameras identical to past ones?)

The Sony P200 is the upgrade to the P150 and has only just become available here. I had to chance to see one the other day and honestly, I couldn't really tell it apart from the P150. I've been reading recently that the digital camera market this year is expected to decline significantly. Well it's no wonder because companies like Sony keep releasing the same darn cameras without any major changes or upgrades. I mean, should this be a 9MP camera? I guess in order to keep interest high and to keep saying its a new model, they have to churn out new models every 6 months that look the same but have different colors or very subtle changes. I want more innovative changes and greater enhancement in technology!

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 20:46 | 4 comments

Monday, February 14, 2005

Panasonic USB Multi Drive

Panasonic has a neat USB Multi Drive that supports all the major formats including their own -RAM format. This is really one of the few (if not the only) that I've seen which can support +/- R, RW, and -RAM. Also, it has a new +R DL format which from what I can read is a dual layer DVD recordable format that can take up to 8.5GB. Very handy considering they way we burn up disc space with things like photos.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 23:04 | 0 comments

Sunday, February 13, 2005

Old school - Leica CM Zoom

If you still like 35mm, and many do, then the new Leica CM Zoom might be a good choice. I came across the pictures in my Leica store this past week and though it looked impressive -- only in that it looked like the old Leica cameras! Not too bad indeed. I had trouble with my Lecia M6 in the past and the after service isn't very good, but they are classic cameras and the lens is definitely one of the best.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 22:50 | 0 comments

Thursday, February 10, 2005

New Panasonic Lumix Cameras

Panasonic has launched a whole bunch of new digital cameras. But they are all large form cameras. There's the 5 megapixel FZ5 which looks like a 35mm camera, the 5MP/6x zoom LZ2, and the rather clunky 4MP LS1. I still prefer my FX7. While they were smart not to mess around with such a great digital camera, they could have at least come out with a few other small form cameras.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 10:40 | 0 comments

Wednesday, February 9, 2005

Sony Qualia SXRD TV Screen

Sony through its ultra high-end brand Qualia has introduced a new TV screen the SXRD (Silicon X-tal Reflective Display) KDS-70Q006, which is supposed to be better than Plasma and LCD. It's a massive screen, some 70" and has really amazing graphics. I can't wait to see it with a Blu-ray disc.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 2:41 | 0 comments

Tuesday, February 8, 2005

Chinese New Year's Eve -- Happy New Year

On this, New Year's Eve, I wish all of you prosperity and good luck in the coming New Year.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 6:11 | 0 comments

Friday, February 4, 2005

Mini XDA II review

The Mini XDA II review is up! This Smartphone finally won me over to try them with its small size and cool features. Have a look.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 17:05 | 0 comments

Thursday, February 3, 2005

Sony DCR-PC1000 new DV video camera w/ 2.8MP camera

Sony has announced a new upgrade to the DV video camera line. The PC1000 follows much of the same design as other past DV cameras but comes with 3 CMOS sensors (instead of the usual 1) and has a 2.8 Megapixel camera built-in. Could this truly be a powerful all-in-one digital video/camera? Most people today carry both when they want to take both video and camera shots. Eventually, I hope that there will be powerful enough combined products that we won't need to. I choose more often than not to leave the video camera at home because I can't be bothered to carry around all the different accessories. This new camera should get us closer so that we can have both. Not sure I'll upgrade my DV camera though...

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 1:26 | 0 comments

Wednesday, February 2, 2005

iRiver H10

Well, I guess the other manufacturers couldn't have been expected just to give up on MP3 players given Apple's dominance. It always amazed me that the iPod/Mini iPod were such simple devices but done with such style that they could keep their dominance. There have been much more advanced players (for instance with color screens, video/picture playback, etc.) well before Apple introduced them. Still they rule and understandably so. Even I had to buy a Mini. iRiver has long been one to introduce new music/video devices. The H10 is clearly aimed at the Mini iPod market. It's small (size and capacity:5GB), comes in a few different colors, and a built-in radio. More importantly, it comes with a color screen in a small package that can show pictures. Sort of a Mini iPod Photo. More advanced than the Mini iPod, but will it be able to sell as well, probably not. Although Apple has been slow to show advancements like color screens in my opinion, they have always made the right move and their products thus far have been really impressive. I hope others can continue to push the envelope in new prodcuts. I expect to see manufacturers try to throw in more functions. A built-in camera can't be far off (like the M:robe). After that, well we'll see.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 1:02 | 0 comments

Tuesday, February 1, 2005

Sony NC50 Noise Cancelling Headphones

I love that companies keep reinventing the wheel so to speak when it comes to headphones. Despite lots of new models over the past year, it's nice to see that companies like Sony keep bringing out new models, like this NC50 model, with new noise cancelling technology. I guess all the new models and the popularity of noise cancelling headphones like that from Bose has made Sony keep up the pace with newer models of their own. For anyone that travels, I know you'll appreciate these. I hope that they can come up with noise cancelling technology that we can use in rooms someday. I don't want to completely block out noise but it would be nice to block out some ambient noise.

theVooner@yahoo.com

posted at 19:54 | 0 comments