Monthly Archive for January, 2006

Proof of Apple launching their own mobile network?

Published on Tuesday, January 31, 2006 in Apple, Technology and Wireless. Closed

This can seem very realistic. It is a picture of a phone with a SIM card with an Apple logo on it. “I should point out that our source isn’t claiming that the phone pictured is the fabled iPhone (it is a Samsung SGH x497). He claims that the SIM card is Apple’s.” This source is saying that Apple will be releasing a mobile network and not an Apple iPhone. The plan is that Apple will become an MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator) which means they lease call time from another huge network operator (Cingular?) and they operate their own mini-network.

Our tipster says that Apple is about 85% ready to roll out a cell service using the moniker Mobile Me, which was recently trademarked. Apple will be using Cingular’s network and Motorola’s hardware.
We are told that the service is on track to launch sometime in February (or so we are told). [TUAW]

So apparently this friend heads to the throne and our tipster snaps up the friend’s Samsung SGH-X497, pops off the battery, and grabs the given blurry shots of the Apple-branded SIM, which was apparently stamped with:
xx/50 Test Unit [digits written in sharpie]
Apple Computer
Internal Test MM1.3.a [Engadget]

I think that the green card inside looks suspiciously like an iTunes gift card, and to avoid us seeing the sharp edges from the badly cut card it was blurred over so that it looked ‘authentic’. If someone were to actually see a real one, I don’t think they would be using a crappy camera, they would at least try and get the image to appear clear. We can wait until February to see if this is real or fake.

Xbox 360 Dashboard Update is now available

Published on Tuesday, January 31, 2006 in Gaming, Internet, Microsoft, Software and Technology. Closed

The Dashboard update was released just yesterday. When your 360 tries to sign into Xbox Live it will ask if you want to install the patch. However if you opt-out then you cannot access Xbox Live. They have done this this way probably because this patch fixes the exploit allowing people to run flash games from a hacked Xbox Kiosk disc. According to Xbox.com the update includes:

Improvements to the Xbox Guide
Option to retain your saved games when you delete a profile
Increased accuracy of “last time played”
Network configuration improvements for Xbox Live members in the Netherlands
More detailed messaging for unreadable disk or region errors

I’ve downloaded this and applied it as I play a lot on Xbox Live, and I can’t be bothered to try that exploit as it involved downloading a 4GB file (which I’m too lazy to wait for).

Google is working on its own OS

Published on Tuesday, January 31, 2006 in Internet, Shorts, Software and Technology. Closed

Google is preparing its own distribution of Linux for the desktop, in a possible bid to take on Microsoft in its core business – desktop software. A version of the increasingly popular Ubuntu desktop Linux distribution, based on Debian and the Gnome desktop, it is known internally as ‘Goobuntu’.
Google has confirmed it is working on a desktop linux project called Goobuntu, but declined to supply further details, including what the project is for.

Microsoft releases IE 7 Beta to the masses

Published on Tuesday, January 31, 2006 in Internet, Microsoft, Software, Technology and Web 2.0. Closed

Microsoft has finally unleashed IE 7, preview Beta 2 to the public. So if you don’t have it already then download it try it out and trash it. I wrote a post a while ago, showing my thoughts of IE 7. Apart from having a nice new skin, and tabbed browsing it doesn’t do anything else. If you have IE 6, download it and use it. But if you use another browser then you can download it to test it, but stick with your own browser. Opera, Mozilla, Firefox, Safari and all the other browsers are still better than IE 7 even though it is still being developed. In my opinion I think the new design is better than they have had before, but they better add some good features and fix the problems that I blogged about.

Burn images onto a CD, literally

Published on Monday, January 30, 2006 in Noteworthy, PC, Shorts and Technology. Closed

Here I’ve shown a CD-R with a picture of two people kissing burned on it. It’s a little hard to discern because I haven’t completely calibrated this CD-R yet.
By carefully choosing the right 1s and 0s to burn to a CD, it is possible to burn visible images on normal CD-Rs. These images rely on the fact that the 1s and 0s created by pits in the CDs surface reflect light differently. Data on a CD, or any optical media, is stored as a sequence of pits of varying lengths. To be precise, a 1 is represented by the change from pit to no-pit or the change from no-pit to pit, and a 0 is represented by no change in height (pit to pit or no-pit to no-pit). The pits and no-pits reflect different amounts of light; thus it is possible to draw images on CDs by appropriately arranging these 1s and 0s.

Video of a CG DS Lite compared with a normal DS

Published on Monday, January 30, 2006 in Gaming and Technology. Closed

This video put together by a DS fan, shows a normal DS compared with a computer generated DS Lite. The video is pretty well done, with some jitters showing that it is a fake DS Lite, however if the dimensions have been done right, the DS Lite looks quite small compared to the original DS.

PSP Homebrew – Hacked for v2.60

Published on Monday, January 30, 2006 in Gaming and Technology. 1 Comment

Success! Finally, all the new firmware versions have been hacked so that you can play those good old homebrew games on every single version of the PSP. It used to be that you had to have v1.51 for it to work. This isn’t even a downgrader, it allows you to play all the games and keep the podcast client! This does mean that Sony will be releasing an update very soon, but to convince people the update it will have to have some sort of new feature.

Making your own Blue LED Mouse

Published on Saturday, January 28, 2006 in Noteworthy, PC and Technology. Closed

This is a cool mod that you, and anyone else can do. Turn your ordinary plain red LED mouse into an uber cool blue LED one. The whole thing basically amounts to soldering a blue LED into the place of the old red one. Though it isn’t as easy as it may seem with some ‘protection’ that helps hold the LED in place. One thing to mention is that you do need “a fairly brighter shining blue led than what the original red led was. The optical sensor is less sensitive for the blue light than it is for red light“. Interesting, I thought it would be the other way round.

Intel iMac: Easy to install RAM

Published on Saturday, January 28, 2006 in Apple and Technology. 2 Comments

From what we’ve heard it seems that the new Intel iMac has made adding and/or removing RAM really easy. Just simply flip the mac so that you can access the bottom, and open up a small hatch and add or remove the RAM you wish. Now that is easy, if only replacing the RAM in my Mac mini would be as easy. The RAM from Apple is seriously expensive, and that is the only way to get it in the mini, unless you take it to an AASP (Apple Authorised Service Provider) or to an Apple Store, is to open it up and that will void your warranty! I’m happy Apple has done this, and I hope they make it this easy for the rest of their Macs.

Stolen PowerBook appears on eBay, however…

Published on Friday, January 27, 2006 in Apple, Internet and Technology. Closed

…this time it was the person who owned the PowerBook who put up a detailed post on what happened with his PB and when it was stolen etc. I have to say that this is a very good idea done by the person. This way the theifs can’t just sell it on eBay to make a quick profit. There is a reward for $500 for the person with any information that leads to the recovery of the PB.

*** UPDATE – 25 JAN 06 11.27 PM – I SPOKE WITH THE POLICE TONIGHT, THEY HAVE JUST SUBMITTED THEIR FORMAL REQUEST FOR THE TRACES FOR THE IP ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBERS USED TO CONTACT ME. OF COURSE THERE MAY BE SOME DELAYS IN GETTING THRU THE PRIVACY ACT REQUIREMENTS BUT THEY ARE GOING TO PUSH THIS AS HARD AND FAST AS THEY CAN.
MESSAGE TO THIEVES : THE BEST ADVICE I CAN GIVE YOU RIGHT NOW IS TO GO AND SEE A SOLICITOR AND HAVE HIM CONTACT ME SO THAT WE CAN WORK THRU THIS OTHERWISE WAIT UNTIL THE POLICE BUST YOUR DOOR DOWN. OH YEAH, AND DON’T RING ME AGAIN AT 2.20 AM, UNLIKE YOU I AM HAPPILY ASLEEP AT THIS TIME.

The brief excerpt from above clearly shows the dedication from the person and how much they want their PB back. It looks like they will get caught soon enough unless they somehow change the IP or sell the PowerBook in a shady place. I really hope this person gets their PB back soon.