![[H]ardOCP](/images/blank.gif){kind=small}
Cases & Modding
Vidabox vCase3 HTPC Case @ techPowerUP!
ETC.
HP Mini 110 Studio Tord Boontje Edition @ T-Break
Jet-Way ION-TOP HTPC @ Techware Labs
Razer Imperator Gaming Mouse @ BmR
Memory/ Storage
In Win Ammo 2.5" HDD RFID Enclosure @ Legit Reviews
Taking a page from AT&T’s playbook, O2 is now complaining about iPhone users sucking up all the available bandwidth. This will lead to the company making a statement like AT&T made recently "Blah, blah, blah, overburdened, blah, blah, need to charge more, blah, blah, blah, the customer's fault."
The head of mobile phone operator O2 has apologized to customers in the British capital who were unable to make calls after the group's network was swamped by people using smart phones such as Apple Inc.'s iPhone. O2 Chief Executive Robert Dunne said some customers in London had periodically not been able to make or receive calls or transmit data because of pressure on the network from such smart phones.
Let’s be honest for a second, you and I both know that Google could own every search related product / business on the planet and they would still "reject criticism" of any new deal like this. Raise your hand if you expected anything different.
Besides, antitrust grounds, the AdMob deal also raises privacy concerns since both firms gather large amounts of consumer online data, the consumer groups said. AdMob collects information on users' ethnicity, age, gender, education and behavior. Google provides analytical services for mobile advertising through its $3.8 billion DoubleClick acquisition.
Here is a four and a half minute video of Google Goggles in action. Pretty spiffy stuff, wouldn't you agree?
The LA Times has posted its 2010 media predictions. Most are pretty obvious but there are a few on the list that are pretty good. What are your predictions for 2010?
Hulu will start charging viewers. Hulu, the free video site owned by News Corp., NBC Universal and Disney, will require people to pay to watch its programming. This will cause a rift internally as Hulu CEO Jason Kilar resists switching to a pay model, leading to his exit.
The New York Times has a rather interesting article posted today. The article says that a former Seagate employee is accusing the company of taking hard-drive technology from a rival company and tampering with evidence to cover it up.
The court filings include claims by Mr. Galloway that Seagate, the world’s largest producer of computer hard drives, tampered with evidence tied to Convolve’s nearly 10-year-old patent infringement case against the company.
MSI, a major international all-in-one PC vendor, is leading the way into a new era of environmentally-friendly IT products. Responding to the growth of environmental consciousness around the world, MSI announced today that the company's Wind Top range of all-in-one PCs and its Wind Nettop and Wind Box PC models all conform to the requirements of the European Union’s EuP (Energy using Products) directive, which will come into effect in 2010. MSI's Wind Top series products are also the first all-in-one PC products to be awarded Taiwan's "Green Mark" environmental certification. MSI has always been committed to protecting the environment; this vision is now being put into practice in MSI's product design and manufacturing operations, with MSI taking environmental protection, energy conservation and carbon reduction as the starting point for the development of a whole range of PC products. While continuing to strive for technological innovation, MSI is also doing its utmost to fulfill its corporate responsibility with respect to environmental issues, and is playing its part in protecting the planet by saving energy and reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
If you are in the market for a rock solid, highly overclockable motherboard, make sure you read our evaluation of the DFI LANParty DK P55-T3eH9. How overclockable is the LANParty DK P55-T3eH9? With a little tweaking, our motherboard editor was able to run a Core i5 750 up to 4.02GHz without a hitch.
While the DK P55-T3eH9 was a bit tricky to get initially dialed in, once it was the board remained solid as a rock. I was able to get the board to a base clock of 210MHz, with a CPU speed of 4.02GHz and memory running at 1680.
One of the downsides to owning newer high-tech cars is that you almost always have to take it to the dealership because regular mechanics don’t have what it takes to fix them. Something is seriously wrong when you need a $1,000 tool to turn off a "check tire pressure" after rotating your tires.
Access to repair information is at the heart of a debate over a congressional bill called the Right to Repair Act. Supporters of the proposal say automakers are trying to monopolize the parts and repair industry by only sharing crucial tools and data with their dealership shops. The bill, which has been sent to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, would require automakers to provide all information to diagnose and service vehicles.
Cases & Modding
LanCool PC-K58 ATX Mid Tower Case @ MadShrimps
ETC.
Head-Direct HiFiMAN RE252 @ techPowerUP!
Memory/ Storage
OCZ Agility EX Series SSD @ HotHardware
Motherboards
ASUS P7P55D Premium Motherboard @ Legit Reviews
Video
ATI Linux 2009 Year In Review @ Phoronix
According to experts in the UK, the tab for the proposed Digital Economy Bill could run as high as $800 million and force as many as 40,000 households offline. 
ISPs have called on the content industries to lessen the burden on broadband consumers by contributing to the costs. Charles Dunstone, chief executive of Carphone Warehouse, whose subsidiary TalkTalk is the biggest consumer provider of broadband, said: "Broadband consumers shouldn’t have to bail out the music industry. If they really think it’s worth spending vast sums of money on these measures then they should be footing the bill; not the consumer."
It’s always funny when people blindly follow a GPS and drive into a pond or some such but what about when it almost kills you? Then again, at least in this situation, I am pretty sure an old school folding map probably would’ve caused the same problem.
A Nevada couple letting their SUV's navigation system guide them through the high desert of Eastern Oregon got stuck in snow for three days when the GPS unit sent them down a remote forest road.
