August, 2009
Zath’s Technology & Gadget Roundup (31/08/09)
August 31, 2009
Here’s the latest in hi-tech gadgets and general technology that sparked our interest here at Zath, but we didn’t get chance to cover ourselves – thankfully these sites did do and you should definitely check them out as we liked reading these articles!
Night Vision Goggles – Who hasn’t played a stealth computer game or watched them used on TV and movies and not wanted to have some yourself to scout out your surroundings in the dark?
Laser Airzooka – When the Airzooka was first released, it allowed you to shoot people with air! Now you can improve your accuracy given the nearly added laser sight!
Continue reading »Blackberry Storm Review
August 30, 2009
The Blackberry Storm had been launched just under a year ago and it was welcomed with criticism from the start. Blackberry needed to come out with something that would stand as good competition against the Apple iPhone 3G, and though the Storm had a sleek look and a touch screen like their rival, it did not wow anyone.
Spotify News Roundup – A Music Service Streaming Ahead!
August 29, 2009
As I’m sure you’ve noticed that in the last 8 months (since our original post back in January on not needing Spotify beta invites in the UK) that the ‘free’ music service Spotify has been popping up pretty frequently here on Zath as its popularity increases and the company goes from strength to strength.
So as you can imagine even within the last week there have been quite a few movements forward in the world of ‘Spotify’, so we thought we should bring them all together for both Spotify lovers and virgins alike in one special post: so here it is, and I think it makes sense to go in chronological order!
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Xbox 360 Price Changes – Down and Up!
August 27, 2009
Following on from Sony’s announcement of the new PS3 Slim and with it, a price cut down to £250 at this year’s GamesCom, Microsoft have now announced that the Xbox 360 will be having a price change effective from Friday 28th August.
The ‘Pro’ console which comes with a 60GB hard drive will no longer be available for sale, leaving the ‘Arcade’ and ‘Elite’ consoles available on the shelves. The Elite will still keeps its 120GB hard drive but will lose the HDMI cable that was bundled with previous sets. The price of the Elite will come down to £200 – definitely a cheap Xbox 360 given what you get for your money!
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Sony Walkman S Series And E440K Speaker Kit Released
August 26, 2009
It seems the people in the Walkman department of Sony have been busy as it was only a couple of weeks ago that they presented us with the Sony Walkman X Series, and now they’re back again with another new addition to the Walkman line, the Sony Walkman S Series and an all in one kit which looks pretty interesting as well.
Sony PSP Mini Games Announced
August 25, 2009
Recently at GamesCom, Sony announced the new PS3 Slim along with a new feature for the PSP called ‘Minis’ – mini games!
Minis are going to be similar to what you already see on the Playstation Network and WiiWare. Smaller companies are going to develop their own games for people to download to play on the PSP. Each of the games will be limited to a file size of only 100MB which is tiny (or mini) compared to how much PSOne games take up on your memory stick for your PSP.
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Windows 7 Family Pack – Cheap Price Bundle Deal!
August 24, 2009
If you were to choose suitable words to describe the Windows 7 pricing system then ‘concise’, ‘clear’ and ‘consistent’ wouldn’t be three that immediately spring to mind – and after a month full of rumours, new options and the death of the ‘E’ version it’s time for a bit of a clear up.
Here at Zath we’ve already been over a load of the Windows 7 pricing details (including when they were released and the Windows 7 pre-order deals) but now with a sensible conclusion having been reached on the Internet Explorer problem with the EU and the introduction of the ‘Windows 7 Family Pack’ it’s time to clarify the situation.
Continue reading »Monopoly iPhone App Review
August 24, 2009
Being a big Monopoly fan (read: ‘dork’) I was quick to get this application downloaded. Even the Make Your Own Monopoly couldn’t satiate me. As a Monopoly collector (try not to snort whilst laughing please, it’s rather undignified), you’re always after the next best thing in the property world. Having not been too excited about the games that have been released for the PC, I was a little reluctant to get too excited about the Monopoly iPhone app.
Being a game of more than 10mb, it took a little while to download (I had to do it on my computer as it refused to download on my iPhone without a wi-fi connection), so I occupied myself by making tea. And then another one; although this time I found some biscuits too. The download and the transfer was a bit of a faff, but once I had actually managed to get it onto my iPhone, I started her up and was definitely not disappointed.
Continue reading »Windows Essentials: How To Backup – Part 1
August 23, 2009
Windows Nerd Essentials: Understanding and Effectively Using Data Backup Systems
Yesterday. All my troubles were so far away. But now my data’s gone, there’s hell to pay. I believe in yesterday…
I fucking hate having to back-up my data, but you know what? I hate losing it even more. You may have read about my experiences as a technician in a little computer shop before, but apart from the viruses, shitware and porn (oh yeah, by the way, some of you people have real problems), the number one question I got when working in Gary’s grot-shop was “can you save my photos and emails!?”
The fact of the matter is, most people don’t run comprehensive backups and to make matters worse, most people who think they do, errmm…don’t.
Continue reading »Tetris iPhone App Review
August 22, 2009
There are many new games released every year, but the ones that still prove popular are the old classics. Once you have an iPhone, you start spending your time thinking about a new application you’re after to enhance your iPhone experience. Or, you know… simply give you something to do when you’re bored on the train.
The other week, I downloaded Tetris to give me some true (wait for it) ‘old school’ gaming fun. And, I have to say, it’s a pretty darn hoot if you ask me. The nice thing about the iPhone is the interactivity and the user-interface. A finger is all you need to make most of the functionality on the iPhone and playing Tetris on it is actually better than playing it on the Gameboy. Touching anywhere in the screen makes the tiles move, with simple drag and drop options – as well as tapping on the screen for a rotation. There is a tutorial that pops up before each game to show you how to do this should you need one (which you can also skip).
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‘The Taking of Pelham 123′ Review
August 22, 2009
The Taking of Pelham 123 (15)
Cast: Denzel Washington, John Travolta, John Turturro, Luis Guzmán
Director: Tony Scott
Running time: 106 minutes
There were a few things that worried me before I went to see ‘The Taking of Pelham 123’ and which resulted in me putting it off for a while for fear of being disappointed, the first of these was that it was a remake, and although I have never seen (or even heard of) the original it seems to be a rule of thumb that the remakes lack the context and originality that made the originals successful in the first place.
Continue reading »3DTV Without Glasses, Coming Soon?
August 21, 2009
I went out for a meal at Xscape in Castleford last night, and thought I’d have a stroll around to let my food settle. I reached the back of the complex and noticed something odd about some of the TV’s that were playing videos……………they were projecting 3D images and I didn’t even have glasses on!!!
I couldn’t believe what I was seeing! I didn’t think this technology was available just yet, I knew that Sky 3DTV is coming in 2010, but you needed glasses for that. Of course you’d need a 3DTV, but why do we need glasses anymore if this technology is available?
Continue reading »Tweetie iPhone App Review
August 21, 2009
Twitter is definitely one of the things that the iPhone has helped to increase the usage of, not just because of the mobile internet access, but moreover the wide range of options that have appeared in terms of Twitter apps available through Apple’s App Store.
As such I’ve tried various Twitter apps, both free and paid, but always seem to come back to Tweetie as my default Twitter app of choice – in fact it was the first paid app that I bought, I’d read good things from other people and so I took the plunge!
Continue reading »Jak and Daxter 5 Rumour? (PS3)
August 20, 2009
This is only talk at the minute, but I couldn’t contain my excitement at the prospect of this! So I’m spreading the wealth with my fellow Jak and Daxter fans.
As most of you know GamesCom is currently on in Germany with a lot of announcements, like the new Sony PS3 Slim. But nothing is more exciting than the fact that Arne Meyer (the community manager at Naughty Dog) said they are keen to do a PS3 instalment of Jak and Daxter!! He was quoted as saying:
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How Much For Championship Manager 2010? Just Pay What You Want!
August 19, 2009
The Championship Manager football-based series have been going for a while now (in fact since 1993 with the original Championship Manager) but since the Eidos/Sports Interactive split before Championship Manager 5, many have felt that it has lost some of the spark that it previously had and the new ‘Football Manager’ made quite an impact.
So, in an attempt to re-secure their place at the top of the football-management genre they have come up with a new idea to boost sales, and it is one that copies the strategy used by Radiohead a few years back: letting you pay what you like for the Championship Manager 2010.
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New PS3 Slim Is Official! – Preview Video
August 19, 2009
There was a lot of talk a few weeks ago about Sony releasing a slim version of the PS3 after releasing the PS3 80GB and PS3 160GB last year. A questionable image was leaked onto the internet and it looked like it could be a legitimate image. Well it was and the Sony PS3 Slim is real, and it’s been one of the worst kept secrets of the year.
Sony finally made the official announcement at Gamescom in Germany. The PS3 slim will be priced at £249 which is quite a nice price cut from the ‘Brick’ (which I’m now going to aptly name mine as) and will be available to buy from September 1st 2009 which is a whole 2 days before Japan!!
Continue reading »iPhone 3.0: The Dark Side – Part 2
August 18, 2009
“Bring On The Pain!”
Ages ago now (sorry), realising that I couldn’t really say what I had intended to say about Apple without actually going through the “fail” process for myself after writing iPhone 3.0: The Dark Side – Part 1, I decided to sacrifice my un-activated 1.0 iPhone in the name of science, and upgraded the firmware to iPhone 3.0. Here’s how it went…
I connected the iPhone to my PC, then waited the 45 minutes or so it takes for Apple’s flagship product to load in Windows. It duly reported that a firmware update was available, so I chose to install and waited. After downloading and installing, the iPhone re-booted and reported that it was waiting to be activated. “That’s all folks!” I thought, but after 2 minutes of sitting doing nothing, my iPhone gave up trying to activate and just turned on and worked.
Continue reading »How To Change Your Facebook Username (Vanity Name URL)
August 17, 2009
Not so long ago, there was the landrush for the launch of Facebook vanity name URLs for your profile page on what is the largest social networking site out there, interestingly we were told at the time that we had to choose wisely as this was a “one time only” deal – never shy of moving the goalposts (so to speak), Facebook have now changed their minds on this one too!
Now most of the non-tech savvy people that I have as friends on Facebook still haven’t chosen their’s – when I’ve asked them about it, most of them either have no clue about it and/or don’t have the slightest interest either way. Perhaps Facebook hasn’t made their users aware of it enough?
Continue reading »Zath’s Technology & Gadget Roundup (16/08/09)
August 16, 2009
Here at Zath we like all things hi-tech, gadget and gaming-related, however unfortunately we can’t feature everything we like, thankfully there are other technology, gadget and gaming websites out there to keep up to date with the other important developments that are going on.
That being the case I thought it might be useful and interesting to everyone to highlight some of our favourite articles that might be useful and interesting to our Zath readers, but first let’s start with highlighting a few of our favourites on Zath in the past week in case you missed them!
Continue reading »Battlestar Galactica: The Movie – A Bryan Singer Remake!
August 15, 2009
It was only a couple of days ago that a rumour was released about a Battlestar Galactica movie being made. Well……the rumours are frakkin’ true and it’s going ahead!
I personally think this is a complete insult to the TV series. Bryan Singer wanted to do the TV series back in 2001, but that fell through after 9/11 happened and was then picked up by Moore in 2003 who did an amazing job in bringing us the best show on TV…….ever!!
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