Another day, another ignorant article about high definition. This time it's Peter Bradshaw, film critic for Guardian.co.uk, claiming Humphrey Bogart would have any cameraman approximating a "high definition" effect thrown off the set. Blatantly ignoring the fact that movies of that era were made on 35mm film with more resolution than even 1080p Blu-ray can display, Bradshaw claims that instead of a HDTV, viewers would be better off with a standard definition projector and DVDs. This is all in response to a recent Sky ad campaign (check out the video with Sir Anthony Hopkins dropping in Rutger Hauer's Blade Runner monologue after the break, plus the original) promoting the broadcaster's new HD transfers, allowing home viewing of many older films in quality that would be impossible unless you'd seen it the first week in theaters, and with sound that likely surpasses anything available at the time. What someone should explain to Mr. Bradshaw and so many others with this misconception is that HDTV allows us to see the movie closer to the way it was meant to be seen when it was originally mastered, with all the detail that was present. Provided a high quality transfer, there's plenty of reasons to catch old flicks in a new format, so spread the word.

This one hasn't exactly been the best kept secret in automotive circles as of late, but Mercedes has now finally come out and confirmed that it will indeed be producing an all-electric version of its new SLS AMG gullwing coupe. For those not immediately sold by the word "gullwing," you may be slightly more impressed by the 48 kWh liquid cooled lithium ion battery pack at the heart of the car, which gets paired with an electric drive system tied to all four wheels that Mercedes says is "on the same high level" as the 6.8-liter V8 engine that's in the non-electric SLS. Somewhat curiously, however, Mercedes isn't doing any talking about range just yet but, as AutoBlog notes, it seems likely that it'll be less than the 200 miles the Tesla Roadster gets, given its small battery capacity. There's also unfortunately still no official word on a price or time frame for a release, but the current talk seems to be that it could be rolling out by 2015.

Remember back in May when Blu-ray sales were reportedly up 72 percent for 2009? Turns out the high definition disc business is doing even better than that. The Digital Entertainment Group is reporting a 91 percent sales increase year-on-year, totaling $407 million, for the first six months of this year -- an impressive feat, especially in this recession climate. Blu-ray rentals, too, saw a 61 percent increase, and on the less tangible side of things, digital distribution rose 21 percent. Despite all this, the report noted that overall consumer spending on prerecorded entertainment dropped 3.1 percent, and net profit down 2.2 percent... come on UMD, pick up the slack.

Research in Motion hit a milestone today, only "achievement" wouldn't necessarily be the best way to describe it. The BlackBerry maker has finally ended a long-running patent dispute with Visto Corp., paying out $267.5 million to settle the matter -- a much larger fee than the $7.7 million Visto got from Seven Networks, but conversely a fraction of the reported $612.5 million RIM paid to settle with NTP years back. With it, however, comes a fully paid license to use Visto's patents, and some of the plaintiff's intellectual property by way of transferred ownership. So now that we can move on from that dispute, who's next to take the mantle and vie for a piece of BlackBerry's pie?

We sort of saw the writing on the wall, but now Belkin has went and made it official: the FlyWire is dead. Originally showcased at CES 2008 and at practically every AV-related trade show since, the wireless HD-enabling FlyWire was seen as the poster child for wireless HD / HDMI by many, and the death of this product certainly doesn't bode well for the technology as a whole. It's true that AMIMON -- the wireless startup responsible for the WHDI technology within the FlyWire and a few other devices -- just landed an extra $10 million in VC funding, but still, we've literally been waiting years for this so-called "promising technology" to get a foothold in the market. Or even make a wave, really.

As has become customary these days, Belkin is also pinning the cancellation of the FlyWire on the economy, with a spokesperson telling us that the "retail price of $1,499 would be out of line given the current state of the economy." She continued by stating that the company has "opted to halt production of FlyWire" and "will no longer be introducing [it] to the market." Granted, the company does seem somewhat apologetic, concluding that "there will be some disappointed folks out there, but [Belkin's] end goal is to introduce products that are accessible and that make sense in the current environment."


Frankly, we're not buying it. In April, Belkin affirmed to us that while AMIMON's WDHI technology was "solid," it was taking its sweet time in order to "pay very close attention to the user experience, such as the packaging, setup, and the quick install guide." We could be way off base here, but we'd say the economy was sucking quite a bit harder in April than it is today. And honestly, that's beside the point. A $1,500 device that enabled a Blu-ray player to communicate wirelessly with an HDTV is obviously a luxury item, and regardless of unemployment numbers, Belkin had to know that the FlyWire would only appeal to upscale consumers. You know, the same folks who also put in an order for a Ferrari California in 1H 2009 while their hedge fund dived.

To us, the sudden death of the FlyWire is more of an industry signal than anything. For quite some while, we've been wondering when the industry at large would embrace wireless HD and HDMI technology, and now we're beginning to think that said embrace will never happen in any significant capacity. Even Wireless USB couldn't cut it, and we're guessing there are an awful lot more USB users out there than HDMI. If the price dropped dramatically and the sector consolidated a bit in order to agree on a single standard, we'd say wireless HD / HDMI has a fighting chance. 'Til that happens, you can pretty much bank on the FlyWire fiasco becoming a model for the rest. Belkin's statement in full is past the break.

The old adage goes "be careful what you wish for; you just might get it." After years of bellyaching (we're as guilty of it as anyone) that Nokia was giving Europe first dibs on its hottest handsets over North America, we're now seeing perhaps the most dramatic, positive shift in North American strategy in the company's history -- in fact, they're straight-up saying that they want to push all the way to number 1 in the local market. But is it enough of a shift to fend off aggressive moves from Samsung, LG, Apple, and the rest of the gang across every conceivable market segment?

Nokia's product portfolio manager for the region, Ira Frimere, sat down with Computerworld recently to discuss the renewed push, admitting that the company has had to rethink some fundamental things about its products and its business model to help its cause in the States; one small example is the fact that the Surge is launching without the typical four-digit model number or Nseries / Eseries code that is found on virtually every Nokia sold worldwide, ostensibly because Americans apparently prefer names to numbers (it'll launch as the Surge 6790 internationally, it turns out). Additionally, the company has dedicated a facility in San Diego to working with its North American carrier partners -- AT&T and Verizon, most prominently. It's still early on, but the labor there seems to already be bearing fruit, considering that AT&T will be stocking three S60 devices once the Surge launches -- a record -- and Verizon's rumored to have some interesting stuff in the pipeline.

Frimere adds that Nokia believes services are key to winning American hearts and minds, an area the company has been putting extensive R&D into lately with its Ovi line (unfortunately, so is everyone else -- and getting to iTunes and App Store-level acceptance with Nokia Music and the Ovi Store is going to be an uphill battle, to say the least). Ultimately, the conclusion seems to be Nokia's reluctant admittance that breaking into the US market requires a willingness to give carriers far, far more respect than they deserve by bending and breaking to their somewhat odd demands -- and that's going to be an ongoing problem for consumers, whether you're a Nokia fan or not.

Honestly, now that Nokia's hooked up with Intel we didn't think we'd ever see any more straight Maemo devices, let alone random third-party Maemo MIDs, but here we are, looking at the Optima OP5-E. The 4.3-inch touchscreen MID with an 806MHz Marvell processor and 128MB of RAM is said to be going through some final software testing before release, and it apparently will support SMS and telephony in the future, so apparently those KIRF iPhone looks are for more than just confusing tourists. No pricing and likely no availability outside of China, but hey -- Maemo, people. Give it up.

[Via Pocketables]

We certainly didn't mind that the Tony Hawk Ride board we played at E3 had a charcoal coloring, and that goes double for our feet. Apparently that sentiment isn't shared by the game's director Josh Tsui, who told GamesIndustry.biz that it'll be launched in a "more consumer friendly... [and] iPod-like" white color, which in our minds all but guarantees someone out there's gonna mistake this for a new version of the Wii balance board. Tsui's not shy with praise either, calling the board "the most advanced peripheral on the market." Ultimately, the color isn't gonna matter to us, and with a board-compatible sequel rumored to already be in the works, there's plenty of time to re-release the peripheral in all sorts of attractive palettes -- that'd of course be very iPod-like.

[Via Joystiq]

It's not officially available yet, but the fine folks at Android Community have gotten their hands on a HTC Hero and posted up a quick unboxing and overview. Their unit is an unaffiliated generic whitebox model, so it's likely that the retail packaging the rest of us see from carriers will be different, but none of that changes the device itself, which AC thinks is the "best Android device to date." That's quite a statement, but we're inclined to agree -- we'll see if anything changes when we get that US 3G version in our hands. More pics at the read link, video after the break.

Did anyone else think that Sony would have finally killed off the UMD movie for real by now? Guess again, suckers. The company just spilled some more details on that Assassin's Creed: Bloodlines PSP Entertainment Pack, and in addition to that sexy white PSP-3000 and 2GB Memory Stick PRO Duo, your $199 will get you an as-yet-unnamed feature film on UMD. Yes, even as Sony tip-toes into the future with the PSPgo, it's still trying to peddle movies on a garbage proprietary format no one ever really wanted and that most studios have stopped supporting. Old habits die hard, we suppose. Video after the break.

Seriously Nintendo, what is it? Do you hate freedom? Are you still bitter about the US reception to your underwhelming GameCube? Whatever the case, we're never going to forgive you for this one. After waiting for years for a Wii in any color other than glossy white, it seems that only the Japanese will be able to enjoy the sleek, sexy and altogether drool-worthy black Wii console. In fact, a rep for the Big N informed GameDaily that there are "no plans to have other colors of the Wii in the United States." As for us? We're plugging our ears and pretending this "individual" has no idea what he / she is talking about. And weeping, uncontrollably.

[Via Joystiq]

The crew over at Engadget HD never gets tired of trying out new Blu-ray players and this time it is Samsung's top of the line BD-P4600's turn. If you've ever thought that the perfect place to put your Blu-ray player is mounted on the wall under your HDTV, then there is little doubt that this is the Blu-ray player for you. Of course that doesn't mean you should buy it blindly without any other regards, which is exactly why we took the time to try it out for you.

The good news, if you want to call it that, is that Sony Ericsson's most recent quarter loss is not as bad as its epic $382 million tab prior, and at this point there's no talk of further en masse job cuts. That said, this new report isn't exactly sunshine, and the Q2 results show a 213 million Euro ($299 million) net loss. Product shipments were around 13.8 million, down 43 percent compared with last year. Some blame is attributed to the focus on mid-tier feature phones in lieu of a greater smartphone push -- SE says it's working to correct that direction, but its higher end devices won't hit until fourth quarter. One interesting note is that one of those late-year handhelds is said to "integrate with PlayStation," but before you get excited over the oft-rumored PSP phone, we'd venture to say it's more likely that description's referencing the Remote Play-supporting Aino. From what we can tell, there's no indication of what's in the cards to improve Q3, so we won''t exactly be surprised if the story repeats itself three months from now.

We can't say we've ever found the Inspiron 13 particularly compelling, but there's a new model up on the Dell Singapore site right now and we're this close to falling in love -- it's thinner and lighter, takes some nice design cues from the Inspiron Mini and Studio lines, and the configuration with a 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo and ATI Mobility Radeon HD4330 graphics costs just S$1,399 ($962). Oh, and there's also an LED-backlit 1366 x 768 display, HDMI / VGA out, an ExpressCard/34 slot, and 1394 -- pretty great for under a grand. We're on pins and needles waiting for official US pricing information: not only do we expect it to be slightly lower, you just know Dell will be blowing these things out when back-to-school rolls around.

[Thanks, Quaysar]

This whole global economic crisis, and its resulting massive loss of jobs got us thinking. We here at Engadget didn't want to stand helplessly by, announcing every new round of misery without giving anything back -- so we decided to take the opportunity to spread a little positivity. We'll be handing out a new gadget every day (except for weekends) to lucky readers until we run out of stuff or companies stop sending things. Today we've got a Scosche reviveLITE on offer, perfect for keeping your iPhone charged and the Boogie Monster at bay. Read the rules below (no skimming -- we're omniscient and can tell when you've skimmed) and get commenting! Hooray for free stuff!

Big thanks to Scosche for providing the gear!

The rules:

• Leave a comment below. Any comment will do, but if you want to share your proposal for "fixing" the world economy, that'd be sweet too.
  
• You may only enter this specific giveaway once. If you enter this giveaway more than once you'll be automatically disqualified, etc. (Yes, we have robots that thoroughly check to ensure fairness.)
• If you enter more than once, only activate one comment. This is pretty self explanatory. Just be careful and you'll be fine.
  
• Contest is open to anyone in the 50 States, 18 or older! Sorry, we don't make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so be mad at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad.
  
• Winner will be chosen randomly. The winner will receive one (1) Scosche reviveLITE. Approximate retail value is $39.99.
  
• If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of the end of the contest. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen.
• Entries can be submitted until Thursday, July 16th, at 11:59PM ET. Good luck!
• Full rules can be found here.

Corsair's no stranger to the wild, nimble and reliable world of solid state storage, but its latest line of 2.5-inch SSDs takes that whole "speed" thing to another level. The aptly-titled Extreme Series is comprised of the X32, X64 and X128, which pack 32GB, 64GB and 128GB of capacity, predictably and respectively. Built using Samsung MLC NAND flash memory and an Indilinx Barefoot controller, these drives have been tested to reach read rates of up to 240MBps and write rates of 170MBps. Corsair even notes that these are upgradable via future firmware updates, meaning that the upcoming TRIM command for Windows 7 will be but a download away. Per usual, the company's mum on pricing and release details, but unless something has changed since last week yesterday, the whole lot will be a bit too rich for our blood.