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Sony releases entry level SCD-XE800 SACD player in Japan, 10 years too late
Many of us at Engadget -- being the audio geeks that we are -- have rooted for SACD to take off as a format ever since its release in 1999. So we're more than happy to see Sony release the entry level priced SCD-XE800 SACD player. We'd being lying though if we didn't admit confusion over Sony's timing of this release, in what seems to be the twilight years of the cherished audiophile format's life. Even more befuddling perhaps is that this device isn't compatible with multi-channel SACD discs, which was one of the most attractive selling points the medium had going for it to begin with. So if this is some strange underhanded way of Sony alerting the world they're resuscitating the format, it looks like it was thought out over several bottles of sake. If we see a press release about a new Beta Max player coming down the pipe soon, we'll know for certain someone at the electronics giant has clearly lost their marbles.
iPodMeister gives you an iPad for your old CDs
Want to get a new iPad but a little short on cash? Trade in a bunch of your old CDs or DVDs to a company called iPodMeister and your problems are solved. Sound too good to be true? It's not, reports the New York Times. iPodMeister was founded by a group of musicians and students who realized that though CDs are virtually worthless in the US, they often fetch higher prices abroad. Their business model is to collect your discarded CDs or DVDs, giving you an iPod, iPhone, or iPad in return, and sell your CDs and DVDs for a profit in other countries. A fringe benefit of this is that your old CDs and DVDs actually get used for something instead of just going into a landfill. The cool cats at iPodMeister do have strict rules regarding what CDs and DVDs are acceptable, but note that if you bought your CDs in a record store, you're probably good to go. They do require both the original jewel case (remember those?) and the original album artwork, however. If you've got binders full of original CDs, but no inserts, you're out of luck. So what will the various iterations of the iPad cost you? The full breakdown's past the link below, but you might be surprised -- an iPad ain't cheap.
Ready Check: Cooldown Management
Ready Check is a twice-a-week column focusing on successful raiding for the serious raider. Hardcore or casual, Vault of Archavon or Ulduar, everyone can get in on the action and down some bosses. Today, we're going to look at a specific tactic for speeding your success through each encounter -- cooldown management.The proper use of a raid's cooldowns is pretty key to maximizing your damage output. (Cooldown is one word. Yes. it. is.) One moment, you are a meager Retribution Paladin. You struggle to maintain your place on the DPS chart. Your weak blows are the stuff of ridicule and angsty blog posts. The Death Knight next to you merely smirks at your DPS, his condescending unibrow peering at you from within his dark, dark helmet of angst. Try as you might, you can barely generate a cooling wind as you struggle to perform for your raid leader.And then you blow wings. Suddenly, your damage is the stuff of legend! With those golden heralds of power and magnificence unfurling from your broad, manly shoulders, there is no enemy who can stand before you! You speak in all exclamation points! Women and men in Leia-costumes hurl themselves at your feet, while you swat away weaksauce Rogues and OP Warlocks with the barest of effort! Ghostcrawler is forced to resign, offering you the ultimate power in World of Warcraft design! You are fantastic!And then it's over, so very, very much too soon. You are left to wait until your next cooldown is up to once again recapture that former glory, and remember what it was like to be the quarterback.Okay, I exaggerate. But the idea that cooldown use increase your performance should be obvious. They don't put a spell in your Spellbook because they don't want you to use it. (Well, they rarely do so, anyway.) But cooldown management is a challenge for every raider. While a lot of folks have their cooldown management well under hand, there's still plenty of folks out there who could use some handy tips.
iTunes 8.2 to include Blu-ray support?
Update: Our bad... the date on the MacRumors comment was in late April, and this recycled up into our queue due to an editing mixup. Apologies –Ed.There's a new iTunes beta version out in developers' hands straight from Apple, and a forum poster over at Mac Rumors found a little something fun in the About screen: a reference to Gracenote's ability to identify Blu-ray discs. Gracenote is the service that IDs your CDs when you import them into iTunes, so you don't have to sit there and type all the track names and artist information in. Apparently Apple is mentioning that not only CDs and DVDs, but also Blu-ray discs, will get information from Gracenote in the latest version of iTunes.This doesn't mean that Apple will adapt Blu-ray as a standard (though it would probably be about time, don't you think?). But it should mean that the future version of iTunes will include Blu-ray support, so if you happen to have a Blu-ray drive hooked up to your Mac, you'll be able to read or play the discs via iTunes.It could just mean that Apple has upgraded the Gracenote version in their app, however, and that they have no plans to actually use it -- the text in the About screen could just be a boilerplate cut-and-paste from some required Gracenote documentation that happens to include "Blu-ray." We'll have to wait and see just what shows up in 8.2 when it eventually releases to the public.
Activision exec: Videogames will eclipse other entertainment
Activision-Blizzard exec Mike Griffith also made a showing at last week's CES, crowing about an industry that he and his company are heading towards the top of. He said to a crowd there that videogames would "eclipse" "movies, recorded music and TV" as forms of entertainment in the future. He claimed that media such as films and music were passive, and that games are moving ever closer to becoming "a legitimate story-telling medium that rivals feature films."Which all seems true, except that it's coming from someone who stands to make a lot of money off of just that happening. Still, for all of the bluster of Activision-Blizzard's hotshots, they've got a few of the most popular franchises in gaming behind them -- Blizzard (of course), the Call of Duty franchise, and Guitar Hero, which has made over a billion dollars for Activision. Especially in a time of declining CD sales, Griffith's words ring truer than ever.But let's not forget, of course, that you can't have great stories without great storytellers, and the folks at Blizzard are definitely that. For all of Activision's bragging, they can't forget that these franchises, all of them, came from strong and talented studios -- Call of Duty was crafted by Infinity Ward, Guitar Hero by Harmonix, and obviously all of Blizzard's properties were put together by the company formerly known as Silicon and Synapse. Griffith can brag that his media is taking over the world, but we hope Activision doesn't forget who helped them get there.
Echoes of War music set out now
Blizzard has released the Echoes of War music set we posted about a while back, and they've got a nice new site to go along with it. The site features a trailer of what you'll hear on the CDs (and the included DVD, which has a feature length documentary, among other interviews and features): music from all of Blizzard's universes, from World of Warcraft to Diablo III. Pretty awesome. We originally said there'd be 70 minutes, but it turns out there's over 90 minutes of music to go around here. At $50 for the whole set and $30 for just the CDs, it might be a little pricey to pick up yourself, but it would make a great gift this holiday for a Warcraft fan (hopefully one close to you, so you can burn the CDs after you buy them, too).And even if you don't want to buy the set, the new site has sample tracks which are definitely worth listening to. Blizzard gets a lot of praise for their art design and gameplay, and while their music isn't the most memorable in videogaming (Mario's theme, Final Fantasy's music, or the Zelda tunes are probably much easier to recollect for most gamers), all of Blizzard's tunes are definitely epic enough to fit nicely in the games they're written for.[via WoW LJ]
Snaptell Explorer retrives product listings from the iPhone's camera
Oh man -- finally, we're getting an app that fulfills the promise of the iPhone. Ever since we knew the iPhone would have a camera and an internet connection, we've been waiting for SnapTell Explorer, and now it's here and free. Download and install it on the iPhone, and then snap a picture of any book, CD, movie, or videogame, and bingo, you've got links to listings for it (Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Wikipedia, Google, etc.) around the Internet. I have no idea how it works (some type of picture comparison script hooked up to a database, surely, though it's amazing that it works that well with just the iPhone's camera), but that's fine, because it makes it all the more indistinguishable from magic.The main drawback is that it takes a bit to search their database -- while wifi or 3G are much faster (obviously), Edge will have you waiting a few minutes for a find. And at this point, all they have are links to pages -- it would be nice to see a price comparison right away and/or a quick rating (to see instantly what people think of a movie if you happen to be standing in a video store making your choice). Finally, it would be nice to see this extended to all sorts of items -- I tried scanning a few groceries that I might be price shopping, but for now it's just books, movies, and music.But otherwise, it's awesome -- even in low light/bad light situations, as long as you can get a recognizable picture of the case, it works. This is exactly the kind of thing the iPhone is made for, very cool to finally see it in action.[via Waxy]
Mac 101: Hide Hard Drives, CDs, etc on your Desktop
I like a relatively neat Desktop. I keep out just those items I need to access right away for my day-to-day work. It's so easy to clutter Finder, especially when you use multiple hard drives and partitions, an iPod, a memory card reader and the odd CD or DVD. An often-overlooked Finder preference can come to the rescue. To hide volumes on your Desktop, choose Finder -> Preferences (or just type Command-, when Finder is active). In the General tab, choose which items you want to show on your Desktop. Place a check next items you want to see or clear the checkboxes to hide items. You can always bring hidden items back by updating your preferences later.And don't forget: whether you hide disks or CDs on your desktop, they're always there on the side drawer of your Finder windows where you'll find all hard drives, servers, removable media and so forth.
Delicious Library Gambler's Sale enters fourth and final week
You'd better get out those credit cards boys and girls, as the Delicious Monster Gambler's Sale has entered its fourth and final week. For those not familiar with this type of sale: Delicious Monster set aside a secret number of Delicious Library licenses and put the app on a four week sale. Each week, they drop the price by $5. Herein lies the catch: the sale ends when either four weeks are up, or the secret number of licenses is sold - whichever is first.This is the fourth and final week of the sale, and Delicious Library has hit $20. I just purchased my own copy, but only Delicious Monster knows how long you can keep waiting to taking advantage of a killer sale on a killer app.Thanks RP
Chicago signing for Uematsu, Aki, & Roth tonight
Are you in Chicago tonight for the big PLAY! concert tomorrow, but weren't willing to shell out $125 for the VIP meet-and-greet at the event? Well, you might be in luck (even if you're not attending), as a few famous folks from the concert will be on hand to sign autographs in Chicago proper for free tonight.From 7 to 9 PM (presumably Central time) at the Tower Records store on 2301 N. Clark St., Final Fantasy composer Nobuo Uematsu, bilingual songstress Angela Aki (who wrote and sang the theme song for FFXII), and Principal Conductor and Music Director of PLAY! Arnie Roth will be signing autographs to promote the world-tour premiere of 'PLAY! A Video Game Symphony' and the CD for More Friends - Music from FINAL FANTASY.While this blogger is sadly occupied with prior engagements tonight, gamers in the area are more than welcome to mob that Tower Records and cause the store's employees much consternation and bewilderment. If you don't have any imported CDs to sign, however, don't fret: the store's web site claims to have "some awesome Japanese imports available for you to purchase and have autographed at the event." Not only that, Angela Aki will be performing live as well. Score! Anybody wanna tell us how this evening turns out when it's all sung and done?[Via The Daily Northwestern; image culled from Angela Aki's blog, Nobuo Uematsu's Squenix profile, and Arnie Roth's 2005 interview with IGN]See also: Official page for Tower Clark Street (with details on the signing) Ticketmaster site for the PLAY! concert debut tomorrow Sonic and Chrono composers to join PLAY! in Chicago
Australia to allow CD ripping, too
In another Pyrrhic victory for fair use rights, Australia's government is set to legalize CD ripping. The revision to the country's copyright law, like proposed changes being mulled in the UK, will legalize activities that are already fairly widespread, including "format shifting" of music you legally own from CDs to digital audio players. While blessing common practices, the new law cracks down on file sharing and piracy, allowing police to issue on-the-spot fines to anyone caught in the act of piracy. The Australian law may also apply to ebooks, which could require companies like Adobe and Microsoft to allow protected ebooks to be printed or saved in other formats for use on non-supported devices.[Via Techdirt]
Seen at E3: A message to MMOs
No beating about the bush from this MMO. Directly attacking your competitors may not be nice, but with a MMO cliché that's so ingrained in the genre, sometimes you have to be bold to succeed.Unless, of course, they had a lapse of concentration while typing Mr. Presley's name.
BackityMac update brings CD/DVD backup
We mentioned BackityMac 1.0 a couple of weeks ago, and since then it's had a minor .1 update with a big new feature: backing up to CDs/DVDs. As icing on the cake, BackityMac can also span disk images that are too big for the media you're using, putting that 'size matters' issues to rest.BackityMac 1.1 is donationware, a Universal Binary and available from Whimsplucky Software.[via Hawk Wings]
