Southkorea -- Engadget

southkorea posts

LG's 15-inch OLED TV now blowing minds in South Korea

by Darren Murph posted Nov 9th 2009 at 9:33AM

Call Daegu home? Just over in South Korea to visit and / or infiltrate the DMZ? Regardless of why you're there, you're probably interested in picking up LG's latest, which has been tempting our retinas since IFA. Just as we'd heard back in late August, the aforesaid firm's 15-inch OLED TV is reportedly now on sale in South Korea, and it's packing a price tag of around ₩3 million ($2,598). By our count, this is just the second major, mass-produced OLED TV to hit store shelves anywhere in the world, but we're hoping to see a lot more action in this space come CES. You TV makers are listening to our ~~requests~~ demands, right?

[Via OLED-Display]

South Korean taxi drivers win right to watch TV in cabs, for now

by Donald Melanson posted Nov 3rd 2009 at 4:44PM

You know, we've made plenty of jokes about the DMB mobile TV functionality found in seemingly every GPS unit released in South Korea, but it looks like taxi drivers in the country take their distractions seriously -- serious enough to go to court. That issue apparently came to a head recently when one cab driver challenged a $500 fine he received for watching TV while on the job, which had apparently become a relatively common means to beat boredom during traffic jams but was banned last year by a local regulation in the city of Seoul. While the court obviously didn't go so far as to condone the practice (watching TV while driving was apparently a factor in upwards of 200 accidents in the country last year), it did rule that the regulation in Seoul was illegal because it was based on a 1961 law that's been superseded. Cabbies shouldn't get too comfortable with their in-car rigs just yet, however, as we have a sneaking suspicion this won't be the final word on the matter.

[Thanks, Badison]

iriver N20 Mariah Carey edition reveals an unfortunate case of man-hands

by Thomas Ricker posted Oct 19th 2009 at 6:34AM

While iriver might not be the mega brand in Europe and North America, it does dominate on its home turf in South Korea. Enough so to attract music celebs like Mariah Carey who's pitching a butterfly approved, Special Edition N20 preloaded with her latest contractual obligation. The $120ish player with integrated clip is limited to 5,000 units so act now... or not. See the songstress in an awkward mid-shill moment after the break.

[Via Anythingbutipod]

Continue reading iriver N20 Mariah Carey edition reveals an unfortunate case of man-hands

Fire-fighting robots head to South Korea, could face conflicts of interest

by Darren Murph posted Oct 8th 2009 at 11:13AM

Fire fighting robots have been put to work for little to no pay once or twice before, but it seems as if the exception is slowly becoming the rule. Just recently, a smattering of fire stations in Daegu (just south of Seoul, South Korea) enlisted the help of two robotic firefighters to jump into "the center of blazing infernos" if need be. The Fire Spy Robots are fully automated and equipped with wheels, though it should be noted that their help is currently labeled "a trial run." Both of the critters were constructed by Hoya Robot and can be maneuvered via humans watching the surroundings through an onboard camera, and while the company claims that these guys can shake off temperatures as high as 500 degrees Celsius for over an hour, there's no mention of what kind of mental meltdown it would surely have should it arrive to extinguish the work of its cousin.

[Via FarEastGizmos]

Digital Cube storms back with touchscreen-based i-Station E9 PMP

by Darren Murph posted Sep 29th 2009 at 9:14AM

Digital Cube may not be a household name in portable media players (at least on this side of the Atlantic), but there's no doubt that its latest attempt at greatness is a real looker. The touchscreen-based i-Station E9 arrives with an expansive 3-inch panel, hardly any buttons to speak of, an FM tuner, accelerometer, video output, support for more formats than you can shake a stick at and a user interface that looks particularly fascinating. Battery life is pegged at just 12 hours for audio and 4 hours for video, but with prices set for $115 (4GB) / $132 (8GB), we won't kvetch too loudly.

[Via Cloned In China]

South Korea clears iPhone for sale

by Chris Ziegler posted Sep 23rd 2009 at 12:59AM

What, you didn't know you couldn't buy the iPhone from at least one carrier in all 193 widely-recognized sovereign nations of the world? It's true; one need look no further than South Korea, one of the most technologically-advanced wireless societies, where much of the growth over the past several years has occurred in a self-imposed bubble thanks to the existence of policies requiring the presence of a custom software layer for connecting to data services -- a layer that gave local players like Samsung and LG an almost impenetrable advantage over foreign competition. Local authorities have been loosening those restrictions in recent months, and the Wall Street Journal is reporting this evening that they've just signed off on a waiver that would allow the iPhone to be sold despite a "technical ban" that had been keeping it off shelves. Local carrier KT had been saying for a while that it intended to carry the phone, so this step seems like little more than a formality -- but in a market accustomed to T-DMB tuners, limitless color choices, and wide VGA AMOLED displays, it'll be interesting to see whether there's profit to be had.

MP navi's 4.3-inch touchscreen PMP slips through the crack

by Darren Murph posted Sep 17th 2009 at 6:50AM

South Korea has a long history of pushing out wicked cool PMP / navigation / do-it-all devices, but MP navi's first effort definitely aims low. Boasting a 4.3-inch touchscreen, an ultrathin chassis and support for more formats than you'd care to count, there's not much here that sets it apart from the competition. Of course, just looking good goes a long way, so if you're interested in saving this one from imminent obscurity, you'll need to hop a flight to Seoul (mind that DMZ, though) and cough up ₩139,000 ($114).

DigitalCube shows off sexy iSTATION S3 PMP

by Darren Murph posted Sep 11th 2009 at 12:29AM

We'll just go ahead and get the bad news out of the way: if you call yourself a North American, and you're not gutsy enough to find an importer, you'll probably never own the downright beautiful device shown above. Known as the iSTATION S3, DigitalCube's latest arrives with 8/16/32GB of storage, an HDMI output, a battery good for 20 hours of audio playback (or 8 hours of video), an expansive 3.5-inch AMOLED display, WVGA (800 x 480) resolution and support for a veritable smorgasbord of file formats. Sadly, we've no price or release date to share, but by all means, give that read link a tap if you're looking for more eye candy.

[Via OLED-Info]

Alleged iRiver Story e-reader pics exemplify imitation as the sincerest form of flattery

by Ross Miller posted Sep 2nd 2009 at 3:43PM

We can't fault iRiver for striving to beat Kindle at its game, but to be Kindle is a different story altogether. A Korea-based MobileRead forum member posted a trio of pics that apparently show off the company's up e-book reader, aptly titled the Story. Here's the scoop as "dasony" tells it: the talented Mr. Ripley here sports a 6-inch screen, physical QWERTY keys, up to 32GB expandable memory, 9,000 page turns (per charge, we presume), a comic viewer, and support for PDF, EPUB, and a number of word / document files. Its local affiliation includes book store chain Kyobo and pre-orders will launch September 16th for around 350,000 to 400,000 KRW, or $282 to $322 in US currencies. Apparently iRiver's looking to expand it to other countries and is in talk with US and Russian retailers, although with that price, it's gonna have to pull out some surprise features and dark magick to compete with what Sony and Amazon are dealing. More pics of the book and its not-quite-svelte case in the gallery below.

Gallery: Alleged iRiver Story e-reader pics exemplify imitation as the sincerest form of flattery

[Via Engadget German]

MIU's vaporware HDPC now looking like a Nokia E90, but less buyable

by Chris Ziegler posted Aug 25th 2009 at 4:23AM

The problem with your product not existing is that it's hard to make money off of it, and after a while, would-be buyers start to hate you and everything you stand for. On the plus side, redesign costs hover near zero, so why not play around and shoot for the moon with wild specs that we'll likely never have the opportunity to own? As far as we can tell, South Korea's MIU is no closer to launching its do-everything HDPC than it was a year and a half ago -- and if anything, they've actually managed to regress a bit since they actually had a real live prototype back then. Anyway, the latest round of virtu-changes gives us a larger primary display that's up to 1024 x 600 (we'll take all the resolution we can get since the $900 flavor is supposed to run XP), a grand total of three cameras, integrated GPS, HDMI out, and a T-DMB tuner. Strangely, the MID's phone face has taken on a distinctly E90 accent, right down to the inexplicable S60 screen shot used in the mockup -- but rest assured, you'll be able to buy, sell, and buy an E90 again before you'll be able to get your paws on the HDPC, which MIU says it's shopping around to distributors. We're keeping our easily-dashed hopes in check.

Ripple unleashes dashingly handsome LOOK on unsuspecting nettop crowd

by Vladislav Savov posted Aug 13th 2009 at 2:31PM

With its shapely curves and dramatic paintwork, the Ripple LOOK makes a wonderful first impression. Though not a candidate for being either the smallest or thinnest mini PC around, it's definitely one of the best looking nettops we've seen. Specs are par for the course -- dual core Atom 330, 2GB RAM, 320GB storage and Intel GMA950 graphics -- but you really don't buy devices like these for their power. Then again, we won't be buying this at all unless it does the unthinkable and finds a reseller outside Korea, where the lucky locals can have it for $321. A couple more glamor shots await after the break to soothe your heavy heart.

Continue reading Ripple unleashes dashingly handsome LOOK on unsuspecting nettop crowd

Viako's Ion-equipped HTPC is more like an HD-capable nettop

by Darren Murph posted Aug 12th 2009 at 6:19AM

You can tussle over semantics all day long (particularly machine translated semantics), but there's little doubt that Viako's Ion-equipped machine is more than eager to handle whatever high-def material you throw its way. The Mini E series of HTPCs (or nettops, if you will) looks to be available in a variety of configurations, with the higher-end model snagging an Atom N330 processor, NVIDIA's GeForce 9400M GPU, 2GB of RAM, a 320GB hard drive, integrated WiFi, VGA / DVI / HDMI outputs, Ethernet, plenty of USB sockets and audio / in ports. There's no mention of price nor a stateside release date, but those in Seoul ought to find it in their local shops pretty soon.

[Via AVING]

Samsung's AMOLED-packin' YP-M1 PMP available in Korea, secret sauce still unknown

by Darren Murph posted Aug 10th 2009 at 6:07AM

Surely we aren't the only technophiles in attendance champing at the bit to find out if Samsung's fresh YP-M1 has some of NVIDIA's hotness inside, but it seems as if we'll still have to wait a bit longer to find out. Right on cue, the AMOLED-equipped portable media player has launched over in South Korea, bringing with it a laundry list of supported file formats, a WQVGA panel, up to 32GB of inbuilt storage and even a DMB TV tuner. If anyone feels like sashaying over to Seoul in order to crack one open and find out what it's really made of, then by all means, be our guest. Just try not to wander too close to that DMZ -- we hear Bill Clinton's rescue fees are through the roof.

Royche RAPOO 3800 wireless mouse is thoroughly ugly, positively alluring

by Darren Murph posted Aug 5th 2009 at 8:33AM

We know what you're thinking, and no, we also have not a clue what Royche was thinking when it designed the RAPOO 3800. The wireless mouse, which ships in black or white along with a "nub" style USB dongle, lays completely flat and boasts what appears to be a few multimedia keys below a totally-too-small scroll wheel. We get that the space constrained traveler may be fond of the approach, but our ergonomics instructor is screaming bloody murder here in the corner. Mouse at your own risk, kids.

FineDigital's FineDrive iQ Special helps commuters learn FineEnglish

by Vladislav Savov posted Aug 5th 2009 at 3:01AM

Ah, those crazy-beautiful multi-purpose navigation devices of South Korea, is there anything they can't do? If your answer is that they can't teach you English, think again. The iQ Special features a language trainer built on voice recognition software from its predecessor, the FineDrive X700, alongside the usual fare of goodies we westerners rarely get to see: SiRF-based GPS, DMB digital TV, video and music playback, and even TPEG traffic alerts. Priced at 469,000 KWN ($384), this PND is available today, and it's probably redundant to note that it won't be making its way to English-speaking countries any time soon -- not that we doesn't need it, mind you.

[Via AVING]