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Lava Mobile's B5 Alpha touts groundbreaking ABCDE keyboard
Okay, we're admittedly a wee bit stumped by what Lava's peddling here. The Lava B5 is a decent-looking, Bold-esque device with an ABCDE keyboard layout -- yeah, this kinda frightened our digits, too -- but as to what OS it runs or what network type it calls home is a complete mystery. For what it's worth, the pic (render?) shows us Verizon Wireless and an EV-DO symbol, all on what must be some old flavor of Windows Mobile... so we've got our doubts as to the veracity of that setup. The phone is destined for India and as such has an Indian calendar, Nimbuzz (messaging, Skype, and the like), a 2 megapixel camera, a bundled 2GB microSD card expandable to 8GB, and even a PC Suite app of some sort that's potentially handy. Pricing on the B5 Alpha comes in at 4,399 rupees (roughly $95). Oh, and if the whole ABCDE keyboard isn't quite catching your fancy, no sweat: Lava has a B5 featuring old reliable QWERTY on offer. [Thanks, deej]
PSB rolls out a whole new Image-series speaker lineup
There's no shortage of quality loudspeaker brands that come to the US from its neighbor-to-the-north, and the incremental improvements to longstanding models flowing across the border usually goes without notice. But when updates are made across an entire product series, it deserves mention -- as in the case of PSB updating its Image lineup (not to be confused with its Imagine speakers). All in, there are eight new models that can blanket your HT setup: T5 ($899) and T6 ($1,199) floorstanders, B5 ($399) and B6 ($499) monitors, B4 ($299) sub-compact/surrounds, C4 ($275) and C5 ($375) center channels, and S5 ($799) bipolar surrounds. The Image lineup has always been value-conscious, so all those prices are per pair -- not the cheapest, but you've got to pay for quality. Interested? Hit that link for details.
