constellation
Latest
Vertu's Constellation Pure series is like every other Constellation: drab and overpriced
Seriously Vertu -- we have zero qualms with you charging €6,800 ($8,574) for a handset, but could you at least work in a little innovation next time? At first glance, the new Constellation Pure lineup looks like every other Constellation ever produced by the luxury phone maker, and it's not until you read that they're built from steel, leather and ceramics that you realize something's different. The set is expected to hit the market soon in white, black and silver, each of which will be limited to 2,500 units. We hear these things aren't half bad at making calls, either, but you know it's that iconic "V" logo you're really dropping the Euros for.[Via Sybarites]
Seagate's 2TB Constellation ES is rife with potential space puns
It's been a long time coming, but Seagate's finally unveiled its first 2TB hard drive, the 3.5-inch Constellation ES. The hefty spinner also comes in 500GB and 1TB varieties and runs at 7,200RPM, which should make it a bit faster than Western Digital's behemoth, according to reviews for the latter. It'll be out calendar Q3, which we take to be fancy schmancy business talk for "this Summer." Meanwhile, the 2.5-inch ES-less Constellation line sports 3 Gbps SATA and SAS 2.0 interface. Look for this one in 160GB and 500GB sizes sometime this quarter, with Dell said to be one the first companies to offer the drives. Check out one more out-of-this-world promotional image after the break.
CCP dev blog addresses lag issues, new features
The latest EVE Online dev blog comes to use from CCP Atlas, and deals with some sweeping changes to that most problematic of systems in the game: Jita. In "A Tale of Two Cities," CCP Atlas makes an analogy between the conveniences of city life and the similar situation of pilots seeking convenience in EVE, often needing to cross through the busy system to reach a destination. CCP's solution is to decentralize Jita from routes between solar systems. In effect, limiting the non-commerce presence in the Jita system, so it can -- hopefully -- continue in its established role as a market hub in New Eden without being a detriment to the players in terms of lag. Once the changes go into effect, players will no longer need to navigate through Jita to reach their destination (namely the Ruomo constellation), nor run agent missions in Jita. That is to say, Jita, as previously announced, will be a dead zone for mission agents; mission runners given missions from agents outside of Jita will not be sent into or through Jita as part of their mission completion.
Constellation Light puts LED twist on chandelier
Though not quite as elegant as the Neues Licht, the Constellation Light is still way more practical. Designed by Kenzan Tsutakawa-Chinn and showcased at the recent BKLYN Designs expo, the LED chandelier is crafted from clusters of 3-millimeter LEDs (364 in total on the tips of 91 copper tubes). Notably, it's creator is currently seeking UL approval for the device and hopes to get it on the market in short order, but there's been no mention yet of just how costly it could one day be.[Via Inhabitat]
The Real Villains: Westin Phipps
City of Villains is full of avatars of comic-book evil. They have skull motifs and spikes and scowling faces. They sport names with 'dark' in them.But the most despicable being in all the Rogue Isles is a weaselly, bespectacled little man with thinning hair plastered across his scalp; a man who is regarded as a public benefactor, a champion of charity. His very ordinariness is what makes him so dreadful, as it is much easier to recognise the evils of the real world in him than in a comic character like Lord Recluse.In our brief tour of the contacts in CoV who have the most authentically villainous content, Phipps's missions are the final stop. Some people have found them disturbing to play; the mission writer, Constellation (no longer with the CoX team) wondered if he might have gone too far. Some players have even wished for side-switching after playing Phipps's missions, and now that player generated content is on the horizon, players are proposing custom missions in which you get to beat Phipps to a pulp. So, what is it about this content that provokes such guilt and remorse?
Vertu throws its own party with Constellation Rococo collection
You know how it goes -- when you're this high-end, don't even bother waiting for your bestest of friends to toss you a birthday party to celebrate ten years of mindless self indulgence. Instead, Vertu's doing the only thing it really can by cranking out a fashionable new collection to commemorate its decennial anniversary. The Constellation Rococo collection was reportedly inspired by "the eighteenth century French art, fashion and interior design movement by the same name," and if you're into floral patterns, bold colors and monogrammed Vs, you're sure to fall head over heels for this lot. Rest assured, however, that the epicurean handset maker won't be giving these away as gifts (or anything close to it) when they land this summer.
Vertu Constellation gets monogrammed -- with Vertu's initials
Well, this is just a little self-indulgent, is it not? Everyone's favorite purveyor of unapologetically overpriced handsets is celebrating its tenth birthday this year (holy cow, has it seriously been that long?) and to commemorate the occasion in style, it's launching a series of Constellations in a "Monogram Collection." Here's the catch, though: the phones can't be monogrammed with their owners' initials. Oh, no, that would be uncouth. Instead, the phones bear Vertu's own "V" logo emblazoned repeatedly across their rarified hides in some sort of process that takes several hours to complete. They'll be available come April 1 in Pewter, Green, Red, Sky Blue, and Cerise -- and unlike their launch date, their stratospheric price tags will sadly be no joke.
Vertu Constellation, now in Mixed Metal flavor
Stainless steel, gold -- how is one exceptionally well-to-do individual to decide? Now one doesn't have to, all thanks to Vertu's Mixed Metal edition of the Constellation. While lacking the 3G data of its Ascent Ti cousin, the Constellation at least has the common decency to rock four bands of GSM reception plus EDGE data, giving users at least a fleeting hope of exploiting the phone's customized version of S40 to its fullest. Then again, virtually anyone within Vertu's target demo couldn't care less about the radio or the operating system; in this rarified air, it's all about the preciousness of the metals, and this particular version of the Constellation seems to deliver by mixing in gold accents (real gold, naturally) with the stainless steel theme. Interested parties should tap their Swiss accounts or prepare to sell their souls, firstborns, or some combination therewith.[Via Sybarites, thanks JW]
Vertu Constellation in rose gold, pricing still outrageous
All that glitters chez Vertu is gold -- well OK most, but who'd spend this much for stainless steel? -- and in the case of this handset in the Constellation series, rose gold. Unlike other in the collection, leather choices only include black, and not the other garish colors we've seen before. This handset still impresses with its opulence factor, but we'd like to see the inclusion of 3G for the kind of money you have to drop to join the club.[Via Sybarites]
Explore the heavens with your handheld
Still in the alpha stage of development, Constellations DS already looks like a useful tool for amateur astronomers. The homebrew application combines the portability of a star chart with the lighted display and interactivity of a notebook computer. Users will be able to zoom in and out of clusters, panning the night sky with their styli. Tapping a particular star displays its name, position, and other relevant information. Only thirteen constellations have been mapped so far, but developer Nameless plans to add 75 more. Future builds of the program will also use the date and your location to lay out an approximation of how the night sky should look. If anything, Constellations DS serves as a great excuse to escape the light-congested city limits and spend a warm evening outside.[Via Drunken Coders]
Real stars in Wii weather
Gamer, Josef Faulkner poked around in the Wii Forecast Channel, discovering that the stars generally correlate to actual astronomy patterns. He identified a few constellations, including Orion and Ursa Major on his Wii.Have you tagged other constellations? Southern Hemisphere gamers, are your stars in the right place?[Via digg]
Hands-on with Vertu's latest, the Constellation
If you're going to drop four figures (or more) on a cellphone, the least Vertu can do for you is hook you up with quadband GSM plus EDGE, and their latest Constellation model finally delivers. Sybarites.org recently had the opportunity to play around with the Constellation and came away very impressed -- we'd expect no less -- loving its S40 OS (highly modified to suit Vertu's needs, of course), the aviation-themed graphics and animations, and that jeweled Vertu keypad we all know and love. It seems the leather / steel model is the only one out the door at the moment, with a gold version to follow -- but rest assured, regardless of the type you choose, it's going to be mighty heavy.
Enable a slick Constellation menu in Quicksilver ?49
Macintalk has posted a how-to on enabling a really slick Constellation menu plugin for Quicksilver β49. Granted, this menu is quite a bit of eye candy, but if you follow Macintalk's post all the way through and assign this menu to a hotkey, it then becomes a bit of really handy eye candy.Keep in mind, however, that (as far as I know) you need the latest developer β49 to bring this plugin to fruition, so just like with the last slick Quicksilver Cube eye candy plugin, if you're not interested in the beta side of things, you should probably leave this one alone until it gets ironed out a bit more......but on the other hand: look at how cool that is! The entire thing is clickable, and it's also bigger in 'real life' - on my 1440 x 900 display it's 512 x 512 pixels, so it's much more legible than the 225 x 225 screenshot in this post. The small button just to the right of the iTunes icon in the middle of this menu, for example, displays a popup list of your playlists. Clicking on any of the larger slices, such as the albums or artists, pops up a second, similar menu you can browse through by using the down arrow at the bottom of the inner circle. The whole menu system seems pretty zippy too, once it takes a second to load all your iTunes information. Of course, I'm also using a 2.0 Ghz MacBook Pro with 1.5 GB RAM, so YMMV. Check out Macintalk's how-to if you're done drooling and want to get down to business.
Vertu Constellation gets the FCC treatment
If we're gonna drop a couple grand on a phone, the least it can do is give us quad-band GSM, right? As we reported a couple weeks back, Vertu's new Constellation handset picks up where their previous efforts left off, packing GSM 850/900/1800/1900 plus EDGE data all 2003-like. We weren't able to glean much from the draft manual (which still has Signature pictures in it), but the Constellation looks to rock a variant of Nokia's S40 platform -- we leave that to the world's privileged to decide whether that's an upgrade from the Signature and Ascent's OS. Look for this little slice of leather-covered opulence to drop later this year; we're sure you rich folk will find ways to shed some cash while you wait.
Vertu Constellation To Be Launched
According to, of all sources, a video on Google Video, the next Vertu line will be dubbed the Constellation; we understand it will feature quad-band EDGE (finally!), Bluetooth, and significantly higher resolution and larger screen. This new model should launch in the September time period; stay tuned as we expect further details to start trickling in shortly.
