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World of Warcraft on twenty seven 67" monitors
Imagine getting ganked in Stranglethorn on that baby. Our friends at BigDownload (home of all things PC gaming) have discovered a ginormous computer screen, supposedly installed at a government office, used to play -- what else? -- the best PC game around, our own World of Warcraft. The monstrosity consists of twenty seven different 67" monitors all tied up into one PC. Unfortunately, as you can see (click the pic above for the whole thing), it's a little warped, considering that the display has a resolution of 12600 x 3150 -- not exactly a standard even for the very compatible Blizzard.But it is pretty awesome to see -- we only "wish" they'd taken some gameplay footage or other pictures so we could see this thing in action. And just what kind of rig is powering all of that? It'd be hilarious if the government splurged on the monitors but skimped on the RAM, leaving a gigantic display skipping along at a low frame rate.Update: Our crack WoW Insider Photoshop judges (one of whom has "government" experience) are calling this 'shopped. Not that you'll ever have a monitor like this, so it probably makes no difference to you, but take the pic with the usual grain of salt.
Target to offer in-home installation on home theater gear
Target -- the big box retailer best known 'round these parts for its preferential Blu-ray treatment (back in the day, of course) and its infatuation with releasing new Xbox 360s early -- is finally diving head first into the home installation realm. Not content to just let competitors rake in all that extra cash for simply following a customer home and plugging in a few wires, the outfit has teamed up with Zip Express Installation to offer home install packages anytime a consumer makes a "large CE purchase." Furthermore, Target.com shoppers will soon be graced with a notification that their shiny new HDTV can be delivered and installed by professionals should they so choose, with services starting at $129 and ranging from TV setup, wall mounting, home theater arrangement, computer networking and furniture assembly. We have all ideas most of you will just brush this off, but don't be alarmed to hear that your grandmother just threw down some extra cash for a nice young man in a bulls eye-emblazoned uniform to setup her new gear.[Image courtesy of JSOnline]
Install your Xbox 360 games to the hard drive, access XBLM on the web
Major Nelson just updated and offered a bit more detail about the upcoming Dashboard update for Xbox 360. Some of the cooler things: Play from hard drive. You'll be able to copy game discs to your Xbox 360 hard drive. Installing the games will prevent wear 'n tear on the disc drive, and will shorten load times. You will still need the disc in the disc tray to prove you own the game. Hopefully, installing things on the Xbox 360 will come with sage advice, a la Metal Gear Solid 4. Access Xbox LIVE Marketplace on the Web. If you're not near your Xbox 360, you can still use this "Internet" thing to browse and purchase things from the Marketplace. Once you purchase something from Xbox.com, it will download automatically to your console while you're away. Xbox LIVE Primetime. This is a "whole new category of games" that not only supports Achievements and leaderboards, but will also offer real prizes. Games are played throughout the Xbox LIVE network and each game is "broadcast simultaneously" so that everyone is partaking in the same activity. These events can feature live hosts, "calling the shots as they happen." [Thanks, Glitch W.!]
PC Gaming Alliance seeking to set guidelines
As much as we like gaming on our PCs, even the most stalwart fanboy has to concede that sometimes the whole process is just a huge pain in the butt. While installing Age of Conan for the first time the other day, this blogger spent no less than five hours downloading the client, patching Windows Vista, updating video drivers, then tracking down a hack to undo the damage down when those video drivers didn't work properly. While there are supposedly a "maze of challenges" ahead with porting the game to consoles, those problems are largely Funcom's and not the consumers'.This is something that the recently-formed PC Gaming Alliance (PCGA) would like to solve. Rick Carini, CTO of gaming technology at Dell and chairman of the PCGA, posits that this needless complexity is the barrier impeding the continued growth of PC gaming. Even hardcore gamers find themselves stymied sometimes by this. The PCGA is looking to push for standards on the side of game makers and computer manufacturers to ensure that a computer sold as a "gaming PC" should be able to run the majority of games. We're not sure what, if anything, will come of the PCGA's work, but we're hopeful they can develop some sort of standard to bring more warm bodies into the fold.
Patch 2.4.2 is live
Yep, as expected after the test realm ended, patch 2.4.2 has hit the live servers, and is now available for download and installation. Daniel did a terrific roundup of what you can see in the new patch this morning. The patch notes aren't available online yet, but the only change I can see between the PTR notes and what's live is that the Druid Natural Perfection change didn't go through -- otherwise, everything else is in there as expected, including the Arena changes and the Growl changes (whatever they are).Enjoy the new patch (and if you're an Outlands Hunter like me, enjoy your new pet!). This might be the last one we get for a while.Update: BigDownload's got the patch, in case you haven't seen it yet.
Georgia's AMC Avenue Forsyth theater opens with Sony 4K projectors
It's been quite some time since we heard of a theater right here in the US of A opening up with 4K projectors tucked inside, but for residents of Cumming, Georgia, such a scenario is about to unfold in your town. The AMC Avenue Forsyth 12 will be the first all-digital theater in the area when it opens on May 16th, packing Sony 4K digital cinema projectors and two auditoriums with screens stretching over three stories high and 50-feet wide. In sum, the venue will boast a dozen auditoriums with over 2,220 seats with rocking-back chairs, and folks who make their way down on opening weekend will even get a free small popcorn with each (presumably overpriced) ticket. There, we made some plans for you -- hope you're available!
DirecTV purchases installer & service provider 180 Connect
In exchange for purchasing 100 percent of 180 Connect's stock at $1.80 per share, DirecTV will take control over one of its largest installers, while in a separate deal, UniTek USA is taking over all of 180 Connects old cable TV servicing units and certain DirecTV installation markets in exchange for Unitek's installation business in several areas. All this swapping and dealing should be complete in the third quarter, when a large number of customers in California, Colorado, Oregon, Washington, Utah, Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Arkansas, Virginia, Hawaii and western Pennsylvania can expect their first DirecTV visit, to come from an actual employee of the company. Check out the PR for all the business details and locations involved and let us know if you think a shakeup from your cable or satellite provider's customer service would be welcomed.
A high-definition look at Washington Nationals Park
For those that witnessed the Nationals topple the Braves on Opening Day (at least on US soil), you got a glimpse of just how nice the all new Nationals Park really is. Now, Sanjay Talwani has taken an in-depth look at the stadium, and he found that copious quantities of HD equipment abounds. For starters, you'll find four 52-inch Sony LCD monitors along with a number of Luma LCDs within the control room, not to mention the 1,552 x 720 Mitsubishi scoreboard screen and the Sony MVS-8000G switcher. As for cameras, there are a pair of HDC-1400s alongside two wireless XDCAMs, but those pale in comparison to the four remote-controlled BRC-H700s around the top of the venue. 'Tis a shame the club's regional carrier, MASN, isn't diving in head first to carry all of its unclaimed matchups in HD, huh? For more details on the technology-crammed park, check out the read link below.
Eddo Stern's WoW and MMO sculpture installations
The National Post has an interview with an artist named Eddo Stern, who has created what he calls "sculptures" of figures from WoW. You can clearly see what looks like a dragon (Onyxia), Chuck Norris, and a Night Elf above, and there is apparently another sculpture in the series featuring Chuck Norris mashed up with something from Chronicles of Narnia. Finally, Stern apparently has created a video installation of a thread from the EverQuest forums called "Best... Flame War.... Ever." Sounds like pretty standard forum posturing to us -- a kid calls another guy a noob, said guy threatens to show up in RL for a fight and then talks about his buddies in Iraq.Stern is supposedly playing with the virtual machismo of playing in MMOs, and how different the players supposedly are from the heroic character they're playing. Sounds like interesting stuff. While I don't really agree with his premise all that much (there are all kinds of people playing these games, and the vast majority of them don't really emulate Chuck Norris or try to pick fights on message boards), I like the techniques a lot -- those projections look pretty good. And his next project sounds even cooler: he's going to try and project a huge dimensional portal on the side of the highway in San Jose. Should be fun to see.[Via Worldofwar.net]
Downgrading your account (or not)
If you're one of those folks who pines for the days of level 60 and Molten Core, but you've already installed Burning Crusade and made your way to 70, Slorkuz (who?) officially tells us you're out of luck. Once an account has been upgraded to Burning Crusade, there is no going back -- even if you uninstall everything and just put vanilla WoW on your PC, trying to sign in with your BC upgraded account will open up Outland and the latest content yet again.If you really want to see the world the way it was before the Dark Portal reopened, you'll have to create a new account, and not upgrade it to Burning Crusade. But even then, you won't really go back in time -- you'll still see gems on the AH, and Blood Elves and Draenei wandering around. It's one more reason to keep asking Blizzard for classic servers, apparently -- as of right now, there's no way to really go back to the way things were.But why would you want to anyway, right? Gold abounds, epics are easy to get, and most of the PvP problems are fixed. Nostalgia may be telling you that you want to stumble around with 39 other people in Motlen Core hoping for a Tier 1 drop every two weeks, but for most people, things are much better nowadays.
Home theater installation includes rotating seats
Granted, the $6 million Kipnis Studio Standard is still apt to blow minds (and fuses) more quickly than Donny Hackett's "ultimate multipurpose room," but for folks looking for a way to squeeze a bona fide home theater into their existing den / living area / etc., this one provides some excellent food for thought. Aside from the 12-foot-wide custom-built screen, 7.1-channel audio system and InFocus SP777 three-chip DLP projector, this room also boasts a unique seating arrangement -- one that rotates 180-degrees at the touch of a button. The installation enables the front row to swirl around and face the second row, essentially creating a conversation pit for times when board games are preferred over catching a BD flick (and that's when, exactly?). There's no mention of how much dough was coughed up in order to make this happen, but we're confidently guessing it wasn't even close to cheap. Hit up the read link for a slideshow of pictures and a construction video to boot.
Monster Hunter 2nd G has installation option
The PSP is becoming more and more like the PS3 every day. Capcom's upcoming Monster Hunter 2nd G will include an option to install data onto the Memory Stick, effectively reducing load times. Details on the "Media Install" feature are slim for now, but let's hope it's not required like Capcom's PS3 version of Devil May Cry 4.While those that don't have space to spare on their Memory Sticks will most likely opt out of this installation, we think it's a great feature that more PSP games should consider. For example, the Memory Stick version of Wipeout Pure loads significantly faster than the UMD version. We hate load times, and we're willing to do anything to get rid of them ... for good.[Via PSPHyper]
Capcom on DMC4 installation: What's the big deal?
The game hasn't even been released yet and already there's a lot of online controversy over Devil May Cry 4's installation procedure. The game takes around 20 minutes to install about 5 gigabytes of data to your hard drive, during which there's a five-minute looping recap slideshow. Capcom's Chris Kramer responded to CVG with a statement regarding the issue: "If you don't want to watch the 'Previously, on Devil May Cry...' portion of the install process, go make a sandwich and grab a soda, then come on back." Kramer continues, "Wah! Have you ever played a PC game? At least we aren't making you shuffle multiple discs into a ROM drive, or continuously click 'Yes!' on a series of endless Windows dialog boxes." Wah, indeed! We agree completely with Kramer on this -- a twenty minute long installation sequence is not a big deal. It cuts down on load times, making it load faster than the 360 version despite the slower drive speed. Without the install, players would be complaining about lengthy load times. Which is better? That's a hypothetical question because we already know and, clearly, so does Capcom.
AT&T ends 2007 with 231000 U-verse subscribers
Make no mistake, the number 231,000 in and of itself isn't exactly valuable, but considering that AT&T is aiming to secure one million subscribers to its fiber-based U-verse service before this year comes to a close, it certainly comes into perspective. Just months ago, AT&T was reporting that it had 126,000 U-verse customers and was handling around 10,000 installs per week. Currently, the carrier is suggesting that it's over one-fourth of the way to its goal, but considering that "just" 12,000 installs per week are being done now, it's not exactly on track to hit that million. 'Course, if it keeps on rolling U-verse out to new markets at a furious pace, we suppose anything could happen, but it's not like the provider hasn't overshot estimates in the past.
The DS Life: Our Digital Yard
The DS Life is a weekly feature in which we scour the known world for narrative images of Nintendo's handheld and handheld gamers. If you have a photo and a story to match it with, send both to thedslife at dsfanboy dot com.The electronic blips and chirps, mingling with the crickets and other evening harmonies, are what draw you in at first. Against a building wall, a projected game of Super Mario World plays, but it's not any level you've ever seen. Nearby, a group of people sit around a Powerbook, one of them shaking a Wii remote while the others watch. Above them all, eleven Game Boys and a tangle of wires hang from a tree. What could be going on?
Mac Mini in a Corvette
After our little scare with the Mac Mini last week, the little boxen that could is quickly becoming my favorite computer (still can't wait to get one with Leopard on it). So seeing cool applications of it like this one thrills me to no end: Andrew sent us his writeup of putting a Mac Mini into a Corvette (complete with touchscreen monitor) as a music player.The whole process looks pretty complicated to me-- the most I've done with my car stereo is install an old CD player, and by install I mean "watched my friend do it." But Andrew's writeup is really thorough, and he goes through everything from choosing components to creating a layout, to potential problems during installation, and what he plans to do next. Apparently the Mini is almost tailormade for car systems like this-- not only is there a special cable built to power it in the car, but there is even a special version of Front Row designed to be controlled from a touchscreen. Not everything worked well, however-- the Mini had a grounding problem, apparently, and Andrew had an issue with the Mini's volume setting reverting after a restart, but he was able to punch out an Applescript to fix it.The end product looks great-- Andrew says he's still working on the mounts, but considering he's got a working touchscreen controlling a Mac Mini in his Corvette, that's good enough for me. Very nice.
Calling the shot: mounting / not mounting flat-panel above fireplace
While the question of hanging your new flat-panel above the fireplace or mantel has been around for years, it's about time the issue was actually tackled and looked at from a safety and feasibility standpoint. Admittedly, there are literally dozens of factors that can go into making said decision, and while no answer will be right for everyone, hopefully the following will lend a hand in easing your frantic mind. Granted, the more affluent homes that are often showcased in marketing promos make hanging a TV look like child's play, and while you may be able to cough up enough dough to let an experience installer come in and handle the dirty work for you, there's quite a few things (and alternatives) to consider. Of course, safety concerns surrounding recalled TV mounts, heat generated from a raging fireplace, and the actual wall material should be inspected first and foremost. Additionally, you should certainly consider just how difficult running every last cable (present and future) from your components below through the wall will actually (not) be, and for those working sans an AV cabinet, you might want to ponder just where you'll be placing those game consoles, receivers, and media players without ruining the overall allure. Still, there's no denying the attractiveness of a flat-panel HDTV hung neatly on a living room wall, but be sure and hit the links below and do a little planning of your own before pulling the trigger.Read - HDInstallers - Safety ConcernsRead - Audio / Video Interiors mounting walkthrough
Wall mounted Picture Frame Tetris features 240 LED buttons
Wall mounted video games are totally de rigeur these days, so it's a shame that the only way to get your hands on anything other than Pong, is to get your hands dirty and put it together yourself. In the case of the Picture Frame Tetris, it took nine guys several hours of work to put together 240 LED buttons into one huge array. So, what're all the buttons for? Well, if you press a button to the left or right of the currently falling brick, then it'll move in that direction. Similarly, you touch the top row of buttons to rotate the brick, and the bottom row to drop it instantaneously. (To us and our Gameboy damaged hands, it sounds like a lot of work to play as well as build.) If you want to get your hands digits on the Picture Frame Tetris, you'll have to check it out at the Maker Faire at San Mateo Fairgrounds in the San Francisco Bay Area. Alternatively, you could plunk down $1500 for a 16x16 board of interactive LED buttons, which would give you more than enough LEDs for a Tetris, but without the extras needed to play Tetris on your wall. Unfortunately, you'll probably have to enjoy the construction as much as the game in order to motivate yourself to make one.
Hackers get AppleTV running WoW
Reader Randomdruid sent along this tip that might interest you if you've picked up Apple's new AppleTV set-top box (I'm too busy working on Sha'tar rep to watch TV, but our good friends at Engadget and TUAW have been doing almost nothing but since the thing came out). Apparently, hackers have already gotten WoW up and running on it.It's not too big a deal, since I'm pretty sure the box is running a specialized version of OS X anyway, and of course WoW runs on that. The guys at Tutorial Ninja have worked up detailed instructions on how to get any number of applications working on the AppleTV (including Firefox and Centerstage, the open source Mac media center). Scroll down to the middle of the page there, and on the list of "confirmed working apps," you'll find World of Warcraft.But there is one catch: it looks like pretty much everything has to be installed onto the hard drive by plugging it into another computer. So not only will you have to crack open your pretty new AppleTV, but odds are that you'll have to somehow run WoW from a text interface. And I don't know how you'd actually play it even if it is running-- one of TN's goals is to "get USB working so people can play WoW comfortably." So it's not as easy as throwing the WoW disc in and jumping into Azeroth.Of course, if you're someone with the time and talent to do all this, you're probably not playing WoW anyway. But if you've got an AppleTV and are already cracking it open to put all the other cool stuff on it, it's good to know that you have the option to get WoW running on your TV screen. Now all we have to figure out is how to get WoW on the iPhone...
Experience a world of weather under one umbrella
"Weather Explorer Umbrella" is an installation project that clues you in on current weather conditions worldwide using a souped-up 'brella and an outlined world map. As you scamper about the "world," your weather "experience" changes according to each unique location that the umbrella captures with a tracking camera. An XML feed provides real-time weather data, altering the actions of a fan, speakers, and LEDs installed on the underside of the umbrella. Wind data adjusts the speed of the fan while other weather patterns are expressed with white (lightning / thunderstorm), blue (rain), and yellow (sun) lights. Definitely not as practical as the news or the internet, but with a little imagination (okay a lot of imagination) it might be fun to try. If you're looking for a dorky umbrella that's actually useful in real life, this one might be more your style.[Via Hackaday]
