Tech Blog

Earlier this month, we caught wind that Apple could be working on a touchscreen iPod shuffle . The rumors of the updated next-generation iPod shuffle called for a 1.7-inch touchscreen display, possibly addressing the issues related to lack of control on the current shuffle. Well, it seems that those rumors are being squashed. Well, perhaps "squashed" isn't the right term. "Adjusted" is probably a little more accurate.

That's because the newest rumors flying around on the Internet say that Apple is indeed working on an iPod with a smaller touchscreen (that is not the iPod touch), but it's not the shuffle; it's the new iPod nano .

And we could be seeing it for the first time in just a few short days

Acer continues to make sure that every segment of the notebook market is covered with their latest releases.

For the power user, the  series, with an 18.4 inch edge-to-edge glass display,  include 4GB of RAM and use Core i3 or Core i5 processors depending on price point, and for graphics include ATI’s 1 GB Mobility Radeon HD5650 with Direct X 11 support so it should be up to snuff when it comes to gaming as well.

Another interesting feature of these is the dual mode trackpad, which can easily switch between a capacitive multitouch trackpad, to a media control centre, with glowing LED light embedded under the surface.

By your first show you will probably realize a few things about your skill and passion, basically you’re either going to love or hate it because;

A. you had the time of your life;

B. was a fresh fish starting out, and you may not have been that good;

C. you choose to forget the whole thing because it didn’t pan out the way you thought it would; or

D. again you remember how bad the night was.

The keyboard isn’t the only thing new about the latest iteration of Rock Band, as it also rolls in the harmonies introduced with the Beatles version.

At Microsoft’s X’10, I had a chance to talk with Marc Nesbitt, Senior Producer of MTV Games about some of the features and philosophy in bringing Rock Band 3 to market.

Harmonix also found a way around the 4 player maximum on the console.  By enabling an “All Instruments Mode”, up to 7 people can play at once (4 instruments, up to 3 singers).  The “All Instruments Mode” will track everyone during the game, but the vocalist(s) won’t be scored after the set is done.

While I was watching TV this afternoon, a commercial for another tech retailer came on and the helpful sales associate suggested to the psychology student that a netbook would be a good choice for her. I almost scream out loud at the TV: No! Are you kidding me? The woman has to write a lot papers! Which then got me thinking, is there ever a case now for netbooks?

Samus returns in Nintendo and Team Ninja’s unconventional approach to a game that defined a genre. The Bounty Hunter that most of the galaxy has a right to fear is in top form, with her upgradable suit, her charge cannon, and her spine-snapping morph ball in this third person... no... first person... 2D... wait, 3D action adventure puzzler.

The first thing you’ll notice when you boot up the game is that you’re told to hold the Wii remote sideways, like an old NES controller. Many new Wii games are turning to this simpler control scheme, using the D-pad for control and the the 1, 2, A and b buttons for interaction. Other M has the fascinating element of shifting to first person perspective by pointing the remote at the screen, allowing you lock onto your enemies and fire at them from a fixed point. It’s a fascinating way to draw you, as the gamer, into the field of play, and it really shifts how you’ll look at ever 2.5D vista.

Naheed Nensh i is running for Mayor of Calgary this fall and while his campaign includes attending community events and getting face time with the electorate, he has also spent time Tweeting, blogging, Facebooking and iPhoning.  Nenshi is the only horse in this race (and perhaps the only one in Canada) with his own iPhone/iPod/iPad app.

It’s already been a transformative year for Old Spice, a brand that was lucky to even sell a bottle of anything to any guy under 35. But the viral campaign surrounding Old Spice Guy has been a huge hit that has apparently helped achieve something of a breakthrough with a younger demographic. With a buff, charming guy in a towel extolling the virtues of being with “the man your man could smell like”, it was a great idea to have him do customized voice mail greetings for the masses, too.

Over the past two weeks, I've been bombarded by a great deal of new camera and lens news releases in preparation for the upcoming Photokina 2010 hosted in Cologne, Germany. Photokina actually starts on September 21, but the photo giants have been preparing with releases of some of the most anticipated SLRs and lenses for 2010.

Canon announced the launch of the EOS 60D DSLR camera today, something which might greet all but camera geeks as "yeah so", until you look at what it has under the hood. We have the impressive 18MP resolution, +/-5 exposure, 9 point AF, full HD recording, up to 6400ISO and a very nice 5.3 frames per second as the "core features", but what I'm looking at in their press materials that caught my eye are the on-board editing capabilities. Just today I was doing some shooting and for the first time I used my iPad as the "proof screen" of sorts. This worked really well, and I certainly wouldn't change too much, but this Canon just got me thinking…what if I wanted to do some of the work on the shots before I imported them?

The Google empire is at it once again, this time adding a new feature to its Gmail service. Now users have the ability to make phone calls to either landlines or cell phones from their computer while logged into Gmail.

The new feature shows up on your left hand menu as soon as you log into Gmail. After installing a voice plug-in (which it automatically prompts you to do) you are ready to make phone calls from your PC or laptop. The setup process takes a bout two minutes. Once you have followed the prompts, you can click on the Call Phone option and a keypad pops up on your screen. Naturally you can dial a number, sit back and chat till your heart's content...for free.

The phrase "there's an app for that" has become as much a part of pop culture as "where's the beef" from decades ago. But you dont <i>always</i> need an app to get things done on an "i" device.  Yes, sometimes we forget when we're in the Steve Jobs spehere there is a website for that too.

Doug and I attended Microsoft’s X’10 event in Toronto, and the first order of business was to get a look at Windows Phone 7 in action.  Greg Milligan of Microsoft gave us a demonstration of the new mobile platform, and showed off some of the Xbox Live integration as well, including cross-platform effects (such as the previously mentioned Crackdown 2: Project Sunburst having an effect on the console game), as well as the possibility of real time multiplayer using WiFi, amongst other bits of info.

What is digital djing ? & What program should I be using if I am? Pros & Cons.

It was perfect timing: Rogers, hoping to steal a little of the thunder from Bell and Virgin with their big Galaxy S launch concert with Metric, announced their version of the Galaxy S, the Captivate (already available in the US on AT&T ), the same day, August 4th 2010.

While I was already pretty excited about the Galaxy S by the day of the concert, having already got to use one for a few days by then, the Rogers news was even better.  The Bell Galaxy S Vibrant is a great phone, but looks too much like an iPhone 3G for my tastes.The Captivate is a unique looking phone, and I was doubly excited

when I got to briefly play with a one at the event.

For decades the enigmatic Samus Aran has remained one of the most fascinating protagonists in gaming, a silent bounty hunter who protects the galaxy from marauding Space Pirates at the request of the Galactic Empire.  After a haunting past left her orphaned as a child, Samus enlisted in the Galactic Federation Police before mysteriously leaving to pursue the solitary life of a bounty hunter.  The typically emotionless heroine has since preferred to work alone in her quest to rid the galaxy of the ruthless Space Pirates and their bioweapons known as Metroids and Phazon.

Sound familar?  If so, Metroid: Other M won't feel very familiar.

I’m two days shy of my first month with my 32GB 3G/WiFi iPad , and it’s time that I take a moment and jot down my thoughts about it so far.

Canada's robust video game industry is making moves again to further strengthen its position as a world class leader for top development talent and innovation, according to the Ontario Technology Corridor.  Leading the charge is the province of Ontario which has committed $130 million to new gaming infrastructure in 2010.

At the recent Futureshop ‘Back To School’, I caught up with Razer , which makes a wide lineup of gaming accessories, from keyboards and mice to headsets.

In this video I take a look at some of the gear, including the Naga mouse, which sports a numeric keypad on the side, for the hardcore MMORPG player.

There's no denying teens know how to text. How often do you see a group of teens sitting in a mall, their eyes glued to their phone, and all of them texting away. So you would think the person who holds the world texting record would be a teenager. Wrong. The title is now held by 27 year-old Melissa Thompson, from Salford, Greater Manchester thanks to a relatively new way to input text on your phone called Swype.

Only 1 in 5 Canadians have a PVR while more Americans watched Entourage last week off their digital recorder than saw it live.  RSS hasn't hit the mainstream when it comes to accessing news feeds for web consumption, but Facebook took off.  Is the PVR heading the RSS or Facebook route?  Here are some theories:

According to Ars Technica— Apple looking at dual-mode touchscreen desktops and laptops —and The Next Web— Apple looks to patent iMac Touch, features both OS X and iOS? —Apple has filed patents for an iMac–like device that when titled switches from OS X to iOS. Or at least that's how it looks. Now, if you're thinking what I'm thinking, this could be Apple's next big coup. Yeah, OS X is easy to use, but the iPad and the larger screen iOS takes everything to a new level. Or are we seeing the end of OS X as we know it?

I know that Simplenote and Notational Velocity are awesome apps, and Catherine swears by them, I haven't taken advantage of them terribly much until now. I have a couple projects on the go where having synced notes on various places/platforms would be a very good thing indeed. Over the weekend I was writing about back-to-school apps and Simplenote was one of the key ones. As it happened, Simplenote said a "great new version" was coming so it wasn't in the App Store at the moment. Now, having been in a software company and work on my share of beta test programs, I take pronouncements of "release any time now" with a hunk of halite (i.e. Bigger than a grain of salt). Well the new Simplenote dropped today and … wow

The title of this post refers to something that is kinda alien to me. Yet, it shouldn’t be. For the last 20 years or so, my life has been online, in one form or another. Yes, I’m a digital nomad, living in a digital world, confused by those who insist on staying offline.

More often than not, many gamers don't realize you can play your favourite console systems on a PC monitor. More importantly, many gamers don't know that monitors are actually far more consistent than most TV's for official, professional gaming. Want to take your game to the next level? It starts with equipment.

Is a reference to a song on UK indie band The Boo Radley's critical and commercial failure C'Mon Kids too obscure for the title of a story about Crackdown 2's upcoming downloadable content, Toy Box? Probably, but too late, it's already happened.

Canon just announced the successor to the much loved PowerShot S90--the new and improved PowerShot S95. The camera has been updated in several ways but still keeps the title of being a "serious photographer's compact" with full manual control...

There may come a day soon when everything and everyone will have an iPhone app. The latest comes from Future Shop, one of the first retailers in Canada to offer an app that not only opens up the great Tech Blog we have here, but also the whole catalogue for consumers to browse through. You can even make a purchase and have it shipped to you or pick it up in a store near you.

We're just four days from Fan Expo Canada, the largest combined video game , horror , comic , science fiction and anime event in the country.  The annual convention keeps on getting bigger and better each year, especially for gamers who have the best Gaming Expo (GX for short) line-up ever seen.

West coast gamers looking to gather with fellow enthusiasts need look no further than GottaCon, a three-day broad spectrum gaming convention held annually on the first weekend of February in Victoria, British Columbia. GottaCon brings together many related hobbies including video games, collectible miniatures, collectible trading cards, role playing games, and board games, all under one roof.

From famine to feast! Last week's dearth of tech dirt has given way to this week's plethora of varied news. Read on, gentle reader, read on...