Lilia Guan

Aussie gamers are throwing away money if they buy a Xbox 360 console off eBay users in the US.

Gamers who were able to get a hold of Microsoft’s Xbox 360 games console in the US, (released on Tuesday) immediately resold them on eBay. The resold products fetched thousands of dollars for packages that sometimes also included games and other add-ins.

According to Xbox regional director David McLean, this is great for Microsoft as it showed how much in demand its console was.

“Having consoles sold on eBay says a lot about the demand for our product. However that’s all good and well, but what these Australian gamers have to realise is a couple of things. One of them is the games console is set for NTSC television standard, while Australian TV sets are set for PAL. While there are TVs built with both standards, users will also have problems with games and DVDs as both are Region 4 encoded,” said McLean.

In a SMH article, according to eBay 1800 Xbox 360s were sold there between midnight and noon Pacific time on Tuesday. Through the online auction site the average price for consoles, including those sold with games and other add-ons, was $A896. According to a spokesperson, some console packages were selling for as much as $US2500, with bidding and sales prices varying widely.

Gamers patient enough to wait until March 2006 the Xbox Core bundle will cost $499.95 in Australia, and A$649 for the upgraded Xbox 360 bundle.

At only 6.5 inches square and 2 inches tall, Apple’s new min Mac provides fun with music, photos and movies.

Unhappy iPod nano users are no longer just complaining over the easily scratched screen.

A nano user is so aggravated by the problems they’ve had with the product, that they are taking Apple to court. According to Pocket-lint.co.uk, lawyers have filed a class action suit against Apple on behalf of those who have purchased the ultra-small MP3 player.

The lawsuit alleges Apple violated state consumer protection statutes, as well as express and implied warranties. The complaint claims the excessive, rapid wear renders the device unusable. Filed in the US District Court in San Jose California, seeks to represent millions of purchases of the iPod nano since its introduction in September this year.

According to court documents, the lawsuit states; “the amount and durability of the resin applied as a protective coating during the nano manufacturer clearly defective in that it is not sufficient to adequately protect the face of the nano from extreme ultimately irreparable damage.”

The lawyers want nothing less than replacement of the device, compensatory and consequently punitive damages, attorneys’ fees, costs of the suit, pre and post judgment interest and whatever else this Court may deem necessary.

Apple has so far declined to comment.

HP has introduced a new blade PC featuring AMD64 technology.

The new HP bc1500 Blade PC is a PC-to-thin client infrastructure based on the Windows platform and represents Australia’s first formal offering in the HP Consolidated Client Infrastructure (CCI) solution portfolio.

The industry-standard HP CCI solution consists of an access device at the user site, such as an HP Compaq Thin Client, through which the user connects to a dedicated HP blade PC using a secure log-in. In the dynamic model, the user is dynamically allocated in a one-to-one connection to an available blade PC, which retrieves their unique profile from networked storage – all of which is located in a data centre.  This secure, centralised model helps reduce the complexities associated with managing distributed PCs and significantly helps enhance data security.

The HP bc1500 blade PC features an ultra-low power AMD Athlon 64 processor that delivers improved performance and the flexibility to easily transition from 32- to 64-bit computing. With the new blade PC, customers gain faster application launch times, greater maximum memory and improved graphics while also positioning themselves for future virtualisation technologies.

Pricing is based on client specifications.

Runco has released the CL-610 and 610LT projector featuring Runco’s Slectable Lamp Intensity Control.

The CL-610 and CL-610LT offers 1280 x 720 native resolution DLP light engines and features Runco’s SuperOnyx technology for high definition images.

Both the CL-610 and CL-610LT provides two selectable lamp intensity levels to allow maximum flexibility for screen size, ambient light conditions, brightness and contrast balance and preservation of usable lamp life. These models also have newly refined lamp-cooling systems, which increase efficiency and reduce noise levels.

The CL-610 and CL-610LT have been engineered to comply with the Imaging Science Foundation (ISF) standards. Runco’s advanced Vivix digital video processing is included in the CL-610 to enhance picture quality from standard video sources, as well as provide artifact-free scaling. Also included are discrete input source, aspect ratio, power on/off, HDMI input and an RS-232 interface for seamless integration with automation control systems.

Hewlett-Packard & the NSW Minister for Environment and Conservation Publicly Commit to the Active Promotion of Environmental Sustainability

Hewlett-Packard Australia and the NSW Environment and Conservation Minister Hon Bob Debus has announced HP’s Sustainability Compact agreement.

The Compact,commits NSW and HP for three years to advance sustainability practices across HP’s facilities, operations and supply chain, and to seek out and promote sustainability opportunities across the NSW Government and community.

Paul Brandling, Managing Director, HP Australia, said “Apart from being a first for the NSW Government, this compact is also the first partnership of its kind for HP globally. HP Australia is extremely proud to be undertaking such a landmark commitment.”

In signing the compact HP and the Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) are jointly committing to; strategic sustainability planning and reporting; staff and other stakeholder involvement in environmental planning, training and project delivery; product stewardship programs for IT product take-back relating to computer hardware, printer supplies (consumables) and packaging; environmentally preferable IT purchasing by consumers, business and government; enhanced environmental performance of HP and DEC sites and operations, including resource efficiency, waste avoidance and recovery and other aspects of facilities management

A steering committee will be established to manage the implementation of the Compact and to formally review progress on an annual basis. An independent evaluation of the Compact’s success will be completed in 2008, when the Compact will also be open for renewal following agreement by both parties.

Annukka Sairanen, Environmental Manager HP South Pacific said it is a natural progression of HP’s Global Citizenship commitment in which the environmental sustainability program is a core strategic initiative. “I’m particularly pleased about today’s announcement, as from our perspective the sustainability compact is an example of true partnership that is built on the principle of shared responsibility,” says Sairanen.

HP Australia has been active in promoting sustainability in the community, taking a leadership role in the development of sustainability initiatives that include end-of-life computer hardware and printing supplies recovery and recycling programs.  These efforts have contributed to HP’s AA rating by independent Corporate Social Responsibility ratings company Reputex.

“Signing this Compact with the NSW Government is another public commitment that we are making to continually improve our environmental performance across all areas of our business.  Combined with our signing of the National Packaging Covenant, this represents a bold statement of the willingness of industry and government to work constructively in the interests of the environment,” Ms Sairanen said.

NETGEAR has released its networked data storage device in Australia, to provide home and SOHO users with data centre storage technology.

The SC101 Storage Central offers a networked storage solution for protecting and sharing large volumes of valuable digital content such as music, game, photo, video files, and office documents wired or wirelessly over the network.  

Ian McLean, Vice President, NETGEAR Asia-Pacific said, “used in either the home or small business environment, Storage Central stores digital content in a location where multiple networked PCs can access them, providing users with more disk storage for greater network flexibility. It automatically creates duplicates of all files and ensures maximum protection against data loss via mirrored volumes, so people can rest assured that their most valuable files are safe.”

The NETGEAR solution incorporates Z-SANTM IP storage technology from Zetera Corporation and features Z-SAN IP-storage technology for fast, block-level access; Support for IDE drives from 80GB to 800GB; SmartSync Pro backup and recovery software for file backup and synchronisation; Integrated heatsink for silent performance; Compatibility with Windows 2000 (SP4), XP Home or Pro (SP1 or SP2). It is also has easy set-up – once plugged into a power outlet and connected to a wired or wireless router or switch via 10/100 Mbps Ethernet interface, it appears on the computer and behaves as a local disk drive.

NETGEAR’s Storage Central is for $229 and is supported by 24×7 technical support and comes with NETGEAR’s standard three-year warranty.

US research firm, Current Analysis has released figures that show PCs equipped with chips from AMD surpassed sales of PCs with Intel chips–again.

In September we reported Current Analysis’ research on AMD capturing 52% of U.S. retail desktop sales for that month. Current Analysis put part of AMD’s success down to the brand’s popularity in Media Center PCs which now account for 46% of all U.S. retail desktop sales.
AMD managed to snare 55% of Media Center PC sales, particularly in the HP Pavilion a1130n. This desktop runs a 64-bit AMD Athlon 64 processor and 1 Gigabyte of RAM. Pricing for the desktop including Media Center operating system was selling for US$679 (post-rebate) (That’s AUD$909 by the way) according to the researcher’s numbers.

New figure relapsed for October shows AMD going from strength to strength. According to Matt Sargent, director of research at Current Analysis, AMD did the unthinkable by surpassing Intel in October.

AMD’s share of unit sales in the U.S retail desktop space increased from 52.0 percent in September to 67.7 percent in October. AMD’s share of unit sales in the U.S. retail notebook space increased from 26.2 percent in September to 31.5 percent in October.

“Continuing to hold this lead in the holiday season would be a colossal win for the company,” said Sargent.

However, the stronger sales may not necessarily be having as much impact on AMD’s bottom line. Current Analysis reports that AMD’s 40.1 percent October revenue share of retail PC sales still trails Intel’s 57.6 percent share because the average selling price of Intel PCs is larger than that of AMD PCs.