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› archive for July 27th, 2010

Roberts Now Carries Kodak Pocket Camcorder

See this bit of sexiness right here? That’s the Kodak Zi8 (go ahead, click it and see it larger). To not dance delicately around the issue, it’s Kodak’s answer to the wildly popular Flip video camera. It’s got one-touch recording, full 1080p HD capture, a 2.5″ screen, flip-out USB plug, streamlined uploading to YouTube, you name it.

It’s also got 4x digital zoom, takes 5mp 16:9 still images, and records to SD/SDHC cards. And, in macro mode it has a minimum focusing distance of about 6″.

And, for right now, you can pick one up in a special Roberts kit with the wireless remote control and a free Tamrac ouch for, oh, $129.97. That’s 50 bucks less than Kodak’s MSRP for the camera by itself!

Seriously, this is a huge deal. If you need a quick, easy way to record videos for Facebook and YouTube, well, you’re looking at it. But, the kits are really, really limited, so, uh, act fast?



Apple’s New Mac Pro Can Probably Eat Your Current Computer

Starting next month the Mac Pro range will get an update (though I see Apple has once again left the exterior pretty well unchanged, I don’t think this line has seen a face-lift since it was still the G5 tower and I was still in college), and there’ll now be an upgrade options for the dual-processor model that’ll push it up to 12 CPU cores. Yes, 12. One dozen.

In any configuration, you’ll be looking at a Xeon series processor, and the base graphics card has been updated to the ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 1GB of GDDR5 memory.

They come with the usual thingers, you know, OSX, keyboard, Magic Mouse. Check out the table below for what the builds will look like, and what options there’ll be. Your base price points are going to be about $2,500 for the quad core, $3,500 for the 8 core, and we’re hearing around $5,000 to play in the 12 core club (but my, what a club to play in).

2010 Mac Pro Base Configurations
Quad-Core Mac Pro
  • One 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon W3530 processor with 8MB of fully-shared L3 cache;
  • 3GB of 1066 MHz DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory, expandable up to 16GB;
  • ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
  • two Mini DisplayPorts and one DVI (dual-link) port (adapters sold separately);
  • 1TB Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive running at 7200 rpm;
  • 18x SuperDrive® with double-layer support (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW);
  • four PCI Express 2.0 slots;
  • five USB 2.0 ports and four FireWire® 800 ports;
  • AirPort Extreme® 802.11n;
  • Bluetooth 2.1+EDR; and
  • Apple Keyboard with numerical keypad and Magic Mouse.
Upgrade Options
  • one 3.2 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon W3565 processor
  • one 3.33 GHz 6-core Intel Xeon W3680 processor
  • two ATI Radeon HD 5770 cards with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
  • one ATI Radeon HD 5870 card with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
  • up to 16GB of DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory
  • up to four 512GB solid state drives (SSD); or
  • up to four 1TB or 2TB Serial ATA hard drives running at 7200 rpm;
  • Mac Pro RAID card;
  • dual-channel or quad-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel card; and
  • up to two 18x SuperDrives with double-layer support.
8-Core Mac Pro
  • Two 2.4 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon E5620 processors with 12MB of fully-shared L3 cache per processor;
  • 6GB of 1066 MHz DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory, expandable up to 32GB;
  • ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
  • two Mini DisplayPorts and one DVI (dual-link) port (adapters sold separately);
  • 1TB Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive running at 7200 rpm;
  • 18x SuperDrive with double-layer support (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW);
  • four PCI Express 2.0 slots;
  • five USB 2.0 ports and four FireWire 800 ports;
  • AirPort Extreme 802.11n;
  • Bluetooth 2.1+EDR; and
  • Apple Keyboard with numerical keypad and Magic Mouse.
Upgrade Options
  • two 2.66 GHz 6-core Intel Xeon X5650 processors (12-cores)
  • two 2.93 GHz 6-core Intel Xeon X5670 processors (12-cores)
  • two ATI Radeon HD 5770 cards with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
  • one ATI Radeon HD 5870 card with 1GB of GDDR5 memory;
  • up to 32GB of DDR3 ECC SDRAM memory
  • up to four 512GB solid state drives (SSD); or
  • up to four 1TB or 2TB Serial ATA hard drives running at 7200 rpm;
  • Mac Pro RAID card;
  • dual-channel or quad-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel card; and
  • up to two 18x SuperDrives with double-layer support.


Apple’s New iMac Range Adds IPS, Moves to i3, i5, and i7 Processors

Alright, let’s move on to the iMac refreshes. Presumably these specs are different than last year’s, but let’s be honest, it’s not like if they aren’t quite to your taste there’ll be more options until next year anyway, and if you don’t buy a new iMac every year they’ll assuredly be better than the last one you bought (and if you do buy a new iMac every year, will you be my sugar daddy/mommy?). So, we’re just going to tell you where the basic specs stand now, and mention and call-out changes, sound good? Great! Onwards, then!

Important all-around upgrades here are that the displays are now IPS, a la the iPad and the new Cinema Display, and the graphics cards have been upgraded to ATI Radeon HD 5670 with 512MB memory on most models, and to the ATI Radeon HD 5750 with 1GB memory on the quad-core 27″ config. They’re all i-series now, mostly Core i3 and Core i5, though the 27″ can get an upgrade to Core i7. There’re some new SSD options available for those of you who favor stability over capacity, and it gets a bit complex so it’s worth just using Apple’s online Store to see what your options are now.

They all come with the Magic Mouse, if you want that awesome new Magic Trackpad (and you probably do), it’ll be extra (and worth it, I’m guessing). Whee!

2010 iMac Base Configs

21.5-inch: 3.06GHz
 3.06GHz Intel Core i3, 4GB RAM, 500GB hard drive, ATI Radeon HD 5670 with 512MB memory, 8x double-layer SuperDrive, 21.5″ LED-backlit IPS LCD with 1920 x 1080px native resolution

21.5-inch: 3.2GHz
 3.2GHz Intel Core i3, 4GB RAM, 1TB hard drive, ATI Radeon HD 5670 with 512MB memory, 8x double-layer SuperDrive, 21.5″ LED-backlit IPS LCD with 1920 x 1080px native resolution

27-inch: 3.2GHz
 3.2GHz Intel Core i3, 4GB RAM, 1TBB hard drive, ATI Radeon HD 5670 with 512MB memory, 8x double-layer SuperDrive, 27″ LED-backlit IPS LCD with 2560 x 1440px native resolution

27-inch: 2.8GHz Quad Core
 2.8GHz Intel Core i5 (2.93GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7 available as an upgrade), 4GB RAM, 1TBB hard drive, ATI Radeon HD 5750 with 1GB, 8x double-layer SuperDrive, 27″ LED-backlit IPS LCD with 2560 x 1440px native resolution


Apples New Cinema Display Is New, Adds IPS

The other low-hanging fruit of today’s announcements is the new 27″ Cinema Display, up from 24″. It’s 16×9 now, with a native resolution of 2560 x 1440px, and it adds that fancy IPS technology that Apple made such a fuss about with the iPad. It’s got a powered 3-port USB hub on the back, and features a cable that splits out into USB, MiniDisplay, and universal MagSafe, making it ridiculously geared towards being slaved to your MacBook Pro.

It coasts in under a grand or so. Did we mention 27″ of edge-to-edge glass-covered IPS LCD LED-backlit display framed in aluminum, though? Now that’s quality.



Apple Announces Magic Trackpad, Charge It With New Apple Battery Charger

Apple announced several things today, and while arguably the iMac refreshes and the new Mac Pro configs are the bigger news here, they involve things like comparing specs tables and reading through mind-numbing press releases. So, we’re going to start with the low hanging fruit and tackle the new Magic Trackpad.

I, for one, am excited by this Bluetooth-powered wireless trackpad. Why? Because I love the one on my Macbook Pro, and this is that, but bigger, and for desktops. It lets you use the same gestures the laptops support (two-finger scroll, four-finger exposé, etc), it’s all glass and aluminum, the whole thing clicks (death to buttons!), etc…

And, for those wondering how well a trackpad could perform to make it a better option than say, a Magic Mouse, well, I play Left 4 Dead 2 on my MBP with one. And survive. So, I figure if it’s well-dampened and big enough to safely play a first-person shooter with, it’ll probably do for any general purpose usage, and it’s not even too bad for casual Photoshopping, really.

And did we mention the gestures? C’mon, that’s worth the $69 bucks right there and you know it. Two-finger “right click” makes OSX considerably better than having to remember to hold down option. I promise.

Also announced is the new… battery charger? Yes, a battery charger. It’s white (natch), and uses the same slip of folding prong wall plug as the laptop bricks do (natch), charges two batteries at a time (NiMH), and is of course touted for being environmentally friendly and having one of the lowest vampire rates of any charger going. It’ll set you back 29 clam, but to be fair it does come with 6 of Apple’s NiMH batteries, promising a 10 year life span each.

Apple says they’re available the heck now, so the sooner you call your friendly neighborhood Roberts, the sooner we can have some heading to your door to power your wireless life.