Loyal All-in-Wonder users from years past have probably been watching the progression of AMD’s revised version of the card with extreme interest. After such an absence, however, we understand the need to be cautious before snapping this up for your upcoming HTPC. HotHardware recently received one of these units for testing, and while it was only deemed “entry level” in the gaming department, the multimedia performance was smiled upon. To quote, “the [card] did an excellent job presenting digital video content in a quality manner without creating excessive power consumption in order to do so.” As expected, the unit wasn’t recommend for everyone (read: non-TV buffs), but those who’d utilize the built-in ClearQAM support probably can’t go wrong for $199. Hit the read link for a whole gaggle of test results.

By Engadget

h oh, Samsung’s just announced their first 256GB SSD. Not that you needed to know anything more than that to trigger salivation, but the MLC-flash SATA II drive has speeds of 200MBps read and 160MBps sequential write. Not like we’ll be able to afford it or anything, but they’ll be available come September, with a 1.8-inch version due in Q4.

By  Engadget

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We’re not sure what whacky voodoo snakeoil these MetaRam people are peddling, but the company’s got some high profile behind it (like Intel, for one), is being led by former AMD CTO Fred Weber, has appears to have some potentially revolutionary RAM quadrupling technology. Claiming to have leapfrogged current RAM technology by 2-4 years, MetaRam uses a specialized “MetaSDRAM” chipset that effectively bonds and addresses four cheap 1Gb DRAM chips as one, tricking any machine’s memory controller into using it as a 4x capacity DIMM. Since a 1Gb chip is apparently far less expensive than a 2Gb chip, MetaRam devices can multiply capacity at prices far lower than their competition; the company claims it’ll be shipping in machines in the first quarter of this year, and Hynix has already announced their own 2-rank 8GB DDR2 RDIMMs for the second half.

Source: Engadget

So far this battle’s been decided primarily by two factors: studio support and ubiquity of content. It’s clear Sony’s camp couldn’t even come close to trumping Toshiba in hardware price war that’s ensued over the past couple of years. But as it turns out, consumers that just spent thousands on a new HDTV weren’t too concerned with a couple hundred dollars between players, and despite whatever users price won HD DVD, the PS3 Blu-ray trojan kept the competition at bay. Meanwhile, most consumers were too smart and too cautious to buy early in a format war. Most have simply waited this thing out, and while Warner’s announcement to go exclusively Blu was obviously huge, it was only indicative of a trend — it didn’t set it.

If you look at the timeline, even before Warner announced its intentions to go Blu-ray exclusive HD DVD’s studio base was already shrunken from its heyday, leaving it with fewer titles both in number and sales. Warner was just another push in the direction things were already headed — the numbers already consistently showed Blu was ahead in media and install base, which has only become far more exaggerated in the last couple of months now that Blu amassed some 70% of studio-released titles.

But if you ask us, it’s the ubiquity of content that sealed the deal. It wasn’t until Blockbuster and later Netflix — two of the three most widely used disc rental businesses in the US — went Blu-ray exclusively that we knew HD DVD wasn’t long for this world.

So here’s the deal, Toshiba. As much as we hate putting any worthy technology on deathwatch, for the sake of the greater good we hope you guys just roll over and cut your losses so we can all move on. But if you really want off this deathwatch, you’re not only going to have to retain Paramount (which owns Dreamworks) and Universal, you also need to win at least a few back from Blu (Warner and Disney would be a great start), and get hardware in consumers’ hands, even if it means practically giving it away. It’s not going to be easy — hell, we think it’s actually pretty hopeless — but hey, that’s why you’re on deathwatch, innit?

P.S. -Special for this occasion, we’ve also brought our Blu-ray vs HD DVD: State of the Division charts up to date and added a few new tables

And like a castle of playing cards HD DVD’s dreams and hopes continue to shatter as the days go by and more people/companies/studios go Blu. The latest to jump into the winning boat on which Sony is captain is Wal-Mart, big-time retailer and now Blu-ray supporter as by June, it has announced that it will only be offering DVDs and Blu-Ray discs (and hardware).

Wal-Mart’s move comes just days after Best Buy has announced that it will be ‘favoring’ Blu-Ray and advertise it as the better high-definition format but this time it’s as definitive as it can get. No more HD DVD in Wal-Mart for you! And another round goes to Blu-Ray.

We’re not gonna read too much into this just yet, but when everyone’s favorite fruit-flavored consumer electronics company files to protect its trademark as it relates to a wide range of gaming devices, well, we feel you’d want to know. The USPTO sleuths over at Trademork just gave us the heads up on this recently-filed application from Cupertino, which requests protection of the word “APPLE” for products that classify as “toys, games and playthings, namely, hand-held units for playing electronic games; hand-held units for playing video games; stand alone video game machines; electronic games other than those adapted for use with television receivers only; LCD game machines; electronic educational game machines; toys, namely battery-powered computer games.” And come to think of it, we did see Apple file for a videogame-related patent not too long ago, so who knows: perhaps the iPod, iPhone, and Apple TV will soon have even more friends among the company’s ever-expanding non-PC ecosystem. Then again, we’ve heard this rumor in one form or another countless times before, and right now pining for a resurrected Gizmondo is already giving us enough headaches.

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