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Tech Week in Photos: Apple TV Sky 3D reviewed, Duke Nukem Forever, Boxee Box, Slingbox Pro-HD and more
Top tech stories this week: HTC Desire HD, Duke Nukem Forever, Nokia N8 iPhone 5 and more
The Social Network: Mark Zuckerberg rates it!
Twitter hack: your direct messages exposed
The QWERTY is dead! Long live the touchscreen!
Firefox 4 beta: Android and Maemo versions unveiled
Nokia N8 LIVE: Social networking live Q&A. Join in now!
Dear Nintendo, we want cheap 3DS games!
Lunchtime Lowdown: Cameras galore, Nokia N8 live Q&A and the HTC Desire HD stat clash
Stat clash: HTC Desire HD vs BlackBerry Torch 9800

Tech Week in Photos: Apple TV Sky 3D reviewed, Duke Nukem Forever, Boxee Box, Slingbox Pro-HD and more

Posted: 09 Oct 2010 05:00 AM PDT

During one of our busier weeks we’ve got hands on with plenty of new gadgets. And here’s the photo evidence to prove it, in this week’s Tech Week in Photos. New Apple TV, Sky 3D and the long-awaited Duke Nukem Forever are among the photo featured this week.

Reviewed this week was Sky 3D, while elsewhere we got hands-on with the Boxee Box, Apple TV, Slingbox Pro-HD and a couple of apps worth checking out, including our own Electricpig app for Nokia phones. Hit the gallery above to see just some of the photos to appear on Electricpig this week, then click the links below to see more.

See more photos:

Competition: Win our Sackboy Stash!

Sky 3D reviewed

Skype Android app reviewed: in photos

Download the Electricpig Nokia app now!

First look at the Boxee Box

New Apple TV unboxed photos

First ever UK play of Duke Nukem Forever

Slingbox Pro-HD reviewed

Top tech stories this week: HTC Desire HD, Duke Nukem Forever, Nokia N8 iPhone 5 and more

Posted: 09 Oct 2010 01:00 AM PDT

Happy weekend tech fans. The week has whizzed by. Missed something? Fear not, you’re in the right place. Join us as we round up some of the biggest tech stories to emerge this week.

Plenty went on in the past week. We’ve got word of the HTC Desire HD and when you can pre-order it (now), the first UK play, and one of the first plays in the world of Duke Nukem Forever, more Facebook privacy woe and much much more.

HTC Desire HD: Vodafone pre-orders are go
Want the HTC Desire HD? Want it in Vodafone? You now pre-order and get it for free on contracts from £35 per month.

Duke Nukem Forever is real
It’s true. After 12 years in development we finally got to play it. Read our impressions here.

Black HTC Legend out this month
HTC itself confirmed that the noir Legend will be coming to Europe this month alongside the white HTC Desire we spotted earlier.

iPhone 5 will look different shocker
As capable handsets as the iPhone series are, they all look samey. But word is the next iteration of the iPhone could have a different form factor altogether. What should it look like?

Facebook iPhone app breaks the rules
Users using the Facebook iPhone app have seen their phone contacts slip onto Facebook without the app notifying them. Read more about it here.

Samsung Galaxy Tab price leaked
Reports suggesting it will cost £600 left a very sour taste in your mouths this week. Will you be buying one?

Steve Ballmer: Windows tablet by Christmas
“As a company we need to cover all form factors…we've done work on a windows tablet, and you'll see slates with Windows on from this Christmas,” the Microsoft boss said in a speech this week.

iPhone 4 glass broken by third party cases
Adding to the iPhone 4 signal woes is word that third party cases are scratching the iPhone 4. Have you had such problems? Let us know.

N8 launch dates revealed
It’s been a long time coming, but the Nokia N8 now has a firm release date of 15th October from online stores, and 22nd October for a number of high street stores.

Nintendo 3DS games prices will not be hiked
Will going 3D come at much extra cost to Nintendo 3DS games? Not too much, Satoru Iwata, President of Nintendo said. Game prices will be “not too far off from current DS software". Hmm.

The Social Network: Mark Zuckerberg rates it!

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 08:39 AM PDT

The Social Network opens in the UK next week and we’ve got news of one review that we weren’t expecting…from Facebook creator and head honcho Mark Zuckerberg. After months of dismissing The Social Network and trying to distract attention from it, Mark Zuckerberg took the surprising decision to hire out a movie theatre on Wednesday and take the entire Facebook staff to watch the film. The trip has been widely reported but one element of the story was missing…

What hadn’t been revealed until now was just what he thought of it. Luckily, Jesse Eisenberg (who plays Zuckerberg in the film) has a first cousin who works at Facebook. Aaron Sorkin revealed Mark Zuckerberg’s review this afternoon in an interview on BBC 5Live. He said: “Jessee Eisenberg’s cousin texted him and said: ‘Mark loved all the parts he agreed with…’” Now there’s a surprise!

Out October 15 | £varies | The Social Network

Twitter hack: your direct messages exposed

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 08:01 AM PDT

First odd Facebook iPhone app issues, now the prospect of a perturbing Twitter direct message hack. It's not been a great week for knowing exactly where your data's going. Gary-Adam Shannon over at Search Engine Watch details a Twitter direct message exploit that could make it relatively simple for someone to swipe your private messages. Here's why you should be careful…

Shannon explains how the Twitter API could be exploited to get hold of your direct messages. Using a Wordpress plugin that allows users to login to a blog with their Twitter credentials, he illustrates how someone with malicious intent could tweak the code to harvest all your recent tweets including direct messages.

It's a little bit code heavy so if you want the full method behind the theory, hit the link at the bottom of the page to get it. The bottom line is that it's not incredibly difficult for a Wordpress site owner or other sites to create a trap that would harvest your private messages.

What's the solution? Well, Twitter really needs to have a think about what its API lets third parties do and work to make Twitter users more aware of the risks of just giving over their details but getting your direct messages swiped is quite easy to avoid. Just don't sign up to applications you don't completely trust to log you in or give read/write permissions to apps.

Let us know: have you had bad experiences with online privacy? Share your stories in the comments.

Out now | £free | Twitter (via Search Engine Watch)

The QWERTY is dead! Long live the touchscreen!

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 07:26 AM PDT

Smartphone manufacturers have pulled back on the push they give to devices with flip out keyboards, leaving the QWERTYs at the back of the class. The only company that sticks QWERTYs upfront is BlackBerry, which is currently on the back foot, with marketshare slipping and glowing reviews nowhere to be found. The QWERTY is dead. Long live the touchscreen…

Sure, a hardware keyboard is a smidge more practical than a touchscreen keyboard, but it means that your device is heavier and clunkier, which equals uglier in the smartphone stakes, and who wants an ugly smartphone in 2010? We want beautiful smartphones, with pretty graphics on the keyboard, not clunky pre-2007 flip-out keyboards that get crumbs stuck in the hinges when you leave it in the bottom of your bag.

Flip out phones are being ignored even by their own manufacturers. Hands up who gives more of a monkeys about the HTC Desire Z than the HTC Deire HD? HTC pumped up the HTC Desire HD far beyond its ugly sister, the HTC Desire Z, and the Desire Z is one of the best looking QWERTYs around. Nevertheless, it’s almost been forgotten already, cast to the bottom of the keyword tree with all the other flip out phones from the last 12 months.

Do you agree? Is the QWERTY dead, destined to have crumbs in the hinge and only be owned by doctors and business types? Click and tell!

Firefox 4 beta: Android and Maemo versions unveiled

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 06:03 AM PDT

The Firefox 4 Android and Firefox 4 Maemo apps have popped out of their alpha chrysalises and taken flight as beautiful beta butterflies. The app is up for grabs from Mozilla right now, packing Firefox Sync to keep your desktop and phone favourites in perfect harmony, support for add-ons, the Awesome Bar and pinch-to-zoom for multitouch phones. The Mozilla blog has all the features detailed in full and you can grab the app at the link below.

Out now | £free | Mozilla

Nokia N8 LIVE: Social networking live Q&A. Join in now!

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 05:37 AM PDT

Our final Nokia N8 live Q&A session is happening right now, peeps! This time around, we’re talking about the Nokia N8’s seriously amiable social networking skills. Want to know how to banter on Facebook or tweet on the go? All you have to do is drop us a line in the live chat, or through one of the many other ways listed here, and we’ll endeavour to answer it ASAP. Come on in!

Pre-order the Nokia N8 at Vodafone

Perhaps you want to know if you can still check in to Foursquare with the Nokia N8, or whether Facebook messages drop straight into your inbox. Whatever you want to know, you can ask us about the Nokia N8 in several ways: drop us a line in the comments, send your question to Electricpig on Facebook, Twitter or email (editor@electricpig.co.uk), or just join in the live chat going on at the same time as the live feed below – you’ll see it pop up just before 2pm.

Whatever you want to know, we’ll do our very best to answer your questions, and if you can’t make it, don’t worry: we’ll have the whole thing for you to watch back on YouTube shortly after too. Enjoy!

Watch live video from Electricpig on Justin.tv

Dear Nintendo, we want cheap 3DS games!

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 05:32 AM PDT

The pricing on the Nintendo 3DS for Europe hasn’t been announced yet, but the Japanese price converts to around £189. Nintendo has said that the relatively high Japanese price is because we all got too excited about it when they first showed it us, but that we should not expect to be paying more for Nintendo 3DS games than standard DS prices. There’s no solid commitments either way, so we asked you which would prefer: a cheap 3DS console, or cheap 3DS games? Nintendo, if you’re listening, we want cheap 3DS games! 75 per cent of you said you would rather have cheap 3DS games, rather than a cheap 3DS console.

Do you disagree? Tell us why!

Lunchtime Lowdown: Cameras galore, Nokia N8 live Q&A and the HTC Desire HD stat clash

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 04:26 AM PDT

We’re just hours away from the weekend well and truly kicking in. Before it comes barging through the door, grab all the latest tech headlines from this morning, rounded up for you here in the lunchtime lowdown.

It’s been a busy morning in photography first up: we set loose our first impressions of the super zoom Canon PowerShot SX30 IS, and reviewed the Ricoh CX4 compact camera.

In mobile meanwhile, we took a look at how the HTC Desire HD stacks up against the BlackBerry Torch 9800, and word on the grapevine is a new iPhone 4 problem could be growing quietly: cases causing the glass on the back to break.

Finally, don’t forget that our Nokia N8 live Q&A goes down today at 2pm. It’s the last one, so be sure to tune in and find out what you need to know before you preorder.

Still want more news? Bounce on over to the homepage and help yourself to it all as it breaks!

Stat clash: HTC Desire HD vs BlackBerry Torch 9800

Posted: 08 Oct 2010 04:01 AM PDT

Today it’s the turn of the BlackBerry Torch 9800 to come face to face with the HTC Desire HD. The BlackBerry Torch was hailed by BlackBerry as a device which would “ignite” customers (hopefully not literally), whereas HTC said the HTC Desire HD would bring “feelings of delight” to its users. Which smartphone, the HTC Desire HD or the BlackBerry Torch 9800, makes good on its metaphors?

Screen
When we reviewed the Blackberry Torch 9800, we said the screen was "grainier than a harvest festival", which, when stacked up next to crisp expanse of the 4.3" HTC Desire HD screen, frankly, doesn’t stand a chance. The HTC Desire HD floors the BlackBerry Torch on this one. The Torch has a 3.2" 360×480 touchscreen, whereas the HTC Desire HD packs a whopping great 4.3" 480×800 WVGA touchscreen in comparison. The HTC Desire HD was pleasingly sharp and bright when we got our hands on it. The BlackBerry Torch 9800, not so much.
Winner: HTC Desire HD

Operating system
The BlackBerry Torch 9800 is boasting the new RIM operating system, BlackBerry 6. The HTC Desire packs Android Froyo 2.2. In review, we loved the BlackBerry 6 universal search, which pulls up options as you type (Google Instant style), although it doesn't search email body text. It does mean it’s quick to pull up a contact and make a call, maybe even quicker than it is on Android. The new app layout was well needed in BlackBerry 6 too, and this gives it a boost. Froyo, on the other hand, has a better browser, despite the improved UI and speed of the BlackBerry browser, plus the ultimate add-on: Chrome to Phone. Until we really put the HTC Desire HD through its paces in our rigorous testing lab though, it would be unfair to give a definite verdict.
Winner: Place your bets…

Rooting for the HTC Desire HD? Click through to join the HTC Desire HD Facebook Fan Page!

Body
While the two devices weigh in at about the same, the tidy aluminium body that wraps around the HTC Desire HD screen puts the BlackBerry Torch 9800 to shame. While the slide out keyboard is solidly built, and will be a boon for those who do a lot of typing on the go, the screen part of the body is chunky and clunky. The Torch also packs an unpleasantly ribbed back, like some sort of hunchback, where, in this case, the HTC Desire HD is putting in a sterling performance as Esmerelda. For looks and feel, the HTC Desire HD wins hands down.
Winner: HTC Desire HD

Storage
The HTC Desire HD has 1.5GB of internal storage, which can be expanded by up to 32GB with a microSD card. The BlackBerry Torch 9800 has 4GB of internal memory, plus a microSD/SDHD slot which can be loaded with a card of up to 32GB. BlackBerry though, gives you a 4GB card, meaning that out of the box, the BlackBerry trumps this one.
Winner: BlackBerry Torch 9800

Read our full review of the BlackBerry Torch 9800 here!

Apps
Problem is what to do with all that space BlackBerry gives you. The BlackBerry App World is still the poorest app store of the big three by a mile. In the last 18 months Android has marched onwards and upwards, trampling the BlackBerry App World in its path, and the state of the App World is still one of the most compelling reasons not to get a BlackBerry. While Android becomes the second platform for apps, BlackBerry gets left even further behind. In stats: Android has around 80,000 apps in the Android Marketplace, BlackBerry has around 10,000 in App World.
Winner: HTC Desire HD

Conclusion
While the HTC Desire HD is far better looking, with a better screen, body, and operating system than the BlackBerry Torch, it's worth noting that BlackBerry has always been good on a few key features, namely, email push, and notifications. Still, we still can’t see much reason to opt for the BlackBerry Torch 9800 over the HTC Desire HD, unless a keyboard is an absolute must.

What do you think? Is the HTC Desire HD a decidedly better device than the Blackberry Torch 9800? Drop us a line in the comments and tell us what you think!

Made for Life

Sunday, 10 October 2010

Electricpig.co.uk - tech news fast!

Electricpig.co.uk - tech news fast!

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