GSM HTC Hero coming to Telus
Clint Eastwood’s ‘Invictus’ Movie Trailer
Volkswagen to sponsor the Scirocco Cup
Fake Coke Can Has A Spy Camera

The Coby KTFDVD7093 7-Inch Under-The-Cabinet LCD TV with Built-In DVD/CD Player and AM/FM Radio offers a viewing and entertainment medium which should aid you in watching some great videos or access some recipes for some good home cooking. This compact DVD player can be placed under the cabinet or somewhere that should be accessible. It boasts of a 7” widescreen TFT and a combo DVD/CD player with ATSC digital TV tuner. It recognizes most CD media and even has audio/video jacks for other devices such as video game consoles, VCRs and so on. A neat device for any part of the home depending on where you want it.

Price: $131.96

(Source) Amazon

If you are still looking for a handy LCD HDTV in the market, check out this one from LG Electronics. The LG 47LH55 47-Inch 1080p 240Hz LCD HDTV boasts of 240Hz TruMotion technology that should address motion blurs for fast paced scenes. It also features a full HD 1080p resolution and an 80,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio for deeper blacks and picture detail. It even comes with an Intelligent Sensor which adjusts automatically to the lighting conditions of the room for better picture delivery.

Price: $1,138.99

(Source) Amazon

Here’s a gadget that you might do well without. It’s impressive, it looks good, it’s solar-powered, it brings you all the content you want from your iPod, but it’s also very expensive. Not to mention it won’t be available until April 2010.

The Regen Reverb is a 3-feet dock which runs on solar energy. The giant dock will offer you 4.5 hours at full volume or 12 hours at normal volume (whatever that means) of music play for every 20 hours of outdoor sun charge or 40 hours indoor light charge. Are you impressed by any of that? The Reverb will cost $2,229 which is too much to pay for just an iPod dock.

via Reverb

LCD displays are a big part of our lives and we will find them anywhere. Take this MTA initiative for example. New Yorkers that happen to take the train a lot will be happy to see LCD screens like the one in the picture here mounted in every station. The screen displays exactly where the cars on the line are so you’ll know exactly when you train is coming.

The service is available for now only on the L line but if testing goes well then other lines should get a similar treatment in the near future. What do you think?

via Gothamist

Full Moon The Apollo Missions At The Joseph Bellows Gallery
Ridley Scott Plotting Alien Prequel?
Timelapser app allows iPhone photos to be made into cool videos
Left 4 Dead 2 DLC hinted?

If you think the VHS player/recorder is dead, guess again. For some reason, the JVC-DR-BH250 continues the legacy. Not only does it continue to play the usual VHS tapes, it can even record blu-ray and some other content as well. And if you are worried about storage, never fear. It even comes with a 250 GB hard drive to save those recorded video formats. The JVC DR-BH250 is slated to arrive in Japan by November and will carry a $1,400 price tag.

(Source) Ubergizmo

Cisco unveils another potential gadget that should allow you to save movies via USB device. The FlipShare TV is a three-piece package which makes use of a software to transfer movies via USB from a computer for possibly playing them on a standard TV set. Thought that last part wasn’t mentioned, the pictures below perhaps best explain the purpose for these interface buttons and jacks. No word on pricing and availability yet but at least you know it is coming after getting FCC approval.

(Source) ZatZnotFunny

So once again, Sony steadfastly refuses to disappoint me, putting out a high quality television system that feels a lot bigger than it looks and generally provides value like no tomorrow with the Sony KDL46XBR9.

The Sony KDL46XBR9 television is a forty six inch 1080p LCD television with Bravia Link and Bravia Sync technology, a networked TV guide program, and a superabundance of ports, including four HDMI inputs, one HD component input, one HD combination input, and one PC input.

This one is a lot like an earlier model we covered here, the Sony KDL46Z5100, in that it too has a beautiful picture and very fine sound quality.  The interesting departure from that earlier Sony is that this one actually manages to FEEL like it has just as big a picture as the KDL46Z5100, but in a slightly smaller overall unit, giving you the feeling like you’re saving on space yet not needing to compromise on picture quality.

Ordinarily, this retails for about twenty six hundred bucks but Amazon’s actually knocking just over a grand off the price bringing this down to just over fifteen hundred.  And even though that’s a pretty big price tag, you’re still coming away with incredible value.

So this guy by the name of Jeff bought a 1921 Georgian colonial house nine years ago, and it wasn’t exactly in the best shape when he got it.  Well, if you were eighty years old you probably wouldn’t be in the best shape either, so don’t laugh.

Anyway, Jeff set out to gut the house and renovate it to suit his needs.  Now, I know that this is how a lot of horror movies started, but for him it worked out just fine.  He added a new master suite, an exercise room, a guest suite…and of course, what we came here for, a sweet home theater setup.

He’s got plenty of awesome equipment in there, including fully TWELVE Acoustic Innovations Deco recliners (those red and pink things you see in the foreground), a Denon Blu-ray player, a JVC VHS deck, an Oppo DVD player, a Panasonic Blu-ray player, Klipsch speakers, a Sony projector and a monster screen from–where else?–Stewart Filmscreen.

For gutting most of his home and adding on like no tomorrow, Jeff’s definitely managed to add on a truly sweet home theater setup.

I’m not a hundred percent sure that this is the best option for a home theater seat, but I can see where there’d be some appeal.  I’m just not convinced it’s wide enough appeal to merit a product launch.

See, what this chair does is not only provide a comfortable seat to watch movies or the big game or what have you, but it also provides a little something extra–the ability to recharge your battery-driven hardware while you sit in it.

The Berkline Concert Series recliner offers wireless recharging of all your handheld devices, it creates “an electromagnetic conduit combined with an intelligent control system that constantly monitors power flow so various devices from different manufactures can charge at the same time.”

See, what I can’t help but wonder at this point is, why would you need your battery gear recharged in a home theater chair?  Oh, sure, it’d be GREAT for remotes!  Are you kidding?  Never recharge a remote again?  That’d be amazing!  But to pay plenty more for a chair–I couldn’t find any pricing data on this one–for the ability to keep your remotes permanently hot and ready just seems a bit unnecessary.  I’ve got my Rayovac Renewal charger for a reason.

There’s a whole lot of people out there who crave the “drive in movie experience” of yore.  But Kevin Van wanted it so badly that he built one.  In his backyard.

He bought his first projector for inside the house, and it got him to thinking, why can’t I use this projector outdoors?   But that wasn’t the end of his quest to remake the drive in, no…only the beginning.   Get this–the guy went so far to restore the “drive in movie experience” that he bought and restored nine vintage drive in speakers, paying a hundred and ten bucks for the lot on eBay.

He put a concession area on his screened-in porch to keep the bugs out, and included a commercial-grade popcorn popper, a hot dog steamer, a nacho chip and cheese warmer and even a chili warmer.  He even built his own screen.

But he’s also got a bit of the twenty-first century hooked in as well–a Sharp projector, a Sony Prologic receiver, Pioneer amps (the vintage speakers on eBay?  Pioneers all.) plus some Bose and MTX speakers too.  Speakers are a big part of outdoor theater.

The sheer devotion to the medium definitely earns the appellation of sweet home theater setup, and hopefully, the heartburn from the chili will be mistaken for the warming love of home theater.

So I got hold of a couple day old press release and caught a little something that I haven’t seen anyone else take a run at.  Check this out.

The TheaterSeatStore company has doubled its inventory at its warehouses, possibly anticipating a massive surge in business.  Why, you wonder?  Well, it turns out the answer’s fairly obvious–here’s the word from the company:

“We’re following the growth and expansion of our client base and their demand for expedited shipping on their orders,” said Bruce Tucker, Director and Chief Operating Officer. “By adding additional square footage to house inventory, and expanded loading docks, we have the ability to handle a larger volume of orders daily, and are positioned for significant growth.”

So…they’re expanding, in the midst of a horrible economy, based on previous orders?  That’s a move that just might come back to haunt them.  After all, if the orders suddenly fall off, now they’re left with expansion for nothing.

Of course, thinking like that will guarantee they don’t go anywhere at all, but it might have been a little more prudent to start expanding slightly smaller than doubling.  So keep your eye on these guys–they might be having bargain-basement prices sooner than you think.

Motorola’s Home & Networks Mobility business recently announced the addition of DCX700 all-digital, high-definition (HD) set-top to its DCX product line. The low-profile design of this new HD DVR will enable cable operators to successfully migrate an all-digital network. It will also accelerate the delivery of personal media experiences and multi-room-DVR (MR-DVR) capabilities.

The small and streamlined profile of the Motorola DCX700 allows a space-saving wall-mounted installation. It is a cost-effective set-top with a single 1 GHz tuner. Plus, it supports both MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 AVC services. Above all, the DVR includes the latest audio and video output, including HDMI and Dolby Digital Plus.

The DCX700 will either support CableCARD conditional access or embedded MediaCipher conditional access. Motorola will be showcasing the DCX700 HD DVR at the 2009 SCTE Cable-Tec Expo from October 28 - 30 in Denver.

Activision comments on leaked Modern Warfare 2 footage
TomTom A Little Tough? Try the TomTom Start
LG GW620 official presentation
The Punishment Online Review–Unexpected Hilarity

Ericsson has a weird but interesting computer concept for us. The Spider Computers doesn’t need a monitor or a keyboard as it projects them both in front of you. The tripod includes a full PC, pico-projector, laser keyboard, 3G and lots of other features. Unfortunately we won’t see such a computer in stores anytime soon. Current technology might make it impossible to build. Well maybe it could be build after all but we can’t expect it to offer spectacular performances at this point. In a few years when pico-projectors and PC components will evolve the Spider Computer might really become an alternative to netbooks and nettops. That’s when we will return with more news about this concept if Ericsson decides to keep it, of course.

via mobileandnetbook

Acer has announced a brand new 23-inch LCD monitor ready to play nice with Windows 7. The T230H comes with full HD 1,920 x 1,080 resolution, VGA, HDMI and DVI inputs, USB connectivity, a brightness of 300cd/m2, 80,000:1 dynamic contrast and 2ms response time.

As for multitouch support, the new monitor can do one- and two-finger gestures and it will cost you $513 when it becomes available. Europeans are set to get it first but there are no actual release dates available yet.

via Acer

Samsung LN40B530 Television Review–Not Up To Samsung’s Norm
Sweet Home Theater Setup - The Modular Poster Boy
Vizio Adds Small LED Backlit LCD TVs
Sweet Home Theater Setups–The Backyard Home Theater
Sears Black Friday Deals Hit–So Good We’ve Got A Disclaimer!
NEC ValueStar W All-in-One Computer Revealed
Buffalo BR-PX68U2-BK External Blu-Ray Writers Announced
JVC XV-BP11 Blu-Ray Player
AUO to Unveil New Panels at FDP 2009?
Netflix to Bring Video Streaming to the Wii

Normally, when I talk about Samsung hardware, I usually have a problem with something.  Well, I always have a problem with the controls, but I mean besides that.  This time around I have a problem with something other than the controls, and it’s actually pretty disturbing. Read on.

The Samsung LN40B530 is a forty inch 1080p LCD television with two ten watt speakers, SRS TruSurround, and three HDMI inputs), one Anynet+ input, and one PC input.

First, I actually don’t have a problem at all with the controls.  They’re side-mounted rocker controls, not those strange subcutaneous ones mounted on the front.  The sound is at least fair, which I generally don’t expect out of Samsung.  Generally, their sound is high quality.  But the biggest problem with this one is that the picture was oddly washed out, which is definitely not something I expect in a Samsung, and especially not in a Samsung 1080p.

And considering that this washed out wreck with merely fair sound costs nine hundred bucks, I can’t even look like recommending it.

David Adey of Newfoundland may well be the poster child for building a home theater in the modular style.  I love the modular style.  I personally espouse it.  And when you consider how he did it, a little bit at a time, he shows exactly why I endorse this style of design.

A little at a time, a new piece here and there, and soon (well, in seven months) he had a home theater system.  And though it sounds like he spent a small fortune on this sweet home theater setup, he actually spent ten thousand dollars.

Now, that SOUNDS like a lot of money.  And objectively, on the surface, yes it is.  But think about this–he didn’t spend ten thousand dollars…he spent three hundred and fifty bucks a week. Every week. For seven months.  And that doesn’t sound nearly as bad.

What did he get for that cash, you ask?  How about a Yamaha receiver, Paradigm speakers, a Sanyo projector and a hundred and four inch projector screen, among others?

It’s a pretty sweet setup, and the fact that he built it a little at a time makes it all the sweeter.