Sirens are mythical creatures that all sailors love to hear at the expense of being shipwrecked, so it is no surprise that iRiver’s Siren MP3 player comes in a pretty albeit rectangular form factor in Japan. It supports MP3, WMA and WAV formats, featuring up to 17 hours of playback time per charge. Available in 1GB and 2GB capacities that retail for $65 and $84 respectively, the Siren will come in gold, pink or blue colors when February 1st rolls around. Tags: gprs, digital, buyers guides, equipment (Read the full post about ‘iRiver Launches Siren In Japan’…)

Dell customers who purchased the new XPS m1530 are literally in for a shock. The laptop is apparently giving some users an electric shock when they touch it. The shock varies in intensity from a minor tingling sensation to a full jump-backwards-shaking-your-hand shock. Various posts on the Dell forums has led to the problem being tracked down to the combination of the power adapter connection on the machine combined with the brushed aluminum casing. The adapter uses two pins instead of three, meaning it isn’t earthed correctly, so the current jumps ship to your body when you come into contact. According to the forums, Dell is sending customers who complain a new power adapter with three pins to solve the problem. (Read the full post about ‘Dell XPS M1530 laptop shocks users’…)

In an effort to curb unhealthy eating habits, one Catholic school in Utah has implemented a biometric finger scanning system that is used to track what kids are eating during lunch.

(Read the full post about ‘Biometric System Narcs On Kids Eating Habits at School [Look Out Fatties]’…)

NBC has a new found respect for Steve Jobs and Apple, and Jobs himself has spoken about mending the fence with NBC. But do a few kind words really substantiate rumors that NBC will bring their shows back to iTunes? While we don’t think a future reunion is far fetched, there’s nothing in either interview that supports this rumor for the time being. [iLounge] Tags: camera, cameras, design, PDA (Read the full post about ‘NBC and Apple Exchange a Few Kind Words, Spark iTunes Rumors [NBC Vs ITunes]’…)

Spendtastic dudes who splurged on the Eight Core Mac Pros revealed earlier this month have an extra surprise for them: 64-bit boot camp support. The Boot Camp install discs have 64-bit Vista drivers on board, meaning you can load up Microsoft’s 2^6 bit OS with little to no problems on your silver cheese-grating behemoth. [Macrumors] Tags: gaming, consumer electronics, MP3, dvr (Read the full post about ‘Leopard Boot Camp Gets 64-bit Windows Vista Support [Software]’…)

Posted Jan 21st 2008 2:40PM by Nilay PatelFiled under: Portable Audio, Portable VideoSo the rising discontent with Apple’s new habit of selective feature enabling got us thinking — while we’re not experts on the subject, the generally accepted reasoning for the $20 iPod touch upgrade fee is the accounting requirements of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act: iPhone and Apple TV updates are free since revenue from those products is realized as a subscription over a period of time, but iPod touch updates can’t be free since Apple just records that revenue directly. That certainly makes sense to us when applied to things like the 802.11n Enabler, which was trivially cheap and turned on unadvertised hardware features, but it strikes us as being a pretty big stretch when applied to a $20 package of new software applications. (Read the full post about ‘The $20 iPod touch upgrade: really for legal reasons or no?’…)