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Techradar |
- UK Police arrest five men over WikiLeaks web strikes
- Android Honeycomb: 10 things you need to know
- Facebook: We're not launching an HTC Facebook phone
- New PEGI game ratings delayed until September
- Google adds HTML5 alerts to Chrome for Gmail and Gtalk
- In Depth: Inside the Sony NGP: the CPU and GPU in detail
- Rumour: Facebook voice calls due this month
- Updated: Sky buys The Cloud
- Xperia Play extensively previewed ahead of launch
- Nintendo 3DS: Asda has cheapest deal yet
- Nintendo 3DS: Asda has cheapest deal yet
- Gary Marshall: Happy birthday, iPad
- Android 3.0 preview SDK released to developers
- Review: ECS P67H2-A Black Extreme
- Review: Samsung B2330 HD
- YouTube documentary gets Sundance premiere
- Exclusive: Hands on: Humax TV Portal review
- New world texting champions crowned
- Yahoo nabs more online exclusive football content
- HTC Desire 2 sneaks out ahead of MWC
- Sky: Half of UK's 3D TVs signed up for Sky 3D
- Updated: Sony NGP: everything you need to know
- Nintendo profits drop ahead of 3DS launch
- Hannspree launches new LED TVs
- Review: Acoustic Energy Neo V2
| UK Police arrest five men over WikiLeaks web strikes Posted: 27 Jan 2011 09:10 AM PST  British Police have arrested five men today over their alleged roles in an online campaign of strategic web attacks in support of WikiLeaks Five males – aged 15, 16, 19, 20 and 26 – were arrested under the Computer Misuse Act in raids across the UK early this morning, with all suspects currently being held by police for questioning. Anonymous arrests A Metropolitan Police spokesperson said that today's arrests relate "to recent and ongoing distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks by an online group calling themselves 'Anonymous'." Anonymous were behind a recent spate of DDoS attacks on companies including Amazon, PayPal and MasterCard, all of whom were seen to have made moves to distance themselves from any association with WikiLeaks, following the high-profile leaks of thousands of sensitive diplomatic cables late last year. The latest arrests follow an investigation by the Police Central e-Crime Unit working in conjunction with a number of law enforcement agencies in Europe and the US. The five males in question were arrested earlier today at homes in the West Midlands, Northamptonshire, Hertfordshire, Surrey and London. We expect further updates on this story from the Met's Central e-Crime Unit shortly. 
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| Android Honeycomb: 10 things you need to know Posted: 27 Jan 2011 08:35 AM PST  Google unveiled its tablet-specific Android 3.0 OS at CES to a flurry of excitement thanks to some pretty exciting new tablet-focused additions to the already impressive OS. But, with a preview of the SDK only just released to developers, we won't be seeing Honeycomb on our Android tablets for a little while; in the meantime, whet your appetite with our round-up of the key new features. There'll be 3D-effect graphics You can't swing a cat without hitting something 3D (literally) in the tech world these days, and Google knows it. Honeycomb offers developers the opportunity to use high-performance 3D graphics which should offer no noticeable lag, even with the extra rendering required. This means we'll see 3D creeping into our apps, wallpapers and carousels as the developers get to grips with the extra dimension. The Android UI has been redesigned especially for tablets The Android user interface had always been intended for smartphones with screens no bigger than around 4-inches – with the advent of tablet devices, displays have shot up in the size stakes. Lucky for us, they're not short of a brain cell or two over at Google and have re-designed the Android UI taking the larger screen into account. The updated UI isn't a million miles away from what we're used to on Android handsets – there are still multiple, customisable homescreens, universal search box and widgets galore – but the small tweaks will make it so much better to use on the larger scale.
An ever-present menu bar at the bottom of the screen will hold notifications, system status updates and on-screen navigation as well as a handy clock, with a "lights out" mode to dim the bar when you're watching a film and want the full screen. Meanwhile, the action bar at the top of the screen is dependent on the app you're in; its look and feel are dictated by each individual app, as are the options available to compensate for the lack of dedicated menu button. Recent apps will make multi-tasking a breeze Multi-tasking is where we expect the dual-core Android tablets to shine, and Honeycomb gives it the tools to do so. The 'recent apps' launcher lays out the last apps you used and the state you left them in, so you can quickly nip from one to another and straight into work. The tool lives in the system bar which is always onscreen, so there'll be no tedious navigation through menus.
The keyboard will be tablet-friendly Of course you could buy an external keyboard for your tablet but lugging a million accessories around defeats the object of having a sleek and handy tablet. To save you the hassle, Google has put a bit of thought into the onscreen keyboard; the keys have been reshaped and repositioned to make typing more comfortable and the targeting more natural for the larger screen, instead of simply scaling up the keyboard. We love the inclusion of a tab key, which makes the typing experience more akin to that of a desktop or notebook than that of a phone. Better copy and paste than ever before Ah, copy and paste. Such a small function and yet so universally adored. While regular Android does allow text selection, copying and pasting, the Honeycomb system has had a few tweaks. Tapping a single word will select it while the bounding arrows either end make expanding the selection super simple - simpler even than the one used in Gingerbread.
A menu in the action bar at the top of the screen then allows you to either cut, copy, copy to clipboard, share, paste, search the web for or find. Connectivity upgrades include improved Wi-Fi and Bluetooth tethering Google has improved Android's Wi-Fi connectivity with a new scanning system; it reduces scanning time across bands and filters, so you should be up, running and connected in shorter times. Bluetooth connectivity has been updated too; more devices can now tether to the tablet and share its connectivity, while simple devices with no user interface (think sensors and the like) are also supported. There'll be anonymous tabbed web browsing If you fancy a spot of private web browsing on your Android tablet, then you're in luck; the new "incognito" mode lends an air of Poirot-era respectability to your secretive searching. Google has also done away with the multiple-window browser, instead going for a tabbed browser system with your open web pages displayed in the action bar at the top of the screen.
Google Chrome users can easily sync their bookmarks to the tablet browser too, thanks to Honeycomb's option to automatically sign in to all Google sites with one supplied account. Legacy apps will work seamlessly Worried that you won't be able to make use of the thousands of Android apps already in the marketplace? Never fear, even though they were designed for a much smaller-screened device, Honeycomb is still compatible with apps developed for earlier Android iterations as long as devs add in a simple spot of code. The menu key functions from Android phones are migrated to the Action Bar menu in Honeycomb, and there's the option for developers to create dedicated layouts for larger screens and add them to existing apps. Two-pane email should mean easy inbox oraganisation Two-paned email sounds a little familiar – oh yes, that's right. We've seen it before on the iPad where it works brilliantly. If it ain't broke, and all that. The ability to select multiple messages in the inbox and move or delete them mean there's no excuse for a messy, disorganised inbox, while attachments can be synced to the tablet for you to view later. Widgets are going to get interactive Widgets saved to the home screen on Honeycomb tablets are going to have a whole new level of functionality available. Rather than passively relaying information to the user, they'll be interactive. Gestures can be used to scroll through 3D stacks or lists of content, while touch gestures can also flip and move the widget's innards like never before.
If you're still crazy for more, then check out the video Google has kicked out about the new Android 3.0 OS - it's like looking at pictures but a lot faster. 
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| Facebook: We're not launching an HTC Facebook phone Posted: 27 Jan 2011 08:28 AM PST  Facebook has responded to rumours that it is partnering with HTC on a Facebook-branded handset by smartly denying it. We reported on the rumours yesterday, which indicated that HTC would unveil two high-end handsets made in partnership with the social network. However, Facebook's head of business development, Dan Rose, told journalists this morning, "This is really just another example of a manufacturer who has taken our public APIs and integrated them into their device in an interesting way. "The rumours around there being something more to this HTC device are overblown." You'll be sayin' no, no, no, no, no Although Rose seems to confirm that HTC is working on a handset that heavily integrates Facebook functionality (perhaps even the ability to call friends within Facebook), when asked if the HTC device would be Facebook branded, he responded emphatically, "No." That seems to be that then. Or is it? We're not entirely convinced by Facebook's denial; it wouldn't be the first time a technology company has said one thing and done another, after all. Whatever the truth is, we won't be sure of it until Mobile World Congress 2011, where we'll be checking each HTC handset carefully for a sneaky Facebook logo. 
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| New PEGI game ratings delayed until September Posted: 27 Jan 2011 08:11 AM PST  The new PEGI game ratings system will not arrive in the UK now until September 2010. The UKIE, the trade association for the UK's interactive entertainment industry, has posted an update on the delay on its website this week. UKIE said the Departure for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has submitted a proposal outlinging areas where it thought a number of games would still require the widely-recognised BBFC ratings as well as the new age-ratings logos from PEGI. Confusing ratings on games TechRadar spoke with a BBFC rep earlier today, who had no comment to add regarding the matter. The games publishers' trade body adds that such dual labelling of age-ratings logos on games "is contrary to the principles that were established in having PEGI introduced into the Digital Economy Act and if this proposal were implemented we believe it would only cause unnecessary and potentially harmful consumer confusion." PEGI's new age-ratings system was recommended way back in 2008 by the Byron Report, which suggested that parents were confused by multiple age-ratings logos on games and that there was a clear requirement for one widely-accepted and well-recognised system to be put in place. Two years later, for whatever reasons, it seems that the games industry is still failing to achieve this seemingly quite simple goal, which was outlined in last spring's Digital Economy Act and originally due to be launched this Spring. UKIE now says that it is working with the DCMS to resolve the matter, but that it sees "no realistic chance of PEGI implementation before September." Politics eh? What fun! 
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| Google adds HTML5 alerts to Chrome for Gmail and Gtalk Posted: 27 Jan 2011 07:51 AM PST  Google has made a simple but very effective addition to its Chrome browser - the arrival of desktop notifications for emails and chat messages. This means that you can now be notified if someone emails you through Gmail or pings you through Gtalk without actually having to flick back to your Gmail account. "We just launched HTML5 desktop notifications which display pop-ups whenever a chat message or new email arrives," said Google's Andrew Wilson in a blog. "To turn them on, click on the Settings link in the top right corner of Gmail and scroll down to the 'Desktop Notifications' section." Alert choice Google has also made it so you can choose whether the notifications come from your whole Gmail account or just the priority inbox. While it is just Google Chrome users that can have the notifications at present, Google has said that it is working hard to make these notifications part of the standard web platform. 
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| In Depth: Inside the Sony NGP: the CPU and GPU in detail Posted: 27 Jan 2011 07:16 AM PST  The announcement of the new PSP2 – or PlayStation NGP – included the revelation that the latest bit of gaming gadgetry would come with a quad-core processor and a quad-core GPU. We were told that the CPU – the beating heart of the NGP – would be based on the new ARM Cortex A9 design and that anImagination TechnologiesSGX5 43MP4+ quad-core GPU would provide the visuals. But why were these designs chosen for this next generation handheld? And, is the talk of the NGP being as powerful as the PS3 accurate? ARM Cortex A9 First up is the ARM Cortex A9 – a design for a multicore processor that is intriguing the technology world. With the first dual-core mobile phones only just hitting the market, the quad-core variant is yet to make an appearance in the wild. Nvidia are one of the companies expected to make a quad-core processor using ARM's Cortex A9 design but the chip – which will probably be called Tegra 3 – is not slated to hit the market until the last quarter, which would just about fit the PSP2 timeline. Tegra 3, however, would include GPU technology, whereas the NGP's specs point to a Imagination Technologies graphics component. So the processor could be a variant of Texas Instruments' OMAP4, for example.
ARM's official benchmarks for its Cortex A9 design suggests that a dual core configuration that is designed for performance rather than power can have a clock speed of up to 2,000Mhz. Of course, the Sony NGP would need to be able to run for a decent length of time and without hefty cooling solutions, which means that the actual clock speed is difficult to nail down at the current time. For reference, the PS3 runs on a Cell processor, offering 3.2Ghz of processing power.
Power versus performance The reason that ARM designed chips have been chosen is the British company's impressive track record in offering processor designs more suitable for portable devices. ARM has become a well established player in the mobile phone industry and, recently, Microsoft announced that the next iteration of Windows would also run on ARM chips as well as the standard x86 chipset that has been at the heart of computing for decades. ARM designs mean good battery life – something which is still a huge consideration in every portable device – and this will be pivotal to the PlayStation NGP. "The ARM Cortex A9 processor provides unprecedented levels of performance and power efficiency making it an ideal solution for designs requiring high performance inlow power or thermally constrained cost-sensitive devices," says ARM. "The Cortex A9 MPCore processor provides the ability to extend peak performance to unprecedented levels while also supporting design flexibility and new features to further reduce and control the power consumption at the processor and system level." Imagination Technologies PowerVR SGX5 43MP4+ The next component under the spotlight is the Imagination Technologies SGX5 43MP4+ quad-core graphics processor. Imagination Technologies is another British company, which has both and Apple and Intel as substantial shareholders. It's another company that has made waves in the mobile phone industry, and it is the PowerVR division that provides the SGX series5 GPU design for the NGP. According to the company its SGX Series 5 is "a series of highly efficient graphics acceleration IP cores that meet the multimedia requirements of the next generation of consumer, communications and computing applications."
Again, the chip designs are scalable – allowing manufacturers to balance power use and performance – and has been designed to work for "very high performance consoles and computing devices." "The family incorporates the revolutionary Universal Scalable Shader Engine (USSE), with a feature set that exceeds the requirements of OpenGL 2.0 and Microsoft Shader Model 3, enabling 2D, 3D and general purpose (GP-GPU) processing in a single core," adds Imagination Technologies' description. Interestingly, the PowerVR SGX is a part of the Apple A4 system on a chip (SoC) used for the Apple iPad – although it is uses the 535 rather than the 543 listed in the PSP2 specifications. Indeed, the iPad also uses ARM Cortex designs in its SoC – which means it will be particularly interesting to see how close the soon to be announced Apple iPad 2 comes to the kind of specs given for the NGP.
What is obvious from the specs given for the PSP2 (or Sony NGP to give it its codename) is that it should it be released today it would be by some margin the most powerful portable gaming device around – at least outside of gaming laptops. But, when it finally arrives at the end of this year – or at least that's what we are anticipating, it is likely that many more devices will be utilising some, if not all of this technology. 
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| Rumour: Facebook voice calls due this month Posted: 27 Jan 2011 06:43 AM PST Following leaked images online that suggested that a Facebook voice calling service is imminent, the social network has invited press to attend an event next Monday at which it is planning to make a 'major announcement'. Rumours that this might finally be an official announcement relating to a partnership between Skype and Facebook – which we originally reported on back in September 2010 – are flying around. "Call me on Facebook" A number of Facebook users have already flagged the fact that there appears to be a new "call" button that shows up when viewing other people's profiles, hence the reason why voice-calling via Facebook seems a likely announcement to expect next week. TechRadar has contacted both Skype and Facebook and been quickly served with 'no comments' on these rumours. A Facebook spokesperson told us: "We don't comment on rumor and speculation and have nothing to announce at this time." Either way, something big and potentially interesting is brewing in the Facebook camp, whether or not it turns out to be voice-calls or a Skype partnership (involving some form of Skype integration into Facebook Chat). Will voice-calls be the latest addiction to Zuckerberg's plans to turn Facebook into a "modern messaging system"? TechRadar will of course be at the announcement next Monday to bring you all the news as it breaks. 
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| Posted: 27 Jan 2011 06:00 AM PST  BSkyB has bought public Wi-Fi network The Cloud, as it looks to compete with the likes of BT in offering its broadband customers extended connectivity. The move should see Sky broadband customers gain access to Wi-Fi while out and about, in much the same way that BT customers can use BT OpenZone. The announcement was made on Thursday when the company revealed its latest earnings report. Cloudy sky As mobile networks struggle under the data demands of super-powered smartphones, public Wi-Fi has the potential to ease the strain. But mobile network operators don't seem too bothered about providing the services themselves, instead allowing fixed-line operators to corner the market. We're particularly interested to see that News Corp, which already owns Sky and The Sun, will now own The Cloud. It's all getting a little bit Monty Burns for our liking… 
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| Xperia Play extensively previewed ahead of launch Posted: 27 Jan 2011 05:43 AM PST  It's hardly a secret that Sony Ericsson will be bringing a PSP-style phone device to Mobile World Congress, but now we've got a full, in-depth preview of the Xperia Play. Engadget, the site that's brought us all manner of leaks regarding the new Xperia Play, is predictably the first to get a good fondling of the phone, and the verdict is pretty positive overall. There are some stark omissions at this early stage: for instance, there are no official games to play, so only PSOne and GB Advance emulators are running on it - the good news is these seem to be handled well enough. Sony has announced that it will initially only be offering PSOne titles for Android devices, but more power hungy titles will surely come at a later date to really test this Xperia Play's capabilities. Touchy feely The dual touch sensors, used in place of discrete analogue joysticks, aren't much use without the correct titles in place, so we'll have to wait to see if they are an adequate replacement. The rest of the phone seems very similar to the Xperia Arc, with Android 2.3 buzzing away under the surface, albeit in a fairly laggy manner (it should be remembered this is a prototype though). The chassis has been confirmed as having as much depth as we expected; if you really want a slide out control pad, you're obviously going to have to sacrifice some pocket space.
But the main point is that this still doesn't look like the 'PSP Phone' as yet - especially with the breathtaking power of the next level PSP Sony NGP - so stay tuned for Mobile World Congress when TechRadar will be bringing you our in-depth hands on: Xperia Play review as soon as we can. 
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| Nintendo 3DS: Asda has cheapest deal yet Posted: 27 Jan 2011 05:35 AM PST  Asda has moved quick to announce itself as the UK's cheapest retailer of the forthcoming new Nintendo 3DS, due for release in the UK 25 March. Nintendo revealed its plans for the new handheld earlier this month at a press event in Amsterdam, announcing the games and applications planned to arrive alongside the console at launch this March. 3DS excitement at UK retail There was some grumbling from UK games hacks following Nintendo's 3DS announcements, as it seemed that the retail launch price for British gamers would fall somewhere within the £220 to £230 price bracket. Following this, Asda has taken the PR initiative to push a special offer on its website of a Nintendo 3DS at a (relatively) bargain-bucket price of £202, with the additional offer of any 3DS launch game available to consumers at £15 a pop. "At the lowest price on the market, the Nintendo 3DS is now available to pre-order online from Asda for the amazing price of £202 – using a £15 off discount code," Asda's PR informs us this week. No doubt we will hear more about similar launch offers from other UK high street retailers and supermarkets such as HMV, Tesco, Morrisons, Sainsbury's and others. TechRadar has contacted all these retailers for further updates on plans for 3DS hardware and games launch offers. For now, If you are in the market for a 3DS this coming Easter, then you might just want to take the plunge and pre-order one from Asda Direct right now for £202. Asda on colossal 3DS Andrew Thompson, Head of Games at Asda notes: "There has been much anticipation surrounding the launch of the Nintendo 3DS, and it is set to be the must-have consumer device of the year. At Asda we aim to offer our customers the latest consoles and games at the best possible value. "Our 3DS offer will continue this trend. We anticipate the launch of this console being colossal – who wouldn't want to experience 3D gaming and films without cumbersome glasses crushing your nose and cramping your style." Nintendo is still to reveal its full 3DS software line up for 25 March UK release date, so we will be sure to confirm those details as soon as we have them. 
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| Nintendo 3DS: Asda has cheapest deal yet Posted: 27 Jan 2011 05:35 AM PST Asda has moved quick to announce itself as the UK's cheapest retailer of the forthcoming new Nintendo 3DS, due for release in the UK 25 March. Nintendo revealed its plans for the new handheld earlier this month at a press event in Amsterdam, announcing the games and applications planned to arrive alongside the console at launch this March. 3DS excitement at UK retail There was some grumbling from UK games hacks following Nintendo's 3DS announcements, as it seemed that the retail launch price for British gamers would fall somewhere within the £220 to £230 price bracket. Following this, Asda has taken the PR initiative to push a special offer on its website of a Nintendo 3DS at a (relatively) bargain-bucket price of £202, with the additional offer of any 3DS launch game available to consumers at £15 a pop. "At the lowest price on the market, the Nintendo 3DS is now available to pre-order online from Asda for the amazing price of £202 – using a £15 off discount code," Asda's PR informs us this week. No doubt we will hear more about similar launch offers from other UK high street retailers and supermarkets such as HMV, Tesco, Morrisons, Sainsbury's and others. TechRadar has contacted all these retailers for further updates on plans for 3DS hardware and games launch offers. For now, If you are in the market for a 3DS this coming Easter, then you might just want to take the plunge and pre-order one from Asda Direct right now for £202. Asda on colossal 3DS Andrew Thompson, Head of Games at Asda notes: "There has been much anticipation surrounding the launch of the Nintendo 3DS, and it is set to be the must-have consumer device of the year. At Asda we aim to offer our customers the latest consoles and games at the best possible value. "Our 3DS offer will continue this trend. We anticipate the launch of this console being colossal – who wouldn't want to experience 3D gaming and films without cumbersome glasses crushing your nose and cramping your style." Nintendo is still to reveal its full 3DS software line up for 25 March UK release date, so we will be sure to confirm those details as soon as we have them. 
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| Gary Marshall: Happy birthday, iPad Posted: 27 Jan 2011 05:10 AM PST  In December 2009, on this very website, I wrote a very silly thing. "There's no way any device, not even an Apple one, can live up to the hype the long-awaited Apple Tablet has generated," I grumbled. Oops! In my defence I was mocking some of the more excitable rumour-mongering (the iPad was still top secret at the time), and unlike some pundits I didn't predict its doom - quite the opposite, in fact; I was banging on about its game-changing potential within 24 hours of the launch - but I don't think anybody, least of all me, realised just what a big deal the iPad would be. There's a nifty infographic at OnSwipe that sums it up: the average analyst predicted 3.3 million sales, but Apple did 15-odd-million. There's more to this than Apple's bulging bottom line, though. The iPad has created a whole new category of computing, and some analysts predict that sales of tablets will hit 115 million by 2014. Prior to the iPad, tablet computing was a niche market. Now, tablets are everywhere. With the Tablet PC it's clear that Microsoft had the right idea but the wrong execution: the hardware was pretty good, but Microsoft approached it on the basis of "how can we add touch to Windows?" rather than "what would Windows be like if it was designed solely for touch?" To use a Tablet PC, you still needed to know your way around Windows. To use an iPad, you don't need to know anything. That's the secret of its success. My iPad's a ukelele By hiding the computer bit of computing, the iPad can be anything you want it to be. My one is a photo frame, a web browser, a typewriter, a games console, a drum machine, a ukelele (no, really), a library, a video player… you get the idea. And one year on, I'm still amazed by the things developers are coming up with, whether that's jaw-dropping children's ebooks or apps that enable iPads to control high-end recording studios. What's great about 2011 is that everyone else is joining the tablet party too. Some, like Asus, are coming up with unusual hardware ideas; others, like Notion Ink, are experimenting with display technologies. Developers are working on yet more killer apps to excite and delight us, and of course Apple is working on the iPad 2. Whether you're Apple's biggest fan or hate the firm, its products and its users with a passion, you've got to give it credit: the iPad kick-started one of the most exciting and creative periods we've seen for a long time. Steve Jobs said it was "magical" and "revolutionary"; the former was pushing it, but the latter turned out to be something of an understatement. 
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| Android 3.0 preview SDK released to developers Posted: 27 Jan 2011 05:01 AM PST  Google has released a preview of its Android 3.0 SDK, allowing developers to get an early peek at the new tablet-friendly platform. The Honeycomb SDK contains some pretty neat stuff, including improved Bluetooth support to allow Android 3.0 devices to connect to a wider range of devices - even simple ones like low-level sensors. Google says that the new SDK preview features: "non-final APIs and system image, to allow developers to start testing their existing applications on the tablet form-factor and begin getting familiar with the new UI patterns, APIs, and capabilities that will be available in Android 3.0." This means that developers will be able to begin coding applications in readiness for the platform's launch in the coming weeks, but won't be able to publish to the Android Market - the full SDK will be with us soon, according to Google. A whole new box of toys The new SDK features such developer delights as new UI widgets, a persistent action bar for easy access from any point in the Android OS, and support for multi-core processors. There has been a worry that some apps coded for Android 3.0 won't be easily ported to smartphones, but while some features (such as advanced Bluetooth connectivity) won't work on older versions of the OS, newer handsets on other versions of Android should be able to handle the apps even if they're not updated to Honeycomb. However, we'll have to wait and see on that front - let's just hope Google hasn't created completely separate ecosystems for tablets and phones. 
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| Review: ECS P67H2-A Black Extreme Posted: 27 Jan 2011 04:58 AM PST  Everybody's doing it and so is ECS, releasing its top-end Sandy Bridge motherboard, the P67H2-A Black Extreme. ECS may not be as well known as some of its rivals, but it does seem to come out with some interesting boards, especially its Black Extreme series for the enthusiasts. And the latest addition to this line is no exception. It combines Intel's Sandy Bridge combination of the Socket 1155 CPU support and the P67 Express chipset with Lucid's Hydra graphics technology to support mix-and-match combinations of graphics cards. That is to say you can use Nvidia and AMD cards together in the same board. While the jury may be out on the performance benefits of the technology itself, it's an interesting route for ECS to take. There's also not one but two USB 3.0 controllers on the board, meaning you get four ports on the rear panel as well as an aluminium two port USB 3.0 front expansion adaptor. That adapter is bundled with the board and sits in any spare 3.5-inch panel at the front of any PC case. This early version of the BIOS, although reporting a 100MHz base clock, was according to CPU-Z running at just under that at 99.8MHz, meant the processor was running at 3.39GHz instead of the 3.4GHz. The same happened when it was over clocked to 4.2GHz – it ended up running at 4.19, which all sounds insignificant but is the reason by the board falls slightly behind the Asus P8P67-M Pro when it comes to the rendering benchmarks. CPU Rendering performance Cinebench R11.5 – Index: higher is better Cinebench R10 – Seconds: quicker is better x264v2 – FPS: higher is better x264v3 – FPS: higher is better 1080p gaming performance Just Cause 2 – FPS: higher is better
Built on an ATX PCB, the P76H2-A has an impressive 14-phase power management design that includes solid capacitors and Ferrite chokes. All of that should mean stability when the board is being overclocked. The P67 chipset and the MOSFETs sit under some fairly hefty passive heatsinks connected together by heatpipes, while the Lucid HydraLogix 200 chip sits all alone under a low profile heatsink, which again is passive. One of the first things that you notice when looking at the ECS P76H2-A – apart from the striking black, white and grey colour scheme – is the collection of three PCI-E graphics slots. The top two slots are positioned with enough distance between them so graphics cards with large coolers can be used together with out too many problems, but the third slot is positioned very close to the bottom edge of the board so any heftily cooled card will overhang the board. This wont be a problem in most chassis, but generally any of the cards capable of three-way multi-GPU will be the high-end cards, which will usually have chunkier cooling arrays. The top slot always runs at full x16 speed, while the second runs at x16 if two graphics cards are used (CrossFire or SLI) but the speed drops to x8 if three cards are used. That third slot will always run at x8 regardless of whether the two other slots are filled. As well as graphics cards, if you've also got a lot of external devices to plug into your board, the ECS P67H2-A Black Extreme will fit the bill nicely. Apart from the previously mentioned USB 3.0 ports, the board supports up to 14 USB 2.0 ports (six on the rear I/O panel and eight more through four motherboard headers) and there are two eSATA 6Gbps on the back panel along with two Gigabit LAN connectors. We liked ECS has taken a bold step by adding the Lucid technology to the board, and it does give a lot of flexibility when it comes to setting up the graphics. The inclusion of the USB 3.0 panel is a nice idea too, because it allows you too add front USB 3.0 ports to a case, which are only just beginning to surface on the latest PC case designs. We disliked The one real dislike about the board will only really concern you if you want to overclock it. We had an early version of the Aptio BIOS that had an unfinished look about it, which will hopefully improve with any upgrades coming down the line. Related Links
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| Posted: 27 Jan 2011 04:39 AM PST  The Samsung B2330HD is the latest in an increasing market of TV/monitor combosm, aiming to combine the televisual excellence of the LCD TV with the convenience and clarity of a PC monitor. Like its competitors, the Samsung B2330HD offers a plethora of connectivity, from SCART, HDMI, DVB-T and VGA. Basically it can handle pretty much anything you can throw at it. The 23-inch 16:9 panel offers a whopping 70,000:1 contrast ratio, which rivals most TVs, demonstrating the great leap forward in the quality of dual action TV monitors. That though is a dynamic ratio. Samsung's B2330HD also features technology such as Picture in Picture, where you can have a TV screen displayed while working from a different source. What's more, there's a remote control for easy switching between modes, so it's simple to sit back and enjoy TV and movies. And you've also got the ability to play content from USB media. Despite the Full 1080p HD credentials of the Samsung B2330HD, there's no actual Freeview HD built in, although one could be connected to one of the HDMI ports if required.
Connectivity options are as vast as they are varied on the B2330HD, but the lack of DVI is the first let down. DVI can easily be converted to HDMI, of which there are two ports, but there's no adapter bundled in the box. So, unfortunately, many people's first experience with this panel may well be a trip to their local electronics store to pick one up. The connectivity woes continued when the monitor was first connected to our test PC. The visuals were frankly shocking, with pixelated text, jagged lines and eye glaring brightness that would have made most people send their Samsung B2330HD on a one way ticket back to the store. There's a myriad customisable options in the B2330HD's menus, but none of them seemed to fix the problem. It was only when we changed the source name from HDMI to DVI, buried in a confusing menu called 'Change input name', that the full glory of the Samsung B2330HD was finally revealed. And glorious it was too. Gone were the jagged pixels and blinding brightness, and we were treated to a top class visual experience. Motion handling, contrast and viewing angles are top notch, and blacks are also deep and well presented. Both as a computer monitor and TV, the B2330HD is one of the best we've seen, and flew through every visual test. As you might expect, the built-in speakers though were poor, and sound was tinny at high volume. Even at a low volume, voices had an annoying distortion, which helped ruin the TV-watching experience. Another criticism of the B2330HD is the lack of positional adjustment, and in our tests we were found to be sitting below the optimum height. Without any height adjustment, something even the most base of bargain-basement screens can offer, this was a problem we could do nothing about. The technology itself though is impressive and the Picture in Picture feature is excellent, and extremely handy for keeping an eye on the football when you should be doing your work… However, its poor implementation almost lets it down. You can only display AV channels, so we weren't able to have the second HDMI input displayed. We liked Stunning visuals make the Samsung B2330HD a fantastic choice for anyone looking for a medium-sized panel for a space crammed with entertainment. We disliked The nightmarish set up is a needless sticking point and so is the colossally awful sound, both of which do their best to ruin a great visual experience. Related Links
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| YouTube documentary gets Sundance premiere Posted: 27 Jan 2011 04:36 AM PST  Life In A Day, the documentary filmed by and starring thousands of YouTube users, will premiere at the Sundance Film Festival tonight. YouTube users around the world participated in the Life In A Day project, produced by Ridley Scott, submitting video footage of their day on 24 July 2010. If the trailer below is anything to go by, the film will make us weep and laugh in equal measures, as thousands of normal people share snippets of their lives via the magic of the internet. 269,910 minutes didn't make the cut Over 80,000 clips were submitted, leaving director Kevin Macdonald and his team to wade through the 4,500 hours of footage to come up with the 90-minute documentary. MacDonald, who directed Touching the Void, won an Oscar in 2000 for his documentary One Day In September, which may sound similar to the Life In A Day project but is in fact about the murder of eleven Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics. The YouTube documentary will be streamed live from Sundance at 1am tomorrow UK time, but will be re-streamed at 7pm on Friday 28 January for those who don't fancy staying up until the wee small hours. 
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| Exclusive: Hands on: Humax TV Portal review Posted: 27 Jan 2011 04:20 AM PST  The Humax HD-FOX T2 was the first Freeview HD box to go on sale in the UK. That was a whole year ago, and even back then, Humax was talking about adding internet TV features including Sky Player and BBC iPlayer via a firmware update. For many who bought that box, or indeed its PVR cousin - the HDR-FOX T2 - the wait has been long and hard. The HD-FOX T2 has since been given magical PVR powers through the use of external storage, and now the wait for IPTV is almost over. While Humax hasn't told us exactly when the TV Portal software will be made available to the public, tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of the release of the T2. Whether that's relevant we're not sure, but either way, we believe the release of the firmware update is merely days if not hours away. So, what do we think of it? As IPTV services on home AV products go, the Humax TV Portal is excellent. We're playing with a late-stage Beta, so it's not quite the finished article yet, but all the same, it works almost flawlessly.
The firmware update is applied in the same way as all other Humax firmware updates. You put the 16MB file on a FAT32 USB stick, insert it into the device and restart it with the standby button held in. It took a couple of minutes to install and then the device booted back up again without a problem.
For the last year, new Humax remote controls have had a green 'TV Portal' button on them, and this button now has a purpose.
A press of the TV Portal button will load up the new interface, and on our T2 it took about 10 seconds to load up properly. Whatever you were watching before you pressed it will continue playing in the top left corner. On launch there are five apps available in the portal - Sky Player, BBC iPlayer, Internet Radio, WIKI @ TV and an unofficial Flickr app.
If you press red on this menu you're taken to what's called 'simple mode' where the app icons are displayed at the bottom of the screen on top of whatever you're watching on the Humax box. This is a nice feature as it enables you to launch into Sky Player etc without having to jump through hoops. Sky Player Obviously in the case of Sky Player you're going to need a subscription, but we're pleased to report that it works perfectly.
The first time you load it, you need to enter your Sky Player username and password, but once you've been through this fairly painless process, you won't need to do it again. It takes about 10 seconds to load up the app - presumably the loading time is something that could well be improved with later updates - and once you're in you have access to most of the Sky Player content you have a subscription for.
Missing channels We say most because there are some notable exceptions. Sky One and ESPN are two of the channels mysteriously absent from the EPG. We can access them from our account on a PC or Xbox, so why they're not available on the Humax box we have no idea. We have a full subscription to Sky Player which means we should have access to all channels, but the only ones available to us on the Humax box are as follows: GOLD, Sky Arts 1, Sky Movies Premier, Sky Movies Showcase, Sky Movies Action, Sky Movies Family, MTV, Sky Sports 1, 2, 3 & 4, Sky Sports News, Sky News, National Geographic, National Geographic Wild, History, Eden, Crime & Investigation, Cartoon Network, Boomerang, Nickelodeon, Disney XD, Disney Channel and Nick Jr. Clearly this limited channel line-up is a bit of an issue for anyone thinking of subscribing to Sky Player especially for the purposes of watching through the Humax portal. We've asked humax for comment and will update you asap on this. UPDATE: The good folks at Humax have got back to us on this issue with the following: "Some channels are still awaiting the rights clearance and they should be available fairly soon. Humax hope to have Sky 1 shortly." So there you go.
Apart from the trimmed list of available channels, the live TV interface is much like you'll find on a regular Sky box. The channel browser is exactly the same, and in fact the only real difference is that it takes around five seconds to change a channel due to the need to load a buffer. Quality Sky Player is renowned for the picture quality of its live TV, and that quality is retained in the Humax TV Portal app.
Clearly it's not up to the standard of Sky HD, but it's only marginally worse than you'd find from a normal Sky satellite box. Even up on a 42-inch plasma it looks great. The same can't be said for the on-demand content, though. Sky Player on PC and Xbox Live has on demand content available at the same resolution as live TV. But we noticed a bit of a drop-off in quality when we switched from Sky Sports 1 to the on demand highlights of the England-Australia ODI match from yesterday.
The EPG is also decent, and is displayed at maximum resolution - so if you've got your Humax box set to a 1080p output, the EPG and the rest of the Humax TV Portal interface for that matter, will be sharp as you like.
The BBC iPlayer interface on the Humax Portal is very similar to other versions of embedded iPlayer we've seen. So if you've used it on a Sony TV or a PlayStation 3, you'll be very familiar with it.
It's fairly quick to load, albeit more sluggish than Sky Player on our fast-as-you-like connection - it seems to take 15-20 seconds to load up from the Portal menu. Quality is brilliant and loading times once you're in are not too much of an issue at all. All videos open in full screen without needing an additional button click - always a relief.
Unlike Sky Player there's no access to live TV, but why you'd need a feature like that on a Freeview HD box we don't know. Internet Radio Using a set-top box and TV combo to listen to the radio is a bit of a bugbear for us. It's got to be the most energy inefficient and environmentally unfriendly method of entertainment imaginable.
However, if you simply must use this feature, the Internet TV app seems to work pretty well. It's a it of a pain to navigate using the remote control, but once you've found stations you like it's super-easy to add to your favourites list.
Curiously, even though there's a BBC menu option fairly high up in the menu system, the only channel in there is something claiming to be 'BBC Russia'. A browse through the UK stations and a search for BBC confirmed that there really are none of the popular BBC radio stations available here. Flickr and WIKI @ TV The last two apps are an unofficial Flickr app which seems fairly useless as it doesn't appear to have a search option. The app itself boldly displays a message saying "this product uses the Flickr API but is not endorsed or certified by Flickr".
Without a search option we were left to browse the images in the 'explore' screen. We were able to enter an email address in order to track down a friend's Flickr images, but there was no option to search for specific pictures.
And the WIKI @ TV app is exactly as you'd expect - it allows you to search Wikipedia. It's a basic interface but it seemed to work fairly well. We can imagine it being useful on the odd occasion to look up something you've just heard on QI, but really, we can't imagine ever using it ourselves. Verdict Clearly, the major draws of the Humax TV Portal are Sky Player and BBC iPlayer. And so that's what we're going to judge it on. Both services work very well and we can't imagine anyone being disappointed by the quality of the video or the simplicity of the interfaces. Browsing is quick and painless. The missing Sky Player channels are a bit of a a let-down, but if Humax is right and the likes of Sky One will be added shortly, there's no need to lose any sleep over it. 
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| New world texting champions crowned Posted: 27 Jan 2011 03:56 AM PST  It's around this time of year that LG wheels out its old PR trick of holding a global speed-texting competition and Being fast at texting is really no big deal in this day and age, with the average teenager able to tap out an SMS message at approximately the speed of light. Still, contestants from sixteen countries participated in LG's "global" competition, which saw champions using the LG Chocolate and LG Town handsets to show off their text-writing prowess. Kids of today, eh? Since the younger generations have now grown up texting each other, it's no surprise that winners of LG's competition are 15 and 20 years old. Cristina and Jennifer Sales Ancines from Panama were crowned the fastest texters, although they did not manage to beat the current world record for texting on a traditional 1-9 numberpad. We're sure the $100,000 prize money will make up for that though. One record was set though; fastest texting on a QWERTY handset. Cheong Kit Au managed to tap out a 264-character text in one minute and 17 seconds. 
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| Yahoo nabs more online exclusive football content Posted: 27 Jan 2011 03:42 AM PST  Yahoo has announced it has teamed up with the League Managers Association to offer exclusive interviews with football managers through its site. Yahoo has already got online rights to Premiership highlights but this new deal with the LMA will offer managerial insight with interviews from Premier league honchos and also online question and answer sessions. All of this content will be hosted on a microsite called 'The Dugout'. Cutting a dash The first manager up to the challenge of answering questions from the great unwashed is Robert di Matteo who, according to Yahoo, is "cutting a dash" as West Bromwich Albion manager. "The LMA is delighted to have signed a partnership with Yahoo," said Richard Bevan, CEO of the LMA. "Working with a brand with such a global presence and reach is significant for the LMA. "The association and its members look forward to delivering some unique, compelling content and insight into management across the leagues for Yahoo's football fans." If you fancy asking Matteo and other managers a question, then head over to Yahoo Sport. 
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| HTC Desire 2 sneaks out ahead of MWC Posted: 27 Jan 2011 03:33 AM PST  HTC's Mobile World Congress announcements are not going to be much of a surprise, with its latest premier Android handset being papped on a Taiwanese subway. Along with an Android tablet and one, possibly two, HTC Facebook phones, we can now expect to see this sultry little number make an appearance in Barcelona. This could well be the Desire refresh we predicted; it certainly looks the part with that high-end HTC look. Higher desire One thing that's missing is the trackpad – the new handset will presumably rely on the touchscreen for navigation. Not much else can be gleaned from the fuzzy shots, other than the presence of a 3.5mm headphone jack, front-facing camera and a lovely sleek look. There's not long to wait for all the official details, which will no doubt be revealed at MWC next month; we'll also be bringing you our first hands on review of the mystery device. 
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| Sky: Half of UK's 3D TVs signed up for Sky 3D Posted: 27 Jan 2011 03:17 AM PST  Sky has revealed that 70,000 people are now signed up for Sky 3D claiming that "thousands more" are signing up each week and half of the 3D televisions in the UK use the service. Sky has expressed its delight at reaching the figure since the channel launched on 1 October, with the total reached in just under four months. The service is free to those people on Sky's top package, but you do, of course, need a 3D enabled television to watch it on. "3D has got off to a great start with around 70,000 customers having signed up to the service in the first few months," said Sky chief executive Jeremy Darroch. "We are very happy with the progress of 3D to date and are really encouraged by the feedback we are getting from customers." 50 per cent Sky 3D's channel director John Cassy believes that the lion's share of 3D-enabled televisions have been connected up to the service. "Around half of all 3D TVs sold so far in the UK are connected to Sky 3D, with thousands more joining every week," said Cassy "The hugely positive response from customers, all of whom are tuning into Sky 3D on a weekly basis, gives us great confidence for the future. "Since the launch on the 1 October we have had a number of world firsts – with the world TV premieres of Avatar, Alice in Wonderland and the Toy Story trilogy. "Coming up we will have our 100th live sports 3D broadcast, further cementing our position as a world leader in 3D sports production. "We are also continuing to increase the breadth of our 3D programming, including performances by Diversity, natural history documentaries from Sir David Attenborough, and another world first,an upcoming broadcast of ENO's new production of Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia". 
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| Updated: Sony NGP: everything you need to know Posted: 27 Jan 2011 03:11 AM PST  It's here! And by "here!" we mean "announced, but not out for months!" After much rumour and speculation, Sony has unveiled the PSP2, which it has dubbed the NGP (and looks nothing like the far out mockup pics). So what are the specifications, when will the UK release date be and how much will it cost? Let's see what Sony's been saying. The PSP2's name is NGP Sony's codename for the PSP2 is NGP, which stands for Nice Gamey Playtime. Only kidding. It stands for Next Generation Portable.
The PSP2 specifications are pretty tasty The PSP's replacement has a five-inch, 16 million colour 960x544 OLED touchscreen, twin cameras, twin speakers and a microphone. There are also twin analogue sticks and a ridiculously powerful quad-core processor based on the ARM Cortex A9. Expect four to five hours from the battery. It's got twin sticks The "biggest criticism" of the original PSP, according to GamesRadar's Justin Towell, was that it had no second stick. "Why is a second stick so important? It allows you to move your character with one stick while looking with the other." The PSP2 specs include a touch-sensitive back The rumour factory got this one right: the NGP includes a touch-sensitive back so you can control the on-screen action without hiding it behind your fingers. The screen's multi-touch too. The combination of a touchy front and back is fascinating - Sony talks about it enabling "touch, grab, trace, push and pull hand movements."
The PSP2 specs include POWERVR graphics The NGP doesn't just have that nifty quad-core processor: it's got a quad-core Imagination Technologies PowerVR graphics processor too. We can summarise its spec in one word: mighty. The PSP2 specifications include GPS Sony promises that the PSP2's built-in GPS will mean some interesting location-aware games via the PlayStation Network, and an application called Near will let you know if your friends are, you've guessed it, near you. The PSP2 also includes a three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer and three-axis electronic compass for handheld-waggling motion-controlled tomfoolery.
The PSP2 design looks a bit like a PSP or PSPgo Sony calls the PSP2's shape Super Oval Design, which is one in the eye for anyone who expected mere Ordinary Oval Design. It looks quite like a PSP, we think. It'll be 13mm longer than the PSP-3000 at 182mm in length - that's big. Thickness? 18.6mm. The PSP2 UK price will be so low, Sony will lose money That's what a little bird told Eurogamer, anyway.
PSP2 games won't be download-only The rumour mill predicted download-only games, but while the NGP does indeed support downloadable games the device introduces yet another new format, "a small flash memory based card dedicated for NGP software titles". What Sony has said is that the games will be "PS3 quality" - quite some achievement if it pans out. Trophies will be coming too It seems that Sony's Trophies system from the PlayStation Network will also appear so you can score points wherever you play - even on your Android mobile.... The PSP2 will play Android games; Android will get PlayStation games The newly announced PS Suite is fascinating: it'll bring PlayStation games to Android, and casual games from Android to the NGP. Could we also see games become cross-platform with the PS3? The PSP2 will have a 3G connection (and Wi-Fi) The NGP has all the connectivity options you could ask for: 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, and 3G. That always-on connectivity means it's ideal for social games too - so much so that Sony's gone rabbit-ears crazy in the press release, promising 'infinite possibilities for users to "encounter", "connect", "discover", "share" and "play" with friends wherever they are.' Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) says that every game title for NGP will be provided with a space called LiveArea where "users can share the fun and excitement with other players".
The PSP2 UK release date will be late 2011 Sony's a bit vague on this one. "NGP will arrive at the end of 2011", it says. In time for a lot of Christmas stockings then...
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| Nintendo profits drop ahead of 3DS launch Posted: 27 Jan 2011 03:00 AM PST  Nintendo has announced a 46 per cent drop in quarterly profits, with the Japanese gaming giant's sales hit hard by the impending arrival of its next generation handheld, the 3DS. With the 3Ds launch imminent, Q4 sales of the DS plummeted, and Sony compounded the misery at Nintendo HQ by announcing the PSP2 – or PlayStation NGP. Sales fals were always likely as people held off buying their latest handheld, but Nintendo was also forced to cut its sales forecast for the Wii as well – from 17.5 million to 16 million in the first quarter of 2011. Sales forecasts of the DS were dropped from 22.5 million units to 23.5 million. Attach rates Things were not all bad, however, with operating profit maintained thanks to stronger sales of software for the Wii. Nintendo has shown its resilience in the past, though, and despite the PSP2 announcement the 3DS is likely to sell well to its legion of fans. The portable console brings a 3D screen which has garnered huge attention, along with an analogue stick and a whole host of slightly scary social functionality. 
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| Hannspree launches new LED TVs Posted: 27 Jan 2011 02:37 AM PST  Hannspree, everyone's favourite novelty TV manufacturer, has revealed a couple of serious new LED TVs, known as the SV Series. Available in a 32-inch and 42-inch screen size, the two LED idiot boxes include Hannspree's Vivid Motion 100Hz technology – this should result in smoother picture transitions and flicker-free films. The Full HD 1080p displays have the super-wide viewing angle of 178 degrees and a 16:9 aspect ratio. El ee dee As with all TVs these days, there are ports galore – three HDMI, two Scart, a USB port for video input and component and VGA inputs too. There's no internet connectivity on board, although you could get a set top box for this if you're into that kind of thing. Unfortunately for some, the new models only come in boring rectangle, and not in squirrel or apple-shaped fascias. Still, they're slim and unassuming. The SV series TVs are available now, with fairly reasonable UK pricing: £419.99 for the 32-inch and £549.99 for the 42-inch. 
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| Review: Acoustic Energy Neo V2 Posted: 27 Jan 2011 02:11 AM PST  Neo V2 is a pimped-up version of Acoustic Energy's original Neo system, which is named after Neodymium, the material from which its driver magnets are made. Neo Mk 1 was the first budget speaker range to use this high quality, low-distortion material, and its implementation on this new version is still big news given Neo V3's invitingly affordable price tag. Elsewhere, this Neo range has been extensively tweaked to build on its predecessor's performance, including new crossovers and improvements to the high-and low-frequency drivers (resulting in half an octave of extra bandwidth from the latter). Well stacked This system reviewed here includes a pair of floorstanding Neo Threes for L/R, a pair of Neo One standmounts for the surround channels, the Neo Centre and Neo Sub, which packs a 200W amplifier. They're all available in a choice of two finishes: black, or the classier Vermont walnut sported by our samples. With smoothly curved edges and the Neo Three's black screw-on plinths, the cabinets have a smart, contemporary appearance. The invisible magnetic grille fixings ensure the tidy aspect and each speaker boasts a build quality to die for.
Neo Three, a two-and-a-half way, reflex-loaded design, features a 5in bass/mid driver with a twin Neodymium magnet assembly and long throw voice coils. Meanwhile, the tweeters use a dual-ring radiator design with air-core inductors, and are able to stretch to a Blu-ray-friendly frequency of 45kHz. The Neo Centre employs an identical driver array to the Neo Threes to ensure homogenous frontal tonality. As for the subwoofer, its compact size belies its power. On the rear panel is an unusually high dial count, including controls for volume, crossover and phase, as well as notch frequency, slope and level to counter problems with room acoustics. Line input and an output phonos are also provided. All of this brain-bending tech sounds great on paper, but what it adds up to in the real world is sensational sound quality. Paired up with an Onkyo TX-NR906, the Neo V2 system delivers a beautifully clean and dry sound, stripped of unwanted colour. This is as neutral and refined as home cinema gets at this price, and it effortlessly does full justice to Iron Man 2's high-octane DTS-HD Master Audio track. The Neo Threes, Ones and Centre deliver a fastpaced, attacking sound, offering punchy transients and digging out detail like a sonic archaeologist. Auditioned in isolation, their bass extension is so deep you'd be forgiven for thinking the subwoofer was involved. Low-end talent But, of course, the system is at its best with the Neo Sub underpinning the action. It's a top-notch performer, driving low-end effects into the room with extraordinary tautness, heft and agility. These bass tones are as clean and solid as they come. Check out the scene in which Tony and Rhodes clobber 12 bales of tin out of each other at the party. As they thump against walls and shoot cannons to the strains of Daft Punk's Robot Rock, the effects are rich and potent, topped off by a hearty rumble as Rhodey blasts off through the roof. Superb stuff. Listening to the Monaco Grand Prix scene, you get a sense of what Martin Brundle feels like doing the grid walk. Formula 1 car engines rev up with a beefy roar, and during the race they zoom from speaker to speaker with no discernible difference in tone, highlighting the system's excellent cohesion. Sharp, incisive effects, such as the buzzing and crackling of Vanko's home-made weaponry, bring zip and liveliness to the soundstage, and as he goes toe to toe with Iron Man the excitement is palpable. High frequencies have a crisp, clean flavour and there's a delightful subtlety during quieter scenes; Tony's hi-tech workshop is alive with delicate clicking and beeping. The Neo Centre weighs in with excellent dialogue reproduction, lending superb clarity and weight to Tony's speech at the Stark Expo. Only one flaw to report – as Rhodes flies to the Army base after his fight with Tony, the booming rockets caused some distortion at high volume and made the Neo Three's low-mid drivers flap more wildly than expected. Even so, I'd rate this £1,200 array as a sensationally good purchase, especially when you throw in its sophisticated performance with music, lapping up a wide range of songs Related Links
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