This Week in EGG

The internet has gotten hold of the EGG, and as such have revealed their first impressions. Browse through some of these and let us know what you think below in the comment section!

Our sister site: ZiiEGG.com

DAPreview (DaHarder)

Anything But iPod

Also, Engadget unveiled a roadmap for development on the platform, which you can see in this article.

Additionally, ZiiLABS has announced that they will be using the Wolfson WM8350 audio chip in the device for audio processing. This will work in union with the ZMS-05 processor, which will do almost all of the work except audio processing. It’s an interesting step, but the chip claims to be a very power-efficient one, and could increase battery life for the audio side. Read more about the WM8350 here, and read the ZiiLABS press release below.

PS3 Slim Arrives, Slimmer and Less Shinier

The Ps3 Slim Sony used to deny is for real! As of today, the old PS3 (160GB) is going down in price by a meaty $100 to drop to 399, or you could wait for a slim, matte PS3 for 299.

The Slim will come with a 120GB HDD. It’s almost 4LBS lighter than the older PS3, using 30W less power at 250W compared to the old 280W. As you might know, the old PS3’s could be set up vertically or horizontally, however the Slim requires you to buy a $24 stand if you want to go vertical.

Was this a desperation move from Sony to boost PS3 sales? Will this be able to take off successfully?

EDIT: Old PS3 price updated, thanks Kelvin for the tip, my friend and fellow Tech In Hiding blogger.

A Bit More on the Zii EGG

After the release of the EGG, there was much excitement about the “next big thing” from the little company that could. However, there were also a few issues that sprung up regarding the shipment unit- and I got some answers.

• Despite the various differences around the web with regards to capitalization and spelling, the official product name is the Zii EGG – with the entire EGG part capitalized.
• The HD cable is not included with the SDK package- and the box contents over at ZiiLABS is much clearer. The device box will include the following: the Zii EGG, earphones, a USB cable, the wall charger, and a warranty card.
• The 32GB included in the SDK promotion is embedded in the device. This is not the 0GB device that ZiiLABS offers to OEMs so they can add 32GB of storage via SDHC.
• The device is of matte plastic material. A comparison shot can be seen here on a fake iPhone.
• Currently the only shipping countries are those listed. No mention of you poor Australian people who want the device.
• No new information on the battery life. The focus at this point is on developers and thus there is no stable benchmark for battery life.
• The SDK contains all the tools, libraries and example applications to get developers started. It will be officially supported under Ubuntu 8.04 using the Eclipse program. This is great because people who are on any system now can (for free) install Ubuntu as a secondary OS to program in without messing up the Windows/Mac system. And if you’re already in Ubuntu, then you know how to manage your OS properly and probably already know a decent amount of programming.

On another note, I’ll be launching an app store over at ZiiEGG.com soon- please post in the forums links to free Android programs so that I can begin building the collection!

Zii Consumer Edition “In Development”

I learned a brief tidbit about the consumer edition Zii- the consumer edition of the Zii EGG is currently in development. By questioning the sales department about interoperability between the EGG and the consumer editions software updates, a bit of previously unconfirmed information was dropped. Note, this is from a customer support rep, so this is definitely not as reliable as someone on the product team, but if they did know this, they would mean it’s fairly widespread at the company. See below for the full text- the top is my question, and the bottom the Creative reply.

Creative Patents Found For “Drag and Drop” on Touchscreen Devices, Revealing Tabbed Web Browsing

Remember when Creative took Apple’s lunch when they stole the ZEN UI? It seems like another Creative patent may come into play down the line to buffer the bottom line. This time, it’s for a drag and drop user interface for touchscreen devices. It was filed back in January 2008 under the 3DLabs brand, but it nontheless shows that the company has been working on the touchscreen for almost eighteen months. This is a patent application, and thus is not an official patent until the USPTO approves the application.

It seems that the way that the device will work is having an “action” area of the screen where the object (music title, album, video) is dragged onto the action tab with the finger. The copy/paste method also seems to be implemented this way- and the ability to copy/paste media files is a first for a Creative device.

Next Stop for Microsoft: Retail Store

The Microsoft Store, pre-alpha build.

Located in Scottsdale and Mission Viejo lies the beginnings of the first ever Microsoft retail store. Is this exciting? Not really. But at least now, Microsoft fans can tell Apple fans that they have their own store too, and Apple fans can reply with “The Apple Store came first!”, “Stop copying Apple”, or the infamous “Vista sucks.”

@Microsoft

PayPal Support Added to Xbox Live

Themes, 800 points. Fragging your ten year old neighbor, priceless. For everything money can't buy on Xbox Live, there's PayPal.

So what happens when you take a financial company that has access to your bank account and credit cards in addition to your eBay seller account and integrate some of its services with one of the world’s biggest technology companies? Nothing evil, of course, simply support for you to feed your debt gaming addiction through PayPal. In the land of the free only, as the US seems to be the only one that supports the “massively in debt, but I’ll keep spending anyways” customer base.  While it’s not full support, and it requires you to buy the Microsoft Points online through xbox.com in order for you to go to the console and then download the content, it makes it really easy. It’s not like they could have figured a way to hook up the PayPal account to distribute money to the account directly from your Xbox Dashboard thus saving a trip to the PC in the still slow web navigation. Just don’t start crying when either PayPal overcharges or Microsoft loses the transaction, or EA decides you need to buy the game twice. Just find a Twitter page and post it there. Please, no blog posts, as those end up on Digg and clogging my Reddit with “OMG PAYPAL STEELZ MY MONIES” and “MICRO$OFT HATES YOU” posts. I already have enough “Damn, EA sucks” posts on there as it is, and those never get old.

Major Nelson- PayPal now available for US Xbox LIVE Accounts

Zii Manual and More Pics Dropped By the FCC Confirming Consumer Model

The government and their loud mouths. After their little oopsie back when the Zii EGG was listed, they again have dropped a few files onto the FCC server with unreleased information on what appears to be a consumer manual for a Creative branded Zii. Additionally, they have posted some poorly taken images of the inside for us interested. Though they’re difficult to see, it appears that the battery is not removable, but rather replacable by the user like the Vision:M- takes a bit of work and voids your warranty- but looks possible if the shell is cracked.

Of note, the manual was written in March 2009- five months ago! The new Creative seems to have a top-notch secrecy plan in place. The only leak seems to be the bezel, which was mistaken for an iPod one (Caution: Apple fans may bite). The timeline is right- at the end of May, there would have been a good likelihood that a bezel was being sent for manufacturing with a target release at the end of August. Why is a consumer model confirmed? Because the follwing was found in the manual:

Opera to Power Zii EGG Platform

Today, ZiiLABS, in a rather unshocking move, announced that the Opera Devices SDK has been selected to power the internet browser. As noted in the press release, the company already packages the Opera browser, and this extends it to the SDK. I’m more of a Firefox person myself, but Mozilla seems very uninterested in the mobile space at this time, only releasing a few early builds for a few platforms. Full press release:

Zune HD Looking Pretty

The upcoming Tegra-Based Zune HD is looking pretty. Microsoft just released some official press shots. The Zune HD will come in your choice of silver or black. In the photos you can also catch few glimpses of it’s interface, which looks pretty stunning!

With the Zune HD and Zii Egg looking this good, I would think that Apple needs to add more than a camera in their upcoming (rumoured) iPod Touch 3rd Generation.

See more photos here.