PMP Today

The Nintendo DS and DS Lite have reached a combined sales of 50 million, an impressive milestone for any product. It’s predecessor, Nintendo’s popular Game Boy took 16 years to sell 119 million units; DS took only 3 years to reach 50 million. The Japanese were the most avid fans of the DS buying 20 million of them. Sony’s PlayStation Portable, DS’s closest rival, has sold 25 million so far and has recently surpassed DS on weekly sales having been boosted by its new slim identity and a new game titled “Crisis Core” of added to its line up.

[via dsfanboy]

Like many Chinese PMPs, the E350 will have the familiar red light touch pad that LG popularized. The E350 itself is a 3.6-inch screen that supports 1.6 million colors, good enough for playing movies in MPG, MPEG, RM, RMVB, AVI, FLV,  formats. We assume the E350 also plays music and does multitasking so you can read an e-Book while listening to your favorite tune. This MP4 player isn’t priced yet, but it looks an under $200 device to me.

[via aving]

The HMP-400 from Shenzhen Powtele supports a wide variety of formats, including MPEG-1 (DAT), MPEG-2 (VOB), Xvid, DivX. 3. 11, 4.0 and 5.0, AVI and MPEG-4 videos, MP3, WMA, AC3, PCM and ADPCM audio files, JPEGs and TXT documents. It’ll even handle 8-bit games, in case you wanted to frag old-school style.

The device has a 4-inch TFT screen with a resolution of 480×272 pixels and comes in 40GB, 60GB and 80GB variants, all of which use a 2.5-inch HDD. Memory expansion is possible through the built-in SD slot, which accepts cards up to 4GB in capacity. A USB 2.0 port is standard, and battery life is claimed to be 4 to 5 hours for video and 10 hours for audio. Dimensions are 152×84x25mm.

[via b2bchinasources]

The Michelin Red Book is Europe’s number one restaurant guide and it is so prestigious that its rankings can make or break a restaurant. It’s very popular in Europe but not so much in the United States, which is why ViaMichelin X790, a GPS device maker and mapping device, might face some difficulties in the US market.

The X790 is about the size of a Nintendo DS and comes with a power cable, base, and built-in speaker. It works like your basic GPS unit; all you really have to do is program your destination and you’re set. What makes this different from the typical GPS unit is that the X790 includes content from the Michelin Green Guide. Thus, famous points of interests, such as five-star restaurants and the like, will appear on the GPS. It even works with ViaMichelin.com so that drag and drop restaurants and other interesting destinations into your unit. The X790 will be available soon for $399, although they are offering a $349 introductory rate.

[via crunch gear]

Is iPhone blooming? It definitely seems that way to me. The iPhone can now play multimedia attachments (at least those WAV and MP3 files) and now guess what the new firmware 1.1.1 update has dropped on iPhone. Yes, iPhone is now Bluetooth capable. It’s not perfect yet. Apparently, it only plays mono and there is some audio leakage via the speaker. There was also the possibility that this wasn’t activated by version 1.1.1 but by 1.0.2.

[via engadget]

First we found this Nano Fatty Clone. The beat (and the blatant imitation) goes on with the HYF58, which is HwaYee Limited’s take on the iPod Nano. The device plays MPEG-4 videos, and MP1, MP2, MP3, WMA, WMV, ASF and WAV files (with ID3 tags and lyric support) while supporting JPEGs.

A 1.8-inch TFT display and a USB 2.0 port are built-in. FM radio and folder password-protection functionality are likewise included. The HYF58 also has a microphone and can record audio for a maximum of 35 hours. Available colors are silver, black, blue, pink, red and green (hey, that’s one more than the real Nano). Windows 98, ME, 2000 and XP, Mac OS X, and Linux Kernel 2.4.2 and newer are supported.

[via made-in-china]

Bangalore-based technology marketer of digital products Computer Kitchen has tied up with Venzero Ltd., to sell the entire range of Venzero products in India. Venzero believes that India is an important market for their products, and Computer Kitchen makes the ideal parter because of their in-house servicing capabilities and marketing and technical support. The product range for the Indian market includes the Venzero ONE, Venzero X1, Venzero Mini, and the Venzero Slickr.

Venzero’s gadgets typically have features like an FM transmitter (enabling a car radio/PMP correlation) and built-in WiFi to stream online radio stations. You’re probably familiar with the Venzero Mini and the Venzero Slickr as we’ve already written about them before. The Venzero ONE has a unique new feature called Shareport, a podcast player and sharing feature. With dimensions of a 3.8 x 2.3 x 0.55, it’s got a 2-inch QVGA display, a storage capacity of 12 GB, video playback, 90dB SNR, and even an RSS reader. It’ll cost Rs 15,990. The Venzero X1 is an mp3 player that also works as an SD card reader. It has five equalizer presets, three playback modes, and supports mp3 and wma files. At a compact size of 55 x 55 x 15 mm, it fits in any pocket and makes it easy to take with you anywhere. It will be available in India for around Rs. 3,425.

[via it news online]

Now this is a case of a Chinese manufacturer cloning another Chinese manufacturer’s product. Judge for yourself. The ZARVA MV570 has a 4.3-inch wide aspect screen, plays AVI, MPG, VOB, DAT, MP3, WMA, OGG, JPEG and TXT and has an MSRP of 1,900 yuan for the 80GB. It’s pricier than Blog Tang A+, which goes for only 1599 with the same storage capacity, but perhaps with the ZARVA brand stamped on it, consumers will find the MV570 worth the 401 yuan premium.

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No multimedia attachments on the iPhone? Apparently, Apple has a lot of explaining to do, because as BGR found out the iPhone can play voicemail attachments in MP3 and .WAV formats. You’ll need to download Winamp and WMP. Apparently, having OS X inside makes the iPhone too complex even for Apple, they forgot to announce this feature. Maybe the iPhone has other unknown features. We’ll be looking in our inbox for your report.

[via bgr]

I have a feeling Blog Tang A+ is going to be a hit. It features a HD storage that maxes out at 160GB. The 4.3-inch LCD screen supports 16.7 million colors and plays high-def videos at an acceptable 30fps or thereabouts. Video support for MP4, AVI, VOB, DAT and aduio support for MP3, WMA and OGG and also for JPEG, BMP and TXT. It’s got line-in recording, TV out and USB 2.0. MSRP is as follows: 40GB 1,299 yuan ($173), 1,599 yuan 80GB(213), 120GB 1,899 yuan(253), 2,199 yuan 160GB($293).

[via zol] Read the rest »