MP3

August 28, 2008 If you’re sick of fumbling with your iPod while hurtling down the freeway Sony have just the thing with the announcement of four new Xplod in-dash head units that are able to connect directly to compatible iPods and allow users to charge and control their iPod devices on the road. Each new unit supports HPF/LPF sound quality, feature 52 watts X 4 peak output enhancements and, if you’re one of the few holding out from joining the iPod brigade, there’s an auxiliary input on the faceplates, facilitating the use of other portable music players with a standard 1/8-inch mini jack cord, which is available separately. Read More
Griffin iTrip Universal streams anything with a headphone jack to an FM radio
By Emily Clark
21:23 August 13, 2008

August 14, 2008 The downside to prior FM transmitters for the iPod is that they only work with an iPod. The new iTrip Universal from Griffin adds an FM transmitter to any audio player with a headphone jack. Read More

The semi-autonomous robotic boombox the Miuro has a new big brother. Tiger Electronics, a division of Hasbro Inc. has teamed up with Japanese distributor SEGA Toys to introduce the Automated Music Personality (A.M.P), a 2.4 feet (73 cm) tall black robot that can be hooked up to an MP3 player or iPod and bobs its head and dances while red LED lights on its head flash. The A.M.P. pumps out 12 watts of stereo sound through a 5" mid-range speaker and two high output tweeters while more boom can be added to any song with the dedicated bass boost button. The A.M.P. also features two turntable shaped hands that allow users to be the DJ and use A.M.P. as a virtual mixing deck. The touch pad hands serve as a way to layer different sound effects and scratches over the music with the left touch pad used to add music effects and the right touch pad controlling the audio. Read More

Designed as a quality alternative to the often unsatisfying speaker systems in mobile phones, this compact and totally wireless sound audio system offers four hours of playback from Bluetooth devices to a range of 33 feet, as well as a plug-in solution for listening to personal media or CD players while you're out and about. Read More

While the Compact Disc may be on its last legs, usurped by Flash based personal media players, DVDs and now Blu-Ray Discs, that hasn't stopped South Korean designer Kim Yong Seong turning out an interesting design for a portable music player that supports CDs and MP3 files. Kim has dubbed his proposed design the DMP, short for Dual Music Player, which plays MP3 files in the compact closed position and then flips open to form two arms that support a CD. MP3 files and charging would come courtesy of a USB connection and the device would also do away with messy headphone cables through Bluetooth support. Read More

April 30, 2008 Featuring an intuitive touch-screen interface and capable of storing up to 3000 CDs in their original quality, the OPUS No4 is pitched at music lovers who want to spend less time managing their collection, and more time enjoying it. Read More

April 3, 2008 In a quest to find "the absolute least amount of data needed to reproduce a piece of music", researchers at the University of Rochester have digitally encoded a 20-second clarinet solo into a file that's less than a kilobyte in size - nearly 1,000 times smaller than standard MP3 compression. Read More

March 26, 2008 The diminutive modu has taken the title of "World's lightest mobile phone" with the 40.1 g (1.41 oz) handset's claim made official by the Guinness World Records. Although it's a great talking point, the record is secondary to the innovation offered by the multi-tasking phone that will launch in Q4 this year. As the name suggests, modu is designed as a modular device that will be complemented by a range of "ecosystem partners" - interchangeable add-on enclosures that transform the appearance and user interface of the phone, as well as dedicated consumer electronics devices such as MP4 players, digital photo frames, car stereos and cameras that directly integrate the modu. In other words, modu is a mobile phone that also acts bit like a SIM card with a brain to form the basic building block in a potentially wide ranging personal communications and entertainment system. Read More

February 26, 2008 These days the mobile phone is as much a fashion accessory as it is a communications device and UK-based manufacturer Onyx is focusing on the former with its first plunge into the mobile phone space - the Liscio. Weighing in at 60 grams, the highly-contoured and compact ( 90 x 35 x 17.8mm) bundle features built-in MP3 and FM radio functionality, Bluetooth v1.2, a 1.10 inch, 96 x 96 pixel LED color screen and 128MB on-board memory backed by a Micro SD card up to 1GB. Read More
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