Mighty Gadget Blog: The latest technology news & reviews in the UK

September 15^th. Mark it in your diaries. Thats the date some leaked Zune packaging was bearing. It’s the PMP we’re all waiting for(if you’re one of these that don’t like Apple especially). Piece by piece fanboys have tried to source the clues and got Microsoft to spill the proverbial beans.

The OLED toting PMP looks nice. It’s specs sound nice, c’mon you know it cant disappoint can it? Well unfortunately the September 15th date is only for the States and Microsoft are keeping quiet as to when us Brits will get a go of it and we havent even got the first Zune which was realeased nearly 3 years ago and has had several models since then too.

Also there’s still no news on a price but a lot of rumours are flying round the £150 mark. C’mon Microsoft pull your finger out and let us limeys in.

Paul Thurrott, a Microsoft guru, has said the ZuneHD is slated to ship September 5, 2009. Unfortunately in his blog post he has quoted CNET saying that:

The Zune HD, which will be available in the U.S. only starting this fall

 

So it looks like the Zune HD may not be getting an international release after all.

Engadget have been lucky enough to get some hands on time with the Zune HD following the exclusive demo that Steve Ballmer carried out.

The device is only a pre-production model however Engadget didn't notice a single hiccup while jumping through menus or playing back HD video.

They found the OLED screen to be absolutely stunning with colours being bright, edges crisp, and text clear.

The UI is an extension of the existing Zune interface, but way tricked out in this version, with lots of flipping images, scaling text, smooth scrolling, and an extreme emphasis on simple visual navigation.

More images and a video after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

There has been a lot of rumours flying around about the Zune HD in the recent weeks, and it has now been officially announced.

So far the specs are a little sketchy but Microsoft have revealed that the Zune HD will include a 3.3-inch, 480 x 272 OLED capacitive touchscreen display, built-in HD Radio receiver, HD output (utilizing a new dock -- not on-board).

However the specs do conform to the leaked specifications a few weeks ago which includes:

• NVIDIA Tegra processor/gpu
• 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, and 32GB versions
• HDMI Connection to stream straight to your TV
• HD Radio.
• Web Browser.
• WiFi compatible, with wireless marketplace.
• Released, early fall.
• International Release
• Home AV packs, Car packs, Charge packs.

Microsoft are getting rind of the squircle in favour a full multitouch device and they have suggested that some new touch-friendly apps and games would be released.

The device will boast an IE-based, customized browser, but little else was said in the way of software.

Zune integration is coming to the Xbox and Xbox Live, as the Zune marketplace will step in to replace the current Live video resources, expanding the library and offering all kinds of new perks.

It is also believed that the Zune will be released internationally!

Press release after the jump

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Zdnet are reporting some very interesting information about the rumoured Microsoft Pink Phone.

While the Pink Phone has not been confirmed the rumours are largely fuelled by the specification for the Windows Mobile 7 Chassis 1.

According to Znet they received the following specification from a “trustworthy source”

WM7 Chassis 1 Specification

Core requirements:
Processor: ARM v6+, L2 Cache, VFP, Open GL ES 2.0 graphics HW (QCOM 8k, Nvidia AP15/16(AKA Tagra) and TI 3430 all meet spec)
Memory: 256MB+ DRAM, 1G+ Flash (at least 512MB fast flash – 5MB/s unbuffered read @4K block size)
Display:  WVGA (800×480) or FWVGA (854×480) 3.5” or greater diagonal
Touch: Multi-touch required
Battery: Sufficient to meet Days of Use LTK requirements.
Controls: Start, Back, Send and End are required (soft controls allowed as long as they are always present).

Peripherals:
Camera: 3MP+, flash optional, 2nd camera optional (VGA resolution sufficient)
GPS: aGPS required
Sensors required: Light Sensor, Compass (3 axis, 5 degrees, 100 Hz sample rate), Accelerometer (3 axis, 2mg resolution, 100 Hz sample rate)
USB: High speed required, 20 MB/s transfer rate.
BlueTooth: BT2.1 required, must run MSFT BT stack, CSR BlueCore6 or later recommended.
Wi-Fi: 802.11B/G required, must run MSFT Native Wi-Fi stack, Atheros 6002 or Broadcomm 4325 recommended.
Connectors: Micro USB and 3.5mm Audio required.

Options:
FM tuner:  If tuner HW is present it will be detected and supported by the Media application.
Haptics
SD Card (Micro SD recommended)
DPAD, qwerty or 12/20 key keyboards all optional

It is strongly suspected that the reference to the QCOM 8k will be the immense Snapdragon's QSD8xxx-series chips

It is also worth noting that the NVIDIA Tegra platform is specifically listed as meeting the core CPU requirements, as well as TI's OMAP 3 platform and the Snapdragon. So in theory the hardware specification all add up, and more importantly they all add up to be a potentially awesome phone.

Neo Win are reporting some exclusive details about the new Microsoft Zune HD. They are claiming that these details have been confirmed by sources within Microsoft so in theory they should be true, which would mean we may be in for quite a treat from the new Zune HD.

Zune HD specs:

• Appoximately a 3.6 inch OLED touch screen
• NVIDIA Tegra processor/gpu
• 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, and 32GB versions
• HDMI Connection to stream straight to your TV
• HD Radio.
• Web Browser.
• WiFi compatible, with wireless marketplace.
• Released, early fall.
• International Release
• Home AV packs, Car packs, Charge packs.

Image from Engadget

There has been quite a few rumours flying around about the Zune recently, including a new HD Zune. This time it is believed that MS maybe released Zune software on mobile phones. According to Adweek Microsoft is auditioning three major ad agencies for the launch of a new mobile service called "Pink".

It is believed that the Zune software will like be the media and software service used on Windows Mobile Devices.