Ripxx debuts Personal Measurement Device for exercise nerds and Olympic athletes



If we’re being candid, the Ripxx Personal Measurement Device (or PMD, as the hip kids call it) looks a lot like the original SPOT with the addition of a display. But aside from the physical likeness, there aren’t too many similarities between the two gizmos. Launched this month, the handheld fitness tool is apt to be a surefire winner for any competitive athlete, not to mention competitive individuals in general who just need a statistical way to track their dominance. Essentially, an integrated GPS tracker pumps out ten tracking signals every second during, let’s say, a ski run. That information, coupled with data gathered from a trio of accelerometers and gyroscopes, is used to record your location, orientation, speed, vertical drop, rolls, spins, turns and just about any other movement you make. Once you’re done, those points can be plotted on a map for review. We’re told that the U.S. Olympic team is already using a prototype to train for the 2010 winter games, though mere lay people won’t be able to buy one until mid-December for $329.

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Ripxx debuts Personal Measurement Device for exercise nerds and Olympic athletes originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 18:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Best Buy bringing value priced all-in-one 32-inch LCD & Blu-ray HDTV to stores “soon”



It’s not that surprising to learn Best Buy will be among those delivering a 1080p LCD with Blu-ray disc player packed in under its Insignia store brand, as we’ve been expecting rebadged units from overseas to hit the value market for some time. Marked “coming soon” at $599, it’s easily a few hundred less than a comparable model from Sharp, but buyers will have to live without some of the newer line items like 120Hz motion processing and a contrast ratio higher than 20,000:1. Though we don’t expect a lot in terms of load times, audio support or other features (no specs on the Blu-ray player noted) we’re sure a bedroom or dorm room somewhere will find a spot for the NS-LBD32X. Your move, Wal-mart.

[Thanks, Zach]

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Best Buy bringing value priced all-in-one 32-inch LCD & Blu-ray HDTV to stores “soon” originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 18:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Maingear, CyberPower and iBuyPower gaming desktops pick up ATI Radeon HD 5870



ATI’s Radeon HD 5870 GPU has already taken its rightful place within a few of Alienware’s newest desktops, but as with most every major GPU launch, a few of the smaller guys are also taking the opportunity to offer gamers the option to pick one up inside of a new rig. Maingear‘s Ephex, F131, Prelude, and Dash can all be ordered up right now with the staggeringly potent graphics card, and if none of those suit your fancy, CyberPower would be more than happy to have your business. In fact, it has squeezed the DirectX 11-friendly GPU into the Gamer Xtreme 4200 (starts at $999), Gamer Xtreme 5200 (starts at $1,393) and the AMD-based Gamer Dragon 9500 (starting at $927). Still on the hunt? iBuyPower has an eerily similar trio, though their lineup starts at just $819. Hit the read links below if you feel like putting together a system for kicks, but don’t blame us when the order button presses itself.

Read – Maingear rigs
Read – CyberPower rigs
Read – iBuyPower rigs

Continue reading Maingear, CyberPower and iBuyPower gaming desktops pick up ATI Radeon HD 5870

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Maingear, CyberPower and iBuyPower gaming desktops pick up ATI Radeon HD 5870 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jabra Stone to bring ‘new shape’ to Bluetooth headset field



C’mon, cut us some slack here. We’re suckers for teasers, and our intuition says that you are too. Jabra, who has definitely done a thing or two for the Bluetooth headset realm, is apparently looking to reveal a “new shape” on October 20th, though it’ll only be sold through AT&T (at least initially). Heck, there’s even a countdown timer over on the outfit’s teaser page for those who’d like to watch every second from now till then tick away, not to mention a brief video that tersely details the forthcoming excellence. So, got any bright ideas about what this thing could be? The second coming of the BT headset? Just another tchotchke?

[Via Electricpig]

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Jabra Stone to bring ‘new shape’ to Bluetooth headset field originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 16:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Video: Moblin 2.1 for MIDs and phones, sort of in action



Although Intel made some waves yesterday with the announcement of the smartphone-capable Moblin 2.1 release, the reality here on the ground at IDF is pretty much status quo: phones and other connected devices based on the next-gen Moorestown mobile platform are nowhere to be found, and the actual products on the floor are the same chunky MIDs we’ve all come to know and ignore. But while the devices remain somewhat uninteresting, Moblin itself has some terrific potential from what we’ve seen — there’s deep location and social networking integration with a unified contacts list that works a lot like Palm’s Synergy, standard Linux apps can be easily ported over and run without any fuss, and manufacturers and developers can even ditch the standard UI and develop whatever they want on top. It’s definitely cool stuff — we just wish Intel had given us this demo on a compelling hardware instead of an older Menlow-based Compal MID, you know? Video after the break.

Continue reading Video: Moblin 2.1 for MIDs and phones, sort of in action

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Video: Moblin 2.1 for MIDs and phones, sort of in action originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 16:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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