Filed under: Laptops, Storage

Sharp just introduced their latest, itty bitty blue laser. While maintaining the same 3.3-mm diameter of their previous package, Sharp’s new GH04P25A4G semiconductor laser manages to boost the power to 250mW. That little trick should make 6x recording speeds to dual-layer BD media in laptops a reality. They’ve also announced a similarly speced 5.6-mm (GH04P25A2G) jobbie for desktops. Both are shipping now in ¥50,000 sample quantities with mass production set to begin in April. That translates to about 462 US dollars — not that the US manufactures CE equipment anymore.

[Via Impress]

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Filed under: Laptops

Although laptop batteries aren’t getting catching fire nearly as frequently lately, every now and again one still seems to spark off — but LG wants you to know that its batteries are safe. The Korean mega-conglomerate said that it’s wrapped up an investigation into reports that surfaced last month about an LG-sourced battery exploding in a reporter’s laptop, and that it was apparently a freak accident. According to LG, “Under normal conditions, it is not possible for a notebook PC battery to combust.” Uh, sure it’s not, guys — you keep telling yourselves that, and we’ll keep blogging in these goggles and red Nomex capes. Deal?

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Hold the front page! Apple has finally dropped what it calls Apple TV Take 2, otherwise know as their second attempt at collaring the streamer market.

The new edition ties in with iTunes Movie Rentals, something that us UK film lovers won’t be getting our hands on until later this year.

If you’ve got one of Cupertino’s silver boxes under your telly, you can get the free update right now, downloading it via your gogglebox.

The system’s been given a complete makeover, with a whole new interface, full YouTube access and the chance to look at all the vids stashed on your Mac, as well as rental goodies.

The box still costs £199 for the 40GB version, £269 for the weightier 160GB model.

Now all we need is Apple to give us a launch date for rental movies and up its frankly weak offering of US tellies on iTunes here in Blighty. Come on guys, we’re desperate.

Filed under: Announcements

It’s hard to think back to a time when Peter and I longed to do our very own cellphone-centric Engadget spinoff — those were the days that a 1GB microSD card was pretty impressive, HTC phones were frequently EDGE-only (the more things change…), and Ballmer was predicting $100 smartphones were still a year or two out. But exactly two years ago today we also finally launched Engadget Mobile, and it’s been a crazy amount of fun watching it grow into its own as the go-to place for handset news ever since. Much love to Chris, Sean, and the rest of our regular EngMob contributors — and, of course, the cellphone fanatics that keep coming back to feed their sick, wireless addiction.

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Looks good, performs well and kicks ass. But enough about us; this laptop pleasures us too. Tosh have come up trumps with their HD offering, but with the super slim Portege on the prowl how does this beast fare?

The screen is a whisker off full HD, but you’d be hard pushed to tell, as movies whisked from the HD-DVD drive look awesome. Colour and contrasts is on par with a number of big telly’s and for such a small screen we didn’t lose any of the drama of Transformers. It’s deep OK?

If films aren’t your thing, this lappie has got gaming licked too, packing enough poke to give silky smooth frame rate in Crysis, and as a bonus, the Harman Kardon speakers pump out some of the best laptop audio around.

The sole bum notes are provided by its weight, clocking in at an offensive 3.8kg. With a power supply that’s only slightly smaller than Battersea power station, this is not the laptop you want to be lugging around in your man bag.