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Fuzzy Signals for Internet TV

It's hard to imagine how Logitech CEO Guerrino De Luca could have been clearer, if a transcript of his recent remarks during an investor day conference call is accurate. He called the implementation of his company's Revue Google TV device a mistake "of a gigantic nature" that cost Logitech dearly. L...

Google unveiled a software update for Google TV on Friday that includes a slew of apps. These are based on Android 3.1, Google spokesperson Jacques Herbert told TechNewsWorld. This is the latest version of the so-called "Honeycomb" release. An update based on Honeycomb has been expected for a while....

The convenience of using your smartphone to store, stream and curate your music collection -- or simply stream music from online, personalized radio stations like Pandora -- doesn't mean you need to sacrifice your home stereo system for the dubious quality earbuds that came with the phone. The inves...

Two former Apple engineers have released a smart thermostat designed to reduce home energy use. Nest Labs -- a company formed by former iPod and iPhone guru Tony Fadell -- has introduced the Nest Learning Thermostat, a device that learns your daily schedule and adjusts your home's heating and coolin...

Microsoft is partnering with two of the most visible players in the education industry -- Sesame Workshop and National Geographic -- to roll out a series of new "edutainment" video games for its Xbox 360 platform. The games -- "Kinect Sesame Street TV," "Kinect Nat Geo TV" and the code-named "Projec...

The stuttering and freezing that can occur when you're streaming video are indicative of issues related to bandwidth. Commercial hosted solutions like Netflix and Hulu can suffer from degraded performance. Rather than simply calling your ISP and requesting a faster, more expensive pipe, there are so...

Sony has issued a voluntary recall for 1.6 million Bravia flat-panel TVs sold worldwide covering certain TVs sold since 2007. A defective component reportedly causes them to be slightly more likely to melt or catch fire than the average TV. In September, a Japanese customer discovered that his TV st...

Smart Devices, Dumb Security?

Right now, you can buy a car that you can unlock by just touching the door handle. No need to struggle with key fobs or keys. Known by various names, including "Keyless Go" and "Smart Key," this feature is available for a cool grand or so as an option on various cars, including the Mercedes-Benz S-C...

One antidote to escalating household budgets is to cut utility services. However, dropping trash pickup and dumping your garbage in neighbors' receptacles in the middle of the night probably wouldn't go down too well in the community. Likewise, terminating your electricity supply won't play too well...

Innovative 3D technology, connectivity, a new Move controller and the reveal of a 3G NGP (Next Generation Portable) were some of the highlights rolled out by Sony's video game division at the E3 2011 Conference in Los Angeles on Monday. Sony Computer Entertainment President and CEO Jack Tretton gree...

Americans seem to love television as much as ever. But they're increasingly viewing it through non-traditional means, usually involving the Web. The number of mobile subscribers watching TV on their mobile phones, for example, increased 41 percent year over year in the fourth quarter of 2010, Nielse...

With a sexy splash page -- a young woman in short shorts waving her arms before a TV screen -- PrimeSense and hardware maker Asus are inviting consumers to connect with kinetics through Wavi Xtion, a three-dimensional technology that couples cameras, motion sensors, and televisions with personal com...

You'll see the weird, the wacky and the wonderful at this week's CES 2011, in addition to the standard array of bread-and-butter high-tech consumer electronics advances. One of the items to be displayed is what's claimed to be the world's first consumer 3D camera that can recognize gesture-based app...

Nintendo has issued a warning for parents of children under age 6: If you're planning on giving the kid a Nintendo 3DS when the device is released early next year, keep it in 2D mode. The 3DS is a portable video game system capable of displaying 3D games without the use of special glasses. However, ...

Logitech has temporarily stopped ordering the Revue Google TV set-top boxes from its supplier, according to a recent report. The Logitech-branded Revue is a device used to provide users with the Google TV service. Reports that the suspension came at Google's request are making the rounds, but Logite...

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