smartech

Samsung has been very active lately within the media players market, and even when we were thinking we’ve seen them all, the South Korean giant has given us yet another prove  it ain’t going to halt any production. In fact, not only the company has never stopped, it was actually shifting gear and going official with another PMP player, this time the Samsung YP-R1, which is scheduled to go live at the Berlin IFA trade show, next month, for a starting price of $180. Specs wise, the new player will presumably pack a 2.6-inch 400 x 260 touchscreen, while the TouchWiz interface will give you the freedom to enjoy any audio/video files anywhere, and the BeatDJ feature will enable users adding their own voice and sound effects to their favorite songs. Besides that, the 8.9 millimeter-thick player will eventually come with a choice of 8GB or 16GB memory capacities, while Samsung’s DNSe 3.0 digital sound engine is about to be the first to support DivX format. Regretfully, no other details, nor video previews were popping up at this point, so stay tuned for more updates to come.

[via Newswire]

Remember the Amilo Mini netbook from Fujitsu? turns out it becomes official, as the company has finally confirmed it at the IFA 2008 in Berlin. Although it looks a bit different from the others, with its unique interchangeable colorful lids, the new Amilo mini has pretty much the same features, including a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 Processor, 8.9-inch WSVGA Display (1024 x 600), 1.3M camera, 1GB of RAM, 60GB or 80GB HDD storage capacity, WLAN 802.11 b/g, Bluetooth connectivity, and Windows XP Home Edition, running inside the 1 kg UMPC. It will be available in October for around €399 ($585).

[via umpcportal]

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LG has decided to jump into the netbooks trend, introducing the X110 UMPC at the IFA 2008 in Berlin, coming up with almost an identical MSI Wind design, but also with some pretty neat features, including built-in 3G HSPDA and GPS capabilities (optional) that can make our internet life much easier when it comes to out-of-wifi places. In addition, the new X110 packs a 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor, 8.9-inch display (1024×600), 120GB storage capacity (optional 6GB SSD), WLAN 802.11 b/g, 1GB of RAM and more. It runs Windows XP operating system and expected to be released in Europe at the end of September for €399 up to €499 ($590 up to $740), not so cheap prices, compared to the competitors, but with a top-notch technology.

[via jkkmobile]

Following Sony’s recent Walkman lineup revelation, the company has decided to go official, introducing “S”, “E”, and “B” Walkman players, to be released in the coming September with prices ranged from $45 up to $180.

The S series

Includes the 4GB NWZ-S736F and 8GB NWZ-S738F Walkmans, coming up with a light 7.5mm thick design, a 2-inch QVGA LCD display, an FM tuner, noise-cancelling technology, drag-and-drop file management and wide formats support, like MP3, WMA, AAC, Linear PCM, JPEG, and MPEG-4. Battery life is very impressive and can deliver up to 40 hours of audio playback or 10 hours of video.

[via cellphonehits]

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It’s not official yet, but word on the street says that Samsung is about to announce their latest YP-Q1 media player at the IFA 2008 in Berlin. The new YP-Q1 is expected to have a 2.4-inch QVGA screen, together with a microphone, an FM RDS tuner, 4GB/8GB or 16GB capacities to choose from, and USB2.0 connectivity. It will support wide formats range, including MP3, WMA, WAV, Ogg, FLAC, MPEG4 or WMV and suppose to deliver 30 hours of audio or 4 hours of video. No word on price or availability, but Samsung will offer the Q1 black, white, silver or pink flavors. Stay tuned for more to come.

Update: Samsung has officially confirmed the new YP-Q1player, to go live in October, together with the YP-U4 version that is already available. Checkout the video after the break.

[via gmp3]

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Korean company Cowon has just introduced some of its latest products, to be officially released next week, during IFA 2008 at Berlin. Together with the sexy curved S9, we find the O2, a 4.3-inch touchscreen (480 x 272) PMP, coming up with a T-DMB tuner, a microphone, a loud built-in speaker, an SD slot, a TV output and storage capacities, range from 8GB up to 32GB. The O2 supports wide variety of formats, including MP3, WMA, AC3, AAC, FLAC, OGG, Apple Lossless, WAV, G.726, PCM, True Audio, Monkey Audio, MusePack, DivX, XviD, WMV, H.264, M-JPEG, MPEG-4 SP / ASP, and MPEG1. The battery can play 18 hours of audio and up to 8 hours of video, which is very impressive in terms of media players. Still no word on price or availability, but you will be able to get one of those in black, white or pink flavors.

Update1: The O2 is set to be released around October.

Update2: Cowon has announced O2 European pricing as follows:

• O2 iAudio 8GB White – €289.99 ($400)
• O2 iAudio 8GB Pink – €289.99 ($400)
• O2 iAudio 16GB White – €309.99 ($428)
• O2 iAudio 16GB Black – €309.99 ($428)
• O2 iAudio 32GB White – €365.99 ($505)

[Cowon]

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Cowon announces some new products to be officially released next week, during IFA 2008 show at Berlin. One of the most interesting devices within the new lineup is the S9, a nice curved PMP with a 3.3-inch 16M colors capacitive AMOLED  touchscreen (480 x 272) and a strong 500MHz DualCore processor. It packs a T-DMB television tuner for Korean market, an FM tuner, a bluetooth connectivity, TV output and even a G-Sensor accelerometer. Still, no info about storage capacities or codecs support, but you can trust Cowon to be generous as usual. Battery life, on the other hand, was confirmed and will deliver up to 40 hours of continuous music. Stay tuned for more to come later this week.

Update: The S9 will be available next month with 8GB or 16GB storage capacities, while a 32GB version will hit later on. As mentioned, it will support many codecs, including MP3, WMA, OGG, FLAC, WAV audio formats and MPEG-4 SP, WMV9 SP, H.264 BP video formats.

[Cowon]