Demonoid tracker moves to Ukraine
Despite the actual website still being down, the once very popular torrent Tracker Demonoid is back, and hosted in the Ukraine.
Back in June 2007, the site was taken down by the Dutch anti-piracy outfit BREIN but relocated to Canada. After just weeks in the new country though, threats from the CRIA shut down the site again, for what many thought was for good.
For now though, Demonoid torrents are working again at inferno.demonoid.com, hosted by the Ukrainian ISP Cocall Ltd.
There has been no word from the Demonoid admin team as of yet but we will keep you updated if there is.
Limewire Store beta launches
It was announced in August 2007, and now finally Limewire has launched a beta for its DRM-free online MP3 download store.
The store offers “a web browser-based interface for downloading music.” The store does not use P2P however and is centralized with the company hosting the MP3s on its own servers. You do not need to be a subscriber to purchase the tracks but you will get better deals if you do. Each individual Track costs $0.99 USD but if you purchase the “Platinum Plan” for $20 USD a month then you receive 75 download credits, good for 75 song downloads. At that rate, each track only costs $0.27 USD.
Users running Internet Explorer 6 & 7, Firefox, Safari or Opera browsers can currently use the store but Limewire hopes to integrate the store into the actual client.
“Our plan with the LimeWire Store is to add to the LimeWire experience–we’re not going to take anything away. We think purchase links should appear alongside Gnutella search results, similar to how Google keeps sponsored links separate. We believe a significant number of users will choose to purchase content if the presentation is convenient and unobtrusive, the price is Right, and the product isn’t hindered by DRM,” added a Limewire spokesperson.
Vista SP1 update coming tomorrow
Microsoft Vista SP1 will be available online tomorrow for download and on Wednesday in stores, reported Microsoft.
The long awaited service pack was released as an RTM version in February but is now available to all genuine Windows Vista users. You can directly download the service pack from the Microsoft Download Center or as an optional update through Windows Update. The company did note however that if your system has drivers “which are currently known to be incompatible with SP1″, you will not be able to install the update.
“Customers who visit Windows Update can choose to install Service Pack 1. Any system that Windows Update determines has a driver known to not upgrade successfully will not be offered SP1,”added a Microsoft spokeswoman.
Customers will also be able purchase Vista with SP1 already integrated in retail stores and online for between $94.99 USD and $299.99 USD, with the cheapest being Vista Home and most expensive being Vista Ultimate.
BenQ introduces “thinnest ever” 24-inch monitor
At 0.9 inches at its thinnest, BenQ has introduced the V2400W, a 24 inch monitor inspired by the B-2 stealth bomber that “uses a new plastic injection technique that both curves the back of the display and makes it one of the thinnest of its kind.”
The display is about 2.4 inches at its thickest point and includes a thin bezel and a touch-sensitive control panel. More importantly, the screen has a 4,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio and a 2ms gray-to-gray (5ms normal) pixel response time.
As is standard, the display has DVI, VGA and HDMI inputs. There was no word on price but the company said it will only be available in North America with a spring release date.
Xbox 360 sees huge sales spike in UK
According to Chart-Track, the Microsoft Xbox 360 saw a 40 percent sales jump in the UK following the Europe-wide price cut last week.
Says Chart-Track director Dorian Bloch, “Xbox 360 is up 35-40 percent - that’s from Friday, when the price cut came into effect, up to midnight Saturday.”
“Now it’s a question of Easter,” he noted. “The real litmus test will be over the next three to four weeks – it’s too early to read too much into it at this stage.”
The data also showed that software sales remained about the same, but more interestingly that the PS2 saw the largest sales surge. “The greatest surge was on PS2,” Bloch said. “There was a lot of price promotion going on, with certain titles being well and truly flogged. It’s now the calm before the high point of Easter.”
On March 14th, Microsoft slashed prices on all models of the 360 in Europe seeing the Arcade, Premium and Elite versions falling to GBP 159, GBP 199 and GBP 259, respectively. The price dropped the Arcade model to an even cheaper price point than the better selling rival, the Nintendo Wii.
Apple updates Safari browser, supports Windows
Apple has announced the release of the 3.1 version of its Safari web browser and it is sporting several key improvements including Windows support.
The company has said the new version “loads Web pages 1.9 times faster than Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 7 and 1.7 times faster than the open-source Firefox 2 browser.” Apple also claims that Safari now runs JavaScript almost 6 times faster than any other browser.
The benchmark stats come from using VeriTest’s iBench Version 5.0 on default settings. The company said the specs of the computer used was an iMac 2.4-GHz Intel Core 2 Duo system with Windows XP and 1GB of memory.
Apple Senior Vice President Philip Schiller added that Safari 3.1 is “blazingly fast, easy to use” and has an “elegant user interface.” More importantly, the browser “supports audio, video and animation standards needed for the next generation of Web 2.0 experiences.”
Safari 3.1 is now available for free for Mac OS X Tiger 10.4.11, Leopard and Windows XP and Vista.
EU picks DVB-H mobile TV standard
European Union commissioners have decided on a mobile TV broadcast standard and has now asked that its member governments ask their respective Cell phone carries to favor it.
The standard, DVB-H, or Digital Video Broadcasting for Handhelds, was chosen over rivals MediaFLO and DMB which were favored by South Korean and Chinese manufacturers. DVB-H is the most widely used standard in Europe currently.
Nokia,,Motorola, Philips, Sagem, Sony, Ericsson, Samsung,Vodafone, O2 and T-Mobile all support DVB-H, but MediaFLO is supported by the largest carriers in the US, Verizon Wireless and AT&T.
“They can do that by labeling, they can do that by promoting it in attributing licenses and so on,” said EU spokesman Martin Selmayr.
Despite the choice, the impact is Limited. EU nations are under no obligation to choose a standard based on the decision of the commission.
100 million will pay for HDTV service by 2012, says report
According to a new Pike & Fischer report, over 47 million American households will pay for some sort of HDTV service by the end of the year and that will increase to over 100 million by 2012.
The report, “HDTV Service: Market Forecast for Multichannel Video Providers”, which is produced every year, showed a 17 million home increase from the 2007 report.
Most broadcast networks air their programming in HD for free currently by cable operators, satellite TV providers and telephone companies all offer “premium” HD channels as well as leasing HD-ready equipment, and selling on-demand movies and TV shows in HD format.
The forecast also showed that HD video “will generate up to $2.6 billion in annual revenue for the multichannel video providers by the end of 2012.”
Despite the recent decline in consumer spending and economic recession in the US, Scott Sleek, Director of Pike & Fischer’s Broadband Advisory Services, believes the slump can have an opposite effect.
“People may decide they’ll save more by investing in home entertainment,” he says. “That way they can microwave some popcorn and order an HD movie on demand instead of spending $50 or more to go out for dinner and movie.”
iTunes adds C4 content
Channel 4 has announced they will be making content available through Apple’s iTunes platform. The announcement comes just a month after the BBC made a similar decision.
The popular C4 shows “Shameless”, “Skins”, “Teachers”, “Peep Show”, “Spaced”, and “Monarchy” will now all be available on iTunes. Each episode wil cost £1.89.
“Digital technology transforms our audiences’ ability to create, access and engage with our content, making it easier for us to identify the best new British creativity and bring it to a wider UK audience and catalyse a new generation of digital media production companies”, said Channel 4 chief executive Andy Duncan.
WinDVD9 supports TrueHD and DTS-HD
According to EngadgetHD, the latest version of the popular WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray (it actually supports HD DVD as well) has finally updated support for the latest audio codecs Blu-ray has available, namely TrueHD and DTS-HD.
Also improved in the update is support for BonusView and the HD video camera Codec, AVCHD.
Of course the software is still buggy but a very effective HD video playback software for those who have made the jump to BLu-ray and HD DVD.
