Millions Steals from Cancer Hospital as Printer Toner Scam

Marque Gumbs, a 32 year old clerk in New York's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center made $37,000 a year officially. He actually ranked in millions by ordering and flipping thousands of unneeded toner ink cartridges

When the hospital's printers needed new toners, he was responsible for ordering and receiving them, and then installing them in the facility's various printers. He got a $1000 paycheck every two weeks for doing this. But according to a recently filed criminal complaint, Gumbs ordered $3.8 million unnecessary and incompatible cartridges over the last six years. Reports say that none of these cartridges ever used into the hospital.

Recently, he has caught red-handed through a footage shows him intercepting the toner deliveries and ferreting them off to the hospital's garage. He's currently being held on a charge grand larceny in excess of $1 million. OMG...

Video Problems in New MacBooks- Apple Acknowldge

Apple has acknowledged two video problems in both the new MacBook and MacBook Pros, following past video problems with other MacBook lines. One of them seems pretty obvious. Called "the black screen of death", it happens when the graphic card goes into overload playing games, turning off video and locking up the system while the audio enters into a loop. Apparently it's a thermal issue, but Apple doesn't know if this is a hardware or software problem yet, according to an Apple Support forums member:

Just spoke to AppleCare UK and they also confirm "Apple are aware of the issue and are investigating. At present we do not know if this is a hardware or software issue and have been advised not to offer customers exchanges until the issue is better understood."

I've also read the posts suggesting this is a thermal issue but I got screen noise/distortion when just waking the machine from sleep and also monitored the fans while playing WoW and they were running at 6000+ rpm consistently.

Ultimately Apple have access to more testing resources and should come up with a fix fairly soon but if my replacement exhibits the same issues when it arrives in two weeks time, I doubt I'll keep waiting: I'll have it shipped back and ask for a re-fund until Apple sort this out and I can purchase a working computer.

The catch here is that it may be hardware-based and not software, because the problem happens under both Windows and Mac OS X.

Another problem seems less important, but users claim that it can be even seen in most systems at display in Apple retail stores: If you scroll a web page with HD video on it, there's a wave-like distortion affecting it. Apple says they are aware of the problem and they are working in a software patch that will solve the issue.

Improvements & new features in Microsoft Windows Vista SP2

It hasn't been too awfully long since Windows Vista SP1 hit the intertubes for real, but the Vista team is already talking up SP2. We all know Redmond is focused on moving beyond all of this Vista hoopla and forging ahead with Windows 7, but there's apparently still some work to do on the outfit's current OS.

Unfortunately, the latest update isn't exactly enthralling, as we're given no set time frame for launch and we're not shown any forthcoming changes that really get our juices flowing. For instance, Vista SP2 will add Windows Search 4.0 for faster and improved relevancy in searches, the Bluetooth 2.1 Feature Pack, ability to natively record data on Blu-ray media and Windows Connect Now (WCN) to simplify WiFi configuration. Waiting for your comments please........

Best LCD TV- Sony LED Bravia KDL-55XBR8 Reviews- Plasma vs. LCD

Cnet has reviewed the 55-inch, plasma-killin' tri-color LED-backlit Bravia XBR8 we saw a couple months ago. Spoiler: Sony's setup didn't lie—it's the best LCD TV ever, falling just short of the best HDTV ever, nearly matching Pioneer's PDP-111FD (Cnet's best flat-panel period) in blacks, color accuracy and bright-room picture quality.

Here's what great: The black levels are near-Kuro deep. In dimly-lit scenes, blacks had "an inky depth in dark areas that lent superb punch and realism to the image, and easily outclassed the rest of the non-Pioneer sets." The only taint is that when bright areas are next to dark ones, it lightens up the bars a bit, so Pioneer wins here. The color accuracy "is nothing short of superb" and after calibration they're as "excellently balanced and still as saturated as on the Pioneer." Its de-juddering mode is also the best they've ever seen."

It's few weak points: Image quality fades when you look at it from an off angle, the previously mentioned blooming with high contrast images, and the dejuddering can produce some artifacts, especially with a standard-def picture. Oh, and it's $7000, the most expensive TV they've ever tested.

A useful digital pen reviews

The pen, once mightier than the sword, has been getting trounced by the keyboard in the computer era. Now and then there's a push toward "pen-based computing" that doesn't get very far.

But in a test of the latest crop of pens that combine ink with digital technology, at least one stands out as a useful tool and a complement to the keyboard.

All three pens I tested record what the user writes, and can transfer an image of those notes to a PC. The standout of the group is the LiveScribe Pulse, which also records audio as you're writing. Later, you can tap a place in your notes, and the pen will play back what it was hearing when that was written.

As you can imagine, this is something of a Holy Grail for journalists, who run around with notepads and voice recorders. A classic problem for us is finding the right place in an audio recording without listening through the whole thing. The Pulse solves this problem.

Students also should pay attention to this pen. There is probably no better gadget for taking notes in class, except perhaps a Tablet PC, which allows you to write on the screen. But Tablet PCs are expensive and more difficult to use than the Pulse, which works with standard Windows PCs. You can also use it in a more limited fashion without a PC.

A Pulse with 1 gigabyte of memory costs $149 from LiveScribe's Web site. A model with twice as much memory costs $199, but the cheaper model has room for 35 hours of audio at the highest quality setting, or more than 100 hours at a lower setting, so it's a good value.

The greatest limitation of the Pulse is that it only works with special paper, preprinted with a pattern of dots. These are picked up by a small camera in the pen (this is the reason the pen is about as thick as a cigar), which lets it figure out where it is on a page. The pen comes with a 100-sheet college-ruled notebook. You can buy a four-pack of additional notebooks from the site for $19.95. Later this summer, LiveScribe hopes to make it possible for users to print their own paper.

The dot-sensing technology in the pen comes from a Swedish company, Anoto, and has been incorporated in a number of pens from other companies.

Another example is the Nokia Digital Pen SU-27W, which uses Bluetooth technology to transfer notes to a cell phone. Dash off a message on one of the small notepads that come with the $299.95 pen, and you can send it as a text message or as picture message through the phone.

The utility of this is hard to grasp. For your note to be converted to a text message, the phone needs to guess at what your handwriting means. If you use block letters, it does a decent job, but any sort of cursive will confuse it, and no wonder — even powerful computers can have a hard time interpreting handwriting.

You can bypass the text conversion by sending the note as a picture, but you really don't need a $299.95 pen and a special notepad to do that, just a cell-phone with autofocus camera. Write your note on any kind of paper, photograph it and send it off. Not as legible as text message, but more personal, for sure.

The Nokia pen can also transfer the notes to a PC, and does a decent job of this, but I really missed the audio-recording feature of the Pulse.

The third pen, the Iogear Mobile Digital Scribe, uses a completely different technology. It doesn't need preprinted paper. Instead, you attach a small "clip" with an LCD screen to the notepad you're using. The pen, which is the size of a regular ballpoint, signals its position to the clip using ultrasonic pulses and invisible infrared light. Connect the clip to your computer to transfer the notes.

The major virtue of this is that it can be used with any notepad. But as with the Nokia pen, the utility is questionable. If you need to save your notes on the PC, you can photograph them or scan them without using a digital pen. The pen does make the process easier, and the notes are clearer, but here and there I found that the clip missed part of a letter.

By tethering the clip to the computer, you can use the pen to control your mouse cursor, much like the dedicated pen tablets graphics artists use. This looks fun, but again, it's not very useful, and dedicated tablets do a better job.

The software that comes with the $129.95 Digital Scribe had the supremely annoying habit of launching when the computer started, and sending up an alert bubble every time, saying that the clip was not connected. This feature could not be turned off.

The LiveScribe Pulse software also had some odd limitations. I was unable to install it on my work computer because the "My Documents" folder was on another computer in the network. There's no way to convert the notes into a text file, or turn notes into e-mail, but you can upload your notes to LiveScribe's Web site to share them, with audio included. The LiveScribe, like the other pens, comes with Windows software only.

But at least the Pulse demonstrated that pens can still be relevant. Sure, you can bring a laptop to a lecture to take notes, but that means you need one eye on the screen. When writing by hand, it's much easier to pay attention to the speaker (and you can draw diagrams too). This is even more important in interviews, where taking notes by hand allows you to maintain more eye contact. Even in a digital world, that's important.

Source- http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080605/ap_on_hi_te/tec_tech_test_digital_pens;_ylt=Atm8nVPi7QFQ9ImMdMpagNwjtBAF

Reviews: Windows 7 not coming in one-year; Bill Gates just loosing his mind?

It turns out that last week when Bill Gates was quoted as saying that the release for Windows 7 would come “sometime in the next year or so” he was not entirely accurate.

According to a Microsoft spokesperson, Windows 7 is still in the “planning stages” and is on track for a January 2010 release. Further comments speculated that Bill Gates may have been referring to early trial versions, but not the general release.

So it looks like Windows 7 is going to remain on the original schedule, which means all you Vista haters will have to continue to use XP for a little while longer or just learn to deal.

Source- http://www.gadgetell.com/tech/comment/windows-7-not-coming-in-one-year-bill-gates-just-loosing-his-mind/

Linux becomes only OS to escape PWN 2 OWN

After a week full of Red Bulls, Fruit by the Foot and dreams of In-N-Out, the mighty Sony VAIO loaded with Linux stood as the only machine unhacked by the end of the PWN 2 OWN hacking contest at CanSecWest. As you're well aware by now, the MacBook Air on display was seized in two minutes by the presumably well prepared Charlie Miller, and after two full days of work, Shane Macaulay and a few of his 1337 associates managed to crack the Vista rig on Friday.

Reportedly, Shane and his pals weren't expecting to do battle with the extra protected SP1 version of Vista, and while the exact loophole won't be divulged, we are told that it was a cross-platform bug that "took advantage of Java to circumvent Vista's security." In the end, it was reported that some folks on hand had discovered bugs in the Linux OS, but many of them "didn't want to put the work into developing the exploit code that would be required to win the contest."

Source- http://www.engadget.com/2008/03/29/linux-becomes-only-os-to-escape-pwn-2-own-unscathed/

Sonic To Be Unleashed On Wii and PS2?

When we first saw screens of Sonic Unleashed, it was pretty clear that we were looking at something that was only feasible on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. No offense intended to the GameCube Turbo, but Sonic and the Secret Rings didn't look this good. Chatter about a sensible Wii version has been making the rounds since first screens and video sneaked out, but it would appear that Sega is planning to unleash more Sonic love on every viable platform.

Retailer GameStop is currently listing Sonic Unleashed for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, as well as the Wii and PlayStation 2. All listings are labeled with November 4 ship dates, along with platform appropriate pricing.

Source- http://kotaku.com/373660/sonic-to-be-unleashed-on-wii-and-ps2

How Microsoft, Yahoo execs finally meet

Microsoft Corp. met with Yahoo Inc. to discuss the software maker's unsolicited takeover bid earlier this week, a breakthrough that could be the first step toward a friendly deal between the two rivals.

The meeting occurred Monday near Yahoo's Sunnyvale headquarters, according to a person familiar with the situation. The person spoke Friday on the condition of not being identified because the preliminary talks haven't been formally disclosed.

No investments bankers attended Monday's meeting, nor was there any discussion about whether Microsoft is willing to raise its offer, initially valued at $44.6 billion, or $31 per share. Yahoo's board already has rejected that bid, arguing the company's Internet franchise is worth more.

Although it's unclear whether Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer and his Yahoo counterpart, Jerry Yang, attended Monday's meeting, senior management from both companies were on hand.

The gathering, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, gave Microsoft its first chance to sell Yahoo on the rationale for the proposed marriage since the software maker unveiled its plans six weeks ago.

Since then, Yang has been exploring different ways to ward off Microsoft. The alternatives have included possible alliances with Internet search and advertising leader Google Inc., News Corp.'s MySpace.com and Time Warner Inc.'s AOL.

Microsoft has held firm with its bid and warned it's prepared to pursue a hostile takeover if Yahoo continues to resist.

Most industry analysts believe neither side wants to engage in an acrimonious battle and expect Microsoft to resolve the impasse with a slightly higher bid.

Investors aren't so sure the stakes will be raised. Yahoo shares fell 79 cents to $26.71 Friday while Microsoft shares shed 66 cents to $27.96. At that price, Microsoft's offer — made partly in Microsoft stock — is worth about $40 billion.

The saga could still take several weeks to play out and may not be resolved until Yahoo releases its first-quarter earnings April 22. With Yahoo mired in a two-year slump, the first-quarter results could sway Microsoft's next move.

The waiting game works in Google's favor by distracting two of its biggest rivals while it strives to extend its dominance of the Internet's lucrative search and advertising market. Google added another layer of muscle this week by completing its $3.1 billion acquisition of online ad service, DoubleClick Inc.

Microsoft believes a combination with Yahoo will pose a more serious threat to Google.

By finally meeting with Microsoft executives, Yahoo could be laying the groundwork for more serious negotiations. Or Yahoo's board could just be touching base with Microsoft to show shareholders that it heard out its suitor before working out an alternative deal.

Yahoo's other options have been considered a long shot by most analysts and now there are signs that at least two of its potential partners aren't interested in getting together.

Rupert Murdoch, the chief executive of News Corp., downplayed his interest in a Yahoo deal at a conference this week. And AOL's plan to buy online social network Bebo for $850 million in a deal announced Thursday may make a combination of AOL with Yahoo more complicated.

Google has offered to work with Yahoo, but analysts say antitrust regulations will make it difficult, if not impossible, for those two companies to become business partners.

Yahoo still doesn't appear to be any rush to resolve the saga, based on how it's handling a key deadline for nominating candidates to supplant its current board. Microsoft has threatened an attempt to oust Yahoo's 10 directors if it can't broker an amicable takeover.

Last week, Yahoo postponed the deadline from Friday to 10 days after the date Yahoo announces its annual meeting.

Yahoo has no plans to disclose the meeting date before April and may not do so until its first-quarter earnings come out, according to a person close to the company. The person wasn't authorized to be identified publicly.

Source- http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080315/ap_on_hi_te/microsoft_yahoo;_ylt=AtmJ77l8srfgjtB6dDGwtmkjtBAF

Cheaper Data Cards- Budget 2008

The FM's budget speech has just concluded though as of the time of posting this article the speech has not yet been made available at http://indiabudget.nic.in/

Mr. Chidambaram mentioned "Wireless Data Cards" in the list of products on which Excise Duty has been slashed from 16% to nil. That's great news considering all the telecom operators who offer such products import them from the likes of Huawei, Sierra Wireless etc. The catch though is that we hope the term "Wireless Data Cards" includes the new USB dongles as well since data "cards" as such have become defunct as laptop makers have phased out the PCIMCIA slot into which these cards were inserted.

Assuming that the entire duty cut benefit is passed on to consumers, a USB data dongle which typically costs around Rs. 3,000 will be cheaper by nearly Rs. 500. We contacted the major telecom players and we'll update you with their reactions on this matter.

UPDATE 1: The budget speech is now available Here is the relevant part:

146. There are a number of products which are goods of mass consumption. There is also the need to have tax parity on similar goods. Taking into account requests from a number of industries, I propose to reduce the excise duty from 16 per cent to nil on a few items including composting machines, wireless data cards, packaged coconut water, tea and coffee mixes, and puffed rice.

UPDATE 2: EXCLUSIVE: Spokespersons for both Airtel and Tata Indicom have confirmed that they will pass on the ENTIRE benefit to consumers.

Source- http://www.tech2.com/india/news/budget-2008-general/budget-08-cheaper-data-cards/30211/0

Laptop Reviews- Top 5 Laptops

Number 1. Apple PowerBook Laptop was miraculously engineered. Mega wide display - the largest ever in a notebook -, brilliant screen, 100 GB hard drive, built-in Bluetooth - these are the features of this laptop.
Then, Apple is a very reliable brand. Don't care about its size and weight; it's not a problem to carry the laptop with you. With its help you can do everything you need: have fun, distract and, of course, work. You will be definitely pleased with it - your laptop will guess beforehand your desires. Great gadget, extraordinary features - you will love it.


Number 2. HP Pavilion DV6745US 15.4" Entertainment Laptop is an entertainment-centric notebook with 15.4-inch LCD widescreen. It has stylish high-gloss finish with wave imprint, so it looks outstanding and gorgeous. This laptop has all the features you need.
Actually, it was designed for entertainment. For example, it guarantees you fast access to your entire entertainment library. Then, you will also find a lot of functions and built-in devices that will make your work on the laptop really pleasant and productive.


Number 3. Toshiba Satellite A215-S5802 15.4" Laptop takes the third place. This is a nice qualitative notebook. It is perfect both for work and games. It has a gorgeous, wide, bright and clear screen. 120 GB of internal memory allow you to keep all the necessary information there.
Thanks to newest TruBrite technology you will be impressed with the vividness of the images. This laptop is more solid that the previous, it also has a lot of nice features that will help you either to work on it or enjoy yourself.


Number 4. Bratz Cyber Style Laptop will be your daughter's most desirable gadget. It looks really cute and attractive. It is perfect for a girl: starting with its design and continuing with its features.
The biggest advantage of the laptop is that your girl enjoys herself and learns at the same time. 11 game categories including spelling, grammar, vocabulary, math, mind benders, study break games, art, science, geography, music, Spanish, writing, and touch typing will help her to develop her mind and succeed at school.

75 different games will help her to distract and have fun. You will be able to open new features every time you turn the laptop on.


Number 5. I think we'd better start with the Darth Vader Learning Laptop. This will be an outstanding educational toy for your kids. This is an exclusive gadget for children at ages 4 and up.

The laptop has 80 different games that will help your child to develop. The good point is that this device doesn't include any cruel games. Games are aimed at hand-eye coordination, music, memory, reading, typing, logic and math.
I think this must be the best set of games for a child. Laptop features a QWERTY keyboard and a large, easy-to-read LCD screen with backlight. But please, don't expect extraordinary quality of the screen.

This is not a professional laptop for work. The laptop seems to be reliable and well-built. So, this gadget can become your child's first personal laptop.


Source- http://gadgets.infoniac.com/top5-laptops.html

Superman's Eyeballs- Everything You Ever Wanted To Know

Superman used to be just strong and sort of invulnerable, but now his powers are officially out of control. According to Superman II, he can erase your mind just by kissing you, not to mention his super-breath, super-hearing and super-ventriloquism. But Superman's out-of-control power really started with his super-peepers, which have a whole arsenal of eye-related powers. Check out our list of Superman's overcharged eyeball abilities.

It's no secret that Superman was so overpowered in the comic books that he used to move planets around, was extremely super-smart, traveled through time (without flying around the Earth backwards) on a regular basis, and had powers ranging from super-smell to super-mimicry. He outmatched nearly everyone in the universe, except God, so they had to retcon his ass a few times.

Chief among Superman's powers was his vision, which started out of just the ability to see things fairly sharply, but over the years he must have had laser-eye surgery, because things got a whole lot better for him:

• Probably the most-wanted usage of Supey's eyes was his 'x-ray' vision. What teenage boy (and possibly some girls) wouldn't have wanted to see through clothes? You could even order x-ray spex (that sadly did not work) from the back of comic books. He couldn't see through lead, and according to Kingdom Come he couldn't give you cancer either. No 'melanoma vision' for our hero.
• His 'heat vision' (which was originally a by-product of the x-ray vision) is portrayed as either lasers shooting from his eyes, fiery optic blasts, or the literal balls of fire which they seem fond of on Smallville. The comics later explain that he's able to shoot his stored-up solar energy out through his eyes.
• His 'telescopic vision' grew over the comics to eventually let him see not just distant planets, but what was happening on those planets. We wonder if he could flip that vision around so things just appeared very, very tiny.
• Superman used his 'microscopic vision' on many occasions in the 1970s, analyzing fingerprints, checking out atomic structures, electrons, and protons. In fact, he could have made a fortune alone just by checking houses for fleas.
• Superman could also see into the electromagnetic spectrum, which allowed him to do dorky things like follow broadcast signals back to their origins. You know, for when crooks go on TV to brag about their plans.
• Supey also sported 'radar vision,' which was apparently just low-powered infravision, allowing him to see in the dark.
• He could also combine these vision powers, like using x-ray vision and telescopic vision at the same time, so he could see those distant planets without an asteroid blocking his view.
• Ultra Boy from The Legion of Super-Heroes had abilities similar to Superman's, although his 'penetra-vision' could see through everything, including lead, and his 'flash-vision' burns twice as hot as Superman's heat vision. Oh, and it's blue.
• Speaking of blue vision, Superman developed a new 'electrical vision' power in Grant Morrison's All-Star Superman as an homage to the electric blue Superman from the 90s. Why you'd want to send a shout-out to that particular version of Superman, we'll never know.
• When Superman "died" and his "Superboy" clone appeared, he didn't have any vision powers. However, he later was given a pair of goggles that simulated most of Superman's vision abilities. Why doesn't Superman just give a pair of those to every cop on the planet?

Source- http://io9.com/360939/everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know-about-supermans-eyeballs

Gadgtes tips- Use Googlemail.com Address in Gmail to avoid spam

The Digital Inspiration blog points out a Gmail trick that's been just under the surface all along. Everyone who has an "name@gmail.com" address can also receive mail sent to "name@googlemail.com."

The big deal is, knowing this gives you a stronger hand when you fight against spam, bacn, and all that other not-so-important but distracting email. Try giving out one or the other addresses to important, close contacts, while using the other for all the other stuff. You people can share your thoughts here....

Source- http://lifehacker.com/360524/use-a-googlemailcom-address-to-lessen-gmail-spam

Zune survey points to video downloads

Apparently, video is all the rage these days. Just ask the folks who received a survey from Microsoft about services which may or may not be coming to the Zune.

It's possible your heart might skip a beat when you read questions like, "I would rather download a movies from an online service than buy a DVD," or, "My friends and I regularly send each other links to online videos." Though the question, "I'm willing to carry a larger MP3 player if it improves the quality of the display," could just be suggesting a new Zune-XXXL is on the way. Regardless of what it you take away from these cryptic messages.


Source- http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/25/zune-survey-points-to-video-downloads/

Elonex One: England's 100 quid laptop

After the Eee PC, Cloudbook, Pixel Qi, etc, now the next at the table will apparently be Elonex, which intends to introduce the £100 (~$200) One on February 28th at The Education Show in Birmingham, England. Obviously the intention here is to sell to education markets, but the One is also going to be up for grabs for "adult learners, business users, people who are constantly mobile, elderly people and first time internet users."

We don't have any better shots of the thing, but apparently this One (not that One, or the other One) will weigh "less than a kilo" (2.2 pounds), has a 7-inch screen, three hour battery, 1GB of flash memory, and runs on Linux. Apparently there's also a more expensive £120 model that has double the memory (2GB) and Bluetooth, to boot. Both will also have access to a service called ONEunion, which will "feature artwork and music for download, opportunities to get your own content added to the club as well as a range of competitions," presumably for the kids.

Jkkmobile's got some additional info. Looks like the One could be a rebadge of a Fontastic A-View ultra-cheap Chinese "simple PC".

Source- http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/17/elonex-one-englands-100-quid-laptop/

15 Reasons- Why Do You Exercise?

Beyond the health benefits to regular exercise, there are many other reasons why you should make fitness training a part of your daily routine. One of these reasons is because you can let go of the stress you have at work. Weblog The Next 45 Years writes:

Not everyone is born an athlete. Only a select few actually become professional athletes.

The rest of us pay their salaries. But in the gym, on the basketball court, we can let go and be the one who attempts the clutch shot or makes a key defensive stop. We are not passively watching, we are engaged and doing.

Exercise makes you feel good. It's also not a competition. A fitness routine can be paced according to your wants and needs and you can do as little or as much as you want. Besides living the healthy lifestyle, why have you chosen to exercise regularly? Come on you people, Share your reasons .

Source- http://lifehacker.com/356645/why-do-you-exercise

Poor People Use Yahoo, Richies Use Google- Demograpics

Online marketing firm Hitwise has published a socioeconomic demographic rundown of Yahoo and Google users.

According to Hitwise data and this Lifestyle Quadrant Analysis, while lots of people are using Yahoo search (those are the dots in the upper left), groups that have spent more that $500 or more online tend to use Google (those are the dots in the lower right, the bigger dots designate $500+ spenders). So while Yahoo has the "struggling societies" market cornered, Google is fairly pleased with their "affluent suburbia" and "upscale America" user base.

Source- http://gizmodo.com/357353/poor-people-use-yahoo-richies-use-google

Lost Odyssey (Xbox 360)- Franken Review

While Microsoft snagging Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi may not have set the Japanese market on fire, we're still interested to see the games that he's creating for the platform. Lost Odyssey is his studio Mistwalker's latest attempt to make the Xbox 360 an RPG system as classic as predecessors from Nintendo or Sony.

Below mentioned the reviews:

GamesRadar
It's also very, very pretty, with gorgeous cutscenes and in-game models, as well as rich environments and diverse level designs...The opening of the game is literally two hours of cutscenes mixed with a few instances of you making Kaim walk across a pretty environment.

IGN
Combat in Lost Odyssey is about as traditional as you will find in a modern-day game. It is completely turn-based with a menu system that seems taken straight from 1998. Everything you would expect is included. You can attack, use an item, cast magic, or activate a skill. Weapons in Lost Odyssey are pretty boring as none hold any special properties whatsoever -- they are merely an Attack rating and nothing else. And the magic is the same thing you've experienced for the past 20 years.

Worth Playing
Lost Odyssey's combat...is excruciatingly, unbelievably, agonizingly slow. A random battle can take somewhere around five to 10 seconds just to get through the opening animation of the battle. This is compounded by Lost Odyssey's rather lengthy loading times, which occur quite often and last for what feels like an eternity. Between the loading times, the pointless camera panning and the incredibly time-consuming animations, combat slows to a crawl.

X-Play
It's just a shame that the developer, Mistwalker, couldn't get beyond their own limitations. Much like SquareSoft before them, it's clear that they'd rather be making a movie. At heart, Lost Odyssey and the most recent Final Fantasy are interactive movies with character stat-building. Many things in the game are done purely for visual style and to passively push the plot.

Source- http://kotaku.com/356253/frankenreview-lost-odyssey-xbox-360

A Better Look At Street Fighter IV's

The official Capcom blog pointed out earlier today that those earlier posted Famitsu pics of Street Fighter IV, well, they don't quite do the game justice. Nor does a Babelfish translation on details relevant to new fighter Abel. If you want a proper look at the new mixed martial arts star, check out the gallery below. The better news from the Capcom USA folks is that they'll be translating entries from the official Street Fighter IV development blog, currently only in Japanese.

Here you go: "With no memory of his past, this young man has no choice but to move forward, using any clue he can get his hands on to rout out what may be left of Shadaloo. His fighting style represents a mix of multiple martial arts. Though he appears gruff and unfriendly on the surface, he is not the misanthrope he seems to be. His serious and polite nature is easy to misinterpret as indifference, but these still waters run deep indeed."

Source- http://kotaku.com/356774/a-better-look-at-street-fighter-ivs-newest-abel

Apple TV 2.0 Reviews

Ever since our Apple TV 1.0 review decided that Apple's thrust into the living room wasn't pantsworthy, we've been waiting for them to step up and make a revision that was. Apple TV 2.0 is their answer. (Let's stop calling it Take 2, please!) It's everything Apple TV should have been when it launched, complete with audio and video podcasts, Flickr and .Mac integration and—most importantly—movie rentals without a computer. At $229, it's an essential part of any iTunes user's living room arsenal.


Source- http://gizmodo.com/355843/apple-tv-20-review