How would you change Panasonic's Lumix DFC-GF2? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 25 Feb 2011 23:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Merger opens door for CSR to add imaging and video to its Wi-Fi, bluetooth and GPS products
Cambridge-based computer chip maker CSR on Monday announced a $679m deal to buy Zoran, the US imaging technology group.
The all share merger, which will see CSR hold 65% of the combined company, opens the door for CSR to add imaging and video to its Wi-Fi, bluetooth and GPS products, such as location-aware digital cameras. The merged company's customers will include Sony and Samsung.
Joep van Beurden, the chief executive of CSR who will head up the combined group, said on Monday: "The combined entity is going to be in a position to be very relevant to camera manufacturers. The same is true for digital televisions, in cars, in gaming and in handsets.
"You will absolutely see combinations of imaging, video technology, and connectivity in one product," he said. "This is an exciting transaction on both a strategic and financial level."
Shares in CSR were down 8% at 399p at 1pm on Monday, as investors expected that Zoran investors may well sell shares in the combined group. Its stock has risen 34% in the past three months.
Zoran, which is listed on Nasdaq, had $260m of cash on its balance sheet. CSR said that it would return up to $240m to shareholders through a share buyback programme. Shareholders in Zoran will receive 1.85 CSR shares for each Zoran share, implying a 40% premium to Zoran's closing price on Friday.
CSR, whose competitors include Broadcom and Qualcomm, has lost ground on the booming demand for internet-enabled mobile phones. Announcing better than expected full-year results earlier this month, Van Beurden said the company aims to increase its share in the smartphone market by 2012.
The company, which also supples Wi-Fi chips to carmakers including Audi, Ford and Toyota, saw its full-year revenues rise 33% last year, with operating profit tripling to $79m.
Dr Levy Gerzberg, the co-founder and chief executive of Zoran, will join the CSR board as non-executive director along with another, yet to be named, Zoran executive.
The deal is expected to be finalised in the second quarter of this year, subject to shareholder and regulatory approval.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/feb/21/csr-chip-maker-to-buy-zoran
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Microsoft Research shows off next-generation gesture interfaces, Kinect integration, other neato stuff (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 25 Feb 2011 23:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Continue reading Google Wants Swiss Government to Lift Restrictions on Street View
Google Wants Swiss Government to Lift Restrictions on Street View originally appeared on Switched on Thu, 24 Feb 2011 11:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Source: http://www.switched.com/2011/02/24/google-wants-swiss-to-live-street-view-restrictions/
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Let it Slide is an engaging, difficult puzzle game originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 23 Feb 2011 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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First Windows Phone 7 update results in bricked Samsung phones originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 22 Feb 2011 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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First Windows Phone 7 update results in bricked Samsung phones originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 22 Feb 2011 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
YouTube Ad Blitz 2011 lets you watch, share and rate Super Bowl ads originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 10 Feb 2011 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Search engine says it is an intermediary and cannot be held responsible for content on the internet
Google will this week challenge a Spanish demand to remove links to articles in newspapers, including El Pa�s, and official gazettes, that the subjects have complained breach their privacy.
The technology giant has been ordered to remove almost 100 online articles from its search listings by Spain's data protection authority, which Google warns would have a "profound, chilling effect" on freedom of expression.
Google will challenge the orders in a Madrid court on Wednesday, the outcome of which could set a controversial new precedent for internet publishing in Spain.
An injunction against search engines is the only way to block access to sensitive material published by these sites, the Spanish authority argues, as newspapers in the country can legally refuse to comply with more informal requests.
However, Google says it acts only as an intermediary, and therefore it cannot be held responsible for all content on the internet.
Peter Barron, Google's director of external relations for Europe, told the Guardian: "We are disappointed by the actions of the Spanish privacy regulator. Spanish and European law rightly hold the publisher of the material responsible for its content.
"Requiring intermediaries like search engines to censor material published by others would have a profound, chilling effect on free expression without protecting people's privacy."
Cases covering five disputed articles will reach the Madrid magistrates' court this week. Google will be ordered to remove the articles from its search results if its court challenge is unsuccessful. However, the articles would still be available on the newspaper websites should Google lose.
The demands follow a burgeoning public debate in Spain about "the right to be forgotten" ? or the right for people to delete their internet "data trails". Complaints from the public about their representation online have jumped 75% year on year, the country's privacy regulator said in June last year.
Padraig Reidy, news editor at Index on Censorship, said the ruling would have "massive ramifications" for freedom of expression. "What's worrying is why they should go to Google, rather than the people who are putting up this content ? some of which is legally bound.
"It encroaches on privacy law, and has massive ramifications on freedom of expression and how the internet works. If Spain is punishing search engines for indexing content how can there be freedom of expression? It looks like a plan by people who don't know how the internet works."
Spain's Agencia Espa�ola de Protecci�n de Datos ? the national data protection agency ? declined to comment.
? This article's headline and first paragraph were amended on 17 January 2011 to reflect the fact that the complaints against Google are about invasion of privacy, rather than libel, as previously stated
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/jan/16/google-court-spain-privacy
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Zipcar adds the plug-in Prius PHEV to its fleet, probably not changing name to Zapcar originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 29 Jan 2011 19:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Texting Teens Shatter More Questionable 'World Records' at LG Worldcup originally appeared on Switched on Thu, 27 Jan 2011 14:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tesla details Closed Loop battery recycling program for Europe originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Jan 2011 13:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Toshiba Dynabook Qosmio T750 laptop has a lid that changes color on both sides originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 29 Jan 2011 21:05:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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The Michell Gyro SE is a classic British turntable that consistently scores well in our reviews, so it didn't take much for the company to tempt us with this limited edition version in a 'blue steel' and black finish.
The SEduction version of the Gyro SE is being sold as a complete package with Michell's TecnoArm, HR power supply and matching record clamp. What's more, there's only 99 serial-numbered examples being made.
The Gyro SE has always been a good-looking turntable and this new finish brings a degree of sophistication that you don't often encounter at the price, but do the extras warrant the price premium over a standard machine?
The centre holds
The Gyro SEduction is a suspended turntable with a spring under each 'tower' on the ring-shaped black subchassis that surrounds the platter. The ring is an aluminium casting with weights on the underside to balance the tonearm at back right.
Each suspension post sits on an aluminium leg with an adjustable spiked foot at its base; the set up instructions suggest using these feet to level the turntable prior to putting the subchassis and platter on, but it pays to get your support as level as possible first.
Set up is a little more protracted than with most modern turntables and the box contains a fair number of bagged components that need to be assembled, but the process is pretty straightforward and the instructions reasonably clear.
?A photographic run-through might help the uninitiated, but this is where the skills of a competent dealer will be invaluable.
We were impressed that the bubble in the spirit level, which sits on the centre pin, remains central when the platter is turning; not many turntables are that well engineered.
The platter itself is made of an acrylic/vinyl mix with weights fixed to the underside to give it inertia. These are usually polished brass, but for the SEduction the brass has been sleeved in blue-steel aluminium. The platter is driven via a round section belt and a DC motor in a superbly finished cylindrical case that sits directly on the supporting surface.
The elements that you don't get with a standard Gyro SE are the TecnoArm and the HR power supply. The latter uses the Never-Connected system to reduce the effects of mains-borne noise and has an on/off switch up front, but, as there's a very convenient switch atop the motor housing.
One feature that's worth investigating is the speed adjuster. You can use this to precisely set the platter speed if you have a suitable strobe disc. The TecnoArm is Michell's variation on Rega's classic RB300 and quite a heavily worked one at that.
It has a different counterweight stub to take an underslung weight (two are provided to suit different cartridges), provides full VTA adjustment with a pair of threaded collars and has the headshell machined to be in line with the bearings.
What you can also see is that there are holes in the underside of the armtube which reveal foam inside, the holes are ?said to increase rigidity and the foam provides damping. The high finish quality is achieved with bead blasting.
Built to last and last
The Gyro SE has always managed to combine solid engineering and good looks and the SEduction finish does it no harm in either respect.
Build quality is extremely high throughout, the inverted oil-pumping bearing is both very attractive ? thanks to its polished brass finish ? and rather clever in that it maintains lubrication at the thrust point where any amount of friction is detrimental to sound quality.
The trick is to set the suspension up so that the subchassis is very close to the felt washers on the spider and to centre the springs within their cut-outs.
There aren't many suspended turntables around anymore, the Linn LP12 is the most obvious competitor and in its Majik guise hits a similar price point. Avid is another player in this sector, its Diva II model has elastomer rather than coil spring suspension, an MDF platter and a cast rather than machined finish.
?If you can provide a well-isolated support for a turntable, then there are a number of very fine solid plinth options around including the Townshend Rock 7. It doesn't look quite as good as the Michell, but its damping trough gives it a mechanical advantage.
Finally there's the standard Gyro SE, which can be had with a Rega RB301 for �1,340.
Gripped
In many respects the sound of this turntable and arm reflects its build quality and even its overall appearance ? it's open by design and open in sonic character. It's also polished and sophisticated, presenting a coherent and extremely stable soundstage that delivers genuine sonic holography when the right slab of vinyl is on the platter.
We started out using a van den Hul DDT II cartridge, a brand that Michell MD Steve Rowland is not keen on, but one that lets the turntable produce a good solid groove thanks to excellent bass definition.
We really like the way you can hear what's going on with each instrument in an ensemble ? double basses in particular seem more nimble and dynamic than usual. ?
The Keith Jarrett Trio demonstrated this to boogie-inducing effect on the Changes album, and the way those musicians manage to improvise such a co-ordinated result really transports you when it's reproduced with this degree of clarity.
The quality of temporal and three-dimensional stability is what separates this package from the regular Gyro SE and we suspect that the degree of calm with which the system deals with dense material is also down to the TecnoArm, which helps to deliver impressive depth of detail and the stunning imaging that comes with it.
One older LP of Alfred Brendel playing Beethoven was particularly startling to the extent to which you could hear both the auditorium and the nature of the recording itself.
And sorted
It wasn't until we got the setup sorted that such entertaining and impressive results were achieved. Iif you audition a Gyro SE and it isn't timing well it's probably a fettling issue.
In SEduction guise this is a polished and revealing turntable that is very low on colouration and high on detail, the sort of detail that makes you realise just how good vinyl can be and why it is making such a big comeback.
With a great slab of the stuff it can place the music in the room in totally unfettered fashion, with instruments and voices placed precisely in the soundstage. Gripping stuff indeed.
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