Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

We should start off by saying that this could be nothing but cautionary corporate-speak, but rather than confirming the scheduled January ship date for Windows Vista — which is what everyone at the company’s annual analyst meeting wanted to hear — Microsoft exec Kevin Johnson seemingly opened up the door to fresh delay rumors by telling attendees that the beleaguered OS will be released “when it is available.” Johnson’s comments came as a response to analysts who wanted to know if Vista was still on track for a January release; instead of a simple “yes,” however, he told the group that “we are going to ship the product when it is ready, and we are going to take it milestone by milestone.” Now, what sounds like a non-denial of further delays could simply be part of a new policy to avoid making specific promises, but following Bill Gates’s recent “statistical analysis” that Vista is only 80% likely to ship in January, this development is troubling to say the least. At this point we don’t really know what to expect anymore, and since our current XP-powered setup already does everything we need it to, we’re getting pretty close to not caring if Vista is ever released at all.

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Filed under: Digital Cameras, Misc. Gadgets

No matter how many spy cams and unmanned surveillance drones government and law enforcement officials can pack into public spaces, their utility has traditionally been limited by the finite amount of footage human monitors can review in a given time frame. New DARPA-sponsored research out of Columbia University, however, may soon allow folks tasked with keeping an eye on video feeds to perform their jobs up to ten times faster — by leveraging the rapid image processing abilities of cortical vision. Since people are able to recognize suspicious activity much more quickly than they can consciously identify what’s wrong, professor Paul Sajda and his team developed a computer-brain interface device — similar to ones we’ve seen control an on-screen cursor and bionic limb — that monitors an operator’s neural output while he/she is watching streaming footage, and tags specific images for later perusal. Once the technology is perfected in the coming months (it still emits too many false positives, apparently), it could allow for more thinly-staffed monitoring departments, though we suspect it will probably just convince officials to deploy more and more cameras.

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Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

If you’re one of the many folks eagerly awaiting the January release of Windows Vista, then there’s a small-but-not-insignificant chance that you may be in for a letdown — a 20% chance, actually, according to outgoing Microsoft CTO, lifelong Engadget reader, and occasional video pirate Bill Gates. During a presentation in Cape Town, South Africa, Mr. Gates informed his audience that although there’s an 80% probability that the next-gen OS will ship as scheduled, “we’ve got to get this absolutely right,” and stressed that “if the feedback from the beta tests shows it is not ready for prime time, I’d be glad to delay it.” Now, we can’t imagine that anyone would want to purchase buggy software, so it’s reassuring to see that Microsoft is committed to only pushing a polished product out the door, but we have to say that Gates’ choice of words here makes him come across as just a little cavalier. Because if he’s “glad” to continue frustrating us with these tragi-comic delays, then there’s probably quite a few people out there who will be just as glad to stick with their copies of XP out of spite — or even worse, make the dreaded leap over to Leopard or Linux.

[Thanks, Matt and Oliver O.]

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Filed under: Media PCs

Besides that pair of smartphones we spotted earlier today, Gigabyte has also been showing off a set of home theater PCs at Computex, and whether you like your media centers in tower or pizza box configuration, Gigabyte's got you covered. While both the silver H971 and white A963 support VIIV-powered Core Duo processors, the rest of the specs are nothing that will get you too excited, and the lack of built-in HDMI  or WiFi will probably keep most of our readers from even giving these machines a second glance. Still, if the Intel spin machine has done its job right, the VIIV stickers alone should help Gigabyte move a few units whenever they hit stores.

Read- A963 [Via AVing]
Read- H971 [Via AVing]

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