Filed under: Misc. Gadgets, Gaming

Joining the nearly endless amount of Nintendo DS hacks already in the wild is TobW’s DS Sampling Keyboard, which “uses the DS’s microphone and touchscreen” to interface with a software-based sampling keyboard. A close contender to join our Music Thing series, this wonderous hack takes advantage of the wee machine’s excellent X / Y-axis controls as well as its built-in WiFi to beam the MIDI commands wirelessly. The program has been tested with Wifi, GBAMP, and M3, so “it should work on pretty much anything,” and provides a much less expensive alternative to those dedicated offerings. While musical gizmos are always more effective when seen heard rather than just heard about, be sure to click on for a front row seat to the YouTube demonstration.

[Via MusicThing]

Continue reading Nintendo DS doubles as wireless MIDI keyboard / controller

 

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BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time

Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Filed under: Features, Misc. Gadgets, Portable Audio

Sometimes, vapourware turns out to be real. There have been rumors, complete with stupid photoshop images, that a portable, pocket-sized sampler/drum machine called the MPC-500 was about to be launched by Akai for at least two years. Last week, after a few leaked photos appeared, it was finally announced: a little black box running on 6 AA batteries, with 12 pads, 16mb of memory and a two-line LCD display beamed straight out of a 1985 pocket calculator. Is it the greatest piece of pocketable audio kit since the Walkman iPod, or just an overpriced toy for DJ wannabes? Keep reading for the full scoop…

As with any announcement about the MPC range, it was met with a barrage of bitching, complaining and mean jokes. Why do people care? Because the many incarnations of MPC are synonymous with hip hop, and people either love it or hate it. As I’ve written before, these things are cult objects, whether it’s Kanye West’s custom-painted MPC-2000XL, or Dr Dre’s five MPC-3000s synced up because he doesn’t like changing disks, or endless guys in bedrooms posting videos of themselves making beats to YouTube. The MPC Forums website is a center of the MPC universe, notoriously bad-tempered and filled with complaints about bugs and missing features.

But these are exciting times in MPC-land. In June, a mysterious Japanese collective (quickly named JJ - Japanese Jenius) released an unnofficial replacement operating system for the cheap, popular MPC1000. It added features ‘borrowed’ from the more expensive MPC-2500, corrected bugs and - in the latest version - added a hidden game of Pong. Last week, just 48 hours after the MPC-500 announcement, JJ released the first paid-for version of the new OS, briefly having to close their site as too many people signed up to pay them $30, causing their password-generating system to break down.

So what of the MPC-500? With that cheap-looking screen and the four ‘missing’ pads it seems very, very expensive at $1,299 list ($799 street). There are certainly plenty of cheaper and arguably more powerful ways to make music on the move - I use the incredible Bhajis Loops software for Palm, and there are options for PSP and DS. But the vast majority of MPC haters are people (like myself until a few months ago) who have never used one for any length of time. If you get a chance, give one a try - there’s something great about a device that has matured and evolved over almost 20 years and is now as close to a real musical instrument as any piece of software-in-a-box has a right to be.

 

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SPONSORED BY: BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time.

It seems service provider or cellphone maker these days is starting their own digital music store. Not one to be left out, Samsung’s announced that they will make their own line of digital music players that work with their own proprietary download service.

Samsung’s already got the digital music player side down, making swanky devices like the YP-K5, but will their agreement with MusicNet be enough to get them into third or fourth place behind iTunes and other already-established music services?

The music store is expected to launch later this year. – Jason Chen

Samsung to launch music download service [Reuters via Crunchgear]

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds, Portable Audio, Wearables, Wireless

Alright, dear readers, you know the drill: proceed with caution. We have no confirmation here, but sometimes a tip is too juicy not to share, no matter how suspect it might be. A reader is reporting to us that a coworker's tech-unsavvy friend, who is regularly hired by Apple to do marketing photo shoots, was recently brought on to take some shots of "the sleekest, sexiest damn phone he's ever seen." The launch date? "Some time in August." Yeah, not a typo -- August. Now, to be perfectly clear, we don't know what the iPhone (if it exists) will be actually called, we've never seen a real pic of the elusive beast, and this doesn't really jive with the time frame suggested by Peter Oppenheimer's recent comments -- but we want to believe, and we don't have to wait very long for this one to get debunked or confirmed.

[Thanks, Frazer]

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Filed under: Handsets, Others

Alright, dear readers, you know the drill: proceed with caution. We have no confirmation here, but sometimes a tip is too juicy not to share, no matter how suspect it might be. A reader is reporting to us that a coworker’s tech-unsavvy friend, who is regularly hired by Apple to do marketing photo shoots, was recently brought on to take some shots of “the sleekest, sexiest damn phone he’s ever seen.” The launch date? “Some time in August.” Yeah, not a typo — August. Now, to be perfectly clear, we don’t know what the iPhone (if it exists) will be actually called, we’ve never seen a real pic of the elusive beast, and this doesn’t really jive with the time frame suggested by Peter Oppenheimer’s recent comments — but we want to believe, and we don’t have to wait very long for this one to get debunked or confirmed.

[Thanks, Frazer]

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Filed under: Portable Audio

Japanese manufacturer Sun Connection has emerged from years of painstaking research and design, today announcing its Music+ MP3 player. Unlike some other totally different digital audio players, the Music+ relies on SD/MMC cards for storage (topping out at 2GB) and also seemingly only plays back music according to the file name order. The unit itself measures about an inch and a half square and weighs less than an ounce, with its battery promising some eight hours of continuous playback. Sun Connection’s also managed to keep the price low enough, just 2,980 Yen ($25 US) — of course that also means you’ll have to supply your own SD card.

[Via AV Watch]

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Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds, Portable Audio, Wearables, Wireless

Apple's been dogged with rumors of an iPod / phone hybrid (the real deal, not a rehash of a Moto E398 with iTunes support) for nearly as long as the iPod's been kickin' around. Apparently looking to beat the dead horse yet again, an analyst mentioned Sony's success with their Walkman line of music-oriented phones during Apple's Q3 earnings call, prompting CFO Peter Oppenheimer to respond with a fairly solid non-denial: "As regards cell phones, we don't think that the phones that are available today make the best music players. We think the iPod is. But over time, that is likely to change. And we're not sitting around doing nothing." Knowing Apple, of course, this is about the biggest admission we'll get until the iPhone actually drops, so relish in the moment, keep your eyes peeled in a year or so, and if you're really hard up, you could fashion your own, like the pictured Nokia 6682 makeover.

[Via MacDailyNews]

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Filed under: Handsets, Multimedia, Others

Apple’s been dogged with rumors of an iPod / phone hybrid (the real deal, not a rehash of a Moto E398 with iTunes support) for nearly as long as the iPod’s been kickin’ around. Apparently looking to beat the dead horse yet again, an analyst mentioned Sony’s success with their Walkman line of music-oriented phones during Apple’s Q3 earnings call, prompting CFO Peter Oppenheimer to respond with a fairly solid non-denial: “As regards cell phones, we don’t think that the phones that are available today make the best music players. We think the iPod is. But over time, that is likely to change. And we’re not sitting around doing nothing.” Knowing Apple, of course, this is about the biggest admission we’ll get until the iPhone actually drops, so relish in the moment, keep your eyes peeled in a year or so, and if you’re really hard up, you could fashion your own, like the pictured Nokia 6682 makeover.

[Via MacDailyNews]

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Filed under: Handsets, Multimedia, Reviews, Sony Ericsson, GSM, GPRS, EDGE

The W300i may not be the most fascinating phone out there, but golly, it's good to see a midrange flip once in a while coming from someone besides Samsung and LG. The music-oriented W300i earned a 7.6 on CNET's 10-scale, earning praise for its "remarkable" call quality but getting knocked for its tricky button placement, lackluster VGA cam, flimsy feel (attributed to the phone's feather-like 3.3oz), and tendency to freeze for a few seconds on occasion. In our opinion, the dismal 20MB of internal storage doesn't really jive with its Walkman branding -- thankfully, the Memory Stick Micro slot is there to bail you out. No word on any US carriers picking the W300i up, but it's rockin' quadband GSM plus EDGE, so feel free to buy your own if you can stomach the $299 Sony Ericsson is asking.

[Thanks, Jen B.]

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Filed under: Handsets, Multimedia, Others, GSM

Sorry, fellas, this one's for the ladies. Philips has officially launched its 588 model in Taiwan this week, a featherweight (78g) clamshell targeted at the fairer sex. Available only in purple and white, the feminine 588 sports triband GSM, a 1.3 megapixel camera, and -- as you may have guessed from the external controls -- a music player feeding off a little over 100MB of internal storage with no expansion slot. No word on pricing for the Asia-only flip, but with its lack of Bluetooth and external display, we're guessing the 588 is designed to be a fashion phone for the masses. At least the female masses, that is.

[Via Slashphone]

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Just in time for those rockin’ summer concerts is this equalizer t-shirt from Bim Bam Banana. This tee, called the Show Off T-Shirt, has a built-in sound sensitive graphic qualizer panel with a EL panel that will light up depending on what beats are in your general vicinity. Only small and medium sizes remain for this $72 shirt and it will likely make you the coolest or easily the geekiest person at the Phish concert this summer.

Product Page [Via Gearlog]

Filed under: Handsets, LG, Sprint-Nextel, EV-DO

If you’re thinking about picking up LG’s Fusic (otherwise known as the LG550) you might want to block off some time to read Phone Scoop’s incredibly thorough review. The handset, which is available now from Sprint, gets high marks for design and advanced features like excellent battery life, A2DP and an FM transmitter, but is hurt by the fact both music players (one for songs purchased from the Sprint Music Store and one for everything else) can’t multitask, so if you need to check your texts, you’ll have to do it in silence. The review goes on to admit that even with interchangeable faceplates and a very familiar scroll wheel, the Fusic is geared more toward the occasional listener than the audiophile, so don’t go making a spot in the junk drawer just yet.

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Filed under: Features, Misc. Gadgets

Each week Tom Whitwell of Music Thing highlights the best of the new music gear that's coming out, as well as noteworthy vintage equipment:

Wait! Come back! Stop scrolling! Why should you read about a boring-looking grey synthesizer? I'll tell you why. This week, music geeks have been talking about two things. The first is the Bleep Labs Thingamagoop, the tiny, cute, handmade-in-America noise box with a strobing LED tentacle and surprisingly reasonable $100 price tag. The Thingamagoop represents one end of what's interesting in music gear at the moment -- fun, handmade, not necessarily very practical analog gear put together in garages by Make magazine readers.

Then there's this grey plastic synth. It's Novation's new Xio, which represents the other big thing happening in music gear: astonishing value for money. This thing is a USB audio interface, with phantom power and a pre-amp, so you can record using real professional microphones. It's a MIDI controller for racks and soft-synths, with a cool touchpad and joystick and lots of knobs. It's a nice-feeling (if short) semi-weighted keyboard (there's also a 49-key version). And, it's a real stand-alone analog-modelling synth, which you can tweak in your deckchair while it runs off 6 AA batteries. The Xio costs £229 (Maybe $350-$399 retail), significantly cheaper than it's nearest rival, the 3 year-old MicroKorg, which has mini keys and no controller or USB audio features. It's amazing.

Chinese manufacturing and cheap DSP chips have revolutionised the music gear business. Sure, this stuff doesn't have much soul, and it probably won't be collectable in 20 years, but it's making the average dorm-room studio a far more exciting place to be. Anyway, you can always invest the change in a small family of Thingamagoops.

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Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Oh Hello Kitty, you adorable little tease — usually the items graced with your lovely visage are priced with the budget-conscious Japanese schoolgirl in mind, but frankly we’re a bit surprised to see you endorsing a product that’s going for an eye-popping $21,625. That’s right, for the same cost as almost a hundred of those regular Kittycaster guitars, Sanrio and renowned retailer Mitsukosh are offering a super-limited-edition Stratocaster from Fender that features an over-sized homage to the frisky feline on the pick-guard along with with a blown-up version of her famous signature on the neck. Surprisingly, your twenty grand doesn’t even seem to buy the usual gold-plated, jewel-encrusted gaudiness found on most products in this price range, but what you’re really paying for here is exclusivity — Mitsukosh apparently has one of the only three models that were manufactured. Sure, we love us some Hello Kitty, but for this kind of loot we’d rather buy a ticket to Japan and camp out in one of the Sanrio stores for a few weeks, using hundreds of plush Kitties as a mattress.

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Filed under: Handsets, Multimedia, Samsung, GSM

There are many variations of the theme, but the story typically ends the same: Korean manufacturer shows off hot phone; hot phone goes on sale in Korea; rest of the world never hears about the hot phone again. For a change of pace, we might have a happy ending this time. Remember the curious SPH-S4300 music-centric spinner we told you about a while back? It seems Samsung’s found a few customers happy with the 2-column keypad layout, since they’re releasing a nearly identical phone with GSM innards as the X830. Internal flash is down from 1GB to a fairly pathetic 82MB, but given the phone’s microscopic 85 x 29 x 20mm dimensions, we’re nearly willing to forgive. If you pick this one up, be careful, dear readers — looks mighty easy to put an eye out with that spin mechanism. View the X830 stowed in its upright, locked position after the break.

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Filed under: Misc. Gadgets, Peripherals, Portable Audio

If it wasn’t yet clear to you that the age of the DIY mashup is upon us, a new set of toys from a company called BlueBox — which let even iPod-toting tweens “enhance” their tunes by dropping beats and sound effects — should remove any lingering doubts. The three members of the new miJam series, which all attach to standard headpone jacks - a guitar, mixing board, and electronic drumsticks — bear little resemblance to  their non-toy counterparts, as all of the effects are triggered by buttons instead of real drumming or thrashing. Even the mixer sounds like it would be a letdown for budding DJ’s, delivering canned scratches that will in no way prepare them for the beat-matching they’ll being doing in a few years on their Numarks. Still, kids are pretty easily entertained, so the flashing lights and loud noises should probably hold their interest for a few minutes longer than your average gimmicky accessory. Like so many other pre-release products we bring you, we have no idea when these are coming out nor how much they’ll sell for.

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Filed under: Culture, Handsets, Multimedia, Samsung

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