TechToaster.com – Technology Buzz

Google broke into the world of television Thursday with the introduction of Google TV, an Internet based TV platform that will be available this fall in devices exclusively from Sony and Logitech.

It seems Google is trying to take on the cable and satellite companies with it’s new product, Google TV.

Popularity: 19% [?]

It seems that someone found a prototype for Apple’s new iPhone somewhere in Redwood City and tech website Gizmodo got their hands on it (and took it apart).  They’ve posted videos and a write up on their website. I guarantee, ahem, someone at Apple got fired over this. It’s good to know that if I ever lose my new phone that a kind soul might find it and take apart for me.  Unfortunately the phone was disabled remotely by Apple before it got to Gizmodo, so they couldn’t boot it up and check out the OS and such.  Moral of the story: If you find a prototype iPhone, first thing you do is put it in airplane mode.

Update:  How apple asked for their iPhone back.

Popularity: 44% [?]

Chipworks, a firm that specializes in reverse engineering, has recently opened up an iPad to look at the hardware.  They released a report detailing the internals of Apple’s new tablet. What they found is that is uses almost indentical hardware to that of the iPod touch.  The iPad is comprised of a small circuit board (that is almost identical to the iPod touch’s) along with a giant battery.  Chipworks calls the iPad ‘a giant battery with a tiny [circuit] board attached to it’ — and looking at the picture above, you can definitely see why!

So if you are in the market for an iPad , be aware that you are basically paying for a touchscreen with iPod touch guts and a gigantic battery (filled with unicorn blood).

Popularity: 36% [?]

My copy of Windows 7 beta is expiring today on my Dell mini 9, so I decided to reinstall XP on it. Unfortunately, my external DVD rom recently took a dive, so I have to install XP from a USB flash drive. I have done this a couple of times before, and it’s pretty easy thanks to this wonderful tool, PeToUSB.

Please note, this method also works with USB hard drives.

What you will need

• A computer with a working CD rom drive
• A copy of Windows XP
• PeToUSB tool (Download)
• A 1gb+ flash drive or USB hard drive

Steps to complete

1. Put your Windows XP Disc in the cd rom drive of your computer.
2. Plug in your USB flash drive or hard drive.
3. Start the PeToUSB tool. (If using Windows 7/Vista, right click and “Run as administrator”)
4. Configure it with your sources and destinations as shown in the pic below.



5. Click the start button.
6. When finished, unplug the USB flash drive/hard drive and plug it into the computer you’d like to install Windows on.  Make sure you set the computer to boot from the USB drive in the bios, and reboot.
7. Install!

Popularity: 48% [?]

Microsoft’s Bing Maps architect, Blaise Aguera y Arcas, demos their new “augmented-reality mapping” technology at the TED 2010 conference.

Microsoft has been seemingly forced into a genuinely competitive position by Google, and it’s good to see that they are going for one-ups, rather than catch-up.  Check out the video to see the amazing immersion and eye candy that Microsoft is developing for Bing Maps.

Popularity: 100% [?]