LG enV Touch (Verizon Wireless)

Product summary
Jun 09

The good:
The LG enV Touch has two beautiful displays, a nice touch-screen interface, and a great QWERTY keyboard. It has impressive features, such as a 3.2-megapixel camera, EV-DO Rev. A, and a full HTML Web browser.

The bad:
The LG enV Touch's touch-screen interface could use some refinement, and the Web browser experience is not as smooth as we would like. Visual Voice Mail and corporate e-mail support costs additional monthly fees. The lack of Wi-Fi is disappointing.

The bottom line:
The LG enV Touch's combination of great design and top-notch features makes it one of the top Verizon Wireless Wireless phones we've ever seen.

Specifications:
Band / mode: CDMA2000 1X 1900/800 ; Talk time: Up to 260 min ; Combined with: With digital camera / digital player ; See full specs 

Price range: $149.99 - $599.99 check prices 
CNET editors' review
Reviewed by: Nicole Lee 
Reviewed on: 06/05/2009 


Photo gallery:
LG enV Touch (Verizon Wireless)


The LG enV Touch was a surprise to us. We thought all of the enV line of phones would be in the style of the LG enV VX9900, the LG enV2, and the more recent LG enV3.Those phones had numeric keypads on the front, with QWERTY keyboards behind their flip designs. But it appears that the LG enV Touch is actually a successor to the Voyager VX10000, due to its full touch screen-interface. Perhaps Verizon and LG are going back to the enV name to reinforce its association with high-end messaging phones. 

We gave the LG Voyager VX10000 an Editors' Choice award when it first launched, but it has been almost two years since then, so it's about time for an upgrade. The LG enV Touch definitely offers better design and features. Both the touch-screen and internal displays are bigger, the keyboard has a better layout, the 3.2-megapixel camera has more advanced settings, the 3.5mm headset jack accommodates your own headphones, EV-DO Rev. A offers faster Web browsing, and more. The enV Touch doesn't have V Cast Mobile TV like the Voyager did, but that's about the only thing missing with this upgrade. Perhaps our only complaints were that the touch-screen interface and Web browsing could use some refinements, and the lack of Wi-Fi was disappointing. 

The LG enV Touch is available for $149.99 with a $70 mail-in rebate and a two-year service agreement, which isn't too expensive for what you're getting. 

Design
When the LG Voyager came out two years ago, touch-screen phones were still relatively new. The market is now flooded with them, and the enV Touch doesn't seem so unique now. However, that doesn't take away from the enV Touch's design appeal. Measuring 4.52 inches long by 2.16 inches wide by 0.66 inch thick, the enV Touch is slimmer than the Voyager, though at 4.92 ounces, it's a bit heavier. It has a sleek and stylish look similar to that of the LG Dare and the LG Versa, with a solid feel in the hand and a sturdy hinge construction. 



The LG enV Touch has a large, 3-inch touch screen on the front.


Like the Voyager, the enV Touch has a large touch-screen display dominating its entire front surface, except for three physical keys at the bottom; the Send, Clear, and End/Power keys. The Clear key doubles as the voice command key (with a short press) and the voice recorder key (with a long press). The touch screen is really stunning, measuring 3 inches diagonally, which is a hair larger than the 2.81-inch display on the Voyager. The display supports a whopping 1.6 million colors and is bright, sharp, and vibrant. You can adjust the screen's backlight time, the charging screen, (what shows on the display when the phone is charging), the menu fonts, and the dial fonts. 

Along the bottom of the home screen are five shortcut icons that lead to the messaging menu, the virtual dial pad, the main menu, the phone book, and a Favorites page, where you can list your favorite contacts or group. You'll also find a small arrow to the far right of the display. Tap that, and you'll reveal a pull-out menu of application shortcuts and shortcuts to media files in the My Media library (Media files include photos, browser bookmarks, and videos). You can then drag and drop those shortcut icons directly to the home screen, which is similar to what you can do on the LG Dare. Some of the application shortcuts will just appear as simple icons, like the browser for example. For certain applications, like the calendar and the clock, they will appear as full-on widgets on the home screen. If you want to add a shortcut that's not listed on the pull-out menu, you can tap the Add button on the bottom right to select from your entire library of applications and media files. If you wish to remove the shortcut from your home screen, simple drag and drop the icon to the small arrow on the right. 

On the whole, we found the touch-screen interface to be quite responsive. There's a touch calibration wizard that you can go through to help with your precision and sensitivity, and the haptic feedback makes the phone vibrate whenever your touch registers. You can even adjust the length and intensity of the vibration. Also helpful is a sound effect whenever your touch registers on the screen. Aside from just tapping, you can also scroll through menus and long Web pages by dragging your finger across the screen. 

Despite all this, the touch-screen interface takes some acclimation. This is especially true with the Web browser, where you need to tap a particular icon just right for it to register. We had to tap links several times before it got through, for example. Also, when scrolling through menus, we would sometimes launch an application accidentally. We got used to it after awhile, but it was frustrating at first. 



The LG enV Touch has a virtual dial pad on the touch-screen interface. 


Instead of having to open up the phone to dial or text, you can do both via the touch-screen interface. We liked the virtual dial pad's large digits. Underneath the keypad are shortcuts to voice dialing, the recent calls list, and the contacts list. As for messaging, you can choose a few ways to enter text: handwriting recognition, multitap or T9 via an alphanumeric keypad, or via a landscape QWERTY keyboard. 

The enV Touch has an internal accelerometer, so you can activate the QWERTY keyboard by rotating the phone horizontally. When using the QWERTY keyboard, each key magnifies as you touch it to show that you selected it, much like the keyboard on the iPhone. All of these text entry methods work fine as far as touch-screen interfaces go, but we would definitely choose to use the actual physical keyboard over the touch screen for faster typing. 

On the left spine of the enV Touch are the dedicated camera key, the volume rocker, and the screen lock key. The charger jack is on the bottom, while the microSD card slot and 3.5 millimeter headset jack are on the right side. We're especially glad to see the 3.5 millimeter headset jack, as it's always good to have the option of using your existing headphones. On the back are the 3.2-megapixel camera lens and an LED flash. 

The 3-inch internal display is just as large as the external display and just as attractive, with the same color support and pixel resolution. You can adjust the backlight time separately from the external display. You can also change the menu style interface. Do note that you need to open the phone all the way to 180 degrees to access the controls on the left spine. 



The LG enV Touch has a full QWERTY keyboard. 


There are stereo speakers on either side of the display, while two soft keys rest right underneath. Below that is the full QWERTY keyboard. Even though it looks similar to the one on the Voyager, there are a few important differences. There's now a Favorites button that leads to your favorite contacts page, a dedicated text-messaging button, plus the usual Shift and Symbol keys. The biggest change is that the space bar is now located in the middle of the keyboard instead of to the sides. This is a welcome change, as it is far more natural to have the space bar in the middle. Thankfully, the QWERTY keyboard on the enV Touch is just as easy to use as on the Voyager. The keyboard is spacious, with keys that are raised above the surface and have a nice give when pressed. The 2, Q, W, E, and S keys are grayed out to indicate game pad controls. 

To the right of the QWERTY arrangement is the navigation array. It consists of the Send and End/Power keys, a square navigation toggle with middle OK key, the Clear key, and the Speakerphone key. The up, left, and down directions on the toggle can be mapped to three user-defined shortcuts, while the right leads to the My Shortcuts menu, which can also be customized with up to four shortcuts. 

You can also customize the QWERTY keyboard shortcut, which lets you initiate a contacts search, a new text message, or a new note, simply by pressing any key on the QWERTY keyboard. 

Features
If you thought the LG enV Touch's design was impressive, wait until you hear about its features. Almost all of its offerings are updated from the Voyager, even the basics. The one thing missing from the enV Touch is V Cast Mobile TV, which is Verizon's live-TV-streaming service. The enV Touch holds a generous 1,500-entry phonebook, with room in each entry for five numbers, two e-mail addresses, and a street address. You can then organize the contacts into caller groups, pair them with a photo for caller ID, or any of 26 polyphonic ring tones. Other basics include a vibrate mode, a speakerphone (which you can activate prior to a call), text and multimedia messaging, voice messaging, a calendar, an alarm clock, a world clock, a stopwatch, a notepad, and even a drawing pad, which you can use with the touch-screen interface. After you finish doodling something, you can send it off to your friends via MMS if you want. 

More advanced users will appreciate USB mass storage and voice command dialing. Supported Bluetooth profiles include hands-free, dial-up networking, A2DP or stereo, phonebook access, basic printing, basic imaging, object push for vCard and vCalendar, and file transfer. You can also use the enV Touch as a wireless modem for your laptop or computer, but you'll have to get the Mobile Broadband Connect plan for $60 a month for a 5GB data cap. The enV Touch also comes with a document viewer, which will let you read Microsoft Office documents from Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, plus Adobe Acrobat .pdf files. To read them, you need to load them onto a microSD card in the "my_document" folder. Other advanced features include mobile instant messenger (AIM, Windows Live, and Yahoo), GPS with VZ Navigator support, e-mail, and visual voice mail. Do note that the Verizon visual voice mail service will cost you $3 a month.

As for e-mail, there are three options; mobile e-mail, with which you can get e-mail from a variety of services (like Yahoo, AOL, and Windows Live) directly into your in-box; mobile corporate e-mail courtesy of RemoSync, which lets you sync your work e-mail and calendar; and mobile Web e-mail, which gives you shortcut access to a variety of Web e-mail services like Windows Live, AOL Mail, and Yahoo Mail--this latter option opens up the Web browser. Do note that the mobile e-mail application costs $5, and in order to get corporate e-mail you'll have to sign up for a $9.99 monthly subscription to RemoSync. The corporate e-mail option works with Microsoft ActiveSync, so you need to know your company's mail Exchange server address. 

The enV Touch has a full HTML Web browser like its predecessor did, and, unfortunately, it seems to have the same clunky issues with the touch screen. Don't get us wrong; we love that you can surf and browse full Web pages. We also like that you can zoom in and out of pages, view a page in full-screen mode, add bookmarks, and search through a page. The enV Touch also features tabbed browsing (with up to three tabs, or pages, open), which we liked. 

But using the Web browser via the touch-screen interface is an exercise in frustration. As we said earlier, it can take several taps in order for a link to register, especially on a crowded page. Also, whenever we bring up the browser navigation array, they only appear for a second before disappearing again. There doesn't seem to be a way to adjust this in the settings. Also, using the toggle to view full screen pages can be tedious, and is nowhere as smooth as the multitouch pinch-to-zoom interface on the iPhone. Still, at least now we can use the volume rocker to zoom in and out of Web pages, which makes things easier. 

The LG enV Touch comes with EV-DO Rev. A, which is a touch faster than the EV-DO on the LG Voyager. It doesn't come with Wi-Fi, however, which is a bit of a letdown on such a full-featured phone. Along with EV-DO, the enV Touch also has access to Verizon's array of broadband services like V Cast Video, where you can download or stream video clips from providers like CBS and CNN, and V Cast Music with Rhapsody, which lets you purchase and download songs over the air. Each song costs $1.99, and includes a download to your PC. 

As for the music player itself, the interface is pretty simple, with the album art displayed next to the artist and album name along with the track title. You can mute the player, create and edit playlists, set the songs on repeat or shuffle, or add one of six preset equalizer settings. There's also a Music Only mode that shuts off the phone's cellular signal so you can keep listening to tunes when you're on an airplane. Other than downloading a song from V Cast Music, you can also sync up songs from your PC with a USB cable using the V Cast Music with Rhapsody software. If you have a Rhapsody subscription, you can also sync up your subscribed tracks. Supported music files include MP3, WMA, unprotected AAC and AAC+ formats. The enV Touch supports up to 16GB of removable memory via a microSD card in case you want additional storage. 



The LG enV Touch has a 3.2-megapixel camera lens and an LED flash.


The enV Touch has a 3.2-megapixel camera, which is an upgrade over the Voyager's 2-megapixel lens. You can take pictures in six different resolutions (2,048x1,536, 1,600x1,200, 1,280x960, 640x480, and 320x240 pixels), five white balance presets, and five color effects. It also has three focusing modes: autofocus, macro mode, or manual mode, the last of which lets you pick one of seven points on the screen to focus in on. You can toggle the flash on or off, adjust a self timer if you want, or select one of three shutter sounds (there's also a silent option). The camera also has a few special shot modes: Smile shot, which automatically takes a picture when a person smiles; Panorama, which stitches together three photos shot from left to right; Intelligent shot, which automatically adjusts the white balance and color saturation based on the surrounding environment; and Facial Makeover mode, which removes all blemishes and unsightly marks from a person's face. There's also a name card reader mode that is specially tuned to take pictures of business cards so that the words are legible. This way you don't have to carry a lot of business cards around with you; just store the images in your phone. 



The LG enV Touch takes good photos.

Photo quality is very good for the most part. Images look sharp, without a lot of blurriness, and colors looked bright, as well. Do note that you can't use the external touch screen as a self-portrait viewfinder. There's also a built-in camcorder, which can record in two resolutions (320x240 and 176x144) in two lengths--short 30-second clips for multimedia messages, or clips of up to an hour or so for saving. Video quality was pretty good for a camera phone, without a lot of blur. It won't replace a real video camera, but it's good enough for sharing short video clips with friends.

You have plenty of personalization options with the enV Touch. You can adjust the wallpaper, display themes, and alert tones. You can purchase more themes and tons via Verizon's online store. The enV Touch also comes with a few games, like Need for Speed Undercover, Resident Evil: Degeneration, and Tetris. You can find more games at via the Verizon store, as well. 

Performance
We tested the dual-band (CDMA 800/1900; EV-DO) LG enV Touch in San Francisco using Verizon Wireless. We were impressed with the call quality. Callers heard us without any static or interference, and we could hear them loud and clear. They said our voices sounded natural, almost as though we were speaking on a landline phone. Even when we activated the speakerphone, they couldn't tell the difference. On our end, the speakerphone had plenty of volume, though it sounded just a tad tinny, which is to be expected. 

The audio quality of songs from the LG enV Touch's stereo speakers was average. It's loud enough, but the bass was lacking, and the vocals seemed weak. We would recommend using a wired or stereo Bluetooth headset for better music quality. 

The enV Touch's EV-DO Rev. A is supposed to be faster than just regular EV-DO, and indeed it is. V Cast videos took around a second to load with little buffering time, and loading a full and complex Web page like CNET's front page took around 15 seconds. Downloading a 1.5MB song took around 30 seconds. 

We were also surprised that the video quality on V Cast videos was quite good. Usually we complain about the pixelation on the video, but not with the enV Touch--perhaps because of the 1,600,000-color support and EV-DO Rev. A. It's definitely not HD quality or anything, but for streaming video, it was sharp and clear, without a lot of pixelation or blurriness. 

The LG enV Touch has a rated battery life of 4.3 hours talk time and 17 days standby time. According to FCC radiation tests, the enV Touch has a digital SAR rating of 0.932 watts per kilogram.

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Maingear Ephex (Intel Core i7 965)

Product summary
Jan 09

The good:
Aggressive overclocking leads to record-setting application and games performance; tri-SLI 3D cards give you lots of headroom for games down the road; fast solid-state boot drive and plenty of secondary storage space; expertly assembled.

The bad:
Most expensive desktop we've reviewed; service and support not quite as comprehensive as its boutique PC competition.

The bottom line:
Maingear's Ephex is the fastest PC we've reviewed, and also the most expensive. You can find better service policies from other boutique PC vendors, but the Ephex's overall speed and build quality are enough for us to recommend it to those in the market for the best desktop they can find.
CNET editors' review
Reviewed by: Rich Brown 
Reviewed on: 01/27/2009 
Released on: 12/01/2008 

Even though lots of vendors offer the capability, we've resisted reviewing a three-way SLI PC until now. Our hesitation had to do with a desire to keep the high-end PCs we reviewed at or around the $6,000 mark, hard to do with $1,800 worth of graphics cards alone. But last November our reservations were steamrolled by a crush of new technologies. Intel's expensive solid-state hard drives proved too enticing for gaming PC vendors, and by supporting triple channel memory, Intel's Core i7 chips invited loads of pricey high performance RAM. As a result, we agreed to review Falcon Northwest's $8,000 Mach V back in November, and it's also why we let Maingear submit this triple-SLI $8,798 Ephex desktop. That price makes this Maingear the most expensive desktop we've ever reviewed. Provided you have that kind of commitment to PC gaming, you'll find the Ephex delivers an exceptional entertainment experience. 

By giving the Ephex a $4,600 price tag for its most basic configuration, Maingear seems to be making a distinct effort to put its flagship PC out of reach for most gamers. And as expensive as it sounds, even our $8,800 model lacked features such as a mouse and a keyboard, a monitor, or extras such as a Bigfoot Killer NIC, a Wi-Fi adapter, or speakers. On the flipside, you can shed $1,100 off the price of the system if you opt out of the fancy paint job and the transparent side panel. None of this is to say that value is a primary concern in reviewing this PC, but if all you care about is clean design and performance, you can get all of this configuration's core functionality for less. 

Like most boutique PC vendors, Maingear pays special attention to the design and wiring of its systems, and if the build quality of this Ephex is any indication, Maingear has shown that it can rival the meticulousness of Falcon Northwest. The liquid cooling plates on the graphics cards hardware obstruct the free card expansion slots, but that's our only major complaint. Adding hard drives is simple with outward facing drive bays, and overall both the external and internal appearance of the system show that it was assembled with great care.

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Sony X-Series Walkman (16GB)

The good:
The Sony X-Series Walkman is a solid device with a sleek, utilitarian design and a unique, engaging interface; it's compatible with both Mac and Windows and supports podcasts from iTunes and videos from Amazon Unbox; it offers a plethora of features including an onboard Slacker app, integrated YouTube support, Wi-Fi, an FM tuner, and built-in noise canceling. The included earphones are nicer than average, the sound quality is excellent, and the rated battery life is superb.

The bad:
The X-Series is expensive, and it's a fingerprint magnet. The included app does not transcode much video adequately.

The bottom line:
The X-Series is a superb choice for audiophiles who want a luxury device with an excellent touch-screen interface and plenty of other bells and whistles.

Specifications:
Device type: Flash player ; Flash memory installed: 16 GB ; Battery: Lithium ion See full specs 

See all products in the Sony X-Series Walkman series 
CNET editors' review
Reviewed by: Jasmine France 
Reviewed on: 07/07/2009 
Released on: 07/01/2009 


Photo gallery:
Sony X-Series Walkman


Touch-screen MP3 players are all the rage, so it was only a matter of time before Sony hopped on the bandwagon. As it turns out, it was more time than we all anticipated. The company's X-Series Walkman was announced at CES 2009 and was expected to hit shelves in mid-June, but the player didn't go on sale until early July. The good news is that the final product is every bit as impressive as the preproduction model that CNET got to play with back in May. The X-Series Walkman offers a high-quality design with a gorgeous screen, a fun and innovative interface, and a plethora of cool features--just be prepared to pay for it accordingly. The player is priced the same as the iPod Touch, with the 16GB going for $299 and the 32GB listing for $100 more. 

Design
Sony did not skimp on the construction of the X-Series Walkman, which is modeled after a geode with its glossy face and back plates wrapped in a glittering textured edge. The player is made of sturdy metal and has a weighty quality that makes it feel as expensive as the price tag insists. It's not as slim as the iPod Touch, measuring 3.8 inches by 2.1 inches by 0.4 inch, but it's still quite pocket-friendly, and the 3-inch OLED display is nothing to scoff at. Our one complaint is that the shiny surface is extremely smudge-prone and nearly impossible to keep clean given the touch screen interface. 

Of course, the fingerprints are easy to ignore thanks to the fact that Sony went above and beyond with the interface, which is the best touch-screen utilization next to the iPod Touch. In fact, it's the only other touch screen we've come across that's actually fun to use. It has the "bounce back" effect when you are quickly scrolling through a long list, and a rather cool and unusual tilted scrolling effect for video and album art that's hard to explain in print--best to check out our First Look video for that. But perhaps best of all, you don't even need to use the touch screen for playback controls. The Walkman has tactile play/pause and track shuttle buttons on the top side, as well as a dedicated volume rocker on the right edge, meaning blind (in-pocket) navigation is a possibility with this player. That's truly a rarity in a touch-screen device. Another cool physical characteristic: the giant hold switch on the back. 


Dragging your finger across the screen lets you tilt and scan quickly through album art and video frames.

In general, navigating the X-Series is a simple task. All of the main functions are laid out as icons on the top screen, where you are free to set any photo as wallpaper for personalization purposes. Delving into the music menu takes you to a list of songs, artists, albums, genres, or playlists, depending on where you left off. A soft key that appears at the bottom of all music screens allows you to choose between the various subnavs for music, including a folder browser option. Album art is always front and center, and you can choose to view by cover art only for a more visual experience. 

Indeed, album art is the most prominent item displayed on the playback screen, which also features soft keys for playing, pausing, and skipping tracks. Or if the old-fashioned way of switching songs doesn't appeal to you, you can tap and hold on the album art and then use tilt-and-scroll to visually select another track. The playback screen also offers up track, artist, and album name; a battery meter and clock; and soft keys for pulling up a contextual menu, stepping back through menus, and connecting to the Web for song-related content (more on this later). 

Even getting content onto the X-Series Walkman is an easy and enjoyable process, something that could not be said of Walkmans of years prior. Sony includes its excellent, superlight Content Transfer app. It allows for simple drag and drop of media files directly from your desktop or from within iTunes. You may also choose to use a jukebox such as Windows Media Player or Rhapsody. Although the X-Series will mount as a UMS device for use with a Mac or Linux machine, the app is made only for Windows. 

Features
Perhaps the most interesting feature offered by the X-Series Walkman is the onboard Slacker app, which lets you get all the free music you want on-the-fly. And unlike with the Apple iPod Touch, you won't need a constant Wi-Fi connection to have access to it. While the X-Series does include a wireless antenna for hopping on to hot spots, the Slacker app only needs access to the network when refreshing station content. Each time you refresh, music is cached to the Walkman so that you can listen to it wherever you are, regardless of Internet access. (In other words, it functions in exactly the same way as on the BlackBerry.) 


The Slacker playback screen looks very similar to the main playback screen, but offers the heart and ban buttons that are integral to the service.


The beauty here is threefold. First, the music is completely free, though you will have to tolerate a few audio ads and skip limits (you can do away with these by signing up for Slacker Radio Plus for $3.99 per month). Also, you don't have to spend countless hours creating custom playlists, and when you get sick of your library on shuffle, you can simply choose from the wide variety of genre- and decade-based stations in the Slacker rotation. Finally, you don't need to connect to a computer to get brand-new music on your MP3 player, although it is worth mentioning that you must hook up the Walkman initially in order to customize which stations you want to live on the device. Setting up the sync is a painless process, but it does require that you create an account and input a device ID. In addition to the Slacker content, the player supports transferred songs in MP3, WMA (subscription included), AAC, and WAV format. 

Of course, the X-Series Walkman doesn't stop with music--the 3-inch, capacitive touch display lends itself well to photos and video. The player supports JPEG images, which you can navigate through with a swipe of your finger. For video, there's an integrated YouTube app that lets you can access free content anywhere you are connected to Wi-Fi. The player also supports purchased video from Amazon Video On Demand and any other online store that uses protected WMV. In addition, you get native playback of AVC (H.264/AVC), WMV, and MPEG-4. Plus, Sony has updated its superbly agile Content Transfer app, purportedly adding automatic transcode for videos, although we found in testing that AVI and MOV files would not run through the software and be transferred to the Walkman. 

The X-Series Walkman also offers a few more Wi-Fi-related features worth noting. The first is an integrated Web browser, though it must be said that the iPod Touch has the Walkman beat here. It's nice that Sony thought to include one at all, but it's quite basic, and the virtual keypad is alphanumeric, which makes entering Web sites and search terms a bit tedious. I'm superkeen on the wireless podcast updating feature, though. You can even subscribe to podcasts on the go, and the Walkman offers excellent support of podcasts transferred directly from iTunes (with passive bookmarking and on-the-fly delete capability). Also, the player has a "Related Links" function on the music playback screen that takes you directly to a YouTube video search for the artist/song or a Yahoo general search. 

As for the nitty-gritty features, the X-Series Walkman has them in spades. There's integrated noise canceling, which is built to work with the included MDR-NC020 EX headphones. Sony even includes a pass-through cable so that you may use the feature with in-flight audio systems (the package even includes a dual-pronged airplane adapter for use on older jets). The player also offers an onboard FM tuner with autoscan and more than 25 presets as well as a five-band EQ including two custom settings and DSNe sound enhancement. 

Performance
There's no denying the Sony X-Series Walkman is a player with a premium price tag; luckily, the player serves up performance worthy of its luxury device standing. Foremost, audio quality is excellent, even through the packaged earbuds, which themselves are much higher in quality than those included with nearly any other MP3 player (the Touch among them). Still, we couldn't help but swap in our favorite pair of 'phones (the MDR-NC020EX are not the most comfortable). For the majority of testing, we used a pair of Klipsch S4 earphones, which offered significantly more powerful bass than the MDRs. 

As mentioned, the X-Series offers a plethora of sound enhancement options for those who want to tweak audio to their liking, but we found that listening to the player with the flat EQ and no enhancements provided the best experience. Music sounds exceptionally rich and warm, with mellow mids that are complemented perfectly by the sparkling highs. Dredg's "I Don't Know" was particularly melodic, with a deep, underlying low-end offset by buttery male vocals and crisp hi-hats. On the whole, the clarity and definition is undeniably remarkable, and the Walkman's balanced response lends well to all types of music, making it an excellent choice for all types of listeners. Sound quality is at least comparable--if not slightly superior--to the S-Series Walkman, likely due to Sony's inclusion of the S-Master digital amplifier. Perhaps another side effect is that the X-Series can get exceptionally loud, which will likely please those who want to hook up the player to speakers and use it as their main music source. 

The X-Series is also no slouch when it comes to photo and video quality, thanks largely to its gorgeous displays. Pictures are crystal clear with defined edges and no pixelation or blurring, and both photos and videos offer excellent color saturation. Videos are extremely sharp--you can even see the rippling of water and waving of grass leaves. The 3-inch screen is a bit too small to enjoy lengthy viewing, but the stellar quality certainly helps in terms of eye strain. For its part, the FM tuner offered good reception, though it wasn't the cleanest we've come across. The rated battery life of 33 hours for audio and 9 for video is fantastic, and we expect CNET Labs will at least come close to these numbers in testing (check back soon for those results). 

In the final analysis, the Sony X-Series Walkman is an otherwise phenomenal device that is crippled somewhat by its high price tag. Although we'd like to see the price drop by about $50, we can't begrudge Sony for pricing the player to match the iPod Touch. After all, the latter doesn't include high-quality earbuds and built-in noise canceling, nor does it match the Walkman in terms of its Slacker capabilities. For audio fanatics who want a luxury device with all the bells and whistles, the X-Series is an excellent choice.

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Sony PSP Go

The PSP Go may have been the worst-kept secret of this year's E3 show, but Sony's press conference has now supplied the official details. For the most part, there's little that wasn't already revealed or correctly assumed: the PSP Go is smaller, has a slide-up screen, no UMD drive--and no game-changing upgrades, such as a touch screen or second analog stick. But the big news is that the new PSP will be available in North America on October 1 for $249. 

Here's a roundup of the PSP Go's features and specs, as we understand them so far.

Form factor: The PSP Go has a 3.8-inch wide screen (versus 4.3-inch on all previous PSP models). It's said to be 43 percent lighter than the PSP 3000, which means it would tip the scales at about 3.8 ounces. The PSP Go design is very reminiscent of the Sony Mylo--the screen slides up to reveal the controls. 

Storage: The Go will offer 16GB of built-in flash memory, and it's expandable via a Memory Stick Micro (M2) slot. There is no UMD (Universal Media Disc) drive on the PSP Go. While that no doubt allows for the smaller size (and, we hope, the potential for better battery life), it also means there's no way to play existing PSP software you might own on the PSP Go. 

Controls: While the layout may be different, the control scheme on the PSP Go is little changed from earlier PSP models: a four-way d-pad on the left, the standard quartet of geometrically coded Sony controls (circle, square, cross, triangle) on the right, select/start buttons in the center, and the PlayStation "home" button to the left of the screen. 

A second analog control is always at or near the top of wish lists for PSP redesigns, so its absence is a disappointment. At the same time, sticking with the same control scheme means game compatibility between the PSP Go and older PSPs is maintained. It remains to be seen whether the single stick's placement--closer to the center of the control deck rather than the outside right, where it sits on earlier PSPs--will be problematic for seasoned PSP gamers. That said, the Go control layout is more closely aligned to that of a traditional full-size PlayStation controller. 

Despite early rumors, there is no touch screen on the PSP Go.

Wireless: In addition Wi-Fi support, the PSP Go adds Bluetooth capability to the Sony handheld platform for the first time. That should allow standard Bluetooth headsets (and, presumably, A2DP headphones and speakers) to pair with the PSP Go. In the leaked video, Sony rep John Koller also specifies the ability to tether the PSP Go to a Bluetooth-enabled cell phone. The advantage of that isn't highlighted, but that would potentially allow Web browsing and online gaming via a tethered phone with a 3G data connection (when Wi-Fi access wasn't available). Another possibility (though pure supposition) is that you could pair a PS3 controller (which is Bluetooth-enabled) to the PSP Go.

Games: At Sony's press conference, the company confirmed new PSP versions of many of its most popular franchises. Notable titles--many of which will be released in 2009--include Little Big Planet, Gran Turismo, Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker, Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier, MotorStorm Arctic Edge, and SOCOM Fire Team Bravo 3. The first Resident Evil game for the PSP is scheduled to appear next year as well. 

PSP games will be available for download directly from the PlayStation Store over the console's Wi-Fi connection. In addition to direct download, Sony says that "all" new PSP games will continue to be available on UMD, too. We have to wonder how long that'll last, given the fact that the company seems to be embracing digital-only distribution on titles like Patapon 2. However, since older PSPs can also access and play download-only titles, the eventual death of UMD shouldn't make them obsolete.

Digital media support: The Go boasts the same support for music, video, and photo files as earlier PSPs, so you should have no trouble transferring gigabytes of media from a PC (or via the M2 flash media card). Downloadable movies and TV shows can be purchased directly from the PlayStation Store over Wi-Fi (no more need to use the PS3 or PC as an intermediary). Despite early rumors of a PSP-centric music store, Sony's instead opted for a partnership with eMusic. In other words, users can purchase DRM-free tracks from any online music store (Amazon, iTunes, eMusic, and so forth) and simply copy them over to the PSP. 

Sony will be releasing software called Media Go to help users manage the PSP's content on their PC (this replaces the older, and not terribly useful, Sony Media Manager software). The company is also promising a feature called "Sense Me" that will analyze your music library to play music based on a mood you choose. 

PS3 integration: Again, it appears the existing interoperability between the PS3 and the PSP line will be carried over to the PSP Go. That includes the ability to cross-load some games and media, as well as the Remote Play option (access PS3-based content from the PSP over the Internet). 

Price and availability: The PSP Go will be available in North America on October 1 for $249. (The portable console will go on sale in Europe the same day for 249 euros, and availability in Japan will follow a month later.) The PSP 3000, currently $169, will stay on the market concurrently. 

Unanswered questions: We're hoping to get more details on the PSP Go in the weeks and months ahead. Chief among our unanswered questions: does the Go support video out like the PSP 3000? How's the battery life? Does the screen have the same weird interlacing issues that bothered some on the PSP 3000?

Is it worth waiting for? That, of course, is the big question. The PSP Go isn't the PSP2, to be sure--it's more like the PSP 1.5. Like Nintendo's done with the DSi, Sony is extending (and, it hopes, revitalizing) a portable platform that's sold tens of millions of units worldwide. Considering that this is an evolutionary product--the only real appeal is the smaller form factor--the high price is certainly going to be a barrier for those who already own and enjoy the existing PSP. 

On the other hand, owners of the older (and heavier) PSP 1000 and 2000 may find the PSP Go to be the upgrade they've been waiting for. But with the DSi and iPhone/iPod Touch competing for the time--and pockets--of casual gamers, the ultimate answer may again rest with the quality and desirability of the games. We'll be able to answer the question more definitively when we get some hands-on time with the PSP Go later this year.

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Intel Core i7-965 Extreme Edition

 


The good:
Fastest high-end desktop CPU; supporting motherboard supports both graphics card vendors' multicard technologies.

The bad:
Requires an expensive new motherboard; chipset needs three memory sticks for maximum efficiency.

The bottom line:
Thanks to an expensive new motherboard requirement, Intel's new Core i7 desktop processors will remain enthusiast and professional-level parts until more affordable complementary hardware comes out later next year. Speed never comes cheap, however, and if you're willing to spend for it now, you'll find yourself in possession of the fastest CPU on the market.

Specifications:
Product Type: Processor ; Processor Type: Intel Core i7 Extreme Edition I7-965 ; Packaging Type: FC-LGA8 See full specs 

Price range: $989.99 - $1,195.70 check prices 
CNET editors' review
Reviewed by: Rich Brown 
Reviewed on: 11/03/2008 
Released on: 11/02/2008 

In the last few months you may have seen previews and news stories regarding Intel's new Core i7 desktop processor family, formerly known as Nehalem. Today, we're able to publish our impressions of Intel's new chip and ultimately its new platform. We've selected the flagship, $999 Core i7-965 Extreme Edition CPU to represent the Core i7 family, which at launch later this month will include three other processors, starting at $284. These new chips all require a new chipset, which will only exist at first by way of a very expensive new motherboard. We don't expect mainstream users will adopt Core i7 in any variation at first, at least until the motherboard prices come down. But the well-heeled performance hounds who do make the leap will enjoy the fastest consumer CPUs on the market. 

Core i7 has enough architecture changes to require a brand new connection design between the chip and the motherboard. This is no small change, because Intel has stuck with the LGA775 (land grid array) chip socket since the days of Pentium 4. The new socket design, LGA1366, will not accept any older Intel CPUs, nor will Core i7 work on any older motherboards. 



Core i7 remains as pinless as older Intel CPUs, but it's otherwise all new.


Unlike a new socket design, new chipsets aren't uncommon with updated Intel CPUs. The last three Extreme Edition chips Intel has launched each required its own new motherboard circuitry, and Core i7 is no different. Intel's new Core i7-supporting X58 chipset will only appear in very high-end boards. We conducted this review with the Intel Extreme Motherboard DX58SO board, and we've already reported on a new X58 board from Asus. Expect Gigabyte, MSI, and Intel's other typical board partners to introduce their own new X58 boards, and we expect prices will stay at or around the $300 mark. For this reason, Core i7 will remain an enthusiast CPU until Intel introduces a more moderate, mass consumption-friendly Core i7-compatible chipset. 

Faster memory access
The reason for this platform shift has to do in part with a fundamental design change in Intel's CPU architecture. As has long been rumored, Intel has finally adopted an integrated memory controller into its Core i7 CPUs. What this means is that instead of the CPU communicating with a separate controller on the motherboard before it can talk to the system memory, Core i7 can save a step, and essentially receive data from the system RAM directly. 



Intel's new Extreme Motherboard DX58SO.

AMD adopted this integrated controller strategy in the early days of its Athlon dual-core processors, and it was one of the factors that led them to dominate the competing Intel Pentium D CPUs of that generation. Through superior design since then, Intel has regained its performance lead over AMD, and we suspect that by adding the on-chip memory controller to Core i7, Intel has only made it more difficult for AMD to find a design advantage moving forward. 

A potential complication here is that the new memory controller has three channels to the RAM. That means that unlike most desktop setups, which involve two or four memory sticks, Core i7 systems will want memory sticks in multiples of three. Hence why Intel shipped our test system with only 3GB of RAM (we got creative with a 2x1GB, 1x2GB RAM configuration, for 4GB total for testing), and why in high-end PCs that use the new X58 platform, 3GB, 6GB, and 12GB configurations will be common. X58 will also only support DDR3 RAM, whose prices have thankfully come down over the past year. 

Four cores, sometimes eight
If you've followed Intel's chips designs over the years, the term "Hyperthreading" shouldn't be unfamiliar. This technology lets Intel simulate more processing threads on top of its old dual-core Pentium 4 chips. It abandoned that strategy with the Core 2 family, but Intel has resurrected it with Core i7, and it's why you'll see eight processing threads when you bring up Windows' system performance screen. Few day-to-day programs will benefit from Hyperthreading, and it's more of a situational benefit for processing reliability and the scant few applications that can actually support so many threads. Core i7 will eventually hit eight native cores on a single CPU, or 16 processing streams with Hyperthreading, but Intel has not made it clear when that will happen. It may be worth the wait, if you know you'll need that much parallelism, but few consumers will. 

Multigraphics agnostic
Another significant change with the Core i7/X58 landscape had to do with graphics cards. Intel's Skulltrail platform of last year supported both standards as well, but the specialized CPUs that made the board worthwhile were prohibitively expensive. With the X58 chipset, yes, it comes on an expensive motherboard, but you can purchase a Core i7 chip to go with it for less than $300. The Core 2 Extreme QX9775 Skulltrail CPU started at $1,500. Gamers who stay current with graphics cards should be especially happy with this flexibility, as changing 3D card vendors will no longer require a wholesale system rebuild. 

We tested both SLI and Crossfire setups on our Core i7 test bed and found both worked without trouble, requiring nothing more than installing the hardware and appropriate graphics-driver software as you would normally. As for their performance, AMD has issued a series of so-called "hot-fix" drivers to improve compatibility and frame rates of its cards with various PC games, which suggests that its software still needs to work out a few kinks on X58. Nvidia has not been shy to point out this fact (its beta drivers have worked fine), but we also find it telling that all three of the high-priced Core i7 gaming desktops we're currently reviewing come with multicard AMD configurations. 

A quicker path
Finally, the last major change with Core i7 is the introduction of what Intel's calling the QuickPath Interconnect (QPI). Essentially this is the Intel version of AMD's HyperTransport interface between the CPU and the chipset. The major impact of the QPI for consumers is that Intel uses different QPI ratings to distinguish the Core i7-965 Extreme Edition from the non-Extreme Core i7 chips. Rated by Gigatransfers per second (Gigatransfers, or GT, refers to a million transfers of data), the Extreme Edition comes in at 6.4GT/sec, where the non-Extreme versions handle only 4.8GT/sec. In addition to that speed advantage, Intel also ships the Extreme version with an unlocked clock multiplier, which means it can be overclocked. The standard Core i7's will have to remain at their shipping speeds.

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