Into Tech

SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
said the global LCD market would be difficult in the first half
of 2007 due to seasonal factors, but predicted strong growth in
demand and even a possible shortage in the second half.

If we told you Sony was getting looked into by the DOJ, what would you guess it was for? The exploding batteries? The PlayStation 3 release? Actually, it’s for their Static Random Access Memory (SRAM) business.

The Japanese company received a subpoena from the Justice Department’s antitrust division seeking information about Sony’s static random access memory, or SRAM, business, company spokesman Atsuo Omagari said.
SRAM is found in relatively small quantities in personal computers. It’s also used in disk drives, communications equipment and networking gear.
He would not elaborate on who manufactures the chips for Sony or to whom Sony sells them.
A separate DOJ investigation into price-fixing among DRAM companies has so far resulted in more than a dozen charges against individuals and more than $731 million in fines against Samsung Electronics Co., Elpida Memory Inc., Infineon Technologies AG (IFX) and Hynix Semiconductor Inc.

Seriously, it’s not like we actively look for Sony’s bad news. But it’s like shooting a barrel full of drunk monkeys—you’re bound to go home with at least one. – Jason Chen

U.S. Justice Dept. Probing Sony Unit [AP via Kotaku]

As much as we’ve tried, there’s no way of hiding the forest of cables that dwells behind our entertainment center. Well now Sony, Samsung, and LG have stepped up to the plate and are waging a full fledged war on cables. Together with Panasonic, Toshiba, NEC, and SiBEAM they’re working on a new spec called WirelessHD (or WiHD) that lets you beam uncompressed HD content from say your cable box to your HDTV. It’ll use the 60GHz frequency and handle video as well as audio. The technology will appear in components, HDTVs, game consoles, and even portable gadgets like HD camcorders by spring 2008. For those of us who’ve already splurged on big budget HDTVs and components, the WirelessHD folks will create wireless adapters that’ll let your equipment go wireless. So long as it’s not outrageously priced, we say bring it on! – Louis Ramirez

Wireless HD [via Yahoo News]

In a shocker for the ages, Samsung has announced that they will no longer manufacture low-end phones. You know, those phones that are often free, or sub-$100 with the purchase of a contract from a provider. Instead Samsung will be focusing its attention on the “mid-end business phones” market.

It’s kind of sad to see this happen—I’m a pretty big fan of the low-end Samsung phones. Hell, they have a pretty strong grasp of the low-end market and it is odd to see Sammy just throw it all away so they can pursue the business-phone market that is already dominated by HTC, Blackberry and Palm. Oh well, good luck, Samsung. – Travis Hudson

Samsung makes early exit from low-end phone market [MobileMag]

As much as we like the technology inside it, the Samsung EW-700 looks like it got hit one too many times with the ugly stick. Get over its looks, however, and you’ll have a decent smartphone. On the media side, it’s got a 2MP camera, video player, Web browser, and MP3 player. For work it features Outlook data sync and doubles as a VoIP phone if you’re lucky enough to live in a city blanketed by free Wi-Fi. More fugly phone pics after the jump. – Louis Ramirez

Later this month, hardcore gadget nerds in Asia will have a choice of three HDD-free laptops and one UMPC when Fujitsu joins Samsung and Sony in pimping portables with sturdy flash memory in place of feeble little spinny platters.

Although pricing and specs haven’t been finalized yet, plumping for the chunks of Samsung-produced flash in the B- or Q-series laptop PCs will add Â¥80,000 (US$669) or Â¥160,000 ($1,338), for either 16GB or 32GB slabs, to the already-hefty ticket. – Jonny Hiratsuka

Fujitsu laptops also ditching hard drives for flash [Digital World Tokyo]

Later this month, hardcore gadget nerds in Asia will have a choice of three HDD-free laptops and one UMPC when Fujitsu joins Samsung and Sony in pimping portables with sturdy flash memory in place of feeble little spinny platters.

Although pricing and specs haven’t been finalized yet, plumping for the chunks of Samsung-produced flash in the B- or Q-series laptop PCs will add Â¥80,000 (US$669) or Â¥160,000 ($1,338), for either 16GB or 32GB slabs, to the already-hefty ticket. – Jonny Hiratsuka

Fujitsu laptops also ditching hard drives for flash [Digital World Tokyo]

Later this month, hardcore gadget nerds in Asia will have a choice of three HDD-free laptops and one UMPC when Fujitsu joins Samsung and Sony in pimping portables with sturdy flash memory in place of feeble little spinny platters.

Although pricing and specs haven’t been finalized yet, plumping for the chunks of Samsung-produced flash in the B- or Q-series laptop PCs will add Â¥80,000 (US$669) or Â¥160,000 ($1,338), for either 16GB or 32GB slabs, to the already-hefty ticket. – Jonny Hiratsuka

Fujitsu laptops also ditching hard drives for flash [Digital World Tokyo]