Well, the great news is that WiMAX service that I have been complaining about for years is finally here but only still in Baltimore.

We should expect WiMAX to become available in more areas and why is this good?

WiMAX is about 5-10 times faster than Sprint’s CDMA network, meaning this WiMAX broadband card will allow you to surf at Cable DSL speeds anywhere you go.

But until there’s more coverage, you will have to wait.

This WiMAX card is actually cheaper than most broadband cards out on the market today at $59.99 plus there’s no contract, a really good deal if you ask me.

As it’s the first of its kind, the E100 is the only XOHM card we’ve tested so far, so we can’t compare it to other WiMAX equipment. Our overall average speeds were 2.3Mbps down and 915Kbps up, which fits into Sprint’s advertised range of 2-4 megabits down and 500-1500Kbps up. But speeds varied widely depending on signal strength: we achieved downloads as fast as 7.1 megabits, and as slow as 620 kilobits.

via pcworld

(Image of DVI Output on the back of your PC)

This weekend, I had the pleasure of hooking up my friend’s new 52″ Samsung LCD HDTV to his new gaming PC.

If you are like most people, you probably already know how to connect your PC to HDTV via an S-Video Cable.

Now, S-Video is perfectly fine for viewing your PC/laptop on your TV but it won’t give you “HD” resolution of 1080p, 1080i, or 720p.

Most S-Video outputs are only capable of producing upto about 1024×768 pixel resolution and that’s analog signals, meaning your signal will get somewhat affected by noise and not the best way to surf the web on your HDTV.

Now let’s say your TV is capable of HD AND you have DVI Outputs on the back of your PC as shown in the image above.

Then, provided you have a Video graphics card capable of 1080p (which means it can pretty much do 1920×1080 pixels on your HDTV), you will be able to get a perfectly crisp 1920×1080 pixels on your HDTV.

Now, to do this, you need a cable depending on how far your PC is from the HDTV.

The simplest way is to get a HDMI-M to DVI-M cable to connect the DVI side to the PC and HDMI to your HDTV.   Here’s a site I found that has really low prices on it. ($32 for 50 feet, I found a 5 foot cable at BestBuy for $60, don’t go there)

(HDMI-M to DVI-M cable)

Once you are connected, you should be able to surf the web pretty easily on your HDTV depending on how far you sit from it.

Here’s a re-cap of what I just told you in simpler terms:

• S-Video - 1024×768 Maximum resolution, Analog signals (suck)
• DVI (PC) to HDMI (HDTV) - 1920×1080 Maximum resolution, Digital signals (clean)

Required Hardware:

• DVI-capable Graphic Card
• HD-capable TV (HDTV)
• DVI(male) to HDMI(male) cable

Most people who have bought PC in the last couple years will probably have all the required hardware except the DVI to HDMI cable.   If that’s the case, I highly suggest you to buy one online.  Don’t buy retail, you will pay 3-5 times more for it.

There you have it, now you  know how to take full advantage of your HDTV and watch YouTube and other online videos crisp and clear.  Perhaps you are a genius already at this but for those of you who don’t know, I hope this helps you surf on your HDTV. (and take advantage over the crisp, clear 1920×1080 pixel screen)

In Asian countries, iPhone won’t be as popular due to the high number of “other” devices out on the market.

iPhone price cuts in Japan prove that iPhone is still priced too high for Asian consumers.

Let me explain why iPhone cannot be popular in Asia:

When I used to live in South Korea for years, we didn’t goto BestBuy or the local AT&T shop.  For the cheapest prices in South Korea, there’s this “town” called the Electronic Town.  You go here and there’s about 1000 different phones in each store.  (And there’s about 1000 different cellphone shops lined up everywhere)

Above is a screenshot of a typical “electronic” mall in Korea.  As you can see, this is just one of the many (usually around 7-10 floors) floors in just one of the many electronic malls.

Each of those circles represent a cellphone shop.  Some cell Samsung phone, LG phones, and some sell a mixed variety.  Each of these cellphone shops have different prices and the consumer must haggle for the best prices.

Now, can you see how iPhone can pop in one of these stores usually sponsored by big companies in Korea like LG and Samsung?  Even if iPhone does get sold in the stores, there’s usually 100s of other great phones at fraction of the price.

Aside from competing in these cell phone “malls”, iPhone itself isn’t really practical enough for people to cash out double, triple for another similar-grade Samsung phone.

On top of that, Asian countries have about 2-3 years advanced models of Samsung and LG phones.  The Samsung and LG phones you see in America are about 2-3 years old, they are the “leftovers” Samsung need to sell off.

So the mystery is, there’s so many new, innovative phones in Korea, why would you need iPhone?

Most phones in Korea come with air-frequency-enabled TV, iPhone is still selling outdated technology (YouTube) to us American consumers.

Don’t get me wrong, iPhone still have the best mobile browser, but it’s simply made for the “English” speaking countries, not localized for any Asian people.

If you don’t believe me, take a look at how popular Google search engine is in Korea, not very popular indeed, worse than Yahoo by many factors, and Yahoo ranks lower than Korean search engines.

Localization is not a part of the iPhone, therefore failure of sales in Japan and probably other Asian countries.

I think for iPhone to be popular, there’s gotta be reasons more than the great Safari browser, right now, that’s the only reason I’d buy one.

With everyone in the industry and consumers going green, Samsung has no choice but to follow in people’s footsteps by introducing an Eco-Friendly cellphone made from corn.

Now, I kinda like this concept of making phones from edibles.  Will they make some new phones out of milk too?  Even better, maybe they can use barley, the same stuff used for making my favorite beverage.

The E200 features a 1.3 megapixel camera, video messaging capabilities and an MP3 player.

Although the device will be available in Europe next month, it doesn’t yet have a release date in the United States.

via keetsa

Well, today, my 42″ Samsung DLP TV I bought in 2005 broke down on me.  The only thing I got from the TV was a Lamp LED going on and off.

So I figured that it was time for the Lamp to be swapped out for a new one.

Before doing that, I ran into this blog posts about how to reset the Lamp hour setting on the Samsung DLP TV.

Once I resetted the Lamp hour, my TV started working again!  Yey, I guess the manufacturer, Samsung, put an hourly limit on the lamp so you replace the lamp but hey, why replace it until it’s truly broken?

Here’s the simple instructions on how to reset that lamp hour setting and make your DLP TV lamp last longer:

Mute + 1 + 8 + 2 + Power.

Your TV set should now say “Loading Factory”.

Browse down to “Option” then press Enter (or the right cursor button).

via fixyourdlp

Dang, check out this palm-sized DLP projector that projects really clean!

The Samsung Pocket Imager is small enough to take anywhere and can project images from a variety of sources, including computers, DVD players, video game stations and digital cameras. Utilizing DLP technology, the P400 has a native resolution of 800 x 600 SVGA. In addition to the 1,000:1 contrast ratio, the pocket imager has 150 ANSI lumens for a crisp, clear 30-40-inch diagonal image even in a well-lit office setting, and RGB, Composite-In, S-Video, audio-in (RCA L/R) rear inputs for optimal functionality.

via aving

Click Here to View in Full Screen Mode

Here’s a great optical illusion of a dinosaur turning his head.  In reality, the dinosaur is not moving at all.

via neatorama

Isn’t it great that Samsung has probably developed over couple hundred WiMAX devices in the last few years while we, in the U.S., don’t even get to see WiMAX yet?

But no worries, as soon as Sprint gets their stuff together, we should be able to take advantage of the numerous different WiMAX devices available already by Samsung.

The good news?

They just rolled out with WiMAX Wave2 products which is even faster than the standard WiMAX.

Whoo Hoo!  Do expect to be watching live streaming HD movies in the bus real soon with the new WiMAX.

The really good news?

The WiMAX technology has been tested abroad in Korea already with success.  It’s only matter of time before we get hands on one here.

Samsung Electronics announced today it has been awarded with the world’s first WiMAX Forum Wave2 certification for both ‘Base Station’ and ‘Mobile Station’ which support the 2.5GHz band, at the WiMAX Forum Global Congress 2008, in Amsterdam.

The Mobile WiMAX Certified products are commercial grade ‘Mobile WiMAX Wave2 Base Station’ and ‘Mobile Station,’ the Express card type device, using Samsung’s own Mobile WiMAX Wave2 modem chipset, which will be commercially used in the Sprint-Nextel Mobile WiMAX service later this year.

via aving

Click Here to View in Full Screen Mode

There are bunch of videos on how to use the new Sprint Samsung Instinct but there’s NO VIDEOS on the browser of the Samsung Instinct.

If Sprint is serious about competing with the iPhone (from a marketing perspective), they gotta get rid of all that voice activated live search crap and make some videos of YouTube playing on the phone OR loading Zedomax.com on the browser.

I think whoever is managing the video marketing section of Samsun Instinct need to be fired.  That’s what I’d do.  Hire someone who’s capable of making good vids.

I personally HATE voice-activated commands because my Blackberry 8830 always ask me, “Say a command” like 10 times a day, it’s annoying and people don’t need voice activated stuff.  I wish manufacturers start focusing more on the internet browser of the phone instead of voice activated technology I’d never use.

Great phone + bad marketing, Sprint better get their act straight soon otherwise people will laugh at them.  (if they are not laughing now)