HDHomeRun Prime CableCARD tri-tuner comes one step closer to reality

Originally announced at CES in January, Silicon Dust's entrance into the encrypted cable TV tuner market just reached an important milestone on its way to market: CableLabs Certification -- anytime CableLabs is involved things take longer than anyone expects. The price of the three tuner HDHomeRun Prime is still set at $249, but the hope of being released by the "holidays" seems lost (Thanksgiving counts as one of those days right?). Said product is expected to start production in the next few weeks, after which you'll be able to pre-order the elusive tuner from major retailers. The big question of course is with the Ceton InfiniTV 4 still on a three month backorder, and selling on eBay for over twice its retail price, which should you order? We suggest you pre-order both just to be safe; worst case you end up on the good side of a crazy eBay auction.

Acer's 10.1-inch tablet reportedly uses AMD C-50 APU

Acer's already confirmed that it's forthcoming 10.1-inch Windows 7 tablet will be AMD-powered, but it unfortunately didn't get any more specific on the matter than that. If a new DigiTimes report is to be believed, however, it looks like the tablet will use AMD's dual-core C-50 Ontario APU (or accelerated processing unit), which itself consumes just 9W of power and packs a built-in Radeon HD 6250 graphics chip. What's more,DigiTimes is also reporting that Acer's 10.1-inch Android slate rocks Tegra 2 and will, in fact, support WiFi and 3G. Wait and see.

Nokia premieres Ovi Suite 3.0 beta

After a private alpha, Nokia has loosed a beta of its refreshed Ovi Suite client -- now at version 3.0 -- on visitors of its Beta Labs site. Seems like most of the improvements revolve around simplifying common activities, but the biggest change would have to be the addition of tight Ovi Music integration, including playback controls, store access, and Ovi Music Unlimited support -- in other words, this product is now officially the Zune / iTunes of the Nokia world, and in this case we'd say that's a very good thing. Installation is said to be faster and simpler than before, too, so come on, hesitant N8 owner -- what the heck are you waiting for? Follow the break for the official video intro of the new build.

INSECT SHIELD TEAMS UP WITH TRAVELCHAIR – THE FIRST INSECT REPELLING CHAIR

Everyone loves a little bit of the outdoors. Whether you’re fishing in the Alaskan wilderness or just watching your kids play soccer, you are going to love this chair. Already the best selling travel chair in the industry, it is easily folded, light and extremely portable. It even comes with a built in cup holder for the frosty beverage of your choice.

The thing I cant believe about this chair is why no one came up with this idea before, we have sprays, foggers, candles and lotions but until now, no one had an insect repellent that was actually embedded into the fabric. That’s right, it’s in the chair! This chair really does keep the critters from ruining your good time and ends the need to apply and reapply all that stinky, greasy repellant. The Insect Shield Travel Chair is EPA registered and safe for pregnant women and kids of all ages.

This chair is going to dramatically change how long I’m willing to sit and fish, no word however, on whether or not I’ll agree to go camping. But if you would like to sit around the campfire and not be “buzzed” you can pick one up for around $65.00 from www.TravelChair.com.

Incidentally, Insect Shield has an entire line of outdoor clothing and camp gear all similarly treated with insect protection that lasts up to 70 washings… who knew?

Anti Sleep Pilot promises to keep drivers alert, warn them when to pull over

Looking for an alternative to that extra large cup of coffee or energy drink to keep you awake on long haul drives? Then you'll soon have another option in the form of the Anti Sleep Pilot, which promises to keep you from nodding off through the magic of technology. Already on sale in Denmark, the device is able to automatically turn itself on and off by monitoring the movement of your vehicle, and it attempts to keep you alert by regularly performing various tests that you can respond to just by tapping the device. That promises to not only prevent fatigue in the first place by keeping your mind active, but also warn you when it's really time to take a break by monitoring your reaction times to each test. Still no word on an official price over here just yet, but we assume it'll cost somewhere in the neighborhood of the 1,499 kr (or $270) the device currently runs in Denmark.

Autobot – Control your car with your Smartfone

The two things I could never live without, my car and my cellphone, and now the two can work together. This pleases me.

This nifty little gadget connects to your vehicle’s on board diagnostic computer port and relays specific diagnostic information to your cell phone. Autobot will let you know what your “check engine” light is trying to tell you, let you start and unlock your car remotely and report to you if your tire pressure is low, or you need an oil change. Autobot will even send GPS location and a 911 message to family members if your airbags deploy and give you walking directions to your car if you can’t find it. Cool.

Autobot probably isn’t going to charge any fees, instead it looks like it will be supported by advertising and coupons, based on what your car’s computer tells Autobot you need, you will most likely receive some special offers from nearby merchants. It is unclear at this time if a premium service sans the advertising will be made available.

The mapping feature available with Autobot lets you know where your husband, I mean, car is and will even alert you if your car passes a preset location. If your precious baby should be stolen, (your car, not husband) you can disable the car remotely. You will even be able to see where your friends are if they have the AutoBot device installed in their own cars.

The system is to begin testing early next year and the hopes are it would be available to the public by 2012 for around $300.00

Opera Mobile 10.1 for Symbian turns to a brilliant shade of gold

Opera has done a pretty commendable job of keeping its latest, greatest wares up to date on most of the major mobile platforms, and here's another checkbox they can tick: Opera Mobile 10.1 has now gone final for Symbian. Of course, this isn't to be confused with the lighter-weight Opera Mini product that went into beta for Symbianlast month -- this is the full package that's capable of operating without a proxy. What's new? Well, the company claims that this version operates some nine times faster than 10.0 did in JavaScript tests thanks to a refreshed JIT compiler, and support for location services is definitely a welcome addition. It's available now for S60 3rd Edition, 5th Edition, and Symbian^3; follow the break for the full press release.

Chrome OS consumer launch pushed to 2011, Google-branded Chromebook could still arrive this year

It's almost time to eat turkey and then jet out to Best Buy to be trampled by mad shoppers. Oh yes, the holiday season is just about here, which according to a few posts we've written in the last year means that the Chrome OS netbooks should be as well. Well, it turns out that the Google OS-powered laptops aren't going to arrive this year, or at least not in the way we thought they would. That doesn't mean Chrome OS isn't going to see a bit of an unveil this year, but major manufacturers, including Acer and HP, won't have its own Chromebooks ready before 2011. How do we know? Acer's Jim Wong told us during the company's global press conference that Acer will be launching its netbook based on the browser operating system during the "consumer launch" of the OS next year, while Google has its own agenda and will be doing something "in December." We didn't get to ask if that Acer netbook is in fact the "ZGA" netbook we've seen popping up in bug reports, but our guess is that it will be something quite similar.
So, what does Google have brewing? You remember the Google-branded Chrome OS netbook that we heard about? Well, according to a few of our very own sources, that's exactly what's going to happen. We don't have exact timing details, but we have been told by a few that Google will launch its own Chrome-book a la the Nexus One for "friends and family." As the operating system is still in a beta or preview form, the netbook would be aimed at the development / early adopter community. Specs-wise we don't know all that much, but we've heard that it will be powered by an Intel Atom Pine Trail processor and, just as Digitimes reported, that 75,000 units are being manufactured by Taiwan ODM Inventec. We should mention that the aforementioned Acer "ZGA" was said to be used internally as a "dogfood device" at Google, but we believe this Google-branded device to be entirely different. Inventec, Intel, and Google wouldn't comment on the hardware rumor, but Google did tell us that it would "have more details to share later this year." By our count, that leaves 'em with just about 37 days to spill the beans!

Team at Purdue University working on high-temp generators to suck power from car exhaust

You know all that gas spitting out the exhaust of your car? Not only is it full of carbon monoxide and other things you shouldn't breathe, it's also full of heat. Heat is wasted energy, and students at Purdue University, led by mechanical engineering professor Xianfan Xu, are working to capture it. With some funding from General Motors the team is working to create better thermoelectric generators, or TEGs, that work at much higher temperatures than those we've seen before. A current Purdue prototype works at 700C, or 1,300F, which could be found behind a car's catalytic converter and generate enough electricity to reduce fuel consumption by around five percent. Future versions would work at higher temperatures and offer better results. Last year BMW indicated it is working on similar tech with deployments coming as early as 2014, and so now the race begins, though the culmination of their efforts will surely looksomething like this.

Portal gun to be auctioned off for Child's Play charity

The Portal gun. If you've been alive over the past year and change, you know exactly what we're talking about. We can safely say our lives were changed after spending a few good minutes with Harrison Krix's handmade replica in 2009, and soon you'll have the golden opportunity to know exactly what we mean. Krix has constructed a new Portal gun, one that's arguably more bodacious than ever, and there's only one way to get it: outbid the Bro Montana next to you on December 7th. A Child's Play Charity event auction will be held on that fateful day in Seattle, and it'll be the one and only opportunity to have the pink slip transferred to you. Of course, monies received from the auction will benefit Child's Play (a gaming industry charity dedicated to improving the lives of children with toys and games in a network of over 60 hospitals worldwide), and the bragging rights afforded to the winner will be fairly epic in scope. Head on past the break for a video of what's up for grabs.