“The basic quality of sounds (and this is true of all four units here) is very high, with crystal clarity and practically no background noise”.
The new issue of Guitarist magazine features a round up of the latest RP model updates, the RP55, RP155, RP255 and RP 355. Most importantly both the RP255 and RP355 are awarded the magazine’s prestigious Guitarist Choice awards.
More information:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/digitech/news/guitarist-magazine-new-digitech-rp-round-up
Picky netbook users will be drawn to its 12 inch widescreen, questioning whether it's a netbook. The size of the screen and its 1.280 by 800 resolution don't suffer the same limitations as a 10 inch screen with a 1,024 by 600 resolution (scrolling, for instance, is minimized with long web pages and Adobe's Photoshop CS series has a 1.024 by 768 resolution requirement). It's not unusual, though, as all of its 12 inch peers possess the same screen characteristics.
Gaming systems like the Sager NP8662 use a brushed aluminum lid, with plastics making up its base the M17x is completely covered in metals, and is more elegant than any other gaming laptop I've reviewed, though not impervious to the scratches and smudges that are all too common on plastic frames. You'd be hard pressed to find any exposed screws on its underside (Alienware M17x has them tucked away neatly). It's a heavy system, too, because of the heavy metals.
The least impressive part of the Pavilion dv7's software library is HP's usual assortment of crapware, including games, online service offers, and the 60-day versions of Norton Internet Security 2009 and Microsoft Office 2007 Home & Student. HP Pavilion dv7 (2173cl) has two main differences from its near twin, the HP Pavilion dv7 (2170us) available at Staples. The first tilts in the 2173cl's favor a Blu-ray player instead of a plain vanilla DVD+/-RW drive.
Features Birthdays for S60:This month's Sound On Sound Magazine dedicates its front cover to the new SSL X-Desk.
“There's no question in my mind that a lot of readers would baulk at the thought of paying this much money for what is, in crude terms, the arse end of a mixer. But what an arse: J-Lo eat your heart out! While there can never be a perfect product, for me SSL's X-Desk gets within a gnat's whisker of that vanishing point - and I can't think of any other product that has so dramatically reversed my initial impressions of it”.
Built from the same SuperAnalogue™ DNA as the AWS 900+, Duality and Matrix consoles, SSL are proud to deliver the X-Desk. Meeting the demand for a world class, compact SSL mixing desk, X-Desk combines a 16 channel SSL SuperAnalogue™ summing mixer with a compact analogue audio hub for the studio.
Read more at:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/ssl/news/ssl-xdesk-review-in-sound-on-sound-magazine
So which guitarist has designed a signature electric guitar complete with a ‘blood spattered’ finish? The man in question is Scott Ian of Anthrax, the undisputed king of the most ferocious rhythms in metal.
The new Washburn WV40 VASI in its striking blood spattered finish has appealed to the darker side of iGizmo magazine - the Dennis Publishing online-only gadgets and technology magazine with a unique-user monthly audited readership of 187,016. The bloody guitar features in the magazine’s ‘Five To Try’ section.
Click here, and flick to page 11.
Two Soundcraft Vi6 digital mixing consoles — and two excellent sound technicians to babysit the systems — were provided by AdLib Audio for feature stages at this month’s Latitude Festival.
In charge of the highly influential Uncut Arena was the experienced Walter Jaquiss, while simultaneously the same furious schedule, with back-to-back changeovers, was taking place in the Sunrise Arena, where Otto Kroymann was based.
While bands were turning round within 15 minutes at the stage end, sound engineers were setting up their patches with equal alacrity at front of house — no doubt relieved that in each case a Soundcraft Vi6 digital mixing console awaited them alongside their two mentors.
Otto Kroymann:
“Quite a few sound engineers were using the Vi6 for the first time but everyone said how absolutely brilliant the experience was. None of the sound engineers brought their own show files and so we had a rolling template and incoming engineers would build on [the sound structure] the engineer before had created. Everyone who walked away from the desk commented on the Vi6’s ease of use and how simple it was to bring up any parameter. They all left the desk with a good feeling.”
Read the full story:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/soundcraft/news/soundcraft-vi6s-at-latitude
Following an award winning Guitarist magazine review last month, the Digitech TimeBender is reviewed in the latest issue of Guitar Buyer, receiving the magazine's 'Gold Stars' for "Great delay sounds", "Solid construction", a "Simple interface" and "Incredible pitch-shifting possibilities". 'Black Marks'...none!
"The lush chorus of the modulation is wide ranging and, when combined with the analogue-style dealy, there is great scope for some Memory Man-eque warbling repeats. Bring in more extreme sounds and that ever-useful tap tempo footswitch, and the appeal certainly broadens - already we're starting to think that this could be the only delay unit many players will need on their pedalboard".
Read more at:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/digitech/news/digitech-timebender-review-guitar-buyer-magazine
The brand new JBL LSR2300 Series monitors get their first review in the new issue of MusicTech Magazine.
Receiving an impressive 8 out of 10 rating the JBL LSR2328P's are praised in particular for their, 'fatigue free listening', 'deep bass', 'impressive clarity', 'wide sweet spot' and the fact that they are 'very loud'!
More information:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/jbl/news/jbl-lsr2328p-review-in-music-tech-magazine
DeviceInfo widget for Nokia 5800 XpressMusic and the N97. Widget displays more or less essential data about the device it’s running on. With this widget you can display: Graphical display for storage and RAM space, Graphical display for battery status, IMEI code, WLAN Mac Address, Phone model, Firmware version, Manufacturer, Product type, Bluetooth status, Vibration status, Autolock status, Autolock timeout and Screensaver timeout.
Key Lock Clock is a free Clock application that is shown while the device's key lock is on.The latest Football and Sports Arena magazine carries an impressive article regarding Sound Technology's projects and solutions for engineered stadium sound.
With our portfolio of products from Harman Professional Group, the world's largest professional audio company, coupled with proven experience in the execution of world-class projects, Sound Technology and Harman Professional are uniquely placed with the skills, products and capabilities to deliver at the highest level.
You can read the article online now at: www.fsarena.co.uk/?p=343
See also www.soundtech.co.uk/stadium-sound
It shouldn't come as a surprise to anybody when they here about tech companies trying to make the things we use more energy efficient. But recently the tech industry has taken a serious boost forward in pursuit of zero-day-dissipation IC technology. The Japanese Rohm Co Ltd is at the forefront of developments and they are designing custom chips for a number of equipment manufacturers. Rohm is the same company that created a prototype microprocessor back in 2008 and with the completion of its production line in Kyoto Rohm can now begin shipping custom IC's with equipment using the new IC's as early as the end of this year. “Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software” is a book that I am sure all self respecting software developers have read. The infamous Gang of Four book seems to shape everything we do in modern object oriented software development and by applying the principles contained within generally results in a quality software product.
One common (but slightly controversial) view on design patterns is that generally they only exist to patch up any shortcomings of the language. If a language can solve a problem in a trivial way then it may well have no need for a design pattern at all. This can be demonstrated by developments within the .NET Framework, for example the “Iterator” design pattern is embedded within the language through the IEnumerable interface, reducing the need to implement the pattern yourself.
Microsoft F#, due to ship with Visual Studio 2010, is primarily a functional programming language and supports all the features you would expect, such as functions as first-class values, currying and immutable values. As F# is fully integrated into the .NET framework it can also be used in an imperative or object oriented way.
So in a multi-paradigm language is there a need for software design patterns? Do we need to worry about design patterns in F#, and if so how do we apply them.
Some articles I have read recently have gone so far as to suggest that the design of functional languages eliminates the need for design patterns completely. This is however only partially correct.
There are some design patterns that are rendered obsolete by functional languages, take the Command pattern as an example. The Command pattern as documented by the Gang of Four enables you to:
“encapsulate a request as an object, letting you parameterize clients with different requests”.
This is simply an approximation of a first-class function. In F# you would simply pass a function as the argument to another function.
In an object oriented language, you have to wrap up the function in a class, which you then instantiate and pass the resulting object to the other function. The effect is the same, but in the object oriented world it's called a design pattern.
The same can be said about the Abstract Factory pattern. The Abstract Factory enables you to:
“Provide an interface for creating families of related or dependent objects without specifying their concrete classes”.
In F# this is known as currying. Currying is the process of transforming a function that takes multiple arguments into a function that takes just a single argument and returns another function if any arguments are still needed.
It is clear therefore that several design patterns are rendered redundant in F# because the language provides more powerful, succinct alternatives. There are however still design problems that are not solved within F#. There is no F# equivalent for the Singleton pattern for instance.
Interestingly it works the other way too. Functional languages have their own design patterns; you just tend not to think of them that way. You may have come across “Monads”, which are a kind of abstract data type and often used for handling global state within functional languages. This is a problem that is so simple to solve in object oriented languages that there is no equivalent design pattern.
So while it is true that some object oriented design patterns become redundant in functional code, many, such as MVC do not.
So if you’re working with F#, don’t forget about design patterns, you never know you may even come across some new ones.
The front has a shiny coating with few buttons. One side contains the on/off/pause slide bar, the top side carries a 3mm head jack connection, and the large 3 inch WQVGA (400 x 240) Touch Screen TFT color LCD takes care of the remaining operation possibilities. With its dimensions of 3.87 x 2.18 x 0.5 inches the T80 closely resembles the Apple iPhone, however; the LG T80's weight is a lot less.
The appearance of Creative Zen X-Fi MP3 player is almost similar to that of previous Zen models, although the current model is somewhat thicker and has a solid grey back made of plastic. The front of the X-Fi Zen features 12 buttons on the right side and a large 2.5 inch monitor with 16.7 million colors. All of this is nicely surrounded by a shiny silver colored line. The micro-SD card slot is found on the topside of the device, and the external speaker on the bottom.
In addition to several buttons below the touchscreen, we also come across a trackball here, as we have seen before on other phones, for example the Blackberry mobile phones. Standard included with the HTC Magic are a neat leather pouch, a USB lead, a headset, a charger, an 8GB memory card and a quick start guide. As mentioned earlier, the HTC Magic runs on the Android platform, which is why this phone is also called the second Google phone, or the HTC G2.
Speedtouch is a lightweight entertainment game that tests your reaction speed."The IONIX U42S is easily the most elegant USB interface we've used, but, more importantly, its sonic performance 'under the bonnet' is just as impressive. An ideal solution for desktop recording that sets the standard for others to follow".
The Lexicon IONIX U42S receives a Music Tech Choice award and a 9 out of 10 rating in the latest issue of Music Tech magazine. The Music Tech Choice award is given products that are likely to become a 'studio standard'.
"In use, the IONIX U42S works elegantly and efficiently. Ergonomically speaking, the angle of the front panel and the large output control makes it a pleasingly tangible, hands-on front end to a DAW. The audio quality is impressive, with the dbx preamp design revealing plenty of detail in the instruments we presented it with".
Read more at:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/lexicon/news/musictech-magazine-review-the-lexicon-ionix-u42s
Nokia 3720 classic cell phone features a sealed, leak proof design and durable materials in a range of great colors. Nokia 3720 battery cover, which protects both the battery and the internal circuitry of the cell phone, is locked with a screw, making for worry free usage in wet, dusty or muddy environments. The rugged Nokia cell phone is easy to use in all weather conditions.
nClicker is a handheld clicker application for Nokia 5800XpressMusic.The iTunes Festival relocated to The Roundhouse in North London this year, with over 60 artists playing live at this free event, which runs throughout July.
With bands ranging from Oasis, Kasabian, Franz Ferdinand and Snow Patrol at the commercial end to acoustic performers like Newton Faulkner, quirky performance artists with wide dynamic ranges (like Bat for Lashes’ Natasha Khan), leavened with some good old fashioned hard house and R&B it was important that the event’s experienced sound engineers, Dave Roden at FOH (here deployed as system tech) and Will King down at the stage had digital mixing environments on which incoming engineers could hit the ground running.
Pictured: Dave Roden, iTunes System Sound Tech and Stereophonics engineer.
Although being a relative newcomer to the Vi6, Dave Roden was able to turn teacher after the briefest of inductions on the board. "The only time I had seen it previously was when the Stereophonics played the iTunes Festival at the ICA two years ago," he admits. "I had never even touched one of these desks before, but within a couple of days I could show people how to use it!"
"The Vi6 is great, particularly for engineers who don’t have their own session file because it’s an easy desk to walk up to. I set up a basic template and engineers simply overlay their mix on that."
For those who have only previously worked in the analogue domain its straightforwardness is particularly reassuring. "Not only that, but it produces a nice sound and has great preamps. We have certainly had a lot of compliments."
Will King agreed with his colleague’s assessment of the desk, though he admits he had to mix the first shows himself. "At the beginning I didn’t have a visiting engineer for four days — and in a way that was good because it kept me busy. It’s so easy to show sound engineers how to use the Vi6 — and I become pretty much redundant once the soundcheck starts."
"You don’t get a lot of resistance from engineers when they see the Vi6," Stuart Turvil concludes, adding that he has good reason to thank Soundcraft’s sister brand, BSS Audio, for the 144 channels of [MSR-604 II] splitters that are being used. "I can’t speak highly enough about the support we’ve had from Sound Technology (UK distributor for the Harman Pro brands)," he says.
Full story:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/soundcraft/news/soundcraft-vi6-itunes-festival
Compass is the first app utilizing N97’s Compass Sensor to show you the NORTH!
MindBreaker is a objective of this touch screen game is to recompose the images shifting the tiles. 
Dataquota can shows how much of your packet data quota you've used so far this month.When Marc Jacobs opened the UK’s first Marc by Marc Jacobs diffusion line on Mayfair’s South Audley Street recently, part of the ambience was provided by Romford-based Digital Village, who equipped the boutique with a high quality JBL sound system. The store has a bazaar type atmosphere (described as “a designer pick ‘n’ mix”) in a chic interior festooned with synthetic white, red and blue roses.
The sound system had to provide unobtrusive coverage across two floors (ground and basement), with zonal switching from another product in the Harman Pro stable, the dbx Zone Pro 640 6 x 4 zone processor. With a requirement for the volume to be run at different levels in different parts of the store, local control has been given via a pair of dbx ZC-8 remote wall controllers (one located behind the PoS counter, the other in the manager’s office).
Music is fed from iPod and multiplay CD to 15 discreetly recessed white JBL Control 24C 4in ceiling speakers, set discreetly around the perimeter, while an additional pair of Control SB-2 slot-loaded subwoofers subs have been provided upstairs to give additional impact to the low frequencies. The entire system is powered by a pair of Crown XTi 1000 (2 x 500W) amplifiers, while Digital Village also supplied a 42in plasma display and DVD playback.
“The client was very happy with the quality of the sound system, which has helped enhance the atmosphere in a shop that is always packed,” says the installer.
Messaging is quick and easy with the ability to review the history of your conversation as you go along. Sony Ericsson T715 handset comes complete with Google Maps including local search and directions and with access to the AccuWeather website giving you free three day weather forecasts so you'll never be caught short without an umbrella or your sunglasses.
Or click onto MySpace to keep your page updated with what you’re doing so your social circle is always looped in. Instant message friends and read texts on the front screen while the phone is closed. Join multiple chats across your favorite IM communities including AIM, Yahoo! and Windows Live Messenger. Locate your friends or that hot new restaurant using on board a GPS that speaks turn by turn directions.
Boasting beveled edges and an angled bottom, the HTC Hero handset is contoured to fit comfortably in your hand and against your face while you're on a call. HTC Hero cell phone is built to last beginning with an anti fingerprint screen coating for improved smudge resistance and a longer lasting, clearer display. The white HTC Hero phone includes an industry first, Teflon coating, resulting in an improved, durable white surface that is soft to the touch.The Geneva Framework is designed to simplify the development of claims-aware applications that want to eternalize the authentication function. I wanted to the the Geneva Framework to help create an ASP.NET application that would enable users to authenticate with either a Windows Live ID or a CardSpace managed information card, and then apply some authorization rules that were defined in the Access Control Service (one of the cloud hosted .NET Services).
My initial working assumptions were:
1. The Windows Live ID authentication would use a passive mechanism (WS-Federation). My ASP.NET application (the Relying Party) would send an HTTP request to an Access Control Service (ACS) endpoint, which would then initiate a sequence of HTTP redirects to authenticate the user at www.live.com, and then deliver a set of authorization rules (claims) from ACS back to my application.
2. The CardSpace authentication would use an active mechanism (WS-Trust). The ASP.NET application would launch the CardSpace UI to enable the user to select a suitable card, which would then be delivered directly to ACS in a SOAP message. ACS would then examine the claims in the card and deliver a set of authorization rules (claims) from ACS back to my application.
Assumption 1 turned out to be valid, and easy to implement as there are plenty of available examples to work from. The only bit which is not perfect here is managing the sign out from Windows Live whilst remaining on a page of my ASP.NET application.
Assumption 2 however turned out to be problematic. The current version of CardSpace (a part of .NET Framework 3.5) will only work with a Security Token Service (STS) that returns at least 1 claim. Unfortunately the endpoint that ACS exposes has an associated policy that does not have any required claims – so CardSpace refuses to talk to it. The Geneva Framework includes a new (beta) version of Windows CardSpace which relaxes this restriction, but I then hit another obstacle: the ACS uses message security, but the new version of CardSpace currently only supports mixed-mode transport bindings. So again CardSpace will not talk to the ACS.
As a work around I reverted to using a passive approach for the CardSpace authentication. My ASP.NET website (the Relying Party) is configured to perform a passive logon to the ACS, but instead of the ACS redirecting to a Windows Live login page, it redirects to a login page on a custom STS (created using a template from the Geneva Framework). This custom STS operates as a proxy, and extracts the claims from the Information Card, before repackaging them as a new set of claims to send to the ACS in an HTTP redirect.
Hopefully, this will all be simplified in future releases of CardSpace and the ACS, when a direct login to the ACS using a managed card will be possible.
For anyone who’s interested I’ve posted some sample code and documentation here:
Karao60 is a .KAR players able to play music and highlight text according to melody. 
Windows 7 is almost here with the release date of October 22nd just right around the corner many people are still wondering if they should upgrade or not. Here are some key things you should know before thinking of upgrading to Windows 7. First is the system requirements in order to run Windows 7 smoothly. There is nothing really out of the ordinary here except the 16-20GB of storage space required.
SameGame 2 is a puzzle game is perfect for those quick breaks, as a game only takes a minute or so to play, but it still is highly addictive! Remove pieces of the same color, in as large blocks as possible. There is also lots of statistics so you can keep track of your best and worst scores, how many games you have played and much more.With music festivals happening left, right and centre Washburn’s Rover travel guitar is getting some fine coverage on Stuff’s website. Indeed, Europe’s best-read fashion, lifestyle, home entertainment technology website, showcases the camouflage finish version of the guitar on no less than three separate occasions:
· The Washburn makes the Stuff Festival Kit Top Ten http://stuff.tv/Top10/Festival-kit/
· The Washburn receives a fine review http://stuff.tv/Review/Washburn-Rover-RO10-travel-guitar-review/
· The Washburn makes an appearance in the Stuff Ultimate Festival Gadgets vidcast http://stuff.tv/Video/Ultimate-festival-gadgets/Vidcasts/
Stuff is the world's most highly regarded lifestyle and technology magazine and has no less than 21 international editions. With an ABC of 88,081 in the UK alone, it now has well over two million readers worldwide. The website is proving equally popular.
The Nord Stage EX has been updated to OS version 5.1, an important update that adds several new exciting features including "Piano String Resonance".
The String Resonance feature, together with specifically designed new acoustic piano sounds in the Nord Piano Library, recreates the wonderful acoustic phenomenon that occurs inside the body of a piano. This happens when un-dampened strings or parts of strings may resonate at their fundamental or overtone frequencies when other strings are sounded. This feature livens up the Stage EX’s already acclaimed pianos and provides a very natural impression of the original acoustics in the acoustic instrument.
In addition, a new Piano Unison feature allows two pianos, selected in Panel A and B, to be detuned to create a nice blend with a natural unison effect or even a honky-tonk sound.
More information:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/nord/news/piano-string-resonance-stage-ex-5_1-update
This turned out to be the loopback checking feature in IIS. This feature prevents you from accessing a Web site with a host header from the same machine - for example, you can access http://machinename/default.aspx, but not http://hostheader/default.aspx. When you attempt to access a site under these conditions, you'll be prompted for credentials three times and then have access denied with a 401.1 Unauthorized: Logon Failed error. The giveaway was that the Central Administration site was set up to use the machine name, whereas the SSP site was set up to use a host header.
Because this is a single server environment, the search service is attempting to crawl sites, by host header, that are hosted on the local machine. In each case, access is denied with a 401.1 error and you end up with a very empty search index.
This issue became a fairly well known problem for SharePoint administrators on Windows Server 2003 environments, and usually arose when the server was upgraded to SP1. I've never come across the issue in a Windows Server 2008 environment before - I guess an update must have triggered the loopback checking feature in IIS7, but I'm surprised it wasn't enabled already.
Anyway, I followed the workaround here (Method 1), restarted the IIS Admin service, started a full search crawl and we're up and running again.
Calc Sheet Lite is a spreadsheet for mobile phones. Useful to organize informations or to perform simple and complex mathematical calculations.
Samsung OmniaLITE B7300 is designed for users who demand an easy smartphone interface with full support of multimedia, internet, and business features. TouchWiz 2.0 User Interface and downloadable online widgets make it highly user friendly, while its 3D multimedia player interface provides and enhanced entertainment experiences. Samsung OmniaLITE comes packed with a host of powerful business tools and multimedia features.
Music Stopper can stop the default music player automatically after the time you want. To set the countdown, move the pen on the rectangle and choose a time between 1-60 minutes.record-you.co.uk brings latest UK information in the build up to this landmark software release
Sound Technology Ltd, exclusive distributor of Propellerhead Software in the UK and R.O.I., is pleased to announce the publication of a dedicated weblog in the run up to the release of Propellerhead's new Record music recording software. Visit record-you.co.uk for everything you need to know surrounding this landmark release scheduled for 9th September 2009.
The site also contains video footage of the moment Record was announced at the UK Propellerhead Producers Conference in May. Propellerhead's own official promotional video for Record has already notched up close to 150,000 views on YouTube.
Record is Propellerhead Software's brand new recording software. Record gives you unlimited audio tracks, world class effects and mixing gear, and a whole new take on music recording. With an intuitive, straightforward interface and a hands-on approach to capturing performances, Record was designed for musicians - not audio engineers. This is recording done right.
For more information please visit www.record-you.co.uk or call Sound Technology on 01462 480000.
BOLT is a free downloadable browser that offers an uncompromised browsing experience on even lower-end mobile phones.
It is smooth and sleek, with curved corners and an all silver color scheme. The front surface is very reflective and can be used as a mirror, while the back surface is covered in tiny dotted bumps for texture and extra grip. The slider mechanism feels sturdy, and it's quite lightweight at 3.7 ounces. It has a really nice 2 inch display with 262,000 colors and a 240x320 pixel QVGA resolution. The screen is rich and vibrant with color, and we like how it shows off the menu's animated icons.
Nokia Java Runtime 2.0 for S60 (JRT 2.0) is a totally re-written Java mobile execution environment for Nokia S60 devices. It gives you several usability and performance improvements, including:"So, its built like a tank, sounds great, interfaces with anything you'll run into in stage and studio situations, is easy to programme, can be as simple or complex as you like, and is operationally controlled by footswitches and as integrated expression pedal. If you're looking for something that does what the RP1000 does, or even if you're just looking to downsize your existing pedalboard whilst adding to your pedal armoury, then there isn't anything else around I know of that'll do anywhere near as much in such an elegant and cost-effective manner".
Although the press reponse to the new Digitech RP1000 has already been fantastic, Performing Musician magazine this month features the best review to date.
More information:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/digitech/news/performing-musician-magazine-digitech-rp1000-review
Added to the long-running Washburn Festival Series for 2009, the Washburn EA21HM (Heavy Metal) gets its first review in this month's Acoustic Magazine.
"Our example played like a dream with a set of 12-gauge phosphor bronzes, and the set-up was spot on".
Aimed at the Hard Rock/Metal guitarist, this slanted headstock, electro-acoustic guitar is perfect for any 'shred head's' quieter moments.
"This is a very solidly made, eye-catching and easy-playing instrument that's clearly designed for the performing musician".
More information:
http://www.soundtech.co.uk/washburn/news/acoustic-magazine-review-washburn-ea21hm
