Microsoft is today set to launch the Elite version of its Xbox 360 console, a substantial upgrade which clearly targets competing next gen gamestations like Sony’s Playstation 3. The new console comes with reworked looks (sleek black surfaces with metallic detailing) a bigger storage space of 120GB and HDMI port to drive High Definition TV sets. Included in the package are HDMI and component cables, Xbox Live headset, and a wireless game controller.

The white clad Premium and Core packages of the console remain available alongside this new beefed up version, which is set to retail at $749.99.

Crucial has introduced a new ultra-slim line to its Gizmo! USB flash storage products. The Gizmo! Jr. is half the size of a standard USB flash drive (measuring a mere 12.4 mm (w) by 34.3 mm (l) by 2.2mm (t)) and weighs only 1.62 g. The diminutive drive comes in three flavors, offering 1GB, 2GB and 4GB of storage space on the go. A key chain, a lanyard and a protective sleeve come bundled with every Gizmo!.

Crucial is also planning a special introductory price offer in the UK set to last for 3 days until April 29, 2007. Special discount prices (with savings ranging from 10-16% depending on density) can be found here.

TIPA (Technical Image Press Association), a consortium of Europe’s leading photography magazines, has today announced its annual awards, dubbed as the European ‘Oscars’ of the Photo Imaging Industry. The prestigious recognitions are given to products excelling in a number of categories, from consumer point&shoot cameras to DSLRs, plus related software, printers and accessories.

Nikon has once again picked up the Best Entry Level DSLR award, with the Nikon D40x 10.2MP Digital SLR Camera following last year’s winner D50. SourceCrowd had reported about the introduction of the new Nikon here.

A great recognition in the Best Photo Software category goes to Apple Aperture 1.5, especially since a lot of criticism had been leveled at the 1.0 version of the pro application. Aperture is a complete workflow and image management app with Apple’s trademark cool design and ease of use, and has now reached full maturity with the update to 1.5. It follows in the path of past winners like Adobe’s Photoshop.

The George Foreman iGrill (!) is the ultimate barbeque cooking machine for the iPod generation… or something like that. We don’t know what the launch campaign slogans will sound like, but we have just heard about this “gem” and couldn’t pass up the occasion to relay it to our readers. The iGrill is an indoor/outdoor electric barbeque grill with an impressive 200 sq. inches of nonstick coated cooking surface, adjustable temperature control probe and… is iPod ready with an integrated 10 watts speaker. So invite your friends around… no barbeque party will ever be the same again!

The The George Foreman iGrill is available now for a street price of $149.99.

Powered by four 500 GB hot-swappable SATA hard drives with hardware-based RAID security features, Iomega® Power Pro handles large data and image files created in business environment.

It offers choice of computer connections, including FireWire® 800, FireWire 400, and USB 2.0, resulting in transfer rates up to 70 MB/sec. Included EMC® Retrospect® Express software delivers protection for Windows and Mac users, enabling automated backups and disaster recovery.

The Iomega Power Pro Desktop Hard Drive is expected to be available worldwide on April 10 for $1,699.95. (Pricing is U.S. suggested retail.)

Iomega’s lineup includes Iomega 1 TB StorCenter Wireless Network Hard Drive with Gigabit Ethernet too.

Best Buy said on Monday it will carry the U.S. broadcast radio industry’s high-definition radio technology at all of its stores nationwide, a move that could boost exposure for the nascent system.

In a continuing push to expand awareness of HD Radio, which receives over-the-air terrestrial stations with CD-quality sound and multiple new-program formats, Best Buy will sell car radios with HD Radio built in. During the rest of this year, other home and auto products that feature HD Radio will be available at the retailers’ 832 stores.

U.S. radio operators are working to promote HD Radio at a time when consumers are already faced with many digital music options, such as Apple Computer’s iPod, other MP3 players and satellite radio. The industry has pledged to spend $250 million on marketing through the HD Digital Radio Alliance.

Wacom has announced the introduction of the new 15″ DTF-521 LCD tablet, adding a little brother to its DTF line of business and education oriented writing instruments (which had debuted with the 17″ DTF-720 and the 21″ DTF-2100). The new product sports an XGA resolution screen with 1024 x 768 pixels and 16.2 million colours. The tablet/screen hybrid comes with an adjustable stand (140 degrees horizontal to 130 degrees vertical), and the standard cordless battery-free pen with 512 pressure levels. According to Wacom, the DTF-521 offers “a natural tool for freehand writing, annotating and navigating directly with the pen on the screen”, allowing huge amounts of freedom during a presentation or lesson. A VGA-out port assures easy connection with external screens and projectors.
The tablet has a RRP of $1624 (£699 excluding VAT in the UK, where it is known as the PL-521), and is compatible with both Mac OS X and Windows PCs (including Vista support).

This week’s National Association of Broadcasters conference (NAB) in Las Vegas has seen Apple unveil Apple Final Cut Studio 2, an upgrade to its pro video editing and production suite. During last Sunday’s presentation, Apple showcased the programs that make up the high-end HDV powerhouse editing tool suite: Final Cut Pro 6 for cutting together video sources, Motion 3 to add animated 2D and 3D titles, Soundtrack Pro 2 to manipulate the score, Compressor 3 to handle different output formats (from HD movie to iPod), DVD Studio Pro 4.2 to output to DVD media, and a new application, Color, that gives editors control over the look and feel of the footage through pro color grading capabilities.

The most interesting features that wowed the public were the Open Timeline, affording maximum flexibility to mix video sources (Final Cut handles “DV and SD up to HDV, XDCAM HD, DVCPRO HD, and fully uncompressed HD”) in one final product, and the introduction of a new post production format, ProRes 422. ProRes promises “uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes” with real time drag and drop editing capabilities for HD video.

To this end, Apple has teamed up with AJA Video Systems to develop IoHD, a new hardware-based audio and video IO box that connects to the Mac using a single FireWire 800 connection, and promises real-time 10-bit HD conversion. The impressive IoHD sports a huge number of ports on the back and monitoring LEDs at the front, in an enclosure design reminiscent of Apple’s Mac Pro line.

Final Cut Studio 2 will cost $1,299 or $499 for an upgrade. Upgrading from any version of Final Cut Pro to the Studio will cost $699. Final Cut Studio 2 will be available next month, while AJA’s IoHD will debut in July for $3,495. Of course these are not consumer-priced products, but they are a breakthrough in high end HD video editing, offering solutions at a fraction of the price of the competition, making Hollywood style editing affordable for smaller studios and independent filmmakers.

iHome has today announced it will team up with the American Breast Cancer Foundation to donate a percentage of its sales of the pink iH19 Portable Water-Resistant Stereo Sport Case (compatible with iPod, Shuffle, and most other MP3 players) to breast cancer research. Pink is the internationally recognized color for initiatives linked to breast cancer awareness and research.

The iHome iH19 (RRP $70) is a water-resistant case with integrated dynamic stereo speakers and built-in remote control. It features a sturdy zippered case that can be attached to bikes, strollers, and exercise equipment with the included brackets. If you are looking for a stylish accessory to listen to your iPod everywhere, you can now help a good cause with your purchase!

Borrowing a page from Microsoft’s history of development woes for the recently released new OS, Vista, Apple has today announced that its eagerly anticipated new version of Mac OS X, Leopard, will be delayed until October 2007. The Cupertino, California based company had announced that Leopard would be released sometime in the spring at last June’s WWDC (its annual developers convention).

Now, according to a press release appearing on Apple’s official website, the release date has been pushed back because some key resources have been redirected from the OS development team in order to meet the late June deadline for the iPhone. Although this probably means no delays for THE hottest gadget of the year, many will see this as a missed opportunity for Apple to steal some of Microsoft’s thunder, seen the tepid reactions to the Vista release from both critics and the public.

The hotly anticipated game Halo 3 - an XBOX 360 best seller - will be released to the public in Beta form on May 16, 2007. Developers at Microsoft’s Bungie Studios will seek feedback from users regarding the online mutliplayer aspects of the first-person shooter hit. The Beta will be released exclusively on Xbox 360, lasting until June 7, 2007.The Halo franchise is one of the most popular on the console, helping to drive the original Xbox sales at its launch and going on to sell more almost 15 million copies of Halo and its sequel, Halo 2. The third chapter in the saga of humanity’s war against a breed of evil aliens is slated for release later this year, with Microsoft hoping it will give them an edge against their rival consoles, the Sony PS3 and Nintendo’s Wii.

Pre-order Halo 3 clicking here.

On the day Apple announced it has sold its 100 millionth Ipod since it was first introduced in November 2001, Yahoo and Sandisk have unveiled their partnership on a new contender in the mp3 player market, the Wi-Fi capable Sansa Connect. As part of the deal, Yahoo is to offer its Yahoo Music Unlimited To Go service on the Connect, allowing users to update music wirelessly from anywhere using an open Wi-Fi connection (which can also be used to listen to internet radio on the move).

The music player sports 4GB of solid state memory, expandable via a built-in microSD slot, a large 2.2” TFT color screen, and is compatible with Microsoft’s PlaysForSure DRM format.

The Sansa Connect is hitting stores today for a MSRP of $250. Full specifications and details can be found here.

QoolLabs SkyQube is the “world’s first VoIP Gateway with GSM”. Targeted at frequent travelers, business executives and pro-skype users, it allows call forwarding from selected Skype contacts to mobile phones or land lines, thus acting as a gateway to receive calls wherever you are at local Skypeout rates.

The Qool VoIP gateway comes in two flavours, the SkyQube and the SkyQube2. The latter adds a GSM module that allows users to insert their SIM card in the device so that all their received calls and SMS messages will be forwarded to their phone in the destination countries using Skypeout or to their laptop. Other features of this smart box are integrated speaker phone, caller ID display, call back, call filtering using the built-in answering machine and call recording. For a full set of specifications and to download a product brochure head over to the QoolLabs website

Today Apple has refreshed its high-end Mac Pro line of desktop computers adding an ultra powerful 8-Core model. The top of the range now sports two “Clovertown” 3.0GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon 5300 series processors, with 8MB of L2 cache per processor (16MB total), while maintaining all the other specifications (which can be found here) of the Quad-Core models. The 8-Core Mac Pro comes as a build-to-order option from the Apple Store and is available now.

Apple also chose today to cut the prices of its Cinema Display line. All 3 current models see significant reductions, probably to tempt new Mac Pro purchasers to include the gorgeous displays in their orders. The 20-inch model is now $599 (from $699), the 23-inch HD model is $899 (from $999) and the high-end 30-inch model is $1,799 (from $1,999). Although there had been been speculation lately of a complete relaunch and redesign of the Cinema Displays, the only news to report are the lower prices.

Apple UK has cut the prices of its fifth-generation high-end iPod models at its online store. The 30GB video-capable iPods can now be purchased for £179 inc. VAT (from £189), while the 80GB model sees an even bigger reduction at £239 inc. VAT (from £259). The pricing for the nano and shuffle models is however unchanged. The cuts are not reflected in the US Apple Store, where 5G models are still priced at $249 for the 30GB version and $349 for the 80GB version.