Technology

Millions of people watch cable television through the use of their set-top box. They are the only things that are able to connect us to our favorite shows. However all of that might be changing sometime in the near future.

Sony and the National Cable and Telecommunications Association stated this week that they have signed an agreement that will allow users to be rid of the annoying and bulky set-top boxes – while at the same time still having the ability to receive ‘two-way’ cable services.

Many consumers are looking for the newer cars that have comfort, power, and of course the technology that many of us love – but don’t necessarily need. Many of the top technology devices that they want are the navigation systems and the in car telematics like the Ford SYNC and General Motors’ OnStar. Consumers from the age of 16-24 are the ones that look for cars like this.

Verizon Wireless stated over the weekend that they will be coming to an agreement with regulators and consumer groups to figure out a reasonable way to lower the fees that are charged when users choose to cancel their service before the contract has expired.

Kevin Martin, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, explained according to Reuters, that there has been a substantial progress in the discussions concerning this topic and that the plan to build a national framework with consumer protections will be good for both consumers and industry.

Samsung stated this week that they are working on creating a 2.5 inch 256GB solid state drive (SSD) while at the fifth annual Samsung Mobile Solution Forum in Taiwan. According to the reports the SSD will be the highest speed and largest capacity that has been created.

Many of the basic solid state drives that are placed in laptops have a storage capacity of 64GB only. With a sequential read speed of 200 megabytes per second and sequential write speed of 160MBps, Samsung is claiming some of the fastest SSD data transfer rates to date.

This week the Rural Cellular Association filed a petition with the Federal Communications Commission to have them take on new rules that would keep exclusivity arrangements between cell phone makers and wireless carriers. The Rural Cellular Association is made up of 80 rural and small wireless providers. The group stated in the petition that the arrangements that have already been set up are making it hard for customers to choose what they want. They also stated that the rules have decreased competition over the years and have violated the 1996 Telecommunications Act.

Napster has decided to take on Apple’s iTunes store as their competitor in the digital music service arena by launching the world’s largest MP3 download store. This store offers more than 6 million songs to users from all around the world.

This new store will have many of the top music labels and thousands of independent labels. All of the songs will be formatted as MP3 and will be compatible with many of the digital music devices that are available on the market including many cellular devices.

The EU data protection agency in Europe is concerned by the fact that Google’s map service has the ability to focus on street level images and place them on the Internet. Google’s Street View has the ability to give users 360 degree, ground level views of a specific street in 30 different cities in the U.S.

Vaja has released the new iVolution Strips leather case for the Apple iPhone. The new case has been designed after the iVolution Top. It has a flip-down protective front flap, a rear clip (optional), and easy access to all of the controls and buttons.

Advanced Micro Devices will be revealing their new five quad-core Opteron processors – which are said to be energy efficient according to the manufacturer. The chips will include the two additions to the 8300 series and the three to the AMD’s 2300 series.

The new chips will have a CPU power of 55 watts and are designed for two, four, and eight way rack blades and servers. The model numbers are the Opteron 2347 HE, 2346 HE, 2344 HE, 8346 HE, and 8347 HE.

Microsoft and Kia Automotive Group have created an agreement with each other to put Microsoft’s Automotive Platform into Kia and Hyundai 2010 models. Microsoft’s Platform is the technology that is used for the system of the Ford Sync.

For anyone who is not familiar; the Ford Sync allows drivers to incorporate cell phones and MP3 players with their vehicles. This gives them the ability to use hands-free calling and voice command to find the song they want.