Still using a knife to cut your steak? Fuggedaboutit. When you can use a laser turned lightsaber, don’t embarass yourself by using old-school manual chopping methods. All you need is a $800 CAD program, a $5000 laser etching set and a premium-grade gourmet $40 steak and you can choose from rare, medium, well-done or laser-crisp. Still not geeky enough? Trying mixing the REALLY heavy-duty laser tools with cake mix, and shaping it like your favourite A-list blog’s logo. Super linkbait! Talk about hardcore geekishness. Whether you’re a veggy-fan and merely want the cake, or a bad-to-the-bone meat chomper like myself (catch the sarcasm?), lasers, CAD packages and intuition win it for us again. And the steak, naturally.

That’s not to say that the power of the laser is limited however. Check out the great Holy Tortilla! artwork by Martin and Zach’s Cheesey Relativity.

Whoda thunk that laser cutting your food could be so interesting? I vow to never use my plastic, fisherprice cutting knife again! Muhahahahaha!

Oh for goodness sake… Yesterday, I tried to keep my opinions to myself. Today - All hell is loose. I’m not going to sit by and let blogs like Crave, newspapers like Capital and agencies like the Associated Press make a big deal outta nothing. A car with integrated Apple compatibility (just look at how many have iPod docks) as nothing new. Throwing in a few extra features? Last time I checked, it didn’t warrant an ‘i’ stuck before it… Blearing headines such as ‘Apple ‘iCar’ in the works’ (found on Crave), quite frankly sicken me and show themselves up as nothing more than a lame attempt to attract extra visitors and extra clicks. Sure, me writing about it isn’t exactly helping, but whoever said any publicity was bad publicity sure didn’t see the Internet.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs and Audi Chairman Martin Winterkorn, who heads the Audi brand group that includes Volkswagen, met recently in California to discuss ideas, but no concrete plans, a Volkswagen spokesman told the Associated Press.

They even admit it. They haven’t the foggiest clue in hell what’s going on. Apple CEO meets Audio Chariman. For all we know, Steve could be thinking about buying a VW and wants a customised dashboard, with a built-in iPod secondary, auxillary screen. Maybe Steve Jobs just wants to grab himself a leopard-painted Beetle as subtle promotion of the launch for OSX Leopard. Would it surprise me? No… I hardly think a fully blown Apple car (let alone one called the ‘iCar’) is about to hit the market. More likely that an Audi car with a boatload of integrated Apple features is coming, but BRANDING it an Apple car? I just can’t see it happening.

According to the article, Frank Weith, ‘technical strategy manager for Volkswagen of America’, in an interview with CNET, parent site of Crave, last week said that…

Its customers can expect to see some interesting things in this space in the near to long-term future, said Weith. “I look at the vehicle as being static in a sense where you can create an environment where the vehicle can be connected to your home system. You can download your iTunes. We have a navigation companion on our Web site. You can download your trip, where you’re going and, eventually, depending on the access, to download a movie. You can create the environment that you would like to have but make it static, download a week of your Internet,” he said.

I hate to be the killer here, but I’m having trouble seeing a static vehicle travelling at 70MPH down the motorway. Sounds mighty like a car with a built in iPod (or maybe just a dock?) with a GPS and additional mini screen too, all no doubtedly touch powered. And whilst I’m at it, I’ll jump on the trend and place my bets on an ‘iSat’ from Apple. A GPS/satellite navigation device for cars, running the same mobile Google OS we talked about yesterday.

NOTE: The above is NOT a picture of the Google Phone. Not even a mockup. Not even a photoshopped, fake ‘concept’. An HTC phone with a Google browser window in, running a Windows mobile platform…

After just yesterday an HTC insider was reported to have sent CrunchGear ‘confirmation’ (all unofficial of course) that Google is indeed working on a ‘gPhone’ as it’s been dubbed, more sketchy details appear to be surfacing. I’m not going to dive in and yell ‘liar’ or back up what anyone says, I’m gonna present the facts as they arive so you can decide more easily for yourself. You hardly want me telling you what to think. You’ll just want to disagree, anyway.

- In 2005, Google acquired a mobile software company, Android, founded by CEO Andy Rubin, creator of ‘Danger’. Naturally, this was all very hush-hush, and whilst at Google, Andy and his team developed a ‘Linux-based mobile device OS (no surprise) which they’re currently shopping around to handset makers and carriers’, presumably to create open, adaptable base on top of which development could ‘truly’ begin. Great Google integration, realtime position tracking (think GPS but far more fancy-schmancy… the ability to send you coupon codes belonging to every store on the block) and a whole bucketload of innovative (we’re talking Google here) new features to boot.

- Flash forward to June ‘06. People are starting to think the Google Phone might never surface. Some hopefuls still straggle on, but the best anyone can dig up are LG phones with pathetic Google integration. Go figure.

- December ‘06 and Om Malik has caught winf that Google may be collaborating with HTC and Orange - something I still personally believe is the best bit of solid, reliable data we’ve got yet. Google IS working with mobile handset developers and mobile phone networks. It’s quite possible that they ARE developing software to run on a mobile device. Who says there’ll just be ONE gPhone though? Why not a universal mobile OS?

What would I like to believe? I’d like to think Google’s working on a realtime, location-based feedback phone. I wouldn’t be surprised of Larry and Sergey have thousands of incredible ideas buzzing around their incredible brains. But do YOU think Google is really working on a mobile device? Maybe not even a phone… Let’s wait and see how things play out.

Microsoft Windows Really Good. Pirated straight outta Redmond, our source, who wished not to be named alerted us to the ‘plethora of advanced new capabilities’ and ‘totally retro design’. Clippy the paperclip finally gets his comeuppance too. I’m McLovin’ it. With rehauled, advanced new ‘related help’, results are refined to match your search habits. Windows Media Player comes preloaded with a fanfare of 1930s trumpet music, along with a psychadelic lighting display, courtsey of the Classic French Horn Trumpeting Society Of Redmond. Nothing however, (and bear in mind, I do mean NOTHING) comes close to Windows Really Good’s “Order Food” feature. Just click ‘n’ order. Select from Microsoft’s wide range of prune juice, sliced ham, chickpeas and… prune juice. It appears there may be a few inital availability problems, my source tells me that (quite honestly) Microsoft are working around the clock to import fresh chickpeas, from wherever need be.

Our insider also let us in on the pricing scheme (world exclusive).

Windows Really Good Basic - $299 (£199)
Windows Really, Really Good - $399 (£299)
Windows Really, Really, Really Good - $499 (£399)

Again, we see slightly unfair translation of US, to UK pricing, but what the heck. For software this good, nobody’s gonna be complianing! For ‘once’, Microsoft can clearly admit they stole nothing from Apple. Jobs my man, you have nothing on ‘em. Word has it that validation will be much improved over Vista’s ’stodgy’ validity program.

Sure, WindowsRG like any other operating system, has a few of it’s own unique bugs to sort out, but even if RG hit the shelves in it’s current form, I’m pretty sure it’s allure and general appeal would attract customers by the millions. David Wilkinson reports - TechZi.net

UPDATE: Talk about geurilla marketing. Word has it that Steve Ballmer is at it again with his famous “In Yer’ Face - Buy Or Die” Marketing! Run for cover. It’s not the daleks. It’s not the cybermen. It’s not even the… (Dang. Use your imagination.) No! It’s Mr Ballmer’s squeeky voice!

And that concludes things nicely.

This post is sponsored by the Affiliate Marketing Revolution.

It’s not my sort of thing to post videos all the time, and two in a row could be considered excessive, but this is simply hilarious.

Where’s the “ROFLOMGFURRYPIZZA” icon when you need it? Nigeria’s business ventures certainly took the hit badly…

First up - The Fanless Quiet PC. Ranking fourth (outta four), brute force merely isn’t enough, even when delivered completely silently. Fully-body heatsinks, water-cooling, no fans.

It wasn’t easy for Quiet PC to build the Jaguar, as several mods were required to keep everything cool and stable. For example, three of the six heatpipes that connect the overclocked 2.93GHz Core 2 Extreme X6800 CPU to the case are obstructed by the standard VRM heatsinks on the Intel 975X motherboard. To get around this problem, Quiet PC desoldered the standard VRM heatsinks and replaced them with shorter Zalman models. Due to its 400W passively cooled PSU, the system doesn’t have enough juice to power a pair of Radeon X1900-series cards in CrossFire, so Quiet PC elected for a single MSI GeForce 7900 GTX card. However, again, to keep heat under control, Quiet PC hasn’t overclocked the GPU or the memory.

The graphics card is hooked up to a gorgeous 24in Dell 2407WFP widescreen TFT, the same monitor that Scan supplied with its Dream PC, which has an eye-popping native resolution of 1,920 x 1,200. In keeping with the silent theme, Quiet PC opted to fit a quiet Samsung SpinPoint T HD400LJ hard disk inside the Jaguar, which is also cooled by a system of heatpipes. It may not be as fast as a Raptor X, but it’s a hell of a lot quieter. And, as there’s only room inside the TNN 500AF for one hard disk drive, its generous 400GB capacity is very welcome. The optical drive is the same S-ATA Samsung SH-W163 drive that won our recent DVD burner Labs test.

Next the formidable Voodoo Omen. Sheer power and a shiny case won’t win you any medals specced up against these babies. Third place.

No Dream PC would be complete without a killer graphics setup, and the OMEN i121x certainly has plenty of gaming horsepower, thanks to a pair of overclocked Radeon X1900XT graphics cards configured together in CrossFire mode. Once again, the choice of overclock is rather strange. This is because, while the GPUs have been overclocked from 625MHz to 655MHz, the RAM runs at its stock frequency of 725MHz (1.45GHz effective). As high-end GPUs are constrained by a lack of memory bandwidth, particularly at high resolutions, this is a strange choice to make, especially as the massive Danger Den Tyee waterblocks that Voodoo PC has fitted to each card cools both the GPU and memory modules.

Games and applications can be quickly installed from the Pioneer DVD writer onto the 150GB Raptor X drive, or one of the two massive 750GB Seagate hard disks. As with all of the Dream PCs, the OMEN i121x is supplied with a Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music sound card, along with a set of the floor-thumpingly loud Logitech Z-5500 Digital surround-sound speakers. The Samsung SyncMaster 244T 24in widescreen TFT is even more impressive than the Dell 2407WFP bundled with some of the other Dream PCs, and offers the same razor-sharp native resolution of 1,920 x 1,200.

The Scan Black Rhino, entering the arena priced at a whopping £7,000. Big case. Big power. Big cooling. Water style. Second only to Vadim - the Scan puts up a valiant fight, eventually being overthrown only by the almighty Chepheus.

2.93GHz Core 2 Extreme X6800 to 3.84GHz. This is achieved by raising the multiplier from 11 to 12, and the FSB from 266MHz (1,066MHz effective) to 320MHz (1.28GHz effective). By using an 2:3 FSB to RAM ratio in the BIOS of the Asus 975X motherboard, Scan has also overclocked the four 1GB sticks of Corsair XMS2-8500 DDR2 RAM to 480MHz (960MHz effective) at 5 - 5 - 5 - 15 timings. The GeForce 7950 GX2 graphics card also gets some attention, and Scan has increased the GPU speeds from 500MHz to 580MHz and the RAM from 600MHz (1.2GHz effective) to 700MHz (1.4GHz effective).

This monster graphics card is partnered with an equally ostentatious Dell 2407WFP 24in widescreen TFT, which has a native resolution of 1,920 x 1,200. Also present is a Sound Blaster X-Fi connected to an awesome set of Logitech Z-5500 Digital 5.1 speakers. The input peripherals comprise a Logitech G5 mouse and the rather over-the-top Logitech G15 keyboard.

The Vadim Cepheus. Undisputed winner. King of all kings. Yadayadayah.

The Cepheus has a Core 2 Extreme X6800 CPU that’s been overclocked from 2.93GHz to 3.6GHz by increasing its multiplier from 11 to 12 and the FSB from 266MHz (1,066MHz effective) to 300MHz (1.2GHz effective). The memory divider in the Asus P5W DH Deluxe 975X motherboard’s BIOS is set to 4:5, which forces the 2GB of Patriot DDR2 memory to run at a heady 500MHz (1GHz effective) with tight 4 - 4 - 4 - 12 timings. Data is fed into this number-crunching overclocked CPU and RAM by a pair of 150GB WD Raptor X hard drives configured in a RAID 0 array. A further 500GB of storage is provided by a Seagate hard drive. All three hard drives are mounted inside Zalman heatpipe coolers that help to conduct heat away from the drives and into the case. There are also two optical drives: a Pioneer dual-layer DVD burner and a Sony DVD/CD-RW combo drive.

The graphics cards are a pair of Sapphire Radeon X1900-series cards configured in CrossFire. As the waterblocks cover the memory modules and GPUs of both cards, Vadim has overclocked both, raising the GPUs from 650MHz to 690MHz and the RAM from 775MHz (1.55GHz effective) to 790MHz (1.58GHz effective). Originally, the cards were overclocked higher, but a bug in the Catalyst 6.6 driver caused the cards to continually lose their clock frequency settings.

Inspired my Matt - Tested by CPC.

The iPod Phatty that’s been circulating the net is (unfortunately) real, according to Engadget, something I’m finding very hard to believe. Seem smore like a carefully planned publicity stunt, especially considering the original file was a .PSD and could be replicated EXACTLY by re-sizing and squashing an existing iPod. *cough cough* Anywho-how-ha… Why haven’t Gizmodo and Engadget received Cease And Disist orders if this is the real deal?

Phatty iPod and all it’s Phreaky friends could very well be getting touch-screen versions of OSX as their next platform, just like the, uh… That phone thing. You know the Apple one. It’s name escapes me.

Then there are the ‘usual’ expected weekly ‘tid-bits’ which could be complete rubbish or absolute gold. Kasper (end of any credibility this blog might have ever once had) from Apple Isider has some interesting thoughts.

- OS X being tapped to build a Digital Device family. Interesting… Worth an eye on.

- Most if not all of the new iPods will employ NAND flash. Admittedly something I find more than likely.

- Sources in the Far East have seen full-screen iPods, which are believed to come this year. Sources in the Far East saw an IPHONE. (Ah - I remember the name. )

- Click Wheels may come. Digital, on-screen ones, presumably if the ‘far eastern’ sources are anything to go by.

- 480 x 320 screen, a la iPhone. *cough* Yeah. I think these guys saw an iPhone.

- OS X, a la iPhone. *cough* Fuggedaboutit.

- Single Button Home Navigation, a la iPhone. *cough* This is a joke - right? Curse you Kasper.

- No earpiece. And I wear neck-high panties. Huh.

- Thicker than an iPhone. Whilst we’re here, iPods can now cook your meals and serve up cheeseburgers on-screen.

Thanks a tonne Brian. *end of sarcasm* I can see alot more Apple rumour stampings coming up at this rate…

The year is 1979. The days of pet rocks are limited, whilst streaking, hula girls and cork pop guns are sadly fading into oblivion. Only one year has past since Atari launched and a frenzy swept over the world like none before it (besides pet rocks ‘n’ streaking of course). David Jeffries and Kenneth Gatland put together a children’s book. Nothing incredible at the time, no major critically-aclaimed strings attached. Just one helluva long name. Future Cities: Homes and Living into the 21st Century, unearthed by The Raw Feed offers an unprecedented insight into some of the thoughts and ideas abotu the future, made by both Jeffries and Gatland at this time. Flat screen TVs - Electronic newspapers (websites/blogs) - Electronic mail (Uh… eMail, anyone?) - The ability to work from home and connect with an office (Can you say Internet?) - Video Phones (who needs a phone? Skype.com) and all sorts of other crazy, impossible things.

It’s amazing what calculated forcasts, estimations and an open mind can figure out, thirty years in advance. I dare not predict anything for feareth of backlash. Tim Berners would have a field day…

I’m in serious thought about this one, and I’m not hiding the e-mail for a reason…

— Sent by qeo.50000@yahoo.com —

This is a warning and if you don’t pay attention to it you will suffer from bad turns.
All your income is through Google Adsense and if you do not cooperate with us we will stop this income source.
We would like you to pay us the total amount of USD 1000 each month.
This small amount could be considered as nothing compared to your earnings from Adsense.
If you do not pay this amount we will have to close your account by the help of special robots & spaming & …
I am not happy to do this but I have to as there is no way out of it and I trust if you were me you would also have to do the same.
I am an inventor and I have recently innovated a new design which will be accepted by scientific societies only if I can present a model in advance; and making the model takes money. They will register my new design only after they have checked all aspects of the same.
My theory is changing the power into energy. If I succeed many big problems will be solved.
All my design specification could be viewed in the following web log:
http://magnetic-machine.blogspot.com/
The magnets will be bought in installments and the amount you pay is to be paid monthly for the same.
After the registration of my design, the entire amount which I received from you will be paid back.
If you collaborate with me, you have helped to the science.
And if not, I will have to close your Google Adsense account.
I seek your help for the sake of the Science and if you are not prepared to collaborate I will have to close your Google Adsense account

Waiting for your reply…..

— Sent by David Wilkinson —

Dang. What can I say? You’ve got me in a tight corner. My $0 per month AdSense income (I stopped using it in February, see) is all yours.

— Sent by qeo.50000@yahoo.com —

i spam your adsense code to 100.000.000 email address
you earn 1000000 click from yahoo mail and Google close your account
plz wait until closing…!

— Sent by David Wilkinson —

Nah… You serious? The fact I know Google AdWords Optimization Specialists and a tonne of other Google employees is going to change nothin, I’m sure.

— Sent by qeo.50000@yahoo.com —

i spam your adsense code to 100.000.000 email address
you earn 1000000 click from yahoo mail and Google close your account
plz wait until closing…!

— Sent by David Wilkinson —

You mentioned that… Please, go ahead. I’ve been sorta watching my AdSense account nervously for fear of being assasinated.

Sorta makes you wonder what lows people will stoop to over the net. I dub it Blackmail 2.0. (Look ma, a new buzzword!)

Criminals. You’ve got the smart, fiendishly clever masterminds and the dumb, dumb dumbasses. Masterfully pulled off crimes. Art gallery silent thefts. Dead of night, undercover bank robberies. Without tripping a single larm system. It’s simply amazing… Anyone who’s watched the film Ocean’s Eleven, or even the classic Italian Job knows you only need ten men and a lady, four minies, a city-wide 30-second EMP disruptor and a hell-boat of good luck to make off with $200,000,000. If you’re gonna cheat ‘n’ break the rules - at least do it in enough style to not get caught. At least spare yourself the indignity of being blogged.

Some guys though downtown evidently forgot to read the memo and thought patching up old oven doors before shrink wrapping them and selling them off as brand new, high definition plasma televisions would work. Fraid not boys - there’s a slight difference…

It’s an art in itself, being simply this stupid. Take the man who robbed a store with a vibrator, for example. If the guy had remembered to take it out the plastic bag and worn flares and a wig, then it’d definitely be more interesting (and succesful?), on par with Grand Theft Auto style madness.

Teaming up tends not to wield any more success, unless of course you can recruit 10 other criminals besides yourself… Two young men from Berryville stuffed $1,200 worth of video games down their pants, in front of CCTV cameras. Naturally, it made perfect sense to resell them next-door at the neighboring gamestop!?!? Go figure.

Share your own funny ’stupid tech criminal’ stories and join in the fun. Thanks Joel for the tip.