Tech Hindsight - 18 February 2007

Tech Hindsight is my little experiment of seeing how much of the tech news I've been wasting time reading over the past week I can actually remember. This first edition is somewhat special because I had my wisdom teeth taken out Thursday morning, and the initial period after waking up involved me hugging a security guard and a few other things I don't really remember due to the drugs required to put me asleep. Moving on...

Today the "always accurate" Inquirer dispelled a rumor surrounding a "drunk Nintendo employee" revealing the Wii does in fact have the capability of displaying HD graphics. Apparently, the PS2 could also display HD graphics, although the 1-frame/second result wouldn't be as astonishing as most people would like it to be. Let's just understand one thing before we move on: the Wii cannot display HD graphics. Get over it.

Although I feel jipped having already bought it at least once - and I'm sure there are others out there who feel the same - the Orange edition of Half-Life 2 is looking good, even if the release date continually gets pushed back. I'm also really diggin' the graphical style of Team Fortress 2. I have the feeling graphics will mean less as we begin to really get close to "life-like" and style will play a much more important role, and this game has lots of it.

I also feel jipped having bought an Xbox 360 only to find out a new black edition with HDMI and a 120GB hard drive is coming out. I guess I should have expected it. Although the rumor has been shot down before, it's coming up once again due to retailers listing it in their upcoming inventory, with the price set at $479.99 for it's supposed May 1st release date. If this is indeed true, expect to see action taken by Sony with regard to price cuts even sooner than expected. Sony can't afford not to do so.

Speaking of HDMI, don't buy expensive cables. It seems the only difference between cheap cables and expensive ones is the insane mark-up and profitability that owns you when you buy Monster Cables at Best Buy. Remember, just because it's gold-plated doesn't mean it offers better quality, at least when it comes to digital cables.

Finally, Chris Cornell has left Audioslave. I've heard tons of talk about Rage Against the Machine getting back together, especially with their upcoming Coachella semi-reunion. I'll hope for the best. To be completely honest though, I enjoyed both Rage's and Audioslave's music even with their radically different styles. They were both great bands and if one of the two doesn't get back together, I don't know what I'll do.

Probably just move on, or somethin'.