First videos of the Zune HD posted

Gizmodo and CNET posted short videos showing Microsoft's Zune HD in action. It basically looks like a faster iPod Touch with a great OLED screen. The screen looks pretty fantastic.

Zune HD Video Hands On from Gizmodo on Vimeo.

Wired.com: Homebrewed CPU Is a Beautiful Mess of Wires

Steve Chamberlin, a Belmont, California, videogame developer by day, set out on a quest to custom design and build his own 8-bit computer. The homebrew CPU would be called Big Mess of Wires or BMOW. Despite its name, it is a painstakingly created work of art.

Read the full story on Wired.com: Homebrewed CPU Is a Beautiful Mess of Wires

Nasa Television releases video of Atlantis Solid Rocket Boosters

From liftoff to splashdown in the Atlantic Ocean, take a ride on Space Shuttle Atlantis solid rocket boosters with video from a camera located on the SRB's. If you're impatient, jump to about 22:45.

CNET: Up to 24 percent of software purchases now open source

Open source has become big business, suggests an article in the Investors Business Daily, but it has done so by becoming more like the proprietary-software world it purports to leave behind.

Read the full article on cnet.com

DEV-monkey reviews the PIC32 Starter Kit

Watch the short video review here: http://bit.ly/Ga7yN or read the more in-depth review here: http://bit.ly/MifU2

Microchip has put together a top-notch evaluation package that introduces engineers to the power of its new 32-bit PIC32MX MCUs. The company's approach to documentation makes it easy to find manuals and guides. This is a kit programmers can use to learn about the Microchip development and debug tools. After running a few demo programs, hardware engineers may decide to move up an Explorer-16 development board with a PIC32MX daughter card. Microchip should have PIC32 expansion boards available starting in June 2008. I stumbled on an error in the User's Guide, but Microchip's support people quickly got me squared away.

Apple Moving Closer to Snow Leopard Release

Internet rumors are predicting that Apple will release the next major version of Mac OS X this summer.

From arstechnica.com:

Apple still has a (perhaps unenviable) goal of getting the next major version of Mac OS X, Snow Leopard, out the door this summer. Work continues on that front with a new beta build of Snow Leopard released to developers last night. Meanwhile, the 10.5.7 update to Leopard also got a new beta release with some additional improvements. Both OSes are getting more frequent updates as the product cycles inch closer to release.