Free Wi-Fi for Vista users

Looking for a reason to make the leap to Windows Vista? If you spend your days sipping lattes while surfing the Net, this deal may push you toward early adoption. T-Mobile is offering three free months of Wi-Fi access for Vista users at any of its HotSpot locations. (Hot spot operator The Cloud is running a similar promotion in the U.K.) If you are paying month to month for Wi-Fi at your local Starbucks or Borders, it amounts to a savings of $120 over the three months (the offer ends April 30). That's half the sticker price of Windows Vista Home Premium.

Disclaimer: Spending more time at Starbucks may result in spending more money given Starbucks prices.

Update: Engadget did a little searching and found a way to glom onto T-Mobile's free trial without having to pony up for Vista first. Unfortunately, Google has yet to spit out the answer for knocking back a Venti mocha latte without first paying $8.

Ok Apple, you hassle us with those incessant advertisements, you exude smug hipsterocity, and this iPhone hype has really gotten out of hand, but we're going to let you pass on this 802.11n thing. Sounds like you're really trying to do the right thing here, but you just didn't want to get busted on some sort of accounting snafu -- it's alright, we understand. Next time you might try not being so sneaksy with those hidden features and stuff, but we're still kind of glad to have the functionality all the same. That's why we're going to skip over that episode of "Johnny and the Sprites" we were hoping to download from that iTunes Store of yours, snap up this little download for its $2 "distribution fee" (last time we heard it was $5, but Apple is saying $2, so all the better) when you make it available, and only complain about it six or seven times to our close friends and / or mom. We care that much.

Thx
The GAdget STory And Engadget

Epson's EMP-1810 and EMP-1815 3LCD business projectors

Epson just kicked out a new pair of 3LCD projectors in their EMP-1810 and EMP-1815. The 1815 is the king of this hill and features Epson's EasyMP (Epson Administrative SYstem for Meetings and Presentations) which, among other things, allows you to display content off CompactFlash cards and USB drives without the need for a PC. It will even source content off your PC over WiFi or project your laptop's display over a quick and dirty USB cable. Otherwise, the projectors share many of the same specs: 1024x768 pixel resolution; 3,500 lumens; 500:1 contrast ratio; 1.6x manual zoom lens; 2x analog D-Sub 15 RGB, composite, and S-Video inputs and another D-sub 15 for output; and direct shutdown for quick getaway. Both are relatively light for 3500 lumen projectors with the 1810 weighing in at just 2.9-kg (6.39-pounds). Ok, they don't throw 1080p, but they don't cost 5 Gs either. Both hit in early March with the 1810 going for ¥498,00 (about $4,121) and the 1815 for ¥448,00 (about $3,708). Look for 'em Stateside under the PowerLite branding soon enough.

Britain's CSR developing uber-sensitive Bluetooth / GPS hybrid chip

Considering how governments are suddenly feeling that tracking your every move, or at least providing the means for someone else to, is such a brilliant idea, it's no surprise to see the Bluetooth masters at Cambridge-based CSR buy up NordNav and Cambridge Positioning Systems. The new mishmash of companies now has consolidation on the brain, as it's developing an all-in-one microchip that will sport both Bluetooth and GPS functionality on a single module. Additionally, the chip would reportedly "drain less power and be cheaper for handset makers than having two separate chips in their devices," as both technologies would have one processor doing the work, resulting in a more efficient process. The company's CEO claimed that its combo chips would cost manufacturers "an extra dollar per chip as opposed to around $5 to $10 for putting in a current standalone GPS chip," and moreover, these devices are designed to be ultra-sensitive, giving it connection abilities indoors and in "deep urban areas" where current units fall short. Already being hit up by a few anonymous mobile producers, CSR plans to get these things shipping "during the first half of this year," and hopes to start turning a profit on them by 2008.