Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

Today, MySpace unveils the all-new MySpace Music alongside new BFFs: EMI Music, SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT, Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group (NYSE:WMG), and Sony ATV/ Music Publishing. 

Users can do all the playlist making, swapping, downloading, streaming, etc. to their hearts’ desires.  Expect to be enticed by MySpace Music partners McDonald’s, Sony Pictures, State Farm, and Toyota.  We can expect free downloads from Mickey D’s, State Farm playlists and Toyota Tuesdays where anything can happen.

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Sonos may have trouble on its hands if Creative’s newest products, the Creative SoundBlaster X-Fi Notebook and the Creative Wireless Receiver work as promised. The X-Fi Notebook is an ExpressCard that fits into your laptop. Well, some of it does—there is a rather large piece that juts out of your laptop.

Creative’s X-Fi line claims to improve audio quality using algorithms.  I have yet to test these claims.  Whether the X-Fi Notebook improves the audio or just sends out your lousy lossy mp3s, the cool thing is that it can wirelessly send your audio out to up to four Wireless Receivers.  You could create a multi-zone set-up using Creative’s latest offerings.  The Receivers are just that – you will need to hook them up to powered speakers to listen to audio.

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Well the time has come, as much as I hated to have to give these away, they are one review item that I would have loved to keep, but the readers are more important and I am proud to announce the winner.

Drumroll please...and the winner of those Axiom AudioByte computer speakers are none other than lucky reader...Nicholas Wright

Now we just need ”Nicholas Wright from Norman, OK” to send me an email at robert (at) gadgetell (dot) com to claim the prize. Please use Axiom winner as the subject line and include a street address where we can ship those to you. Keep in mind, due to the fact they come in two large boxes and they are not all that inexpensive I plan to ship with a signature required. That may be a pain for some, but I just to make sure they arrive safely, and without being left (possibly in the rain) on a door step.

So...what are you waiting for, send that email and I will get them out shortly, I am sad to see them go, but am happy to reclaim the space in my office. And finally, I can only hope you enjoy them even half as much as I did.

Just sending a quick reminder in case you missed the earlier announcement, our contest to giveaway a set of Axiom AudioByte computer speakers ends tomorrow, the official deadline for entry is Friday (September 5, 2008) at 11:59pm EST, which also happens to be just 24 hours from the time of this posting.

Remember entry is simple, just leave a comment on the original announcement posting (link above and below) with a picture of the speakers you are hoping to replace.

You can check out the full contest post including the rules here, and don’t forget to check out our full review also.

Cambridge Audio just announced today in Denver that they too will be joining the ever popular Blu-ray club by coming out with their version of Blu-ray technology, the 640BD, in Spring 2009.  The player is meant to complement the Azur range of AV receivers, and from the spec sheet/release, it looks like it isn’t too shabbily put together.

The 640BD will have a full set of analog video outputs, full HDMI 1.3 output (which will include bitstream output of all the latest Dolby/DTS tracks), S/PDIF, Ethernet, Toslink and a set of separate, dedicated 7.1/stereo analog outputs. And no...they haven’t put a price tag on this baby yet.

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Hey, if thousands of people are doing it, it can’t be wrong.....right? That’s the million dollar question about one of the newest music sites on the Web. Songza advertises itself as a “music search engine and Internet jukebox”. Ummm, ok.  Or, one might also say they are a site you can go to in order to search out music and be able to listen to and download it for free. I’m just sayin’.

With 28 million songs instantly playable on the site, 10 month old Songza is luring in the music-seeking crowd pretty nicely.  And they make their songs playable in a rather creative way. When you go on their site and enter the song or band title of your choosing, Songza will search the huge inventory of music videos on YouTube looking for it.  Then, it streams the audio of the song, while hiding the video in an unseen margin of the browser. Pretty dang tricky, but.....is it actually legal?

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Just sending a quick reminder in case you missed the earlier announcement, our contest to giveaway a set of Axiom AudioByte computer speakers ends this Friday (September 5, 2008) at 11:59pm EST.

You can check out the full contest post including the rules here, and don’t forget to check out our full review also.

Its always nice to be able to give stuff away, especially a very nice sounding set of computer speakers that retail for $528. This latest giveaway is the set of recently reviewed (and loved) Axiom Audio AudioByte computer speakers, and I must say they are hard to part with, but I cannot delay it any longer. They have been packed up and are sitting on my office floor awaiting shipment to the lucky winner. You can check out my review here.

To enter: Via the comment form below, show us where you will be using these. Take a picture of your current setup or current speakers, upload it to the web, and leave a link to the image in the comments below.

The rules:

• You can only win once during the extent of this giveaway.
• The winner will be sent a notice via email and has 72 hours to reply with their mailing address to claim their prize—make sure you use a valid email address.
• This giveaway will close on Friday, September 5 at 11:59pm EST, then we’ll pick the winner at random.
• All entries become the property of Dabbledoo, LLC and we have the right to use any and all submissions in any way, manner and in any media and in perpetuity without additional compensation or right of approval.
• This is only open to residents located in the continental 48 US States, and you must be 18 or older to win.
• Void where prohibited by law. The promotion is subject to all federal, state and local laws and regulations.

This giveaway will close on Friday, September 5 at 11:59pm EST, then we’ll pick the winner at random.

Product: Axiom Audio AudioByte Computer Speakers
Price and Availability: $528 total price. The speakers and amp are $349, plus an additional $179 for the subwoofer.
Rating: 9/10
Pros: Excellent sound quality, clean design, very nicely built.
Cons: A little on the expensive side, and the system takes up a lot of under desk space between the amp and subwoofer.
Overall: Would not hesitate to recommend, would also love to own a set.

Keep reading to check out the full review, and keep reading Gadgetell because one lucky reader will have the option to win this set very soon!

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No middleman. Claims of paying their artists more than twice the royalty rate offered on commercial radio. Sounds pretty darn good for independent artists, doesn’t it? Last.FM is a music-streaming service that says they offer all of that and more.  The company actually launched in January of 2007, and has since been bought by CBS, so, they have some pretty strong backing holding them up. And they are starting to pass the longer running Sound Exchange even with the fact that royalty rates for music being streamed over the Internet has been raised; making it somewhat difficult for ad-supported start-ups to stay afloat. Some people though, say this is not wholly due to their really being all for the artist, but instead because they pay rock bottom royalty rates. From a commenter at DashGo regarding Last.Fm’s royalty tier - “Even bands that write just one great song deserve compensation for their copyright. Maybe not by a major label force bundling it into an album, but certainly at more than 30% of whatever pitifully low CPM Last.fm and CBS can dredge up - something they won’t even guarantee a floor on.”

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