The tears of Microsoft fans in Australia were heard trickling down their cheeks - as once again, Australia gets a watered down release of a product.

Microsoft just posted a press release in regards to the expansion of the Zune services internationally. The Zune Marketplace will have music, tv shows and movie rental, but select components available in select regions.

Windows Phone 7 is being launched this year - with Zune Marketplace having to tackle Apple's iTunes - it would be a very good move to give all markets the same deal, right? No. Enter MS's "Zune Pass" - it allows users to pay a monthly subscription and get full access to Microsoft's entire music library - sounds great, right? Too bad you live in Australia!

Gamers often prefer to play with headphones even if they are alone in the house and can use any speakers they want. Often headphones allow you to hear more nuances of the sound like that enemy creeping up behind you before you see them. While many of the new headsets that have been launching over the last few months have had virtual surround tech inside. Tt eSports has unveiled a cool new headset that uses stereo sound.

The headset is called the Shock and it is specifically designed for gaming. The headset has a microphone that allows the player to chat and issue orders when playing with a team. The mic has noise cancelling technology built-in to get the users voice rather than background sound.

Other features include inline controls for volume and muting of the mic. The ear cups entirely cover the ears to block external sounds and promise to be comfortable for extended gaming. Connecting the headphones requires a single USB port so you don't have to crawl around looking for ports on your computer. The Shock will ship in October at an undisclosed price.

HP has been offering printers, cameras, computers and all sorts of other gear for a long time now. Some of the best looking computers that the company offers are the Envy line of thin and portable machines. HP has now added printers to the Envy mark and the first is the Envy 100 e-All-in-One.

The printer is made to look as good as it performs. It looks more like a media server or set top box than a printer with no exposed paper or output trays. Those trays slide out like a CD ROM tray does on a computer to keep things looking neat. The printer runs the Android operating system and has a 3.45-inch touchscreen on the front. The printer uses two ink cartridges with one black and one for color printing.

That touchscreen lets you get online and select apps that you might want to download for the printer. The Envy 100 will copy, print, scan, and fax. It is good for 30 ppm in black and 25ppm in color. HP will launch the Envy 100 on October 4 with a price of $249. I will say that this is one of the best looking printers that I have ever seen.

OnLive has been available for a while now and is an interesting way to get your video games. The idea is that you can play all sorts of video games without having to go to the store and make a purchase. The streaming service has a monthly fee to be a member and then you still have to purchase the video games as well. Since launch, you have had to have your machine connected to a wired web connection to play.

OnLive has announced that it has a new Wi-Fi Beta service now available that lets users wanting to play some games on a notebook use a wireless connection. According to the company all you need to do is launch OnLive and the user will get a prompt for Wi-Fi Beta that they can select if they are using WiFi when the app is launched.

The only catch is that your wireless connection has to offer at least 3Mbps connection speed. One nice thing is that if your web connection drops the game will save your place for up to five minutes and allow you to resume when the connection comes back online. OnLive states that it will continue to make improvements and enhancements to the service.

I know a few people that really like to text and email from their mobile phones, but have cancelled their data plans due to cost issues. If you are one of these folks that doesn't want to pay for a data plan, but still want to be able to text and send emails to people the Peek 9 may be perfect for you.

The Peek 9 device looks like a thin slate style smartphone. It lacks voice capability, but it has wireless connectivity that will allow you to send emails and texts to cell phone and computer users. The device sells for $69.99 with no service or for $99.99; you can get it bundled with two months of service. The service is $19.95 monthly, $49.95 quarterly, or $179.95 for a year. You can also get lifetime service for $129.99.

The device has a battery good for 4-5 days under typical use. It measures 4" x 2.7" x 0.4" and weighs 3.8 ounces. The screen is a 2.5-inch unit with a resolution of 320 x 240. Internal memory is 8MB and the radio is a GPRS 800/1800/1900 MHz unit. The CPU inside the Peek 9 is an ARM7 at 104MHz. The device supports texting to other mobile phone users and email from web accounts, Outlook, and Exchange.

Intel plan to charge users $50 to software unlock their CPU's.

WHAT. Yes, you read that right - Intel want to charge people for software unlocks - is this the future of CPU's?

Intel's Pentium G9651 LGA1156 dual core CPU hasn't not had much air-time, compared to the G6950. But, the G9651 supports "hardware feature upgrades" which by purchasing them enable certain locked features through software. The $50 upgrade gives the G9651 user support for HyperThreading tech, enabling four threads on the processor and unlocks the disabled 1MB of L3 cache.

Despite the usual denial from Apple, it seems as though they are on target to release the sequel to this years biggest tablet, the iPad.

Some of the Taiwan based component suppliers of Apple revealed they believer the shipments for the second-gen iPad will begin next year, according to DigiTimes. With that in mind, it would indicate to us that Apple will announce the iPad at the end of Q1 2011.

DigiTimes publication reported that four iPad suppliers, TPK Touch Solutions, Wintek, Cando and Chimel Innolux were in the process of completing validation by Apple for "ultra-thin, glass-based touch panels". With those terms used, it would seem that the next-gen iPad could've been on the treadmill this last few months and maybe lost some weight, maybe starting to look a bit thinner too.

In a surprising move, Internode has called a "cease fire" between gamers and the publishers of the Call of Duty franchise by setting up a deal with GameServers.com that will secure local services for the newest CoD venture, Black Ops (available in November).

If you remember, the last Call of Duty title, Modern Warfare 2 broke sales records, won an arm full of awards and gave gamers world wide wet dreams for months. But, for PC gamers - it was a change. Dedicated servers, which have been a staple of PC multiplayer gaming since the 90's was absent, instead a peer to peer network (where one players internet connection is the "host" and the others are "guests") was included.

The result was obviously heard world wide, where premier gaming network games.on.net and Internode have gone into partnership with GameServers.com

Foxtel are set to launch Australia's dedicated 3D channel.

Foxtel, in November, are starting a 3D channel as well as introducing a new range of high-definition channels.

The quick move into 3D gives Foxtel an advantage as the free-to-air networks only broadcast 3D in trial mode. The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) will limit the trial broadcasts of the AFL and NRL grand finals from the Seven and Nine networks to all major cities while it had "a review of certain spectrum, licensing and consumer policy issues associated with 3D TV".

Apple CEO Steve Jobs has long been known to personally respond to emails sent to his personal Apple email address. When a Long Island University journalism student sent an email to him after being repeatedly ignored by Apple's PR department requesting a quote for an assignment covering iPad use in public settings, she got an unfriendly response; being told by Jobs himself "Our goals do not include helping you get a good grade. Sorry" and "Please leave us alone."

After receiving the assignment from her professor to cover her school's new initiative to buy iPads for all incoming students, Long Island University senior Chelsea Kate Isaacs decided to try an speak with someone at Apple about their feelings on the use of iPads in academic settings. After sending six emails with no response from Apple, she took a friend's offhanded idea to email Jobs himself and ran with it and didn't exactly get the warmest of responses. Maybe she should have turned off the option that tags her emails "Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile?"

After explaining her lack of luck getting in contact with Apple's PR department for her assignment, Jobs' email replied "Our goals do not include helping you get a good grade. Sorry." After a few more back and forths, he laid down the final statement of "Please leave us alone." While it may be a little ambitious for a journalism student to think she will get a quote from Jobs, why couldn't he just ignore this one like he does with most others?

Apple's massive success with the iPad has shown that consumers are eager to buy tablet computers and there are hoards of makers rushing their offerings to market. The iPad continues to sell to the tune of millions each month all around the world. The holiday shopping season is coming up and that time is pivotal for many of the new tablets trying to come to market.

Motorola was expected to launch its first tablet in time for the holiday shopping season, but the maker has now announced that its tablet will not make it. According to Motorola co-CEO Sanjay Jha the Motorola tablet will not land until early 2011. Jha gave no specific reason the tablet would not make it this year other than to say that Motorola will not launch the tablet until it is competitive.

Google has already said that it does not think Froyo is appropriate for tablets. Perhaps Motorola is waiting for a new more tablet specific version of Android to launch. Jha said, "We want to make sure that any tablet that we deliver is competitive in the marketplace, and I think all of us will make sure that we will only deliver that when that occurs. Hopefully, that's early next year."

Dell has been shipping 30-inch LCDs for years now and I have been using one of the original 30-inch units and wouldn't give it up for anything. The new LCD is an improvement on the original LCD with a lot of nice new features and a big price tag. This may be the best LCD for gamers looking to play with high resolutions.

The screen has a 16:10 aspect ratio and uses IPS technology. The resolution for the LCD is 2560 x 1600 and it has a 1000:1 typical contrast ratio. The dynamic contrast ratio for the screen is 100,000:1 and the screen can display 1.07 billion colors, which is way more than my original 30-inch LCD can handle. The screen has a 7ms response time so ghosting should not be an issue.

Viewing angles for the big screen are 178-degrees horizontally and vertically and the screen has a 0.2505mm pixel pitch. Connectivity options include a pair of HDMI ports, two DVI-D ports, VGA port, DisplayPort, and an integrated four-port USB hub. The screen has a stand that is height, tilt, and angle adjustable as well. You can order the screen right now for $1499.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has recommended to Telstra to lower their wholesale pricing to their copper network. iiNet's chief regulatory officer, Steve Dalby doesn't seem to think it will get Telstra to play ball.

The ACCC recommends a price reduction in wholesale line rental (WLR) (the price an ISP pays to provide a line when not connected to their own infrastructure) on top of a recommendation to drop the local carriage service (LCS) pricing.

While the price drops for WLR and LCS are recommended from the ACCC's report, they don't recommend a change in the line sharing service (LSS) which let's a company supply ADSL services using their own equipment in Telstra exchanges. Also left out, is ULLS which is the supply of a service from a whole copper line, from the exchange to the home.

Internode launched 1TB plans yesterday, as well as increasing data amounts to existing plans.

Managing director of Internode, Simon Hackett, labelled the new plans like T-Shirt sizes. S to XXL. The new plans are for data starved customers, but are free of "off-peak" limitations.

Internode now have the "Easy Broadband XXL" plan, which includes 1000GB (1TB) of quota, available at all times, without peak or off peak, for $119.95 a month when bundled with their NodeLine phone service.

Always Innovating's Smart Book may just be the most flexible mobile device yet. It takes the current netbook you know and love and breaks it down into pieces, allowing you to take what you need or use as few or as many pieces as you need.

A touchscreen VoIP phone, a tablet, and a keyboard are the three major components that you can put together or use separately depending on your needs. The Smart Book even includes a switch that will allow you to switch between Android, Chrome, Ubuntu, or your own OS. An ARM Cortex-A8 processor, 512 MB of RAM, 256 MB of built-in flash storage, and 802.11 b/g/n WiFi make up the insides of the device. Always Innovating is currently taking preorders for their Smart Book at their website for $549 USD. Creepy introduction video after the break.

Chiphell, a Chinese tech site has leaked out some specs on the upcoming Barts series from AMD.

The upcoming Barts series will be the successor to the very popular HD 5750 and 5770 boards. What's impressive about the new Bart boards, is it will compete with the GTX460. Not only will it compete, but it's upgraded it's memory bus from 128 to 256bit.

Barts XT will have 12 SIMD's, 960 shaders, 48 texture units and 32 ROP's. To compare this to the current Juniper XT (5770), the current board has 800 shaders and 40 texture units (with the 128bit bus). Core clocks should be about the same (850mhz), but with the internals being tweaked - it looks like this might become the favorable board of the upcoming gaming season in November. Barts XT looks to have a TDP of over 150W.

The technology world was all aflutter a few weeks back when Apple unveiled its new line of iPods. One of the new offerings was an updated version of the nano with a touchscreen and a clock function. With the thing being able to be used as a clock it didn't take long for some accessories to hit the market to turn the thing into a watch.

Many of the watchbands for the new nano were just simple bands that you clip the nano onto. The problem there was that the nano was left unprotected from scratches or drops. A new nano case has surfaced from Incipio called the Linq that offers protection while you wear the nano like a watch.

The Linq has a case that wraps around the edges of the nano to protect it from scratches and bumps. The band is flexible strap material that you can fasten to the wrist. The band can be removed from the case section and different colors matched with it. The complete Linq device sells for $24.99 and the bands only can be purchased for $9.99 each.

I haven't touched a vinyl record since I was a kid. I know there are a lot of people out there who have large vinyl record collections that they want to listen too. There are also a lot of folks out there who have vinyl that they want to turn into digital tracks to use with modern devices like the iPod. Crosley has announced a new portable turntable that is really cool and will play vinyl on the go.

The device is called the CR6002A Revolution and it is a portable belt-driven turntable. I really like the design that has the edges of the record sticking out and floating over the surface the turntable is sitting on. It will work with small 45 RPM records and larger 33 1/3 RPM records as well. The turntable also has a pair of stereo speakers built-in.

Other features include an integrated FM transmitter and the turntable ships with software for ripping tracks and converting them from vinyl to digital formats. The turntable does have to be connected to a PC or Mac computer to turn the vinyl tracks into digital songs via a USB port. The Revolution is coming soon and will sell for $149.95 with several colors available to choose from.

Nicole Scott of Netbook News is on the ground for us at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco and she has a few nuggets of great video coverage for us to share with you all.

Next up we get a demonstration of the raw power of the Xeon platform in the form of four Intel Westmere EX processors. Each CPU has 10 cores per chip with Hyper-Threading enabled giving us an insane total of 80 processing threads to work with on a single system. If you don't know, that is an insane amount of processing power. What do you do with all that power? You show off some amazing fully CPU-powered ray tracing in the form of a program called KeyShot by the folks over at Luxion.

We get a look at KeyShot which is real-time racing tracing software that only uses the CPU to do its work. What is displayed it the production of photo realistic images. And when we say that, we mean it. The chap from Luxion adjusted settings such as the index of refraction (Ior) of glass on a chess piece and it impacted its immediate vicinity according. There are a couple other neat demos in the video below, too.

There are a huge number of docks on the market today for the iPhone. Many of those docks require the iPhone or iPod to be physically plugged into the dock for music to play. There are also a number of systems that allow you to stream music to the device using Bluetooth. The catch is that the Bluetooth wireless systems don't charge the iPhone and your battery can drain quickly.

XtremeMac has unveiled a new audio solution that works with the iPhone and the iPad that combines features of a normal docking station with a wireless Bluetooth dock. The audio system is called the Tango TRX and it uses a 2.1 configuration. The device offers high quality Bluetooth streaming from a remote docking station that can be connected to the AC outlet for charging the iPhone while it plays. A second dock is built into the main device.

The speakers inside the Tango TRX include a pair of mid-range drivers, a pair of dome tweeters, and a down firing sub. Other features of the dock include a line-in jack for connecting non-dockable devices and a multifunction remote control. A free app also integrates with the system to allow control over the sound and the music it plays. The Tango TRX is shipping now for $179.99, the version of the dock with the separate dock to charge while playing via Bluetooth is an Apple Store exclusive selling for $199.99 and is called the Tango TRX D.