Matthew Hicks

LAS VEGAS—A Motorola executive on Thursday previewed an upcoming mobile phone that can play music from Apple Computer Inc.s iTunes store. Speaking during a keynote at the International Consumer Electronics Show here, the executive demonstrated a phone that in many ways mimics the iPod. The phone syncs with a computer and the iTunes Music Store […]

LAS VEGAS—Hewlett-Packard Co. is preparing to expand its presence in the living room this year with its first HDTV media hub and 17 new high-definition televisions and home projectors, the companys top executive said here on Friday. Speaking at a keynote during the International Consumer Electronics Show, HP CEO Carly Fiorina said the HDTV media […]

LAS VEGAS—In televisions transition to digital, theres a missing link: a firm date for when broadcasters must completely switch from analog to digital broadcasts. That link needs to be found this year in order to end uncertainty in the TV market about when digital will fully arrive, said Michael Powell, chairman of the Federal Communications […]

LAS VEGAS—Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates may have been heralding the “digital lifestyle” Wednesday during his International Consumer Electronics Show keynote here, but his on-stage demonstrations proved that technology remains error-prone. The kickoff address from Gates was riddled with demo glitches ranging from a marred digital-photo slideshow to a memory error that crashed an Xbox […]

LAS VEGAS—Online auction giant eBay Inc. is leading an effort to encourage the recycling or resale of used computers and consumers electronics. eBay on Wednesday launched the Rethink Initiative and a related Web site at the International Electronics Show here. The initiative brings together major IT companies such as Intel Corp. with government agencies and […]

Blinkx Inc. hopes to steal some search thunder from Apple Computer Inc. on the eve of the Macworld Conference & Expo next week. The startup on Monday plans to release a Mac OS X version of its desktop search application, which automatically returns hard-drive and Web results based on the context of what a user […]

LAS VEGAS—Soothsayers attempting to divine the hot trends at this years International Consumer Electronics Show need to look no further than TiVo and the iPod. Those products represent two of the fastest growing categories in consumer electronics—digital video recorders and digital music players. And they are helping to drive an expected 50,000 product launches during […]

SBC Communications Inc. is merging home entertainment and digital content through the television set-top box. The San Antonio, Texas-based telecommunications provider on Monday announced a joint venture with equipment maker 2Wire Inc. to deliver a new home entertainment service and set-top box by the middle of the year. It will be available to customers using […]

Opera Software ASA unveiled Thursday a beta test version of its next Web browser release that features speech recognition, discovery of news feeds and automatic Web-page resizing. While the next release had been on track to be Version 7.60, the Oslo, Norway, company announced a change in plans. It is retooling the version to be […]

America Online Inc. is preparing to compete next year with Yahoo Inc., MSN and Google Inc. in the free Web-based e-mail market. The Dulles, Va., company late Tuesday launched a beta of a revamped Web-based e-mail service called “AOL Mail on the Web.” It is available to AOL members who are registered beta testers. In […]