With the amount of digital media about the place it is highly likely that, unless you have a fancy MP3 player docking station, most of your music and movie sounds will come out of an underwhelming PC speaker set. Although technically the Apocalypse system could be used with any digital media player to good effect, using its 3.5mm jack input, I would reckon that being attached to a home computer puts Zicplay's offering in its best setting. This is an area of the speaker market normally dominated by the likes of Creative and Logitech so it's nice to see some new blood.

The Zicplay Apocalypse sets itself aside from the competition by using vacuum tube amplifier technology for enhanced sound quality. The Apocalypse 3 and 5 systems differ in terms of power but each have a 40 watt sub and two 15w or 20w satellite speakers respectively. At £119 they are starting towards a premium setup so hopefully the introduction of this vacuum tube technology will pay off. They will be available shortly from the Zicplay website.

More multimedia speakers
Trust offers USB speakers
Saitek's wireless designer speakers

Evesham Bluemedia has come up with a simple addition to the humble in-car navigation gadget that gives it an edge over the competition: MP3 support.  First things first though; the BM6380 has all the goods you would expect from a decent GPS system. It comes with the latest selection of navteq 2D and 3D maps which are displayed on a 320 x 240 touchscreen and address/postcode programming plus alerts for six types of speed camera designed to keep you "safe" when you're booting it across the countryside.

If you find that you're lugging the unit around to prevent thieves from liberating it via a broken window, the MP3 player should prove its worth especially as the unit supports up to 2GB SD memory. Oh, and there's also a pedestrian mode to make it more useful sans car. The Evesham Bluemedia BM6380 will be available from November for £299.99 and you can chose to up date its memory every few weeks to keep you ahead of those speed cameras and road changes for an extra annual £30 subscription.

More GPS
Smallest ever GPS watch
Mio unveils GPS smartphone

Denon's latest entry for the hotly contested sub-£1000 home cinema amplifier sector is the newly unveiled AVR- 3806. Amongst a vast array of features it boasts 7-channel surround, HDMI conversion and automatic room setup via Audyssey MultEQ XT room calibration which will carefully set up the speaker levels to suit your room without you needing to scramble around with a tape measure. It even boasts the ability to produce a distinct sweet spot for six independently placed listeners simultaneously. Its power output is 7 x 120w and a 3 zone multi-room system can use different sources to simultaneously supply a separate room with independent sound.

Wanting to prove that it is ahead of the game, HDMI technology is the main focus of Denon's offering. On top of two HDMI inputs, the AVR-3806 also fully converts analogue, composite and S-video inputs to HDMI output (although whilst you save up for that HDTV you can use more traditional outputs too). Denon has even redesigned the remote control to help match the demands of what remains, despite its best efforts, a pretty complex system; the programmable control now sports a combination of hard buttons and touch screen.

More home cinema
Arcam expands DiVA range
SIM2 C3X 3-Chip DLP home cinema projector

Not wishing to be outdone by its rivals - most notably Orange - Vodafone has teamed up with Sky to offer mobile TV to its Vodafone Live 3G customers. Initially 19 different channels will be offered free of charge to customers. However, from February 1st subscribers will be charged £5 a month for each of the packages they subscribe to. Some channels will be broadcast 'as live' while others will be dedicated 'made for mobile' channels, featuring regularly updated blocks of programming. In order to attract customers to the service Sky is giving all Vodafone Live 3G customers exclusive live coverage of the England cricket team's tour to Pakistan, starting with the first test in Multan on 12 November. Sky also claims that it will offer both breaking news and sports headlines to Vodafone's 3G customer base.

More Mobile TV stories:
Orange TV on a mobile reviewed
Samsung shows mobile TV at IFA

What's happening at some of our other top blogs this weekend?

Games Digest: Nindendogging? You've got to be kidding, Xbox 360 Euro launch titles revealed?, PS3 spring 2006, £200?

HDTV: Pana's future-proof 65inch plasma, Sky to demo HDTV next week?, Dell delivers cheap big screen HD LCD

Propellerhead (Computer Help): Top tip - travel smart, A word to the wise - control formatting, Top tip - reply to emails while you are out

Bayraider (eBay Blog): Daniel Craig 007 Press Pack, Refurbished Phone Box, Buy a Slab for Cloughie

Pop Junkie (Great Lost Pop Albums): Embrace - If You've Never Been, Bob Dylan - Slow Train Coming, Robyn Hitchcock - I Often Dream Of Trains

Manchester's Vodafone stores are currently trialling the new QuickPhone kiosks in an experiment which could eventually see similar machines become commonplace in public places throughout the UK. The QuickPhone has a pretty simple concept: it can sell you anything from cheap pay-as-you-go mobiles to sim card packs costing between £5 and £30. The machine also showboats some of Vodafone's other telecommunications technology; 3G technology is used to monitor stock levels and arrange refills. Plus, if you're worried about having to pump £30 in small change into a machine, they even come imbued with a 'chip and pin' system. I'm not particularly sure that there is quite enough demand for instant access to cheap mobiles to support a nationwide network of these vendors, especially with all those pesky phone boxes about, but we'll wait and see.

via The Scotsman

More vending machines
Music downloads from a vending machine?
The iPod vendor

LG has unveiled plans to integrate a breath analyser into a phone handset. This will come in pretty handy if you think you may have had a couple too many wine spritzers somewhere outside the UK, but I think under this country's somewhat tighter legislation it might be worth using if you've been standing too close to a bar maid. The LG-SD410, LG-KP4100 and LG-LP4100 handset are set to come with this unique feature out in Japan and I think the odds are pretty good of something similar reaching these shores eventually. It would also be especially useful if it could speed dial a taxi company in the event of an unacceptable level. Then maybe order you a kebab and work out where the hell you left your house keys.

via Akihabara News

More quirky handsets
Samsung's hand warming mobile
Samsung SCH-S350 Sci-Fi Phone

Pana has added a whopping 65inch plasma screen to its Viera line up. Key features include a digital terrestrial (Freeview) tuner and an HD-ready screen capable of displaying both the main HD formats: 1080i and 720p. The TV-65PV500 also comes with SD memory card and PCMCIA card slots so you can view still images from a digital camera/camcorder. Usefully it's also possible to record MPEG4 video footage from the TV on to the SD card for playback via a portable device (for example the Panasonic D-Snap).

Panasonic

More HDTV stories:
Sony's 50inch rear projection TV
Panasonic's HD ready LCD screens

Looking for a flat screen this Chrimbo but don't want the hassle of hanging it on the wall? Sony's new 50inch BRAVIA (the KDF-E50A12U to give it its full title) promises a really clear big picture and comes with this rather nice glass stand for putting your other gadgets on. Other useful features include a built in digital terrestrial TV tuner for watching Freeview channels and screen resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels - handy for when we get HDTV next year. An LCD rear projection model, the 50incher will set you back around £1399. You can buy the 50inch BRAVIA 3LCD telly from here.

Yep it's that time of the year again when Sky invites designers to take their magic markers to its Sky+ Box and conjure up some tasty new styles. Only this year it isn't only girlie designers like Matthew Williamson who have been on the case (you can see some of those here), Sky has let some bloke-friendly stylists have a go too. In particular Red or Dead man Wayne Hemingway has developed a quartet of new box emblazoned in the colours of the Premiership's top four (as denoted by Sky so no arguing) football teams.

Naturally pride of place goes to the Arsenal box with its cannon to highlight the Gunners' power, well at Highbury anyway. Chelsea get lions, Moan United get a box in red, gold and black and as for Liverpool - think 'You'll never walk alone' and those famous wrought iron gates. The boxes go on sale from John Lewis next moth retailing from £99.99.

More Sky
New Sky+ box
Sky's HDTV hardware

There's nothing quite as beautiful as an airship floating across the north London sky, and hopefully we'll be seeing a lot more of them now that boffins at the Chubu University in Japan have come up with a really good use for them. Their Solan-2 airship is being used at the World PC Expo this week to deliver Wi-Fi signals to the gathered techies. Even more impressive is that the ship is solar powered and features wireless remote-controlled cameras for taking sneaky pics of the show visitors. There's more about the Wi-Fi airship than you ever really need to know the ace new gadget blog Digital World Tokyo. Kind of reminds us of this - wonder whatever happened to this concept? Maybe it proved to just be a load of hot air?

Philips has been giving its DVD recorder range the once over adding three new models two of which feature hard disks. The top-end DVDR7300H (£500) and DVDR3300H (£330) are equipped with 250GB and 80GB Hard Disk Drives respectively, each storing, so Philips says, approximately 400 hours and 130 hours of footage. They both feature the usual hard disk party tricks, such pause live TV, watch a recorded programme before it has finished being archived and instant rewind. And obviously you can archive recordings on the hard disk to DVD at speeds of up to 20x. Both players also offer Dual Layer DVD+R disc recording, doubling the recording capacity and features the GUIDE Plus+® Interactive Programme Guide, which provides 7-day channel listings. 

Top new website Gadget Centre has been playing with the Creative X-Fi Elite Pro, a device designed to soup up your PC's performance to make the most of its multimedia, and especially music, facilities. Sounds pretty good too. Review here.

After all the excitement that was the British Inventions Show the other week, the Tech Digest crew has yet another gadget filled weekend to look forward. On 4th November - though the show runs to the 6th - we'll be hotfooting it down to the Best of Stuff show in Hammersmith. Like a Dixons store on steroids, the show will have a splendid selection of the world's best gadgets and some of its worst too probably, for you to poke your fingers at. Apparently you will get to see an Xbox 360, Sky's first High Def satellite box - although if this is a working sample it will be very big news - and the world's smallest MP3 player.

Struggling to afford the downpayment on a new iPod shuffle? Well, if things are that tight here's some good news. You can now buy an MP3 player for, get this - a tenner. The 24g Ebuyer Ecoman delivers all the usual features including MP3 playback and in-ear phones. What you don't get are rechargeable batteries - it plays for eight hours on one standard AAA battery - and any storage. You have to slip your own SD cards, but seeing as 512MB SD cards sell for around £20 now that isn't too bad a deal.

If you are feeling flush you can opt for the £13 'MP3 Player with Expansion Slot' which also features a screen. Can it be too long before Mp3 players drop out of your cereal packet? Yep the days when you'll be crunching on your Cheerios and break your teeth on the iPod pico can't be too far away. Get 'em here.

Via
More MP3
World's smallest MP3 player (again)
Philips new hard disk MP3 players

According to bruv blog Games Digest the Internet is buzzing with multiple sources suddenly talking to trade newspapers and websites about Nintendo's Revolution launch plans. Apparently the console is set to launch worldwide in June 2006, with a possibility that Europe may slip to July 2006. Spong.com, one of the more excitable websites, is also predicting a $200, Euro 300, £200 price.

Other top stories on Games Digest - PS3 backwards compatibility now called into question. Nintendo gets handwriting recognition for DS

Here's a round of some of the top stories on other Shiny Media sites

Propellerhead - (Your PC queries solved) How to fine tune your PC.Back up for Beginners. Plus loads more of this stuff here
HDTV UK - (High def blog) Sony's top-end projector coming to UK. NTL unveils Sky+ rival
Bayraider (eBay blog) - Win an Emmy Jumbo Jet landing light  Xbox 360s

Well we knew it wouldn't be long before some serious broadband player announced an IPTV service (Internet Protocol TV, or TV via broadband to a set top box) and here is the biggie. BT has confirmed today that in conjunction with box maker Philips it is to debut a broadband IPTV/digital TV hybrid service in summer 2006.

The box itself will feature a digital terrestrial decoder, so that it can access all the Freeview digital TV Channels, but it also uses Microsoft's TV IPTV Edition as the software platform on which it delivers some interesting services. For starters user will be able to access a large video on demand library, watch "catch-up TV" which is basically programmes that have been on early in the week (this will be on demand) and access a range of interactive services.

Parents: it may be high time to confiscate that mobile phone. A survey carried out by company Xingtone has found that, on average, youths will spend a phenomenal £4,320 each on ringtones in the next 15 years! Perhaps we should have seen the warning signs in the Crazy Frog fiasco. A lot of this spend has also been put down to the both the high cost of the ringtones themselves and the fact that downloading them often ties you into a contract which is next to impossible to escape. People with daughters aged 10-14 ought to be especially wary of the lure of this most sinister phone fad, with some of those surveyed boasting as many as six downloads per month. Yikes.

More ringtones
Avanquest seek to kill the Frog