Oddly enough, the far-fetched proposal is apt to be accepted. Circuit City has reportedly solicited the services of Goldman Sachs to help "negotiate a deal," which will essentially put the troubled electronics retailer in the hands of someone else. As it stands, Blockbuster looks to be the most interested in picking up the pieces, with billionaire Carl Icahn (Blockbuster's largest shareholder) agreeing to finance the get-together. Of course, it looks as if Blockbuster may be the only outfit interested. Not like that's any surprise, however, as Best Buy itself is having to look to Europe to boost revenues with US consumer spending off from where it once was. The real question here is whether a Circuit City-Blockbuster combo would be the perfect concoction to turn things around for both flagging firms, or will we find that two sinking ships actually do go down faster when anchored to one another?

We had a pretty good feeling this would go down eventually, but we certainly didn't see a confirmation (of sorts, anyway) coming this soon. Jim Denney, VP of product marketing at TiVo, has been quoted as saying that although the current version of Amazon Unbox can't process high-definition content, TiVo and Amazon will jointly announce HD capabilities "in the not too distant future." Granted, the content -- whenever it does actually arrive -- will only be accessible by "cable subscribers" with adequate bandwidth, but it's not like that's any sort of surprise. Sadly, details beyond what you've seen here were left out, but at least you can sleep soundly tonight knowing that high-def Unbox material is most certainly on the horizon.

[Via Zatz Not Funny]

It'd be absolutely spectacular to actually see one of these admittedly ambitious municipal WiFi projects actually work out every now and then, but instead, we're seeing the nails start to sink into yet another citywide WiFi coffin. This go 'round, the network blanketing most of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania is on the verge of sending out its last signals unless the city can devise a plan in short order to take it over from EarthLink, who unsurprisingly wants out on the double. Unfortunately, we don't have a great feeling about the system's future -- history has a way of forecasting, you know?

[Via CNET, image courtesy of Stippling]

Surely you remember that Solo Plus HMD that Myvu aimed at iPod owners late last year? Wait, what? You purged that from your memory as soon as you saw it? Ah well, looks like you'll be on yet another blotting mission after peeking this, as the aforesaid outfit has delivered yet another option for those looking to check out iPod clips on their own personal theater and destroy any chance at garnering friends. The Shades 301 iPod Edition, which is set to cost two Benjamins, actually looks quite different (and dare we say, a smidgen better) than the Solo Plus, and reportedly comes bundled with a pair of Ultimate Ears earbuds, detachable Dock Connector cable, remote, integrated battery and a two-piece cable manager for its neck cabling. If you're inexplicably overcome with an urge to see more, you can check out a brief hands-on by following the read link below.

It's been a hot minute since we've seen any fresh new kit from Plextor, but the firm has just rolled out a new pair of NAS drives for those on the hunt for -- what else? -- networked storage. The StorX PX-NAS500L / PX-NAS1000L drives offer up 500GB and 1TB of capacity, respectively, and each unit includes a gigabit Ethernet port, one-touch USB back-up button and the ability to grow thanks to a pair of USB 2.0 sockets. Beyond that, you won't find much else special about the new duo, and your guess is as good as ours on pricing / availability.

[Via BIOS]

Make no mistake, Terrafugia's outlandish airplane / motorcar hybrid has been on the drawing board for years, but it looks like the rubber is about to hit the proverbial road (or take to the skies, whichever) this July. A team of ten is working feverishly to ready the Transition for its debut at this year's AirVenture, where it hopes to catch more than a few eyes with its zany "roadable aircraft." As you can likely guess, this thing is meant to both fly and drive, and yes, that means it'll have to pass safety regulations from both the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. If all goes well, the startup expects to deliver its first vehicle to a customer in 2009, while mass production isn't scheduled to happen until 2012. We're no experts in the field, but it seems like it'll take a Christmas miracle for either of those feats to actually be accomplished.

[Via Slashdot]

Newman has never had much luck cranking out portable media players that were easy on the eyes, and unfortunately, things aren't getting any better with the M8000. The bulky PMP features a 4-inch 320 x 240 resolution display, support for NES emulation and text viewing, a 1.3-megapixel camera, integrated speaker / microphone, video output, USB 2.0 connectivity and compatibility with a smattering of file formats. Unlike many craptacular rivals, this one comes in black or white and can be equipped with up to 250GB of internal hard drive space. Of course, it's not like anyone with a shred of dignity is going to fork out $388 for the quarter-terabyte edition, but if you've got the coin to roll, you can certainly test the limits of buyer's remorse.

[Via PMPToday]

It's a tough call -- are you willing to get your eyeballs within the driver's seat of your remote-controlled vehicle, even if it means looking freakishly like Geordi La Forge? If you've thrown aside your pride and confidently answered "yes," you should certainly have a gander at the Pilot View FPV 2400. Designed for use in radio-controlled aircraft and cars, the system places a wireless camera in the cockpit and then beams back live first-person footage to those horrifically unsightly goggles you see consuming the face of that poor gal above. In all seriousness, we'd bet the experience is fairly novel, if not a touch fantastic, but we could probably think of more enthralling ways to spend $549 if we were really pressed.

[Thanks, Claudio]

It's times like these when holding our fingers back from buying that one-way ticket to Tokyo is so incredibly difficult. Just today, Pioneer has introduced the Air Navi AVIC-T10, a portable car navigation system that "supports communications modules and provides drivers with new communications services for the Japanese market." According to the release, this bad boy is "clearly distinguished from conventional PNDs," provides oodles of information about traffic, weather, local events, gas station prices, etc. and packs a pretty impressive list of specs. We're talking a 5.8-inch WVGA display, 1-seg TV tuner, 4GB of flash memory, integrated gyro sensor and built-in Bluetooth to boot. Those lucky enough to be in the right nation can snatch this gem next month for a currently undisclosed price.

[Via AkihabaraNews]

As lovely as the D2 is, we've always had a secret wish for it to offer up a bit more internal capacity. Apparently the higher-ups at Cowon have heard our inner cries, as a 16GB edition of the player is now available through JetMall. Aside from being more capacious, nothing else has changed, but if this was just the thing to push you over the edge, you can hand over your $240 right now and join the club.

[Via AnythingButiPod]

Yeah, those GSM carriers have been offering up RIM's BlackBerry Curve for eons (we're measuring in cellular years, kids), but not until recently have the major CDMA operators in the US been able to scoop up their own. Now that Alltel, Sprint and Verizon all have the Curve 8330 available to customers, we're interested in seeing an absolute torrent of responses from folks who just aren't entirely satisfied with their new handset. Was it really worth the wait? Is it missing any features that you're just dying to have (like, say, WiFi)? And, be honest, are you jealous of those AT&T / T-Mobile users who've already worn the letters from their keypads? Speak your mind, won't you?

Considering that mechanical beings will be fighting our real wars here in just a few years, it's no shock to see more focus placed on the areas where actual humans will still be the ones waging. DARPA is looking to create what it calls a National Cyber Range, which would essentially act as a training ground for cyber warriors. The setup would enable defense gurus to simulate battle against attacks our on nation's most highly prized data, and of course, give victors over virtual phishing scams immense bragging rights. Come to think of it, Estonia could have totally benefited from something like this last year.

[Via Information Week, image courtesy of Sandia]

Sure, we've seen a set of robotic chompers before, but a team of scientists led by one Gaëlle Arvisenet is taking artificial mouths to a new plateau. In a study set to be released in next week's Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, researchers report on the "design of an artificial mouth that mimics the first vital steps of human digestion -- chewing, saliva release and the initial breakdown of food." In order to ensure accuracy in the mechanical chewer, the gurus actually compared masticated apple pulp from human mouths as well as the robotic version; they reportedly scrutinized texture, color and aromatic compound release. Great, as if we really need our next humanoid servant to start begging for eats.

[Via The Register]

So, we hear you're edging ever closer to pulling the trigger on a shiny new XPS 420, huh? Lucky you, as it looks like Dell just opened up your options. While the only processor choices on the XPS 630 are the E8500 and the absurdly expensive QX6850 (it's an $850 addition), the XPS 420 now has a half dozen CPUs to pick from. Most notably, users can now get their rig equipped with a Core 2 Quad Q9300 / Q9450, both of which provide much more oomph than the baseline chips while not forcing you to refinance your home and pick the QX9650. So, when can the aforesaid 630 expect similar selections?

[Thanks, Evan]

After an absolutely heart-wrenching video of Pleo being annihilated by a sadistic ComBot emerged yesterday, we're thrilled to add a little balance to the whole thing with a totally heartwarming clip today. Down at Sea World, Pleo was politely introduced to a number of animals in the park, though its interactions with the dolphins were particularly special. In the vid posted after the jump, you can go ahead and fast-forward to around the two minute mark -- there you'll find the true definition of a stud. Or maybe the pod just thinks miniature dinosaurs look extraordinarily tasty.

[Thanks, Robert]