If you still long for the good old days of SNES, now you can relive them on your home computer with a new and updated controller. The “USB Metal Game Pad” is a USB controller for your PC that is created in the style of the old SNES controllers.

Just like your traditional SNES controller, the USB Metal Game Pad has an 8-way directional pad, star/select buttons, shoulder triggers, and four game buttons. The controller has a 6 foot USB cable, a rubber coated “base” for grip control

All the controller needs to work is a PC running Vista, 2000, or XP, 50MB of available hard drive space, a VGA of better resolution monitor, and a sound card. Check it out here on the developer, Dream Cheeky’s website. No word on pricing or availability.

[via Technabob]

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Record company executives think they deserve a bigger piece of the profits from games like Rock Band and Guitar hero. The games success (in the eyes of the company) are almost completely dependent on the music they choose to include. In a conference call discussing company earnings earlier this month Edgar Bronfman Jr, the chief executive of Warner Music Group Corp. said “The amount being paid to the industry, even though their games are entirely dependent on the content that we own and control, is far too small”

Currently record companies receive licensing payments from game publishers, and a ton of free publicity. Games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero bring some music into peoples home that they might not have otherwise listened to.

Sales from music-based games is reportedly expected to hit around the 1.5 billion dollar mark this year. With CD sales failing it’s not surprising that record companies would be looking for a bigger piece of the pie as far as game sales are concerned. Currently they receive somewhere between 10k and 25k per song included in the game, record companies are now reportedly asking for 4 to 8 cents per game copy sold in addition to the initial royalty payment.

[via ChicagoTribune]

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The Xbox 360 Arcade bundle may be packaged with a motion controller and some motion controlled mini games. The bundle, which is expected to be released this holiday season is expected to be in direct competition with the Wii.

Xbox 360 Fanboy received a tip from someone “close to Microsoft’s marketing department” that claims the new Xbox 360 Arcade will come packaged with the motion controller as well as the motion controlled mini games developed by Rare.

According to the source the motion controller is expected to work with other Xbox 360 consoles, and will be sold separately, as well as bundled with more motion controlled games. The Xbox 360 Arcade bundle is expected to be released this holiday season for around 9. Assuming the rumor is true, would you purchase the bundle instead of a Wii?

[via Xbox360Fanboy]

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This is a video on using Data Execution Prevention in Windows Vista.

Tags: Microsoft, Vista, Windows

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This is a video on Windows Vista about running Fahrenheit.

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This is a beautiful Windows Vista wallpaper. I found this from Manzz of Flickr.

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Microsoft has released their August update for Windows Vista which contain fixes for 6 critical and 5 important issues.

The following are the critical fixes:

Vulnerability in Microsoft Windows Image Color Management System Could Allow Remote Code Execution (952954)
Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer (953838)
Vulnerability in the ActiveX Control for the Snapshot Viewer for Microsoft Access Could Allow Remote Code Execution (955617)
Vulnerabilities in Microsoft Excel Could Allow Remote Code Execution (954066)
Vulnerabilities in Microsoft PowerPoint Could Allow Remote Code Execution (949785)
Vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office Filters Could Allow Remote Code Execution (924090)

The following are the important fixes:

Vulnerability in IPsec Policy Processing Could Allow Information Disclosure (953733)
Vulnerabilities in Event System Could Allow Remote Code Execution (950974)
Security Update for Outlook Express and Windows Mail (951066)
Vulnerability in Windows Messenger Could Allow Information Disclosure (955702)
Vulnerability in Microsoft Word Could Allow Remote Code Execution (955048)

The security bulletin is found here.

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Microsoft announced that they are releasing details of Windows 7 on the upcoming conferences — Professional Developers Conference and Windows Hardware Engineering Conference. It is said that the new operating system uses the core of Windows Vista and improving on touch interface and the ability to recognize gestures for task operations. It is believed that the new operating system is going to be released on January of 2010.

I think Microsoft is being to cautious on their marketing of the successor to Windows Vista because they would not want consumers to skip Vista and upgrade straight to Windows 7. Microsoft is using Windows 7 to excite consumers and use that excitement to convince them to upgrade to Vista which is a safer and better upgrade path than XP – Windows 7.

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Do you want to get quick medal count updates on Beijing Olympics? Donavon West has just released a Windows Vista sidebar gadget that display medal count. You can download the gadget here.

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The View Beyond Vista (Internet News)
The Windows Vista book (TPLibrary)
Windows Vista® Step by Step, Deluxe Edition (O’Reilly)
Could Vista fail?(Scripting)

Tags: Microsoft, Vista, Windows

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