Opening up the box, the first thing that strikes you is how much the O2 resembles an iPod Classic. It’s as if someone took the first generation video iPod, pulled out the clickwheel and extended the screen instead, but we can live with that when the picture quality’s so fine.

iPod alike Headphones, a proper mains charger (HINT Apple, not just a USB cable, HINT) and some strange clips come provided, as you can see from all the pics below. We’ll be taking it out and about this weekend so check back on Monday for the low down on how it works.

Out now | From £209 | Cowon

Cracking open the box, we’ve got almost everything you could need - almost.

There’s the Catcher itself, unsurprisingly, which looks unobtrusive as it should do - though the black shell feels like it could snap off with little force. Next up’s the remote, then ethernet and component cables, but no HDMI cable - you’ll have to shell out for a decent one yourself.

Have a flick through the gallery while we go and plug the Catcher in. We’ll be testing it out over the weekend to see if Sling’s managed to fine-tune some of the bugs we spotted on first play a few months back, so be sure to check back on Monday for our first impressions.

Out now | £200 | Sling Media

Ronald Richard told local rag The Times-Picayune that he had placed the once-cool-but-now-horribly-ubiquitous clamshell in his shirt pocket on a whim.

If he’d kept it in his hip pocket (its usual position), the .45 calibre bullet thought to have come from nearby woodland would have hit him. But the RAZR tough but skinny body was in the right place at the right time - a coincidence Richard attributes to a higher power.

“I look at this as God telling me to put my cell phone in that pocket,” he said. He escaped his scrape with death with nothing more than a bruise - and presumably a new found sense of brand loyalty to Motorola. The phone? Well, it wasn’t so lucky…

Via Reg Hardware

Guy Cocker, a games journo from Gamespot UK exposed the crafty tactic in a Twitter post on Wednesday saying: “call from Eidos–if you’re planning on reviewing Tomb Raider Underworld at less than an 8.0, we need you to hold your review till Monday.”

Eidos’ UK PR firm, Barrington Harvey even confirmed the ploy. “Thats right. We’re trying to manage the review scores at the request of Eidos” they told Videogaming247.

When asked why, the PR reportedly told the gaming site: “Just that we’re trying to get the Metacritic rating to be high, and the brand manager in the US that’s handling all of Tomb Raider has asked that we just manage the scores before the game is out, really, just to ensure that we don’t put people off buying the game, basically.”

Before games are released they’re sent to all the major games publications, with most reviews published just before, or on the date a game hits the stores. The Metacritic website creates aggregated scores, and of course, a low Metacritic rating means less people will go out and buy the game.

Eurogamer and OXM UK have already posted scores of 7.0, something which is bound to irk Eidos.

Sadly it’s not the first time review scores have caused a row. Last year Gamespot’s Jeff Gerstmann got his P45 sent to him after trashing Kane & Lynch in a review and failing to bow down to advertising pressure. it outraged the gaming community, and rightly so.

Put simply, massaging review scores to squeeze a few more first-day sales out of consumers is just plain wrong. But if anything good came from Gerstmann-gate it’s that gamers are now more review savvy.

But do game reviews actually matter anymore? Currently Tomb Raider’s metacritic score sits at 78 per cent, but with a user average score of 9.0, or 90 per cent it seems gamers are quite happy to vote with their feet.

Will you be buying the latest Tomb Raider installment? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section.

Out now | From £39.99 | TBC | Tomb Raider | (via videogaming247)

You’re spoiled for choice at the moment with swanky smartphones more common than out-of-work bankers. Everything from the T-Mobile G1 to the BlackBerrry Storm is free on monthly contract, but don’t whip out the credit card just yet - there are a few more mobiles on the horizon worth waiting for.

See which ones are worth waiting for after the jump.

Sony Ericsson W705 Walkman phone
It’s not out until the new year, but the latest in the Walkman series will stand out as being the first in the range to offer WiFi, which already puts it above the Storm in our books. HSDPA is also included for when you’re out of a hotspot, as well as “shake control” - lifted wholesale from the new iPod Nanos. Perfect for music heads with mobile browsing needs.

Samsung C6620
We’re yet to have confirmation that this BlackBerry-squashing smartphone will make it to the UK, but if you want a fast emailer mobile, it might be worth holding back to find out. There’s no touchscreen, and only a 2MP camera, but bashing out messages with one hand will be anything but a chore, and the C6620 will run Windows Mobile so you’ll not be left wanting for apps.

LG Prada II
Don’t be fooled - this stylish touchscreener with slide out keyboard isn’t just for strangely orange woman who drive around in Chelsea tractors. HSDPA, more file support than almost any other mobile, multitouch web surfing and a Prada Bluetooth watch to sync all your data to your wrist add up to the smartest non-smartphone out there, and it’s out this month. If you don’t believe us, check out what the LG Prada II can do here.

Nokia Wahoo
It’s early days, and very little is known about Nokia’s new clamshell, codenamed Wahoo. The Finnish phone company has dumped the traditional candy bar concept for a BlackBerry Pearl Flip style half-QWERTY keypad, with two screens, 3G connectivity, a microSD slot for storage and a 2MP snapper. Think the efficiency of a BlackBerry crossed with the size of a Motorola RAZR and you’re not far off.

Asus P656
When the maker of the Eee PC range enters the mobile market, there’s cause to be excited. The Taiwanese company’s lil’ laptops turned the notebook market on its head, and its first smartphone could do the same. We already know it’ll be the fastest mobile yet (its 800MHz CPU is not far off the first Eee’s processing power), with 128MB of RAM, GPS, HSDPA and SDHC support for massive amounts of media storage. There’s no word yet on a UK release, but fingers crossed Asus will be hoping to capitalise on the success of the Eee over here.

Given that pretty much every flat panel display maker massively exaggerates their products’ contrast ratios, we’ll take that claim with a truckload of salt until we see the beast in action. It’s a professional-grade 1920 x 1080 resolution display with class-leading 18-bit colour for smooth dark-to-light gradation, and gets its fearsome black levels from some new technology dubbed “Dynamic Black Layer”.

We’ll bring you more on this humungous screen as we get it - the price is yet to be revealed, ominously…

Out January 2009 | £TBC | Panasonic

Most LCD televisions have poor black levels due to the lights behind the screen, which can’t be turned off - so light leaks through the black parts of the picture, making them look grey. Not so with this “LED Lux” TV - it uses hundreds of LED clusters to light the picture, each of which can be completely switched off when needed. So while you might have a bright object in the middle of the picture, any black areas around it are unlit - so they actually look black.

This morning we stuck on the Blu-Ray version of Sunshine and were blown away by the Philips’ handling of the backgrounds. It’s outer space, so it’s obviously supposed to look black, but it rarely does on any LCD television. Except this one, which succeeds in delivering both very black blacks and very white whites.

It also comes loaded with Philips best picture processing and 100Hz tech, which helps by smoothing out motion judder, cleaning up noise and enhancing colours and contrast.

The TV also looks a bit different to the average LCD. Rather than glossy black it’s framed by brushed silver metal. Eye-catching indeed.

The only bad thing we’ve noticed so far is the price. At over £2,000, it’s one of the most expensive LCDs around - but we guess that’s the price you pay for innovation and performance…

Out now | £2,000 | Philips

The German company is working in association with Luxembourg-based BlueSky Positioning and aim to sell the cards - apparently the first of this kind in the world - to mobile phone operators who want to offer location-based services to their customers.

François Blanchard, global account marketing manager at Sagem Orga, said in a statement to the press: “The SIM is entering a new era where it can now be considered as a real service platform and a valuable device - the A-GPS-enabled SIM card will reshape the way SIM card are perceived by MNOs and end-users.”

The card contains a “highly accurate” GPS receiver and a proprietary antenna actually in the SIM card, that will work with most mobile handsets, with no need for software or hardware changes. Absolutely awesome.

We’re talking a full 1080p HD upscaling Sony DVD player, cut-price Kodak digital cameras and the latest Xbox game at a knock-down price.

There’s also news of a brand new online shopping centre, with exclusive savings and prices not found anywhere else. Read on for more money saving madness!

Call of Duty: World at War (£24.99 from Carphone Warehouse)
The next game in the Call of Duty franchise, World at War has been out just over a week, and already it’s been discounted by the Carphone Warehouse. It looks set to match the success of its predecessor with some top grade military gameplay and epic storytelling to boot.

It features all the challenging gameplay and realism Call of Duty fans expect, with terrific online multiplayer and split screen modes for chum-based warfare. It’s currently lodged in our Xbox, and we love it to smithereens. And for under £25, it’s one hell of a bargain, although you’ll need to hot foot it down to the high street, or pick up the phone, as it’s not available online.

Got no console to play it on? Grab a Sony Ericsson T303 from Carphone Warehouse for £35 a month and you’ll bag yourself a free PlayStation 3 too. If you fancy the Wii version, you can get Nintendo’s console free for £30 a month with a Nokia 6300.

Out now | £24.99 | via Carphone Warhouse

Sony DVPNS708 1080p upscaling DVD player (£49.99 from Amazon)
Getting on the HD train needn’t mean kissing goodbye to all your existing DVDs. Amazon is offering up this 1080p Sony upscaling DVD player for just the cost of a handful of shiny discs.

Its full HD upscaling talents will squeeze the very most from your old DVD collection, bringing them to life on your HD telly. There’s also full Sony BRAVIA sync tech inside to let you control other Sony products such as camcorders using the player’s remote. Not enough features for your £50? It’ll play back still pictures too, using Sony’s Photo TV HD technology to enhance your snaps when displaying them onscreen.

Out now | £49.99 | via Amazon

Kodak C913 9MP Digital Camera (£49.99 from Argos)
Hey big spender, tighten up those purse strings with this penny pinching shooter from Kodak. For under £50 it crams in some top photo tech to leave your bank balance looking as pretty as a… (no we’re not saying it).

The C913 squeezes in 9.2-megapixels along with a 3x optical zoom and wobble eliminating image stabilization tech. It’s got a 16Mb internal memory, but because it’s SD and SDHD card compatible that can easily be bumped up. And it’s splash proof too, making it the perfect stocking filler for the camera clumsy.

Out now | £49.99 | via Argos

Where else can I get a bargain this weekend?
Don’t punish yourself in the great Christmas rush. Stay in, brew a cuppa and get your feet up because a brand new online store has just opened, combining your favourite high street and online stores in one place.

Mallplace.com is a virtual shopping mall where online stores can be browsed alongside their high street compatriots. Stores such as Topshop and online clothing store ASOS sit side by side, and even offer up exclusive discounts not found elsewhere.

With instant product search functions and discount alerts it promises the simplest shopping experience imaginable, and all in one place. Perfect for real life bargain hunters (with David Dickinson nowhere to be seen).  There’re even online coffee shops for social networking based chat.

Check it out at Mallplace.com

1) Delete games from your Achievements list

Any long-serving Xbox 360 player will by now have bought or borrowed at least a couple of games that they got bored of within seconds and never went back to. Until now, the fact you fired up My Horse & Me 2 was an unsightly blemish on your permanent gamer record. However, NXE will let you erase titles from your history, just as long as you never earned any achievements. From the Guide button, bring up your achievements, select the game you want rid of, and hit X to send it to the great video game graveyard in the sky.

2) Schedule downloads from your PC

For a very nifty feature, Microsoft kept its arrival fairly quiet. Sign into Xbox.com with your LIVE ID, then hit the LIVE market place. From here you can shop through the complete Games and Video marketplaces, and anything you choose to download will be automatically scheduled for your Xbox 360 next time you turn it on. You can even spend your Microsoft points just as you would from your console, and because it’s in a browser, its far easier to find your way around. It doesn’t get bogged down in the same way as the console version is prone to either.

3) Let it all out

Avatars are supposed to be childish fun, but even so, playing dress up isn’t all that appealing to the 360’s core demographic. The expulsion of bodily gases, however, is right up our street. While you’re in the Avatar customisation screen, click the right analogue stick to make your character burp. Sadly, doing this on any of the main screens does nothing but elicit a poncy little wave. We’re hoping for farting, mooning and vomiting noisily to be added in a future update.

2) Get free memory

NXE requires 128MB of free storage space in order to install, so if you’re on an old Arcade model with the 256MB memory card, then there’s a very good chance you may not be able to fix it. In all honestly, you need to get a hard drive, and pronto, but in the meantime you may be eligible to receive a free 512MB memory card replacement. You may get the option to buy a reduced cost, refurbished 20GB hard drive. You’ll need to enter your Serial Number and Console ID here to see if you’re eligible.

1) Be a head banger

If you’re frustrated with the child-friendly Avatars and the fact you’re forced to spent valuable play time personalising one, you can vent some rage on the blighter. In the Avatar customisation screen, flick the left stick back then forwards to crack the little twerp’s skull on the screen, complete with sound effects. You’ll probably feel much better about the whole affair after a few minutes of this.

Found anything we’ve missed? Let us know below. Or if you want share your thoughts on NXE, join the discussion here.

According to Mobile Today, Nokia has denied any problems, but some retail staff have raised the issue of negative customer feedback as well as some unrealistic expectations regarding the BBC iPlayer service.

Some customers have experienced a glitch where mis-entry of the message centre number for voicemails completely disables the phone. Nokia told Mobile Today that it was replacing handsets that suffered from this problem.

There have also been complaints concerning the heavily-advertised BBC iPlayer service with reports of poor video buffering and crashing.

Nokia says it is not aware of any faults with the device. A spokesman said: “The N96 is selling really strongly across the board and we are getting great feedback about all of the entertainment options, especially BBC iPlayer. We are not getting reports of problems. Indeed, we are getting very positive feedback on the Nokia N96.”

Out now | £varies with contract | Nokia

Described by the French firm as an “Internet Media Tablet” or IMT, it comes with a humungous 7-inch touch display and either 160GB or 320GB of storage. The web browser is compatible with Flash 9 (that that, Apple!) and MSN Messenger, and comes with an email client. It can hook up to the web via Wi-Fi or, if you’re willing to shell out some extra dosh, 3.5G.

As with previous Archos PMPs a variety of media formats are supported, and you can remotely access TV too (again, you’ll have to pay out a bit more for this option).

It’s on sale now from the usual emporia.

Out now | £360 for 160GB, £440 for 320GB | Archos

Firstly, iPhone users will be pleased to hear that they can finally download podcasts direct. Yep, no more messing about with iTunes on your PC/Mac - the all-new 2.2 firmware update brings over-the-air podcasting joy to all and sundry via Wi-Fi or 3G. Lovely, and it’s only one of several changes the update ushers in - read the story for more info.

Looking for a netbook with a bit of panache? Well, Asus has just given its premium mini-lappy its official unveiling, meaning that the brushed metal, LED screened Eee PC 1002HA is heading for a shop near you soon. It won’t be as cheap as the existing Eees, mind you.

Last but no least, Humax has revealed that its FOXSAT-HDR set-top box (we’re not shouting at you, that’s how it’s written) will go on sale tomorrow. Finally, Freesat users can have both hi-def pictures and Sky+ style live pause and instant rewind. Which is nice.

And it seems likely that many times more were then sold in the weekend following launch. With over 11 million WoW subscribers now on record, Blizzard is off to a good start. And so far, only one raving WoW addict has succumbed to sleep deprivation and starvation in his quest to defeat Arthas the Lich King.

The staggering sales figure pips the previous day-1 sales record of 2.4 million copies. And that was set by the previous expansion pack, The Burning Crusade. Smug gits.

This news throws down a gauntlet for the rest of MMO industry. Publishers must blinded by dollar signs as they watch Blizzard drowning in sweet, sweet cash money. But it’s abundantly clear that WoW isn’t going to be easily budged from the top spot either. Games like Lord of the Rings Online, Age of Conan and Warhammer Age of Reckoning (and a LOT more) have tried extremely hard to topple WoW from its throne, but so far, it isn’t going anywhere.

What do you think - how long can Blizzard realistically stay on top? Tell us in the comments below.

Out now | £24.99 for PC and Mac (WoW + Burning Crusade also required)  | Blizzard

The update also enhances Maps, adding Google Street View as well as walking and public transport directions. Other changes include the usual performance boosts in certain areas and the squashing of some bugs.

Stay tuned, folks - we’ll bring you some hands-on pics of 2.2 in action very shortly!

Out now | £Free | Apple