According to Taiwan's Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI), consumers will likely see mass produced 3D LCD HDTVs that do not require glasses by as early as 2015.

The group showed off an early prototype this week, a 42-inch glasses-free 3D HDTV, with the company claiming it can make displays as large as 65-inches.

Stephen Jeng, director of ITRI's 3D System & Application Division, says consumers are unwilling to pay the extravagant prices for special 3D glasses, with many costing over $100 USD per pair on top of already expensive prices for 3D hardware.

Initially, the ITRI technology will be used in digital billboards and photo-frames, with some already available in the market.

Computerworld, however, is quick to note that the technology is still far away from being mass consumer ready, with images appearing blurry.

The global 3D HDTV market is still in its infancy, with an expected 6.2 million units being sold this year. By 2012, sales are anticipated to grow to over 30 million.

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Hitachi-LG Data Storage (HLDS) has announced the launch of HyDrive, the world's first SSD (solid state drive) embedded optical disc drive.

The company says the first drives will be available in August 2010.

First generation drives will have either 32GB or 64GB SSDs, with second generation drives having up to 256GB SSDs. Second generation HyDrives will be ready for mass production starting in March 2011, notes HLDS.

Says HLDS CMO YK Park (via press release): "We are very excited about the potential of this ground-breaking product. The PC industry have come to expect us to lead in optical storage products and HyDrive is the logical next step, where it offers user benefits to PC booting, shutdown and application loading times with typically 30~60% reduction in addition to robust media handling and playback."

HyDrives enables storage on the PC through separate device types, SSD, optical drives, and a traditional HDD, all while saving space.

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In April, just 5 months after purchasing the music streaming service, Apple decided to shut down Lala, likely signalling that it would be integrated into iTunes.com.

Apple gave current users until May 31st, but as is the problem with time, that date has come and gone and the service is now gone.

All users with remaining Lala credits will be given iTunes Store credit in the next 14 days and PCMag says "credits will be rounded up to the nearest dollar for refunds less than $10 and to the nearest $5 for refunds greater than $10."

If you don't care for iTunes, you can also request a check refund, which will sent out within the next two week as well.

Lala was a download and streaming music service that gave members a "digital locker" to store their music. What made the company different from iTunes, Amazon MP3, etc, is that Lala would also sell streaming rights to tracks for pennies, allowing for unlimited streaming online of the track, but no download.

Apple is now expected to open a Web-based iTunes that will be based on the Lala framework and will do much of the same things, such as a digital locker for "Web-only" versions of the tracks.

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According to a new note by Rodman & Renshaw Equity Research, Apple could sell up to 15 million iPhones in the quarter ending in September, easily the company's strongest quarter for iPhone sales.

Sales will be boosted by the upcoming iPhone "4G" or "HD," the smartphone leaked last month by Gizmodo after it was left in a bar by an Apple developer.

Rodman & Renshaw analyst Ashok Kumar said the company will manufacture 12 million of the new iPhone HD for the September quarter, which combined with iPhone 3GS sales could lead to 15 million for the period.

For the fiscal year, Apple could sell 40 million iPhones, up from 18 million for the fiscal 2009.

Adds Kumar (via SFGate): "Apple is close to achieving peak market share with its existing lineup of wireless carriers. The only way to keep growing its iPhone business is to expand its relationships with other carriers and to become more carrier-agnostic."

The new iPhone will have a front-facing camera for video conferencing, a better standard camera (including larger lens and flash), a Micro-SIM slot (just like the iPad), large 960x640 resolution, a second mic, metallic exterior (not plastic) and split side buttons for volume.

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Last week we reported that Hon Hai Precision Industry of Taiwan, the owners of manufacturer Foxconn, said they were planning to raise worker's salaries by 20 percent amidst a flood of worker suicides at their Chinese factory.

Today, the company has announced it will instead be raising salaries by at least 30 percent.

Workers making a minimum of 900 yuan per month ($132 USD) will get a raise to 1200 yuan ($176 USD), effective immediately.

Says spokesman Edmund Ding: "It's been a while since we increased wages, hence the decision. Raising pay and the suicide issues are two separate matters."

Ten employees of the manufacturer have died via suicide this year, with the latest happening this week, and public anger at the company is rising. Last Thursday, an 11th employee tried to kill himself, slitting his wrists. He was revived by a medical team. The company was allegedly giving 100,000 yuan to compensate families of suicide victims.

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According to the latest figures from NetApplications, Google's Chrome browser continues to take market share at a rapid pace, and is continuing its pace to surpass the 10 percent milestone by the end of the year.

For the month ended May 31st, Chrome moved to 7.05 percent share, up from 6.73 percent at the end of April.

Google's gain came at the expense of Microsoft's Internet Explorer and Mozilla's Firefox, which both continue to lose share on a continuing basis.

IE, which once controlled 93 percent of the market, fell to 59.69 percent from 59.95 at the end of April and Firefox dropped to 24.35 from 24.95 percent.

Apple's Safari, which continues to see growth but at a very slow pace, rose to 4.77 percent from 4.72 the month before.

Additionally, IE6, the aging browser which has seen its reputation hit repeatedly over the past year fell to under 10 percent for the first time ever.

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Back in 2008, Sony launched the PlayTV PVR (personal video recorder) for the PlayStation 3, giving gamers in Europe and Australia a chance to to use their console as a DVR, one that can record TV, even if they are playing games.

According to an interview with Spong, Sony Cambridge Studio's Mark Green has confirmed that an updated version of the PVR is coming, dubbed PlayTV2.

When asked by the interviewer what was currently in development at the studio, Green responded: "Well, as a whole studio, I think you saw TV Superstars for Move announced a little while ago. We're still working on PlayTV, PlayTV 2. And then we have other guys working on other concepts..."

The updated device will have social networking features such as Facebook integration being built-in. Another rumored addition is that of Freeview HD support, giving users a chance to watch free terrestrial TV.

PlayTV (the original) cost 99 euro when it launched in September of 2008.

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