Tech titans including Apple, Samsung, Toshiba, Panasonic and Nintendo have been criticised by a major charity for failing to clean up their supply chains and potentially using so-called ‘conflict minerals’ from the Congo in their products. Enough, a project of the Center for American Progress, has assessed the precautions 21 major gadget manufacturers took to …

Angry Birds for Android will soon let you pay to get rid of ads, with the currently undisclosed fee charged directly to your phone bill rather than via Google Checkout. The hugely popular game’s Finnish developer, Rovio, wants other Android app makers to use its new system too. Bad Piggy Bank will also let players download the Mighty Eagle cheat. …

The fabulous looking Avatar has given 3D a huge kickstart, and the tech has bowled into CES on a fresh wave of momentum. Every tech manufacturer (apart from Sharp, arguably) has put it front and centre as the next big thing to persuade you to upgrade your goggle box. Sony, with its massive investment in the PlayStation 3, has more …

Sony made a hippo-sized splash at CES 2010 with a herd of ‘Monolith’-styled 3D TVs and Blu-ray players, set to dampen your home cinema this spring. It turns out the UK is rather a different set of swimming baths, and Sony has tweaked its Blu-ray line-up for Britain with the announcement of the BDP-S470 and BDP-S570 players. They’re very similar …

Nokia’s purloined the name of its new music phone from the superior second X-Men movie, but the X2’s conspicuously lacking in superpowers — it’s as simple as Cheryl Cole’s Bumper Book of Puzzles. A bog-standard candybar design and small 2.2-inch screen belie a surprisingly full set of music features, though. It has dedicated music keys on the side, an FM …

Sky has beefed up its HD+ PVR offering with a new high-end box that offers a grunty 1 terabyte of storage. Large enough for 240 hours of space-hogging hi-def programming, it could store Avatar 88 times over, or 137 Premier League football matches — including the graphic HD mansitting with Jamie ‘Thomas Cook it’ Redknapp at half-time. The new Sky+ …

Strangely for a summer month, July saw a fabulous crop of home-cinema equipment hit our reviews section, with some superb tech to keep people indoors, whatever their budget. If you really insist on going outside, a very fine compact camera and some earphones also won our highly competitive Editors’ Choice award. V HD We love the V HD box because …

BBC 6 Music has been saved from the threat of closure by the BBC Trust, but its sister station the Asian Network has been granted only a stay of execution. 6 Music received huge support on Twitter and Facebook — resulting in many more listeners — after the digital radio station was marked for death in a BBC strategy review …

The iPhone 4 is here, in our immaculately manicured hands, and here’s the first thing we noticed: the aerial, so cleverly forged into the frame, loses several bars of signal when you hold it in your hands. This seems like something of a flaw, to say the least. This is because our fleshy meatbag digits are not conducive to smoothly …

Do you need a new iPhone 4 like a drowning man needs air? Like England needs a second centre forward? Like Russell Brand needs a good ticking-off from his mum? Smashing news from O2! You can buy your way out of your existing contract for a discount and get your hungry hands on the gadgety goodness quick smart. O2 is …