David Ayala

This year's E3 has motion controllers, 3D capable doo-hickies, and plenty of unreleased videogame goodness to last you the whole year. But along with all the glitzy top tier entertainment products, there is also a fair share of strange events and geeky characters roaming around the all-too crowded show floor.

Let GeekTech take you on a tour of all the odd sights to be found off the beaten E3 path.

Square-Enix is coming back strong into the MMO space this year with Final Fantasy XIV (FFXIV), an updated sequel to its first foray into the genre. I got a chance to sit down with the game at this year's E3 show in Los Angeles and experience the new world, improved battle system, and streamlined controls.

What's got me most excited, you ask? The impressive tech demonstration using nVidia's 3D Vision created an immersive MMO world that's unlike anything I've experienced.

The 3D consumer electronics trend reached a boiling point today when Nintendo announced the portable 3DS gaming device, a no-glasses 3D system promising simplicity and elegance for gamers seeking a 3D experience. After getting a hands on with the new gadget at E3, there is little doubt that the era of effective and sensible 3D has finally arrived.

That said, here at GeekTech, we care just as much about the engine under the hood as we do about the rims on our ride, and in that respect Nintendo still has a lot to answer regarding their revolutionary portable.

It's about time! British Guitar Amp maker Orange Music is developing the O PC, a unique amplifier-PC hybrid that aims to make beautiful music with both music and computer geeks alike.

The iPad survived a good, long day before hackers were able to break into it and gain root access over the weekend. The hack was engineered by a group credited with the iPhone "Spirit" jailbreak, according to MacNN.com. The hack uses an exploit in Safari to let you get root access on the device.

Yesterday gave way to a Wall Street Journal report that suggests a new Apple iPhone is coming sometime this summer, and could make its way to Verizon customers. But the report lacked details, mentioning support for a CDMA cellular network and not much else -- specifically, the components that would power a new device, or features that would drive consumers to a new phone.

Enter John Gruber, a respected pundit in the tech community. In a decidedly curt post on the Daring Fireball blog, Gruber seems to suggest that he may know a thing or two about the upcoming phone that no one else is willing to admit. Maybe.

The one caveat for those planning to buy HTC's latest smartphone powerhouse is that the HD2 will be running Windows Mobile 6.5. The soon to-be-obsolete OS will be replaced by the newest, snazziest contender in the mobile space, Windows Phone 7 Series, later this year. So what are you to do if you want your 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen and 1GHz Snapdragon processor now, but don't want to be stuck with old software later? You hack that thing!

Today, Nintendo announced the successor to its handheld gaming DS platform, which will include a 3D screen and debut at this years E3 expo in Los Angeles. Beyond that info, however, we don't know very much at all about the hardware powering the new device, unique input methods being introduced, or even the kind of 3D tech employed. So we did some digging through the speculation to sort out the likely rumors that may come to fruition--and thought about what we want it to do.

One of the many potential pitfalls that could spell the demise of the 3D TV consumer market are the glasses. They're going to be expensive, proprietary, and a general barrier to having a seamless 3D movie experience with the family. One company, XpanD is looking to nip that problem in the bud by announcing universal 3D active glasses that will work on almost any 3D HDTV set.

Your brain has a lot to communicate, but when you're working on a computer or playing a game, all of those thoughts gets distilled into a keyboard or gamepad interface that can be limiting to say the least. NeuroSky's new Mindset headset wants to expand your computer-interfacing options by adding EEG brain wave sensory to the equation. I got some hands-on time with the Mindset at GDC to find out if our wildest telekinesis fantasies may finally come true.

Some of you World of Warcraft addicts may be familiar with Blizzard's Armory app for iPhone that lets you keep track of your character and guild, and generally blurs the line between your online and offline world. Running with that same concept is AFK Interactive, which has created a mobile development platform that will bring similar functionality to all kinds of mobile phones, including "dumb" ones.

Geosense shows up as a location sensor in the Location and Other Sensors pane in Control Panel.

It would be downright nutty to put a GPS sensor inside your desktop (unless maybe you're sporting one of those super-small media nettops). But what if you wanted to enjoy the perks of mobile device geolocation at your sedentary workstation without the hassle of adding new hardware? Geosense for Windows 7 has you covered.