By now, you should all be familiar with Griffin's Beacon universal remote system, as we've gotten our hands on the iPhone version and let you know about the one for Android, too. Well Dijit, who creates the apps that work with the Beacon hardware, wasn't done, and so has released an iPad-specific app to take advantage of the extra screen real estate it affords. Dijit calls it a "reimagined" version of the iPhone app and it provides both a new look and some new functionality to the Dijit experience. We got to spend some time with the app at gdgt Live in San Francisco, and found it to be quite similar to the recently released Android version. Head on past the break for a video breakdown of Dijit for iPad and our impressions of the app in action.



Dijit for iPad supports the same sizable library of devices as its predecessors and helps you to find the right IR codes for your A/V gear, so the initial setup is relatively painless. The app itself integrates social networks to help you find new content of interest -- similar to services like Miso and Buddy TV. Not only does the app show your TV listings, but it can access Netflix and let users play YouTube clips inside the app, plus there's episode and cast information on tap as well. As in previous iterations, the remote control layout is fully customizable and allows users to pick and choose their buttons of choice while arranging them in any configuration. Right now, the app still works using Bluetooth to communicate with the IR blaster hardware, but the folks from Dijit told us they're working on making the app communicate directly with smart TVs over WiFi using UPnP. Keep at it guys, you've got about six weeks to get it ready for show-and-tell at CES.

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The multimedia features on the new Nook Tablet mean more than just watching video and listening to music -- they actually give a bit of a boost to the reading experience, as well. One of the best implementations of this is the new Read and Record feature, an update to the Nook Color's Read and Play feature, which takes advantage of the Tablet's new mic to let users (parents in most cases, we assume) record narration to children's books. It's a simple but clever addition that certainly drives home the product's value for families.

The feature lets you record custom narration on each page of compatible texts, offering up the words as a script. Once recorded, the text can be saved with a simple icon, so kids can play it back themselves -- in the case of our hands-on demo, it was a gingerbread man (fitting, perhaps, given the OS we're working with). The feature is equally simple to use on both sides of the equation, and is a nice little bonus for parents who, for whatever reason, can't always be around to read to the kids. Video after the break.

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While everyone was in a tizzy about Amazon's $199 Kindle Fire price point, the Indian government was busily working to help bring out the $35 Aakash Android tablet. The tablet was developed with similarly good intentions as OLPC's XO laptop before it -- an attempt to get low-cost computing devices into the hands of students. One of the tablets landed in the VentureBeat offices this week. The site spent some hands-on time with the Froyo slate, and mostly liked what it saw, noting that seeming compromises made for price and a speedy release date ultimately benefit the whole of the device. The tablet will start hitting India next month, at the $35 government-subsidized pricepoint (actual retail price is a still mega-cheap $60).

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