This is just an awesome idea for an app: Converse by Riot Software turns your iPad into a traveling, dual-keyboard kiosk that will allow you to have a conversation with anyone you might encounter, no matter how bizarre and filled with phlegmatic squawks his native language is.

There’s not much else to know right now, but Valve Software — the AAA game design house behind Portal 2, Team Fortress 2 and Steam for Mac — have just announced an entirely new game in the Counter-Strike series, which will debut on the Mac in early 2012.

I’ve mostly been very happy with my migration to Lion, but I did get bit with one bug after the upgrade: for the life of me, I couldn’t get sound to output through HDMI when using my Kanex Mini DisplayPort to HDMI Adapter. That meant the days of hooking my 11-inch MacBook Air to my 47-inch 1080p HDTV were at an end.

I wasn’t alone. Apple’s support communities are filled with threads from frustrated Lion upgraders who suddenly lost the ability to pump sound through their HTPCs. HDMI sound also stopped working on my girlfriend’s MacBook when she upgraded to Lion. It’s obviously a widespread problem.

Luckily, today I finally figured out how to fix the issue, and it was remarkably simple. Here’s how to get HDMI sound back into Lion.

While Apple obsesses on slimming down the next iPhone, maker Benjamin Bachmeier instead focused on blowing the iPhone 4 up to Brobdingnagian proportions. That’s why he took a 40-inch LCD 1080p display and installed it in the body of an enormous white iPhone 4.

Bachmeier calls it the iTableous, and while it doesn’t run OS X, it is a pretty impressive Hackintosh. All the buttons even work, and it even has a hinge so you can use it while sitting down. The only thing it needs is an appropriately large case. Maybe Bachmeier should consider laying out the 40 gees for this one?

One Intel director revealed in a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal that Apple threatened to drop the chip maker over its hungry processors if it couldn’t “drastically slash” the amount of power they demanded.

Sick of greasy fingerprints smudging your pristine iPhone or iPad? Wish Apple would come up with a tiny vacuum with a practically microscopic nozzle to suction out the vast rivulets of grease and oil that flows between the furrows of your digits’ epidermis? No need to go crazy: Apple’s already working on fingerprint resistant coatings for future iPhones and iPads.

We’re all aware of how popular Apple’s iPhone has become since it was launched in 2007. But did you know that over the past three years, it’s one of only two devices to maintain a spot in the top 20 mobile phones list produced by Millennial Media? Not only has it stayed firmly in the top 20 for three years running, but it has also stayed firmly in at number one.

Apple’s devices were designed work wonderfully without the need for a stylus, but sometimes they come in handy for certain things. But where do you keep them? There’s no room for a stylus in the iPad itself like those old touchscreen devices you no longer see, and if you clip it to the from of your Smart Cover it’s going to keep falling off. The JAVOedge Mini Stylus, however, fits neatly into your iPad’s dock connector.

So what we have here is a MacBook Pro slathered in so much 24 karat gold and multi-colored sapphire encrustation that you’d think it was a rapper’s bridgework. In fact, the guys over at Computer Choppers took this whole crazy idea so far that they even gold-plated the keyboard.

You know what they say: one man’s bling is another man’s vomitsome eyesore. Check out more pictures after the jump.

Following the discovery of some pretty convincing fake Apple stores in China a few weeks ago, the Chinese authorities have been on the hunt for more. Their last find uncovered a whole 22 stores in the city of Kunming along.

If you own an iPhone, you’re more likely to get a quick answer from tech support compared to Android and BlackBerry users, which require much more hand-holding, a Friday report suggests.

If you’re still banking on Apple releasing the iPad 3 this October, this might disappoint you: there’s just no chance that an A6 SoC will be ready this year. In fact, if there’s going to be a quad-core chip at the heart of the iPad 3 at all, we might be looking at an iPhone 5 sized delay between tablet generations by the time the next iPad comes around.

Apple provided some great default keyboard shortcuts in Mac OS X Snow Leopard and one of my favorites was Command+D. You could use that keyboard shortcut combination to select the Don’t Save option when closing a document you haven’t saved yet. Unfortunately Apple decided to change the keyboard shortcut combination in Mac OS X Lion.

Developers are now enjoying the fifth beta of Apple’s next major iOS release, but just like everything created at the Cupertino camp, we never know when an update is about to drop. Unless, of course, you go digging around in iOS files… which seemingly reveals the release date of iOS 5 beta 6.

Apple’s annual iPod media event traditionally happens during September, and we’re hoping that this year’s is going to be pretty spectacular. In addition to the final previews, and possibly the public release, of iOS 5, we’re hoping that elusive iPhone 5 finally shows its face.

While we’ve heard many, many rumors surrounding the fifth-generation device, and indeed the next-generation iPod touch, we’re yet to hear a specific date for their unveiling. Until now.

In the latest series of iPhone 5 rumors, a new report has surfaced that strings together months of murmurs relating to a second iPhone model release this Fall. This time, it’s believed that Apple will introduce a free, ‘iCloud’ iPhone alongside a new flagship device.

This second, low-cost iPhone would tie heavily into Apple’s iCloud service for streaming and syncing data, and the device is rumored to consist of cheaper parts combined with current parts in the iPhone 4.

Last year brought news of another innovative use for an iPad when Hyundai announced that the 2011 Equus would include one as its Owner’s Manual. That was sweet: look up your maintenance schedule, make service appointments, and order pizza right from the glove compartment.

This year Hyundai has apparently decided to go back to the Dead Tree Version.

You know the new default Lion wallpaper of the Andromeda Galaxy? It’s a heavily photoshopped version of this Astronomy Picture of the Day.

Apple’s version sure is pretty, but do you notice anything else different about it? If you’re eagle eyed, you’ll probably see the problem: along with wiping out several stars, Apple has also deleted an entire galaxy from the picture.

Reddit’s consensus is that this Apple Store is in Switzerland, and this gentleman packing an assault rifle is just one of Switzerland’s many soldiers just walking around with his BFG in one of the most heavily armed countries in the world.

Our guess? He wants to have a leverage point when the Genius Bar tells him his iPhone has one too many pink moisture indicators for warranty replacement.

Have you fallen in love with Google+? Do you find yourself checking the social network frequently throughout your day?

There’s a free app in the Mac App Store that let’s you run Google+ from your Mac’s menubar, and it’s called Tab for Google+. With this app, you can easily check and interact with Google+ while doing just about anything on your Mac.

Nothing says “geek” like a desk that’s loaded with Apple gear. Some prefer the cockpit-style setup with multiple monitors and tons of peripherals, while others prefer simple, minimal setups.

A desk that’s home to some cool tech can be a very grand thing to behold. And we want you to show us your Apple setups!

Take this with a huge grain of salt, but one site is reporting that a new leaked memo says that Canadian wireless carrier Rogers is already making their employees undertake “iPhone Pre-Launch Training.” If history’s any guide, that could mean the iPhone 5 will be out within three weeks.

One of Lion’s most impressive features is the new way that the OS handles the saving and managing of files. Versions and Resume allow the user to never have to worry about saving or losing files again — Lion just takes care of it.

If you still don’t really understand how Lion saves files, check out this infographic to see the process laid out in a simple way.

Having gotten used to carrying a task management app in my pocket for some time now, I’d struggle to get through the day without my trusty to-do list. But for a group of amnesia patients in Ontario, Canada, apps are doing a lot more than just reminding them to buy milk. They use Apple’s iPod touch as a “memory substitute.”

I love it. Not only is Acer totally ripping off the design of the MacBook Air for their new “ultrabook”, the Aspire 3951, but even though it looks cheaper than the real thing, it’ll almost definitely be more expensive than the $999 Air as well.

Edit: Wasn’t it just a few days ago that Acer’s founder was saying that the MacBook Air was just a silly fad? Why, yes, it was.