According to the latest NPD Group report for game sales in May, this is the fourth month in a row that Nintendo has come out on top for the number 1 AND number two spot for console sales. The Nintendo Wii and the handheld Nintendo DS were the two top-selling hardware units for May, 2008.

Nintendo sold over 675,000 Wii consoles in May and almost 453,000 Nintendo DS’s, which would probably explain all the new colors and designs they have been coming out with lately for the DS. Sony’s Playstation 3 followed with a little under 209,000 units sold and Microsoft sold 186,600 Xbox 360 units during the same period.

When we saw a press release from Salamander Designs announcing new A/V cabinet configurations, we yawned and moved to click to another page. Our click was stopped through when we read an interesting line about the company’s Extended Rear Panel with Active Cooling Kit. That looked pretty cool to us given the hot rat’s nest behind our A/V cabinet in the next room.

The Salamander Designs Extended Rear Panel with Active Cooling Kit is designed (without the Active Cooling Kit) to provide more depth and ventilation than standard rear panels and can reportedly be removed quicker. What the Active Cooling Kit adds to this configuration is a remote thermostat and dual fans which offer self-described “precision cooling.”

A group of German students have somehow managed to use the Wii Balance Board from Wii-Fit to navigate their way around Google Earth. Specifically to surf Google Earth. Talk about a creative way to use a Wii accessory.

It’s really not all that impressive, and these guys are no Silver Surfer, but I guess it’s the first step in being able to fly or surf around the world virtually. And when that day comes, it will be sweet to do this in a nerd hero costume, while playing theme music. Video below.

Some good news for sound. The Sony Tubular non-directional speaker concept has now become a reality. The speaker is being released on June 20th, 2008 and it measures 325mm x 1845mm x 325mm and 12.5kg. The “Sountina” speaker is a transparent and organic glass tube that vibrates to expand sound a full 360 degrees.

You’ll get a frequency response of 50Hz – 20,000Hz, an input line, 13cm subwoofer speaker, 7cm medium speaker and the tweeter which is also made from organic glass. It’s priced at around €6500. If they add some color, every Jedi in the galaxy will be using them and matching colors to their lightsaber.

Those into Rock Band will love this news. The Rock Band Stage Kit has been spotted and it will help you more fully forget your current reality of slinging hash by day at some burger joint while crashing in your mother’s basement at night. Instead, you’ll be on stage with your band mates with lights and smoke. The crowd will be chanting your name…Oh that was your mom intruding on your other life. She wants to know when she’s going to have grandchildren. Obviously girls will have to wait. You have a gig.

The Stage Kit is available for pre-order. Looks like it comes with a 360 controller/strobe light thing and it will cost you $100 in nerd money. Available on August 15th.

Xbox 360 owners can now make their Xbox glow like depleted uranium, without setting off the geiger counter. In the light of day, the XCM Pearl Glow is translucent so you can see the insides. Turn out the lights and it glows a bright X-Files green.

It replaces the case entirely. You’ll think it’s the 80′s all over again and it will let you know where your console is at all times. If this is your thing and you can’t get enough glow in the dark toys, you can find one at Extreme Mods.

It seems that the guitar mania that has engulfed the geek world with games like Guitar Hero and Rockband is here to stay. So you may as well embrace it and get yourself this iPod speaker amp. You probably already have the Guitar Rocker and the catbox 360 after all. I’m sure this will make your life complete.

Just plug in your MP3 player and you are ready. It’s not just for your mp3 player either, you can also use it as a computer speaker. It has working treble and bass knobs and a 5-watt output. It can be powered from your computer via USB, or by using 3 AAA batteries.

Pump up the volume during your next pool party, with this floating system. The waterproof Radioraft will have your tunes pumping and jumping a full 360 degrees with five speakers and a built-in ipod dock.

It’s a completely submersible radioraft, with 400 watts of power, that will give you 8 continuous hours of play time, with 6 stainless steel cupholders, a watertight glove box to protect your iPod with controls on the top. So, yeah, they basically took a bouy and put in some cup-holders and speakers. Oh, and an iPod dock. All for the outrageous price of $2000. Your pool party guests had better be paying at the door.

Microsoft is touting some new statistics trying to gain some additional momentum for the Xbox 360 game console, stating that in the U.S. they have sold 10 million units. There is no refuting that this is quite an accomplishment, but Microsoft is trying to add some more significance to the 10 million unit mark.

“History has shown us that the first company to reach 10 million in console sales wins the generation battle. We are uniquely positioned to set a new benchmark for the industry, ” said Don Mattrick, senior vice president of the Interactive Entertainment Business in the Entertainment and Devices Division at Microsoft.

Here is a laptop on some serious steroids. The Eurocom D901C Phantom-X has more muscle then is good for it’s battery life, which is a mere hour. Some features include: Quad Core Xeon X3360 2.8GHz processor, 1.5TB of storage space (three SATA-300 drives), 8GB DDR2-800 RAM, Blu-ray burner and a 17″ display. As far as looks, it’s pretty average though.

If you have deep enough pockets, you’ll want to check this laptop out. Just be careful you don’t throw your back out lugging this 12 pound beast. Judging by Eurocom’s other products, it will likely cost you about $3,500.

The Magnavox and Sylvania branded Funai NB500 Blu-ray players have been spotted at Walmart. A number of Walmarts apparently. The NB500 is a Profile 1.1 Blu-ray player and is priced at a fairly reasonable $298. It’s got HDMI version 1.3, HD audio codec’s, and DVD upscaling.

Yes, these are low end players, and already somehow outdated, but the price being what it is, it’s going to get it’s share of buyers. We’re not really sure what you can expect performance-wise, but if any of you brave souls should buy one, do let us know in comments.

For those sticking it out with the device, Microsoft released a whole mess of new features today with the Zune version 2.5 software update. The new feature set is led by the Zune Card, TV downloads and a number of smaller, but highly requested items.

A subscription with the Zune Card allows you to pick up copies of favorite songs from your best buddies who also have a Zune. If you don’t subscribe you can still see others Zune Card information but you’ll have to pay to listen to their favorite tracks.

It’s never as much fun to write an article to report on things that aren’t going to happen, but in this case we think this is something that should happen and we still expect it to, despite Microsoft’s denials.

What we do know is that Microsoft had an HD DVD player for the Xbox 360 which they put a stop to producing. We also know that rumors keep cropping up that Microsoft is going to work something out with Sony to bring a Blu-ray player to the 360, and Microsoft continues to squash them.

Recently Microsoft announced a new partnership with the non-profit organization Companions in Courage, an organization dedicated to supporting families with children who are dealing with life-threatening medical conditions. As partners, Microsoft will be supplying hundreds of single Xbox 360 kiosks to children’s hospitals across the nation.

Some have already been installed at the Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital of New York-Presbyterian, the Children’s Hospital & Regional Medical Center of Seattle and the Children’s Hospital of Orange County, California. The kiosks won’t just feature games, but TV shows and movies as well, plus they’ll be connected to each other with a special version of the Xbox LIVE network. That will allow kids from one hospital to interact and play games with kids from another. If you like, you can be a part of the project too. Help bring more 360 kiosks to other hospitals by visiting the Companions in Courage website at http://cic16.org and making a donation. It’s a great way to help these kids out.

While everyone’s waiting for X-Box’s new Wii controller, another wireless controller is coming our way for the Xbox 360. The only difference is that you’ll be using your feet, not your hands. Qmotions will be developing a version of their skateboard controller for Microsoft’s game console.

The company already makes controllers for various sports games and plans to release it’s “Big Air” board for the Xbox in the second half of 2008, with more Microsoft-endorsed products to follow. I’m guessing one of those products will have the name Tont Hawk in it. Call it a wild guess.