19 May, 2008
by Paul Miller, posted May 17th 2008 at 3:15PM Good news for the cyborgs in the crowd: the ruling by the International Association of Athletics Federations that barred double-amputee sprinter Oscar Pistorious from a shot at the Olympics has been overturned by the Court of Arbitration for Sport. Detractors from Oscar’s entry into the Olympics have cited a suspect study that says Oscar could be using as little as 25% of the energy of other sprinters, thanks to the mechanical advantage of his “Cheetah” prosthetics, which basically act as springs. Others feared that this could set a dangerous precedent for the entry of bionics into athletic competition, but the ruling was rather tightly worded, and if related cases come up they will be tried individually. (Read the full post about ‘Oscar Pistorius free to qualify for Olympics on prosthetics’…)
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19 May, 2008
by Paul Miller, posted May 18th 2008 at 11:14AM We’ve seen all sorts hip-cool interactive window installations, usually comprised of a camera for a modicum of interactivity and a projector or a display for screening the results. The Salling store in Arhus, Denmark is taking things a bit further and making the window itself interactive. There’s still a camera to sense motion, but instead of a display there’s some fancy window tech that makes sections of the glass transparent or not based on where the person is standing. Sure, the idea of having to walk up to a window and wave your arms around to reveal what’s behind it might seem a bit counter-intuitive, but at least it’ll give the loiterers something to do. (Read the full post about ‘Salling’s interactive window tech is interactive’…)
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19 May, 2008
Casio EX-F1Pop quiz, hotshot. There’s a bomb on a bus. Once the bus accelerates to 55 miles per hour, the bomb is armed. If it drops below 55, it blows up. What do you do? If you happen to have the 6-megapixel Casio EX-F1 handy, we’d recommend switching to burst mode and wait for the ensuing mayhem. You’ll have to forgive the obligatory Speed reference, but it’s hard to resist given the F1 is flat out one of the fastest cameras we’ve ever tested — and ideal for capturing life’s unpredictable moments, like you know, bus explosions. Just like the auto-racing class it shares a name with, everything about the F1 screams speed, from its sleek elongated body to the 60 frames per second you’ll be able to capture with its high-speed CMOS sensor and LSI processor. (Read the full post about ‘Review: Casio EX-F1 Is a Speed-Demon Snapper’…)
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19 May, 2008
Forget about LCD displays - those will be phased out in the future once AMOLED technology takes over as the mainstream player. Samsung has just demonstrated its 12.1″ AMOLED laptop concept that features a keyboard which sports similar keys on a cell phone. It is extremely thin, thanks to the display technology and the screen is just gorgeous to look at. Other than the 1,280 x 768 display resolution, nothing much else is known about this concept laptop. AMOLED displays are still mighty expensive though in comparison to vanilla LCDs, so it will take a fair number of years before it becomes mainstream. (Read the full post about ‘Samsung 12.1-inch AMOLED Laptop Concept’…)
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19 May, 2008
The Zvue Spirit, the latest mp3 player to show its face, and quite a face it has. It certainly lives up to its Spirit name, with the red, white and blue flag design, not to mention its star shaped control pad. The Zvue Spirit will retail for $36 and be available beginning July 4, 2008. Aside from its patriotic outer shell, the Zvue Spirit is a pretty basic player that offers 1GB of storage and can play MP3, WMA and WAV files. The Spirit also comes with “fifteen great rock/pop/country songs creates a fun, patriotic, listening experience.” Product [Zvue] Via [anythingbutipod] Keep up with the latest gadget goodness! (Read the full post about ‘Zvue; allows you to be patriotic, still listen to your MP3’s’…)
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19 May, 2008
One of Silicon Valley’s oldest companies is boosting its effort to acquire the youngest customers. CNET was at a Teens and Tech conference when Hewlett-Packard officials announced a forthcoming line of computers and other devices catering to - and in some cases, designed by - teenagers. The HP execs quoted talked about something called its Teen Council, which will offer suggestions for product design and how they are used. I’m curious as to how many times the name of a certain Cupertino-based company with a piece of fruit as its logo was mentioned when this Teen Council offered its advice. HP’s TouchSmart PC is mentioned as an example of an company product that was designed with teens in mind. (Read the full post about ‘HP to get schooled by teens on PC’s’…)
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19 May, 2008
by Darren Murph, posted May 17th 2008 at 8:46AM We’ll be frank — we really have no idea what Samsung’s getting at with its freshest Soul promotional video, but it’s certainly a fine piece of eye candy if nothing else. Put simply, the video shows a maniac darting about demonstrating ten optical illusions in just over two minutes, and in case you couldn’t guess, the Soul is saved for last. Should we have prefaced that bit with a spoiler warning? (Read the full post about ‘Samsung Soul promo video shows 10 optical illusions in 136 seconds’…)
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19 May, 2008
Two Chinese companies, Zarva and Zippo recently came together to create a new MP3 player. This new player is dubbed the Zarva Zippo MP320 and Zippo is the official partner of Zarva. Basically, the MP320 is going to come with a small screen, and is not going to support video playback. Nearly all MP3 players these days comes with video playback, so it’s pretty rare to see a mp3 player without video playback. Additionally, for audio, MP3 and WMA are the only formats supported. Other features include 7 EQ’s, integrated microphone, A-B repeat and USB 2.0 connectivity. Furthermore, it is going to be really cheap, only 188 yuan, which is around $27 US, and only available in a 1GB model. (Read the full post about ‘Zarva, Zippo announce the MP320′…)
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19 May, 2008
I’m amazed at how many of these companies there are. Here’s another one called SpinVox. Pretty much like Simulscribe and Nuance. About $10/mo for 40 or 50 voicemails transcribed and sent as a text message to your phone.
Posted in Phones
Tags: AAC, speakers, pvp, equipment
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