Dell may have a mini Inspiron or Vostro laptop in the wings. So say the folks at Gizmodo who ran into Michael Dell himself toting one of these little lookers. The pencil in the image gives you an idea of the scale of it - probably an 11″ screen (hit the jump for the pic). The folks at Gizmodo have some more photos for your perusal. Posted in Computers, Portable Tags: mobiles, Ogg, speaker, dap (Read the full post about ‘Dell may roll out a mini laptop’…)
by Donald Melanson, posted May 29th 2008 at 1:54PM Night view isn’t exactly a new technology, but Toyota’s latest implementation of it in its Crown Hybrid luxury sedan is a bit different than most. Unlike the company’s previous effort, which displayed images straight on the windshield, this one makes use of an LCD in the dashboard, which also does double duty by displaying the speedometer and all the vehicle’s other vitals. What’s more, the system also takes things to Terminator-like levels with a pedestrian recognition system, although that apparently only works at speeds below 60 kilometers per hour (the company says it’s also working on a means of recognizing bicycles and animals). (Read the full post about ‘Toyota rolls out Night View-equipped, pedestrian-finding Crown Hybrid’…)
by Donald Melanson, posted May 29th 2008 at 4:48PM It’s far from the first supercomputer created with the help of some gaming hardware, but this rig built by a group of researchers from the University of Antwerp is certainly impressive enough in its own right, with it employing four of NVIDIA’s high-end GeForce 9800 GX2 graphics cards (which combined pack eight GPUs) to help develop new computational methods for tomography. Dubbed the FASTRA, the system also packs an AMD Phenom 9850 processor, 8GB of RAM, and 750GB hard drive, all of which is powered by a 1,500W power supply (and tastefully lit up with some blue LEDs). (Read the full post about ‘Researchers create supercomputer with four GeForce 9800 GX2 cards’…)
Everyone remembers the scene in Caddyshack. Not that scene. Not that scene either. But the one where the priest is playing the greatest golf game of his life in the worth storm in decades and on his last shot, he misses the put and the course record. He curses to the heavens and is struck down by lightning for his imputence. Well, it would surprise you to know that happens a lot. Every year, hundreds of golfers get struck by lightning while trying to get in a quick 9 holes. Even famed golfer Lee Trevino was hit by a sideways bolt of lightning in 1975. So, how does a foursome get their round in when the clouds go dark? The Eball Golf Simulator, of course. But it’s not cheap. (Read the full post about ‘Home based golf simulator goes indoors as well as out.’…)
Take a peek at the upcoming Asus Eee Box, a desktop version of the wildly successful Asus Eee PC. This white mini PC will definitely be a firm favorite with folks who are competing with four other family member every morning for the bathroom since everyone shares a cramped apartment. Being diminutive in stature, the Eee Box is tipped to be powered by either Linux or Windows XP, and will feature the following :- e of hard drive options (80GB to 250GB) Draft-N connectivity Four USB 2.0 ports SD/MMC/MS memory card slotDon’t expect to play Crysis on a machine like this - it is more suitable for casual web surfing and pumping out Word documents. Prices start from $328 upwards. (Read the full post about ‘Asus Eee Box Sneak Peek’…)
SanDisk has just added a fast read/write memory card to its Memory Stick product line, the Extreme III Memory Stick PRO-HG-Duo. How fast? If 30mbps read and write capability ain’t fast enough for you, better wake up, cause this is the fastest that a memory card could possibly read so far. Slated for launch during the PMA Australia Imaging Technology Show which runs from May 30 to June 1, this new memory card will come in 4GB and 8GB storage capacities. Suffice to say that this card would be of great use for photography purposes. Be reminded that Memory Stick PRO-HG Duo is the direct off-shot of the Memory Stick PRO format memory card and was developed by both Sony and SanDisk to answer the needs of PRO-HG capable Sony cameras. (Read the full post about ‘SanDisk touts new Memory Stick PRO-HG Duo boasting a 30mbps speed’…)
For the last several years, the still pretty crappy cameras on my cell phones have been my main camera. Knowing that I have the cam on the phone in case of impromptu photo opps (generally involving my dogs) makes me less likely to want to drag around yet another device. So now I have hundreds of great pictures, or pictures that would be great if they weren’t so low-res and crappy. They’re not suitable for framing or generally even for printing because they’d look like blurs. Unless… you’re printing with a Polaroid Pogo pocket printer, which prints small, 2″ x 3″ prints with sticker backs that are small enough to look good even with the resolution provided by most phone cameras. (Read the full post about ‘Polaroid Pogo pocket printer’…)
Michael Largent, a hacker from California, has managed to use the tiny verification payments used by services such as Google Checkout, E-Trade and Schwab to collect over US$50,000.
Verification payments are very small payments, usually of only a few cents, sent to the bank accounts of new customers that have signed up for a brokerage account. The payment helps to verify a bank account and customer are real.
Largent wrote a script that could open such brokerage accounts and used it 58,000 times with the payments being deposited across several personal bank accounts.
(Read the full post about ‘Hackers uses verification payments to amass $50,000′…)
Every once in a while, some company will improve on something that you wouldn’t think needed any improvement at all. Take the grand piano, for instance. Its sleek blank ebony framework and perfect ivory keys are a symbol of pure music. And yet, Yamaha has made the grand piano even more perfect with the recently unveiled Disklavier Mark IV, a piano that can “play itself, teach you to play, and perform in sync with your favorite CDs”. It is also one of the first pianos to have a Wifi connection with 802.11b specification. As far as I know, the Disklavier is also the only piano with a remote control. This PDA-type pocket remote controller has buttons and a full-color LCD touchscreen, and some models include a tablet-PC remove with 10.4 inch touchscreen. (Read the full post about ‘Yamaha Disklavier Mark IV is one Grand Piano’…)
iRiver has a spanking new portable media player known as the L-Player, but this will probably be confined to Korea only it seems. The L-Player takes a minimalist approach to its design, featuring a D-click user interface as well as a minimal amount of visible buttons so as not to interfere with the overall design. In addition, iRiver has also developed a pretty interesting transparent speaker dock for the L-Player itself that is pretty nifty. Features include :- 2″ LCD display SRS WOW MP3, WMA, OGG, ASF, MPEG-4, WMV and XviD file format supportIt will come in black, chocolate, pink or white colors, and you will be able to choose from 2GB, 4GB or 8GB capacities. (Read the full post about ‘iRiver L-Player PMP’…)
