Monday, November 5, 2007
Random Stuff
Slick Kloss DeLighTable Touch-Surface Coffee Table
11:33PM Adam Frucci | The DeLighTable by Kloss is a slick, 25-mm-thick coffee table that has a touch surface built in. It reacts to finger touches and glasses being rested on it, creating streams of light as you run your fingers across it, as you can see in the above video. It doesn’t house a computer or anything, so you won’t be able to go through your pictures on it, but it’s still really cool. It’s been in development for a few years now, but it hasn’t been available for sale until now, it’ll set you back a cool $2,300, which actually seems somewhat reasonable for what you get, and will take four to six weeks to build. The only real issue I have about it is how it’s getting its power, as it has a cord running to the wall that really hurts the sexiness that this thing would bring to your living room. I guess if you have an outlet on the floor you could make it kind of subtle, but there’s no real way to escape having a cord visibly snaking out of a leg of your coffee table. [Product Page via BornRich] More »
Phones
Sexy LG KS20 Now Shipping (At Least For Some)
11:24PM Wilson Rothman | Europeans get lucky this week, as the Prada successor LG KS20 hits stores in France, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands and Italy. (What up, UK?) The final specs on this baby are in, and they make us terribly jealous. It’s got 3.6Mbps HSDPA and Wi-Fi B and G, and what looks like a half-way decent web browser. There will be some built-in games and video on demand, video telephony, and a media player that will read MP3, MPEG4, WAV, 3GP, AMR-NB, WMA, AAC, AAC+ and eAAC+. We don’t even mind the Windows Mobile 6 part, given the fact that there’s a customised interface like the T-Mobile HTC Shadow or the Sprint’s HTC Touch. I suppose the upcoming entry of Verizon’s LG Voyager to the US doesn’t preclude us from getting a KS20, but the powers that be might not want the competition this early, and LG’s relationships with other carriers are not as cuddly. [LG via Akihabara News] More »
Random Stuff
Zune Tattoo Guy Legally Changing His Name to ‘Microsoft Zune,’ is Clearly Insane
11:15PM Adam Frucci | Zune Tattoo guy, the Lothario who’s made small, small waves in the blogosphere for getting Zune tattoos on both arms, has a real name: Steven Smith. The issue is, no one cares, and they all just call him Zune Tattoo Guy. Well, he wants to make it easier for us to make fun of him, so he’s legally changing his name to Microsoft Zune. No joke. Sure, it’ll be embarrassing for him now, but just imagine what his life will be like in 15 years when nobody can remember what the Zune was. Awkward! [ZuneScene via GadgetLab] More »
Hardware
Marvell Power Supply Chip Shrinks Power Bricks, Energy Use
10:59PM Matt Buchanan | Marvell’s launching a new chip for more efficient power supplies that cuts down energy use by automatically adjusting the amount of juice drawn by a computer depending on what it actually needs, slashing waste—it can chop peak energy use by up to 50 percent, according to Marvell. It also supposedly rolls the functionality of 20 components into the single processor, allowing for the “Honey I Shrunk the Power Brick” magic (by up to a third) at lower costs for OEM manufacturers. When we talked with Hubie Notohamiprodjo, general manager of industrial control and power management, he said we could probably expect products with the new chips to start showing up in a few months. While we’ll see them in desktop and notebook power supplies first—Marvell’s hitting them because of the size of computers’ carbon footprint and its potential reduction—they could also make their way into flatscreen TVs, portables and other consumer electronics. It was tipped that they’re talking to at least one manufacturer now. Even if green tech’s not really your bag—or hell, even if it didn’t actually save that much power —carrying around a smaller notebook power brick is reason enough for us to give it a thumbs up. More »
Software
Launch Apps Without Booting Windows Using Phoenix HyperSpace Mini OS
10:56PM Wilson Rothman | The Windows boot-time backlash is in full effect. BIOS-builder Phoenix Technologies is introducing a mini operating system called HyperSpace that can boot up in seconds in place of Windows, to run e-mail managers, web browsers and other apps. Such a system could prolong battery life by 50%, and would give laptop makers a chance to show off their own personalities, rather than act as mere vessels to the Microsoft experience. There are some catches: Though the Wired story didn’t specifically say it, the applications probably wouldn’t be the exact same ones you’d run in Windows. There might be a word processor, but it probably wouldn’t be Word. Lenovos, Dells and Acers of the world can start tailoring computers with HyperSpace functionality to very specific demographics. A student-aimed laptop, for instance, could come with apps like word processing, e-mail and IM preloaded into HyperSpace. Also, not only is it probably Linux-based, but as one Wired commenter pointed out, it’s likely similar to code that experienced software ninjas have been messing around with for years. Some PC makers such as HP and Gateway have offered Windows-free quick-start media players already, though nothing to this degree. A widespread implementation of HyperSpace across consumer laptops would still be a coup and a half. Microsoft regards HyperSpace as “outside their sphere of influence,” and is not too happy with Phoenix’s offering, which adds yet another voice to the already loud chorus of voices complaining about operating-system bloat. Look out for HyperSpace in laptops starting in mid to late 2008. [Wired Tech Biz] UPDATE: Here’s a link to the press release. More »
Robots
Carnegie-Mellon Wins $2 Million Robot Car Urban Challenge
10:47PM Charlie White | Carnegie Mellon University’s Tartan Racing Team showed us who’s boss on Saturday with a winning truck named Boss. The Chevy Tahoe robot SUV was bristling with PCs and sensors that steered it safely through a complicated city street course, winning the $2 million Urban Challenge prize from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). More »
Vehicles
Segway Mods Taking Over the Dweeb World
10:10PM Charlie White | We had no idea Segways were being modded even more than PCs. Of course, you can put crazy, gigantic wheels on the thing, but you can also add all kinds of containers to carry stuff, pull a trailer with it, gold plate it, turn it into a rickshaw, and of course, it wouldn’t be an American invention without plenty of room for advertising. Take a look at Segway Junkyard for even more outrageousness. [Segway Junkyard] More »
Phones
Samsung SPH-M4650, WinMo Smartphone with Multi-touch
9:42PM Charlie White | Samsung answers the iPhone (isn’t everyone?) with this Samsung SPH-M4650, a smartphone running Windows Mobile 6 that takes the touchscreen concept a step further while adding a dose of tacky design along the way. Its touch screen gives you haptic feedback, goosing you with a slight vibration when you touch an icon on its 2.8″ screen. The usual 2MP camera is on board, and its DMB TV tuner tells us this exact model isn’t headed for these shores. What do we like best about this $550 phone? Its 16mm thinness. Nice try, Samsung—almost iPhoney and a design that might be good enough for the gPhone. [Akihabara News] More »
Games
Wal-Mart Selling Wiimote Knockoff, Perfect for a Stepchild Stocking Stuffer
6:00PM Matt Buchanan | Usually this kind of awesome is relegated to Chinatown shops, but this fake Wiimote produced by LA-based ToyQuest is available in that most red-blooded of American institutions, Wal-Mart. The $10 to $15 Wiimote-”inspired” toy actually features motion controls for the built-in game, but thanks to the tiny, cruddy screen you can’t see anything when you’re waving it around, making it impossible to play. But it does rattle when you shake it, making it the closest thing around to Wii Samba di Amigo maracas. [About] More »
Networks
