As you know by now, SpaceX’s most recent rocket launch attempt failed early in its flight, destroying the vehicle and sending its satellite payload and the ashes of James Doohan—Star Trek’s original Scotty— into the ocean. It’s just what happens sometimes with space technology: there’s so much complexity, so much technology/aerodynamics/engine chemistry and engineering that just has to work perfectly, in sync and under high stress. And that’s a point that is elegantly detailed by one of James’ sons in a letter to BoingBoing about the SpaceX launch. It makes for poignant reading.
We first showed you the rainbow-illuminated Luxeed LED keyboard a year and a half ago, but then it was in Korean letter-style versions. Now it’s got plain old Western characters and is on sale in the US. It’s not quite in the same league as the legendary Optimus Maximus, sure, but with 430 LEDs embedded inside—each fully controllable with some custom software—it actually sounds pretty impressive. Check out the video: it’s psychedelic, man. Or, at least, vaguely sci-fi looking anyway.
The inexorable march of solid-state drive technology continues forward with news from Micron Technology (one of the worlds leading semiconductor suppliers) that they’re going to produce SSD’s with a read speed of 250MBps. That’s more than twice the speed of the drives Samsung announced last month (90MBps.)
We all know that Apple’s MobileMe had a difficult birth: but it’s quite another thing to be able to read the criticisms of the service from his Steveness himself. And over at Ars Technica they’ve got hold of an internal Apple email that Steve Jobs sent out to Apple employees detailing his displeasure that MobileMe was “not up to Apple’s Standards.” It needed both more time in testing, and a piece-by-piece launch, rather than attempting to launch it as a “monolithic service,” he thinks.
Sonos upgraded their ZonePlayer lineup to the ZP 90 and the ZP 120. The ZP 90, which connects to existing home theatre amplifiers, is essentially the same as the ZP 80, but now features SonosNet 2.0, which combines MIMO antennas with Sonos’ existing mesh network. The ZP120, Sonos’ main amplified unit, also includes SonosNet 2.0, but is also smaller (17.8 x 7.6 x 20.3cm vs. 25.4 x 10.2 x 20.3cm) , lighter (2.3kg vs. 4.5kg), and has more power (55W vs 50W) than the previous ZP100.
David Flynn over at APC just loves his mini-notebooks. And it looks like they love him as well, considering that he’s gotten the scoop on the Australian pricing and release dates for the S10 ultra-portable that was announced overnight.
We can expect the Ideapad S10 at the end of September for $699, which is for the 80GB model (a 160GB model is also expected).
Head over to APC for more details, including which colours won’t be coming to Australia.
[APCmag]
And this is why I love you guys. Within hours of Google’s Streetview going live in Australia, I’m already receiving images of funny quirks within the system. Like this one from reader Douglas.
Obviously, as the Streetview driver was making their way down Denigan street in the ACT, they felt an undying need to pull the Holden Astra in and go to the toilet grab a bite to eat to the Erindale shopping centre. The fun thing is that the camera decided to count that as part of the road, including the drivers door open and trees all around. For the full effect, drive back on Denigan street a bit and then go forward – you’ll cop a face full of tree for your trouble.
Even better though is the fact that they pulled in again a bit further down the road. I wonder what they forgot?
So, give us your best caption for this Streetview anomaly, and keep sending in those entertaining Streetview blunders pics.
[Google Streetview - Thanks Douglas!]
A few new details about AMD’s mysterious Fusion CPU/GPU combo chip have leaked to the Web and they seem to confirm what some rumours have been saying, namely that AMD would be making the chip with help from the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), the world’s largest chip plants. ATI, whom AMD bought two years ago, had been a long time customer of TSMC so the deal makes sense. The technical details point to the first processor under the Fusion name will launch Q1 of next year, and will be a dual-core Phenom CPU running along side an ATI RV800 as GPU at 40nm, a “half-node” size that will probably transition to 32nm within a year. It’s an exciting idea, we just hope AMD can pull it off. [TG Daily]
Yeah, USB Fever just started taking pre-orders for this super thin iPhone hardware unlock tool that attaches to your SIM card, but be forewarned — it requires that you cut the corner off your SIM in order to work. If you’re up for the challenge, it will supposedly start shipping on August 20 for US$35. [USB Fever via iPhone Atlas via IntoMobile]
Good news for people looking for a smartphone that isn’t made by Apple – the HTC Touch Diamond is now available through Telstra.
For a Windows Mobile device, this is one of the best available, thanks to the fact that TouchFlo 3D essentially hides WinMo deep within its interface.
Being a Telstra exclusive (at the moment), it’s only available on an $80 plan over 24 months (or $999 outright), which as you’d expect from the big T, doesn’t include any real data allowances ($10 on a business plan). Considering that HTC were pushing this as a real web browsing machine when they launched it in Australia, that’s (another) missed opportunity from Telstra.
Hopefully the other networks will remedy the situation when the exclusive arrangement ends in a couple of months…
[Telstra]
