Reality Bites
Shanghai office worker Wang Kang had an innocent dream — to wear his 50-kilogram foam Iron Man exoskeleton to his workplace and impress his colleagues with his cosplay prowess. Did it work? Yes…perhaps a little too well. More »
Android: Free app SHREDroid really is like a shredder for Android phones. It doesn't perform a "secure delete" on a particular file or folder, but instead securely wipes the supposedly vacant spaces where deleted files used to be listed. If you're wondering why that means anything, it's because deleted files aren't really gone the moment you delete them—they're just not listed anymore. Something needs to be written over the data for it to really be gone, and that's what SHREDroid does with one tap of the finger. More »
Nokia and Apple have been battling it out for market share, and also in the courts over accused patent infringements. One of the cases stem back to 2009 with Nokia suing Apple over the iPhone infringing on Nokia patents for GSM, UMTS and wireless LAN (WLAN) standards. Nokia stated then that Apple is “attempting to get a free ride on the back of Nokia’s innovation”.
Nokia has apparently spent over EUR 43 billion and has a collection of 10,000 patents. Today a press release went out stating the two companies have signed a patent license agreement, which results in a settlement of all patent litigation issues. No dollar amounts were released but they did note that Apple must hand over a one-time payment and on-going royalties to Nokia.
This changes everything. Steve Jobs probably isn’t the happiest CEO today, but Nokia’s CEO Stephen Elop is. “We are very pleased to have Apple join the growing number of Nokia licensees. This settlement demonstrates Nokia’s industry leading patent portfolio and enables us to focus on further licensing opportunities in the mobile communications market.”
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Airbus has always been the first choice for the luxury flyers. Be it the Airbus A350 that has BMW interior or leisure travelers with facilities as luxurious as mini-hotel suites, the company has never disappointed its flyers. So, to continue with the luxury ritual, Airbus has come up with a futuristic design for 2050 travelers.
Airbus has unveiled the futuristic design of a transparent plane that will come around 2050 for panoramic views. The plane is designed in such a way that the flyers would be able to see through the cabin and the roof. With this futuristic travel option, the business class and economy class will be replaced with custom-made sectors that offer space for relaxation, interaction and working.
The see-through aircraft cabin will come with various options that will allow the rider enjoy panoramic views outside the aircraft. The comfortable seats could be made to take up any size and shape for each passenger. If we talk about entertainment, the boring small TV screen will be replaced by a larger Interactive zone together with virtual holographic golf courses or virtual clothes shopping.
According to the Airbus engineering executive vice-president Charles Champion say,
Our research shows that passengers of 2050 will expect a seamless travel experience while also caring for the environment. The concept cabin is designed with that in mind, and shows that the journey can be as much a voyage of discovery as the destination.
Via: TheAge/TheAustrian/UberGizmo
So, you’re looking to up your video chatting game using SkypeHD, but found that little camera in the lid of your laptop can’t cut the mustard? Good news, friend, because Logitech’s latest HD webcam, the C615, is here to shoot images of your face over the internet in 720p. Like its sibling, the C910, it works with both Macs and PCs and has one-click uploads to Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. Additionally, the new unit takes 8-megapixel stills and 1080p videos (software limits video chat to 720p), plus it packs a 360-degree swiveling autofocus shooter to make viewing those hard to reach places easy. It’s available now in the States for $79.99, and is making its way overseas in September. PR’s after the break.
Continue reading Logitech lets loose HD webcam C615, $80 gets you video chatting in 720p
Logitech lets loose HD webcam C615, $80 gets you video chatting in 720p originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 14 Jun 2011 04:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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A newborn’s immune system needs time to figure out what should be fought and what should be left alone. Conventional wisdom had it that early exposure to potential troublemakers, from peanuts to pets, could lead to allergy issues later.
But recent research shows that having a dog or cat at home isn't likely to make children allergic to animals. And a new study finds that kids who grow up with pets are less likely to have an animal allergy all the way through age 18. The works is in the journal Clinical & Experimental Allergy . [Bill Hesselmar et al., " Does early exposure to cat or dog protect against later allergy development? "]
AMD’s Llano platform has been on our radar for more than two years, and finally, the company has come clean with its latest class of hybrid CPU / GPU chips, officially dubbed the Fusion A-Series. Unlike the low-power flavor of Fusion accelerated processing units already on the market, these 32-nanometer APUs were designed with desktops and mainstream laptops in mind, taking direct aim at Intel’s Core 2011 processors with the promise of superior processing and discrete-level graphics, and 10-plus hours of battery life.
Aside from the assorted performance and battery life claims the company is making (much more on that in a moment), what this means is that as far as laptops go, AMD is completely stepping away from the standalone-CPU-plus-GPU paradigm. But, the company will still make dedicated Radeon cards, which can be coupled with an APU for a 75 percent boost in graphics performance — a setup AMD is calling “Dual Graphics.” All told, these chips measure just 228 square millimeters. To put this in context, check out the gallery of hands-on shots below, featuring the A-series next to a standalone CPU, discrete graphics card, and, for the sake of scale, the kind of low-power Fusion chip introduced back at CES.
A-Series-equipped PCs are already shipping, and AMD says we can expect to see at least 150 of them this year. That sounds promising indeed, but we’ve still got lots of technical details to rehash. Head on past the break for the full spill on what these APUs pledge to do, along with a video of AMD senior product marketing manager Raymond Dumbeck showing off some A-series laptops in action.
Gallery: AMD Fusion A Series hands-on
AMD’s Fusion A-Series chips official: 10.5-hour battery life, DirectX 11 graphics, and USB 3.0 support (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 13 Jun 2011 23:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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The folks at Swype sure know how to get our attention. The Android keyboard app has always inspired us to get a bit dramatic, but we had no idea that predictive text and moveable QWERTY pads were this intense. To celebrate the beta release of Swype 3.0 it appears the company hired Doug Liman (or at least some one who has studied the Bourne Identity very closely) to whip up a promo video. Enjoy the thrills of a resizable input area! Be wowed by the Honeycomb support! Get stunned by the auto-correct! Oh, and don’t forget to head after the break to watch the clip.
Continue reading Swype 3.0 gets Honeycomb support, intense promo video (video)
Swype 3.0 gets Honeycomb support, intense promo video (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 13 Jun 2011 23:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
There are no patriotic calls to arms beneath the rockets’ red glare, no bragging about ruling over a vast empire, or any of the militaristic overtones of so many national anthems. This one, a proposed national anthem for an independent Quebec, extols rainbows of love.
If you don’t like something change it; if you can’t change it, change the way you think about it.
— Mary Engelbreit
Air Canada and its customer service and sales staff continued talks on Monday against a midnight strike deadline.
The Environmental Working Group’s 2011 report on produce finds the most pesticide in apples, celery, strawberries, peaches, and spinach and the least in onions, sweet corn, pineapples, avocadoes, and asparagus.
This is a crazy figure: 50% of the iPhones brought to Genius bars have never been connected to a computer. Ever. I don’t know about you, but I can’t understand how people can live without synching between devices or backing up. More »
No matter who you are, you’ve likely spent some amount of time arguing online with someone you just couldn’t believe was incapable of accepting the truth. That may have been because they were susceptible to something called the backfire effect, or so were you. More »
The genetic predisposition to play the field appears to be locked into the DNA of socially monogamous species, including humans.
The genetic predisposition to play the field appears to be locked into the DNA of socially monogamous species, including humans.
As file sizes for many data types continue to grow, smaller chunks are also becoming more ubiquitous, particularly on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, and search tools like Google. These high-volume, small-size blocks of data may soon be served up from a specific type of SSD, like the Moneta Onyx prototype developed by a team at the University of California, San Diego. Onyx uses phase-change memory (PCM), which can rewrite single bits of data (1s and 0s) on demand, rather than rewriting data in larger chunks, yielding sustained 327 megabyte per second (MB/s) reads and 91MB/s writes with smaller file types — two to seven times faster than the most efficient commercial SSDs. PCM specifically benefits granular data, rather than large files that must be transferred completely (like photos and documents), so the tech is more likely to appear on devices serving up short text-based messages. Traditional SSDs can write larger files faster than the Onyx prototype, though the new drive offers speedier read speeds across the board. It’ll be at least a couple years before PCM becomes commercially available, but once (and if) it does, you’ll be reading about your coworker’s breakfast or college buddy’s traffic jam milliseconds faster than before.
Moneta Onyx phase-change memory prototype can write some data 7x faster than traditional SSDs originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 13 Jun 2011 14:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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For the first time ever, we can track the number of genetic mutations in each generation of a human family. Humans are mutating at a downright glacial pace, with a shockingly tiny number of mutations passed on in each generation. More »
When it first announced the launch of its eReader Touch Edition late last month, Kobo referred to itself again and again as the "David" in a reader market full of "Goliaths." It's not difficult to see why — the company's chief competition in the space is Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Sony, all giants in their respective fields. In spite of overwhelming odds, however, Kobo has managed to stay afloat, and even competitive. True to form, however, Barnes & Noble launched its own device a mere day after Kobo, which for most intents and purposes, looks an awful lot like the eReader Touch Edition. In fact, the devices were seemingly so alike that we created a head to head, in order to see for ourselves precisely what set them apart.
The new Nook also managed to beat Kobo’s device to market, offering a more than worthy competitor to Amazon’s latest. The question with the launch of the Kobo then, is not only whether the David can compete in a market so dominated by the Kindle, but if the eReader Touch Edition has enough to set it apart from the superficially identical Nook.
Gallery: Kobo eReader Touch Edition review
Continue reading Kobo eReader Touch Edition review
Kobo eReader Touch Edition review originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 13 Jun 2011 14:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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