Sometimes choosing between new products in the camera industry is like trying to figure out who to vote for in an election: Sigma's come out with its third generation D-SLR that uses the very unique Foveon CMOS-based sensor. But the question is, will this 14 megapixel D-SLR shake up the camera world the way that dark horse candidate of yesterday, Ross Perot, did in 1992? Or will it just turn out to be like Ralph Nader in 2004? Only time will tell.
And, if the SD-14 D-SLR wasn't enough, Sigma's including a running mate--a 14MP fixed-focal length point-and-shoot digital camera, Sigma's first, the Sigma DP1. It may not have any zoom, but it's got the same 14 megapixel sensor as the SD-14. Which one will you vote for?
(And for those who think my political reference is way out there, one definition for the word "Sigma" is "standard deviation." Makes you think, doesn't it!)
Just when I thought the "i" products would die down a bit, I discovered the Import 16" iPillow iPod Radio with Audio Speakers. Yes, it's a giant-sized iPod that you can tuck into bed with you while listening to music from an iPod or other player.
We've looked at plushy speakers before, such as the Flower Pod and the Pillow Pod, but how can you compare them with a huggable iPod?
Scientists at Diversa Corp. have discovered a rich new source of enzymes that can convert agricultural biomass to clean-burning ethanol fuel—in the digestive tracts of termites. This discovery could be key to making the economic production of cellulosic ethanol a viable and cost-effective energy alternative.
The U.S. has traditionally focused on the production of biofuels through the conversion of cornstarch into fuel ethanol. However, it's been estimated that in 2006, the U.S. will only produce between 5 billion and 15 billion gallons of ethanol from corn, which will represent less than 10% of total transportation fuels at that time.
Cellulosic biomass has largely remained untapped natural resource to produce alternative fuel. By dissected thousands of individual termite intestines, Diversa scientists were able to isolate the cellulose-degrading enzymes from bacteria in termite intestines. By reenacting this natural process, the company created a cocktail of high-performance enzymes for industrial ethanol production. Though still in the early stages of this work, the initial results are promising.
How It Works: Fill the burner with fragrance oil or scented pastille, connect it to your computer's USB port, power on, and voila! You'll be taking in some sweet smells. The LED indicator will glow red so you know it's on.
Performance: We used the included scented pastille to test the burner. It takes about a good 35 minutes until the pastille is completely melted inside the burner. But after only 15 minutes, I began to smell the fragrance. It's not an overwhelming smell either, so you won't be bothering co-workers with allergies near you. What if you accidentally knock your hand into the burner? The burner comes with a safety plastic cover that goes over the oil to prevent your most embarassing spills. Just to make sure nothing does spill out, I knocked the burner with my hand a few times and thankfully I saved my cube from any immediate wax damage. But make sure you turn it off before you leave work; I wouldn't want to leave this running overnight since the burner does get pretty warm.
Overall: If you love candles and incense burners but don't want the mess, I strongly recommend getting this USB burner to geek your cube!
Corrected. At the Nokia N75 event today, I wandered over to a music demo to find that the N75 is as compatible with Windows Media Player as Windows Mobile phones are! The N75 can sync multiple playlists between the desktop and the phone, and supports both purchased and subscription WMA music services.
The multiple-playlists feature, especially, is a big deal, because the Windows Media Player 10 that ships with most Windows Mobile phones can't sync more than one playlist to a mobile device. Fortunately, Windows Media Player 11 can. When handhelds only had 128 MB or so of memory, multiple playlist syncing didn't matter so much. But now that everyone's touting 2GB memory cards, you'll probably want to have five or six playlists on your device. I copied three playlists in Yahoo!'s subscription music manager, and three others in Windows Media Player 11. They coexisted happily on the phone, and filed easily into the phone's "playlist" area along with their associated songs.
The N75, along with the N80 and the new N95, has another cool multimedia trick up its sleeve: it's compatible with TivoToGo, which lets you download TV shows from your Tivo onto the phone. The option to automatically transcode videos for the phone requires Tivo Desktop Plus, which costs $24.95, but it works pretty seamlessly.
Note: This item has been amended to reflect the new capabilities of Windows Media Player 11.
Dash Navigation unveiled its Dash Network Traffic Service on Tuesday, allowing drivers to "report" traffic conditions to others on the network.
Dash's dashboard device, the Dash Express, will be released next year, at a price comparable to other GPS receivers. The startup has yet to dislcose the price of the service, however, which is one of the keys to its technology.
Although Dash made its intentions known last month, the company hadn't disclosed its technology until today, at the Demofall conference in San Diego, where a number of small startups will present their wares to competitors as well as venture capitalists.
In addition to providing maps and planning a route among various streets and highways, GPS receivers are beginning to factor in emergencies and other unplanned events. Dash's Express device goes a step further, and uses the car's own progress as a guide to help others avoid the same fate -- or follow it down a relatively uncongested boulevard.
"It always happens that I get off the freeway to take side streets and then see that the traffic has cleared up right when I get off," said Robert Currie, president and chief operating officer of Dash, in a Demofall presentation. "With Dash, I would have that traffic information before I made that decision."
When users turn on the Dash Express, the device plots three different routes to the same destination, and calculates an estimated time of arrival. Based upin historical data that the company collected, the device "knows" the fastest route to a destination, based not only on the distance, but on the expected amount of a traffic at the given time. Furthermore, the Dash Express also has the ability to communicate on the fly with other Dash users, anonymously communicating data like location and speed, to calculate whether a chosen route is in fact the best choice.
Dash has said previously that it will use cellular backhauls to communicate information, as well as a network of road sensors already in use by other traffic services. The connectivity to both the Internet, the Dash network, and the sensor net will not only allow features such as the ability to send a URL or address information from Microsoft Outlook or a web browser directly to the Dash device (known as Dash "Send to Car"), but also allow the device to dynamically update itself, adding new updates to its mapping software and algorithms.
While the Dash Express device is connected to the Dash network, it also remains connected to the Internet, and can take advantage of "knowing" its location to find neighborhood points of interest, like gas stations. Users can also ask it to look for items on a restaurant menu, such as "fajitas," to discover a local Mexican restaurant.
Although the price of the service hasn't been disclosed, "Dash will cost about the same on a monthly basis as a satellite radio system," Paul Lego, chairman and chief executive at Dash, told the Demofall audience.
Sensic's piSight, a 150-degree head-mounted virtual reality system, will be integrated into Renault's (manufacturer of environmentally-friendly vehicles worldwide) ULTIMATE driving simulator.
The Renault ULTIMATE simulator is a driving simulation for industrial use that consists of a car cockpit, panoramic display, and driver-access systems with 15 databases of different road journeys.
Dr. Andras Kemeny, head of the Renault Technical Centre for Simulation, wanted to utilize piSight's VR system "in order to fully utilize the simulator's potential in the study of improving vehicle and road safety thanks to the enhanced visibility conditions offered by new vehicle architecture solutions." It's a good idea to look in to improving vehicles and the road, but drivers themselves need to look in to their own driving skills as well to be good drivers!
I don't like to encourage violence, especially against ducks, so I was loathe to post this product. But my love for anything ducky won out.
The Duck Shooting Gallery (click image to enlarge) lets you experience the carnival without leaving your house or forking over dollar after dollar. (Although the thing costs a whopping 44 bucks, batteries not included.) As the ducks go by, waddling past static targets, you start shooting to the tune of raucous carnival music and shooting sound effects. The more ducks you shoot, the faster they go; an LED counter keeps track of your bounty.
Of course, we're not using real bullets here, so how does it work? Why, it's the magic of infrared sensors--the pistol has a range of up to about 6.5 feet. Before you start playing you need 4 D batteries for the gallery and 2 AA batteries for the gun.
Leave behind the agony of peddling uphill: Currie Technologies is releasing a new hybrid electric bicycle that will zip you around town with ease.
The IZIP Trekking Li NuVinci (try to say that ten times fast) is powered by Currie's very own Electro-Drive hub motor drive system, which gives your shiny new bike front-wheel drive. The bike is powered by a proprietary pedal torque sensor system; the old-school pedals control the rear drive train as they would on a conventional bicycle, but Currie has decided to add to the experience by throwing in the NuVinci CVP (continuously variable planetary) technology to make your pedaling experience all the better. (Gizmag has a great writeup on this technology.)
The bicycles, which can reach a top speed of 15 mph, come with a plug-and-play battery that you can charge overnight with the Currie Smart Charger; you can tell when it's ready on its LED. Currie claims you can pedal your way through town on one charge for 25 miles of normal pedaling, and they threw in an on/off switch to save battery life when you make a stop at the store, or decide to stop being lazy and walk for a change.
Mvox Technologies, Inc is at the DEMOFall '06 conference this week to demonstrate its Mvox Duo, dubbed the world's first wearable Smart Communicator.
When I first heard of the Mvox Duo, I just thought it was a bluetooth headset. I soon learned that it's so much more than that. It's a cell-phone headset & VoIP headset, hands-free car kit, and mobile conference speakerphone all in one!
I thought Black Diamond's Switchback PC looked like a typical UMPC that was doomed to fail. That is, until I heard about the user-defined module. Basically, you can swap out different modules based on your hardware needs. If you need more USB ports or a terrestrial radio, there are modules for both. If you're driving drunk and require a breathalyzer, guess what: There's a module for that too. There are over 20 modules to choose from, each of them useful in its own way.
Let's not forget that the Switchback is still a UMPC. It does come with a rugged housing, meaning it meets the military specs for shocks, vibrations, extreme temperatures, etc. The downside is that the processor is a Celeron M (1.0 Ghz), and battery life is miserable at 2 hours. The Switchback does have what it calls a condensed QWERTY keyboard. Think Blackberry and the thumb keyboard. By no means is this a practical keyboard, but it's better than nothing, or than the Samsung Q1.
I spoke to a rep at Black Diamond about pricing. In a nutshell, they told me prices will be consistent with many of the rugged devices out there. In other words, it's going to be expensive, and definitely not what Bill Gates had in mind.
Updated. You may want to know that the N75 will be $399 before subsidy, so probably around $200 with contract, and that it's compatible with Windows-based music stores, including syncing multiple playlists!
Original post. Nokia let loose a passel of music phones on New York City today, and two are coming to the US: the N75 (shown at left), a flip phone that syncs with Windows Media Player, plays a slew of other music formats including AAC and MP3, and runs on high-speed UMTS (but not HSDPA) networks in the US; and a version of the existing N91 which has the same capabilities, but in a chunky slider format and with an 8 GB (!) hard drive built in. The world's #1 cell phone manufacturer also announced a "kitchen sink" smart phone, the N95, which will have a 5-megapixel camera and built-in GPS.
All three phones are Symbian Series 60 smartphones (complete with Web browsing, document editing and PDF reading capabilities), and Nokia insists the N75 is coming out before Christmas in the US. As Cingular runs the only UMTS network in the US, that means the N75 could be the first actual smartphone on Cingular's high-speed network. Maybe.
Meanwhile, many of the technologies in the N95 will come to the US in 2007, a Nokia rep said. Does that mean 5-megapixel camera phones are on our horizon? I wouldn't say yes until I see them on shelves.
Read more in my article on pcmag.com or the press releases on nokia.com.
EVDO (Rev A) was recently announced as part of Verizon's and Sprint's efforts to beef up EVDO and replace the aging EVDO (Rev 0) networks. The Sony VAIO VGN-TXN10 will be the first laptop to offer Sprint's EVDO Revision A networks into its 2.8-pound chassis. The new networks promise faster download speeds (3.1 Mbits/sec versus 2.4), faster uplink speeds, and lower latencies. Now the problem: There are no Rev A cities available in either Sprint's or Verizon's network, according to Sascha Segan, a Lead Analyst here at Gearlog, and people with the new Rev A modems will default to Rev 0 speeds. If Cingular's HSDPA network is any indication, a complete rollout for Rev A might not happen until 2007. But EVDO, whether it's Rev A or Rev 0, is still the preferred network over competing services like Cingular's EDGE.
Otherwise, the TXN10 doesn't go through any significant design changes. It's still one of the few (if not the only) ultraportable to have a built-in optical drive yet weigh under 3 pounds. As with the Sony VAIO VGN-TX670P, the TXN10 will continue to offer a carbon fiber lid with a variety of colors. Systems with the Rev A modem will be available at the end of Sept. Prices start at $2.300.
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