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Monday, August 10, 2009

Draganfly X4 UAV: Tiny, Camera-Packing, UFO-Looking 'Copter Is Cheaper Than Ever [Helicopters]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/9aYvU7Tugcs/draganfly-x4-uav-tiny-camera+packing-ufo+looking-copter-is-cheaper-than-ever

Draganfly's series of photo/video-based UAVs have always been awesome, but they've also been more of a pipe dream than anything else. The X4 is smaller than the X6, but the smaller size also comes with a 25% price cut. Yes!

Like the X6—featured in Giz Gallery 2008—the X4 is a carbon fiber-bodied UAV with four carbon fiber rotating blades. The 680-gram (with battery) copter is capable of using a still/video camera (in this case, a Panasonic Lumix point-and-shoot), an infrared camera and a low-light camera, all of which can be controlled from the ground. The X4 also features three accelerometers, three gyroscopes, three magnetometers and a barometric pressure sensor, and the controller is based on an OLED touchscreen. The X4 only has four motors to the X6's six, but that comes at a big boon to the pricey 'copter: The X6 checked in at about $15,000, and the X4 should be more like $10,000.

So yeah, this thing is still super expensive. But it's also just about the best heli-cam we've ever seen, capable of flying both indoors and in inclement weather (up to 18mph of wind). Check out these videos at Draganfly's site to get a real sense of the true badassery of the copter. [Draganfly]

Genome Sequencing Gets 99.9833% Price Cut [Dna]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/yTxIWRCLrkM/genome-sequencing-gets-999833-price-cut

Dr. Quake of Stanford University only needed $50,000 and a month's time to complete a genome sequencing process which previously took $300 million, over 250 people, and several years. How cheap would Windows 7 be with this guy's cost-cutting?

Dr. Stephen Quake and his team used a "commercially available, refrigerator-sized instrument called the Helicos Biosciences SMS Heliscope" to sequence Quake's genome.

This machine, also known as a single molecule sequencer, is incredible. Instead of needing to generate thousands upon thousands of copies of a person's DNA, it chops the fundamental units of DNA, the bases, into short strands, slaps them onto a specially treated glass plate, and proceeds to read the sequences.

After these steps are completed, a series of computers will assemble all the DNA strands into a genome while comparing it to previously compiled genomes. According to an algorithm used by the team, this sequencing process results in genomes which are about 95% complete. (This is on par with previous sequencing technology.)

While Quake's research is important in what it represents: genome sequencing could become something used by regular health care providers to diagnose genetic predispositions to diseases (or maybe just figure out if someone's genetic code "contains a form of a gene that has sometimes been associated with increased disagreeability"), it also does something curious: in shows a far larger decrease in cost than Moore's law alone would suggest. The combination of better processing with a far better algorithm resulted in this dramatic progress over the past eight years and we can't wait to see how the implementation of improved algorithms will continue to affect this trend. [Business Wire]

Photo by Helicos

Bionic Athlete Aimee Mullins To Speak At TEDMED 2009 [Tedmed]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/X__l0wXbp90/bionic-athlete-aimee-mullins-to-speak-at-tedmed-2009

After displaying her collection of prosthetic legs at this year's TED conference, bionic actress, athlete and model Aimee Mullins recently announced that she will speak at the TEDMED convention this fall.

Mullins has been instrumental in changing the public perception of prosthetics. After setting multiple world records at the 1996 Paralympic games, she has used her modeling, athletic and film careers to end the idea that prosthetics are a mark of disability. Instead, she's shown the world that bionic limbs can enable some amazing things. As a guy who's barely 5'8" on a good day, listening to Mullins talk about how easy and fun it is to change her height on a whim does sound like a pretty incredible ability to have.

TEDMED annually explores a wide range of issues in health care. Topics this year range from ethical questions in the face of medical advancement to the theoretical capabilities of medicine. The fifth TEDMED conference will be held October 27-30 in San Diego. Be sure to keep an eye on the conference come fall. [TEDMED, image via Women's Sports Foundation]

Gigabyte T1028X TouchNote brings fresher specs, steeper price

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/gigabyte-t1028x-touchnote-brings-fresher-specs-steeper-price/

It's only been a few months since Gigabyte unveiled the 1028M netbook / tablet hybrid, but its successor is already available to buy in Europe. Announced in Hong Kong last month, the 1028X ups the resolution to 1366 x 768 on the 10.1-inch swivel display and bundles a 6-cell 7650 mAh battery for a purported six and a half hours of juice. There's also an utterly meaningless 60MHz CPU upgrade from the Atom N270 to the N280, but the most surprising thing of all might be the price: €622 ($877). That's an awful lot of damage for what is still very much a netbook, but then if you simply must have a touchscreen display in that specific size range, there isn't much competition going around. At least for now.

[Via Slashgear]

Read -- Gigabyte product page
Read -- European reseller

Filed under: Laptops, Tablet PCs

Gigaby! te T1028 X TouchNote brings fresher specs, steeper price originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 10:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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WinMo 6.5 build 23022 caught on video, in all its finger-friendly glory

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/winmo-6-5-build-23022-caught-on-video-in-all-its-finger-friendl/

It's been a hot minute since we first laid eyes on those WinMo screen grabs featuring big ol' buttons at the bottom of the display -- signaling, we hoped, an all-around effort to minimize stylus use in the mobile OS -- and now we have a video for you that seems to further make the case. While WinMo 6.5 build 23022 is still pretty clumsy, those finger-friendly (well, at least, "finger-friendlier," or maybe "not as finger-hostile") buttons grace the bottom of the display, and there is an iPhone-esque magnifying glass option for zooming in on and editing text. Technical details for this build are available at the read link -- but first, make sure you peep the thing in action at the break.

[Via SlashGear]

Continue reading WinMo 6.5 build 23022 caught on video, in all its finger-friendly glory

Filed under: Cellphones

WinMo 6.5 build 23022 caught on video, in all its finger-friendly glory originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 13:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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NVIDIA inks deal for SLI support on Intel Core i5, i7 systems

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/nvidia-inks-deal-for-sli-support-on-intel-core-i5-i7-systems/

The relationship between the two companies may have descended to the level of a schoolyard fight at times, but it looks like NVIDIA and Intel are now doing their best to get along -- in public, at least -- united, in part, by AMD's entirely in-house CrossFire graphics solution. This latest gesture of goodwill comes in the form of an announcement that NVIDIA will indeed be licensing its SLI graphics technology to Intel and various motherboard manufacturers for use in upcoming Core i5 and Core i7-based systems, which Intel describes as the "perfect complement" for each other. Intel further goes on to say that "NVIDIA and Intel share a combined passion for furthering the PC as the definitive platform for gaming," while unconfirmed reports also have NVIDIA holding up its fingers in a comical gesture behind Intel's head during the announcement.

[Via Electronista]

Filed under: Desktops, Gaming

NVIDIA inks deal for SLI support on Intel Core i5, i7 systems originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 15:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Zune HD on-screen keyboard and browser caught on camera

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/zune-hd-on-screen-keyboard-and-browser-caught-on-camera/

Oh, you want even more Zune HD news today? You got it! Yahoo! Tech managed to get a hands-on with the device, snapping some pictures of the browser and, more importantly, the on-screen keyboard. It's only a minor glimpse, but it definitely looks sleek. Shot of the browser after the break, and hit up the read link for full gallery. Seriously, Microsoft, add a 3G chipset and dialer app, and you can go ahead and draft those "million seller" press releases already.

Update: CNET has posted some more pictures of the browser and keyboard, including Facebook in landscape mode.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Continue reading Zune HD on-screen keyboard and browser caught on camera

Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video

Zune HD on-screen keyboard and browser caught on camera originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 19:06:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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USAA's Deposit@Mobile app puts check deposits a mug shot away

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/usaas-deposit-mobile-app-puts-check-deposits-a-mug-shot-away/

The problem with banks, you see, is that they're one of the few remaining weak links in our ultimate goal of eliminating all human interaction. If you've got a check you need to deposit in your account, you've got to trek all the way out to your local branch; sure, granted, you can slip the check in an ATM, but your odds of encountering another living creature in the process of doing that are nonzero. Fortunately, USAA -- which counts military personnel as a significant percentage of its customer base -- is helping to close that loop with its "Deposit@Mobile" service, a component of its just-launched mobile banking app in the iPhone's App Store. The secret, you see, lies in the iPhones magical camera which can "take" a "picture" of the check, transmit it to USAA, and boom -- your cash is instantly deposited. No muss, no fuss, and no pesky people to get between you and your hard-earned cash. Of course, that doesn't change the fact that you've got to get the check from someone in the first place... but, you know, one thing at a time.

[Via The New York Times]

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

USAA's Deposit@Mobile app puts check deposits a mug shot away originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 21:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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TG Sambo announces trifecta of Full HD 16:9 monitors

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/tg-sambo-announces-trifecta-of-full-hd-16-9-monitors/

TG Sambo is all set to refresh its display line with four new models, three of them proudly pimping full 1080p panels and making your 4:3 display look all the more tired and washed up. The 24-inch TGL 2400A, 23-inch 2300A and 21.6-inch 2250A all have an integrated digital TV tuner, 2ms response time, 20,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio (which probably means real contrast is around 500:1), HDMI, DVI, VGA, and menu presets for internet, movie and gaming use. There's also a similarly outfitted 2000A version, which alas loses the 1920 x 1080 resolution. Only the price for the biggest 'un is known at present: 449,000 KRW ($336), but the PR indicates "the second half of the market strategy is to attack," so we'll go ahead and assume availability is coming shortly.

[Via AVING]

Filed under: Displays

TG Sambo announces trifecta of Full HD 16:9 monitors originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 22:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Five Best Video Players [Hive Five]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/aTnkUs-uhBc/five-best-video-players

We've come a long way since animated GIFs and video-game-style MIDI files were considered cutting edge computer-provided A/V entertainment. Take advantage of today's high-quality video with one of these five most popular video players.

Photo by horsager.

Earlier this week we asked you to share your favorite video player. We've tallied up the votes and now we're back to share the results. Below you'll find the five most popular video players among Lifehacker readers. If you're dissatisfied with the features of your current player, it's a great shopping list of alternatives.

The movie used in the screenshots below is Big Buck Bunny—a completely open-source generated and Creative Commons-licensed short movie.

Media Player Classic (Windows, Free)

Media Player Classic started out as a project to preserve the simplicity and lightweight playback of the old Windows Media Player while keeping codecs and features current for the present generation of video. The outcome is an extremely lightweight, free, portable, and self-contained video player that has built-in codecs for a wide variety of media playback. The upside of such a design is you can use it on a machine that doesn't have the proper codecs installed for the video you want to watch. The downside is in some instances—although rare—it can conflict with an u! pdated c odec you have installed on your machine.

MPlayer (Windows/Mac/Linux, Free)

Originally designed to fill the void of a lack of adequate Linux media players, the development for the robust media player MPlayer has branched out and now includes versions for Windows and Mac, among others. MPlayer supports a wide variety of content and, perhaps owing to its Linux roots, pays extra close attention to hardware and hardware optimization to squeeze the most playback power out of your system.

GOM Player (Windows, Free)

GOM Player is another entrant in this week's Hive that, like VLC, excels at playing damaged and incomplete video. Originally designed as the streaming media player for GOM-TV, a Korean TV network, it is available outside of Korea with the GOM-TV streaming functionality disabled—although folks outside Korea still have access to the live streaming of StarCraft matches (StarCraft is so wildly popular among Koreans playing it is practically a national sport). GOM Player also includes a wide variety of sub-title tweaks, an important feature for a player from a country that consumes a lots of foreign media.

VLC (Windows/Mac/Linux, Free)

VLC is a media player with far-reaching appeal. It is available for over ten operating systems including systems as obscure as BeOS. Built with open-source code and fueled by free decoding and encoding libraries, it has a history of innovation and performance; it was, for example, the first player that could play back encrypted DVDs on Linux. VLC allows you to play incomplete or damaged videos, so you can decide if it is worth finishing a download or repairing a video file. VLC can also play a variety of formats not commonly supported by media players, such as a raw DVD ISO file or AVCHD—a format currently used by many HD camcorders. VLC is available as a portable application.

KMPlayer (Windows, Free)

If you like all your media player's settings at your fingertips, KMPlayer has a lot to offer. The right click context menu is absolutely enormous and gives you nearly instant access to all manner of settings, including screen ratio, playback speed, video bookmarking, filters, and other effects. You can set KMPlayer to change its skin based on what media type you're playing or if you're running it on a media center you can use an overlay skin to provide easy remote-based navigation. KMPlayer supports an extensive number of formats including DVD playback and is easily customized to your specific needs.

Now that you've had a chance to look over the contenders for Best Video Player, it's time to cast your vote in the poll below:

Which Video Player is Best?(survey)

Can't believe your favorite didn't make it? Shocked we didn'! t mentio n your favorite feature of your player of preference? Set us straight in the comments.

First Football Game In Cowboys Stadium Played On World's Largest HDTV [HDTV]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/iAp8shT0ozk/first-football-game-in-cowboys-stadium-played-on-worlds-largest-hdtv

The first football game to *officially* grace the brand spankin' new Dallas Cowboys stadium was in fact rendered for all to see in glorious 1080p high definition.

The game played out on the stadium's 160ft. x 72ft screen—the world's largest 1080p HDTV—as part of a fan appreciation day sponsored by EA and PlayStation. More than 10,000 were expected to attend.

Driving the game as it unfolded high in the air was a humble (in comparison) PlayStation 3. [Kotaku]

AdAge: Massimo continues w/Arnell; Pepsi Top Talent Exit in Droves who'd blame them, after costly, useless rebrandings - http://bit.ly/1Yf1L

HTC Touch Pro2 spotted again, this time with AT&T branding -- to be called Tilt 2?

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/htc-touch-pro2-spotted-again-this-time-with-atandt-branding/

Alright, listen up: we're going to play a little game we like to call, "what carrier isn't getting the Touch Pro2?" Sound easy? Not so fast, partner -- this bad boy gets around like a record, if you know what we're saying. In fact, the beefy, all-business WinMo superphone is well on its way to becoming the first handset carried by every top-tier North American carrier in we-don't-know-how-long (granted, we don't have solid intel on Bell or Rogers, but we wouldn't be surprised to see them coming). We suspected AT&T was signed up for it some time ago, and now we've got it snapped in the flesh, complete with an AT&T logo conveniently assigned as the function on the down key. We don't know when this'll be available, but seeing how all notions of exclusivity appear to be out of the window on this one, we could see an announcement any day now. Better list that Fuze on eBay now, ladies and gentlemen.

[Thanks, Ahres]

Update: It'd stand to reason that this is going to be branded Tilt 2 in light of the screen shot posted earlier; kinda strange that AT&T would return to the Tilt branding, but... you know, marketing departments work in mysterious ways that we'll never understand.

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

HTC Touch Pro2 spotted again, this time with AT&T branding -- to be called Tilt 2? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 00:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Indilinx firmware cleans dirty SSDs, restores performance while idle

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/indilinx-firmware-cleans-dirty-ssds-restores-performance-while/

You know those quirky, not-at-all convenient issues that can cause certain solid state drives to lag with extensive use? Yeah -- not cool. Thankfully, the engineers at OCZ Technology and Indilinx are fed up, and rather than sitting around doing nothing, they've both collaborated on a breakthrough firmware that can actually clean and restore one's "dirtied" SSD while the drive sits idle. In short, the firmware instructs the SSD to perform a "garbage collection" process in order to mitigate the unwanted block re-writing quandary, where the drive actively seeks and removes garbage that hinders read / write performance when handling small chunks of data. The crew over at HotHardware managed to run a few speed tests with said firmware firmly implemented, and the results are downright shocking: after just five minutes of idle time, the SSD was restored to near new, with an hour of downtime being enough to "totally restore" performance. Don't believe us? Give that read link a tap, bub.

Filed under: Storage

Indilinx firmware cleans dirty SSDs, restores performance while idle originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 02:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MSI X-Slim X600 reviewed: an 'attractive choice'

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/08/10/msi-x-slim-x600-reviewed-an-attractive-choice/

MSI's X-Slim X600 may not be the quickest, most nimble or most powerful 15.6-inch laptop on the market today, bit with a thickness of just 0.75-inches, it's definitely got the ultrathin motif down pat. The kind lads and ladies over at Laptop Mag recently secured one of the machines for review, and they seemed adequately impressed with the combination of a low-power CPU (1.4GHz Core 2 Solo SU3500) and a multimedia-friendly discrete GPU (ATI's 512MB Radeon HD 4330) -- a tandem that's hard to find anywhere, let alone for $799. All told, the machine performed satisfactorily across the board, notching decent scores in a wide array of benchmarks and looking good all the while. Still, critics noted that Sony's VAIO NW would be more suitable for those with a Blu-ray craving and that Gateway's $599 NV is probably better for those looking for raw horsepower. If style is atop your list, though, it'll be tough to dodge the "buy" button on this one.

Filed under: Laptops

MSI X-Slim X600 reviewed: an 'attractive choice' originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Aug 2009 07:37:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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