Sunday, March 01, 2009

$25 billion in electric vehicle loans still waiting for perfect beggars

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/28/25-billion-in-electric-vehicle-loans-still-waiting-for-perfect/


While the Big 3 seem to be visiting Washington on an all-too-regular basis trying to secure funding for future success, $25 billion in loans set aside to promote electric car usage in America has been sitting untouched for nearly two years. As the story goes, the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan program was established in 2007, but administrations have been toying with ideas about how to use it until present day. Some 75 applications from hopeful companies have been whittled down to 25, but there's no telling how long it'll be before we hear who's getting the cash (and when). Many are irate that this dough is still sitting idle, but we tend to agree with the "let's wait until we find truly remarkably beggars" approach before it's just handed out to those without a viable plan. The takeaway? Electric vehicles may still end up progressing as planned despite the current economy, but only if brilliant plans can cut through miles of red tape.

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$25 billion in electric vehicle loans still waiting for perfect beggars originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 28 Feb 2009 07:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Posted by Augustine at 10:07 PM

AMD looking to ship 32nm chips in 2010

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/28/amd-looking-to-ship-32nm-chips-in-2010/


Or, you know, maybe the headline should read: "AMD looking to ship 32nm chips behind Intel. Rather than staying one step ahead of its fiercest rival, it sounds like Advanced Micro Devices is perfectly content with being a few months behind. Based on words from CEO Dirk Meyer, the company is hoping to "ramp up" production of 32 nanometer processors -- which Intel has already demonstrated -- in the middle of next year, with volume production hopefully starting in Q4. Of course, these chips will be among the first not actually built by AMD; instead, they'll be fabricated by the newly spun Foundry Company, so we suppose the lag is little easier to understand. Oh, and there's also the fact that "AMD isn't in a race with Intel on all technologies," though the business bone inside of us thinks it should be.

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AMD looking to ship 32nm chips in 2010 originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 28 Feb 2009 11:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Posted by Augustine at 10:07 PM

Cooler Master's 5-CPU monstrosity has your craptop cowering in a corner

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/28/cooler-masters-5-cpu-monstrosity-has-your-craptop-cowering-in-a/


Yeah, your PC sucks. That video card you "borrowed" from your brother two years ago makes an exasperated sigh every time you fire up The Sims 2, and you're pretty sure your power supply is one Cheeto crumb away from giving up the ghost. Not this thing, however. Cooler Master has built an utterly ridiculous setup, with five separate quad-core computers running simultaneously under one roof, off of one power supply. The whole thing, which Cooler Master dubbs the 53GHz, is basically a showcase for various Cooler Master components, and will be displayed at CeBIT in Germany next week. Personal grid computing here we come? Video is after the break.

[Via Make]

Continue reading Cooler Master's 5-CPU monstrosity has your craptop cowering in a corner

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Cooler Master's 5-CPU monstrosity has your craptop cowering in a corner originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 28 Feb 2009 17:08:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Posted by Augustine at 10:05 PM

Self-assembling nanoscale discovery could catapult data storage capacity

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/01/self-assembling-nanoscale-discovery-could-catapult-data-storage/

Ready to have your mind blown? What if 250 DVDs could fit onto a storage module no larger than a quarter? According to research conducted by brilliant geeks at the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Massachusetts Amherst, it's all within the realm of feasibility. Reportedly, an easily implemented technique "in which nanoscale elements precisely assemble themselves over large surfaces" could soon blow open the doors to significant improvements in data storage capacity. Without getting too Ph.D on you, the process essentially works by taking advantage of just how precise molecules can self-assemble. The end result has researchers achieving "defect-free arrays of nanoscopic elements with feature sizes as small as 3 nanometers, translating into densities of 10 terabits per square inch." Per square inch, son.

[Via TheStandard, thanks Apoc]

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Self-assembling nanoscale discovery could catapult data storage capacity originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 Mar 2009 06:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Posted by Augustine at 10:04 PM

IBM ThamesBlue supercomputer uncovers antediluvian English words

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/01/ibm-thamesblue-supercomputer-uncovers-antediluvian-english-words/


Granted, we could personally think of much more amazing ways to put supercomputers to work, but maybe there is some sort of benefit to humanity by knowing precisely what our ancestors' first words were. All that aside, the IBM ThamesBlue supercomputer has been tapped by language masters at the University of Reading in order to find that 'I,' 'we,' 'who' and the numbers '1,' '2' and '3' are amongst the most ancient across all Indo-European languages. Comically enough, it was also found that words like 'squeeze,' 'guts,' 'stick,' 'throw' and 'dirty' were also markedly archaic, which sure says a lot about how men in particular, um, don't evolve. At any rate, these new computational powers have reportedly opened up another 25,000 years or so of language study, so we suspect the folks on this project will be occupied for some time to come.

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IBM ThamesBlue supercomputer uncovers antediluvian English words originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 Mar 2009 10:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Posted by Augustine at 10:03 PM

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