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Wednesday, February 24, 2010

ARM and Globalfoundries partner up for 28nm Cortex-A9 SOCs, invite great expectations

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/arm-and-globalfoundries-partner-up-for-28nm-cortex-a9-socs-invi/

This one slipped the net during the excitement that was MWC this year, but it's such a promising development that we have to give it its due attention. ARM and Globalfoundries have announced plans to start building new systems-on-chip using the latter's ultramodern 28nm high-k metal gate production process, with the resultant chips offering up to 40 percent greater computational power, 30 percent greater power efficiency, and a terrific 100 percent improvement in battery longevity relative to their current-gen siblings. Mass production of these Cortex-A9-based units is expected in the second half of 2010, which means they should be among the very first chips off Globalfoundries' 28nm assembly line. The good news, though, is that the technology is described as "ready for high-volume implementation," so there should be no shortages when things finally get rolling. Let the wild-eyed anticipation begin.

ARM and Globalfoundries partner up for 28nm Cortex-A9 SOCs, invite great expectations originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 07:43:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Neonode's zForce Pad multitouch display panel set to rock the world

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/neonodes-zforce-pad-multitouch-display-panel-set-to-rock-the-wo/

Neonode's zForce Pad multitouch display panel set to rock the world

Neonode has been keeping busy over the past few years, getting into the GPS game, smartphones, and even an e-reader touchscreen. Today it's a touchscreen of a different type, or rather a range of them, multitouch LCDs spanning from 5- to 13-inches. The suite is being demonstrated in a concept reference design called the zForce Pad, highlighting its relative thinness compared to competing products. The company is also highlighting the screen's lack of a touch-sensitive layer, meaning there's less sitting between you and your pixels -- except glass, of course. Neonode is also happy to point out that this non-resistive, non-capacitive touchscreen is being adopted by "Asian companies" but won't tell us which or when they'll be releasing product based on it. Cheeky.

Neonode's zForce Pad multitouch display panel set to rock the world originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 08:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nokia serves North American X6 up for pre-order: $455 unlocked

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/nokia-serves-north-american-x6-up-for-pre-order-455-unlocked/

Nokia's downright seductive X6 just started shipping to those across the pond, and shortly after the company announced a Comes Without Music edition, along comes this: a NAM version for those who call North America home, sweet home. The pre-order page (which is live this very moment, by the way) makes no mention of a Comes With Music requirement, giving you complete freedom to shove whatever you darn well please onto what's left of that 16GB after the OS install and a hidden 'thank you' note from Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo. So, is that $455 peeking out of your Fifth Pocket really that important to you?

Nokia serves North American X6 up for pre-order: $455 unlocked originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 12:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Flash 10.1 beta 3 released, adds support for Intel GMA 500 and Broadcom Crystal HD chips (Update: 1080p Flash on a netbook!)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/flash-10-1-beta-3-released-adds-support-for-intel-gma-500-and-a/

Rejoice, owners of netbooks with Intel GMA 500 graphics: Flash Player 10.1 Beta 3 is here, complete with hardware video acceleration for your machines. That should make Hulu and YouTube HD usable on machines like the Sony VAIO P and VAIO X, the Nokia Booklet 3G, and the previous-generation Dell Mini 10. The new build also bring support for the Broadcom Crystal HD accelerator found in Pine Trail Atom machines like the newest Dell Mini 10 and HP Mini 210 -- support we found sorely lacking when we reviewed the Dell. We just tried it out on our review HP Mini 210 and it managed 720p YouTube just fine, although 1080p was a no-go -- we're waiting on some updated Broadcom drivers though, so don't take that as gospel quite yet. We'll have much more on that in our full Mini 210 review; for now you should all get downloading and let us know how it's going in comments.

Update: Success! We updated the Broadcom drivers on our Dell Mini 10 and downloaded the fresh Flash 10.1 Beta 3, and as you can see in the video below 1080p YouTube HD content plays smoothly. It's almost everything we've ever dreamed of for our netbooks. We are still having issues with the HP Mini 210 which uses the older BCM70012 Crystal HD card, but will have an update on that in our full review soon.

Continue reading Flash 10.1 beta 3 released, adds support for Intel GMA 500 and Broadcom Crystal HD chips (Update: 1080p Flash on a netbook!)

Flash 10.1 beta 3 released, adds support for Intel GMA 500 and Broadcom Crystal HD chips (Update: 1080p Flash on a netbook!) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 16:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Bloom 'Box' Energy Server hands-on (literally) with video!

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/bloom-box-energy-server-hands-on-literally-with-video/

So here it is, the now-famous (that was fast) Bloom "Box" Energy Servers -- all five of 'em -- working their magic at eBay's north campus. Not much to look at, but we're happy to say it retains a low temperature -- the only heat we really found was due to direct exposure to the light -- and remains quiet while running. There are vents just underneath the sides where cool air was being pumped out. Of course, its raison d'etre is its ability to more efficiently deliver power, which is not something we can really test ourselves. Bloom Energy showcased a number of customers today -- FedEx, Walmart, Staples, Google, Coca-Cola, Bank of America, Cox, and of course, eBay -- and if the numbers meet their mark, you can color us mighty impressed. You know the drill: gallery below, quick video after the break!

Gallery: Bloom Box Energy Server hands-on

Gallery: Bloom Energy press shots

Continue reading Bloom 'Box' Energy Server hands-on (literally) with video!

Bloom 'Box' Energy Server hands-on (literally) with video! originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 17:18:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Vertu taste on a Nokia budget: meet the N97 Mini Gold Edition

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/vertu-taste-on-a-nokia-budget-meet-the-n97-mini-gold-edition/

Phone manufacturers usually leave the gilding to jewelers and other specialty shops that are more willing to show complete disregard for taste and common sense than themselves, but once in a while, pure, unadulterated emotion gets the better of someone in a position to make product decisions -- yes, even at Nokia -- and something like this slips through the cracks. Meet the N97 Mini Gold Edition, which is pretty self-explanatory: it's an N97 Mini with 18-carat gold on the important bits. It's coming to Europe, the Middle East, and Asia at the beginning of next quarter; pricing in Poland will run 2,499 zloty (about $851) unlocked, which is a bit of a premium over the 1,999 zloty ($681) charged for the standard model.

Vertu taste on a Nokia budget: meet the N97 Mini Gold Edition originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 20:47:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Evian babies vs Etrade babies - FIGHT! - http://bit.ly/dp0V2x

MagicJack's Defamation Case Against Boing Boing Dismissed [Legal]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/o08Ud19WJIA/magicjacks-defamation-case-against-boing-boing-dismissed

Doing the right thing by exposing a company's shoddy product, customer service, or iffy privacy policy can have consequences. Our friends at Boing Boing just finished dealing with MagicJack and a groundless defamation suit because they were brutally honest.

You can read a full account of the events along with the post that started it all over at Boing Boing, but the ordeal boils down to this:

Boing Boing posted about MagicJack's "terms of service-which include the right to analyze customers' calls-and various iffy characteristics of its website" in April of 2008. According to Robert Beschizza:

The post was titled "MagicJack's EULA says it will spy on you and force you into arbitration." This EULA, or End-User Licensing Agreement, concerns what subscribers must agree to in order to use the service. I wrote that MagicJack's allows it to target ads at users based on their calls, was not linked to from its homepage or at sign-up, and has its users waive the right to sue in court. I also wrote that that MagicJack's website contained a visitor counter that incremented automatically; and that the website claimed to be able to detect MagicJacks, reporting that "Your MagicJack is functioning properly" even when none are present.

He also notes that "the post didn't criticize the service or the gadget itself, which works very well."

In March 2009, Boing Boing was notified that MagicJack was filing suit because "these statements were false, misleading, and had irreparably harmed MagicJack's reputation by exposing it to 'hate, ridicule and obloquy.'"

A great deal of back-and-forth followed until the suit was finally dismissed and MagicJack was ordered to pay Boing Boing "more than $50,000 in legal costs."

We may think that all's well that ends well and that the truth prevailed, but it took a great deal of time and legal costs. Perhaps a site smaller than Boing Boing could not have handled the effects of a defamation suit like this—justified or not—and would've given in to a company's demands. And that's more terrifying than some wonky EULA. [Boing Boing]

iPad confirmed to use PowerVR SGX graphics, Apple job posting suggests A4 chip will hit other products

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/23/ipad-confirmed-to-use-powervr-sgx-graphics/

It may not be as big a surprise as the A4 itself was, but Apple has now confirmed via the latest iPad SDK Beta 3 documentation that the iPad does indeed use PowerVR SGX graphics hardware as part of its custom system-on-a-chip, which flatly contradicts previous reports of A4 using Mali, and lines up with what our pal Anand Shimpi has been telling us lately. What Apple doesn't confirm, unfortunately, is exactly which chip in the PowerVR SGX family the iPad uses, so it's still at least possible that it could pack a bigger punch than the iPhone or iPod touch.

In related news, a recent Apple job posting has now also offered up the first hard evidence that Apple might actually be putting its huge investment in A4 to use other platforms besides the iPad -- shocking, we know. That job is for an Engineering Manager, who would lead a team focused on the "bring-up of iPhone OS on new platforms," and would otherwise be responsible for "low level platform architecture, firmware, core drivers and bring-up of new hardware platforms" -- experience with ARM-based SoCs is also an "additional success factor." Sound like the job you've been waiting for? Then hit up the link below for the complete details.

iPad confirmed to use PowerVR SGX graphics, Apple job posting suggests A4 chip will hit other products originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 23 Feb 2010 17:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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LG debuts T280 ultralight, X140, X200 netbooks

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/23/lg-debuts-t280-ultralight-x140-x200-netbooks/

Well, it looks like MSI isn't the only company churning out new systems in advance of CeBIT -- LG has now also let out word of three new laptops and netbooks ahead of the big show. Leading the pack is the stylish, CULV-based T280 ultralight pictured above, which packs an 11.6-inch display, a choice of a 1.3GHz Pentium dual-core or Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB of RAM, a 320GB or 500GB hard drive, and a price ranging from $990 to $1,094. Joining it are the X140 and X200 netbooks, the latter of which actually looks to be identical to the X20 model we spotted at in the FCC's hands earlier this month. Both of those will pack 1.66GHz Atom N450 processors, along with some other seemingly similar specs, but fairly different designs. Dive into the links below for a closer look.

LG debuts T280 ultralight, X140, X200 netbooks originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 23 Feb 2010 19:16:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Editorial: the American phone subsidy model is a RAZR way of thinking in an iPhone world

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/23/editorial-the-american-phone-subsidy-model-is-a-razr-way-of-thi/

The concept is simple enough -- pay more, get more. So it has gone (historically, anyway) with phone subsidies in this part of the world, a system that has served us admirably for well over a decade. It made sense, and although it was never spelled out at the customer service counter quite as clearly as any of us would've liked, it was fairly straightforward to understand: you bought a phone on a multi-dimensional sliding scale of attractiveness, functionality, and novelty. By and large, there was a pricing scale that matched up with it one-to-one. You understood that if you wanted a color external display, a megapixel camera, or MP3 playback, you'd pay a few more dollars, and you also understood that you could knock a couple hundred dollars off of that number by signing up to a two-year contract. In exchange for a guaranteed revenue stream, your carrier's willing to throw you a few bucks off a handset -- a square deal, all things considered. So why's the FCC in a tizzy, and how can we make it better?

Continue reading Editorial: the American phone subsidy model is a RAZR way of thinking in an iPhone world

Editorial: the American phone subsidy model is a RAZR way of thinking in an iPhone world originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 23 Feb 2010 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MIT jumps straight to wirelessly powering multiple devices

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/24/mit-jumps-straight-to-wirelessly-powering-multiple-devices/

Ah, wireless power. One of those mythical mysteries that are far more likely to remain "something to strive for" rather than "the next big thing." Oh sure, we've got Palm's Touchstone and the Powermat, but until we can hang a 50-inch plasma from our bedroom ceiling and power it up without a single wire, we'll remain firmly unsatisfied. Thankfully for those of us in that camp, MIT exists, and a few of the school's best and brightest are toiling around the clock in order to develop a technology that would power not one, but multiple devices sans cabling. Thanks to the wonders of coupling resonance, we're told that the "overall power transfer efficiency of the wireless system could be increased by powering multiple devices simultaneously, rather than each device individually." In theory, the system could be implemented by "embedding a large copper coil in the wall or ceiling of a room," but there's obviously no set time frame for release. We'll be looking for you geeks at CES next year, okay?

MIT jumps straight to wirelessly powering multiple devices originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 00:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Acoustic Metamaterials Could Make Ultra-Thin, Ultra-Effective Noise-Cancelling Panels

Source: http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-02/ultra-thin-noise-cancelling-panels-shut-out-bass

Hong Kong researchers have combined simple latex with some plastic buttons to create metamaterial panels that can stop sound waves very effectively, according to New Scientist. The reflected sound waves include low-frequency bass sounds that typically manage to sneak through the walls.

Thick pieces of certain materials, such as the commonly used foam, can typically absorb or reflect sounds, but creating a thin soundproofing material that can block low-frequency sounds has proven extremely difficult. For instance, a thin latex membrane by itself cannot resonate at the right frequency to either absorb or reflect the bass rumble of a jet taking off.

The team at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in Kowloon managed to solve the problem by creating a "membrane-type acoustic metamaterial with negative dynamic mass" that combines latex and plastic buttons. Each soundproofing panel consists of latex stretched over a 3mm-thick rigid plastic grid of squares, with a small weighted plastic button sitting in the middle of each square.

Sound waves that hit the panel cause the latex membrane and weighted buttons to resonate at different frequencies that cancel out the sound waves. Individual membranes are tuned based on the weight of the plastic buttons, so that each can cancel out a certain frequency band of sound waves.

Stacking five differently-tuned membranes together can produce a soundproof panel that works from 70 to 550 hertz, and is just slightly thicker than a ceramic bathroom tile. At least one independent researcher envisions such tiles seeing use at airports or other noisy environments -- and we're not saying that your home doesn't count. We're also not saying that soundproofing will discourage your neighbors' robotic drum circle.

[via New Scientist]

Project Natal's Lag Timed at 1/10 of a Second [Xbox 360]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/DrRDw9Usiv4/project-natals-lag-timed-at-110-of-a-second

Ever since our hands-on, we've been shamelessly excited about Project Natal...except for one key piece: The slight but undeniable lag. And now, MTV has actually put the difference between your movement and onscreen response to a stopwatch.

Over the course of several demos, MTV found that the lag ranged from .08 seconds to .12 seconds, and .10 proved to be a pretty consistent average. (You can time .10 seconds here.)

During our demo, I likened the delay in a driving game to steering an old Cadillac. Indeed, as an input device alone, such a delay will mean certain gameplay situations just aren't possible (Natal might not make the best jet simulator).

However, I still see the delay as a non-issue for the aspect of Natal that's still gone without mention by most publications—that of head tracking. You'll see what I mean in this demo by Johnny Chung Lee who, it just so happens, works on the Natal team now. The same can be said for vocal commands, facial recognition, and heck, even just spotting your exact position in a room. [MTV via Kotaku]

Custom Grip Makes Canon S90 More Grabby [Digital Cameras]

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/E5-VTAvEkRU/custom-grip-makes-canon-s90-more-grabby

The problem with elven cameras like Canon's S90 is that they're awkward to hold sometimes. Richard Franiec's custom grip—CNC-machined from a block of aircraft-grade aluminum and black-anodized to match—adds just enough extra surface area to fix that.

It stays just about as pocketable since the grip sits 1.5mm below the lens, and is attached to the camera with very high bond adhesive tape (meaning you can take it off without screwing up the camera's finish). It's 33 bucks, which isn't a bad price to pay to make one of the best point-and-shoots on the planet even more usable. [Lensmate via Gadget Lab, Richard Franiec's Picasa]

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