Dr. Augustine Fou's Online Scrapbook

Wednesday, January 08, 2014

Gigabyte's dual GPU Aorus gaming laptop is less than an inch thick

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/08/gigabytes-aurous-dual-gpu-one-inch/

To impress us with a gaming laptop these days requires more than just spec-bombing, but Gigabyte's Aorus has grabbed our attention. For starters, the 17.3-inch model is a mere 0.9-inches thick and weighs 6.4 pounds, rather insane numbers considering that it packs a pair of NVIDIA GTX 765M chips in an SLI configuration. In comparison, the 17-inch Razer Blade Pro is almost exactly the same size with a single GPU. To achieve that, Gigabyte made the case out of solid aluminum with a sculpted look only a gamer could love, while packing copious vents and ports to duct away the hot air. The rest of the specs are also top-tier: a 17.3-inch, 1080p display, Intel Core i7-4700HQ CPU, up to 32GB of RAM, three USB 3.0 slots, 500GB of mSATA SSD storage max, and up to a TB of 2.5-inch HDD storage. Gigabyte calls it a "powerplant on your lap," and it'll arrive around March for $2,099 -$2,799 depending on options. If you're interested, some heat-proof pants might also be in order.

Filed under: Gaming, Laptops

Via: The Verge

Source: Gigabyte

Intel Unveiled Some Massive Innovations Yesterday But The Only Thing People Are Talking About Is This 'Smart Bowl'

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/intel-smart-bowl-2014-1

Intel Smart Wireless Charging Bowl reference_design

We've all got one: A large bowl that sits in the kitchen or the hall or the dining room where you put all the junk you don't have any other place for: keys, mail, rubber bands, matches, batteries, take-out menus, whatever.

At CES, the big tech conference in Las Vegas, Intel unveiled a "smart bowl" that could change all that forever. It's a wireless charging bowl: You dump your phone, iPod, earpiece, Fitbit or any other gadget that needs a charge into it and — boom! — pick it out a while later and it's fully charged.

No more wires. No more jacks. No more plugs and sockets.

Your gadgets go into the bowl (probably with a bunch of other non-tech junk too) and voila! They're charged.

The irony of the announcement is that Intel CEO Brian Krzanich unveiled a bunch of new, potentially game-changing initiatives at his keynote last night: a PC the size of a golf ball called Edison and an end to the use of "conflict minerals" from African war zones in its products, among them.

Intel Smart Wireless Charging Bowl But as people left the gargantuan Venetian ballroom where he gave his speech, and as Business Insider chatted with other people at CES who had been at the event, it was clear that the bowl was the thing that really caught everyone's imagination.

Basically, we're all saying the same thing: I've got a bowl full of junk in my house, and I would totally use a smart bowl if it charged my stuff while it was in there.

There's something else going on here too. While Intel's announcements were impressive, they weren't perfect. Some of them had a somewhat sinister surveillance bent to them. Intel has a smart watch coming that allows an app u! ser to t rack its wearer — like a parent tracking their kids — for instance.

Separately, although Intel's other new devices seemed useful (like the Jarvis earpiece that can handle a conversation and manage your phone even when it's not switched on) the design wasn't great. Jarvis looks like a hearing aid, not something you'd actually wear by choice.

The smart bowl, however, was sleekly designed, simple and useful.

Everyone seems to want one. Intel, however gave few details about it. You can read Krzanich's speech here, to see exactly what he said about it. And there are some technical specs here. But as far as we can tell, right now, it's simply a prototype and not a product.

Join the conversation about this story »

Tuesday, January 07, 2014

Limitless Tracks How Productive You Are Online, Motivates You to Focus

Source: http://lifehacker.com/limitless-tracks-how-productive-you-are-online-motivat-1496372876

Limitless Tracks How Productive You Are Online, Motivates You to Focus

Chrome: How productive are you, really, when you're online? Unless you track your time, you might not really know. Limitless is a new extension that not only tracks your browsing habits, it also inspires you to complete your goals.

Every time you open a new tab, Limitless greets you with a productivity tip, a pleasant background, and how much time you've spent on different site categories. You can edit sites' categories in case you want to put Lifehacker into entertainment rather than productivity, for example (but you wouldn't do that, would you?). When you first set the extension up, you tell the app your goals for the new year and can also add a daily goal, to be reminded of these when you open a new tab.

Limitless also displays how long you've been on a productive or time-wasting site with a green or red number in the icon.

If you tend to get really distracted, you'll probably need a more powerful site blocker, but for everyone else, this is a helpful tool, much like RescueTime, but for your browser. A Firefox version is in the works.

Limitless | Chrome Web Store via Your Story

Razer's Modular Desktop Makes Building a PC Like Playing with Legos

Source: http://gizmodo.com/razers-modular-desktop-makes-building-a-pc-like-playin-1496479940

Razer's Modular Desktop Makes Building a PC Like Playing with Legos

Building your own computer is generally reserved for the hardcore, the devoted, the geeky. But with Razer's Project Christine, it's as easy as playing with Legos. Really big, actively mineral cooled Legos. Also it looks like a badass rack of rockets or something, which is cool as shit.

Hands On: I Just Fell In Love With LG's Flexible 4K OLED TVs

Source: http://gizmodo.com/hands-on-i-just-fell-in-love-with-lgs-flexible-4k-ole-1496503499

Hands On: I Just Fell In Love With LG's Flexible 4K OLED TVs

The other night we saw a bunch of Samsung's curved 4K TVs, including a gigantic one that could flex between flat and curved. They looked pretty good. LG's curved 4K OLED TVs absolutely blow them out of the water.

Panasonic 4K Life+Screen Television Eyes-On: Life After Plasma

Source: http://gizmodo.com/panasonic-4k-life-television-eyes-on-life-after-plasm-1496587187

Panasonic 4K Life+Screen Television Eyes-On: Life After Plasma

Yesterday, Panasonic says that its new 4K LED Life+Screen TVs have picture quality that's just as good as its recently murdered plasma line. I spent some time with the 85-incher. Plasma was wonderful, but everything's gonna be OK. There can still be beauty.

Toshiba Crammed 5 Computers in Its Shape-Shifting Concept 5-in-1 PC

Source: http://gizmodo.com/toshiba-crammed-5-computers-in-its-shape-shifting-conce-1496625032

Toshiba Crammed 5 Computers in Its Shape-Shifting Concept 5-in-1 PC

It's a concept but it's a super fun one. Toshiba's shape-shifting concept 5-in-1 PC somehow manages to be a laptop, a tablet, a convertible tablet, a canvas, and a presentation TV-type device. A few of those five might be redundant (and/or useless), but it's pretty freaking sweet to see one computer try to be everything you want it to be.

drag2share: Look At These Insanely Huge Curved TVs Coming Soon To A Living Room Near You

source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/~3/syJQOG3EPpE/curved-tvs-at-ces-2014-1

Yesterday, we told you that Samsung's big product reveal for 2014 was a bunch of giant, curved TVs as much as 150 inches wide.

But Samsung isn't the only company promoting gigantic bendy screens at CES, the consumer electronics show in Las Vegas, this year. Panasonic and Haier both have their own wave-shaped screens coming.

And it's not until you get up close to them that you realize just how curvaceous these new beauties are.

First, here's a look at Samsung's Ultra High Def (UHD) screen. Check out the curve on this thing:

Samsung curved TV

The closer you get to it, the more rounded it becomes. Makes you wonder how it's going to look against your non-curved living room wall:

Samsung curved TV

What the photo above doesn't show is that the picture on the screen stays sharp and "natural" looking even when viewed from the side. There is very little image distortion if you don't get the prime middle seat on the sofa.

Not to be outdone, Panasonic also has a bunch of curved 4K OLED screens that appear to bend in both concave and convex ways:

Panasonic curved TV

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Article: Intel unveils RealSense hardware and software line, including 3D camera module

The takeaway at today's Intel press event? All signs point to the RealSense product line -- a number of hardware and software products that "make interaction with technology simple, more natural and immersive," according to Intel's own words. The first product bearing the compound name is the Rea...

http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/06/intel-realsense/

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Article: Pebble Reveals The Pebble Steel For $249 Shipping Jan. 28; App Store Coming Soon

[tc_rr_related_video] Smartwatch pioneer Pebble is introducing something everyone has been waiting for at CES this year: new hardware. But the hardware isn't so new that it throws the baby out with the bath water – any software developed for the current Pebble will work with the new one, and vice...

http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/06/pebble-reveals-the-pebble-steel-for-249-shipping-jan-28-app-store-coming-soon/

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Article: Polaroid C3 packs an HD camera into a one-inch-cubed form factor

Who fancies a one-inch-cubed action camera with an HD video sensor? Polaroid hopes you're about to say, "Oh, me!" This little video camera was spotted on the floor of Pepcom's Digital Experience at CES and captures video at 720p onto microSD card. Its lens covers 120 degrees for wide-angle shooti...

http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-01/07/polaroid

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Article: Lumo BodyTech Introduces The Lift: A Small, Stylish Wearable For Better Posture

Palo Alto-based Lumo BodyTech is revealing its second product today, the Lumo Lift. The Lift, like its original Lumo Back, is a device designed to enhance a user's posture, but with a radically different take. The Lift is small and stylish, and is designed to be placed unobtrusively on the collar...

http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/07/lumo-lift/

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Article: Fitbit Partners With Tony Burch For High Fashion Accessories

The $99 Fitbit Flex is about to get an injection of fashion. Today, at CES 2014, Fitbit is announcing a partnership with the fashion brand Tony Burch for a line of accessories. Pricing has not been announced yet, but chances are these accessories will cost nearly as much as the $99 Flex. Fitbit r...

http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/07/fitbit-partners-with-tony-burch-for-high-fashion-accessories/

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Article: Vimeo Rolls Out A Totally Rebuilt HTML5-Based Video Player

One of the key differentiators for Vimeo over the years is simply its user experience, and a lot of that comes from its video player. It's one of the reasons that all sorts of artsy independent creators decide to upload and distribute their videos on Vimeo instead of just putting them on YouTube....

http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/07/vimeo-new-video-player/

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Monday, January 06, 2014

Epson introduces new Moverio glasses with head-motion tracking and camera

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/06/epson-moverio-bt200/

Everybody knows about those other smart glasses, but they're certainly not the only ones making a big fuss these days. Epson has been working on a similar product called the Moverio BT-100, for the last few years, and it's ready to show off the next iteration of its signature wearable at CES. This one, the BT-200, will retail for the same $700 price point as the original, and comes with Android 4.0 support and a few new features and capabilities: Bluetooth 3.0 support, head-motion tracking aided by sensors and Dolby Digital Plus for surround sound are among the new options. Also, there's a front-facing camera with image and video capture, but bystanders won't need to worry about asking you if you're filming them -- an LED lights up on the lower left corner anytime you're trying to capture precious moments.

But how does it look inside the glasses? Thanks to a pair of tiny transparent displays built into the glasses, you can view movies, play games, do augmented reality and conduct other tasks while walking around, talking to other people or any other normal activity. It comes with an Android device attached that doesn't actually feature a touchscreen; rather, it acts like a mouse of sorts, mimicking your movements on the display and letting you drag the cursor around to wherever you want. It also features wireless mirroring, so other people can watch you fall flat on your virtual face on a HDTV. Sound good to you? Check out our full gallery of images and save up $700 before March.

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