Dr. Augustine Fou's Online Scrapbook

Friday, October 29, 2010

Dean Kamen unveils revamped bionic arm and water machine, LED light bulb powered by Cree

Segway inventor Dean Kamen just stole the show at TEDMED 2010, with both a far-reaching lecture on how technology can save the developing world, and a peek at his latest projects. We'll spare you the wave of guilt for now and get right to the cool stuff, like the latest rendition of his Luke prosthetic arm and Slingshot water machine. Dean admitted he's having difficulty finding companies interested in manufacturing the former, but it's looking snazzier than when it last grabbed Stephen Colbert, with components like this shoulder piece printed out of titanium in a custom 3D printer, and it's slated to look like this. The Slingshot's seeing even more action, as Dean and company have pulled it out of the ugly box into these svelte tubes, and finally has a distribution deal (with Coca-Cola, of all companies) to bring the clean-water-from-any-source machines to developing countries early next year.

Last but not least, the man's got a product you might be able to afford for your home. In the quest for an item for his FIRST young engineers to sell -- a la Girl Scout cookies -- he tapped LED manufacturer Cree to produce an 450 lumen light bulb that draws just 7 watts and will retail for about $25 door-to-door. In case you're wondering, that's cheaper and more efficient than most any lamp we've seen before. Dean says they've already produced several hundred thousand of the bulbs thanks to a surprise $3 million investment from Google, and plan to have them in the hands of every FIRST kid soon. Keep on fighting the good fight, Dean.

Gallery: Dean Kamen at TEDMED 2010

Dean Kamen unveils revamped bionic arm and water machine, LED light bulb powe! red by C ree originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Oct 2010 20:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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ASUS lays out Armdroid and Wintel tablet plans, we already feel overwhelmed

Leave it to ASUS to blast out an entire series of tablets that saturate the market in a single go. Many of these have already been mentioned, leaked, or even revealed at trade shows. But now we've got company president, Jerry Shen, filling in the launch details. Starting in December, ASUS will begin launching tablets in 7-, 9-, 10-, and 12-inch form factors. The 12-inch model will run Windows on an Intel chipset and be ready for purchase in January. Of interest, Shen says that Microsoft assisted in the development by making several enhancements to related technologies including touch control and the user interface. In March ASUS will launch a pair of 7 inchers (one with WiFi and the other with "3.5G" and phone functions) and another pair of 9-inch tablets (an ARM-based Tegra 2 model running Android and another Wintel tablet) with a price gap of $100. Of course, we've see a 10-incher around as well. That means we should see a grand total of five or six tablets from ASUS at CES in January. Fun.

ASUS lays out Armdroid and Wintel tablet plans, we already feel overwhelmed originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 29 Oct 2010 05:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Acer Liquid Metal gets official in the UK with Android 2.2 and Breeze UI

After seeing quite a few leaks, Acer just made its Liquid Metal handset official. The 3.6-inch slate runs Android 2.2 Froyo atop an 800MHz Qualcomm MSM7230 processor. Inside all that molten metal you'll find 802.11n WiFi, support for 14.4Mbps HSDPA, DLNA/UPnP streaming support, Dolby Surround technology, and an image stabilized 5 megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash capable of recording video at 720p (30fps). Acer's new handset also features a new Breeze UI and SocialJogger app that aggregates Twitter and Facebook feeds. Look for it to land in brown in the UK starting mid November for £299. A silver version should arrive in early December. Still no word on that AT&T compatible jobbie that passed through the FCC. One more image and the full press release after the break.

Continue reading Acer Liquid Metal gets official in the UK with Android 2.2 and Breeze UI

Acer Liquid Metal gets official in the UK with Android 2.2 and Breeze UI originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 29 Oct 2010 06:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Thursday, October 28, 2010

OCZ amps up performance on RevoDrive X2 PCIe SSD: 740MB/sec, up to 120k IOPS

Blink, and you've probably missed it. Just four short months after we saw OCZ Technology's original RevoDrive reviewed (and subsequently adored), along comes revision two. The RevoDrive X2 PCI-Express SSD looks, feels and smells the same as the first, but the performance is obviously looking north. The unit we saw introduced at Computex was capable of hitting 540MB/sec, while the X2 pushes that to 740MB/sec and up to 120,000 IOPS -- "nearly triple the throughput of other high-end SATA-based solutions." Furthermore, this guy packs double the SandForce SF-1200 controllers (four versus two in the original), and it retains the onboard RAID 0 design that you've come to know and love. It's available as we speak in 100GB to 960GB capacities, but there's nary a mention of price; something tells us that you're probably not the target market if you have to ask.

Gallery: OCZ RevoDrive X2 PCI-Express SSD

Continue reading OCZ amps up performance on RevoDrive X2 PCIe SSD: 740MB/sec, up to 120k IOPS

OCZ amps up performance on RevoDrive ! X2 PCIe SSD: 740MB/sec, up to 120k IOPS originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Oct 2010 16:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Bang & Olufsen rolls out 32-inch BeoVision 10-32

It's still a long way from the more budget-friendly model you may have been hoping for, but Bang & Olufsen has now at least introduced a smaller BeoVision LCD TV. That comes in the form of the company's new 32-inch BeoVision 10-32, which hangs onto many of the features of the other BeoVision 10 series TVs, including edge LED-backlighting, a DVB-HD module, and a pair of built-in speakers that B&O says offers a sound quality that is "quite superior compared to the market level for TVs of this size" -- you can even add your choice of one of two motorized stands. Just how much will it cost you? Try €4,000, or roughly $5,500. Full press release is after the break.

Continue reading Bang & Olufsen rolls out 32-inch BeoVision 10-32

Bang & Olufsen rolls out 32-inch BeoVision 10-32 originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Oct 2010 12:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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