Thursday, August 02, 2012

Dying a Single Shirt With CO2 Saves 25 Liters of Water [Video]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5931326/dying-a-single-shirt-with-co2-saves-25-liters-of-water

Dying a Single Shirt With CO2 Saves 25 Liters of WaterThe simple act of turning a shirt from white to blue—or any color—requires 25 liters of water and enough harmful chemicals that every clothing manufacturer should be looking for safer methods. Like this fantastic CO2-based DryDye technology that Adidas has started using which doesn't require a single drop of H2O.

But it's not like the color dyes are blasted at the shirts with a pressurized CO2 canister—although that would be pretty awesome. In reality, the fabrics and chemical dyes are placed in a large sealed chamber, and CO2 is pumped in to a pressure of about 74 bar. The tank is also heated to 88 degrees fahrenheit at which point the CO2 behaves like a gas and a liquid, allowing the colored dyes to thoroughly permeate the fabrics without the use of excessive chemicals.

The DryDye process actually uses about half the chemicals as traditional water-based dying methods, and requires about half the energy too, so it seems like an all-around better way to go about tinting clothing. Which is probably why Adidas has already made 50,000 shirts using this safer process this summer, and is banging the drum so everyone knows how awesome they are for doing so. [Adidas via Gizmag]

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Software Glitch Costs Trading Firm $440 Million In 45 Minutes [Wtf]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5931284/software-glitch-costs-trading-firm-440-million-in-45-minutes

Software Glitch Costs Trading Firm $440 Million In 45 MinutesKnight Capital lost $440 million in a flash on Wednesday when newly installed trading software went haywire. That's nearly double the company's second quarter revenue, and could be enough to sink Knight for good.

You know all the concerns about automated high-speed trading on the stock market? This.

So how does a screw up this colossally epic happen? According to The New York Times, the company "accidentally sold all of the stocks it bought Wednesday morning." Seriously:

The problem on Wednesday led the firm's computers to rapidly buy and sell millions of shares in over a hundred stocks for about 45 minutes after the markets opened. Those trades pushed the value of many stocks up, and the company's losses appear to have occurred when it had to sell the overvalued shares back into the market at a lower price.

Oopsies! What? How the hell does that happen by accident? This isn't the first time a computer error has caused massive losses on the stock market—in fact Knight took it on the chin during the NASDAQ Facebook IPO fiasco as well—and it's just going to keep happening if the industry isn't better regulated. Financial institutions hate regulation, but as this case plainly proves rules aren't just there to protect us plebs. They can save billionaire asses as well. [New York Times]

Image via Mark Lennihan / AP

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ARM claims new GPU has desktop-class brains, requests OpenCL certificate to prove it

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/08/02/arm-mali-opencl/

ARM claims new GPU has desktopclass brains, requests OpenCL certificate to prove it

It's been a while since ARM announced its next generation of Mali GPUs, the T604 and T658, but in the semiconductor business silence should never be confused with inactivity. Behind the scenes, the chip designers have been working with Khronos -- that great keeper of open standards -- to ensure the new graphics processors are fully compliant with OpenCL and are therefore able to use their silicon for general compute tasks (AR, photo manipulation, video rendering etc.) as well as for producing pretty visuals.

Importantly, ARM isn't settling for the Embedded Profile version of OpenCL that has been "relaxed" for mobile devices, but is instead aiming for the same Full Profile OpenCL 1.1 found in compliant laptop and desktop GPUs. A tall order for a low-power processor, perhaps, but we have a strong feeling that Khronos's certification is just a formality at this point, and that today's news is a harbinger of real, commercial T6xx-powered devices coming before the end of the year. Even the souped-up Mali 400 in the European Galaxy S III can only reign for so long.

Continue reading ARM claims new GPU has desktop-class brains, requests OpenCL certificate to prove it!

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ARM claims new GPU has desktop-class brains, requests OpenCL certificate to prove it originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Aug 2012 14:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Samsung's New Superfast Chips Could Fuel Your Future iPhone [Guts]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5931281/samsungs-new-superfast-chips-could-fuel-your-future-iphone

Samsung's New Superfast Chips Could Fuel Your Future iPhoneSamsung has just announced some superfast new chips and they might one day power an iPhone.

The company claims the Pro Class 1500 line is the Usain Bolt of flash memory cards—four times speedier than predecessors, and possibly the fastest chips around. They can read data at 140 MB per second and write it at 50 MB per second and process at 1,500 IOPS (inputs/outputs per second) for writing and 3,500 for reading. They come in 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB configurations. Despite their very public squabbling, Samsung still provides Apple with some very important components, including flash memory.

And the latest chips could be the innards that supercharge not your next iPhone, but your next next iPhone. [Samsung Tomorrow via Engadget]

Image credit: Samsung Tomorrow

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Compact Hydroponics Cube Turns an Extra Parking Spot Into a Vegetable Farm [Video]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5931253/compact-hydroponics-cube-turns-an-extra-parking-spot-into-a-vegetable-farm

Tired of paying the exorbitant markup for fresh produce at your grocery store? For a mere $70,000—and the cost of finding someplace else to park your car—this compact hydroponics container lets you grow a farm's worth of vegetables on a minimal chunk of land.

In fact, the creators of the aqua-cube claim it can successfully grow up to 23 different varieties of leafy vegetables, or smaller root plants like radishes and turnips, at the same time. And while $70,000 is certainly a steep investment, its yield is promised to be upwards of 10,000 heads of lettuce per year. More than the average family can consume, but perfect for a restaurant with a free parking spot near the kitchen. Just make sure you spring for the rooftop solar panel option to help cut down on the aqua-cube's $4,500 yearly power bill.

Compact Hydroponics Cube Turns an Extra Parking Spot Into a Vegetable Farm

[DigInfo TV]

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