BoxWave’s Keyboard Buddy turns your iPhone 4 into the Droid it always wanted to be
November 18, 2010 No Comment
Suffering from a little bit of Droid envy? It happens to even the most loyal of iPhone users, and now BoxWave is stepping in to make your life almost complete (we say “almost” because there’s still no native Gmail client for the iPhone, and all your tears aren’t going to solve that). The BoxWave Keyboard Buddy Case is just what it sounds like, a Bluetooth keyboard embedded in an iPhone 4 case, only instead of flipping out like the TK-421 or slide-tilting like the ultra-bulky Nuu Mini Key , BoxWave’s solution is a simple sliding affair that adds very little to the iPhone 4′s profile and hardly anything to its footprint. Also, it’s your buddy. It’ll start shipping next month, and it’s a little spendy at $70, but can you really put a price on the flattery of imitation? BoxWave’s Keyboard Buddy turns your iPhone 4 into the Droid it always wanted to be originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 20:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Ron Garriques , who has been leading Dell’s mobile communications group ever since its formation a year ago, is leaving the company. Ron originally joined Dell in 2007, after a high profile career at Motorola , and has overseen a rather ambitious entry for the company into the phone industry. Now Dell is folding the communications unit into its “core operating structure,” and Garriques won’t be along for the transition. Of course, it’s not like there haven’t been some missteps and head scratchers along the way (we still don’t know if the Streak is a phone or a tablet or a phonelet or a tabset or whatever), and it’s a little hard to tell whether Ron decided to leave willingly when he heard his unit was being absorbed, or if Dell gave him a little “push.” True or not, it would be the perfect comeuppance for the man who re-dubbed the Lightning the Dell ” Venue Pro .” Not that we’re bitter or anything. Dell’s mobile chief Ron Garriques is out originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 19:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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AT&T promised that it would be expanding its HSPA+ rollout this year, and it’s now finally touting some actual results. Speaking at the Sencha Conference in San Francisco this week, AT&T CTO John Donovan confirmed that the carrier has upgraded a full 80 percent of its network to HSPA+, which promises to offer two and half times the performance of regular HSPA. Donovan also talked a bit out mobile data use in general, and revealed that data traffic growth has actually slowed over the past few months from a rate of 50 times to 30 times what it was three years ago. Donvon was quick to point out, however, that “If you look in absolute numbers, it’s still a tremendous growth rate,” and actually represents a three thousan d percent uptick in data traffic over the past three years. AT&T: 80 percent of network now upgraded to HSPA+ originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 19:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …FingerPrint app for Mac enables AirPrint for the printers Apple left behind
November 17, 2010 No Comment
Printing never “just works,” does it? There always has to be some wrench thrown in. We were hoping Apple was about to solve some of that with AirPrint , but at the last minute it left out the Mac printer-sharing functionalities that were supposedly going to arrive with Mac OS X 10.6.5 . That means as of right now the only way to do AirPrint with the yet-to-be-released iOS 4.2 is to buy one of those fancy new HP printers with the AirPrint-compatible ePrint functionality. We’re guessing Apple is just giving this feature a little more time in the oven, but if you’re just too passionate about printing things to wait, the FingerPrint application from Collobos might fill the void. The $8 app shares just about any printer that your Mac can find over Bonjour and… well, that’s about it. Some printers work, some don’t, and there’s a trial period to find out if it’ll work with your particular setup. Too rich for your blood? There’s always the hack . FingerPrint app for Mac enables AirPrint for the printers Apple left behind originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 18:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Motorola video survey says Americans are still into paying for TV service, buying new TVs
November 17, 2010 No Comment
It doesn’t seem like everyone’s jumped on the cord cutting bandwagon just yet, as the 2010 “Media Engagement Barometer” conducted by Vanson Bourne for Motorola surveyed 7,500 consumers in 13 countries (1,000 in the US) before issuing its findings that 86 percent of Americans subscribe to pay TV providers and 6% are using video/TV on the internet, even while free OTA TV is available. And those 3D TVs that are everywhere? Worldwide, they figured 75 percent of viewers either own or plan to own an HDTV in the next 18 months, while 4% currently own 3D sets, 25 percent indicated they plan to upgrade to one in the same time period. US stats pegged 59 percent of respondents with HDTVs, 20 percent with an internet enabled set and 25 percent with a smartphone. Other results indicate we haven’t seen the last of the Twitter widget on our TVs and set-top boxes either, with 58 percent of responses showing people have used social media during a TV broadcast and would switch providers to have it integrated in their TV service. Check out the press release after the break and PDF fact sheet for more statistical breakdowns while we figure out exactly what this means for any a la carte TV dreams. Motorola video survey says Americans are still into paying for TV service, buying new TVs originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 18:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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We want one of these so bad. The LSI WarpDrive SLP-300 packs 300GB of solid state storage onto a PCI Express card and promises up to 240,000 sustained IOPS (Input / Output Operations Per Second), with 1,400MBps sustained throughput — about double the performance of OCZ’s substantially cheaper RevoDrive X2 . According to LSI, you would need over 400 regular hard drives in 36U of rack space and 300 times the power to match the WarpDrive for sheer IOPS. Sure, LSI recommends all sorts of fancy server applications to put this $11,500 card to good use, but we’ve been noticing some serious browser launch lag time lately… and we’re worth it. Continue reading LSI’s WarpDrive SSD is a steal at $11,500 LSI’s WarpDrive SSD is a steal at $11,500 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 17:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Kinect data massaged into retro-futuristic ‘Box Cloud,’ iPad tilts its way into the action
November 17, 2010 No Comment
We’re sorry if you’re like, so over Kinect hacks , but with a million tinkerers just getting warmed up on the thing, we recommend you just get comfortable and try to enjoy it. A new processing app by Chris Rojas takes the distance data and renders objects in neon cubes, with the size of the cube based on the object’s distance from the sensor. Sure, it won’t cure world hunger, but it looks pretty sweet. Of course, that wasn’t good enough, so Chris hooked his app up to TouchOSC on the iPad, which gives him sliders to define and adjust different “planes of interest,” along with the accelerometer input of the iPad to control zoom and pan of the virtual camera. Just don’t get too close to that sensor, Chris, or the MCP might decide to digitize you entirely! Check out the original, iPad-less Box Cloud video after the break. Continue reading Kinect data massaged into retro-futuristic ‘Box Cloud,’ iPad tilts its way into the action Kinect data massaged into retro-futuristic ‘Box Cloud,’ iPad tilts its way into the action originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 16:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Scientists have been working on artificial retinas for years, and while the main focus of research has been to increase the amount of light captured, a study led by Sheila Nirenberg, PhD, has taken a different tack. The new system being devised at Weill Cornell Medical College better mimics frontline photoreceptor cells, making it easier for the ganglion cells to output a more accurate image. “If you want to really restore normal vision, you have to know the retina’s code,” Nirenberg said. “Once you have that, the door is open to the possibility of restoring normal vision.” When researchers performed tests with mice, they found that those with the new system reconstructed more details (the second image, above) than those without (image three, above). “Incorporating the [more accurate] code jumped the system’s performance up to normal levels – that is, there was enough information to reconstruct faces, newsprint, landscapes, essentially anything,” Nirenberg said. The next step? Coordinating with other researchers to test the technology on human participants. Artifical retina reconstructs normal vision in mice, human trials next originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 16:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Hitachi was the first to roll out a 7,200 rpm, 3.5-inch 2TB hard drive, and it looks like it’s now done it again at the 3TB level. That comes in the form of the company’s new Deskstar 7K3000 model, which appears to not only be the first 7,200 rpm 3TB drive hard around, but Hitachi’s first drive with a 6Gbps SATA interface. Otherwise, the five-platter drive packs a 64MB cache buffer, an idle power draw of 6.8W, and what Hitachi describes as an eco-friendly, halogen-free design. Still no word on pricing or a release date, but The Inquirer surmises it’ll cost somewhere in the neighborhood of
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Well, this is interesting. VG247 has published what it says are pics from an early Sony PSP2 development kit. There isn’t much to go by in terms of back story, and in many ways it looks more like a KIRF from Mr. Blurrycam’s vintage collection than something for software testing, but let’s hear what the site has to say: HD screen, two cameras (front and rear), microphone, two thumbsticks, and a rear “trackpad” of sorts, presumably akin to what we’ve seen on the PS Phone leak . VG247 later updated to say that a source claims it’s an earlier version of the kit and that a revision has since been developed without a sliding screen — a move to perhaps deal with ( also rumored ) overheating concerns. We know a PSP2 exists in some form, so this can go one of two ways — either cleaner shots will be found, or an entirely different leak will surface later. Given the suspect Fall 2011 debut, we have plenty of time to wait around and see. [Thanks, Ross M -- no relation] Early PSP2 dev kit in the wild? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 14:52:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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