Ross Rubin contributes Reserve Power , a column focused on personal perspectives and products. They come from across the country to a conference room at Telebrands, the Fairfield, NJ-based infomercial marketer that serves as the arbiter in the TV show Pitchmen . It was Inventors Day, an event that the company holds around the country about every six weeks. Those who submit the best ideas to inventorsday@telebrands.com are invited to present. At stake, the chance to design Telebrands’ next hit product and become a millionaire. And all that stood between them and fortune was a convincing pitch to the judging panel (made up of CEO A.J. Khubani, his wife Poonam Khubani, and marketing advisor Don Braca) and a permanently installed five-foot long model of a PedEgg — invented by the Telebrands CEO in ’97 — signed by company well-wishers. Continue reading Reserve Power: when inventor meets informercial, Part 1 Reserve Power: when inventor meets informercial, Part 1 originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 20:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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We’re pretty sure someone out there is snapping up gaming laptops with spray-painted red dragons and speaker grilles that look like belt buckles , but we suspect plenty of you just crave something that isn’t going to embarrass you at your next LAN party. Grown-ups, meet the ASUS G74, that buttoned-up fellow you see there. So far, we’ve found two configurations, both of which include a quad-core Core i7-2630QM CPU, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560M graphics with 3GB of video memory, 12GB DDR3 RAM (out of 16GB), dual 750GB 7200RPM drives, 1080p display, a Blu-ray player, backlit keyboard, and a USB 3.0. socket (along with three of the 2.0 variety). That’s what the G74SX-A1 ($1,745) looks like, and there’s also a $1,979 version with a 3D display, dubbed the G74SX-3DE. That generally matches what the new $1,899 Qosmio X770 has to offer, though the G74 is the clear winner in the memory department and, well, you can’t put a price on taste, right? Hit the source links to pre-order, and find some fancy press shots below that promise not to incinerate your eyeballs with tackiness. Gallery: ASUS G74 ASUS quietly releases G74 gaming laptop, promptly puts it up for pre-order originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 18:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Mozilla promised a faster refresh cycle for its wily web browser, following the release of Firefox 4 , and it’s made good on that promise. We got word this morning that the final version of Firefox 5 is now available for download on Mozilla’s ftp server, just 12 weeks after the last re-up. The latest incarnation brings with it support for CSS animation and a more easily accessible do-not-track setting — now available at the top of the privacy pane — but won’t see much in the way of GUI enhancements. Of course, if you want to play it safe, and avoid any last-minute tweaks, you can always hold off until version 5 gets official, but what’s the fun in that? If you’ve already got your hands on the sly fox, let us know your thoughts in the comments below. [Thanks, Haseeb] Firefox 5 slips out ahead of schedule, gets official June 21st originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 16:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Nintendo says one Wii U controller per console, robs player two of extra screen
June 18, 2011 No Comment
Nintendo’s tablet-esque Wii U controller raised a few questions when it was announced at E3. Questions like, “What kind of crazy games are going to use that thing,” and “How much will a second controller cost me?” The latter, at least, has been answered. Nothing. You don’t need one. Nintendo’s Satoru Iwata recently said in an interview that games enlisting more than one Wii U controller aren’t being considered just yet — although they are possible. Our very own Ittosai tells us that Iwata told Diamond Online that the Wii U can technically support multiple screen-controllers, but that additional slabs would be too expensive to sell on their own. Iwata went on to say that the console would ship with only one, and that game developers should design titles under the assumption that each console will use a single Wii U controller. Player two will have to settle for a good ‘ol Wiimote, and even Satoru himself admits that there are plenty of those around. Nintendo says one Wii U controller per console, robs player two of extra screen originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 15:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …ChevronWP7 Labs will jailbreak your Windows Phone with Microsoft’s approval
June 18, 2011 No Comment
Microsoft just earned itself a boatload of geek-cred and made Apple and Sony look pretty bad in the process. We knew the Windows Phone team was playing nice with the jailbreakers from ChevronWP7, but we didn’t realize just how cozy the two were going to get. Today the devs announced that ChevronWP7 Labs would open up soon, with the approval of Redmond, allowing users to load homebrew apps on their handsets. Unlike tools from the iPhone Dev Team , this service won’t be free. Instead, customers will have to cough up a small fee via PayPal — but we’re sure many of you are more than willing to pay a reasonable price to avoid the sort of cat and mouse game Apple has been playing with hackers since 2007. ChevronWP7 Labs will jailbreak your Windows Phone with Microsoft’s approval originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 13:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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NYU’s Langone Medical Center is getting a jump on that whole 21st-century medical care thing by ditching the clipboards and paperwork for palm scans and digital databases. On June 5th the hospital threw the switch on an electronic patient-tracking program from Epic Systems and paired it with biometric identification technology from PatientSecure, which scans the veins in persons hands using near-infrared light. Instead of being forced to fill out forms with your insurance info and social security number every time you visit, you simply place your hand on a scanner and — ta-da! — your records come right up. By combining the vasculature scans (which are even more unique than fingerprints) with patient photos, NYU should be able to minimize misidentification and cut down on duplicate records. Rather than go out on some cheesy pun about palm reading, we’ll leave the predictable word play to the folks at ABC news — check out their coverage after the break alongside PR from the Langone Medical Center. Continue reading NYU medical center goes sci-fi, scans patients’ palms NYU medical center goes sci-fi, scans patients’ palms originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 11:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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In Insert Coin, we look at an exciting new tech project that requires funding before it can hit production. If you’d like to pitch a project, please send us a tip with “Insert Coin” as the subject line. We’re not sure proper air guitarists would ever consider adding a bonafide pick to their cherished imaginary pastime, but what if a petite plastic plectrum could turn those strokes into stringed acoustics that more than just you can hear? That’s the idea behind Air Guitar Move, a $50 motion-sensing guitar pick that pairs with a dedicated iPhone app using a single dock-connected string. The minds behind Move aren’t new to product design — Colin Karpfinger created Thumbies, a suction cup-based gaming control accessory for iPhone, and Ronald Mannak has launched other freestyle electronic toys, including the V-Beat AirDrums and AirGuitar — so if they meet their $25,000 funding goal, we imagine that we’ll have a very solid iPhone accessory on our hands. A $39 pledge gets you a single Move with a 20 percent discount, and a pledge of $49 will net you a pick from the first shipment, so you’ll be strumming away a month before folks in the first group. The creators have yet to commit to a ship date, but head over to Kickstarter if you’d like to make a pledge, or jump past the break for the intro video and an update on our last featured product, ZionEyez . Continue reading Insert Coin: Air Guitar Move for iPhone (video) Insert Coin: Air Guitar Move for iPhone (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 12:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Sun’s coronal ejections caused by magnetic ropes, galactic weathermen to predict solar storms?
June 18, 2011 No Comment
Space weather gets nasty when the sun starts shooting plasma into the cosmos, and these solar storms wreak havoc on both satellites and gadgets here on earth. Scientists want to predict the sun’s eruptions so we can protect our gear (and know the best time to go tanning), and George Mason University researchers have made a discovery that may help us do so. By examining images from NASA’s Solar Dynamic Observatory spacecraft , Professor Jie Zhang and grad student Xin Cheng determined that magnetic ropes are causing coronal ejections . The ropes are formed by several magnetic fields wrapped around each other, and scientists believe they can carry electrical currents strong enough to cause the plasma bursts. Prior to an eruption, Zhang observed a low-lying channel with unique electromagnetic properties (believed to be a magnetic rope) heat a portion of the sun’s surface up to 10 million degrees. Once hot enough, the spot spewed forth copious amounts of the plasma and magnetic energy that gives GPS units and phones fits. Now that we know what gets Helios all riled up, we just need to find a way to calm him down . Close-ups of the sun in its tizzy are after the break. Continue reading Sun’s coronal ejections caused by magnetic ropes, galactic weathermen to predict solar storms? Sun’s coronal ejections caused by magnetic ropes, galactic weathermen to predict solar storms? originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 09:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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At the moment, there are two very similar-looking e-readers with black-and-white Pearl E Ink touchscreens on the market, and now, the smaller and less expensive of the pair is up for grabs. The Kobo eReader Touch Edition went on sale today in the US and Canada for $129.99 (or $139.99 Canadian Dollars) at Best Buy, Borders, Walmart, and the Canadian bookseller Indigo. If you’ll recall, the 6-inch Kobo is thinner, lighter, and more compact than the Nook Touch, even though its screen is the same size. It also undercuts it by $10 but , it lacks a memory card slot, and there’s only 1GB of internal memory reserved for book storage. Could these trade-offs be worth the trimmer design? We’ll leave that to you and your wallet (and the guy who may or may not receive this as a last-minute Father’s Day gift). Continue reading Kobo eReader Touch Edition goes on sale in the US and Canada Kobo eReader Touch Edition goes on sale in the US and Canada originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 07:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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There are 53 “official” Jelly Belly flavors available at present, few (if any) of which are MP3 compatible — strange, really, in an era where pretty much everything else is capable of music playback. The company’s new gadget cases are perhaps the next best thing, though despite the fact that they’ll add a candy-like scent to your iPhone, iPod touch, nano, or BlackBerry (sadly not this guy ), biting into them will almost certainly void your warranty — and raise your dental co-pay. The cases are currently available and will run you $15 apiece, the same price as the new Jelly Belly-branded headphones, which are similarly recommended for external use only. Continue reading Jelly Belly cases make your iPhone smell edible, come in BlackBerry flavor Jelly Belly cases make your iPhone smell edible, come in BlackBerry flavor originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 18 Jun 2011 06:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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