Inhabitat’s Week in Green: sugar-covered lamps, IKEA’s solar lamp, and the 30MPH all-wood racing bike
May 1, 2011 No Comment
Each week our friends at Inhabitat recap the week’s most interesting green developments and clean tech news for us — it’s the Week in Green. Several breakthroughs sent shock waves through the field of renewable energy this week as Inhabitat reported on a new type of “invisibility cloak” that could supercharge solar cells and researchers at MIT harnessed viruses to improve the efficiency of dye-solar cells by a full third. We also cast a keen eye on the royal wedding, which is expected to produce 6,765 tons of CO2 , and we explored a new wireless charging technology being developed by Toyota and WiTricity. And if futuristic eco cities float your boat, check out this self-sustaining ecotopia designed to produce energy and food in the North Sea. We also showcased several novel electric vehicles, including the crazy Uno 3 transforming scooter which is now available for pre-order. Alternative fuels also took off as a Kentucky man unveiled a car that runs on bourbon and a mobile greenhouse powered by renewable energy hit the streets of New York City. And from the realm of pedal-powered transportation we brought you the SplinterBike – a bicycle made entirely from wood that can hit a record-breaking 30 miles per hour. In other news, energy-efficient lighting advanced by leaps and bounds this week as we flipped the switch on IKEA’s new solar-powered Solvinden lamp and we spotted a crystalline “Stardust” LED lamp made from sugar at the Milan Furniture Fair. Finally, we shined a spotlight on Katy Perry’s debut on American Idol as a LED-studded Extraterrestrial , and we took an exclusive look inside New York City’s first LEED gold skyscraper – the Hearst Tower ! Inhabitat’s Week in Green: sugar-covered lamps, IKEA’s solar lamp, and the 30MPH all-wood racing bike originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 22:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Samsung’s Galaxy S WiFi 4.0 and 5.0 now rolling out to countries far away from you
May 1, 2011 No Comment
While Samsung has yet to announce an actual date for its new Galaxy Players in the US, their international counterparts are already heading towards other parts of the world for a head start. The Galaxy S WiFi 4.0 is said to be debuting in Russia followed by other countries, whereas its 5.0 sibling will be launched in Switzerland. In terms of specs, not much has changed since we last saw these 1GHz, DivX-friendly Android PMPs, and yes, they’ll still be shipped with Froyo “with a possibility to upgrade to 2.3 Gingerbread.” As always, we’ll let you folks know when we eventually find out about the US launch (if ever ), though to be frank, we’d rather just go for the beefier Galaxy S II instead. Continue reading Samsung’s Galaxy S WiFi 4.0 and 5.0 now rolling out to countries far away from you Samsung’s Galaxy S WiFi 4.0 and 5.0 now rolling out to countries far away from you originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 23:20:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On , a column about consumer technology. During the holiday season of 2009 when netbooks were the hot commodity , Apple lost share in the PC market. It had nothing to compete with the sunken prices and shrunken sizes of those miniature laptops. PC vendors such as ASUS and Acer, on the other hand, did well in the netbook segment, as they could call on their expertise in building inexpensive Windows notebooks. After the iPad’s introduction, though, the tablets were turned. While many PC vendors loathed the low profitability of netbooks, they were now faced with competing with their own products. With the exception of HP, which shelled out billions of dollars for webOS, the iPad set PC vendors scrambling to choose which operating system might best compete. Is it Windows, the devil they know, or Android, where they have far less experience than competitors from the smartphone market? Switched On has already taken on the role that Windows might play in future tablets , but what about Honeycomb? In contrast to the original version of Android, which was in the works prior to the introduction of the iPhone, Honeycomb arrived a year after the iPad. Android licensees, particularly smartphone vendors, surely beseeched Google for a tablet-optimized version of their preferred mobile OS. But Google may also be a victim of the iPad’s jujutsu. Continue reading Switched On: Honeycomb or the highway Switched On: Honeycomb or the highway originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 20:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Motorola’s Atrix 4G laptop dock was a seriously sweet concept, which is why we were so disappointed when it failed to pan out . Sounds like Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha is ready to give it another try, though — on the company’s earnings results call this past week, he told investors that Moto is planning a whole series of Lapdock devices in the second half of the year: You will see multiple devices from us in the second half launching with these capabilities, and we will expand the range of our Lapdock devices so we cover a broader price point, addressing both the enterprise premium tier as well as more consumer tiers. “We plan on introducing successive iterations of our Webtop software and accessories that incorporate improved productivity tools and multiple price points,” he also said, echoing previous promises to include Webtop in all high-end smartphones starting this summer. Perhaps those closely spaced I/O ports on the Droid Bionic and Targa won’t go to waste after all? If you simply can’t wait, Sanjay claims there’s also an official price drop inbound for the Atrix 4G — AT&T will offer a bundle with the Lapdock and phone for $400 later this month. Motorola promises more Atrix-like laptop docks for future phones originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 18:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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We suspected HP’s diminutive webOS 2.2 smartphone might be on its way to AT&T, and now a handful of leaked photographs rocking a panda-like color scheme have further confirmed our suspicions. As you can see from the image above, the little guy’s working the carrier’s logo in the upper left-hand corner of its 2.6-inch display. The photos of HP’s smallest webOS smartphone first appeared over at Pocketnow on Friday, just days before the Veer’s May 2nd launch party is scheduled to pop off in Los Angeles. Unfortunately, we still don’t know exactly when the Snapdragon-packing device will be available for purchase, or how much it will cost when it lands, but we’re hoping to have more on that after tomorrow’s alleged event. Until then, you can always live vicariously through our hands-on with this little multi-tasking wonder. Now, isn’t that just precious? HP’s Veer gets AT&T logo, two-tone exterior originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 19:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …PSA: AT&T DSL and U-Verse landline internet caps begin tomorrow, if you can see this website
May 1, 2011 No Comment
Tomorrow is May 2nd, 2011, and you know what that means — tomorrow is the day that AT&T will impose data caps on DSL and U-Verse Internet, and begin tallying up overage fees. At least, that was the plan on March 18th — when the company formally announced 150GB DSL and 250GB U-Verse caps — but even if you’re a paying customer who chows down several hundred gigabytes in a month, you may not have to worry about paying extra right away. AT&T specified that folks like yourself will have access to an online tool to self-police your usage before the company even begins to calculate the cost of your formerly all-you-can-eat bandwidth buffet, and as you can see in the picture above, the tool isn’t quite ready for public consumption across the entire country. Scoot on over to our source link, enter your AT&T ID, and if you see the same, perhaps you won’t have to cancel your 700-hour Star Trek marathon quite yet. PSA: AT&T DSL and U-Verse landline internet caps begin tomorrow, if you can see this website originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 13:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Researchers create two 100 terabit per second optical connections, dare us to torrent something
May 1, 2011 No Comment
Even a woman with a 40 Gbps internet connection might feel a twinge of jealousy at this news — Japan has successfully tested two separate 100 terabit per second data links that use a single optical fiber to carry their loads. New Scientist reports that NEC scholars stuffed the light from 370 lasers into 165 kilometers of fiber to achieve a speed of 101.7 Tbps, while NICT researchers set a new record of 109 Tbps using a special fiber with seven cores to manage the trick. We imagine that Alcatel-Lucent and NTT aren’t sitting still. Not that we really care who has the fastest fiber… just so long as one end leads to our house. Researchers create two 100 terabit per second optical connections, dare us to torrent something originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 16:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Verizon doc suggests BlackBerry PlayBook, HTC Trophy and Xperia Play ‘coming soon’, prices LTE tablet data and intros 4G netbooks
May 1, 2011 No Comment
What happened to the HTC Trophy , long overdue on Verizon 3G? How about the Sony Ericsson Xperia Play , mysteriously missing a Verizon release date long before Japan’s catastrophe ? Will Verizon commit to carrying the BlackBerry PlayBook this year? Just how much will LTE data cost for the Xoom and its tablet friends? We may finally have all of the answers, thanks to Verizon’s fancy new online catalog. RIM’s tablet, the PlayStation Phone and the HTC Trophy are all listed as “coming soon,” and that’s not all — both the BlackBerry Bold 9650, Curve 3G 9330 and the Droid 2 Global are all “while supplies last,” suggesting successors may be inbound. Meanwhile, tablet LTE data plans look like they’re going to cost the same as 3G ones — $20 for 1GB, $35 for 3GB, $50 for 5GB and $80 for $10GB as usual. LTE netbooks will only be able to take advantage of the two highest-priced plans, but there are a pair of them on the way, including the 11.6-inch HP Pavilion dm1 (with a 1.6GHz AMD Fusion chip) and the 10.1-inch Compaq Mini CQ10 with an Intel Atom N455 processor. Mind you, the catalog’s URL explicitly mentions “2011 Winter,” so it’s quite possible that “soon” won’t be as soon as you’d like, but to get a peek at all the goodies, check out the gallery below or shoot on over to our source link. Gallery: Verizon Winter 2011 online catalog [Thanks, Thump3rX17] Verizon doc suggests BlackBerry PlayBook, HTC Trophy and Xperia Play ‘coming soon’, prices LTE tablet data and intros 4G netbooks originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 14:17:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
Continue reading …Screen Grabs: Newly minted Bengals wide receiver AJ Green rocks Dell Streak during NFL draft (video)
May 1, 2011 No Comment
A tipster sent us video from ESPN’s NFL draft coverage , asking us to identify the giant phone in University of Georgia wide receiver AJ Green’s hand. Turns out it’s a white Dell Streak , perhaps the only phone on the market capable of dwarfing the Cincinnati Bengals’ fourth overall pick by comparison. Keep in mind, Green is a big guy — he’s 6 feet, 4 inches. He also catches footballs for a living, so we figure that, at the very least, he’s got to have average hands for a man of his size. We’re happy to report he didn’t spike the phone after hearing the news. Videographic evidence after the break. [Thanks, Ramon] Continue reading Screen Grabs: Newly minted Bengals wide receiver AJ Green rocks Dell Streak during NFL draft (video) Screen Grabs: Newly minted Bengals wide receiver AJ Green rocks Dell Streak during NFL draft (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 10:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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Looks like Gigabyte’s S1080 tablet, which landed in Taiwan earlier this month, is getting ready to hit shelves here in the US. The 10.1-inch Windows 7 slate stopped by the FCC, where it got cracked open and had its silicon-packed innards exposed for the camera. There’s nothing new to glean here — specs are still the same (dual-core Atom, 320GB hard drive, etcetera) and we haven’t heard anything about a much-needed price drop, but if you want a quick peak under the hood, check out the gallery below! Gallery: Gigabyte S1080 hits FCC Gigabyte’s S1080 Windows tablet undressed by the FCC originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 08:07:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink
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