iiView’s Latest Electronic Device: Vpad Windows 7 Tablet

Ever since Apple announced its latest device known as iPad, a number of manufacturers have released their own tablets as well. Today a new tablet was introduced in the market called iiView Vpad tablet. This new device features a 10.2 inch touchscreen display with a resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels, an Intel 945 chipset, an Intel Atom N270 1.6GHz processor, three USB 2.0 ports, a VGA port, a 2-in-1 headphone and microphone jack, built in 802.11n WiFi, 10/100 mbps Ethernet, optional 3G and user can choose between 1GB or 2GB of RAM. The iiView Vpad tablet comes with Windows 7 Starter, and cost $499 for the 160GB, 1GB RAM model, and the high end model with 3G and a 320GB hard drive and 2GB of RAM for $699.

Gallery image: toyota-prius-2010

Here’s abit of auto tech for this morning folks, the Toyota Prius is pretty well known for being the top of the class when it comes to hybrid technology. In the new 2010 version, on board technology has been much improved, both under the hood and within the cabinet. I especially fancy that solar panel equipped roof!

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The Latest in Hearing Technology: You Wont Believe Your Ears

Wearing a hearing aid is as much fun as a root canal or at least thats what most people think. Big, clunky things with lots of wires, howling feedback and constant complaints from granddad, right? Sure, you remember. But, right along with other forms of digital technology, hearing aids have gotten smaller, more comfortable, more intuitive and produce a more natural sound. These mighty, little machines have changed the way we hear and you heard it here, first.

The Latest Technology Simply Simple

Lets look at a couple of examples of this leading edge technology and how its improved hearing quality (not to mention quality of life) for millions of people.

Siemens makes some of the best hearing devices in the world and two in particular are going to make you smile if youre in the market for a better hearing experience, i.e. youre tired of asking people Whatd ya say?

Check out Siemens Artis 2 helping people with hearing loss fully appreciate all that life has to offer according to the product literature. The Artis 2 is actually one smart machine. Tiny, but smart.

First, like several other premium-grade hearing devices, the Artis 2 learns the wearers volume preferences. (Thats you.) The longer its worn, the smarter it gets and will adjust automatically. That is less that you have to do. Thats cool. Even better, the Artis 2 actually records and stores hearing aid use data so your hearing health professional can access the data for quick adjustments as needed and theyre not needed often.

Another feature a necessity in todays go-go, stay-connected world is e2e wireless' connectivity. Huh? This technology creates natural, transparent binaural hearing by synchronizing the settings between the left and right hearing aids. Directional microphone systems are synchronized to ensure optimal localization and listening in background noise. e2e also allows for one touch control you make an adjustment on one hearing aid and the other changes too. Effortlessly.

Feedback the awful, painful whistling sound is reduced digitally with feedback cancellation, meaning you can talk on the telephone with ease, usually a common cause of feedback, without having an eardrum blown out just saying Hello. Again, its all done automatically so you can focus on the world around you, not some screeching in your ear.

The Artis 2 can also differentiate between sound and just plain noise. Say youre at a noisy conference. Lots of chatter, lots of give-and-take. The Artis 2 manages speech and noise by upping the volume on speech while reducing background din. So you can hear the speaker even when some guy at your table is telling the same old joke again. The adaptive microphone used in the Artis 2 optimizes hearing settings even when youre surrounded by multiple sources of noise including the stale joke guy.

Finally, the Artis 2 comes with an optional pocket remote so you can make manual setting adjustments without making a big deal about it. You don't have to remove the device and ask your buddy to say Test. Test. while you fiddle with tiny knobs and scrolling wheels. All handled discreetly from your coat pocket no fuss, no bother, and no worries.

Siemens, one of the leaders in hearing technology, introduced one of their most advanced hearing devices.

Meet Artis 2 – “helping people with hearing loss fully appreciate all that life has to offer”. Artis 2 is a smart little device that learns the wearer’s volume preference, so that it adjusts automatically while it is being worn. Artis 2 actually records and stores hearing aid use data so your hearing health professional can access the data for quick adjustments as needed. This tiny little device is so smart, it utilizes wireless technology. Yes, both ear pieces can communicate with each other wirelessly.

The Artis 2 can also differentiate between sound and just plain noise by upping the volume on speech while reducing background din. The screeching feedback problems have also been reduced digitally with feedback cancellation.

Nuclear battery for new technology gadgets

Are you tired of your short laptop battery life with only a few hours? Would you like the charge of your mobile phone to last a couple of months? Well, the answer to your “prayers” might be the nuclear batteries, which are been developed at the University of Missouri. They are designed especially for providing a lasting source of energy. And some people think these batteries could replace the current ones, including those used by the electrical cars. According to the creators, a nuclear battery has a very enormous capacity to generate electricity when compared to a regular one.

The batteries have always been the Achilles’ heel of the mobile devices. Usually, the designers of electronic devices for mass consumption (like laptops or media players) use small displays or screens that are not very bright in order to save the scarce energy resources that are provided from the regular batteries. But the new nuclear battery would bring a solution based on a liquid semiconductor (rather than a solid semiconductor) that will produce a much longer lifetime for the battery. The reason is the solid semiconductors are attacked constantly by some radioactive elements used by other types of batteries, while the liquid semiconductor is quite resistant to these attacks. Although the term “nuclear” can be a little perturbing, the fact is that these batteries are not very different from those batteries used in, for example, medical pacemakers.

The new radioisotope battery has the size of a penny and provides much more power than the traditional ones because, according to the researches, its capacity is very superior. Jae Kwon, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Missouri, said that the radioisotope battery “can provide power density that is six orders of magnitude higher than chemical batteries”. That is to say, it provides no less than a million times more charge than any “normal” battery.

Kwon and his research team have spent enough time working to solve many problems that they have encountered when developing this type of battery. One important thing is the batteries need to be small and thin in order to be practical and useful; this way, they could be used to power watches and small electronic devices. As mentioned before, the prototype (which you can see in the picture below) has the size and thickness of a penny, but the researchers think they can achieve a thinner battery. In order to do this, Kwon has required the collaboration of another professor: J. David Robertson (chemistry professor and associate director of the MU Research Reactor). Together, they hope to maximize the power of the nuclear batteries as well as reduce the size and test other materials to make additional improvements. Kwon thinks that the final battery, which would be used in commercial gadgets, could be thinner than a human hair. For the moment, the research team have required a provisional patent in order to protect the exclusive right to use this invention.

iPhone 4G front panel

From the world of Apple rumors and leaks, we have the picture below. What is currently being speculated is that the image below features the front panel of a new iPhone 4G. Compared to the current iPhone’s front panel it appears to be 1/4 of an inch taller. As you can see, there also looks to be a shiny, reflective bit at the top which is something we haven’t seen before. Otherwise, just looking at thefront panel, there doesn’t seem to be any other noticeable new features.

The front panel of the rumored iPhone 4G has been pictured by iResQ, an iPhone repairs site, which of course as you will imagine is picking up all the buzz at the moment. This also makes us wonder if the pics are legit.

iResQ also observes that the front panel has a “reflective, mirror-like surface” near the top of the phone, and speculates that this is a relocated proximity sensor. The current iPhone’s proximity sensor is used to detect when you’re holding the phone up to your ear. If you are, it shuts off the screen to save battery life and to avoid blinding you with light.

If the reflective surface is the proximity sensor, then Apple might be planning to use the sensor for other functions as well.

If this is the real deal, then it is likely that the pictured iPhone 4G will be announced later this year at the WWDC. More pics can be seen if you click on the iResQ source link below, let us know what you think.

New Inventions

Wind-Powered Highway Lights Disconnect From the Grid

Turning The Tide To A Well Lit Tomorrow on the Highway

As far as practical renewable energy concepts go, these wind-powered highway lights are pretty elegant. And from my layman’s perspective, they seem to be practical and realistic. I like ‘em!


USB Electronic Key Impressioner Could Help You Be Gone In 60 Milliseconds

If you’re stealing a car these days, there’s a good chance you’re not bothering to actually pick the locks, but if you are, your job is about to get a little easier. A device called the Electronic Key Impressioner is inserted into a car door and scans the position of the tumblers inside. ..


Spray-On Liquid Glass Can Protect Almost Any Surface From Damage

The SiO2 coating on a filament of a microfiber. (The fissure was induced in order present an image which shows the characteristics of the coating.)
Spray-on liquid glass is transparent, non-toxic, and can protect virtually any surface against almost any damage from hazards such as water, UV radiation, dirt, heat, and bacterial infections. The coating is [...]


Knife and Fork Lifts – Workout While You Eat

Knife and Fork Lifts
A knife and fork that weigh 1½ pounds each, the better to make you eat more slowly? Seriously?
This is quite serious, according to the Knife and Fork Lift’s inventor, Tom Madden. “Everybody approaches it as a joke,” he said, “but when you think about it, it does require you to eat [...]


Invention of ‘Plastic Water’ Paves Way For Ecologically Clean Plastic Materials

Elastic water
Think Silly Putty, and you’ll probably have a very good idea what the brains at Japan’s Tokyo University have created. The new material, called Elastic Water, retains its Flubber-like consistency by mixing a few grams of clay and organic matter to H20, essentially binding the whole into a jelly-like putty.


Space-Age Plasma Jet ‘Set To Replace Dentist’s Drill’

A futuristic ‘plasma jet’ that eradicates tooth decay without fillings could be replacing the hated dentist’s drill in as little as three years, it was claimed today.
The space-age device fires a beam of electrically-charged oxygen atoms into tooth cavities to obliterate decay-causing bacteria.
Traditionally, the same job is done by drilling holes into the tooth that [...]


Brain-Cooling Motorcycle Helmet Could Save Thousands of Lives

The brain cooling helmet.

An extraordinary new ‘brain-cooling’ motorcycle helmet could save thousands of lives each year.
Called the ThermaHelm, the incredible piece of equipment comes with an inbuilt device that acts like an instant ice pack after a sudden impact.
By cooling the brain it is thought the carbon fibre helmet can reduce the risk of long-term [...]


Anti-Rape Condom Could Help Protect Victims

Rape is not a pretty topic, but it is massive global problem.

A new “anti-rape” condom could protect women in dangerous areas from being attacked. The device is a female condom filled with sharp, microscopic barbs that will attach themselves to flesh. The theory is that while the attacker is stunned and doubled-over with pain, the woman will [...]

Gartner Identifies the Top 10 Strategic Technologies for 2010

Analysts Examine Latest Industry Trends During Gartner Symposium/ITxpo, October 18-22, in Orlando

ORLANDO, Fla., October 20, 2009 — 

Gartner, Inc. analysts today highlighted the top 10 technologies and trends that will be strategic for most organizations in 2010. The analysts presented their findings during Gartner Symposium/ITxpo, being held here through October 22.

Gartner defines a strategic technology as one with the potential for significant impact on the enterprise in the next three years. Factors that denote significant impact include a high potential for disruption to IT or the business, the need for a major dollar investment, or the risk of being late to adopt.

These technologies impact the organization's long-term plans, programs and initiatives. They may be strategic because they have matured to broad market use or because they enable strategic advantage from early adoption.

“Companies should factor the top 10 technologies into their strategic planning process by asking key questions and making deliberate decisions about them during the next two years,” said David Cearley, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner. “However, this does not necessarily mean adoption and investment in all of the technologies. They should determine which technologies will help and transform their individual business initiatives.”

The top 10 strategic technologies for 2010 include:

Cloud Computing. Cloud computing is a style of computing that characterizes a model in which providers deliver a variety of IT-enabled capabilities to consumers. Cloud-based services can be exploited in a variety of ways to develop an application or a solution. Using cloud resources does not eliminate the costs of IT solutions, but does re-arrange some and reduce others. In addition, consuming cloud services enterprises will increasingly act as cloud providers and deliver application, information or business process services to customers and business partners.

Advanced Analytics. Optimization and simulation is using analytical tools and models to maximize business process and decision effectiveness by examining alternative outcomes and scenarios, before, during and after process implementation and execution. This can be viewed as a third step in supporting operational business decisions. Fixed rules and prepared policies gave way to more informed decisions powered by the right information delivered at the right time, whether through customer relationship management (CRM) or enterprise resource planning (ERP) or other applications. The new step is to provide simulation, prediction, optimization and other analytics, not simply information, to empower even more decision flexibility at the time and place of every business process action. The new step looks into the future, predicting what can or will happen.

Client Computing. Virtualization is bringing new ways of packaging client computing applications and capabilities. As a result, the choice of a particular PC hardware platform, and eventually the OS platform, becomes less critical. Enterprises should proactively build a five to eight year strategic client computing roadmap outlining an approach to device standards, ownership and support; operating system and application selection, deployment and update; and management and security plans to manage diversity.

IT for Green. IT can enable many green initiatives. The use of IT, particularly among the white collar staff, can greatly enhance an enterprise’s green credentials. Common green initiatives include the use of e-documents, reducing travel and teleworking. IT can also provide the analytic tools that others in the enterprise may use to reduce energy consumption in the transportation of goods or other carbon management activities.

Reshaping the Data Center. In the past, design principles for data centers were simple: Figure out what you have, estimate growth for 15 to 20 years, then build to suit. Newly-built data centers often opened with huge areas of white floor space, fully powered and backed by a uninterruptible power supply (UPS), water-and air-cooled and mostly empty. However, costs are actually lower if enterprises adopt a pod-based approach to data center construction and expansion. If 9,000 square feet is expected to be needed during the life of a data center, then design the site to support it, but only build what’s needed for five to seven years. Cutting operating expenses, which are a nontrivial part of the overall IT spend for most clients, frees up money to apply to other projects or investments either in IT or in the business itself.

Social Computing. Workers do not want two distinct environments to support their work – one for their own work products (whether personal or group) and another for accessing “external” information. Enterprises must focus both on use of social software and social media in the enterprise and participation and integration with externally facing enterprise-sponsored and public communities. Do not ignore the role of the social profile to bring communities together.

Security – Activity Monitoring. Traditionally, security has focused on putting up a perimeter fence to keep others out, but it has evolved to monitoring activities and identifying patterns that would have been missed before. Information security professionals face the challenge of detecting malicious activity in a constant stream of discrete events that are usually associated with an authorized user and are generated from multiple network, system and application sources. At the same time, security departments are facing increasing demands for ever-greater log analysis and reporting to support audit requirements. A variety of complimentary (and sometimes overlapping) monitoring and analysis tools help enterprises better detect and investigate suspicious activity – often with real-time alerting or transaction intervention. By understanding the strengths and weaknesses of these tools, enterprises can better understand how to use them to defend the enterprise and meet audit requirements.

Flash Memory. Flash memory is not new, but it is moving up to a new tier in the storage echelon. Flash memory is a semiconductor memory device, familiar from its use in USB memory sticks and digital camera cards. It is much faster than rotating disk, but considerably more expensive, however this differential is shrinking. At the rate of price declines, the technology will enjoy more than a 100 percent compound annual growth rate during the new few years and become strategic in many IT areas including consumer devices, entertainment equipment and other embedded IT systems. In addition, it offers a new layer of the storage hierarchy in servers and client computers that has key advantages including space, heat, performance and ruggedness.

Virtualization for Availability. Virtualization has been on the list of top strategic technologies in previous years. It is on the list this year because Gartner emphases new elements such as live migration for availability that have longer term implications. Live migration is the movement of a running virtual machine (VM), while its operating system and other software continue to execute as if they remained on the original physical server. This takes place by replicating the state of physical memory between the source and destination VMs, then, at some instant in time, one instruction finishes execution on the source machine and the next instruction begins on the destination machine.

However, if replication of memory continues indefinitely, but execution of instructions remains on the source VM, and then the source VM fails the next instruction would now place on the destination machine. If the destination VM were to fail, just pick a new destination to start the indefinite migration, thus making very high availability possible.

The key value proposition is to displace a variety of separate mechanisms with a single “dial” that can be set to any level of availability from baseline to fault tolerance, all using a common mechanism and permitting the settings to be changed rapidly as needed. Expensive high-reliability hardware, with fail-over cluster software and perhaps even fault-tolerant hardware could be dispensed with, but still meet availability needs. This is key to cutting costs, lowering complexity, as well as increasing agility as needs shift.

Mobile Applications. By year-end 2010, 1.2 billion people will carry handsets capable of rich, mobile commerce providing a rich environment for the convergence of mobility and the Web. There are already many thousands of applications for platforms such as the Apple iPhone, in spite of the limited market and need for unique coding. It may take a newer version that is designed to flexibly operate on both full PC and miniature systems, but if the operating system interface and processor architecture were identical, that enabling factor would create a huge turn upwards in mobile application availability.

“This list should be used as a starting point and companies should adjust their list based on their industry, unique business needs and technology adoption mode,” said Carl Claunch, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner. “When determining what may be right for each company, the decision may not have anything to do with a particular technology. In other cases, it will be to continue investing in the technology at the current rate. In still other cases, the decision may be to test/pilot or more aggressively adopt/deploy the technology.”

Microsoft to patch 26 holes in Windows, Office

Microsoft will patch 26 holes next week, including critical ones in Windows, one affecting the kernel of 32-bit versions, and several holes in Office, the company said Thursday in a preview of its Patch Tuesday.

Five of the 13 bulletins affect vulnerabilities that could lead to remote code execution and they are rated critical. The bulletins affect Windows 2000, XP, Vista, and Windows 7, as well as Server 2003 and 2008, Office XP, Office 2003 and Office 2004 for Mac, according to the advisory.

"The Office-related bulletins are both rated Important and would require user action to be exploited [usually in the form of convincing a user to open a specially crafted file]," Jerry Bryant, a senior security communications manager at Microsoft, wrote in a blog post. "The vulnerabilities only affect older versions of Office so customers on Office 2007 or Office 2008 for Mac will have no actions this month."

Included in the bulletins will be a fix for a hole in the kernel of 32-bit versions of Windows that Microsoft disclosed two weeks ago, Bryant said.

Meanwhile, Microsoft will not have fixes ready by Tuesday for two other issues--a hole in Internet Explorer that could lead to data leakage and which was disclosed on Wednesday, and a hole in the Server Message Block file-sharing protocol that was disclosed in November.

"We are not aware of any attacks on these vulnerabilities and continue to encourage customers to implement the mitigations and workarounds outlined in the advisories," Bryant wrote.

PSP gets video downloads too with Go!

You can now download tele from the BBC and Sky, along with movies to watch on your PSP with Sony’s new Go! View service. While we still wait for Sony to launch a film and TV download series for PS3, at least we have Go! View for PSP. The Go! View website offers TV shows and films for a free. The current line up includes Lost, Heroes, plenty of comedies and documentaries, along with sporting highlights from Sky Sports and a smattering of recent blockbusters.

Ultimate internet experience with JooJoo


Fusion garage’s JooJoo tablet PC makes conecting to internet qucik and easy. Relaxing on your couch at home or travelling in a train, JooJoo connects you with the world in quickest and simplest way.

Touch phone: Technical data of the HTC Trophy

Recently, a picture of the HTC Trophy was leaked. The picture was also accompanied by a list of technical aspects of this mobile device. They were published on HTCPedia.com, a website for HTC users with news and information about the company HTC, including its smartphones and accessories.

The features of the HTC Trophy include:

* A wide 3-inch capacitive touch screen
* A Qualcomm MSM7227 600MHz processor
* It has 512MB of ROM and 256MB of RAM
* TouchFLO 3D
* It is a very thin device: Only 11mm thickness
* It has a built-in 5-megapixel camera (which is perfect for those who like to take those unexpected pictures at any time)
* It comes with a 3.5mm audio jack
* Slot to insert microSD memory cards
* WiFi and 3G connectivity (although there is no clear indication about what type of 3G will be supported)

Of course, the specs are very decent but not quite impressive. At this point, we don’t see a strong reason to spend money by buying this mobile phone, especially if we keep in mind that some smartphones with Snapdragon processors and 3.7-inch touch screens are starting to appear on the market. But maybe some new features will be announced soon.

Anyway, it is interesting to see that this gadget has a really slim design with a thickness of only 11 mm (so it is thinner than the original Motorola RAZR V3, which has a thickness of 14 mm).

At this time, nothing is known about the launch date. And the price is also a mystery.