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Samsung is already the world’s largest maker of flash memory chips—seriously, their chips are in like everything—but it told regulators today that it’s thinking about picking up ailing industry giant SanDisk. Part of the reason, no doubt, is that Sammy pays SanDisk up to $500 million a year in royalties thanks to its massive portfolio…
We’ve been following this for a little while to let some meat stick on the skeletal rumors, and it’s finally feeling substantial enough—though definitely still a rumor—to throw your way. It looks like Nikon’s got a 41-megapixel medium format (MX) sensor up its sleeve, which is most likely for a digital rangefinder. Nikon itself teases…
According to the Wall Street Journal, Dell is restructuring their production in a massive overhaul that will send the entire manufacturing process overseas. According to one insider’s account, most or all of Dell’s factories, which are based in the US, will be sold off in 18 months.Dell has long used their own factories to assemble…
Lisa Katayama at Boing Boing has found a manga gem from the 80s: the story of Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, from the moment Woz started to get interested in gadgets until the Apple II was created and launched. Into space apparently. Truth is that I don’t have a clue of Japanese, so that’s probably…
There’s a good reason why Washington has generally veered away from 80s robot cartoons. And now we know that reason. [brewcityonline]
I don’t know what to say about the Polygon Bike, a concept that has an iPod-compatible charger powered by yourself. On one side, the bike-dock combo is just way too much. On the other, it may be actually useful for those days that you forget to charge it at home. The bike also has other…
Check out this lengthy vid: it shows how one day you may just call-in giant robots to print out a new home based on a CAD model. Research into the concrete-jet printer is being carried out by USC, and their technology can already build up complex concrete structures using technology that’s half-CNC machine and half…
Comcast has sued the FCC to overturn its order to stop slowing down P2P traffic, as was widely predicted. Even though they’re fighting to have the FCC’s ruling reversed, it’s actually not so they can go back to mucking your P2P funtime—no, they’re already way down the road of slowing down heavy users’ entire connection…
Garmin’s new fleet of GPS nav units looks fantastic, especially in light of a particular feature: Free traffic alerts lasting the lifetime of your Garmin product. But according to the first review of the nüvi 755T by PC Magazine, Garmin is coincidently preloading map screen with clickable ads (probably to offset traffic alert costs). From…
Forget the Picoo Z’s, no matter how much fun they are they can’t be as cool as making and flying your own indoor remote-control ‘copter. And over at this site there’s a set of instructions that’ll help you DIY, assuming you have some spare CD drive motors and servos lying around, and are happy with…
The StellarWindow is a USB stick loaded with a compass and tilt sensors and bundled with software to convert your laptop or tablet into an astronomy guide. Point the system at what you want to see for 3D stock photography and more information, or speak your target into the computer and the StellarWindow will point…
According to rumors, the new iTunes 8 presumably coming next week at the Apple “Let Us Rock” event will come with some beautiful new visualizations. Now, new rumors say that the new visualizations will actually be Magnetosphere, a formerly-available plugin by artist Robert Hodgin. After seeing the gorgeous video above, I hope this rumor ends…
MultiTouch, the company, not the technology, has developed the MultiTouch Cell, a multitouch LCD display that’s modular (meaning that many LCDs can assemble to make one big LCD). Beyond expandability, the screens are quite advanced, supporting multiple users and recognizing fingers in relationship to the hand as opposed to independent points (which allows for more…
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From November you’ll be able to buy the OLPC in its classic “buy one for the price of two” offer from Amazon, which should be a smoother way of distributing the device than when the OLPC was originally on sale from the source. This new Give 1 Get 1 program will also cover the Windows…
Remember the video above, with our very own and beloved Addy Dugdale cursing and tearing apart Sharp’s IFA 2007 sharp-as-knives gigantic swag bags? Well, I’m happy to report that Addy changed the world that day, once and forever. I witnessed the consequences of her actions at IFA 2008: This year, Sharp kept the same size,…
We need a new intern for the fall in New York City. Here’s what you need to know and what we want out of you, besides blood, sweat and the occasional tear: What You Need • Gadget love and knowledge &bull An alarm clock, ’cause you’ll be up early every morning • Basic experience with…
While Asus has gone a little Netbook-nuts, their recently leaked N10 is actually a promising revision on the genre dominated by clones. The 1.6Ghz Atom, 10.2″ screen and 2GB of RAM—that’s all pretty standard stuff. But three things other than its draft n Wi-Fi and face/thumb recognition have us interested in the N10. First, it’s…
Yesterday it was AMD, and today PC Watch has got hold of Intel’s Atom roadmap: looks like the next-generation of chips, dubbed “Pineview,” will hit in Q3 of next year. The 45nm processors will follow the route taken by the current gen, using hyperthreading to double up single and dual processor cores so that the…
I hate, hate, alarm clocks. Especially after going out and having way too many straight bourbons. Like yesterday. But I digress. This R2-D2 Alarm Clock will wake you up with real R2 squeeks and electrobabbles. And while it doesn’t have the same power as the much-lusted-after R2-D2 video projector, it projects the time on the…