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Archive for the ‘Hardware’ Category

Google did not succeed with its focus on smartphones (Nexus One), which is no longer sold directly from Google.
But now it is rumored that they will launch a tablet PC this winter.

The information said to come from a source with good insight into Google, and according to this the tablet-PC will be launched on 26 November and run Chrome OS operating system. As with the Nexus One, the tablet-PC will also be manufactured by the famous smartphone manufacturer HTC.
I want to emphasize that this is only one unofficial rumors so far. The source of the rumors is a whistle-blowers quoted by the website Download Squad, and there are quite convinced that the truth is high.

Canon have sold 40 million EOS-cameras.

EOS stands for Electro Optical System, but is also the Greek name of the dawn goddess. The production of EOS, started in 1987 and total production is therefore now more than 40 million units, which EOS digital models stands for half, 20 million.

Here you can see the history of the  EOS system:

• 1987 produced the first EOS SLR – EOS 650 – Canon’s plant in Fukushima, Japan
• 1997, production of EOS cameras passed the 10 million copies.
• 2003 reached 20-million mark.
• 2007  Celebrated the 20th Anniversary of the EOS series, and also reached 30-million mark.
• 2009, The company’s 50 millionth EF lens was produced.
• 2010 April, Canon reached the current 40 million milestone.

Notable is that Canon sold in the first 10 years, 10 millions EOS-system between, 6 years after (2003) the reach 20 million, 4 years after (2007) reaching 30 millions. And only 3 years after that (2010) reach 40 million, so what will it take to reach 50 million? 2 years……or less?

Concept CTRUS ball is loaded with sensors that feel of their position on the pitch accurately using GPS.

Concept CTRUS ball, prepared by the design firm of agents has the potential to completely eliminate the risk of homicide convictions miss the match-winning moments.

The ball is itself built in a completely elastic material which simulates a conventional football. The need, therefore, never inflated.

Furthermore, it is fitted with a GPS chip that keeps track of the ball’s position on the pitch. The signals can get the ball to change color in different modes depending on the game situation – such as red for offside, and green when it crossed the goal line.

The ball is still in concept stage, and it is impossible to say whether – and when – we can expect to see it on a football field.

HP buying Palm for $ 1,200,000,000.

HP plans to launch new mobile products with the operating system Web OS. What happens to the Palm brand is unclear at this writing. HP says that Palm’s CEO, Jon Rubenstein, will remain in the company.

HP has big plans for the mobile operating system Web OS. The company wants to build it into smart phones and other connected devices. If this means that they will abandoning Windows 7 in his Slate PC series that Hp have on the market remains to be seen.

Todd Bradley, executive vice president, have said in a statment.
- Palm’s innovative operating system is an ideal platform to expand HP’s mobile strategy.

Palm’s planned product launches, will be left unchanged, according to the website Engadget.

As the last major manufacturers, has now Sony decided that it will shut down production of 3.5-inch floppy disks at the end of March next year. This although  last year sold over 12 million discs.

It was Sony, who was first to use 3.5-inch diskettes, the first unit arrived in 1981, before that was the 5.25-inch floppy disks that was used. The space on 3.5-inch floppy disks is limited to a maximum of 1.44 MB.

Long into the 2000. Was it standard among computer manufacturers to delivered computers with a 3.5 inch floppy disc reader, and as late as 2002 was Sony’s annual sales figure of disks  47 million pieces.

Now you can get yourself an updated version of the classic Swiss army knife from Victorinex.

This Army knives have been manufactured since the late 1800s, and are known worldwide. But by supplying the latest models of blades with built-in USB memory the company shows that that their are planing for the furture.

Victorinex Secure are the 3 models called. A model of the knife that are equipped with a USB flash, and are protected with 256-bit encryption, and as an addition, the knife is equipped with a fingerprint reader so that you can not access the files on the memory but that you first identify yourself. Victorinex Secure is available in 8, 16 and 32GB of memory and costs between 100 to 240€

Jaguar, the world’s largest supercomputer, running on Linux Suse operating system, and its not only Jaguar that’s doing that, 6 of 10 of the biggest supercomputer in the world running on Suse Linux Enterprise Server operating system.
According to Top 500 Supercomputer Sites that periodically list the world’s largest supercomputer environments.
The list also tells that nine of the ten of the largest supercomputers use Linux as the operating system.

Jaguar is called the time of writing the largest supercomputer. It is the Department of Energy facility in Oak Ridge, USA. Jaguar was upgraded in 2009. Jaguar is a petascale supercomputer built by Cray at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. As of November 2009, it was the world’s fastest computer with a peak performance of more than 1750 teraflops (1.75 petaflops). A Cray XT5 system, Jaguar has 224,256 Opteron processor cores (1 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000).
Source Wikepedia

In 2011, the new hard disk were to reach the market. The new format represents the biggest change among the hard drives of 30 years.
The format is different in the size of each block, the current block has a size of 512 bytes, while the new standard has 4 kb. This will make the hard disk to be more effective, and that space can be used in a more optimized way.

But for people that still running Windows XP or other older OS. This new format was planned after Windows XP was released. Other operating system like Vista, Windows 7, Leopard, Snow Leopard, and some versions of Linux are already prepared for the new disk format.

The older OS, however, will work with the new disk format, but you have to use a so-called emulation, but this will lead to a reduction in performance of up to 10% of disk access.

This is not my article, it copied straight over from Typically Spanish but I thought it was interesting……….

There is a Spanish version of the Apple iPad which has been developed by Córdoba University. The iFreeTablet is a low cost touch screen device which runs open software.

Carlos de Castro, professor at the University Córdoba, told Público that the project had been set up with public financing and was not intended to make a profit. He said it was not an alternative to the iPad, preferring to describe it as ‘a new way to interact with tactile systems which includes more functions. The professor is himself a Mac user, but also a firm believer in free software. His device runs on the SiESTA system which is Debian GNU/Linux based and thousands of users have collaborated on the creation and modification of the open source code.

The Córdoba device is being made by the Graef company in Jaén, and offers a 10.2 inch screen, a 1.3 megapixel camera, WiFi and a 160 GB hard disk. Its weak point is battery life – just 2.5 hours. It will be distributed over the internet at a price of between 300 and 500 € depending on the configuration.

Now is the date set for realese of Microsoft’s new game console code-named “Project Natal”

Just in time for Christmas shopping 2010, will it be available on the market.

This is a revolutionary new way to play games and have fun with the Xbox 360.
To describe it with few words. “There is no controller!” you can play sports, singing, dancing and fighting -- yes, anything that the world’s leading game developers to find. Your movements and emotional responses are recorded by the Xbox 360 console.
This will most likely steal much of the market from the Wii, and Microsoft can only keep down the price, it is questionable if anyone will continue to buy the Wii in the current format.
Microsoft says there are already 80% of the publishers of games, which develops games for Natal Project.

Technology in Project Natal sensor, combines an RGB camera, a depth sensor, several microphones and a specialized processor that runs a unique software in the same unit.
Existing cameras and hand controls can only register two-dimensional movements, but Project Natal can register helkroppsrörelser in 3D and you can give commands, and pointing in different directions … it can even distinguish different voice modes!

When you stand in front of Project Natal sensor, you can easily give commands by voice. And you need not only use certain words -- it understands everything you say. Project Natal sensor also recognizes your face so you can sign in to Xbox LIVE, without saying or doing anything special at all except that four of a smile.

The technology that we saw in the various sci-fi films in the 90s, which we thought was cool is soon a reality.