TechCat

Hoodie Sweatshirts with Earbuds in Drawstrings

Coming next Fall from Rusty, is the Wired Series of fleece sweatshirts and hoodies. The cool thing about these tops is that they have HB3 technology which are machine washable earbuds built directly into the drawcords! No need to bring your headphones along anymore, they’re right in the sweatshirt. Not much more information is available right now, so maybe go check out the unnecessarily overstylized video that shows you lots of people doing cool things like surfing but doesn’t actually show the product- click here.

via chip chick

It appears that Google are having a pretty tough week, with the announcement that their Google Phone, the Nexus One isn’t doing as great as they expected, Google have now rather boldly decided that they will no longer censor search results on Google.cn, the Chinese version of the Google search engine.

Google launched google.cn in 2006, agreeing with the Chinese Government to have some censorship of the search results, however Google have taken the ‘enough is enough’ after evidence was found to suggest that a “sophisticated and targeted” cyber attack originating from China had targeted the email accounts of Chinese human rights activists. The company said its investigation into the attack found two accounts of its online mail service – Gmail – appeared to have been accessed as well as “at least twenty other large companies” over the course of the last month.

According to a post on Google’s Official Blog:

“These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered—combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web—have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China”.

It is great to see that Google are standing by the rights of these people affected by the cyber attacks, especially those who are fighting for a good cause however, Chinese rival search engine, Baidu are calling the move ‘hypocritical’ and “financially driven”. The reasons for Baidu accusations are because they feel Google want to pull out of China because they are not dominating the market share in the country, as recent figures show that Google have 31% of the market share and Baidu have 60%.

The search engine has now said it will hold talks with the government in the coming weeks to look at operating an unfiltered search engine within the law in the country, though no changes to filtering had yet been made.

I hope that Google can try to persuade the government to come to some sort of agreement, because if Google do decide to close down their search engines in China then how will this be helping the plight of the human rights activists who would only be able to get their voice heard if Google was still running in China.

So what do you think the search engine will do? Do you think they will be able to negotiate a deal with these Chinese Government? Do you think Google is making the right decisions? Leave a comment and let us know what you think…

Via Gizmodo

Google Threaten to Pull Out of China: Right Move or Wrong Decision? is a post from: UK Gadget and Tech News, Reviews and Shopping Site – Gaj-It.com

Emperor Penguin Lamp

This Emperor Penguin Lamp would be great for your kid’s room… if only it wasn’t $115. Because this looks like exactly the type of lamp a kid would knock over. It’s really cute though and it comes in a lot of un-penguin colors like green and orange.

via nerd approved

We’ve long been fans of the Auto X PRIZE, the automobile competition sponsored by Progressive Insurance. The set of contests is meant to “inspire a new generation of super-efficient vehicles that help break America’s addiction to oil and stem the effects of climate change,” with a $10 million dollar purse up for grabs.

Now comes word from the foundation that it will partner with the state of Michigan’s economic development corporation to host multi-stage on-track challenges for 2010.

Whether it’s been getting the private sector into space, bringing in tried and true organizations like Consumer Reports as a testing organization, working with the federal government on funding, or even having former competitors end up on eBay, we’ve been keeping on top of what the X PRIZE foundation has been up to for quite some time, and have loved every minute of it.

For 2010, The Progressive Insurance Automotive X PRIZE will bring fifty-one super efficient cars from 41 teams to the state of Michigan to host an intense multi-stage competition. The competitors that have made it this far have all survived the painstaking design judging phase and will now ready their vehicles for the start of on-track performance events coming this spring.

The Auto X PRIZE is partnering with MEDC, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation and Michigan International Speedway to hold the on-track action.

“As the birthplace of the American automotive industry, Michigan has the knowledge base, the talent, and the facilities to support the innovation central to achieving the goals of the Progressive Insurance Automotive X PRIZE and the future of the automotive industry. We couldn’t be more thrilled to partner with Michigan as we enter the most exciting phase of the competition, and I’d especially like to thank Governor Granholm and the Michigan Economic Development Corporation for helping us bring the competition to Michigan,” noted Peter Diamandis, chairman and CEO of The X PRIZE Foundation.

Running from April 26, 2010 through the end of August the series of scored performance and evaluation events will feature several closed-door competition stages aimed at evaluating the efficiency, safety and performance of each competition vehicle under real world conditions. After the closed-door sessions, events in Michigan will give the public and the automotive world a chance to observe the competition stages as they unfold.

The Competition Opener & Welcome will be the first public event and will be held on April 29, 2010 at the Michigan State Capitol in Lansing. On July 2010 there will be an open house event at Michigan International Speedway, but the Auto X PRIZE has yet to announce the date.

Photo courtesy X PRIZE Foundation

Clip On 7 Port USB Hub Keeps on Clipping On

It’s a seven port USB hub and it clips on to your desk. Why would you need one that clips onto your desk you might ask? Beats me. Why do you need 7 different USB items plugged in at once? Just one of those great mysteries of life I guess. I’ll put my buddies Mulder and Skully on it, they’ll get to the bottom of this mystery.

7 port usb clip on hub

Apparently its not only Hivision who think that pairing a 7-inch display and Android OS is cool, Its King Yung – a Taiwanese PC maker who introduce its GL-750 Android netbook at CES 2010. Sport a 7-inch display with 800 x 480 pixel resolution, GL-750 runs Android OS and powered by a 533MHz Freescale iMX31 ARM11-based, 128MB of RAM and 16GB of flash storage.

Beside ca[pable to runs Android, GL-750 also capable to runs Windows CE or even a lightweight Linux based on a 2.6.x kernel.
[source]

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Visitors to Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport may be forgiven if they feel they’ve stepped back in time, and it’s not just because of the old terminals that lost their luster after a brand new airport opened outside the city.

Blocked from purchasing modern Western aircraft by economic sanctions in place since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iran’s domestic airlines rely on an aging fleet of planes that have largely disappeared from North American and European skies. As a result, what Havana is to old cars, Tehran is to old airplanes. It’s not uncommon to see vintage Boeing 727s, Boeing 747-100s, Airbus A300s (a relatively new 1993 model is shown above) and a bevy of aging Soviet aircraft — complete with aviation enthusiasts flying to Iran just to take pictures of the old birds. It’s a far cry from the pre-revolution days, when Iran Air was to be a launch carrier for the Concorde.

Perhaps the most interesting aircraft are those survivors which cannot be found anywhere outside of Iran. Flying for Saha Airlines, which is owned by the Iranian Air Force, three Boeing 707s are the only examples of the historic jetliner still in scheduled passenger service. In addition to the famous Saha 707s, Iran Air operates a rare passenger example of the shortened 747SP and Fars Air revived a Lockheed L-1011 that had previously flown for TWA.

Sadly, with three major crashes and countless lesser incidents in 2009, it’s also not uncommon for the safety of Iran’s aging airfleet to be called into question. A senior Iranian transport official publicly said that lack of access to Western parts has nothing to do with Iran’s recent spotty aviation safety record — except for when it does.

“The U.S. embargo on the import of planes to Iran has been the cause of no plane crash in Iran by now since all planes start their flight based on standard principles,” Reza Nakhjavani, the head of Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization told the Tehran Times. Of course, Nakhjavani went on to blast U.S. sanctions against Iran’s aviation industry as “inhumane,” likening the blockade of spare Boeing parts to a denial of needed medical supplies.

While we’d love the chance to fly on some classic aircraft, we’re not quite sure we’d have the nerves for it. A tour group of aviation enthusiasts who arranged to fly a Saha 707 on the 50th anniversary of the 707’s first flight for Pan Am found themselves in the midst of an emergency landing, while one of the world’s few Ilyushin Il-62s still in service crashed earlier this year while performing a flight for Aria Airlines. Sadly, that crash took the lives of 30 people including the airline’s CEO, who reportedly flew on all flights “just in case.”

Photo: Flickr/Amin Tabrizi

Asustek keep improving the battery life of its products. The result is impressive, while yesterday they annnounce laptop with 12 hours batterylife, today they introduce Asus 1005PE netbook which offer 14 hours battery life. As of its specs, Asus 1005PE netbook packs a 10.1 inch display with 1024 x 600 pixel resolution powered by a usual Atom N450 processor, 1GB of DDR2 RAM and 250GB HDD. Asus also give 500GB online storage for the user.

Arrive with a webcam and runs Windows 7 Starter Edition OS, Asus 1005PE is retailed with a $368,50 price at Amazon.
[source]

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Capacity of Texas, Inc. has teamed up with L.A.-based Vision Industries to create a hydrogen fuel cell-powered terminal tractor that can haul cargo around busy ports with zero emissions.

Named ZETT and based on the company’s earlier partial hybrid terminal tractor, the new tractor will be able to carry containers for two full eight-hour shifts without refueling. Capacity president Phillip Ford says that refueling only will take 15 minutes, a distinct advantage over battery-powered trucks.

While state and local governments have already taken cargo ship owners to task for the exhaust fumes that some marine diesel-burning container ships belch while in port, advocates say the trucks and tractors that haul cargo around ports have also been responsible for the high levels of particulate emissions in communities surrounding working ports.

Hydrogen fuel cells may be ideal for terminal tractors. They spend their entire working lives hauling shipping containers within the confines of a port, to and from boats, trains and storage yards, but always close to a central refueling source. Hybrid terminal tractors have already caught on in California, partly because of the state’s strict regulation of in-port pollution and ban on the highest-polluting trucks.

According to Vision Industries CEO Martin Schuermann, the truck will provide economic benefits to owners in addition to the environmental benefits that nearby communities will enjoy.

“Terminal tractors typically operate in industrial settings in close proximity to heavily populated urban areas,” Schuermann said. “This is a new market sector for Vision and we believe that the marketplace will readily embrace a zero emissions terminal tractor that features significant operating cost savings when compared to conventionally powered diesel terminal tractors.”

Photo: Flickr/bispham2

You wanna enjoy the super high speeds of USB 3.0 but your computer is not ready yet. Instead of spending too much for a new PC system, you can now make use of a cheaper and quicker solution by making use of one of these Active Atomix SuperSpeed USB 3.0 adapters, to equip your computer with USB 3.0 ports.

The Active Atomix USB 3.0 adapters are available in two versions, which are the Atomix PX and Atomix EC. The Atomix PX comes in the form of a PCIe interface that can virtually fit into the PCIe slot of any desktop PC.

On the other hand, the Atomix EC is meant for laptops. It comes in the form of an Express Card interface that works on most laptops that have an Express Card slot. Both the Atomix PX and EC offer two USB 3.0 ports and are priced at $35 and $40 respectively.

After this upgrade, you’ll get to enjoy up to 4.8Gbps or 10 times of the transfer speeds of USB 2.0. And of course, they’re backwards compatible with USB 2.0 and they also come with supplemental power input jacks to support the power-hungry USB 3.0 devices.

via pclaunches

Written By TechChee.com, Active Atomix USB 3.0 adapters offer cheaper upgrade from USB 2.0 to USB 3.0 system

Since the announcement of the Google Nexus phone being sold in the US, mobile application analytics company Flurry have released sales figures to show that Google may have only sold 20,000 in their first week.

After being dubbed by Google as a ’superphone’, it’s superphone status was tarnished when their phone was plagued with complaints from customers regarding their unresponsive 3G, their minimal customer service support and more recently their confusion with their service installation charges, so it is not surprising that Google should be disappointed with their sales figures.

Also, further to this, Flurry compared figures with its competition, the Motorola DROID, which sold 250,000 and the iPhone 3GS which sold a staggering 1.6m handsets in their first week, which conclusively showed that things are not looking good for the Nexus One.

Although the figures are just guesses and no official figures have been released, it should be noted that in the past Flurry has been fairly accurate in giving estimates on first week sales because they have built up a good relationships with 10,000 Android and iPhone app developers to find out how much of their software has been used and therefore making educated guess on the first week figures for the iPhone, Motorola DROID and now the Nexus One.

So what do we think was the reason for these disappointing sales figures? Well, many believe that there has been very little marketing from Google or T-Mobile USA regarding the Nexus One, especially as technology blog Gigaom reported that after speaking to Google’s boss, Andy Rubin, he explained, “Google didn’t spend a lot of money on marketing — that isn’t part of the plan”. This comment does make you wonder. Surely, if Google wanted to benchmark itself against the iPhone then it should have taken some notes regarding its lucrative marketing and advertising campaign.

Also, some might say that maybe it was just the wrong time to launch the phone, especially with the Christmas period and with purse strings tight. They should have either waited a while after this period or maybe given their development team a push to launch it just in time for Christmas to guarantee the gift sales.

What do you think is the reason for Nexus One’s poor first week sales? Do you agree it is to do with their 3G problems or is it more deep rooted with their lack of marketing or wrong launch date? Leave us a comment and let us know.

Source and Image Via SlashGear

Google Nexus One: Only Sold 20,000 in 1st Week is a post from: UK Gadget and Tech News, Reviews and Shopping Site – Gaj-It.com

Since the availability of optical mice, your mouse will never suck up dust from your desk like what a scroll-ball mouse used to do. You’d probably miss those old days where your desk had less dust, though you had to frequently clean the scroll ball.

Here comes the USB dust vacuum mouse, which is an 800 dpi optical mouse that also doubles as a vacuum cleaner powered by the USB port. It’s a great one that helps keep your desk less dusty like those old days.

The USB vacuum mouse has a dust bin and an on/off switch at the side of the mouse. Make sure you only turn it on for sucking dust off while you’re not mousing on your computer.

Buy online, $12.70, Uxsight

via therawfeed

Written By TechChee.com, USB dust vacuum optical mouse

DETROIT — Carlo Abarth was to Fiat as John Cooper was to Mini and Carroll Shelby was to Ford. He took unassuming cars like the Cinquecento and made them wickedly quick. Abarth died in 1979 and over time the company bearing his name was all but forgotten. But cars wearing the Abarth Scorpion logo are rolling out again.

Fiat brought an 500 Abarth SS to the North American International Auto Show since its unruly stepchild Chrysler didn’t have much to show. No one on the Chrysler stand had anything to say about the car, which may or may not come to America when Fiat finally gives us the 500.

While the 500 is best described as adorable, the Esseesse is all business. The 1.4-liter turbocharged four produces 160 horsepower and 170 pound-feet of torque. It’s bolted to a five-speed gearbox. Put that much power in a car that weighs 2,282 pounds and you hit 62 mph from a standstill in 7.4 seconds. Torque-vectoring helps keep the FWD car pointed in the right direction. Stiffer springs improve the handling while bigger drilled rotors improve the braking. All that and it gets 36 mpg (combined).

In keeping with Abarth tradition, all the go-fast parts are packed in a wood crate and installed by an authorized Abarth shop. Last we heard, the 500 is headed this way later this year. Here’s hoping Fiat-Chrysler honcho Sergio Marchionne sends some of those crates as well.

UPDATED 8:30 a.m. Jan. 14.

Photos: Chuck Squatriglia / Wired.com. More after the jump.

In terms of the majority of the software on the phone, it’s very similar to the INQ Mini 3G that I covered here and here, so what’s different about the Chat, what’s good, and what’s bad?

Well, that QWERTY keyboard is the main physical difference, and it is a very nice keyboard.  It’s similar to the Symbian QWERTY layout, and just slightly different to the BlackBerry layout (the Symbol and Shift keys are reversed compared to a BlackBerry, which makes it a challenge to get used to if you are a long term BlackBerry user).

A GPS is the other key difference to the INQ Mini 3G, and to be honest, it sometimes took it’s time to get a fix, but generally worked ok.  The included Google Maps worked well with the GPS.  Unlike Symbian devices, there is no configuration control over the GPS settings, so no facility for changing the Positioning Server over to Google to help speed up the initial fix.  One downside of Google Maps was it was expecting numeric key input, and that meant pressing the Symbol and the relevant key to emulate a number; it was a shame it wasn’t aware of the QWERTY and mapped keys allowing a single key press for functions.  As with all Brew OS devices, there is no cell ID location function within Google Maps, which limits you to waiting for the GPS to find a fix; if you are used to a device that can also use cell ID location information, then this seems to impact the fast “locate me” type functions when you know roughly where you are and just want to seatch for something local to your position…

In general terms, the integration of the Social Networking apps remains a key selling point of this phone, bringing together Skype, Facebook and Twitter, and linking the first two into the Contact List too.  Personally, it felt like the Twitter app was more of an add-on, with less integration than the other two, and no facilities for downloading contacts or avatars like the Facebook and Skype apps offer.

It’s nice to see the INQ Hub included as standard on the INQ Chat 3G (see here for how to access from the INQ Mini 3G), and overall the phone seemed a nice device.  For a device which can be described as a smartphone (although only just, given it’s limited to Java apps) the battery lasted well over a day, and unless you are using Twitter, Facebook, Windows Live Messenger and Skype constantly, should easily last two days.  With all 3 apps turned on, it still managed to last over a full working day, which is certainly a key timeframe.

Compared to Symbian, the lack of worrying about Access Points and just letting the device go ahead and connect to the Internet for you was a nice refreshing change, although for many it may fell like a level of control has been taken away from you.  Of course, with no WiFi support, the only option is 3G connectivity, which helps with the simplification.

So, overall, you may think my opinion is that this is a good, cheap phone worthy of consideration…? Well, I’m afraid it wasn’t as perfect as I would have liked…  Firstly, start running all those Social Networking apps together, and the phone often freezes when one of them is performing an update in the background, which can leave the phone locked for a minute or two, and although it doesn’t come with the Social Networking support out of the box (yet), buying a Nokia E63 and adding Gravity (plus the 3UK specific Skype and WLM apps) gets you very close, with the additional benefit of a true multitasking OS, and WiFi support too (although no GPS).  If it wasn’t for the device feeling so underpowered, then I would be supporting it as a worthy device, but it did occasionally leave me very frustrated.

So, if you don’t want to run all the Social Networking apps all the time,but want a device with a QWERTY keyboard, and the ability to use your favourite Social Networking sites out of the box, then certainly go and try out the INQ Chat 3G; you may be pleasantly surprised at the functionality on offer given the price, and hopefully a firmware update, or software updates will resolve the responsiveness issues I found.

As always, thanks to 3mobilebuzz for the loan of the device, and if you want more information, or to purchase an INQ Chat 3G, then head to the 3Store to see more.

Permalink

Rumors come all the way from South Korea, claiming that the 4th generation iPhone may be coming in April 2010. And the new iPhone will likely be equipped with an OLED display, video-chat capability, along with much faster performance and flexible battery.

The information was published by the Korean newspaper, Korea Times, which claims they’ve got it from the current iPhone’s career in Korea, KT Telecom. The source says the iPhone 4G will come with dual-core CPU, which is the first time in smart phone industry and it’s likely be a new ARM Cortex A9 CPU under development.

The iPhone 4G also allows its battery to be removable, which has been the major complaint for the pass three generations of iPhone. With the flexible and removable battery, users will be able to use after-market batteries to extend usage time.

There will also be a front-facing camera dedicated for video calling, along with a high-performance main camera. KT expects the launch of the iPhone 4G to be in June 2010 and may plan to get their corporate clients to try out as early as in April.

via devicemag

Written By TechChee.com, 4th-gen iPhone may see you in April

BBQ is fun, but if you’re always the one in-charge of roasting food on the BBQ grill, you’ll most probably hate one action i.e. you’ll have to consistently blow some air onto the charcoal under the grill to keep it burning. Well, this is not safe, it’ll likely get some ashes into your eyes or get your face on fire!

Now with this little Hand-crank BBQ air blower, you can easily keep some air flowing into the oven to keep the charcoal burning. The BQQ blower just needs some hand-cranking action to produce some steady air to help you get the most out of your barbecue. It’s definitely worth adding to your barbecuing arsenal.

Buy online, Uxsight, $4.70

Written By TechChee.com, Hand-Crank Barbecue Fire Blower

The terror threat in air is very real as evinced by the recent attempt by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused of trying to ignite explosives aboard a Northwest Airlines jet. If he had gone through the full body scanner, the explosives he was carrying would most likely have been detected.

If metal detector and x-ray scanners don’t work, if strip searches are not effective, then perhaps these see-through scanners will ensure a greater degree of safety in the air. However, most people, when asked, said they preferred to be scanned rather than face a terror threat in the air.

In the US, the Transportation Security Administration is planning to buy at least 150 machines which will be able to scan people thoroughly. Albuquerque, N.M.; Las Vegas, Miami; San Francisco, Salt Lake City, and Tulsa, Okla airports already use these. In 13 other states these machines are used if the metal detector is set off. Canada is going to buy 44 machines, which will initially be installed at Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Vancouver, Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton and Halifax airports. In the UK, Heathrow will be the first airport to get the scanner.

BAA, which runs six UK airports, said it would now install the machines ‘as soon as is practical’ at Heathrow.

Jay Stanley, public education director for the American Civil Liberties Union’s Technology and Liberty Program, said the machines essentially perform ‘virtual strip searches that see through your clothing and reveal the size and shape of your body.’

‘As a society, we’re going to have to figure out the balance between personal privacy and the need to secure an aircraft,’ said Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah. ‘And there is no easy answer.’

Peter Bibring, from the American Civil Liberties Union said that safeguards were needed if the technology was not going to be abused. The images are extremely clear and there is a real concern that they could be misused in the case of celebrities and other famous people.

On its part, the TSA says that the person viewing the image will be in another room (and viewing a fuzzy face) and not actually see the person while the person who is seeing the individual being screened will not view the image. Also the images are supposed to be deleted immediately.

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Now here’s one ridiculous piece of tripe tech. The OWLE iPhone Video Rig is designed to help you take ‘professional’ quality video [...]

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150 words | permalink | One comment | digg this

Fact is, we of the gadget generation are carrying around too much stuff. You only have to work out how much [...]

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With China providing over 95% of the earth’s supply of “rare earth” minerals to the rest of the world, they’re in a very good supply-control position. They effectively control the flow of resources needed to create conductors, magnets, capacitors, and other crucial electronics components.

Most kinds of rare earth materials are—despite the name—not very rare. China however can mine them relatively freely, with environmental regulations making the process very expensive for other industrial bases in the US and Europe. Right now the Chinese are happy to maximize this advantage, effectively selling rare earth for use by other countries and foreign-based companies at a profit.

Unfortunately, as the Chinese economy grows and local demand for electronics grows, you can bet China will start using more of its rare earth supply for local development, and divert less for export.

As recently as 2004, China used less than half of the rare earth metals it produced. But according to an estimate by the Industrial Minerals Co. of Australia, in Mount Claremont, China’s domestic demand will overtake its production in less than 10 years. Now Beijing is considering banning exports of some rare earth elements and limiting shipments of others to 35 000 metric tons a year, which would immediately threaten not just electronics manufacturing across the globe but also hybrid vehicles. A Toyota Prius, for example, requires about a kilogram of neodymium for its electric motor and as much as 15 kg of lanthanum for its battery pack.

The country will definitely increase production to keep up with demand, but it’s also reasonable to assume that they will realize their key position in the global supply market. How will this affect manufacturing and electronics industries around the world? While only time will tell, other countries—especially those where electronics are high in demand—should definitely try looking for other sources.

Source (Photo from Wikipedia)

Post from: The Gadget Blog