Snody's Technology Blog

Virtual Laser Keyboard

2009-01-20T06:15:00.000-08:00

This Nifty little guy was one that i came across while looking for a stowaway portable keyboard. Much to my surprise it is about the same price as all the rest, but its only the size of a Zipo lighter. I have not used it personally (yet) but it claims to be able to handle quite a workload. Assuming of course that you can get away with the 1mm deviation of flat surfaces, meaning that the projected upon surface must be flat with only 1mm bumps.

It is a laser projected keyboard, that has the buttons mapped out and censored by Infra Red (IR) laser as well. So that when you touch where they key would be, it senses that you pressed the button. This might cause some issues for people used to relaxing their fingers on the board though. Also the device seems to be small enough that if i set my phone in front of it, the laser would be blocked, but if it was in front of my phone, then the display would be blocked, so you would have to offset it to some degree in order to make it work, or lay the phone flat on the table.

Here are the manufacturers specs.

In the size of a Zipo lighter and in an outer spaced "enterprise" style, it uses a laser beam to generate a full-size perfectly OPERATING laser keyboard that smoothly connects to MAC's, Smart Phones, the new Blackberry (8100,8300,8800),Nokia N95 (Symbian Series 60 3rd Edition) and Any kind of PC and Most of the handheld devices (PDA's, tablet PC's).

Keystroke Sensor: Ambient illumination
- Works under all standard indoor illuminations up to 1000 lux Detection rate
- Up to 400 characters per minute Detection algorithm
- Multiple keystroke support Effective keystroke
- Approximately 2mm Operating surface
- Any firm flat surface with no protrusions greater than 1mm
- Electrical Power source: Integrated, rechargeable lithium-ion battery (~450 mAH) Voltage
- 3.6 Volts Battery capacity: > 120 minutes continuous typing Interface
- RS232 serial interface Connector
- 4 pin for serial interface + battery charger
Mechanical & Environmental: Dimensions
- Approximately 24 x 34 x 90 mm Weight: 160-serial / 80 -BT gram
Temperature:
- Operation 10 – 35 Deg. C Temperature
- Storage -10 – 75 Deg. C
Certification & Safety:
- EMC per CE - EN 55024 55022 EN 61000-3-2 -3-3 Laser safety
- IEC 60825-1 Class 1 laser enclosure

Here is a little diagram of how the technology works.

Apples Newest Laptop

2009-01-16T13:54:00.001-08:00

I just like to add a little bit of comedy in life from time to time.

Source http://www.theonion.com/content/video/apple_introduces_revolutionary

LCD and Plasma is sooo 2000's

2009-01-16T08:37:00.000-08:00

The coming of age of all technologies has to face the limelight sooner or later. But with the rate of growth in the tech industry, it seems to be getting faster and faster with every passing decade. Already we cant imagine a world we once lived in 10 years ago. And how quick we are to forget the way things once were only yesteryear.

Alas the time has come for LCD's and Plasma TVs. HD is still in the here and now, but its now how you get it that is changing. LCD has been around for a very long time, and in tech years, is old technology. Plasma is relatively new, but only a modification of an old technology. Now, as MP3's did to the CD, and CD's did to the Cassette tape, SONY has unveiled yet another revolution (following BluRay a couple years ago). Its called OLED, short for Organic Light Emitting Diode. Now, i know what your thinking, LED is even older than LCD technology. But this is Organic, and in the application of a TV, the difference is phenomenal. What they have done is, instead of our traditional flat panel TVs that have a back light display, which is what gives it light and color, this OLED does what any LED is supposed to do, displays light. But whats unique about it is that each pixel is a LED, therefore eliminating the need for a back light display.

This comes at the same time that Samsung and Sharp released there Ultra Slim formats. What they did is remove the TV tuner and make it separate, slimming it down a bit, and also re-invented the light bulb, or the back light in this case, making it even slimmer still. The end product is less than half the thickness of the original or standard flat screen we know of today.

But SONY has taken it one step further. They decided, why use a back light at all? And so, just as a new technology, or rather, a redesign of a modern technology is released, its instantly made extinct. OLED TVs are so thin, you could consider it a poster on the wall. Let me give you a comparison. Today's modern TV set is about 10 centimeters thick, or about 4 inches, the newly redesigned TVs would bring that down to about 3.5 centimeters, or 1.3 inches at their thickest point. Quite the improvement, not to mention the 120hz, up from 60, and the 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio, up from about 5,000:1 for a good set. But Sony's OLED TV is a mere 3mm thin or 0.1181 inches, with over 1 million to 1 contrast ratio, and 10 bit color (up from 8) delivering 64 times the color richness of our standard TVs. LED's are also faster at displaying light, so no blurs or tracers when watching fast, action packed movies. Also it uses 40% less power (can you say green TV?), and generates allot less heat then its predecessors.

This is the NEW future of television, that is until Nano technology figures out how to paint your TV on your wall (not joking). The only model available to the market as of yet is the 11'' XEL-1, and will cost you $2,499 (plus tax and shipping). That price is just for the novelty of having the only one of its kind, and will surely lower as time goes on, to prices we can relate to nowadays, not to mention the size will increase as well. I would love to have one of these babies, but its gonna be a while till i fork out more money for another TV, kinda like the new iPod's every 6 months. But know this, OLED is the future industry standard, more companies will lease this technology, and as time goes by, it will be a staple in households around the world (again, until Nano Technology can paint your TV on the wall).

Source: http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10551&storeId=10151&productId=8198552921665327724

Nokia N-97

2009-01-16T07:06:00.000-08:00

This is the phone of all phones people. It seems to me that almost a decade ago we all had these candy bar phones with Snake on it or Tetris. It could make phone calls and text messages. They couldn't even take pictures, or have color displays. These were the industry standard back then, and they were mostly Nokias in every ones pockets.

Now adays we all have color displays, with cameras built in. We can send and receive pictures, play more advanced games (snakes is extinct now), browse the Internet at some capacity. We have mp3 ring tones, and all sorts of special features which are now standard. And it would seem like Nokia is all but disappeared, but they haven't. In fact they are the #1 cell phone manufacturer in the world, though they have more presence in other parts of the world than they do in the US, they are the leaders of the cell phone industry. And on December 2nd they officially announced what has been rumored for a long time. The Nokia N-97 is due to release mid 2009, though i would assume the US release will be later in the year.

This will be the next phone of the already existing N-Series phones made by Nokia, but will be the start of a new era within the existing series. This will be not only their first touch screen phone, but also the first phone with a full querty keyboard. The one thing noticeable about it is that it has the likeness of the AT&T Tilt a.k.a HTC TyTn (titan)II. One major difference is that the face of the phone is used by more screen than said Tilt, without the large and chunky nav buttons on the left hand side. It seems to be a cross between the Tilt and the iPhone, though it has a style all it own, they have learned and borrowed from past advances in technology and taken it a FEW steps further. Here are some of the highlights of the MANY features of this phone in detail.

Specs:

5 mega pixel camera with Carl Zeiss Tassar Lens and "DVD quality" video capture at 30fps, and dual LED flash (no xenon yet). One thing i like very much is on the lens there is a little slider that covers the lens and protects it from dust and scratches, allowing for a more durable image quality. Another thing is that this is a dual camera phone, which is kinda the wave of the future so to speak. It will allow others who have this feature, the ability to do video chat. You have the 5mp on the back, like any other phone, and you have another one on the front (as seen in the top left hand corner of the image above), its hard to say what the quality of that will be, but i would guess it would be between 2-3.2mp camera, also good for taking self portraits.

32GB built in memory with a Micro SD expansion slot adding an additional 32GB, for a grand total of 64GB. Pending further advancements in mobile solid state memory, this could change by the time the phone is released. This allows for thousands of hours of MP3's and hundreds of hours of video.

DVB-h OTA (over the air) live TV. This is not a world wide service as of now, but in years to come, you will be happy to know that your phone had the foresight to include this nifty feature, allowing you to watch live TV right from your phone, without needing a data connection. And the best part is, it doesn't need to have an obnoxious antenna to extend out of the phone to pick it up.

A-GPS (assisted global positioning satellite) this can also just be referred to GPS 2.0. It basically takes about 10 seconds to locate where you are in the world, yes, the world. I has Nokia Maps 2.0 covering over 100 countries, and that is a free service. Voice nav comes with the purchase of the add on from Nokia.com (one time fee) but the maps are free and always updated.

HSDPA a.k.a. 3G, capable of 3.6 mbps high speed Internet, similar to DSL. And thanks to the Symbian OS, you can use the 802.11 g/b WiFi (another feature) and reverse it to act like a WiFi hub, or a Hot Spot if you will. This means that wherever you are, if you have a signal, you can use your phones data connection to access the Internet with your laptop, or have your friends iPhone use it to connect to the Internet via their WiFi. Very cool feature in my opinion.

I can only speculate based on the data but, a battery capable of up to 1.5 days of continuous audio playback or 4.5-hours video. That would have to be at least 1450mAh of power, a step up from the N-96's paltry 950mAh batter, which only lasts about 4 hours of continual use, less if watching a video (2-3 hours). It could possibly be higher capacity than that, but given the slim size of the phone, i don't see that being possible, but its definitely not smaller.

A 3.5-inch wide screen 16:9 touch display, displaying 16 million colors at 30fps (video), allowing you to see on your phone what it was really meant to look like.

A graphics accelerator built in for the N-Gage games, giving smooth 3D graphics unique to the N-series phones. The N-Gage software is free of charge, while most of the games you have to pay for, they do have many games with free trials.

This phone is unlocked and unbranded, meaning that you can take it with you when you switch carriers, as long as you use a SIM card to do so (Verizon users are out of luck).

This is just a sample of the main, but many features that this phone has. I have included a video from YouTube.com that shows a product demonstration/promotion of the N-97. All i can say is that when its released in the US, i will be trading up my N-96 for this piece of technology art.

Source http://www.nokia.com/A4136001?newsid=1274500