Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
Way back in 1987, Canon ditched its FD lens mount for the all-electronic EF bayonet fixing. At the same time, it introduced the first usable autofocus for SLR cameras, with a fast and quiet motor inside the lens itself, and patented it as the USM (Ultrasonic Motor).
Fast forward 21 years, and we find Nikon doing the same thing. Up until now, many Nikon autofocus lenses have been driven by a motor in the body (though “AF-S” lenses have had motors inside for some time). This leaves the D40, D40x and D60 incapable of focussing many older lenses. Tamron is the latest third party lens maker to add motors for these cameras with its new SP AF28-75mm F/2.8 XR Di LD Aspherical (IF) MACRO.
As ever with lenses, the entire specification is contained within the name, a linguistic tesseract if you will.
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
Electronics and water don’t play nice as they’re something of arch enemies, and mixing both won’t do any good to your wallet either. Enter the Overboard Waterproof Gadget Cases that ought to give you some peace of mind. These OverBoard Waterproof Gadget Cases are 100% waterproof and float if dropped in water. They are perfect for safeguarding your gadgets (phone, camera, MP3 player) and also keep out dust, sand and dirt. The Phone/GPS Case lets you take your phone (or compact GPS) to places you wouldn’t normally dare and will protect your phone without stopping you from using it. The Camera Case lets you take pictures down to 19ft (6m) underwater and is perfect for digital cameras without a telescopic zoom lens. (Read the full post about ‘Overboard Waterproof Gadget Cases’…)
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
If we take a statement from Intel Germany’s CEO, mix in a little internet rumor and season with a salty sprinkling of speculation, we come up with an Apple Internet Tablet. Here’s the first ingredient, machine translated from ZDNET, Germany: Germany-World’s managing director Hannes Schwaderer today confirms what has long been a rumor on the Internet […]: namely, that there is an iPhone with Intel’s new nuclear-chip type. The device is slightly larger than the current version, Schwaderer. This is not the Intel chip, but to the larger display in the new iPhone is used. For “Nuclear Chip” read “Atom”, Intel’s 45nm x86 chip intended for UMPC use. (Read the full post about ‘Intel Germany ‘Confirms’ Apple Tablet’…)
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
Yesterday Yves Rossy, former fighter pilot and proud owner of the biggest cojones on the planet, strapped a wing and four jets to his back and jumped out of a plane. When the engines kicked in, he shot off at 186mph over the Rhone Valley, performing long, slow loops and a quick 360º roll “to impress the girls”.
This video was grabbed from YouTube, and shows a test flight from earlier in the year.
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
by Nilay Patel, posted May 16th 2008 at 8:31PM Dell’s plans for Alienware and the XPS line are getting a little clearer, even as rumors swirl — a post on the company’s Direct2Dell blog today says that the XPS and Alienware dev teams are going to be integrated, and that the XPS line will go in “new directions,” hinted at by the m1330 and XPS One. Furthermore, you can now buy the Area-51 m9750 gaming laptop direct from the Dell website in addition to the Area-51 m15x, which doesn’t seem all that wild to us — we’re more interested in why Dell picked the super-geeky XPS brand to be its “premium” line. (Read the full post about ‘Dell to integrate Alienware and XPS dev teams, take XPS line in “new directions”’…)
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
by Chris Ziegler, posted May 16th 2008 at 4:54PM Rumor has it that E-TEN will be unveiling a new Windows Mobile set at Taiwan’s Computex next month that sports — count ‘em, one, two SIMs. The so-called DX900 (pictured) in the glofiish series should be quite a powerhouse, too, with triband HSDPA, quadband GSM, 3 megapixel autofocus cam, FM radio, 256MB of ROM with microSDHC expansion, GPS, motion sensor, and that all-important VGA display that’s probably (hopefully) going to come to define high-end WinMo devices from here on out. We don’t see any particular reason why this one wouldn’t come to fruition; dual-SIM phones are pretty commonplace in Asia, though the presence of triband HSDPA is a pretty rare feat in that bunch. (Read the full post about ‘E-TEN prepping dual-SIM glofiish DX900?’…)
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
by Darren Murph, posted May 16th 2008 at 3:40PM See how easy it is everyone? All that’s required to snag a blackberry Bold well before its public release is to become a Grammy award-winning artist, sell out shows worldwide, date a smattering of superstars and convince Fender to create and sell your own branded guitar. While you’re off working on step one, John Mayer is living it up with his brand new BlackBerry Bold. Granted, he can’t claim to be the very first with said handset, but it’s likely the first completely legitimate edition let loose. (Read the full post about ‘John Mayer secures a BlackBerry Bold, makes world envious’…)
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
Rollout still won’t happen until later this year, which really means late this year if not next, as no dates have been announced. Anyway, Sprint who has been working with Samsung on this say it’s ready.
There’s a collection of companies (Clearwire, Google, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Bright House Networks) that will bear the brunt of the cost of getting WiMax out to over 120 million customers by the end of 2010. That’s just a year and a half. I can’t wait.
Posted on May 17th, 2008 in Gadgets News | Comments Off
Most of the so-called antennas for cell phones are just gimmicks and not worth the money, but we’ve finally found one that works. The Griffin case conceals a built-in booster antenna that captures more of the available wireless signal and sends it to the internal antenna of your iPhone. This should result in a better signal, especially in drop-out areas — which translates to fewer dropped calls, wider coverage areas, and faster downloads when browsing. I gave it to a friend of mine to test, who seems to know ALL the drop-out areas in LA and he put it through its paces. (Read the full post about ‘ClearBoost - iPhone antenna case’…)
