Gizmag News - Novatel invents new class of mobile connectivity

Welcome to the newsletter for gizmag Emerging Technology Magazine. These are the headlines for January the 9th, 2009. Novatel Invents New Class of Mobile Connectivity: The MiFi Hotspot Novatel has built an innovative product that combines a wireless access point, an internet router, and a 3G modem card into a package that's the size of a business card, half the thickness of your Blackberry and weights less than 80g. Today Noel McKeegan and I had a chance to sit down with Jon Driscoll, Novatel Wireless' VP of Global Product Managment, and talk about their upcoming line of MiFi Hotspots. Read More iRobot 2nd Generation Looj Gutter Cleaning Robot Consumer robotics manufacturer iRobot is demonstrating the second generation Looj Gutter Cleaning Robot at CES, which is newsworthy in that the original model won last year's 2008 Best of CES Innovations Award and it's still the only product of its kind. The Looj, makes gutter cleaning faster (it can clean up to 60-foot of gutter in10 minutes), easier and safer by reducing ladder work and reaching in precarious positions. The new Looj comes in three models starting at US$130, and has been significantly redesigned with additional features that help it break up clogged leaves and debris and improve overall performance. Read More Location, location, location: could this hotel be in the world's most beautiful? Gizmag readers are an intelligent, well-traveled, knowledgeable and resourceful bunch if the feedback emails we receive are any indication. So here's your chance guys and gals, because we're struggling even to imagine a more stunning setting for a luxury hotel than this. Explora Hotel Salto Chico sits at the edge of an alpine lake, beside a giant waterfall, at the foot of one of the Andes' most spectacular views, in the middle of the Patagonian wilderness in remote Southern Chile. Just take a look through the photo gallery, it's absolutely mind-boggling, and very close to enough lakes, glaciers, snowy mountains and waterfalls to chew through the tallest stack of camera memory cards. So tell us, is there a more spectacularly located hotel anywhere in the world? Read More SDXC Memory Cards to provide 2TB storage in defacto standard format The next-generation SDXC (eXtended Capacity) memory card specification was announced today and while it promises the inevitable seemingly limitless capacities we always knew would arrive eventually, it certainly paints a picture of digital life being quite different in the future. The new SDXC specification provides up to 2 terabytes storage capacity and accelerates SD interface read/write speeds to 104 megabytes per second this year, with a road map to 300 megabytes per second. The day is not far away when a single chip can store weeks of high-definition video, a lifetime photo collection, and months of music. Enough to store your entire life and its soundtrack in your mobile phone. Professional hi-def video equipment form factors will become incredibly small. Read More Eight-wheeled Japanese electric supercar shooting for 250mph land speed record What's the land-speed record for an electric eight-wheeler? It seems we're soon going to find out. A team of electron-heads at Japan's Keio University have built two of these oddly-shaped supercars, powered by Lithium-Ion batteries and an 80 horsepower electric motor for each wheel. Top speed is expected to be in excess of 230mph, with 0-60 times around 4 seconds already recorded. Power's not an issue, then... What about range? The Eliica's claimed 200 miles per charge puts it right at the pointy end of the field. While each of the prototypes has cost around US$320,000, the team plans to produce 200 units with the right backing. Read More LG 3G Touch wristwatch video phone on sale this year The wristwatch video phone we've been waiting for nearly half a century thanks to the broadly syndicated Dick Tracy cartoon strips, is finally about to arrive. LG Electronicshas unveiled the world's first Touch Watch Phone and it appears to be the hamburger with the lot – camera, Flash Interface, MP3 player, Voice Calling, Text messaging, 3.63cm (1.43-inch) touchscreen, voice recognition, text-to-speech, a 3G Video Telephony (VT) service and GSM Quadband Network capabilities. Shown in prototype form at last year's CES, the phone (designated LG-GD910) will be available in Europe this year. Read More MSI's Hybrid SSD/HDD notebook The MSI U115 Hybrid notebook uses both a Solid State Disk and a Hard Disk Drive, allowing users to switch between them at will. The 1kg notebook measures 26cm by 18cm, with a 10-inch widescreen LCD display (1024x600), and supports 802.11 b/g/n wireless LAN and Bluetooth. Read More Novint's Falcon 3D controller We all know the keyboard and mouse are NOT the future of the Computer Human Interface (CHI), and it's high time we found a replacement capable of generating critical mass. One device with the potential to play a role in the next generation interface is the Novint Falcon. Aptly named because of its predatory view of the mouse, we wrote the Falcon up when it was first announced in 2005, then released in 2007, and this week Dave Weinstein and Noel McKeegan sat down with Tom Anderson, Novint's CEO to discuss the future of the Computer Human Interface. Read More Netgear’s new set-top boxes connect internet video to TV Internet video consumption is growing rapidly, and many people are finding their choice of video source (the internet) is still cut off from their preferred video viewing medium/location (the TV and loungeroom). People want to access internet video from a TV and two products debuted by Netgear at CES today offer just that. The US$200 Internet TV Player (ITV2000) enables internet video on a HDTV or old analog TV, but it was the US$400 Digital Entertainer Elite (EVA9150) that really blew our socks off. Think of the EVA9150 as a wireless video jukebox that automatically finds all digital media files on the home network (including Win, Mac and Linux PCs) and organizes them into an accessible library supporting almost any file format, to deliver a configurable living space media experience. F'rinstance you can pause a video in one room and resume it in another or synchronize music/video playback for every room. Read More Asus releases world's first Skype-certified standalone Videophone As Internet connectivity extends further around the world and broadband uptake becomes almost ubiquitous, Skype finds itself in an excellent position dominating the Internet telephony business with its simple, familiar software and free Skype-to-Skype calls around the world. It's certainly our preferred communication tool at Gizmag, keeping our globetrotting team in touch without any fuss. And now it can be completely divorced from the computer, as Asus has shown with its AiGuru SV1 standalone videophone at the 2009 Vegas CES. The US$300 AiGuru can connect to the net through your home wifi, and with its built-in speaker, camera, screen and microphone, you've got a fully functional videophone right out of the box, ready to connect to the world's biggest videophone network. Read More Breakthrough infra red sensor provides accurate tyre data With each new sensor man invents, we find a way to a greater understanding of how physics plays out in the real world. Sometimes the value of the data revealed by a new sensor gives access to is very important – this new system uses IR sensors to measure the inside temperature of an F1 tyre at all times and it will make life much easier for the thousands of race teams around the world attempting to understand what their tyres are doing on the racetrack. Tyre temperature sensors are normally fitted to the rim as part of the valve and the readings are often distorted by heat soak from the rim and brakes. The new sensor from BERU also allows race engineers to receive data remotely, even when the wheels are not fitted to a vehicle such as in dynamometer testing or other test beds. It has already been tested by F1 teams in the first winter tests and with new tyres in 2009 plus a dramatic reduction in testing and a subsequent ban on tire warmers in 2010, all F1 teams will want this … and that's just the starting point for applying this technology. Read More If you would like to refer this newsletter to a friend or colleague, please point them at our free subscription page. Please don't try to forward this email, as the formatting is unlikely to remain intact. And don't worry, we don't share email addresses. Please read our privacy policy if you are concerned. Watch for more of the best new innovations, ideas and practical technologies in your inbox. If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter please click here to unsubscribe. COPYRIGHT GIZMAG (c) 2008