Google is making it easier for developers to purchase the latest version of its smart glasses, with the company saying on Tuesday that the Glass Enterprise Edition 2 is now available from some hardware resellers.
“We’ve seen strong demand from developers and businesses who are interested in building new, helpful enterprise solutions for Glass,“ Google said in a blog post, adding that the new headset was already being used by people with jobs in logistics, manufacturing and field services.”
Alias is a teachable “parasite” that gives you more control over your smart assistant’s customization and privacy. Through a simple app, you can train Alias to react to a self-chosen wake-word; once trained, Alias takes control over your home assistant by activating it for you. When you’re not using it, Alias makes sure the assistant is paralyzed and unable to listen to your conversations.
When placed on top of your home assistant, Alias uses two small speakers to interrupt the assistant’s listening with a constant low noise that feeds directly into the microphone of the assistant. When Alias recognizes your user-created wake-word (e.g., “Hey Alias” or “Jarvis” or whatever), it stops the noise and quietly activates the assistant by speaking the original wake-word (e.g., “Alexa” or “Hey Google”).
From here the assistant can be used as normal. Your wake-word is detected by a small neural network program that runs locally on Alias, so the sounds of your home are not uploaded to anyone’s cloud.
About 35 years after the MIDI 1.0 Detailed Specification was established, instrument manufacturers voted unanimously on January 18th to adopt the new MIDI 2.0 spec. So what’s changing for audio interfaces? The “biggest advance in music technology in decades” brings two-way communication, among many other new features while remaining backwards compatible with the old spec.
Companies like Roland, Native Instruments, Korg and Yamaha are part of the MIDI Manufacturers Association behind the update, and we’ve already seen Roland’s A-88MKII keyboard that will be ready for the spec when it goes on sale in March.
And it’s about time for a new standard, while the 5-bit DIN cables used in the 1980s couldn’t handle high resolution audio, the MIDI 2.0 spec is ready for any digital connector you’d like to use, and will start by targeting USB ports. That allows for far more accurate timing, and far more resolution by upgrading messages from seven bits to as much as 32-bit.
It should also make instruments easier to use, with profiles that will automatically set up gear for its intended use and a feature called Property Exchange that uses JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) to send over more detailed configuration info. You’ll spend less time shuffling through presets and more time simply making music, plus some of these features can be used even on older MIDI 1.0-spec hardware. As Reverb.com notes, there’s still room for improvement on things like networking multiple devices, but it represents a massive upgrade over the old standard, and will be useful for anyone trying to make a Grammy-winning album, whether it’s in their bedroom or a fully-kitted studio.
PC hardware maker NZXT has just announced the latest additions to its line of liquid CPU coolers, the Kraken X-3 and Z-3. The X-3 has a bright LED ring and rotates so the logo can be repositioned. The Z-3 comes with a 2.36-inch, 24-bit color LCD screen capable of displaying images, computer data, or animated GIFs, because maybe that is a thing people want.
The animated GIF of the CPU cooler displaying animated GIFs atop this post? With the Kraken Z-3 installed on my PC, I could display that GIF of a CPU cooler displaying GIFs as a GIF on my CPU cooler. I could put some anime there. Or maybe some looping pornography. Then I would turn my computer to the side with the glass window facing away from me and never see it again. I need a better way to display the glowing and flashing things inside of my PC. Maybe a mirror or something.
I’ve found NZXT liquid cooling quite reliable in the past. The idea of that reliability combined with this frivolity tickles me to no end. Look, they’ve even made a little trailer showing it off.
The Kraken X-3 and Z-3 are available for purchase in the U.S. starting today. The X-3 is available in 240mm, 280mm, and 360mm sizes for $130, $150, and $180. The Z03, AKA the one with the GIFs, costs $250 for the 280mm and $280 for the 360mm size. That means the ability to have an animated GIF on your CPU cooler costs $100.
Spectrum customers who are also users of the company’s home security service are about a month away from being left with a pile of useless equipment that in many cases cost them hundreds of dollars.
On February 5, Spectrum will no longer support customers who’ve purchased its Spectrum Home Security equipment. None of the devices—the cameras, motion sensors, smart thermostats, and in-home touchscreens—can be paired with other existing services. In a few weeks, it’ll all be worthless junk.
While some of the devices may continue to function on their own, customers will soon no longer be able to access them using their mobile devices, which is sort of the whole point of owning a smart device.
On Friday, California’s KSBY News interviewed one Spectrum customer who said that he’d spent around $900 installing cameras and sensors in and around his Cheviot Hills home. That the equipment is soon-to-be worthless isn’t even the worst part. Spectrum is also running off with his money.
The customer reportedly contacted the company about converting the cost of his investment into credit toward his phone or cable bill. The company declined, he said.
Motherboard on Thursday revealed that a “secretive” U.S. government vendor whose surveillance products are not publicly advertised has been marketing hidden cameras disguised as seemingly ordinary objects—vacuum cleaners, tree stumps, and tombstones—to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, among other law enforcement agencies, and the military, in addition to, ahem, “select clients.”
Yes, that’s tombstone cams, because absolutely nothing in this world is sacred.
The vendor, Special Services Group (SSG), was apparently none too pleased when Motherboard revealed that it planned to publish photographs and descriptions of the company’s surveillance toys. When reached for comment, SSG reportedly threatened to sue the tech publication, launched by VICE in 2009.
According to Motherboard, a brochure listing SSG’s products (starting at link from page 93) was obtained through public records requests filed with the Irvine Police Department in California.
Freddy Martinez, a policy analyst at government accountability group Open The Government, and Beryl Lipton, a reporter/researcher at the government transparency nonprofit MuckRock, both filed requests and obtained the SSG brochure, Motherboard said.
In warning the site not to disclose the brochure, SSG’s attorney reportedly claimed the document is protected under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), though the notice did not point to any specific section of the law, which was enacted to regulate arms exports at the height of the Cold War.
ITAR does prohibit the public disclosure of certain technical data related to military munitions. It’s unlikely, however, that a camera designed to look like a baby car seat—an actual SSG product called a “Rapid Vehicle Deployment Kit”—is covered under the law, which encompasses a wide range of actual military equipment that can’t be replicated in a home garage, such as space launch vehicles, nuclear reactors, and anti-helicopter mines.
Sleep Number first made a name for itself with its line of adjustable air-filled mattresses that allowed a pair of sleepers to each select how firm or soft they wanted their side of the bed to be. The preferred setting was known as a user’s Sleep Number, and over the years the company has introduced many ways to make it easier to fine-tune its beds for a good night’s sleep, including its smart SleepIQ technology which tracks movements and breathing patterns to help narrow down which comfort settings are ideal, as well as automatic adjustments in the middle of the night to silence a snorer.
At CES 2017, the company’s Sleep Number 360 bed introduced a new feature that learned each user’s bedtime routines and then automatically pre-heated the foot of the bed to a specific temperature to make falling asleep easier and more comfortable. At CES 2020, the company is now expanding on that idea with its new Climate360 smart bed that can heat and cool the entire mattress based on each user’s dozing preferences.
Using a combination of sensors, advanced textiles, phase change materials (a material that can absorb or release energy to aid in heating and cooling), evaporative cooling, and a ventilation system, the Climate360 bed can supposedly create and maintain a separate microclimate on each side of the bed, and make adjustments throughout the night based on each sleeper’s movements which indicate a level of discomfort. What isn’t built into the bed is a full air conditioning system, however, so the bed can only cool each side by about 12 degrees, but is able to warm them up to 100 degrees Fahrenheit if you prefer to sleep in an inferno.
The Climate360 bed goes through automatic routines throughout the night that Sleep Number has determined to be ideal for achieving a more restful sleep, including gently warming the bed ahead of bedtime to make it easier to drift off, and then cooling it once each user is asleep to help keep them comfortable.
Instead of a rigid panel wrapped in fabric, Bosch’s Virtual Visor features an LCD panel that can be flipped down when the sun is hanging out on the horizon. The panel works alongside a camera that’s pointed at a driver’s face whose live video feed is processed using a custom trained AI to recognize facial features like the nose, mouth, and, most importantly, the eyes. The camera system should recognize shadows cast on the driver’s eyes, and it uses this ability to darken only the areas on the LCD visor where intense sunlight would be passing through and impairing a driver’s vision. The region of the visor that’s darkened is constantly changing based on both the vehicle and driver’s movements, but the rest should remain transparent to provide a less obstructed view of the road and other vehicles ahead.
The Virtual Visor actually started life as a side project for three of Bosch’s powertrain engineers who developed it in their free time and harvested the parts they needed from a discarded computer monitor. As to when the feature will start showing up as an option in new cars remains to be seen—if ever. If you’ve ever dropped your phone or poked at a screen too hard you’ve already aware of how fragile LCD panels can be, so there will need to be lots of in-vehicle testing before this ever goes mainstream. But it’s a clever innovation using technology that at this point is relatively cheap and readily available, so hopefully this is an upgrade that’s not too far away.
Soundbar and smart-speaker-flinger Sonos is starting the new year with the wrong kind of publicity.
Customers and netizens are protesting against its policy of deliberately rendering working systems unusable, which is bad for the environment as it sends devices prematurely to an electronic waste graveyard.
The policy is also hazardous for those who unknowingly purchase a disabled device on the second-hand market, or even for users who perhaps mistake “recycle” for “reset”.
The culprit is Sonos’s so-called “Trade Up Program” which gives customers a 30 per cent discount off a new device, provided they follow steps to place their existing hardware into “Recycle mode”. Sonos has explained that “when you recycle an eligible Sonos product, you are choosing to permanently deactivate it. Once you confirm you’d like to recycle your product, the decision cannot be reversed.” There is a 21-day countdown (giving you time to receive your shiny new hardware) and then it is useless, “even if the product has been reset to its factory settings.”
Sonos suggests taking the now useless gadget to a local e-waste recycling centre, or sending it back to Sonos, though it remarks that scrapping it locally is “more eco-friendly than shipping it to Sonos”. In fact, agreeing either to return it or to use a “certified electronics recycler” is part of the terms and conditions, though the obvious question is how well this is enforced or whether customers even notice this detail when participating in the scheme.
The truth of course is that no recycling option is eco-friendly in comparison to someone continuing to enjoy the device doing what it does best, which is to play music. Even if a user is conscientious about finding an electronic waste recycling centre, there is a human and environmental cost involved, and not all parts can be recycled.
Sonos has posted on the subject of sustainability and has a “director of sustainability”, Mark Heintz, making its “Trade Up” policy even harder to understand.
Why not allow these products to be resold or reused? Community manager Ryan S said: “While we’re proud of how long our products last, we don’t really want these old, second-hand products to be the first experience a new customer has with Sonos.”
While this makes perfect business sense for Sonos, it is a weak rationale from an environmental perspective. Reactions like this one on Twitter are common. “I’ve bought and recommended my last Sonos product. Please change your practice, at the very least be honest about it and don’t flash the sustainability card for something that’s clearly not.”
According to a Verizon press release, the new Motorola Razr will clock in at the eye-popping price of $1,500 retail (still less than foldable competitors Samsung Galaxy Fold at $1,980 or more and Huawei Mate X at $2,420). Its 6.2-inch screen is ultrawide and the device packs a 16-megapixel main camera; Verizon added that when folded, the Razr’s “touchscreen Quick View external display lets you respond to notifications, take selfies, play your music, use Google Assistant, and more without having to flip open your phone.”
Graphic: Verizon
Graphic: Verizon
Slashgear has some more details on the device, including that the main display is a pOLED running at 2142 x 876 resolution while the Quick View display is a 2.7-inch OLED running at 600 x 800. Replying to text messages and emails via the external display requires using smart replies or dictation, though it will also function as a music controller and preview screen for the camera. It also has a Snapdragon 710 processor, 6GB of memory, and 128GB of storage, running Android Pie 9.
Graphic: Verizon
Downsides noted by Slashgear include no wireless charging and fast charging that caps out at 15W, as well as a 2,510 mAh battery. That’s considerably lower than the 3,000 mAh battery in Samsung’s flagship Galaxy S10 and newer iPhones, most models of which come in closer to or slightly over 3,000 mAh. Additionally, the new Razr follows other manufacturers’ leads by ditching the 3.5mm headphone jack for a USB-C connector, a decision widely reviled by consumers used to simply plugging in whatever headphones they have available at the moment. And despite Verizon’s big talk about their 5G network, the Razr will cap out at current-gen 4G LTE speeds.
US mega-retailer Best Buy will switch off the “smart” portion of its Insignia-branded smart home gadgets this coming Wednesday, rendering them just plain old dumb gear.
Folks who’ve bought these soon-to-be-internet-less Internet-of-Things gizmos can apply for some money back in the form of a gift card, though a full refund is off the cards, literally.
“As the Insignia Connect platform will be discontinued on November 6, 2019, this process will determine your eligibility for compensation for your eligible Insignia Connect products,” Best Buy stated on its webpage about the shutdown. An FAQ with more details is here.
“The compensation will not be a full refund of your product, and will be determined by product type.”
The affected Insigna Connect line includes smart power plugs, in-wall light switches, security cameras, and a God-damn freezer. Yes, a freezer. Being Wi-Fi-connected, these devices can be remote-controlled via an iOS or Android smartphone app, allowing you to turn lights off and on, monitor power usage, schedule stuff to turn on, view camera footage, and so on, wherever you are. They can also be directed via Amazon’s voice-powered assistant Alexa or Google Assistant.
However, when the Insigna line’s backend systems are shut down for good, and the phone apps withdrawn, on Wednesday, this gear will degrade to normal non-smart stuff. Crucially, though, the camera will be completely useless – and the footage inaccessible from the apps by the time you read this – and while the NS-SP1XM8 smart plug with metering will work with Apple’s Home app, via HomeKit, the other plugs will just be normal plugs.
Google’s Senior Vice President of Devices & Services, Rick Osterloh, broke the news on the official Google blog, saying:
Over the years, Google has made progress with partners in this space with Wear OS and Google Fit, but we see an opportunity to invest even more in Wear OS as well as introduce Made by Google wearable devices into the market. Fitbit has been a true pioneer in the industry and has created engaging products, experiences and a vibrant community of users. By working closely with Fitbit’s team of experts, and bringing together the best AI, software and hardware, we can help spur innovation in wearables and build products to benefit even more people around the world.
Earlier this week, on October 28, a report from Reuters surfaced to indicate that Google was in a bid to purchase Fitbit. It’s a big move, but it’s also one that makes good sense.
Google’s Wear OS wearable platform has been in something of a rut for the last few years. The company introduced the Android Wear to Wear OS rebrand in 2018 to revitalize its branding/image, but the hardware offerings have still been pretty ho-hum. Third-party watches like the Fossil Gen 5 have proven to be quite good, but without a proper “Made by Google” smartwatch and other major players, such as Samsung, ignoring the platform, it’s been left to just sort of exist.
In 1999, at the peak of Hydrogen fuel cell company start ups in California he left BAe to start his own fuel cell company. “My old boss at Rolls Royce pointed out that the Hydrogen needed to come from somewhere. So I looked at other technologies and found metal-air,”he says.
Technically described as “(Al)/air” batteries, these are the — almost — untold story from the battery world. For starters, an aluminum-air battery system can generate enough energy and power for driving ranges and acceleration similar to gasoline-powered cars.
Sometimes known as “Metal-Air” batteries, these have been successfully used in “off-grid” applications for many years, just as batteries powering army radios. The most attractive metal in this type of battery is aluminum because it is the most common metal on Earth and has one of the highest energy densities.
Think of an air-breathing battery which uses aluminum as a “fuel.” That means it can provide vehicle power with energy originating from clean sources (hydro, geothermal, nuclear etc.). These are the power sources for most aluminum smelters all over the world. The only waste product is aluminum hydroxide and this can be returned to the smelter as the feedstock for — guess what? — making more aluminum! This cycle is therefore highly sustainable and separate from the oil industry. You could even recycle aluminum cans and use them to make batteries.
Imagine that — a power source separate from the highly polluting oil industry.
“I rented a lab, read everything on it and then turned back into a Development Engineer, which means: thinking, making, testing and tweaking until you find answers. One or two bolts from the blue and I saw a massive difference on one test,” says Jackson.
But hardly anyone was using them in mainstream applications. Why?
Aluminum-air batteries had been around for a while. But the problem with a battery which generated electricity by “eating” aluminum was that it was simply not efficient. The electrolyte used just didn’t work well.
This was important. An electrolyte is a chemical medium inside a battery that allows the flow of electrical charge between the cathode and anode. When a device is connected to a battery — a light bulb or an electric circuit — chemical reactions occur on the electrodes that create a flow of electrical energy to the device.
When an aluminum-air battery starts to run, a chemical reaction produces a “gel” by-product which can gradually block the airways into the cell. It seemed like an intractable problem for researchers to deal with.
But after a lot of experimentation, in 2001, Jackson developed what he believed to be a revolutionary kind of electrolyte for aluminum-air batteries which had the potential to remove the barriers to commercialization.
“Everything was steady, the hydrogen and gel were almost gone but the power was a lot better.”
His specially developed electrolyte did not produce the hated gel that would destroy the efficiency of an aluminum-air battery. For Jackson, it seemed like a game-changer: “All I needed to do was to tell the government. ‘Simple’, I thought.”
The breakthrough — if proven — had huge potential. The energy density of his battery was about eight times that of a lithium-ion battery. He was incredibly excited. Then he tried to tell politicians…
Despite a detailed demonstration of a working battery to Lord “Jim” Knight in 2001, followed by email correspondence and a promise to “pass it onto Tony (Blair),” there was no interest from the U.K. government.
And Jackson faced bureaucratic hurdles. The U.K. government’s official innovation body, Innovate UK, emphasized lithium battery technology, not aluminum-air batteries.
He was struggling to convince public and private investors to back him, such was the hold the “lithium battery lobby” had over the sector.
This emphasis on lithium batteries over anything else meant U.K. the government was effectively leaving on the table a technology which could revolutionize electrical storage and mobility and even contribute to the fight against carbon emission and move the U.K. toward its pollution-reduction goals.
Disappointed in the U.K., Jackson upped sticks and found better backing in France, where he moved his R&D in 2005.
Finally, in 2007, the potential of Jackson’s invention was confirmed independently in France at the Polytech Nantes institution. Its advantages over Lithium Ion batteries were (and still are) increased cell voltage. They used ordinary aluminum, would create very little pollution and had a steady, long-duration power output.
As a result, in 2007 the French Government formally endorsed the technology as “strategic and in the national interest of France.”
At this point, the U.K.’s Foreign Office suddenly woke up and took notice.
It promised Jackson that the UKTI would deliver “300%” effort in launching the technology in the U.K. if it was “repatriated” back to the U.K.
However, in 2009, the U.K.’s Technology Strategy Board refused to back the technology, citing that the Automotive Council Technology Road Map “excluded this type of battery.” Even though the Carbon Trust agreed that it did indeed constitute a “credible CO2-reduction technology,” it refused to assist Jackson further.
Meanwhile, other governments were more enthusiastic about exploring metal-air batteries.
[…]
Jackson tried to tell the U.K. government they were making a mistake. Appearing before the Parliamentary Select Committee for business-energy and industrial strategy, he described how the U.K. had created a bias toward lithium-ion technology which had led to a battery-tech ecosystem which was funding lithium-ion research to the tune of billions of pounds. In 2017, Prime Minister Theresa May further backed the lithium-ion industry.
Jackson (pictured below) refused to take no for an answer.
He applied to U.K.’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory. But in 2017 they replied with a “no-fund” decision which dismissed the technology, even though DSTL had an actual programme of its own on aluminum-air technology, dedicated to finding a better electrolyte, at Southampton University.
Jackson turned to the auto industry instead. He formed his company MAL (branded as “Metalectrique“) in 2013 and used seed funding to successfully test a long-range design of power pack in its laboratory facilities in Tavistock, U.K.
Here he is on a regional BBC channel explaining the battery:
He worked closely with Lotus Engineering to design and develop long-range replacement power packs for the Nissan Leaf and the Mahindra Reva “G-Wiz’ electric cars. At the time, Nissan expressed a strong interest in this “Beyond Lithium Technology” (their words) but they were already committed to fitting LiON batteries to the Leaf. Undeterred, Jackson concentrated on the G-Wiz and went on to produce full-size battery cells for testing and showed that aluminum-air technology was superior to any other existing technology.
In tests, Jackson’s Aluminium-Air power technology could create a 1,500 mile range battery with a 90 second swap system. The benefits are obvious: Cost effective for the driver; safe & CO2 free; recyclable and reusable; and with an £0.08 / mile cost to driver. The batteryis also low cost: just £60/kWh (Battery Price to OEM).
[…]
The advantages of aluminum-air technology are numerous. Without having to charge the battery, a car could simply swap out the battery in seconds, completely removing “charge time.” Most current charging points are rated at 50 kW which is roughly one-hundredth of that required to charge a lithium battery in five minutes. Meanwhile, hydrogen fuel cells would require a huge and expensive hydrogen distribution infrastructure and a new hydrogen generation system.
But Jackson has kept on pushing, convinced his technology can address both the power needs of the future, and the climate crisis.
Last May, he started getting much-needed recognition.
The U.K.’s Advanced Propulsion Centre included the Metalectrique battery as part of its grant investment into 15 U.K. startups to take their technology to the next level as part of its Technology Developer Accelerator Programme (TDAP). The TDAP is part of a 10-year program to make U.K. a world-leader in low-carbon propulsion technology.
The catch? These 15 companies have to share a paltry £1.1 million in funding.
And as for Jackson? He’s still raising money for Metalectrique and spreading the word about the potential for aluminum-air batteries to save the planet.
What happens when it runs out of juice? You replace it with a new one while the old one gets recycled. At the beginning of the electric car era when charging infrastructure was nonexistent, the idea of swapping spent batteries for fully charged new ones was considered feasible. Jackson says such a thing could be the future, with his batteries/fuel cells sold at grocery stores and retail outlets. He says the process of disconnecting the old one and connecting the new one will take about 90 seconds.
But is it tin foil hat time? Is this story just another example of some crackpot inventing some radical new product that defies conventional physics, like cold fusion? Lots of people think so, and in fact Jackson says powerful forces have attempted to prevent his idea from reaching a larger audience. But an independent evaluation by the UK Trade and Investment agency in 2017 said Jackson’s invention was a “very attractive battery” based on “well established’” technology, and that it produced much more energy per kilogram than standard electric vehicle types, according to a report in theDaily Mail.
Some comparisons are in order. A Tesla Model S can drive up to 370 miles on a single charge. Jackson says if you drove the same car with an aluminum-air cell that weighed the same as the Tesla’s lithium-ion battery, it would have a range of 2,700 miles. Aluminum-air cells also take up less space. If that same Tesla were fitted with an aluminum-air fuel cell the same size as its current battery, it could run non-stop for 1,500 miles.
[…]
Jackson has also secured a £108,000 grant for further research from the Advanced Propulsion Center, a partner of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. His technology has been validated by two French universities. He says: “It has been a tough battle but I’m finally making progress. From every logical standpoint, this is the way to go.”
Austin Electric has three targets for the new batteries — the three-wheeled tuk-tuks used for transportation in many countries such as Pakistan, electric bicycles with far more range than current models, and a program that will convert front wheel drive cars with internal combustion engines into hybrids by fitting aluminum-air batteries and motors to drive the rear wheels.
Jackson expects the conversion operation to start next year. He says the cost of each conversion will be £3,500 or about $4,000. He thinks this will be a proof of concept “stepping-stone” phase in the transition to aluminum-air batteries for all vehicles. “We are in discussions with two aircraft manufacturers. It’s not going to be suitable for jets. But it would work in propeller planes, and be suitable for short-haul passenger and cargo flights.”
It’s ridiculous that this invention is only now going into small scale production and only gets 108k for development. Considering this is relevant and the technology is really viable, this should be on the top of the agenda. What happens to li-ion batteries is melt and destroy the environment.
Earlier in October, Hyperstealth filed a patent for the material, which doesn’t require a power source and is both paper-thin and inexpensive — all traits that could make it appealing for use on the battlefield.
According to a press release, it works by bending the light around a target to make it seemingly disappear. This light can be in the visible spectrum, or it can be ultraviolet, infrared, or shortwave infrared light, making the material what Hyperstealth calls a “broadband invisibility cloak.”
Ready for Battle
Alongside the news of the patent application, Hyperstealth released more than 100-minutes worth of footage describing and demonstrating the material — and if the press release doesn’t make it clear that the military is the company’s target customer, the video footage sure does.
In one segment, Hyperstealth shows how it can hide a scaled-down version of a tank by placing a sheet of the material above it. In another, it renders a small jet invisible by placing it behind the “Quantum Stealth” material.
As for the phone’s more traditional specs, there’s a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855+ processor, 5G connectivity, 12GB of RAM, 512GB of storage, 40W wired fast-charging, and a 4,050mAh battery. That last spec would perhaps suggest that Xiaomi doesn’t imagine you having the whole screen turned on all the time.
Xiaomi describes the Mix Alpha as a “concept smartphone” and isn’t going to be mass-producing it any time soon. The phone will go into small-scale production this year and go on sale in December for 19,999 yuan, or about $2,800. The original Mi Mix was also given the “concept” label and released in small quantities, with the Mi Mix 2 following a year later as a more mainstream device.
On one hand, this design poses obvious issues with cost, durability, battery life, accidental touch recognition, privacy, and so on. On the other, well, just look at it:
team from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) has brought us closer to this chameleon reality, by way of a new system that uses reprogrammable ink to let objects change colors when exposed to ultraviolet (UV) and visible light sources.
Dubbed “PhotoChromeleon,” the system uses a mix of photochromic dyes that can be sprayed or painted onto the surface of any object to change its color—a fully reversible process that can be repeated infinitely.
PhotoChromeleon can be used to customize anything from a phone case to a car, or shoes that need an update. The color remains, even when used in natural environments.
“This special type of dye could enable a whole myriad of customization options that could improve manufacturing efficiency and reduce overall waste,” says CSAIL postdoc Yuhua Jin, the lead author on a new paper about the project. “Users could personalize their belongings and appearance on a daily basis, without the need to buy the same object multiple times in different colors and styles.”
Credit: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
PhotoChromeleon builds off of the team’s previous system, “ColorMod,” which uses a 3-D printer to fabricate items that can change their color. Frustrated by some of the limitations of this project, such as small color scheme and low-resolution results, the team decided to investigate potential updates.
With ColorMod, each pixel on an object needed to be printed, so the resolution of each tiny little square was somewhat grainy. As far as colors, each pixel of the object could only have two states: transparent and its own color. So, a blue dye could only go from blue to transparent when activated, and a yellow dye could only show yellow.
But with PhotoChromeleon’s ink, you can create anything from a zebra pattern to a sweeping landscape to multicolored fire flames, with a larger host of colors.
The team created the ink by mixing cyan, magenta, and yellow (CMY) photochromic dyes into a single sprayable solution, eliminating the need to painstakingly 3-D print individual pixels. By understanding how each dye interacts with different wavelengths, the team was able to control each color channel through activating and deactivating with the corresponding light sources.
Specifically, they used three different lights with different wavelengths to eliminate each primary color separately. For example, if you use a blue light, it would mostly be absorbed by the yellow dye and be deactivated, and magenta and cyan would remain, resulting in blue. If you use a green light, magenta would mostly absorb it and be deactivated, and then both yellow and cyan would remain, resulting in green.
“By giving users the autonomy to individualize their items, countless resources could be preserved, and the opportunities to creatively change your favorite possessions are boundless,” says MIT Professor Stefanie Mueller. Credit: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
After coating an object using the solution, the user simply places the object inside a box with a projector and UV light. The UV light saturates the colors from transparent to full saturation, and the projector desaturates the colors as needed. Once the light has activated the colors, the new pattern appears. But if you aren’t satisfied with the design, all you have to do is use the UV light to erase it, and you can start over.
They also developed a user interface to automatically process designs and patterns that go onto desired items. The user can load up their blueprint, and the program generates the mapping onto the object before the light works its magic.
The team tested the system on a car model, a phone case, a shoe, and a little (toy) chameleon. Depending on the shape and orientation of the object, the process took anywhere from 15 to 40 minutes, and the patterns all had high resolutions and could be successfully erased when desired.
How is this possible? In the simplest of terms, the scientists measured the electrooculographic signals generated when eyes make specific movements (up, down, left, right, blink, double blink) and created a soft biomimetic lens that responds directly to those electric impulses. The lens created was able to change its focal length depending on the signals generated.
Therefore the lens could literally zoom in the blink of an eye.
Incredibly, the lens works regardless of whether the user can see or not. It’s not about the sight, it’s about the electricity produced by specific movements.
Canon’s G7 X line has long been a favorite of photographers who wanted a travel-friendly camera that could still capture high-quality images. But with the rise of smartphones and the decline of point-and-shoots, Canon began pushing its compact cameras towards vloggers, who I’ve seen use cameras like the G7 X and Sony’s RX100 line as a backup or more portable alternative to a big mirrorless or DSLR cam. After all, when you’re attaching a camera to a gimbal or the end of a GorillaPod, every extra bit of lightness make a camera easier to handle.
So for the new G7 X III, it seems the influencers have influenced Canon because one of the camera’s new standout features is the ability to record vertical videos without rotating the footage in post natively. Using a new built-in gyro, the G7 X III can determine the camera’s orientation and then embed that info into a clip’s metadata, which means filming vertical videos for your Instagram stories on the G7 X III is as simple as turning the camera sideways.
And if that’s enough not to excite attendees of VidCon 2019—the vlogger convention where the $750 G7 X is making its official debut—Canon also gave the camera the ability to livestream video directly to YouTube over wifi via the company’s Image Gateway software. The G7 X III also comes with a built-in microphone jack for vloggers who aren’t satisfied with the camera’s on-board audio, and a 3-inch touchscreen that can flip up 180-degree so that vloggers can check their composition while they’re filming themselves.
The tech world is probably sitting on the edge of a charger revolution, and most of us just haven’t realized it yet. No, I’m not talking about USB-C (sadly); I’m talking about GaN (gallium nitride) chargers, a material that’s started to replace silicon in chargers. I’ve had the chance to try out two of the first GaN chargers — RavPower’s 45W slimline design model and Anker’s PowerPort Atom PD 1 — and it’s not just marketing hype: the new chargers really do make a huge leap forward for shrinking down power bricks in a way that’s really exciting to see.
In both cases, simply holding the charger in your hand is enough to make you skeptical. The 30W Anker just flat out seems too small to drive anything bigger than a phone, and the 45W RavPower option, while a bit larger, also pales in comparison to a similarly specced silicon-based charger.
From left to right: Apple’s 5W iPhone charger (for scale), Anker’s 30W PowerPort Atom PD 1, and RavPower’s 45W GaN charger
But both work as promised, outputting the charge they say on their respective labels without getting unnecessarily hot or exploding, which is basically all you can really ask of a charger. It’s not magic: as my colleague Angela Chen explains, GaN is much more efficient, meaning that chargers that use it can be much smaller and waste less energy than ones based on silicon. The biggest obstacle is simply that companies are used to working with silicon, whereas GaN is relatively new; in an ideal world, we’ll probably start to see more products taking advantage of the tech in the near future.
It’s not perfect yet: Anker’s 30W Atom PD 1 struggles to power something as large as a 13-inch MacBook Pro — you can charge it while the computer is sleeping, but while actively running, it’ll still struggle to really keep pace with the power drain (although it’ll work in a pinch). And for anything smaller, like a phone, iPad, Nintendo Switch, headphones, or anything else with USB-C, it’s practically a no-brainer for the $29.99 price.
RavPower’s 45W plug is even more impressive — it can actually drive basically any USB-C device, barring the most power-hungry laptops (like Apple’s 15-inch MacBook Pro). And while I’d wish for that kind of wattage in something a little smaller, we’re still in the extremely early days for GaN chargers, and odds are that we’ll start to see more varied designs soon.
In order to create what it calls “the world’s lightest gaming mouse,” the engineers at peripheral maker Glorious PC Gaming Race took a mouse and put holes all in it. The result is the Model O, a very good gaming mouse that weighs only 67 grams and may trigger trypophobia.
“You’ll barely feel the holes,” reads the copy on the Model O’s product page, answering the question I imagine most people have when looking at the honeycombed plastic shell. I’ve used the ultra-light accessory for a couple weeks now, and the product page is correct. It feels slightly bumpy under the palm.
Only when I look directly at the Model O do I feel mildly disturbed by the pattern of holes covering the top and its underside. The effect is less jarring when the RGB lighting is cycling. While I’m actively using the mouse, my giant hands cover it completely. Glorious PC Gaming Race says the holes allow for better airflow, keeping hands cool, but my massive paws negate that benefit. I worry about dirt getting in the holes, but that’s nothing I can’t avoid by not being a total slob. Perhaps it’s time.
The Model O slides over my mouse pad effortlessly thanks to its ridiculously low weight and the rounded plastic feet, which Glorious PC Gaming Race calls “G-Skates.” I particularly enjoy the mouse’s cable, a proprietary braided affair that feels like a normal thin wire wrapped in a shoelace. It doesn’t tangle, which is an issue with many mice and one of the main reasons I prefer a stationary trackball.
Beneath the unique design and proprietary bits, the Model O is a very nice six-button gaming mouse. It’s got a Pixart sensor that can be adjusted as sensitive as 12,000 DPI (dots per inch), with more sensible presets of 400, 800, 1,600, and 3,200 cyclable via a button on the bottom of the unit (software is required to go higher). It’s fast and responsive.
Glorious PC Gaming Race Model O Specs
Sensor: Pixart PMW-3360 Sensor
Switch Type (Main): Omron Mechanical Rated For 20 Million Clicks
Number of Buttons: 6
Max Tracking Speed: 250+ IPS
Weight: 67grams (Matte) and 68 grams (Glossy)
Acceleration: 50G
Max DPI: 12,000
Polling Rate: 1000hz (1ms)
Lift off Distance: ~0.7mm
Price: $50 Matte, $60 Glossy.
Note that the Model O comes in four styles: black or white matte finish and black or white glossy. The glossy versions cost $10 more than the $50 matte versions and weigh 68 grams instead of 67. In other words, the glossy versions are not the “world’s lightest gaming mouse” and should be exiled.
The Glorious PC Gaming Race Model O is the lightest gaming mouse I’ve used. I’m not sure I’m the type of hardcore mouse user that would benefit from the reduced weight. In fact, many of the gaming mice I’ve evaluated over the past several years have come packaged with weights to make them heavier. If you prefer a more lightweight pointing device and don’t mind all the holes, the Model O could be for you. And if not, you can probably fill it with clay or something to weigh it down.
Apple’s Memoji may have become the more popular 3D avatar feature for smartphones, but Xiaomi wants people to know that its similarly named version — Mimoji — came first, despite increasingly confusing overlap between the apps’ names and features. Moreover, it’s apparently threatening legal action against writers who call it a copycat without providing proof.
In September 2017, Apple introduced Animoji as an iPhone X-exclusive component of Messages, enabling the high-end smartphone’s users to see their facial expressions rendered in augmented reality as one of 12 animated emoji glyphs, including pig, fox, rabbit, panda, and poop icons. On June 4, 2018, it added user-customizable Memoji faces to Animoji — notably without changing the Messages component’s name — which hit all iPhone X, XR, and XS models with a final public release in September 2018.
By contrast, Xiaomi notes that its own feature was originally called “Mi Meng” when it hit China in late May 2018, but had the English name Mimoji, as evidenced by the package name of its Android application. While the company’s Mimoji generally looked like second-rate Animoji — including a pig, fox, panda, and rabbit-ish mascot — there weren’t any human figures. Until now.
Above: Xiaomi’s initial Mimoji.
The new version of Mimoji is arriving with Xiaomi’s CC9 phones, adding user-customizable human faces complete with the same basic facial, hair, and clothing elements, albeit rendered with various small changes. Writers in China found the similarities similar enough to call Xiaomi’s version a clone, but after a day of “internal self-examination,” the company challenged that on the Weibo social network. As Gizmochina notes, PR head Xu Jieyun posted the app’s naming timeline, and said that the “functional logic difference between the two products is huge.” It also promised “the next phase of action” against people who said it was copying Apple’s Memoji without proof.
Neither Apple nor Xiaomi can reasonably claim to be first with either the 3D animal or 3D human avatar concept; the ideas have been found in third-party apps for years, and Samsung’s AR Emoji beat both companies to market with OS-integrated human avatars in February 2018. Even the Memoji name dates back to at least early 2017, and not from Apple.
But there’s no question that Apple’s specific implementation of Memoji, complete with TrueDepth face tracking, was something special, and now Mimoji offers something similar. Apple has already announced a host of new customizations for Memoji in iOS 13, and each company will likely iterate on its system — under whatever name — for years to come.
I had no idea that quick charging mouse mats were a thing, but it seems like a great idea. Considering QI has won the wireless charging race, I have selected a few which have LED colours, because I love them. Note, if you buy on Amazon US you often get cheaper prices for the hardware than elsewhere for some reason.
ASUS ROG Balteus Vertical Gaming Mouse Pad with Hard Micro-Textured Gaming Surface, USB Pass-Through, Aura Sync RGB Lighting and Non-Slip Base (12.6” X 14.6”)
12.6” x 14.6” vertical gaming mousepad
Hard micro-textured, low-friction gaming surface for smooth gliding and precise control
Usb 2.0 pass-through for connecting gaming mice or headsets
Lighting mode button can adjust brightness or effects on the fly
ASUS Aura Sync RGB lighting features a nearly endless spectrum of colors with the ability to synchronize effects across an ever-expanding ecosystem of AURA Sync enabled products
CORSAIR MM1000 Qi Wireless Charging Mouse Pad – Adapters Included for Most Smartphones Including iPhone and Android (CH-9440022-NA)
Qi wireless charging allows you to effortlessly charge any QI Certified Device
Included USB Micro-B, Type-C and Lightning QI charging adapters enable you to charge almost any other wireless/mobile Device Performance micro-textured Hard surface tuned for Optical or laser mouse precision
Convenient USB 3.0 pass-through port for maximum Device compatibility
Built-in LED indicator displays charging status at a glance
Qi Wireless Fast Charging Mouse Pad Mat for iPhone X iPhone 8 Galaxy S8 S9 Plus Samsung Note 8 9
Input: 9V/1.6A; 5V/2A Output: 10W (Max).
Material: Non skid soft lining base protects desktop and keeps the pad in place. Copper Coil:Built-in circuit protection keeps you and your device safe.
Gaming Mouse Pad RGB Oversized Glowing LED Extended Illuminated Keyboard Thicken Colorful
1、Colorful RGB lights, 9 colors, 10 modes available: red, green, blue, purple, cyan, yellow, white, color, breathing lights. 2、About 4mm/0.16in ultra-thick fine textured fabric with precise positioning and low resistance. 3、Separable USB cable for easy use, convenient storage/portability, foldable. 4、PU non-slip rubber bottom surface, not easy to move. 5、Large size, large mouse activity space, enhance the gaming experience. Product parameters:
Product Description: Turn on the key to control lighting mode, the default is red light, each press to switch to the next lighting mode:
1.Red 2.Green 3.Blue 4.Purple 5.Cyan 6.Yellow 7.White 8.Automatically switch according to the above color order 9.Fantasy slow flashing 10. Symphony slow flashing 11. Turn off the backlight
Product size: about small 30*25*0.4 cm/11.81*9.84*0.16in large 78*30*0.4 cm/30.71*11.81*0.16in
Product interface: USB
Product wire: 1.2 m/47.24in black braided data cable
University of Maryland researchers have created a fabric that can automatically regulate the amount of heat that passes through it. When conditions are warm and moist, such as those near a sweating body, the fabric allows infrared radiation (heat) to pass through. When conditions become cooler and drier, the fabric reduces the heat that escapes. The development was reported in the February 8, 2019 issue of the journal Science.
The researchers created the fabric from specially engineered yarn coated with a conductive metal. Under hot, humid conditions, the strands of yarn compact and activate the coating, which changes the way the fabric interacts with infrared radiation. They refer to the action as “gating” of infrared radiation, which acts as a tunable blind to transmit or block heat.
“This is the first technology that allows us to dynamically gate infrared radiation,” said YuHuang Wang, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UMD and one of the paper’s corresponding authors who directed the studies.
The base yarn for this new textile is created with fibers made of two different synthetic materials—one absorbs water and the other repels it. The strands are coated with carbon nanotubes, a special class of lightweight, carbon-based, conductive metal. Because materials in the fibers both resist and absorb water, the fibers warp when exposed to humidity such as that surrounding a sweating body. That distortion brings the strands of yarn closer together, which does two things. First, it opens the pores in the fabric. This has a small cooling effect because it allows heat to escape. Second, and most importantly, it modifies the electromagnetic coupling between the carbon nanotubes in the coating.
University of Maryland Chemistry and Biochemistry Professor YuHuang Wang (left) and Physics Professor Min Ouyang hold a swatch of their new fabric that can automatically adjust its insulating properties to warm or cool a human body. Credit: Faye Levine, University of Maryland
“You can think of this coupling effect like the bending of a radio antenna to change the wavelength or frequency it resonates with,” Wang said. “It’s a very simplified way to think of it, but imagine bringing two antennae close together to regulate the kind of electromagnetic wave they pick up. When the fibers are brought closer together, the radiation they interact with changes. In clothing, that means the fabric interacts with the heat radiating from the human body.”
Depending on the tuning, the fabric either blocks infrared radiation or allows it to pass through. The reaction is almost instant, so before people realize they’re getting hot, the garment could already be cooling them down. On the flip side, as a body cools down, the dynamic gating mechanism works in reverse to trap in heat.
“The human body is a perfect radiator. It gives off heat quickly,” said Min Ouyang, a professor of physics at UMD and the paper’s other corresponding author. “For all of history, the only way to regulate the radiator has been to take clothes off or put clothes on. But this fabric is a true bidirectional regulator.”
According to the Science paper, this is first textile shown to be able to regulate heat exchange with the environment.
In a demonstration of “computational periscopy” a US team at Boston University showed they could see details of objects hidden from view by analysing shadows they cast on a nearby wall.
Vivek Goyal, an electrical engineer at the university, said that while the work had clear implications for surveillance he hoped it would lead to robots that could navigate better and boost the safety of driverless cars.
He said: “I’m not especially excited by surveillance, I don’t want to be doing creepy things, but being able to see that there’s a child on the other side of a parked car, or see a little bit around the corner of an intersection could have a significant impact on safety.”
The problem of how to see round corners has occupied modern researchers for at least a decade. And while scientists have made good progress in the field, the equipment used so far has been highly specialised and expensive.
In the latest feat, Goyal and his team used a standard digital camera and a mid-range laptop. “We didn’t use any sophisticated hardware. This is just an ordinary camera and we are all carrying these around in our pockets,” he said.
The researchers, writing in the journal Nature, describe how they pieced together hidden scenes by pointing the digital camera at the vague shadows they cast on a nearby wall. If the wall had been a mirror the task would have been easy, but a matt wall scatters light in all directions, so the reflected image is nothing but a blur. Goyal said: “In essence, computation can turn a matt wall into a mirror.”
They found that when an object blocked part of the hidden scene, their algorithms could use the combination of light and shade at different points on the wall to reconstruct what lay round the corner. In tests, the program pieced together hidden images of video game characters – including details such as their eyes and mouths – along with coloured strips and the letters “BU”.
Given the relative simplicity of the program and equipment, Goyal believes it could be possible for humans to learn the same trick. In a draft blog written for Nature, he said: “It is even conceivable for humans to be able to learn to see around corners with their own eyes; it does not require anything superhuman.”
Why replace your things just because they’re not state-of-the-art? Smartians are cloud-connected motors that breathe new life into the things around you.
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