IPod Touch Line-up But No Built-In Video Camera

Apple disappointed the many people who were expecting to see a new iPod touch sporting a built-in camera, though the company is still said to have one in the works. All we have is a new iPod Touch lineup that includes a more affordable 8GB iPod touch at a new low $199, and two new models that deliver twice the capacity for the same price, with the iPod touch 32GB player selling for $299 and a 64GB iPod touch player going for $399. Other than that, we've got the excellent Multi-Touch user interface on a pocket computer / mobile game player that we know the iPod Touch is capable of, not to mention access to over 75,000 apps from Apple's App Store. A 3.5-inch wide screen glass display, Wi-Fi, Blue tooth, fast web browser, built-in accelerometer and speaker are also packed in the thin metal design of the i Pod Touch, but we already knew that. Oh, here's something new, the 32GB and 64GB i Pod Touch models also include up to 50 percent faster performance and support for even better graphics with Open GL ES 2.0.

LG-GW620 - LG’s First Android-powered Smartphone

LG Electronics' first Android mobile device is the new LG-GW620 Android-powered smart phone featuring a 3-inch full touchscreen, a slide out QWERTY keypad, and access to Google mobile applications and services. LG has not offered much more details on the device thus far. The new social networking / messaging phone is just one of about 13 new smart phones that LG will be releasing over the next 16 months, with most of them running Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 6.5.

As for this LG-GW620 smartphone, it's expected to be available in the fourth quarter of this year in select European markets. Pricing has not yet been announced.

HP Vivienne Tam Digital Clutch Netbook

Designer Vivienne Tam teamed-up once again with HP to unveil the new "digital clutch" at Tam's Spring 2010 fashion show during New York's Fashion Week at Bryant Park. Merging fashion and technology, the chic HP Vivienne Tam digital clutch mini laptop / net book design was inspired Vivienne Tam by the classic Chinese love story concerto "Butterfly Lovers."

HP is hoping that this ultra portable PC will be the must-have accessory for women when it comes out in Spring 2010. We should know more about specs, features and pricing by then.

Dell’s New Thin and Light Inspiron Z Laptops

Featuring thinner, lighter bodies, and longer-lasting batteries, Dell's new Z” model laptops have arrived in two versions. The 14-inch Inspiron 14z and 15-inch Inspiron 15z both have wide-screen displays, and they are available in black or cherry red starting at $599 in retail stores and at www.dell.com

Features:

* Thin Is In (about 1-inch tall) Dell consumer laptops with 16:9 displays in 14-inch (14z) and 15.6-inch (15z) models.
* Choice of Intel Pentium Core 2 Solo ultra-low voltage, Core 2 and Core 2 duo processors.
* Up to 500 GB, 7,200 RPM hard drives; Included DVD drive.
* Up to 8GB DDR3, 1,066MHz.
* Standard Wi-Fi and optional Mobile Broadband.
* Choice of 4-cell (4-hour) or 6-cell (8-hour) batteries.
* Express Charge (4- and 6-cell batteries) are 80% recharged in 60 minutes.

Motorola’s Droid Is Memorable, But Won’t Make You Forget the iPhone

Like it or not, Motorola’s new Google-powered Droid smart phone will be compared to the iPhone.

The good news is that this feature-rich handset, running version 2.0 of Google’s Android OS, compares very favorably to the Goliath of the smart phone world as a utility mobile-computing device — and, oh yeah, a phone.

The bad news is that there may be too many good things going on to make using this device the quick, intuitive, out-of-the-box experience it should be. That’s a problem, given that the iPhone has set the usability bar so high.

Like the iPhone and many other handsets this is a primarily a touchscreen device whose face is almost 100 percent screen — and a bright, crisp screen it is. Rather than take sides in the virtual-vs.-hardware keyboard debate, the Droid provides both. The hardware keyboard slides out in a familiar landscape mechanism, and it includes a 5-way directional pad, the better to allow you to keep your hands on the keyboard once you have them there.

On-board music purchase is from Amazon (at least), but when the Droid is connected to a computer, it’s read as an SD card, and dragging any tracks onto it makes them playable within the music app. The Droid also sports a 5-MP camera with autofocus, on-demand flash and video.

Motorola New CLIQ and DEXT Android QWERTY Slider Phone

It's been a while since Motorola came out with any eye-catching mobile phones, but the company has now unveiled its new Android-based QWERTY slider touch screen phone with 5 megapixel camera which will go by the name CLIQ in the U.S., and DEXT in the rest of the world. This social networking device features Motorola's new MOTOBLUR solution which syncs a users contacts, posts, messages, photos and more from sources like Face book, My Space, Twitter, Gmail, work and personal e-mail, and LastFM, and automatically brings it all to the home screen.

T-Mobile will be releasing the Motorola CLIQ 3G smart phone with MOTOBLUR in Titanium and Winter White exclusively in the U.S. later this fall. The CLIQ also features a a 3.1-inch HVGA touch-screen display, Wi-Fi, a 5 megapixel auto focus camera with video capture and playback at 24 frames per second, a 3.5mm headset jack, a music player with pre-loaded Amazon MP3 store application, Shazam, iMeem Mobile, and a pre-installed 2GB microSD memory card with support for up to 32 GB of removable memory.

Windows 7

While Windows XP seemingly keeps going, and going, and going, Windows Vista has had a tumultuous less-than three years. The fact that Microsoft has released a new OS, Windows 7, less than three years after Windows Vista shows how big a failure Vista was.

Windows Vista was much hyped as it was launched, just as Windows 7 was, but a lack of device drivers for older peripherals, sluggishness on some lower-powered PCs, and an eventual class-action lawsuit over the term “Vista-Capable.” Internal Microsoft emails even showed that the company was aware there might be issues with lower-powered systems.

Windows 7 is supposed to be everything Windows Vista was not. In fact, some have called it a Windows Vista service pack. Some have called for Microsoft to make it a free upgrade, as well (which isn’t going to happen).

For one, Windows 7 shouldn’t have the issues with driver support that Vista did. Between XP and Vista, Microsoft changed the driver model, which led to that problem. Vista drivers should work on 7, with the operative word being should.

Building a brain inside a supercomputer

Blue Brain is an IBM computer built to simulate a human brain. It's powered by 2,000 microchips, each acting as a single neuron, that enable it to execute 22.8 trillion operations per second. Based at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, the project launched in 2005 to much controversy and skepticism. Modeling the complexity of the brain in a computer is considered a holy grail to some, and hubris to others. The Blue Brain Project isn't an attempt to build an artificial intelligence, although it could someday inform such an effort. That's because the scientists are hoping to use the machine to understand physiology, brain chemistry, and even intelligence and consciousness. The project's stated goal? "To reverse engineer the brain." Here's Markam talking at TEDGlobal this year:

Fake car key is a spy video camera

The FAKE Key chain Car Key Lock with REAL Security Video Record, Photo Record and Sound Record!
- Spy Camera, Audio Recording and Color Video Camcorder
- Support PC Web Camera
- Micro SD/TF Card Reader
- Dimension: 6.0 x 2.7 x 1.5 cm

Specifications:
- Pinhole Lens
- Image Resolution: 1600 x 1200 pixel
- Color Video Resolution: 640 x 480 pixel
- FPS: 29 frames per second
- Image file format: JPEG
- Video file format: AVI
- Audio file format: WAV
- Color Video and Audio
- Micro SD/TF Card Slot: Support SDHC format
- Rechargeable Li-ion battery

Fake car key is a spy video camera

Inexplicably expensive iPhone accessory (video stabilizer)

This is a $300 "professional" video grip for the iPhone 3Gs. However, I can't imagine any "professional" choosing to shoot video with their iPhone, much less have a KIT to do it.

"Zacuto has the first serious solution for shooting video with the iPhone 3Gs."

The advantage, as far as I thought, with cellular video, was that you could whip the phone out of your pocket and capture whatever is going on, without the hassle of carrying equipment around with you. This, of course, completely negates that.

And for heaven's sake, it costs $100 more than the 8GB model! I'd love to interview anyone who actually buys this item.