CWmike writes "It has been years since the banking industry made any large investments in core IT systems, but some of the largest financial services firms in the U.S. are now in the midst of rolling out multi-million dollar projects, say industry experts. About a decade ago, they began replacing decades-old Cobol-based core systems, with open, Web-enabled apps. Now, they are spending more than $100,000,000 to replace aging systems, converting to real-time mobile applications for retail services such as savings and checking accounts and lending systems. The idea behind going real-time: Grab more business — and money — from customers. 'Five of the top 20 banks are engaged in some sort of core banking replacement and we expect to see another three or four in next 12 months,' said Fiaz Sindhu, who leads Accenture's North American core banking practice. 'They're looking at those upgrades as a path to growth.'"

MojoKid writes "With Bobcat and Llano launched, AMD has one more major product overhaul set for this year. The company's Bulldozer CPU will launch in the next few months, and after years of waiting, enthusiasts and IT industry analysts are both curious to see what AMD has in its high performance pipeline. According to recently leaked info, one of the new AMD octal-core processors will be an AMD FX-8130P running at 3.2GHz base speed, with what's reported as a 3.7GHz Turbo speed, and a 4.2GHz clock speed if only half the CPU's cores are in use." Writer Joel Hruska justly points out that measures based on unofficial data and unreleased chips are subject to all kinds of potential errors, not to mention Photoshop.

theodp writes "On Tuesday, the USPTO granted a patent to Apple for Portrait-landscape rotation heuristics for a portable multifunction device (USPTO), which covers 'displaying information on the touch screen display in a portrait view or a landscape view based on an analysis of data received from the one or more accelerometers.' Perhaps the USPTO Examiners didn't get a chance to review the circa-1991 Computer Chronicles video of the Radius Pivot monitor before deeming Apple's invention patentable. Or check out the winning touchArcade trivia contest entry, which noted the circa-1982 Corvus Concept sported a 15-inch, high-resolution, bit-mapped display screen that also flipped between portrait and landscape views when rotated, like our friend the iPhone. Hey, everything old is new again, right?"

destinyland writes "Some time in the next 10 weeks, Amazon will release a new Android tablet device, which will compete directly with Apple's iPad, according to the Wall Street Journal. Amazon hopes to leverage the digital content they've already made available online — digital video, music, and ebooks, as well as their new app store for Android devices. The device will ship without a built-in camera, prompting one tablet watcher to report that 'it feels like Amazon is trying to strip it down and bring it in at the lowest cost possible.' Amazon will also release two new versions of the Kindle — one with a touch screen, and one at a lower price." Now if only they'd make it a proper e-reader by including a Pixel Qi (or similar) daylight-readable screen, I'd be sold.

An anonymous reader writes "If you're a Windows or Linux user, or simply an Apple user that can't justify the $500 price tag on those beautiful 3TB Time Capsules, why not build your own? With a wireless router, an external USB hard drive, and a little bit of setting up, you can make your own wireless, network-attached backup device for around $200."

ShipLives writes "Researchers have developed a memory device that is soft and functions well in wet environments, which could lead to new biocompatible electronic devices. 'We’ve created a memory device with the physical properties of Jell-O,' says Dr. Michael Dickey, an assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at NC State and co-author of a paper describing the research."

An anonymous reader writes "The National Science Foundation today announced an $18.5 million grant to establish an Engineering Research Center for Sensorimotor Neural Engineering based at the University of Washington. 'The center will work on robotic devices that interact with, assist and understand the nervous system,' said director Yoky Matsuoka. 'It will combine advances in robotics, neuroscience, electromechanical devices and computer science to restore or augment the body's ability for sensation and movement.' Steve Austin, anyone?"

MikeChino writes "We've learned about Scotland's wave energy initiatives in the past, and just this morning the nation unveiled Aquamarine Power's next-generation Oyster 800 wave power plant. The new generator can produce 250% more power at one third the cost of the first full-scale 315kw Oyster that was installed in Orkney in 2009. The device's shape has been modified and made wider to enable it to capture more wave energy, and a double seabed pile system allows for easier installation."

snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Neil McAllister takes an in-depth look at the Samsung Chromebook Series 5 3G and finds the device comparatively lackluster. 'The Chromebook is lightweight and inexpensive, and it offers a full-featured Web browsing experience. But its low-end hardware, lack of versatility, and primitive support for commonplace computing tasks such as printing, file management, networking, and media playback make it a poor choice for everyday use, particularly in a business setting,' McAllister writes. 'All in all, the Samsung Series 5 is an average-quality netbook with a large screen and a higher-than-average price tag, while Chrome OS itself feels more like a proof-of-concept project whose time has not yet come.'"

Vigile writes "For users that have known about the process of bitcoin mining the obvious tool for the job has been the GPU. Miners have been buying up graphics cards during sales across the web but which GPUs offer the most dollar efficient, power efficient and quickest payoff for the bitcoin currency? A series of tests over at PC Perspective goes through 16 different GPU configurations including older high-end cards through modern low-cost options and even a $1700+ collection with multiple dual-GPU cards installed. The article gives details on how the mining programs work, why GPUs are faster than CPUs inherently and why AMD seems to be so much faster than NVIDIA."

An anonymous reader writes "Following up on earlier work in the field, researchers at MIT are developing a process to print solar cells directly onto many common forms of paper. 'The technique represents a major departure from the systems used until now to create most solar cells, which require exposing the substrates to potentially damaging conditions, either in the form of liquids or high temperatures. The new printing process uses vapors, not liquids, and temperatures less than 120 degrees Celsius. These "gentle" conditions make it possible to use ordinary untreated paper, cloth or plastic as the substrate on which the solar cells can be printed. ... The resilient solar cells still function even when folded up into a paper airplane.'"

An anonymous reader writes "Astronauts embarked on the final space walk of the U.S. shuttle era at the International Space Station, where Atlantis is docked on the final mission of the 30-year U.S. program. Atlantis carries a year's worth of supplies — more than 3,600 kilograms — for the International Space Station. It will also bring up a system that will be used by Canada's Dextre robot to test a system for refuelling and repairing spacecraft and satellites in space."

We've previously discussed a few projects by game system hacker Ben Heck, including his PS3 laptop and Xbox 360 laptop. Now, GameSetWatch points out two videos produced by Ben showing and explaining new projects. First, he designs and builds a disc-changer for an Xbox 360, and then he turns an old Sega CDX system into a portable console.

MojoKid writes "Solid state drives have gone from essentially non-existent on the desktop to the preferred storage medium of enthusiasts and workstation professionals in less than three years. Three of the drives featured in this six-drive SATA III SSD round-up consistently offered 'best-of-class' performance throughout testing, with speeds in excess of 500MB/s for read and write throughput. OCZ's Vertex 3 Max IOPS, Corsair's Force GT, and the Patriot Wildfire all feature the same SandForce SF-2281 controller and synchronous NAND flash memory. These drives offered the highest transfer rates in the majority of tests, though performance does drop off as the data gets more incompressible."

An anonymous reader writes "Ever wonder what life will be like when the robots take over? On Saturday, some of us might get a glimpse, when the first robot film festival kicks off in New York. Botskers (robot Oscars) will be awarded and the event will feature a red carpet, robotically milled statuettes, a robot-human comedy duo, and a rock band with robot musicians playing backup. 'We are trying to focus on celebrating robotics and thinking about positive futures,' says festival creator Heather Knight of Marilyn Monrobot."

Vrtigo1 writes "I keep a Pentium Pro CPU on my desk underneath my monitor because it reminds me of simpler times. Every once in a while I want to revisit the old days of the original Doom, the phonebook-sized Computer Shoppers, when you looked forward to the demo CD that came with Computer Gaming World because the Internet was too slow to distribute software, and when Falcon Northwest's Mach V was the envy of many a geek. IRC is just about the only technology I can think of that's still in use today and still looks the same as it did in the early nineties. So where do you go when you need to regress back to simpler times and get your nostalgia fix? I foolishly trashed my old tech mags, and there isn't a whole lot online that has survived from that long ago."

An anonymous reader writes "Last weekend, Silicon Valley VC Marc Andreessen called out 'wearable computing' as a Next Big Thing. Now MC10, a three-year-old company making flexible electronics, is taking an old idea to new places. The startup is developing health sensors that conform to the human body, image sensors that curve like the retina, and stretchy solar cells (and other circuitry) that can be woven into the fabric of a tent or aircraft skin. Unlike organic or printed electronics, which tend to be inefficient, MC10 uses silicon islands linked by springy interconnects. It's still early, but the company has new backing from VCs, Reebok, and the U.S. government to develop wearable devices, mini-sensors, and portable power. Imagine a self-charging UAV with tiny cameras on board, and you can tell what the military wants out of this."

An anonymous reader writes "There's a fundamental flaw with fan-and-heatsink cooling systems: no matter how hard the fan blows, a boundary layer of motionless, highly-insulating air remains on the heatsink. You can increase the size of the heatsink and you can blow more air, but ultimately the boundary layer prevents the system from being efficient. But what if you did away with the fan? What if the heatsink itself rotated? Well, believe it or not, rotating the heat exchanger obliterates the boundary layer, removes the need for a fan, and it's so efficient that it can operate at low and very quiet speeds. That's exactly what the Air Bearing Heat Exchanger, developed by Jeff Koplow of the Sandia National Laboratories, has developed. It's even intrinsically immune to the build up of dust and detritus!"

dotarray writes with this piece on GamePron with a piece of game pr0n: "If you're big on nostalgia, but small on space, we might just have the solution for you. A clever gentleman has created a teeny-tiny '80s arcade cabinet that will fit happily on your desktop – and while it might look like a mere mock-up, this one actually works, playing Space Invaders on the miniature screen."

arisvega writes "Dead battery in Belgrade, Serbia? Head to the city's Obrenovac district, where a group of students has developed the world's first public charging station powered entirely by solar energy. Known as the Strawberry Tree, the structure's 16 ports support a variety of handhelds, allowing pedestrians to juice up their handhelds in just ten to 15 minutes, at no charge. Its built-in batteries can also store up to a month's worth of back-up energy, enabling the station to hum along at night, or even during Serbia's less sunny seasons. 'Energy from the sun is free, and it would be unethical to charge people to use the Strawberry Tree...We are trying to inspire young people to think about the source of the energy they use, and behave and act responsibly,' said the inventor Milos Milisavljevic (17 years old when he came up with the idea) and now, at the ripe old age of 22, is looking to plant new stations across other Serbian cities."