judgecorp writes "Bell Labs believes that data networks can be more efficient and has launched a consortium which aims to develop technology that uses only a thousandth of current network energy requirements by 2015. The Green Touch initiative is going to focus in particular on wireless, seeking to reduce wasted energy in signal broadcasts. Cynics might say Alcatel-Lucent is using its research division to distract attention from its troubles — the Financial Times described it as 'a poster child for much that is wrong in the telecoms equipment industry' — but Bell Labs still commands respect and support, and the goal it has set is an interesting one."

s122604 sends in a performance review of the Chevy Volt, paying particular attention to what happens after the initial plug-in capacity has been depleted. This reader adds, "The review indicates that the performance is adequate, and perhaps better than anticipated. If the Volt can deliver technically, especially with the possibility that it could retail for less than expected (WSJ subscription may be required), does GM have a potential hit on its hands?" "How well will General Motors' Chevrolet Volt drive once it gets past its 40 mile all-electric driving range and starts to rely on power generated by its gasoline engine? That's been a question for both critics and fans of the Volt, and with just 11 months to go before this car hits the market, I got the answer."

mdsolar writes "The decrepit nuclear reactor Vermont Yankee has sprung a radioactive leak similar to those at other poorly run reactors in Illinois (Braidwood, Byron and Dresden), Arizona (Palo Verde), and New York (Indian Point). Greenpeace noted 3 years ago that radioactive tritium leaks even threaten Champagne from France. Tritium and its decay product helium 3 are incredibly valuable and there is currently a shortage of helium 3. What, besides shutting down leaky old nuclear plants, could be done to better control release of tritium into the environment?"

A new type of "wet computer" that mimics the actions of neurons in the brain is slated to be built thanks to a €1.8M EU emerging technologies program. The goal of the project is to explore new computing environments rather than to build a computer that surpasses current performance of conventional computers. "The group's approach hinges on two critical ideas. First, individual 'cells' are surrounded by a wall made up of so-called lipids that spontaneously encapsulate the liquid innards of the cell. Recent work has shown that when two such lipid layers encounter each other as the cells come into contact, a protein can form a passage between them, allowing chemical signaling molecules to pass. Second, the cells' interiors will play host to what is known as a Belousov-Zhabotinsky or B-Z chemical reaction. Simply put, reactions of this type can be initiated by changing the concentration of the element bromine by a certain threshold amount."

Asus' new high-end laptop could finally be the traveler's best accoutrement, touting twelve-hour battery life thanks to intelligent, second-by-second switching between the two GPUs and automatic, on-the-fly re-clocking of the Intel Core i7 CPU. All this also comes in with a price tag of just over $1,000. "ASUS's solution is different because it's user-transparent; even a novice user will get the fullest possible benefit because the laptop itself is deciding when to switch. The same principle applies to the dynamic CPU clocking. ASUS includes a desktop widget to track CPU clock speed. While using the UL80JT, I could see it moving up and down with what I did; up with program openings and CPU-intensive processes, and way down at idle. Between the GPU switching, dynamic clocking, and ASUS's other power management features, the UL80JT manages to consume less than half as much power as the unibody Macbook while browsing."

gyrogeerloose writes "A test published by MOTO labs comparing the accuracy and sensitivity of smartphone touchscreens among various makers gave the iPhone top marks ahead of HTC's Droid Eris, the Google-branded Nexus One and the Motorola Droid. The test was conducted within a drawing program using a finger to trace straight diagonal lines across the screens and then comparing the results. While it's not likely that a smart phone user is going to draw a lot of lines, the test does give some indication of which phones are most likely to properly respond to clicking on a link in a Web browser."

Technology Review reports from the Consumer Elecronics Show in Las Vegas that potential e-reader competitors to E-Ink are everywhere. The current market leader in e-book displays is greyscale-only, and it takes a long time to change the display ("turn the page"), so video applications are not possible. E-Ink says they will have a color display shipping by late next year, but it will be dimmer than the current greyscale and its response time will still be too slow for video. The wannabe competitors — Pixel Qi, Qualcomm MEMS Technologies, Liquavista, and Kent Displays — all do color and some of them can do video (Pixel Qi, Qualcomm, Liquavista), and some of them (Pixel Qi, Kent) are shipping now.

Charbax writes "This is an extensive video interview with Freescale's manager of software development about their integration of the Chromium OS onto their ARM Cortex A8 i.MX51-based $199 Tablet reference design. It seems to run smoothly and fast with multiple tabs. There's no touch screen support yet, so input is done through a USB keyboard and mouse for now, but the WiFi drivers are fine. Freescale is also demonstrating Android and Ubuntu versions. Those have a 3G SIM card reader built-in, an HDMI output and 720p video playback. The question is: will they be able to support Chrome browsing at full speed on the most JavaScript- and Flash-intensive websites and support a large amount of opened tabs?" The demonstration of the Chromium tablet begins at about 11:20 into the video. The Android and Ubuntu versions are displayed earlier.

MojoKid writes "As we saw earlier this week, Intel's new WiDi (Wireless Display Interface) technology will start to be bundled with various Core i5 and Core i3 notebooks later this month, promising to address the Home Theater and Multimedia PC markets with a solution that enables wireless connectivity of your notebook over HDMI to an HDTV using standard 802.11n wireless technologies for transmission of the data. Intel was also demonstrating this technology live at CES 2010 and HotHardware captured video of the technology in action, with Intel Product Manager Joshua Newman. This new technology is obviously fairly mature at this point with retail products waiting in the wings, just a few weeks away."

High-C writes "With apologies to Futuristic Sex Robotz, the future is here, and her name is Roxxxy. Truecompanion.com has revealed their answer to the Real Doll, and it looks nice. The site is short on details, pictures, pricing info, but wow." NOTE: some of the above links are not work-safe, for many values of work. I stopped by this exhibit today at the AVN Expo (not officially a part of CES, but by curious coincidence scheduled to coincide; the old saw that porn drives tech isn't without merit). Roxxxy, though, was rather unsexily posed on a couch, not moving a bit — downright creepy, in fact.

alphadogg writes "The group developing a standard for wireless charging expects to complete its first specification within six months, opening the door for makers of cell phones, digital cameras and other devices to bring compatible products to market. Wireless charging lets consumers place gadgets on a mat that plugs into a wall outlet, and have the devices recharge automatically without needing to plug in each one. Apart from the gee-whiz factor, it's supposed to make life more convenient by letting people walk into their home or office, toss their gadgets onto a mat to recharge and forget about them."

Dyne09 writes "The Design blog has posted an entry on Samsung's new laptop with a transparent OLED screen. The photos show a dark-tinted and dimly-lit screen that is fully see-through. While the utility of a see-through laptop probably isn't that high for the average user, several medical and industrial industries could greatly augment design work or frame 3-D models over real life in real-time."

Lucas123 writes with a followup to news we discussed earlier this week that the encryption on NIST-certified flash drives was cracked. "A number of leading manufacturers of encrypted flash drives have warned their customers of a security flaw uncovered by a German company. The devices in question use the AES 256-bit encryption algorithm and have been certified using the FIPS 140-2, but the flaw appears to circumvent the certification process by uncovering the password authentication code on host systems. The National Institute of Standards and Technology said it's investigating whether it needs to modify its standards to include password authentication software on host systems. Security specialist Bruce Schneier was blunt in his characterization of the flaw: 'It's a stupid crypto mistake and they screwed up and they should be rightfully embarrassed for making it.'"

Several sources have written to tell us that in terms of hype at this year's CES show, there is none bigger than that surrounding 3D TV. Sony, Panasonic, Samsung, LG, and Toshiba all have their own flavors of hardware and ESPN announced a 3D sports channel, but Microsoft seems to be bucking the trend with their apparent lack of 3D interest surrounding the Xbox product. "We're yet to see any major brand at CES pushing a 3D TV that doesn't require them. In most cases these aren't the basic Ray Ban style you might have worn to watch Avatar. In many cases they'll actually require power. For example, Sony's 3D TVs use a 'frame sequential' display method, which involves active-shutter glasses that turn on and off in sync with the images. Some TVs come with the glasses and have the transmitter built in, but again, in some cases you'll need to buy the transmitter and glasses separately."

necro81 writes "Google consumes massive amounts of electrical energy to power its data centers across the country and world. Now it has created a subsidiary, Google Energy LLC, and applied (pdf) to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to become a utility-scale energy trader. Google's stated aim is to be able to purchase renewable energy directly from producers at bulk rates, pursuing its goal of becoming carbon neutral. It is likely that Google Energy would also permit Google's own renewable energy projects to sell their energy at more favorable rates. Google reportedly does not have plans to actively become an energy broker, a la Enron."

VincenzoRomano writes "You won't need to swipe your fingers over smallish touch screens. You'll move your arms, hands and fingers (or whatever else applies) in the air or shake the handset. The phone camera(s), the G-sensor, the compass and so on will be used by a software to understand the gestures and to translate them into control commands. This breakthrough comes from a company called GestureTek, a non-startup company in this field." I love the idea of my screen no longer being smudged. I hate the idea of people doing this on a bus.

waderoush writes "The deafening roar of anticipation around Apple's expected 'iSlate' announcement on January 27 is strange, to say the least, given the public's utter apathy about tablet computers to date. What's going on? Xconomy's analysis makes three points. 1) Previous tablet makers have shown little imagination around UIs and how a touchscreen changes things. 2) With the iPhone, Apple has shown what's possible in this regard. 3) There's latent demand for a mobile computing device that's smaller and lighter than a laptop but has more screen real estate than a smartphone — something reminiscent of a Star Trek tricorder or PADD. Hence the hopes for the iSlate — which are so high that it may be difficult for even Apple to meet them."

An anonymous reader sends along this excerpt from Shacknews: "Gaming hardware developer Razer has announced a new multi-year partnership with Sixense Entertainment and Valve Software to deliver a '...revolutionary true-to-life, next-generation motion sensing and gesture recognition controller for PC gaming.' Razer, Valve, and Sixense, along with a selection of PC OEM partners, are aiming to produce '...ultra-precise one-to-one motion sensing controllers that use electromagnetic fields to track precise movements along all six axes.' Each controller will reportedly track its orientation within a single degree, and detect positioning within one millimeter. Thankfully, the device will be compatible with both current and future generation PC games."

An anonymous reader writes "Following yesterday's announcement of a late 2010 launch date for Natal, more details are emerging on exactly how Natal works. Alex Kipman, the project's lead developer, explains that Natal uses only 10-15% of the Xbox's resources to calibrate to a new player inside 160 milliseconds, track one or two players simultaneously, and use rudimentary knowledge of body anatomy to estimate where hands or other body parts are even when they can't be seen by Natal — for instance when they are held behind the back."

ElectricSteve writes "Shooting in 3D has traditionally required a complex, bulky and fragile rig using two cameras and additional hardware to calibrate and adjust them. Panasonic's straight-forwardly-named Twin-lens Full HD 3D camcorder looks to radically change the 3D game, with integrated lenses and dual SDHC memory card slots allowing you to capture 3D footage immediately, with just one device." So there ya go, get started making your own Avatar.