HP Will Market 3-D Printers to the Masses

3-D printing is finally hitting the mainstream. Hewlett-Packard, maker of many of the ubiquitous inkjet and laser printers adorning office spaces everywhere, plans to broadly market a printer that can turn out three-dimensional models from computer aided design programs. It can be yours at the highly ambiguous price point of somewhere less than $15,000.
3-D printers have long been available to specialized design professionals like architects or industrial designers. NASA is even considering shipping a very special one to the international space station. But the high price of the machines as well as the software that drives them made them all but unobtainable to smaller firms and individual hobbyists. HP's device could bring a fairly good quality of three-dimensional printing to small- and mid-sized design firms, as well as a broad market of mechanical design professionals that need to model their designs precisely. [Detail]

USB 3.0 Finally Arrives

When you're in front of your PC, waiting for something to transfer to removable media, that's when seconds feel like minutes, and minutes feel like hours. And data storage scenarios such as that one is where the new SuperSpeed USB 3.0's greatest impact will be felt first. As of CES, 17 SuperSpeed USB 3.0-certified products were introduced, including host controllers, adapter cards, motherboards, and hard drives (but no other consumer electronics devices). Still more uncertified USB 3.0 products are on the way, and they can't get here fast enough.
The beauty of USB 3.0 is its backward compatibility with USB 2.0; you need a new cable and new host adapter (or, one of the Asus or Gigabyte motherboards that supports USB 3.0) to achieve USB 3.0, but you can still use the device on a USB 2.0 port and achieve typical USB 2.0 performance. In reducing some overhead requirements of USB (now, the interface only transmits data to the link and device that need it, so devices can go into low power state when not needed), the new incarnation now uses one-third the power of USB 2.0. [Detail]

Ten Technologies That Will Rock 2010

Now that the aughts are behind us, we can start the new decade with a bang. So many new technologies are ready to make a big impact this year. Some of them will be brand new, but many have been gestating and are now ready to hatch. If there is any theme here it is the mobile Web. As I think through the top ten technologies that will rock 2010, more than half of them are mobile. But those technologies are tied to advances in the overall Web as well. [Detail]

RingCentral Office

RingCentral Office delivers a virtual PBX, VoIP phone service and full-featured IP phones as one complete system. It eliminates the need for complex hardware, lengthy installation and technical expertise, making your business communication easy, affordable and accessible from wherever you need to be. [Detail]

Intel's Multi-tasking Concept Laptop Brings You Three More Screens

Sitting in the coffee shop with forty Firefox tabs open on your laptop, wishing you had one more monitor? Or three? Today at IDF, Intel introduced a multi-tasking concept PC that allows users to work on their main screen while providing three small auxiliary screens above the keyboard for organizing and accessing smaller, snackable chunks of info from their PCs.

The concept PC was developed with an eye toward future-gen laptops--on which you can organize more information while still reducing the size of your notebook. Without affecting the information or activity on the main screen, you can access information--say, a phone number in your address book or a reminder you’ve placed in your sticky notes--while keeping the desktop as clutter-free as possible. [Detail]

Audio labels speak to the blind

A device that allows blind people to attach and read audio labels on everyday objects has gone on show.

The PenFriend uses minute barcodes which - when scanned by a digital pen - trigger MP3 files recorded on the unit.

It has been developed by a UK firm together with the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB). [Detail]

LG system lets 11 users share one PC

LG is demonstrating a software system at IFA that lets users share a PC to lower power consumption and cut costs.

The Network Monitor system uses software installed on a host computer connected to one of LG's monitors to enable up to 11 users to share one PC within 10 meters.

The latest version of the system is available in the US and will go on sale in Europe in September. The next generation of the system will increase the number of users to 30 and remove the distance limitation by connecting the monitors to the host PC via an Ethernet network, according to Heinz-Dieter Speidel, technical marketing manager at LG in Germany. It will go on sale in early 2010, he said.

Besides power savings, another advantage of the system is that IT departments have to patch, update and install software on one machine rather than multiple PCs. The system also leads to lower ambient noise, according to LG.

The software that makes it all possible is vSpace from NComputing, which is installed on the host PC and also allows the administrator to set up profiles for each user and decide which programs each is allowed to access.

Current performance limitations make it best suited for simple applications such as Microsoft Office, according to Speidel. Typical users would be schools and training facilities, he said.

The host PC needs a quad-core processor at 2.66 GHz or higher with 4GB of memory to handle the maximum number of users.

The system supports both Linux and Windows and is based on the vSpace software from NComputing. The total cost per user is between €240 (US$340) and €280.

What is LG Network Monitor?

How To Create Your Own Dual Monitor Setup

Recently I wrote a post for The Web Squeeze about my essential ‘Tools of The Trade’. One of my biggest recommendations in that article was for web designers to get an extra monitor and hook it up to their computers. The TWS editors have now very kindly asked me to come back and give you a more in depth look into the world of dual-screen setups, and how you can create your own!

Although still quite a rarity outside large corporate companies and graphic design studios, dual monitor set-ups have actually been around for quite some time. Support for up to three monitors has been standard in Apple machines since 1987 with the launch of the Macintosh II, but wasn’t made a default feature of Microsoft’s flagship operating system until Windows98. [Detail]

Action! LifeCam Cinema Introduces 720p HD Widescreen Video

Widescreen technology is everywhere these days, built into virtually every new notebook, desktop monitor and flat-panel TV,1 and today Microsoft Hardware sets a new standard for webcams with the launch of LifeCam Cinema, the first consumer webcam on the PC to offer widescreen video with a native 720p sensor.2 The timing couldn’t be better, with more and more people going online to share videos with friends and family; in fact, more than 10 million videos are uploaded each month to Facebook alone.3 LifeCam Cinema webcam’s 720p widescreen sensor will deliver clear, quality videos — without leaving anyone out of the shot. [Detail]