Archive for the 'Hardware' Category
iClooly: make your iPod into a baby iMac - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
OK, how cool is that! OK, while it’s not a technological masterpiece I’m still very impressed with whoever came up with the idea.
This is the cutest damned thing I’ve seen in a while. The iClooly, from Japanese manufacturer RockRidgeSound, is a stand for your iPod Touch that makes it look like a lil’ baby iMac — and, as a side effect, serves as an actual useful way to watch movies on your iPod Touch without having to get your greasy mitts all over it.
Cell Phone Spying: Is Your Life Being Monitored?
While it’s sufficiently difficult to capture and decrypt GSM data over-the-air, and we can usually trust our operators not to divulge private conversations to anyone without a court order, one attack vector that is not protected by either your operator or GSM encryption is an attack directed at your handset.
Essentially your phone has all of the ingredients a (semi-)professional data miner could need to gather all sorts of personal and confidential information about you. It has a microphone and a camera; maybe even a GPS system or a temperature monitor. You store your contacts’ details, your calendar, videos and pictures, notes, text messages and maybe emails on the device.1 It has an integrated worldwide network connection through GSM, a high-speed data connection through GPRS or UMTS and personal area connectivity through Bluetooth.
Above all of these things, your mobile is a fully fledged programmable device — a computer if you will — with its own processor, storage, operating system and application software, and all of the bugs, loopholes and vulnerabilities you would expect from its more traditional desktop cousin.
Continue reading ‘Is Your Life Being Monitored?’
- The only protected storage in your mobile phone is on the SIM card — none in the device itself. [↩]
iPhone as Tricorder - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
Now I’ve got to get me one of these… If only it used the accelerometer to determine when you’re waving the damned thing in front of an interesting object and played that cool scanning sound… 
Once you "turn it on" by clicking the power button, you can switch between three functions and view related animations. Every minute or so, a window pops up with a snide remark like, "The Federation is shocked. The Enterprise actually ferried an alien VIP from one place to another without serious incident."
I have to say, that no matter how dangerous and geeky this is, I’m very impressed, and sorta jealous.
When Everett Bradford flicks his middle finger, jets of fire shoot out of the palm of his hand. He’s built himself a fully-functional, wrist-mounted flame thrower that turns him into the real-life equivalent of the Pyro, the firestarting mutant from the X-Men. In the … video, Bradford gives a quick demo of what his "Pyro" system can do.
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We actually WANT a Surface Computer, but since we can’t afford one, we thought it might be fun to make fun of it.
This vid gets the Laugh Out Loud award.
Killer NIC | Gaming Network Card | Bigfoot Networks
The Killer™ Gaming Network Card from Bigfoot Networks is designed to reduce lag and latency often experienced in high action interactive MMO and First Person Shooter games. Killer accelerates your game data for a smoother more responsive online gaming experience and a competitive edge.
- Dedicated Network Processing Unit (NPU)
Offloads all network processing to the NPU, freeing up vital CPU resources to boost average frame-rates and smooth gameplay.- Direct Game Hardware Interrupts
Bypasses the Windows® Network Stack to transfer packets directly to/from the game. This speeds-up game loop execution to improve game responsiveness and frame-rates.- Hardware Bandwidth Control
Fine-tune your network traffic for each application by setting bandwidth priorities and max/min limits through a simple interface.- Hardware Firewall
Stops intruders with zero gaming performance impact. Based on robust Linux iptable implementation.- Runs In-Game Applications Directly on the Card
Provides higher gaming performance while multitasking, with applications that run directly on the card’s NPU. Run Bit Torrent, Game Patcher, FTP and more while gaming with zero performance impact.- Plug-&-Play compatibility with all online games
Works with all online games for improved performance without game modifications.
I gotta get me one of these! I saw a very positive review (pdf) in Custom PC a while back. A bit pricey for a NIC though. If money were no object I’d have one of these faster than I’d get an X-Fi…
Handheld Lie Detector Goes to War | Danger Room from Wired.com
In its eternal quest for the "Thingamajig that Solves All Terrorism," the U.S. military has developed a rough prototype: a hand-held lie detector that can be used on suspected insurgents/terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan.
So very, very scary.
iPhone vs. gravity is no contest - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
Apple’s MagSafe power cords have probably saved thousands of laptops from untimely impacts — too bad there’s no such insurance policy for the iPhone. Brett Peters’ phone had an unfortunate encounter with his young son and moments later, with the floor, and the result is as you see above.
I’m sure he’s having a heart-to-heart with his son about the facts of physics. 9.8m/s2 — it’s not just a good idea, it’s the law.
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Another reason to support sterilisation.
Despite getting punk’d on the Mortal Kombat for iPhone April Fool’s joke, we’re still innocent and trusting enough to buy into this video demo of Quake 3 running — in multiplayer, accelerometer-enabled fragging glory — on a pair of iPod touch handhelds. Is it real? Is it coming soon to a jailbroken device near you? Can you even stand the suspense until June when the SDK-based games start shipping? Yep, us neither.
OMFG, want one now! [Via]
