Author: Nic Boerma

IBM have have created an optical chip capable of shifting a terabit of data per second. The prototype, called the ‘Holey Optochip’, consists of a standard CMOS chip that has 48 tiny holes drilled into it. Optical chips transfer data using light rather than electrons and the perforations in IBM’s ‘Holey Optochip’ permit light to travel faster than before. Another benefit of the prototype is reduced power consumption as it uses less than 5 watts to move a trillion bits. It may not be far from being commercially available either, the chip has been built using already-existing methods and materials.…

Microsoft researchers have come up with a Wearable Multitouch Projector which is designed to allow multitouch applications on any surface. The gadget at present consists of a shoulder-mounted depth-sensing camera (which looks to be a modified Kinect unit) and a pico-projector that can turn just about any surface into a touchscreen. According to Microsoft, “Foremost, on such surfaces–without calibration–Wearable Multitouch Interaction provides capabilities similar to those of a mouse or a touchscreen: X and Y locations in 2-D interfaces and whether fingers are “clicked” or hovering, enabling a wide variety of interactions.” Researchers believe that the unwieldy shoulder-mounted unit can…

Belgian company SoftKinetic have presented their take on Microsoft’s Kinect technology at this year’s Game Developers Conference (GDC). Their sensor, called ‘DepthSense’, is being aimed predominately at laptops and ARM-powered television sets. The DepthSense uses infrared time-of-flight technology, allowing users to make use of the device in the dark. This will also permit use in a more confined area than the Kinect is capable of. The sensor can reportedly discern individual fingers accurately at a range of between 1.5 and 4.5 meters. A wider range of gesture-based products may be just around the corner. Source/Image: Engadget

Some Apple devices are still downloading iOS 5.1, which was released yesterday, and the operating system has already been the subject of a jailbreak. It has been reported that the iPhone Dev-Team have updated their Redsn0w jailbreak tool to allow users running iOS 5.1 to jailbreak their devices. The hack is slightly limited to products that use the A4 chip, meaning that the iPhone 4S and iPad 2 are not supported by the new workaround. The jailbreak is still incomplete at the moment so prospective users will have to make do with a tethered jailbreak for now. The iOS 5.1…

We all might as well admit it, we have no privacy anymore. Well, certainly not the outdated sense of privacy from last week. This week, the latest privacy storm hit the internet when Google’s long-announced plan to consolidate its 60 separate privacy policies into one, as part of a new “single sign-on” plan for all its various services, These include YouTube, Gmail, Google Maps and Docs. This comes a week after it was revealed that Google has been circumventing the privacy settings in Apple’s iPhone browser, called Safari, and in the same month a number of smartphone apps uncovered for…

Let’s get this out of the way: every new mobile device is always thinner, faster and has a better camera. Always. It’s the newly minted Shapshak’s First Law of Gadget Upgrades. I’ve had to coin it because, on Wednesday the new iPad will be launched. It’ll be thinner, faster and have a bigger camera. It might have the same higher resolution retina display as the iPhone. It might not. Apple steadfastly and resolutely never says a word. This builds hype until it reaches fever pitch, then the company sells tens of millions of whatever iDevice it launches. It’s like being…

The run-up to Apple’s latest reveal has set gadget websites alight, generating a buzz that will only start subsiding once the Cupertino-based company has said what they have to say. Most prominent of the talk is that Apple will be dropping the numbering system for the latest iteration of their popular tablet. The expected title for the newest iPad is the iPad HD, so named because of the screen it will apparently feature. Several reports are stating that the third iPad will feature a screen resolution of 2048×1536, double that of the iPad and iPad 2. This resolution is crammed…

Apple is widely expected to reveal an updated version of the Apple TV  set-top box along with the revised iPad later this evening (local time). According to The Verge both the iPad HD and the new Apple TV will feature the same A5X chips. The rumoured A6 chip will apparently be part of the  iPhone 5. The updated Apple TV is said to boast 1080p capabilities and work with the iPad and other Apple devices to provide streaming functionality. There is also speculation that the new iPad will feature haptics technology from Finnish company SenSeg, adding tactile features to the…

Toshiba have got a new red-and-black gaming laptop joining the ranks some time before June this year. The Qosmio X870 doesn’t even have finalised specs just yet, with both the CPU and GPU being vague at this point but there are some details available. The CPU and GPU will come courtesy of Intel and NVidia respectively. The green graphics company will be providing an as-yet unnamed 3GB graphics card according to reports. The X870 will feature a 17.3″ full HD screen capable of utilising NVidia’s 3D Vision tech and buyers will have the option of 2TB of standard hard drive…

ALL the little app called “Mirror” did was turn the green screen of the PalmV black, giving it enough reflectiveness to function as a mirror. It was 1999. here were many other clever “third-party apps”, as the computer industry called them at the time, but this very simple one demonstrated the innovative ware appearing on those small personal digital assistants. There were others that let you read Microsoft Word documents, or functioned as basic e-readers. When Mark Shuttleworth went into space, he used a Palm with a special app written by a South African company for his task management. It…