Top Stories

Canon’s new EOS 7D DSLR and the first Hybrid Image Stabilization lens

By Gizmag Team

07:21 September 5, 2009 PDT

Canon’s new EOS 7D will be released later this month with a USD$1700 tag. Key features include eight FPS continuous shooting, 18-Megapixel Resolution and full HD video with variable frame rates and manual exposure control. Three new lenses were also announced, being the EF-S 15-85mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM, EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS and an interesting EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM featuring Canon's new Hybrid Image Stabilization (Hybrid IS) technology, which compensates for both angle camera shake and shift camera shake, and is designed especially for macro photography. Read More

Samsung's 11.6-inch Ion-powered N510 netbook

By Tim Hanlon

06:42 September 6, 2009 PDT

Samsung has announced the imminent release of the N510 netbook. The N510 is powered by the Nvidia Ion LE platform, a scaled-down version of the Nvidia Ion platform designed for Windows XP and DirectX 9.0 that retains the benefits of a discrete GeForce 9400M - including 1080p video playback. Read More

The world's largest single-story motorhome?

By Darren Quick

17:00 September 2, 2009 PDT

Running the risk of being mistaken for another pavilion at the recent Caravan Salon Motor Home and Caravan Trade Show in Dusseldorf was the Snakeliner President-Suite – a mobile house sitting atop a semitrailer that lets travelers satisfy their wanderlust while enjoying 969 sq ft (90m²) of living space. Read More

Torotrak’s new generation transmission is good gear

By Darren Quick

00:30 September 3, 2009 PDT

Most of the efforts to produce more environmentally-friendly cars in recent years have focused on alternative fuels and more efficient engines. UK-based engineering company, Torotrak, has instead decided to turn its expertise to another vehicle component with the development of a new generation transmission that it claims can not only slash CO2 emissions and improve fuel efficiency, but also boost performance. Read More

Would you like some powdered beer to wash down that canned cheeseburger?

By Karen Sprey

05:47 August 31, 2009 PDT

Picture the scene: you’ve been trekking hard all day in the great outdoors, enjoying everything nature has to offer. You’ve set up camp and your canned cheeseburgers are bubbling gently on the fire. As you watch the sun sink slowly behind the mountains the only thing missing is a cold beer. Well… (beer aficionados, you may want to stop reading now) Katadyn, the Swiss-based company behind the Trek’n’Eat canned cheeseburger and other high-tech, freeze-dried foods, has developed a world first – powdered beer – to wash it all down with. Read More

New solar battery technology offers household power at 2.5c per kWh

By Jeff Salton

00:14 September 2, 2009 PDT

As part of man's ongoing quest to extract the greatest benefits from solar power, Salt Lake City-based company Ceramatec, the R&D arm of CoorsTek, has made what it believes to be a massive breakthrough in batteries for storing energy harnessed from the sun. The company is making impressive inroads on the prototype of a deep storage battery, the size of a small refrigerator, that safely operates at room temperature, consists of everyday materials, and can output household power at 2.5c per kWh. What’s more, Ceramatec says it will be cheap to purchase. Read More

Confederate's all-aluminium P120 Fighter Combat motorcycle

By Loz Blain

17:54 September 1, 2009 PDT

Harley-Davidson might have set the mold for the archetypical American motorcycle, but it's boutique brand Confederate that has taken it to the extreme. Confederate's Hellcat and Wraith are glaringly unique machines - all metal and carbon, nasty skeletal designs dripping with confrontational attitude. Now they're joined by the limited-edition Fighter Combat - a celebration of machined metal that looks like it's been chiseled from one hunk of polished aluminum for the next Terminator movie. But beyond its arresting looks, there's some interesting ideas on board. Read More

Men-only RV on show at Caravan Salon Dusseldorf

By Jeff Salton

21:01 August 31, 2009 PDT

Attention all males! When you were young, did you ever dream about being given the keys to the toy shop? Well, for four very lucky men that dream was realized when they won a competition to help design the red-blooded man’s recreational vehicle (RV). They chose to incorporate a bar, disco, outdoor theater, rooftop sundeck, two plasma screens, sound system, poker table and barbecue – and no needless devices in the kitchen. Read More

Video: Eric Giler demonstrates wireless electricity at TEDGlobal 2009

By Loz Blain

23:21 August 30, 2009 PDT

It's fascinating to think that while Edison and Tesla battled over the ascendancy of AC versus DC, most of the world didn't think this electricity thing was going to take off - I mean, who was going to spend trillions of dollars rolling out great coils of copper wire to bring this thing to the masses? Nikola Tesla was thinking along the same lines, and the Serbian genius's mysterious Wardenclyffe Tower was to be an experiment in beaming electricity wirelessly across the world, eliminating the need for a wired power grid altogether. But wireless electricity has been enjoying a cautious revival in the past decade - mainly at short distance and for reasonably trivial applications like charging cell phones and other battery-powered equipment. And as Eric Giler's great ten-minute demonstration at this year's TEDGlobal shows, wireless power seems very close to breaking through into the mainstream market. Read More

Ferrari advances driver-car interface

By Mike Hanlon

07:18 August 29, 2009 PDT

In the run-up to the official unveiling of the Ferrari 458 Italia at the Frankfurt Motor Show, Ferrari has released new imagery of the 458 Italia’s interior and of the steering wheel and instrument binnacle which represent a significant step forward in the concept of the ergonomic interface between driver and car. Read More

Kodak flexible OLED display gets its feet wet

By Darren Quick

20:20 August 30, 2009 PDT

Flexible Organic Light Emitting Diode (FOLED) technology has opened the door to a range of new lighting and display applications, such as roll-up displays and displays embedded in fabrics or clothing. Unfortunately OLED displays are notoriously moisture sensitive, so underwater applications haven’t really been an option – until now. Kodak has dunked their latest FOLED displays under water to provide a virtual aquarium for a group of assembled Playmobil people. Read More

Four crucial resources that may run out in your lifetime

By Loz Blain

06:14 August 27, 2009 PDT

We're living in lucky times. Living standards - in the Western world, at least - are the highest in history. It's an era of relative peace and plenty that would amaze our ancestors. But it's not going to continue forever; we're already stretching many of our natural resources to their limits, and the world's population will jump from 6.5 billion to around 9 billion over the next 50 years. Get ready for a painful correction - here are four interconnected resources that are headed for a catastrophic squeeze within our lifetime. Read More

Smarter touch surfaces with new pressure sensitive technology

By Darren Quick

01:43 August 28, 2009 PDT

Resistance touch technology, which generally relies on the use of a stylus or similar instrument, typically detects touch by measuring changes in electrical resistance. But it can only detect one touch at a time. Touch screen using capacitance technology can detect multiple inputs, but can’t detect pressure. Now researchers at New York University (NYU) are looking to get the best of both worlds with a new type of touch-sensitive pad that responds precisely to pressure and can detect multiple inputs at once. Read More

LRO - a giant leap for data transfer from the moon

By Jeff Salton

22:52 August 27, 2009 PDT

How is it that my cell phone still loses connection in the city and my laptop barely gets the Internet in the mountains, yet NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) can keep in touch with Earth from 238,800 miles away, 24 hours a day? Additionally, LRO can transmit 461GB of data per day (the equivalent amount of information found in a huge library), sending this information at a rate of up to 100Mb/s, while my so-called high-speed Internet service struggles to provide about 1-3Mb/s. Obviously, it’s not what you know but who you know! Read More

TOOB dome screen delivers IMAX experience at home

By Jeff Salton

23:12 August 27, 2009 PDT

Alexander McDonnell, founder of TOOB (Think Out Of Box) confesses to a fascination with the Mugar Omni Theater in his hometown, Boston – so he decided to build a mini-version for himself. The result is much smaller plastic half-dome screen that’s big enough for a couple of people to sit in front of to watch a movie or enjoy a video game. Read More

iRobot Warrior 700 designed to deliver... more robots

By Alan Brandon

22:14 August 26, 2009 PDT

The new iRobot Warrior 700 robot looks like the (much) bigger brother of the company’s PackBot. In fact the Warrior is a much larger, more powerful platform designed to deliver, well, PackBots (among other missions). The Warrior 700 can carry a PackBot at the end of an articulated arm, and insert the it through a window for reconnaissance, explosive ordnance disposal, rescue, or other missions. Read More

Drink a smoothie to treat your diabetes

By Jeff Salton

23:52 August 26, 2009 PDT

A yogurt-based treatment for diabetes that uses non-harmful bacteria is being tested on diabetic mice. Gut microbes that have been engineered to make a specific protein are helping regulate blood sugar in the rodents, according to research presented at the American Chemical Society conference in Washington, D.C. Scientists hope the treatment might one day provide an alternative for people with diabetes. Read More

GoPet scooter - 25 miles on 10c of electricity

By Jeff Salton

03:29 August 26, 2009 PDT

If a Segway isn’t really your style and a bicycle’s too hard going, a four-wheel scooter is a little too pedestrian and jogging is out of the question, then perhaps the GoPet Personal Electric Transportation scooter from MyGoPet Inc will meet your needs. GoPet is a three-wheeled electric vehicle that's easy to ride and eco-friendly. It has a top speed of 16mph and can travel 25 miles on 10 cents worth of electricity courtesy of its 48V, 350W front hub direct drive motor, say the manufacturers. Read More

The eniCycle is an electric unicycle that balances fun and utility

By Alan Brandon

17:36 August 26, 2009 PDT

The eniCycle is the latest entry in the increasingly crowded self-stabilizing electric unicycle market. Developed by Slovenian inventor Aleksander Polutnik, the eniCycle has Segway-like balancing capabilities but only a single wheel. With its three-hour battery and lean-to-go controls, this diminutive one-wheeler prototype brings Jetsons-type technology one step closer to reality. Read More

Boeing Airborne Laser ‘shoots down’ first missile

By Michael Mulcahy

20:19 August 23, 2009 PDT

On August 10, Boeing and the U.S. Missile Defense Agency were finally able to demonstrate that the US$1.1 billion Airborne Laser (ABL) program actually works. The ABL aircraft, a modified Boeing 747-400, took off from Edwards Air Force Base and located, tracked and fired on a target missile. Although a surrogate high-energy laser was used – rather than the megawatt-class laser that will ultimately arm it – instrumentation on the target verified the hit. Read More

Scientists catch lucky break with 'upward lightning' photo

By Jeff Salton

23:16 August 24, 2009 PDT

Scientists have scored a lucky break by capturing a one-second image and the electrical fingerprint of a rarely-seen ‘gigantic jet’ - a huge lightning that flowed 40 miles upward from the top of a storm. Images of highly charged meteorological events like this have only been recorded on five occasions since 2001. The team from Duke University team captured a one-second view and magnetic field measurements that scientists hope will give them a much clearer understanding about these occurrences. Read More

Phase change materials for the perfect cup of coffee

By Jeff Salton

17:02 August 24, 2009 PDT

You know how it is … you make or buy that perfect cup of coffee or tea only to have it go cold before you’ve finished because the phone rang or your boss interrupted your break with some urgent assignment. Well, there’s great news for coffee-lovers (and tea connoisseurs). Two German scientists have put their heads together to come up with a hot drink receptacle that keeps your beverage at the perfect drinking temperature for up to 30 minutes. Read More

Sony Playstation fights back with the smaller, cheaper PS3 Slim

By Mick Webb

18:37 August 24, 2009 PDT

In a move set to shake things up in the ongoing gaming console war,

Sony has unveiled the overhauled Playstation 3. Dubbed the PS3 Slim, the unit features a revised cell processor, 120GB hard drive and is smaller, lighter and – yes – cheaper than its predecessor. Read More

Renovo Hardwood Bikes provide the smoothest ride - the looks are a bonus

By Karen Sprey

21:07 August 24, 2009 PDT

Back in the 1700s before strong, lightweight metals were available, the first bicycles were made almost completely of wood. Crude wooden bikes are still used in many developing countries today, built from whatever recycled timber can be found. And as interest in sustainability and renewable energy grows, not only are more people (re)turning to pedal power, there is renewed interest in wooden frame bicycles. Renovo Hardwood Bicyles combine "high-tech magic and fine craftsmanship" to create a range of bikes from hollow wood and laminated bamboo, and are confident their bikes are “the smoothest bike you'll ever ride, stealth quiet, light and responsive, stiff as you want.” Read More

Fisker Karma PHEV hits the tarmac for the first time

By Jeff Salton

19:27 August 17, 2009 PDT

The Fisker Karma Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV) recently demonstrated how quick it is in two ways – it goes from 0-60mph in six seconds and from concept to public driving debut just 19 months after the company was formed. The 403hp prototype Karma PHEV almost silently attained a top speed of 100mph (using no gasoline) as it made its way around the Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca during the Rolex Monterey Historic Automobile Races. Read More