Asus competes for business users.

The Asus company announced via a press release on Friday, their newest bid to gain a piece of the business technology pie, the P565.

This entry into the ever-filling market of cell phones that do everything, delivers speed and quality to the consumer. Utilizing Asus’ exclusive touch-responsive user interface, Glide, multi-tasking has never been easier. Quickly switch between applications without cumbersome click wheels, closely grouped controls, or a complex button combination; all that is needed, is to move a finger.

Boasting the fastest processor at present, 800MHz, the P565 is equipped to handle your photo and spreadsheet needs, as well as the e-mail and instant messaging, text documents, and web browsing… all at the same time without slowing down.

Now, speed is great, but means little to nothing if you are unable to see any of it. That is why this PDA has a 2.8”VGA High-resolution (480 x 640-pixel) touch screen. With such a clear and brilliant display, you will not have to worry about eyestrain and fatigue.

No release dates or pricing have been mentioned yet. View further details, and the official press release here
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Pandigital Kitchen Technology Center

Pandigital is hoping you're looking to update your kitchen technology with a little of their technology. Back in March, they announced their latest foray into digital frames is going to involve a 15-inch LCD touchscreen, 720p HDTV, and recipe database.

The Kitchen Technology Center, or KTC arrives on your countertop pre-loaded with the hundreds of recipes, a music/picture player, and calendar/clock. The calendar function allows you to program the frame to start a slide show at 2pm, bring up a recipe and play you a song at 4pm, or just remind you "Emerald" is on.

Of course being that it's an offering from a Pandigital, it also accepts every digital camera card you can think of...

Worried about operating a sensitive piece of technology when you have messy fingers? The KTC touch screen is a mess-proof design that is easy to clean. Sealed with glass, it is protected from water, oil, flour and other common ingredients, as well as from spills and splatters.

Other niceties are - the included countertop stand, an under-cabinet mount, and flat panels are also wall-mountable, so you can position the KTC where you’ll need it most. Interchangeable faceplates in brushed stainless, black, and white let you match your kitchen’s décor.

Centralized control over the entire array of kitchen appliances has been a promise of consumerism since the Fifties, these frames are the first widely available system that actually presents the idea to homemakers in a way they can use now. I could easily see something like the KTC controlling the kitchen one of these days... when blenders, refrigerators, and ovens learn to communicate with one another.

June was the proposed release, but it doesn't look like that's happening.
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Windows 7 Revealed to Include Multitouch Surface Computing Support

Last evening at the The D Conference, Microsoft bigwigs Gates and Ballmer talked about the company's core business, Operating Systems. Ballmer shared a video snippet of Windows 7's multitouch support on a Tablet PC. Click Read More! link for the video

Multi-touch computing has been demonstrated by Microsoft before, with the Surface that was introduced to the public by Glenn Derene, of Popular Mechanics, in July. They have sold these Surface systems to the a hotel chain and a couple mobile communications providers, so far.

The ten thousand dollar Surface is more showpiece that PC, but it does present a new interactivity were dragging and dropping virtual content to physical objects becomes a reality. Using WiFi, special machine-readable tags (RFID), and shape recognition the table can see what's placed on it and interact accordingly. Dragging a few pics over to your phone, sitting on the Surface, actually places the pics in the phones memory; no syncing, no cord... just done. Getting pics off a digital camera work similarly. Place the camera on the Surface, and instantly the images are available.

Data visualization has been on the minds of database designers for decades. Virtual reality...

promised data visualization and physical interactivity, but stepping into a computer is a bit much. The approach of conforming the interface to the user is much more palatable.

Microsoft, along with companies like NYC based Perceptive Pixel, are pushing this technology into the hands of government and corporate buyers, luckily for us little people this may led to more innovation in the way of cheaper solutions.

Video: Multi-Touch in Windows 7

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Wacom makes strides in Touchscreen Tech

Wacom, on Friday, announced they've engineered a more sensitive capacitive touch screen. Using newly designed low-power circuitry and a patent pending technology that they've dubbed Reversing Ramped Field Capacitive (RRFC) touch.

What this means to a touchscreen interface is that even with a less than optimal battery level the RRFC touchscreen still delivers precise and drift-free cursor performance.

Other innovations of the RRFC touch, touted by Wacom, include the screen's superior optical performance, increased sensitivity, and durability through use of a non-glass surfaces.

Apple's multi-touch displays use older capacitive touchscreen technology, but in a more inventive way. With Wacom's new capacitive touchscreen you can use tablet with the screen and get dual touch action, but it's not the same at all.

If only Wacom and Apple would develop products together without patent restrictions, they might be able to realize an interface that conforms to us.

The video (tap Read More!), from last year, shows the direction we could be going.

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Pandigital Touch Panel Digital Photo Frames: PanTouch

Touch screens have been making their way into all types of devices lately, so it stands to reason that digital photo frames manufactures would eventually get into the touch interface game. Frames are usually with reach anyway, on our desk or sitting on an end table.

Remotes have worked up until now, but this added tactile aspect makes viewing photos in these frames reminiscent of flipping through album pages.

Pandigital, in May, will debut their new PanTouch series touch panel digital photo frames. Now if you’re like me you might be thinking, wouldn’t a touch screen picture frame mean fingerprints over the pictures? Wouldn’t the pictures be affected? Of course, this was considered.

Wisely, the matte around the pictures is where the touch sensor resides. The patented sensor responses to swipes or taps, and display icons point out all function controls for reference, if needed. Intuitiveness was a goal in this frame's development so learning the controls placement is reportedly a quick process.

PanTouches will be available in three flavors all of which incorporate image optimization (resizing) software, 6-in-1 memory card reader, and USB 2.0 speed:

• 7”, 482x234 pixel display, holds up to 800 images, MSRP 119.99
  
• 8”, 800x680 pixel display, holds up to 3200 images, MSRP 169.99
• 10.5”, 1024x768 pixel HD display, holds up to 2000 images, MSRP 249.99

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Passwords be 'Damned', I Want to Draw

Tech News
Remembering all those passwords got you down? Do you use the same password for all your accounts? This practice can be a bit risky to say the least. What if someone found out that one password? The damage could be widespread. No worries mate the British are here to help. Newcastle University researches, Dr Jeff Yan, a computer science lecturer, and PhD student Paul Dunphy have developed emerging Draw a Secret(DAS)for drawing rather than typing your pass code. To even use DAS pass codes you would need something that allows you to interface using a stylus. Devices such as tabletsor Smartphoneswould allow for this type of interface. This DAS type of security measure would be difficult, if not impossible, to hack or reproduce.
DAS apparently has failed to take off due to the difficulty of remembering where you started your pass-drawing when you assigned it. So in the enduring spirit of trail and error, they’ve added a background image(BDAS). In hopes that this will enable you to remember where to start that scribble you foolishly made your pass code. This direction makes sense, drawings are potentially easier to memorize. However, making a drawing that is complicated enough to be effective and that you can consistently reproduce is a challenge in and of itself. Plus, how many more ways will we give ourselves to enable our memory to go soft? Although, if you’re an illustrator this is most likely right up your ally.
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Holiday Showdown: Touch Screen Phones Come Out Swinging

[Image courtesy of Sprint Nextel Corp.]

Yet another touch screen phone has been unveiled today. HTC, a Taiwanese company, is the proud recipient of a deal with Sprint Nextel to provide the new phone. If you're not a Sprint fan there is an unlocked HTC Touch. The phone is based on a modified version of Windows Mobile 6 software which usually requires a stylus for the touch screen interface. HTC’s software modifications allow for finger touch operation. Its origins are evident, the phone still comes with a stylus. Also, there's no physical keyboard on the HTC Touch(Out of the three major carries that have touch screen phones Verizon’s LG Voyager is the only one with the actual keyboard.) Sprint Nextel’s data network was the first to introduce wireless web and it is the fastest data network here in the states. The speed of the AT&T’s data network connection has been criticized by users. The iPhone WiFi connection supplements for the data network’s shortcomings to an existent. The HTC is a smaller and lighter unit mainly due to the 3.5 inch screen size. If you’ve read this much, you are most likely asking yourself why you never heard of HTC. HTC has been producing PDAs and Smart Phones under other manufactures names for a while. Now, HTC is trying to build there brand here in the states. Piggy backing on the Sprint Nextel brand. This seems like it's a pretty good means to that end. Kudos guys, you’ll have ‘caviar dreams and Champaign kisses’ in no time.

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LG Voyager set to Stun Mode

[image courtesy of Verizon Wireless]

posted by Andrew Harris

Even if you’re suffering option overload when it comes to wireless handsets, read on; one seems to float to the top. Now you may ask yourself what does this new touch screen wonder device have that the iPhone doesn’t have? LG’s Voyager has physical keyboard, for one…well a QWERTY keypad, removable SD memory expandable to 8 GB, and Bluetooth connectivity. Needless to say, LG’s latest handset, Voyager, is much more than an iPhone wantabe. Verizon Wireless is hoping that the stocking will be stuffed in their favor this holiday season, promising Voyagers to be in stores by Thanksgiving. Mobile media addicts will get their fix in the usually sundry ways, including Verizon’s high speed wireless broadband with HTML browsing capabilities. Seems as if you can only watch V-Cast videos, but really they have most anything you want to watch on v-cast. As for the music playback it’s much more versatile supporting .mp3, .wma, & .acc, and music downloading is “quick and easy”. LG is banking, not on hype and aesthetics; they’re more about form following function. So satisfy you left brain and be sensible, buy for features not for hype.

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