Penn State busts out 100mm graphene wafers, halcyonic dream inches closer to reality

Yes, we’ve been marching on this road to graphene-based superconductive electronics for a long, long time. But in the space of one week, we’ve now seen two significant advancements pop up that rekindle our hope for an ultrafast tomorrow. Hot on the heels of IBM’s recent bandgap achievement comes Penn State University with a 100mm wafer of pure graphene gorgeousness. Built using silicon sublimation — a process of essentially evaporating the silicon away from the carbon layer — these are the biggest graphene wafers yet, and field effect transistors are being built atop them now to start performance testing early this year. Naturally, nobody’s sitting on this laurel just yet, with further plans afoot to expand beyond 200mm wafers in order to integrate fully into the semiconductor industry, whose current standard wafer size is around 300mm in diameter. On we go then.

Penn State busts out 100mm graphene wafers, halcyonic dream inches closer to reality originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 10:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Tour company supports JAL to win customers

When a man’s down on his luck it is kind to offer him a helping hand back up. However, it is rare for a company to do this in their campaign slogan.

Yet that is precisely what tour operator H.I.S. is doing for its spring vacations campaign, currently being heavily advertised on TV. It proudly announces “We support JAL” (H.I.S.は日本航空を応援しています), over images of JAL jets soaring phoenix-like into the skies. The bankrupt airline is in need of friends, having some 2.3 trillion yen ($25.4 billion) in debt as of late September last year.

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H.I.S. points to five reasons to use JAL: their trustworthy network of routes; delicious meals; good in-flight entertainment; its safety with children; and their air miles system.

Now this is clever for several reasons: it latches H.I.S.’s seasonal promotions onto the slightly nationalistic sentiments that Japanese might feel for their troubled original carrier, and certainly pulls moral and emotional strings (we all want to help victims, right?). Also, people who might be concerned that the prices of the packages are TOO cheap will be reassured — oh, it’s that low because it’s through JAL, not because quality (or safety) has been jettisoned.

A Month With the Lumix GF1, And Why I No Longer Use The Nikon D700

Last month, we took a first look at Panasonic’s Micro Four Thirds (M4/3) GF1, a small camera with interchangeable lenses and a big sensor. That post, detailing the performance and features, got a lot of comments, so I thought it might be a good idea to relay my thoughts after using the camera rather a lot over the last few weeks. Here you’ll find out about its performance, as well as some of the hidden gems that make using it easier.

The (Missing) Viewfinder

As previously noted, the GF1’s rear screen is pretty good, its high resolution and fast (60fps) refresh making it very nice to use. I had thought I’d buy an add-on viewfinder for it, but now I’m not so sure. Composing pictures on this big screen is not only better than on other finderless compacts I have used, but actually more natural-feeling than a ‘finder. It’s almost like using the ground-glass screen of a view-camera.

The one problem is with long lenses, especially heavy Nikon lenses used with an adapter that require manual focus. The extra wobble and zoomed-in focusing would make a viewfinder very welcome here.

Wrong Lenses

Speaking of lenses, I have shot a fair amount with an M4/3 to Nikon adapter, which lets me use my old lenses on the camera. The results are good, and these lenses, which need to be focused completely manually, are surprisingly easy to use.

Pop one on (and set the camera so it will shoot without a lens — page 128 in the manual) and the camera defaults to manual focus. Press on the control dial so it clicks, and the display zooms in to allow accurate focusing. This is amazingly intuitive. You can also move the focus point around the frame.

Because this is all manual, if you set anything other than the widest aperture on your lens it will stop down and the image on the screen will darken. The camera still works great in aperture priority mode, though, so exposures are accurate. One further (unavoidable) niggle: No aperture value is recorded in the EXIF data.

Exposure

Speaking of exposure, the GF1 has a nice line in auto-ISO modes. You can pick two. While both seem to favor setting a wide aperture (I have been using the 20mm ƒ1.7 most of the time) before they ramp up the ISO, they work OK, and you can choose a maximum ISO in the preferences.

The i-ISO mode is the one you want to set. It detects when the camera (or subject) is moving and ups the ISO so you can use a faster shutter speed. This works by monitoring what is happening onscreen, as the GF1 has no accelerometer.

To test it, take the same shot with both Auto and i-ISO. They will be identical. But if you jiggle the camera as you shoot, the i-ISO will kick in. It’s simple, but it works very well. I leave it set pretty much all the time, along with aperture priority.

Video

Video quality is fine, not outstanding. The lack of an image stabilizer really shows up here, and things can get a little jerky. Lock the GF1 down on a tripod, and use it in good light and video shines, with the short depth-of-field from the large sensor and fast lenses lending a very filmlike quality.

But the best part is the dedicated video button on the top plate. Hit it and you start shooting, whatever mode the camera is in. Press again to stop. It uses auto-settings, but you’ll find yourself shooting little clips much more often. Better yet, you will never be left in video mode when you think you’re shooting a still.

The Flash

The vestigial pop-up unit is weak, in both output and construction. It pops out of the solid body and sits on a plastic scaffold high above the camera, waiting to be snapped off.

That said, having it so far off the lens axis means it doesn’t wash things out too much. And having a built-in flash adds another advantage: It can trigger off-camera flash. I set a Nikon SB900 speedlight to “slave” mode, turned the internal flash down as low as it could go and it triggered the Nikon every time, even without line of sight. Manual-shooting strobists will love it.

Other Niceties

The GF1 will store the faces of several people in memory and, if it spots them in a picture, give priority to focus and exposure to them. A gimmick, but a potentially useful one.

The Q-Menu, too, is handy. Press a dedicated button and you can navigate between the onscreen icons, changing settings as you go. It’s the virtual equivalent of having buttons in fixed places, so you can learn where they are.

Problems

I mentioned the tiny control wheel in the last post, and hoped I’d get used to it. I didn’t. The thumb wheel is used to set almost everything in the camera and it is tiny, slippery and hard to turn. Panasonic needs to fix this in any future GF2. Also in need of a fix is the “My Menu,” which lists the last five settings you have changed. You should be able to specify what you want in there.

The LCD screen has a crappy, thin plastic cover. It comes with a screen protector attached, but the hefty cover of my Canon G9 is way better.

The body, while solid, is hard to grip. When shooting it is fine, but try to carry it in one hand as you walk around and you’ll soon drop it. Buy a wrist strap.

There’s plenty more to the GF1, and nothing can beat a hands-on test before you buy one. But if you are worried about idiosyncrasies or showstopping problems, don’t. I have hardly touched my Nikon D700 since I got this camera (just once, for a flash-lit portrait shoot). That should tell you something.

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Motorola Devour officially coming to Verizon next month

And just like that, it’s official. Verizon Wireless has today announced that Motorola‘s scrumptiously named Devour will be heading to its network next month, with it being the first VZW phone to feature Motoblur. Not that we’re seeing any surprises here, but a quick specification run down draws our attention to a 3.1-inch capacitive touchscreen, a touch-sensitive navigation pad, a pre-installed 8GB microSD card and Bluetooth support. Unfortunately, there’s no apparent mention of multitouch — and we wouldn’t expect it out of the box, since the Devour runs Android 1.6 — but we’re crossing our fingers (and toes, for that matter) for Google to sling that delightful Nexus One update to the rest of its high-powered Android phones in the very near future. There’s nary a mention of an asking price, but we’ll be sure to keep an eye out as launch day approaches.

Motorola Devour officially coming to Verizon next month originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 09:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sony working to wedge laser-based pico projectors into its compact cameras?

Sony working to wedge laser-based pico projectors in its compact cameras?

Nikon’s Coolpix S1000pj camera/pico projector combo hasn’t exactly taken the world by storm, but we’re guessing it took a little while before Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups became a global phenomenon, too. If reports from DigiTimes prove to be true, Sony wants to be front and center to meet the eventual demand for such cameras, working with Opus Microsystems to license its laser-based scanning mirror chips, projector tech that sounds similar to Microvision’s Show WX. Word is that other camera manufacturers are working with Texas Instruments for the development of their own pico-packing cams, relying on TI’s DLP-based tech found in the S1000pj and a variety of other devices. Which will rule the roost? We’ll take lasers over LEDs any day of the week.

Sony working to wedge laser-based pico projectors into its compact cameras? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 09:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Open-PC is the nettop for those who won’t be constrained by you and your corporate ways

Open-PC is the nettop for those who won't be constrained by you and your corporate waysNettops come in all sorts of shapes, from Wii would-bes to keyboard come-alongs, but they’re all small, and most are running some variant of Windows. Not the Open-PC. It isn’t particularly svelte (345 x 425 x 100mm) and it is entirely free of commercial software, with a KDE core neatly wrapped in a collection of free software. It was designed by the community, specifications and even price determined by a set of surveys, and by the end of the month it will be available to those who said they wanted it — meaning it’s put up or shut up time, Linux fans. Price is €359 (including a $10 donation to the KDE project), a bit steep for a machine rocking an Atom N330 processor, 3GB of RAM, and a 160GB hard drive, but then again you can’t put a price on stickin’ it to the man.

Open-PC is the nettop for those who won’t be constrained by you and your corporate ways originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 09:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Runaway Prius: A Tech Problem Wozniak Cant Understand

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Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, is caught up in Toyota’s unintended acceleration problems. Wozniak’s 2010 Toyota Prius unintentionally accelerates to as much as 97 mph when using automatic cruise control, he says. Wozniak told Bloomberg News that Toyota and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration haven’t responded to his complaints submitted over the past two months. (Maybe his iPhone wasn’t in a 3G coverage area?)

Intel swings 25nm factory doors open for a tour de fab

Intel and Micron’s recent announcement that their collective superhero body, appropriately named IM Flash, is sampling 25nm flash chips has been accompanied with a whirlwind tour of their Utah production facilities for a few lucky journalists. PC Perspective bring us the atmospheric photo above, along with some videos, as they prance about one of the most hallowed (and cleanest) environments known to gadget lovers. Apart from the die shrink, the lads also discuss Intel’s reputed plans for a G3 SSD refresh some time “later this year” with snappier controllers onboard, which apparently was echoed by Micron who also intend to pump out faster processors with their SSD products. While you wait for all that to happen, hit the source link to find out how and where the stuff that gets put inside SSDs is made.

Intel swings 25nm factory doors open for a tour de fab originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 09:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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What if Cell Phones Dont Cause More Car Accidents?

 

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Insurance industry researchers say they’re not sure that the use of cell phones leads to more car accidents. While conventional wisdom has been that holding a cellphone and talking while driving is hazardous, crash data doesn’t  clearly show it.  What’s more amazing, the conclusion comes from the Highway Loss Data Institute, an arm of the insurance industry that generally finds most every aspect of driving to be dangerous to motorists and by coincidence to insurance industry loss reserves.

Lensbaby Gets Fisheye and Soft Core Optics

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Did you know that your Lensbaby Composer has a removable optic inside? Using the right tool you can extract this glassy core and swap in one of Lensbaby’s new Fisheye or Soft Focus optics.

The Lensbaby Composer itself is a twist’n’shoot lens which bends to place the point of focus anywhere in the frame. It’s great fun to use, and can give some odd and unexpected effects to your photos. These new optics slot into that same case and distort the images even more.

The fisheye gives a fully round view, with the bending of straight lines you expect from a fisheye. With a full-frame camera, you actually see the circle. Crop frame sensors will get a little vignetting at the edges and Micro 4/3 bodies will not see the circle at all, but do get the bendy lines.

The soft focus unit slots in and gives even blur across the image. From the example pictures, it looks like the picture is still in focus but jut, well, softer. Imagine the old Hollywood vaseline-on-the-lens trick and you’ll be close.

Both optics have interchangeable aperture disks, and both can still be used with the tilting mechanism of the Lensbaby, although in the case of the fisheye you end up just blacking out a lot of the frame. The softy is $90, and the rather satisfyingly hefty fisheye is $150. Both turned up here at Gadget Lab España yesterday, and will be thoroughly tested over the next week (including shooting video on a Micro 4/3 body).

Fisheye [Lensbaby]

Soft Focus [Lensbaby]