Hasta La Gadget!

The Is have been dotted, the Ts have been crossed with a flourish, and pretty soon Nokia will have very little indeed to do with its formerly beloved Symbian OS. Oh sure, the company promises to keep it going with such standout devices as the Oro, but responsibility for developing and supporting Symbian is being wholly handed over to Accenture, along with 2,800 employees. When announced back in April, the deal called for 3,000 Nokia worker bees to make the jump over, so we suspect a few more (hopefully voluntary) redundancies are making up the difference with the new number. Now that everything’s been finalized, you can expect the switchover to take place in “the early part of October.” Accenture promises to care for its ailing patient through 2016, after which point even the most die-hard of fans will have to make the switch to a mobile OS from the 21st century. Full PR after the break.

Continue reading Nokia and Accenture seal Symbian handover deal

Nokia and Accenture seal Symbian handover deal originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Jun 2011 02:55:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Let’s be honest, it’s no big secret that we’re running out of dead dinosaurs to fuel our lives. And with recent natural catastrophes proving atomic energy isn’t what you’d call ‘safe,’ it’s a good thing the researchers down at the RMIT University in Melbourne have been hard at work figuring out how to turn you into a self-sustained energy source. Marrying piezoelectrics with a thin film microchip coating, those scientists Down Under have for the first time identified just how much energy your pressure can generate. This is certainly not the first time the tech has been put to use — Orange UK’s been doing something similar, albeit bulkier, for the Glastonbury fest each year. What are some practical uses, you ask? Imagine a gym powered by a sea of workout-hamsters, each producing significant energy from the soles of their feet. Curious for more? Try a pacemaker that runs solely on blood pressure, or a laptop charged by banging out Facebook updates. Who knows, maybe even RIM can put this to use in its next Storm. Just sayin’.

[Image courtesy Alberto Villarreal]

Thin film coating makes everlasting energy a piezoelectric possibility originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Jun 2011 02:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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For months now, DigiTimes has been fueling rumors of Amazon’s first foray into the LCD tablet market. Today it ratchets up the specificity with sometimes contradictory claims that Quanta Computer will be responsible for assembling the tablet with a supposed TI (not NVIDIA) processor and Wintek (not EIH) touch panel among its components. According to DigiTimes, Amazon hopes to move some four million units in 2011 alone with plans to launch the new tablet as soon as August. Possible? Sure, likely even. But we’ll wait for Bezos to sing before updating our holiday shopping lists.

Amazon tablet with TI processor shipping as early as August? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Jun 2011 01:48:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Online retailer to launch much-anticipated tablet PC in time to take advantage of the pre-Thanksgiving shopping rush, DigiTimes reports.

Originally posted at News – Digital Media

It’s been a while since we’ve heard anything from the VESA folks, so it was a pleasant surprise when the organization hit our inbox with a bit of PR announcing an update to the DisplayPort 1.2 standard. New active cables being introduced will allow video connections to stretch up 100 feet — five times that of the old-school, passive variety — and use thinner gauge wire for more flexible cords. The one kink is that the cables are directional, though, a new logo (above) should help minimize confusion over which end gets jacked into the source and which feeds your TV. Not that we’re complaining about longer, thinner cables but, it sure would be nice if we could cover those 33 meters without making our apartment look like a data center – how’s that wireless DisplayPort coming along?

Continue reading DisplayPort 1.2 adds active cable support: brings longer cords, more logos

DisplayPort 1.2 adds active cable support: brings longer cords, more logos originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Jun 2011 00:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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