Hasta La Gadget!

A selection of work and belongings of the late theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking snatched hundreds of thousands of dollars per item at a recent Christie’s auction. Among the items sold were his motorized red leather wheelchair and a copy of his doctoral thesis Properties of Expanding Universes—one of five known…

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Celebrate the holidays in classic video game style. This Nintendo Light-Up Wreath has a Super Mario Bros 3 theme that combines one of the coolest video games ever with our favorite holiday. The pixel art wreath has power-ups and five green LEDs that blink intermittently in the center of the donut blocks. I

It looks awesome and very festive. Sadly, it doesn’t play any music, but what are you gonna do? Some 8-bit holiday songs would have sweet. At least it looks amazing. It lets those on the outside of your house know that there’s a Mario fan inside. Santa will see this from a mile away as he flies by in his sleigh, and he’ll make a special stop at your place with extra gifts because he’s a big Mario fan too.

This is perfect for the kind of person that leaves a powered-up NES on for Santa instead of milk and cookies. And you know what cartridge is inserted. If Santa gets distracted from all of his other stops, that’s on him. You gotta complete those levels. Hey, if he can’t deliver, maybe you get to keep all of the gifts. Sweet!

As magical as fingerprint on displays or FoDs might sound, they are not so different from their regular optical sensor counterparts. They are practically just cameras and the real magic actually lies more in the display that lets the light through. That said, not all FoDs are created equal and OnePlus’ first attempt at one deserves closer inspection. Zack Nelson … Continue reading

Image credit – iFixit

Due to laptops constantly being transported here and there, it is bound to encounter some knocks and drops every now and then which can affect its durability over time. Not to mention laptops have less efficient cooling systems than desktops, which means that over time the heat in a laptop can also lead to damaged components.

Of course laptops can be repaired, but the question is how complicated are these repairs, and if they are, are they expensive? Thankfully for those looking to get Apple’s 2018 MacBook Air, the folks at iFixit have done a teardown of the laptop in which they found that it is easier to repair when compared to other MacBooks, such as the MacBook Pro and the 12-inch MacBook.

According to their teardown, iFixit found that a lot of the components in the laptop are modular and easy to access. However they note that the pentalobe screws means that opening it yourself might be tricky if you don’t have the correct tools. They also point out how the battery is difficult to remove due to the use of screws and adhesives, but as previously noted, the batteries are no longer glued to the top enclosure of the laptop. This means that changing the batteries will no longer require users to change the top enclosure which should help keep costs down.

iFixit also deducted some points for the non-upgradeable storage and RAM which is a pity, but then again it is Apple so it’s not entirely surprising.

MacBook Air (2018) Teardown Reveals That It Is Somewhat Easy To Repair , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.

SpaceX’s planned communication satellite constellation, known as Starlink, will now be targeting a much lower orbit than originally planned, at least for over a thousand of the satellites, the company revealed in an FCC filing. The move should help mitigate orbital debris and provide better signal for the company’s terrestrial users as well.

Starlink plans to put 1,584 satellites — about a third of the 4,409 the company aims to launch — in an orbit just 550 kilometers about the surface of the Earth. For comparison, many communications satellites are in orbits more than twice as high, and geosynchronous orbits are more than 20 times farther out (around 36,000 miles).

At that distance orbits decay quickly, falling into the atmosphere and burning up after a handful of years. But SpaceX isn’t daunted; in fact, it writes in its application, lower orbits offer “several attractive features both during nominal operation and in the unlikely event something goes wrong.”

In the first place, orbital debris problems are naturally mitigated by the fact that anything in that low orbit will fall to Earth quickly instead of cluttering up the orbit. Second, it should shorten the amount of time it takes to send and receive a signal from the satellites — ping time could be as low as 15 milliseconds, the company estimated. And 500 fewer kilometers means there will be less spreading for beam-based communications, as well.

The satellites will have to do more work to stay at their optimal altitude, as atmospheric drag will be higher, and each one will be able to see and serve less of the planet. But with thousands working together, that should be manageable.

The decision was informed by experimental data from the “Tintin” test satellites the company launched earlier this year. “SpaceX has learned to mitigate the disadvantages of operating at a lower altitude and still reap the well-known and significant benefits discussed above,” it wrote.

This change could lead to competitive advantages when satellite communications are more widely used, but it will also likely lead to a more intensive upkeep operation as Starlink birds keep dropping out of the air. Fortunately a third benefit of the lower orbit is that it’s easier to reach, though probably not so much easier that the company breaks even.

Starlink is aiming for the first real launches of its systems early next year, though that timeline may be a little too ambitious. But SpaceX can do ambitious.