Hasta La Gadget!

We haven’t heard a whole lot from MiniWIZ since it introduced its Hymini wind / solar charger quite a while back, but the company looks to have rolled into CES with at least one new offering: the seemingly 2001-inspired Solarbulb lamp. To complete the device, however, you’ll have to supply your own bottle, which attaches to the bottom and can be filled with water to provide a sturdy base and some sure to be soothing lighting. The lamp itself is supposedly fully weatherproof and apparently charges in just 3-4 hours of daylight, with it able to store enough energy to provide about six hours of continuous night lighting. Unfortunately, there’s no word on a price or release date just yet, though the replacement bulbs will apparently set you back between $23 and $25 apiece.

[Via Inhabitat]

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets, Household

MiniWIZ debuts solar-powered Solarbulb lamp / bottle cover originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 10 Jan 2009 01:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Samsung has already thrown most of its excitement out here at CES, and after looking at the SL102 and SL420, you might argue that “most” should actually be “all.” Nah, there’s nothing intrinsically awful about either of these 10.2 megapixel shooters, but they’re certainly amongst the most ho hum delivered at the show. Both of the SL-Series devices also offer up Face Detection, rechargeable Li-ion batteries and Digital Image Stabilization technology. As for differences, the SL102 packs a 3x optical zoom and a 2.5-inch LCD, while the SL402 includes a 2.7-inch LCD monitor and a 5x optical zoom. Like we said, pretty boring, but we don’t doubt their ability to get the job done if it really came down to it.

Filed under: CES, Digital Cameras

Samsung intros SL102 / SL420 point-and-shoots, no one notices originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 09 Jan 2009 23:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We hit up Dell for a few more minutes with the sleek new Studio XPS 13 and 16, and our positive early impressions just got better with time. We’re really digging the leather panel on the lid, and while the machines are total fingerprint magnets, when they’re cleaned up they’re pretty eye-catching — particularly the light-up circles on the hinges and the backlit keyboard and mouse buttons. Even the bottom is slick — it’s nicely detailed and the whole things lifts off (Dell calls it a “garage door”) for easy access to the RAM and hard drive. We nabbed a ton of shots, check it out in the gallery!

Filed under: Laptops

Dell Studio XPS 13 and 16 hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 09 Jan 2009 22:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Panasonic had its slim SC-HC3 iPod / CD dock on display in its booth at CES so we made the long trek to LVCC’s central hall from our sweet double-wide HQ. For some reason, they didn’t have a single iPod available for us to test it with (go figure), but the thing wasn’t lacking in the looks department. If you’re interested, Panasonic’s estimating availability for March at around $200. Still images of the system in action are available below, or peep some video of the sliding mechanism after the break.

Continue reading Video: Panasonic SC-HC3 iPod stereo system hands-on

Filed under: CES, Home Entertainment

Video: Panasonic SC-HC3 iPod stereo system hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 09 Jan 2009 21:18:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pegatron has been pretty quiet ever since it split off from ASUS to do ODM stuff all by its lonesome — which is sort of the idea, since Pegatron’s mainly doing the behind-the-scenes manufacturing. We’re glad, however, that the company peeked out of its shell to show off these new Freescale-based netbooks. The Linux-running laptops boast 8.9-inch screens, 8 hour battery life, 8GB of storage and projected retail prices around $199, while the nettop holds similar power in a pico-style form factor. Under the hood is Freescale’s brand new ARM i.MX515 processor, which is a 1GHz chip that’s described as basically being three times faster than the iPhone. The win here is that the chip draws very little power and generates very little heat, allowing Pegatron to squeeze impressive battery life out of a very thin form factor. Freescale is working with Ubuntu to prep an ARM-Linux distro, which will hit in May, and Adobe will have an ARM happy version of Flash 10 sometime this year. Supplementing the processor are chips for DSP, 2D, 3D and 720p acceleration, which switch on and off as needed — we saw the computer in action playing 720p video smoothly while drawing a mere 0.5 watts and not even feeling warm to the touch. The limitation here is obviously straight-up processing power — it’s not very impressive, and certainly slower than Intel’s Atom — but for running an optimized Linux build and surfing the web or watching a vid, Pegatron and Freescale might’ve just found a new portability sweetspot. They’re hoping to have an OEM pick these up around May or June sometime.

Filed under: Laptops

Pegatron and Freescale team for low-power, ultra-cheap netbooks and nettops originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 09 Jan 2009 20:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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