Hasta La Gadget!

Toyota’s not too pleased with the general scarcity of rare earth minerals and China’s near-monopolistic grip on the world’s supply, so it’s decided to act before it’s too late. A company spokesman has been cited as saying the Prius maker is hard at work on a new electric motor design that should dramatically reduce (though seemingly not eliminate) the need for rare earths in its production. Aside from being made of less price-volatile materials, the new electric ticker is expected to be generally cheaper to manufacture. Further details aren’t yet available, but we hope this turns into a classic case of necessity breeding innovation — that Prius C concept deserves a set of internals that can keep up with its bodacious exterior.

Toyota developing new type of electric motor in an effort to escape dependency on rare earth metals originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 17 Jan 2011 04:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Yes, in addition to being one of the coolest and largest nations in the world, China now has the distinction, at least for the time being, of having the longest bridge in the world. The Qingdao Haiwan Bridge — at 26.4 miles long — in Shandong Province is almost three miles longer than the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway in Louisiana, which was the previous record holder for the longest bridge over water in the world (the longest bridge in the world period is also in China). The bridge took four years to build — lightning fast by American construction standards — and cost around $8.5 billion dollars. It was designed by Shandong Gausu Group and built by about 10,000 workers.

China has built the longest bridge in the world… so you don’t have to dig that hole originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 12 Jan 2011 11:20:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Well, that was quick. It was just two days ago when the elusive PlayStation Phone popped up on a Hong Kong forum, and now it’s back again in full exposure thanks to Chinese website IT168. It’s now confirmed that said Xperia-branded device is powered by a Qualcomm Adreno 205 GPU, along with what’s likely to be a 1GHz Snapdragon QSD8255 as featured on the HTC Desire HD. Interestingly, Neocore is reporting an impressive 59.1fps benchmark, which is a huge improvement from our exclusive look back in early December. Quadrant also reports a high score of 1,733, but hey, there’s no saying that this is the final build, so the graphics performance may get even better.

Other tidbits found in the latest leak include the generous battery capacity of 1,500mAh, the 854 x 480 resolution on a 4-inch LCD, a 5 megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash sans 720p video recording (although it’s probably just that the leaksters didn’t look in all the submenu in the camera app), 512MB RAM, 512MB ROM, a microSD slot, SIM slot, micro-USB, and a second mic on the back for active noise cancellation à la Nexus One. Interestingly, the still-empty game launcher app is now called “PlayStation Pocket.” We’re still unclear just what the app will run; will it be PSOne games (the company has written an emulator before), PSP games, or an entirely new lineup? (In contrast, the PSP Go has a 333MHz processor, 64MB RAM, and a 3.8-inch 480 x 272 display — albeit on different, not-quite-comparable architecture.) Hopefully we’ll know soon enough, eh Kaz? Anyhow, you can peruse some pictures and videos below, and definitely check out IT168 for the full skinny on this (somewhat tick) device.

[Thanks, Dave]

Continue reading Sony’s PlayStation Phone gets in-depth preview in China, PlayStation Pocket app in tow

Sony’s PlayStation Phone gets in-depth preview in China, PlayStation Pocket app in tow originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 07 Jan 2011 00:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Did a Thai company we’ve never heard of just make the best-looking portrait QWERTY Android phone to date? We might not jump the gun that quickly — but it’s definitely up there. Spriiing Design (yes, three i’s) is launching its Smile model in Bangkok on January 18th and the rest of Thailand thereafter, featuring a 3 megapixel camera, 512MB of ROM, 256MB of RAM, microSD expansion to 16GB, and a 2.6-inch QVGA display along with 3G support on the 900 and 2100MHz bands paired to a 528MHz Qualcomm MSM7225 core atop Android 2.1. In other words… yeah, this pretty low end fare. More interestingly, though, the handset was apparently designed in Sweden and manufactured by Huawei — in fact, it’s got “In connection with Ideos” silkscreened on the back, and Ideos is the brand that Huawei’s been pushing this year for its Android-powered gear. Small world, ain’t it? Follow the break for Spriiing’s video teaser.

Update: Turns out this puppy is on sale in Australia, too, through Boost Mobile (yep, there’s a Boost Mobile there). Thanks, Matt!

Continue reading Spriiing Smile Android phone hits Thailand by way of Sweden with China’s help

Spriiing Smile Android phone hits Thailand by way of Sweden with China’s help originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 04 Jan 2011 02:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pretty impressive, isn’t it? Meizu sure has made a wise decision to launch its M9 Android Froyo phone on the first day of 2011 which, like most other countries, happens to be a public holiday in China. According to some Meizu fans (aka “Mei-yo” or literally “friends of Meizu”) outside one of the two Shenzhen stores, there were already about 60 people lined up outside at around 6am. A few of them even braved the cold weather since 8pm last night, despite CEO Jack Wong actively discouraging such hustle on the forum for the sake of people’s health, promising “all the flagship stores will have sufficient stock” for all pre-orderers. Meizu wasn’t keen on giving us an official number, but the two Shenzhen stores alone could’ve easily served several thousand customers this morning. With no limit on how many units each person could pre-order (¥2,499 / $379 for 8GB, and ¥2,699 / $409 for 16GB), you can imagine Meizu’s assembly lines working long hours to supply its stores from 28 other provinces in China. Meanwhile, somewhere out there, Mr. Wong is happily checking his bank account. Video after the break.

Continue reading Meizu’s M9 launch amasses thousands of Jack Wong fans across China (video)

Meizu’s M9 launch amasses thousands of Jack Wong fans across China (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 01 Jan 2011 07:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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