Hasta La Gadget!

Corning and Samsung were the best of friends well before even the Lotus Glass deal, but the relationship just got a little cozier. The two have agreed to build a plant in China’s industry-heavy Wuxi New District focused on making glass to cover LCD panels in laptops and desktop displays. The roughly $600 million factory will be a major production hub for Samsung, not just an expansion: it’s planning to stop some of its glass production in South Korea and send that work to the new facility when it opens. There won’t even be signatures on the agreement until sometime later this year, so the plant itself is still a distant prospect — but while the two haven’t outlined their exact strategy, the new plant may be the ticket to toughening up that future Series 9 laptop with a touch of Gorilla Glass.

Filed under: Displays, Laptops

Corning and Samsung plan LCD glass plant in China, may toughen up a few laptop screens originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 24 Jul 2012 10:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Qualcomm has quietly confirmed that it is backing out of mirasol display production, instead looking to license the color e-paper technology amid struggles to mass-produce the screens. The news was announced by Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs as part of the company’s financial results call last week, and described as being a strategy to “better align our updated roadmap with the addressable opportunities.”

According to Jacobs, “only certain” of the mirasol products previously on Qualcomm’s roadmap – i.e. certain sizes of display and certain ereaders – will now be produced and sold by the company itself. Instead, it will look to third-parties who want to adopt mirasol instead.

“With respect to QMT, we’re now focusing on licensing our next-generation mirasol display technology and will directly commercialize only certain mirasol products. We believe that this strategy will better align our updated roadmap with the addressable opportunities” Paul Jacobs, CEO, Qualcomm

mirasol’s path to the marketplace hasn’t been an easy one. It’s been several years since we first saw the fruits of Qualcomm’s labor in small screens, and took from a 2009 reveal to late 2011 for the first mirasol ereader to go on sale.

Along there way there have been various delays and postponed or cancelled launches, and Qualcomm has apparently struggled to meet output goals from its manufacturing facilities. There have been roughly four mirasol product launches, all using an Android-based ereader reference design of the company’s own making, though market feedback has been muted.

Exactly who might jump in and license mirasol remains to be seen; Qualcomm did not mention any potential partners during the results call. The decision echoes that of Plastic Logic, another next-gen screen company which shifted its focus from device production to licensing and partnership deals, in the face of increasing competition within the low-power display market.

[via The Digital Reader; via SeekingAlpha]

Mirasol production doused as Qualcomm chases licensing instead is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

LG has announced a new series of IPS monitors, the 23- and 27-inch IPS7 series, with a mishmash of specs aimed at mobile, HD and professional users. Foregoing WQHD resolution in favor of plain jane 1920 x 1080, the panels feature a so-called Cinema Screen design with a 1.2mm (.025-inch) bezel, half-inch depth, a mobile high-definition (MHL) link, fast response times and color calibration software for professionals. If it’s trying to to tap the pro market, the monitors lack some features like dual-link 2560 x 1440 resolution and 10-bit, 1.07 billion color graphics like the Dell U2711 or HP ZR2740w, for instance — but then they could turn out to be considerably cheaper than those rivals. We’ll just have to wait to find out the pricing.

Continue reading LG outs IPS7 Series monitors: 23 or 27-inch IPS, minimal bezel, MHL mobile link, 8-bit 1080P

Filed under: Displays

LG outs IPS7 Series monitors: 23 or 27-inch IPS, minimal bezel, MHL mobile link, 8-bit 1080P originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 20 Jul 2012 08:08:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Summer in Paris — you can’t walk a block on Champs-Élysées without locking eyes with at least one camera-equipped tourist. But Steve Mann’s shooter wasn’t dangling from his shoulder and neck; it was mounted on his head, with a design strikingly similar to Google’s Project Glass. Unlike that mainstream Mountain View product, however, Mann’s version has reportedly been around in one form or another for 34 years, and was designed with the objective of aiding vision, rather than capturing stills and video or providing a bounty of database-aided readouts. It’s also street-ready today. While on vacation with his family, the Ontario-based “father of wearable computing” was sporting his EyeTap as he walked down the aforementioned French avenue, eventually entering a McDonald’s to refuel after a busy day of sightseeing. He left without his ranch wrap, but with seriously damaged hardware.

What allegedly occurred inside the restaurant is no doubt a result of the increasing presence and subsequent awareness of connected cameras, ranging from consumer gear to professional surveillance equipment. As Mann sat to eat, he writes that a stranger approached him then attempted to pull off his glasses, which, oddly, are permanently affixed to his skull. The man, at that point joined by one other patron and someone that appeared to be a McDonald’s employee, then pushed Mann out of the store and onto the street. As a result of the attack, the eyewear malfunctioned, resulting in the three men being photographed. It wouldn’t be terribly difficult for police to identify those involved, but this encounter may have greater implications. McDonalds has since launched an investigation into the matter and seems to be denying most of the claims, but it’ll be some time yet before the full truth is uncovered. Still, the whole ordeal got us at Engadget thinking — is the planet ready for humans to wear video recorders, and will it ever shake a general unease related to the threat of a world filled with omnipresent cameras? Join us past the break for our take.

Continue reading Editorial: Engadget on EyeTap, Project Glass and the future of wearable cameras

Filed under: Digital Cameras, Displays

Editorial: Engadget on EyeTap, Project Glass and the future of wearable cameras originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 18 Jul 2012 13:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Here you are LG’s latest all in one monitor the DM279D. Available in either 17 or 27” this Cinema 3D Full HD Monitor come with an IPS Panel offering a 178 degrees view angle as well as natural color reproduction but also comes with a thing 1mm bezel.
The DM2792D comes with a pair of USB ports letting you access to movies and pictures stored on a USB Stick for example as well as basic PIP features.
Finally the DM2792D as been announced at around 500,000 Won in Korea and will be shortly available …