Hasta La Gadget!

Humanoid robots can be pretty creepy, but most of them aren’t that strong. That’s because their electric motors they use are pretty limited due to size. However scientists are working on making humanoid robots more powerful. The SCHAFT robot is a new prototype that features actuators that could make robots much stronger.

SCHAFT Inc. is an off-shoot of the University of Tokyo’s Jouhou System Kougaku Laboratory, which was the first lab to develop the actuator technology. SCHAFT is the first humanoid robot to use them. Can you dig it? Right on.

The actuator technology works by replacing standard servos with motor systems that have higher output, are capacitor-powered, and are water-cooled. The robot gets added strength and by pairing the new motors with advanced algorithms to control its bipedal movement, it can now withstand being shoved or kicked and remain upright.

That’s just frakkin great. Soon we won’t even be able to push them over. Not that robot tipping is all that much fun, but damnit, do you scientists actually want us all to die in the robopocalypse?

[IEEE via Geekosystem]

Philips today announced a breakthrough in LED lighting technology, providing a significant gain in brightness per watt compared to other LED light sources.

Philips researcher Coen Lidenbaum with TLED 200lm/w prototype

The new warm white TLED (tube LED) prototype is able to deliver 200 lumens-per-watt, which is about half of the energy required by current LED technology to produce the same brightness, without affecting the quality of work light.

Philips researcher Rifat Hikmet with TLED 200lm/w prototype

To put this in perspective, a fluorescent bulb only produces 100 lumens-per-watt, and incandescents produce 15 lumens-per-watt. This breakthrough could result in significant energy savings, especially when replacing existing tube bulbs widely used in offices and industrial applications.

Philips hopes to commercialize the 200 lumen-per-watt TLED bulb by 2015.

In the latest What The Tech podcast of Guys From Queens, tech blogger Paul Thurrott dished out a number of details about the next Xbox that he says he received back in January (of this year, I suppose). Thurrott says that the next Xbox (codenamed “Durango”) will cost $500 (USD), with a $300 subscription model. And yes, he also said that Microsoft’s next Xbox “must be Internet-connected to use.”

In addition to the price of the next Xbox – both financially and technologically – Thurrott also said that Microsoft will release a $99 Xbox 360 (codenamed “Stingray”) at the same time as the new Xbox, indicating that the new console will possibly not be backwards-compatible with Xbox 360 games. Thurrott also said that the next Xbox will be a Windows 8-based device, and as such will be discussed in Microsoft’s upcoming Build developer conference in June.

Thurrott then caps off the discussion by commenting on the much-maligned always on requirement of the next Xbox, which he seemed pretty certain about as well. He doesn’t think it’s a bad thing because the way he uses his Xbox 360 is an always online setup anyway. Skip to 54:44 in the video below for the relevant bits. Note that some language in the video is not safe for work:

I am in no position to say whether Thurrott’s take on the online bit is just propped up by anecdotal evidence or if it’s representative of how most Xbox 360 users interact with the current console. He’s also right in that we still don’t know in what way the next Xbox will require an online connection, if it ever will. What I do know is this: Microsoft should seriously listen to the criticisms about an online requirement. Because they might be risking turning each and every next Xbox game into a Diablo III or a SimCity.

[via Guys From Queens via NEOGAF]

How much electricity do your electric curlers gobble up while they’re heating up? What about your iron or your food processor? In this day and age, it pays to know how much electricity your appliances and devices are consuming. The good news is that there’s now an easier way to do it: with Plug2Know.

Plug2Know looks like a surge suppressor outlet, only it’s not. Instead, it will show you the energy that each of your plugged devices consumes based on your current usage. It’ll help you with energy cost awareness and hopefully inspire you to live a life that requires less electricity to run it. A series of LEDs on the top of the device provides feedback as to energy usage. An included chart helps you identify the rough monthly cost for whatever is plugged into it.

Cymbrio, its creators, claim that earlier testers of Plug2Know were able to cut back on their electricity bills by up to 50% after using the device.

Whether you want to save money or are just curious about the energy consumption of your plugged devices, the Plug2Know can lend you a hand. It’s also extremely easy to use: just plug it into the socket, and plug in the appliance or power strip into it and you’re all set.

Plug2Know provides you with specific, personalized information about your projected energy use so you can take steps to eliminate waste, reduce consumption and save money.

Plug2Know is currently up for funding on Kickstarter, where $20(USD) will get you one of your very own.

One of Google’s April Fools’ Day pranks was the launch of Google Nose, a search engine that would supposedly push your olfactory senses into hyperdrive. While you won’t be able to smell stuff on your computer display yet, you might soon be able to on your television screen.

This is all thanks to researchers from Japan’s Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology[JP]. They’ve developed a ‘smelling screen’ that makes smells waft from certain areas on the screen where the object that you’re supposed to smelling is located. So how are the smells produced? The secret lies with the four fans installed on each corner of the screen. Odors from gel pellets are bed into the streams in each corner, and they are then blown by the fans across the surface of the display.

The screen was demonstrated at the IEEE Virtual Reality conference last month, where the researchers explained: “The smelling screen is a new olfactory display that can generate a localized odor distribution on a two-dimensional display screen. The generated odor distribution is as if an odor source had been placed on the screen, and leads the user to perceive the odor as emanating from a specific region of the screen.”

They also added: “The user can freely move his/her head to sniff at various locations on the screen, and can experience realistic changes in the odour intensity with respect to the sniffing location.”

It might take more time before they’ll be made commercially, but the future of television is here – and it smells.

[via Daily Mail via C|NET]