Hasta La Gadget!

Apple’s 3.5-inch Retina Display is certainly sharp, but large-screen smartphones like the Droid X are missing out on all the 326 ppi goodness. Not if Hitachi has anything to say about it. The same display technology that powers the iPhone 4 is about to get super-sized.
The company has produced a 4.5 inch, 1280×720 (720p) display aimed directly at the smartphone market. Citing the number of people watching “high-definition video” and reading “photo-quality books” on phones as reasons for the increase in pixels, they plan to put them into production around October and show them off at the Society for Information Display in Los Angeles this summer.
At 329 pixels per inch, these displays slightly outpace the density of the iPhone’s screen while adding an inch to the size. Like Apple, Hitachi claims their new screen is “close to the limit of the human eye.” Not only is the resolution excellent, but the display will use IPS technology, which promises great color reproduction and viewing angles compared to other LCDs. If Hitachi sticks with their planned release date, you can expect smartphones this holiday season will come with quite a lot of pixels.

[via Boy Genius Report, Hitachi]

Hitachi Maxell is planning to release a wireless charging pad for the iPhone 4 in April for Japan. The company will release two models called WP-PD10.BK and WP-PS10S. The WP-SL10A.BK, meanwhile, will be more of a charging sleeve than pad. 

All three pads use a cable free method of charging that is standard, called Wireless Power Consortium (WPC). WP-PD10.BK has enough room for 2 iPhones or iPods to charge at a single time. Other than that, they are pretty much the same. Hitachi has not released any info about if you can charge other devices on it, as of yet. Also no price was released for any of the 3 charging pads.

I think charging pads for devices are pure genius. My only real issue here, is that they do say if it is safe to charge other devices on it. I think if they did state if it is safe or not would make a good selling point for the charging pads.

Via Hot Hardware

It’s February, and we still haven’t seen the iPad 2. Given Apple’s traditional one year product release schedule, it seems crazy to suggest that the iPad 3 might actually hit store shelves before this holiday season, but there you have it. While the rest of us are still obsessively examining leaked photos of iPad 2 parts, Daring Fireball’s John Gruber is heralding the release of its successor. 

Writing in response to yesterday’s HP Touchpad announcement, Gruber states, “If my theory is right, they’re not only going to be months behind the iPad 2, but if they slip until late summer, they might bump up against the release of the iPad 3.”

Gruber clarified his statement in a followup post, writing, “my gut feeling is that Apple will move the iPad to a September release schedule, alongside the iPods. But they wouldn’t want to wait over a year and a half from the announcement of the original iPad to announce the second one–not with these stakes, and not with so many serious competitors trying their best to catch up.”

The words “gut feeling” are important here. As Gruber states earlier in the post, “when I say I’m guessing, I’m really guessing.” These are speculations of a blogger who doesn’t claim to have any special insight into this release schedule. It’s an interesting concept, nonetheless, with the company announcing two separate iPads in the same year to correct what he sees as a faulty release schedule.

According to this theory, the iPad 2 will ship in April. It will be thinner and lighter with more RAM, more storage, and a front-facing camera. iOS will be announced in March and shipped in June.

The iPad 3, meanwhile, will start shipping in September, alongside a new iPod touch. Gruber thinks the third version won’t kick the iPad 2 out of the line–instead it will be a high end version of tablet, sort of the MacBook Pro to the iPad 2’s MacBook, perhaps with a higher resolution display.

When it comes to technology, board games are usually blissfully outdated. People play board games to get away from the LCD inundation and computer overload. But Hasbro is releasing a fresh new version of Monopoly that brings it into the next generation and tries to appeal to technophiles.

Monopoly Live incorporates four electronic card swipes, special debit cards, and a towering computer in the middle of the board. The “smart” board game keeps track of everyone’s money and where their token is on the board, so cheating in this game is getting harder and harder.

The core of the game doesn’t really change, so the 108-year-old Monopoly legacy is still kicking, but it’s nice to see something new and fresh spicing things up. Monopoly Live will go on sale this fall for $50.

Via Uber Gizmo