Hasta La Gadget!

Bodelin Technologies has unveiled a new product that turns your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad into a fully functional microscope. The microscope itself has precision optical glass and supports magnification of 20x to 80x.

It has 12 white LEDs arranged into alternating circles to provide polarized or reflective lighting. The lighting intensity is adjustable via a three-way power switch. Power for the LED lighting system comes from an internal rechargeable battery good for up to five hours of continuous use. The battery charges using a USB port.

The microscope hardware is the same for any of the Apple gadgets. The part that differs between devices is the sleeve that connects the microscope to the device’s camera. The company offers sleeves for the iPad, iPad mini, iPhone 4/4S/5 and the iPod Touch fourth and fifth-generation.

The new ProScope Micro Mobile will begin shipping on May 1 and can be pre-ordered for $149(USD).

Apple has just released its Q2 2013 earnings report, announcing sales of 37.4 million iPhones in the quarter ending March. Apple also reported 19.5 million iPad units sold, which shows incredibly strong growth for Apple’s tablet business.

This is a slight decrease from last quarter, which included a holiday sales spike and being the first full quarter in which the iPhone 5 was available.

In terms of iPhones, this quarter’s 37.4 million represents 7 percent YOY growth; however it’s down 22 percent from last quarter. Where iPads are concerned, we’re seeing an 18 percent decline from last quarter, yet the segment remains strong. It’s grown 65 percent from last year’s 11.8 million from the same quarter.

Moreover, this is the iPad’s second-best quarter ever, losing out only to last quarter. It’s also the best non-holiday quarter the iPad has ever seen.

The iPhone numbers here aren’t all that surprising. Tim Cook has said before (and Steve Jobs before him) that expectations for the next-gen iPhone always tend to slow sales of the current model ahead of launch. Since we expect to see the next iPhone in June, it would make sense for sales to slow a bit.

Last quarter, Apple sold a whopping 47.8 million iPhones and 22.9 million iPads, both of which broke previous records. In other words, this latest report shows continued growth for the iDevice segment.

Apple doesn’t break out specific device numbers, so it’s hard to tell which models perform best. However, it seems that the introduction of the iPad mini has most certainly boosted sales for Apple’s tablet division, as many have been holding out for a smaller tablet from Apple since the iPad first launched.

watches based on the iPod nano design

There have been several rumors over Apple’s alleged iWatch, and thanks to a recent report by French site, MacGeneration, they are reporting that former Adobe executive, Kevin Lynch, is now heading up a team of engineers who supposedly have experience in designing iPod products. Lynch signed on with Apple as VP of Technologies last month and it is not clear what his role at Apple will be, apart from his appointed title, of course. While MacGeneration does not know what role Lynch will be playing in this team, they have speculated that Lynch and his team of engineers might be applying their expertise and experience with iPod products to help create the rumored iWatch.

They claim that some members in that team include an engineer who has spent four years working on iPod firmware, and another who has patents that are related to Apple’s music player and touchscreens. If anything this sounds like Lynch and his team could be working on a new iPod of sorts, but with the previous generation iPod nano having the ability to double up as a watch, and with all the hype surrounding the rumored device, we guess there is a possibility that Lynch and his team could be part of Apple’s iWatch project.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Analyst: iPhone 5S To Feature Fingerprint Scanner, Larger Camera, And Re-arranged Side Buttons, iPhone Mini Speculated By Analyst,

Sony’s new combination music player for iPhone/iPod will be released on May 11.

It is Lightning Connector compliant for iPhone/iPod touch/iPod nano out in autumn 2012 or later.

Music can also be listened to through CDs and FM/AM radio as well as from other types of smart devices or Walkman by connecting them to the music player via an audio connecting cord (sold separately).

“Sleep Timer” and “Playback Timer” are other useful functions on this player.　You can go to sleep and wake up to your favorite music.

Price: 17,800 yen
Color: white
Size: 400 × 197 × 114mm
Weight: 2.4kg

Apple likes to build devices using metal. Unfortunately, the material isn’t usually conducive to touch, in the literal sense of the word — capacitive touch doesn’t always register on a metal gadget, and you can often forget about a response to pressure. A newly published patent from the company could at last get these unfeeling devices to acknowledge our grip without putting sensors above the surface. Apple’s method would detect the changes in capacitance between hidden nodes when a device’s shell is put under strain, and trigger a hardware or software reaction when there’s a strong-enough squeeze. The concept is simple enough. Just what Apple would like to do with the patent, if anything, is the real riddle. The patent was originally filed in 2009, and covers just about everything computer- or mobile-based that Apple could produce; any burning desire to use the technique would likely have been satisfied by now. If our future iPhones or Macs ever answer a hug with more than just cold indifference, though, we’ll know why.

Filed under: Cellphones, Laptops, Tablets, Apple

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Source: USPTO