Hasta La Gadget!

A few months ago we saw a concept for a camera-based device that is meant to recognize sign language and translate it into spoken words. A Ukrainian-based team has something better: a working prototype of a smart glove with the exact same capability.

The quadSquad team won the 2012 Imagine Cup – Microsoft’s technology competition for students – for their invention, which they call EnableTalk. The glove has 15 flex sensors, an accelerometer, a gyroscope and a compass, all manned by an onboard microcontroller. The glove sends input via Bluetooth to a custom app made for Windows smartphones, which will then interpret the data and output spoken language.

The brief demo below show the tester spelling “hello” letter by letter, which the app is able to translate after just a brief delay:

Head to EnableTalk’s official website for more information on the product. I tip my hat off to quadSquad; I hope the team succeeds in releasing a commercial version of their device.

[via CNET via Reddit]

Tablets these days can do a lot of different things, but NTT DOCOMO has a new tablet in the pipeline with a feature that we don’t see all that often: eye tracking. The eye tracking technology in NTT DOCOMO’s new ibeam concept tablet will be supplied by Tobii, and if you’re going to be at CEATEC in Tokyo at the beginning of October, you’ll get the chance to see it in action. It’s there, at booth #4B66, that NTT DOCOMO will be unveiling the prototype ibeam for the first time.

Of course, eye tracking tech probably isn’t going to sell millions upon millions of tablets in the blink of an eye, but it does have its uses. The ibeam uses the Tobii IS20, which is described as “the most advanced and compact eye tracker in the world,” in a statement released today. During CEATEC in Tokyo, NTT DOCOMO will be showing off examples of natural user interfaces for PCs and tablets that are centered around eye tracking integration.

One of the benefits of eye tracking integration is that users would potentially be able to control the ibeam tablet using only their eyes. This means that you could have true hands-free functionality, and we imagine that using eye tracking tech would prove to be a lot easier than using voice commands. At the very least, when using eye tracking tech, you won’t be caught in public shouting commands at your device.

The ibeam certainly sounds like an interesting tablet, but unfortunately we’re going to have to wait for the lion’s share of the details. Since it sounds like the ibeam is in the early stages of development – keep in mind that NTT DOCOMO will only be showing off a prototype at CEATEC – the tablet is probably still a ways off from hitting the market (if it ever does at all). Still, it will be exciting to see what the ibeam can do, so keep it tuned here to SlashGear for more information.

Tobii and NTT DOCOMO announce ibeam eye-tracking tablet is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

“No form-factor left untested” may well be Samsung’s unofficial motto for Windows 8, with the company bringing a raft of prototype notebooks and tablets to IFA, Alongside the Dual-Display Notebook were four alternative concepts that played with sliding, swiveling, slate and other designs, as Samsung took a suck-it-and-see approach to Windows tableteering.

The Swivel model, shown above, follows the convertible notebook approach we’ve seen in Windows tablets before, with a touchscreen that can be rotated and then folded flat down onto the keyboard so as to make a ruggedized slate. That would deliver the same functionality as the Dual-Display concept, but with less weight thanks to only having a single screen.

The Binder concept is more unusual, with a touchscreen slate sliding into the docking slot of a removable keyboard. It’s hard to tell how it differs from the docking systems of the Samsung ATIV line-up – all four of the concepts were behind glass – but it presumably has low-profile connections in the docking “gutter” so as to allow the slate to glide into place.

Samsung’s Slider concept took a slightly different angle to the Sliding PC Series 7 the company showed off back at CES in January, with a form-factor more akin to Sony’s VAIO Duo 11. The fixed viewing angle is a compromise, but the mechanism may well be more sturdy than a single swiveling hinge as on the first prototype.

Finally, there was the Samsung Memo PC, a smaller form-factor slate (somewhere between 7- and 8.9-inches, we’d say) with S Pen support, intended for those that don’t need a physical keyboard. The asymmetric profile would be more suited to right-handed users, but it could be an interesting alternative to Samsung’s Android-based Note series.

Of course, that’s assuming any of the designs actually make it to production. Samsung is pushing ahead with more conventional docking-tablet designs right now, but was polling IFA attendees to see if they were swayed by any of the concepts it had on show. Let us know which you prefer in the comments.

Samsung spills Windows 8 concepts is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Renders, shmenders. According to Coolxap.com what you see above is a real-world prototype of the Nokia Lumia 820 — aka Nokia Arrow. As well as some tantalizing hardware shots, we get a sneaky glimpse at that all important “About phone” page. All we can see, though, is that it’s running Windows Phone 8 (shock) and has only 335MB of RAM? Though, being a prototype, that’s likely to change. Sadly little else of note, but it’s at least good to see that while the mock-ups were close, the real thing has a little more going for it.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile

Nokia Lumia 820 prototype breaks cover in photos, confirms little else originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While it might not be as huge as the Super Hi Vision panel lingering in the same darkened theater, Panasonic’s new 103-inch demonstration display has the ability to offer up a 3D view to five different viewers — as long as they’re in the right visual sweet spot. The effect is subtle, natural, although colors felt little bit muted compared to the 145-inch prototype, with the demo videos drawing us in to its demo reel, rather than pushing out an image. The plasma display panel prototype is also glasses-free, with the 4K2K screen able to push out enough pixels to offer these multiple viewing angles. Again, there’s no substitute for being there yourself.

Filed under: Displays, HD

Panasonic’s 103-inch glasses-less 3D plasma panel arrives at IFA (eyes-on) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 30 Aug 2012 08:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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