Hasta La Gadget!

While we’re busying ourselves with arguing about how to replace the perfectly usable book gadget, Intel is right to point out that plenty of people, for whatever reason, can’t read at all. Presenting its Reader as a necessity rather than luxury, Intel has shown off its vision for how visually impaired and dyslexic people can obtain access to the written word. Combining a text-scanning camera with a text-to-speech engine (powered by an Atom inside) is certainly no bad idea, but as the video beyond the break will show you, Intel’s execution isn’t exactly stellar. The arrhythmic, robotic reading from Alice In Wonderland left us shaken, but what floored us was the $1,499 asking price. Yes, it’s a customized niche device, but we reckon we could build something similar for a third of the price. Full PR and video after the break.

Continue reading Intel Reader reads books to the lazy and infirm (video)

Filed under: Digital Cameras, Handhelds

Intel Reader reads books to the lazy and infirm (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 10 Nov 2009 09:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Barnes and Noble‘s late to e-books. But the company’s new gadget—first seen here—should address the weaknesses of all other readers with screens evoking a Kindle and an iPhone. A source from within reveals.

The Barnes and Nobles e-reader project, set to be revealed next week, has been under development for years, with several devices of varying size and capability in the pipeline. First rumors said it would have a color e-ink screen. Then people said it didn’t. They were both kind of right: The layout will feature a black and white e-ink screen like the Kindle has—and a multitouch display like an iPhone underneath other. Pow!

More hardware details of the Barnes and Noble E-Ink/LCD reader here:

What’s interesting is that B&N will sell the books it also publishes (yes, remember, they are also a publisher and not just a store) at a deep discount compared to print editions. And the device will have some sort of access to all books scanned by the Google Books project; probably books that are out of print.

The name of the gadget, which I cannot reveal and may have changed anyhow, is freaking terrible. I hope they change it before it ships. Oh and yeah, it runs Android.

This is the Duke family. The father, Charles Moss Duke, Jr. born October 3, 1935. The mom, Dorothy Meade Claiborne. The two sons, Charles and Thomas. They are probably in their garden, sitting on a bench. They look so happy.

And they should be, because Charles Moss Duke was the lunar module pilot of Apollo 16 in 1972. He landed with mission commander John W. Young at the Descartes Highlands, which is what makes this photo so special: It’s still there, untouched, unperturbed, exactly in the same position as he left it before taking this snapshot with his Hasselblad 70mm film camera.

I didn’t know about this fantastic photo until a couple of days ago, ignorant that I am. Following the advice of my friend Adán—who is a space exploration fanboy like me—I bought an amazing book called Full Moon. It shows the trip to the moon through 128 brunch-bacon-crispy photographs, many of them giant four-page spreads containing fascinating panoramas. All clean, pitch black background, no text. Like the silence of space.

Full Moon is not a new book: It was curated and published in 1999 by Michael Light. It contains the first and only digital scans of the Apollo missions’ original camera film. See, when these images returned from space, NASA copied each of the photos, then stored the original film right away for future scanning. Every lunar photo you have seen out there are copies made from copies of the originals.

The vaults were opened for Light and this book for the first time. He went through all of the original transparencies, selected what he thought were the best, scanned them using the best digital equipment available, created the spread panoramas when needed, and printed this book. The quality is so perfect, and the selection so good, that I can’t recommend it highly enough.

So there I was, sitting in amazement, slowly flipping through the amazing views, and then I found this. It instantly caught my attention. The idea of leaving such a happy photo in the surface of such a inhospitable place filled me with a mix of happiness, sadness, and much, much nostalgia. I instantly remembered another image like that. Surely, that image must have been inspired by Duke’s original shot:

You can buy Full Moon here. Actually, you must.

Astak — the company looking to give Amazon’s Kindle a ‘run for its money’ — gave us a little bit of a shock when it unveiled its attractive 5-inch EZ Reader Pocket PRO back in August. At the time, the company said that the units would be shipping by the end of September, and, lo and behold, they’re now shipping from Newegg. The Reader features a 400MHz CPU, 512MB of memory, an SD card slot, an 8-level grayscale E-ink screen, a replaceable battery good for 8,000 page turns per charge plus MP3 player that can operate in the background, and it’ll run you $250 if you want to get in on the e-reader action.

[Via E-reader-Info]

Filed under: Handhelds

Astak’s 5-inch EZ Reader now shipping from Newegg originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 01 Oct 2009 11:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Filed under: Handhelds

iriver Story e-reader hits pre-order status in Korea, gets priced originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 24 Sep 2009 14:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments