Wired posted a gallery on Friday of surgical robots, and Bloodbot here caught my eye, largely because it seemed to be the most practical. The robot consists of an arm with a needle and a probe. In order to find an accessible vein, the robot probes around your arm until it finds an area of flesh that is a little bit less squishy than the rest. Then it jabs you with a needle, and when it feels a little pop indicating that it’s punched through into a vein, it knows to stop the jabbage, lest it go right through the other side of your vein, out the back of your arm, and into your femoral artery, causing a massive amount of hemorrhaging that will no doubt kill you in minutes.
So far, the robot is accurate about 78% of the time…
Within 24 hours of the 5G iPod nano announcement, the design community at Quirky had come up with a pretty cool case for it.
This case maintains a slim profile while adding a ton of functionality. We’re talking: hard plastic exterior, cord wrap, shock-resistant silicone core, as well as full body and screen protection.
Oh, but that’s only half of it. This case comes packed with a hand steadying video grip that transforms into vertical and horizontal kickstands.
That’s a lot of simple, ingenious features for a little $15. It’s currently on pre-order, with 35 out of the needed 300 pre-orders filled. Once that number is reached, you can expect to receive the product within 6 weeks.
I find that headphones are more than sufficient for my audio needs while traveling, but if for some reason you feel the need to bring a desktop-like speaker with you then the Orbit USB from Altec Lansing should fit the bill. It’s powered by the USB connection, which usually doesn’t bode well when it comes to volume levels, but its size (it fits in the palm of a generously sized hand) and something Altec Lansing calls ‘audio alignment technology’ apparently dishes out “astonishing volume.” It’s also got a small pop-up stand on the bottom, and the 16-inch USB cable winds into the base for easy transport. $49.95 according to the Altec Lansing website.
It’s not Halloween just yet, but I’m pretty sure I know what Jonathan Gleich will be wearing this year. His truly impressive Zoltar fortune teller costume relies on a mostly hidden Segway to make it appear as if the booth is rolling around on its own. Now it won’t make anyone Big, but it did manage to take 1st place in the motorized division of the 2009 Coney Island Mermaid Parade, and will probably continue its reign of contest winning terror as October 31 gets closer.
And for the record it’s no where near as impressive as my Big-themed costume, a 12-year old boy living inside a 30-year old guy’s body, which I never actually take off.
Today Sandisk announced a new line of compactflash cards aimed at professional photographers with read & write speeds of up to 90MB/s over a UDMA-6 bus. The Extreme Pro CompactFlash cards feature the company’s “Power Core Controller” for increased reliability over the life of the card, and include other pro features like a silicone coating for moisture and humidity protection. According to Sandisk the new cards are available/shipping worldwide now in 16, 32 and 64GB capacities ranging in price from $300 up to a hefty $800.
It’s hard to find a compact speaker that doesn’t, well, suck when it comes to sound performance. And I can’t say for sure whether or not the U-Tube i-Speaker from Brando continues in that tradition of non-excellence, but it at least includes a rechargeable lithium-ion battery so it’s not just relying on power from the headphone jack of an MP3 player or a laptop. The tube design might also be of some benefit when it comes to this speaker’s sound performance, but with a price tag of just $19 I have my doubts. It’s definitely compact though… I’ll give it that.
Well if there’s one demographic the iPod hasn’t targeted yet, it’s the lucrative Hello Kitty fan base. Thankfully though someone has had the foresight to produce a Shuffle-like player in the shape of the famous kitty’s head. It’s not exactly feature-rich, with just 2GB of internal memory, a 10-hour rechargeable battery and support for MP3 or WMA files, but I somehow don’t think that will stop fans from dropping almost $160(¥14,500) on it. But it does come with an angel and devil-themed silicon skin, so I guess that justifies the price.
For a long time I’ve thought about developing some skill with 3D rendering. Why? Because I want to be one of those people that designs really cool products that will never get paid. That way people can look at my work, and get excited thinking that it’s something they could one day own. Then in one fell swoop, I’ll crush their dreams as I tell them it is only a concept. Why the rant? Because I want this Pac-Man chair.
As you’ve no doubt guessed, this chair is only an artist’s rendering. There’s a good chance that this will never be produced by anyone, so don’t get your hopes up. Were it the real deal, it would make an awesome addition to any gaming lounge or bachelor pad.
We’ve heard about 802.11n wireless devices for a while now. In fact, 802.11 was first introduced over 7 years ago. There have been devices released in the years since (remember pre-N stuff?), and the Draft-N was finalized back in 2007. Well, it seems that IEEE has finally ratified the standard. Seriously, it took 7 years to get this done. There were almost no changes to the standard from the draft made back in ’07. Seriously, if they already knew that the Draft-N was going to work with the final standard, why did it take this long to finish things?
Related Tags: BotJunkie, Robotics
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