Technology and Science

Freebox France offers VoIP, HD TV, and Internet for just 29.99 â¬/month

July 8, 2008

I just happened to be checking out our firewall logs and noticed traffic coming from 88.160.222.185. Curious, I did a whois and figured out it was coming from http://www.proxad.net/ which redirects to http://www.free.fr/adsl/.

The first thing I noticed other than the fact that website is in French,-- which I can't read -- is that they offer Internet + Telephone + Television for 29.99 â¬/month. I was able to figure that out since apparently Internet, Telephone, and Television don't translate at all in French. They're the same words except for some accent letters, as seen here from a website screen grab I did:

What I can gather is that they offer 250 channels, ADSL (ADSL2+?), Freebox HD receiver, unlimited phone calls to 70 destinations, and even a WiFi-MIMO (multiple-input and multiple-output) router.

Posted in Home Entertainment, TMCnet, Technology and Science, Triple Play, Unified Communications, Video Hardware & Software, VoIP

How about Your Own Invisibility Cloak

July 3, 2008

Apologies to Harry Potter, but we seem to be on the verge (I mean, just barely at the verge) of developing an invisibility gadget.

Yes, that's right -- invisibility. Like a Klingon Bird of Prey, the effect is the same: to hide the user from sight. While one mostly sees such technology being used for military purposes in books and movies, there are some applications that are grounded in reality. (Really?)

One approach to creating a cloaking device is using something called a superlens, which has what's called a negative refraction index.

Posted in Technology and Science

PlayStation 3 helps discover oil

July 1, 2008

The technology used in the PlayStation 3 is being used to help explore and find oil much faster than before. Woohoo!

Using IBM technology, specifically the IBM PowerXCell 8i, which was originally developed for the Sony Playstation, a Spanish Oil company reports that specialized "Cell" microprocessors are speeding the search for oil and natural gas reserves located 30,000 feet below the Gulf of Mexico up to 6 times faster than current technology. Repsol and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center are using a process known as Reverse Time Migration (RTM), a sophisticated subsurface imaging tool accepted by the oil industry.

It has proven essential for imaging areas of complex subsurface geological structure, such as the rich hydrocarbon provinces of the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, offshore Brazil and West Africa.

Posted in Home Entertainment, TMCnet, Technology and Science, Video Games & Gaming, Video Hardware & Software

Fringe on FOX

July 1, 2008

Speaking of fring (blogged earlier today), there is a cool new TV series called Fringe which comes out this Fall created by American Emmy Award-winning film and television producer, writer, actor, composer, and director J.J. Abrams. J.J. Abrams also wrote and produced for the popular TV show Lost, including the opening sequence in the first episode of Lost where the plane breaks apart in mid-air.

Apparently Abrams hates planes since in the opening sequence in Fringe involves a plane that lands "intact" but all of its occupants are dead and the inside of the plane is bloody, dark, and eerie.

Posted in Home Entertainment, Reviews, TMCnet, Technology and Science, VoIP, Wireless

Cocoa bean (chocolate) genome being sequenced

June 26, 2008

The entire cocoa genome (DNA) is being sequenced and analyzed as part of a project to help create stronger, healthier cocoa crops. Cocoa, of course s the key ingredient in chocolate. Through the collaboration of the U.S. Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS), IBM and the world's largest chocolate company Mars, scientists hope to increase the crop's yield, as well as pest and disease resistance and increased water and nutrient use efficiency.

Posted in News, TMCnet, Technology and Science

WD VelociRaptor Hard Drive

April 22, 2008

Western Digital (WD) released their latest VelociRaptor 300GB hard drive. The WD VelociRaptor hard disk drive (HDD) is one scary looking beast! This puppy spins at 10,000 RPM - fast enough to tear through your gigabytes of naked flesh in nanoseconds. Did I say gigabytes of 'naked flesh'?

Posted in Accessories, Gadgets, Technology and Science, Video Hardware & Software

Asterisk USB Hub

March 31, 2008

No Asterisk fan can do without some Asterisk paraphernalia such as an Asterisk or Digium T-Shirt, Asterisk book, maybe even an Asterisk coffee mug from ITEXPO where lots of Asterisk happenings take place. Well now you can add an Asterisk USB hub to your collection of all-things Asterisk! This four-port USB hub in the shape of an "asterisk" was created by industrial designer Joel Escalona

He writes:

Some of these designs have been fortunate enough to be manufactured, others were just lucky to be prototypes or models and the less fortunate live within a render. So if at some point you are interested in finding out more about any of my projects or you want to produce, buy or distribute one, do not hesitate to contact me to ask for more details about any of my designs.

Posted in Accessories, Asterisk, Gadgets, ITEXPO, Linux, Microsoft, TMCnet, Technology and Science, VoIP

SureWest Communications Launches Combined VoIP, TV, and HD DVR

March 12, 2008

Interesting news from SureWest where they debuted VoIP service combined with a high-definition digital video recorder (DVR) product for watching recorded and live TV. I'm assuming this is a combined set-top box that does video (TV) and voice over IP. If they really want to get crazy with combining stuff, they should stick a camera in there which will add video over IP (videoconferencing) capabilities. I'll see if I can get a photo of the set-top box.

In the meantime, here's the news from the Sacramento Business Journal:

SureWest Communications has launched Digital Phone, the telecommunication company's new Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service and a high-definition digital video recorder product.

SureWest already offers VoIP for business customers, but Digital Phone extends the service to residential customers.

SureWest (Nasdaq: SURW) has been testing the high-definition DVR in region since December.

Posted in Home Entertainment, Technology and Science, Triple Play, Unified Communications, Video Hardware & Software, VoIP

TeVeStream FrameSeeker Detects Video Frame Changes

February 25, 2008

Arcosoft Inc., those same rascals that built 8 simultaneous video streams only Star Trek's Data could love, today announced the release of TeVeStream FrameSeeker. According to Arcosoft, "Surveillance video, such as those captured for security, paranormal investigation, and wildlife study, often contains many frames that are essentially static. Without FrameSeeker, a reviewer must spend many tedious hours watching the video completely to find interesting events. FrameSeeker reduces the effort by scanning for changes frame by frame.

Posted in Gadgets, Home Entertainment, Technology and Science, Video Hardware & Software

Battery Breakthrough = 40 hour Laptop Batteries

January 18, 2008

Following up on Toshiba's recent SCiB lithium-ion battery breakthrough, researchers discovered a way to use silicon nanowires to give rechargeable Lithium-ion batteries used in laptops, iPods, mobile phones and just about everything else these days, as much as 10 times more charge. This gives a conventional Li-Ion battery-powered laptop 40 hours of battery charge instead of just four.

According to ZDNet Australia, the new Li-ion batteries based on silicon were developed by assistant professor Yi Cui and colleges at Stanford University's Materials Science and Engineering Department. Traditional batteries use graphite to hold lithium, but their storage capacity is limited.

According to Cui, silicon anodes have the "the highest theoretical charge capacity". Unfortunately, silicon placed in a battery swells as it absorbs positively charged lithium atoms during charging, then shrinks down uring use as the lithium is drawn out of the silicon.

Posted in Technology and Science

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