Sony Ericsson Xperia Play Hits Verizon for $200 On-Contract, in Stores May 26th

It will be available for pre-order on the carrier's website starting May 19th, and be available in stores on May 26th for the usual $199.99 on a two-year contract. That, of course, gets you the first PlayStation Certified handset with console-style controls -- a real D-pad and PlayStation face and shoulder buttons, plus a pair of miniature touchpads for dual-analog gameplay on the go. You'll also get seven games pre-loaded on the device (including Madden NFL 11 and The Sims 3).

 

 

Eole Concept Watch Has Turbine Bezel, Shows Time When You Blow

Traditional electronic watches may be practical, but there's nothing elegant about battery power. With the Eole watch concept, designer Julien Moise envisioned a device that's powered by blown air, displaying the time only when you want to see it. Sure, compulsively blowing on your watch in a meeting is less discreet than sneaking a peek under the table, but you'll still have your BlackBerry around for when you need to count down the minutes until freedom. There's also a weather indicator and alarm function, so there's a battery in there that's doing more than keeping time.

 

 

BlackBerry PlayBook Coming to the UK on June 16th

UK retailers have revealed the date and prices at which they'll be selling RIM's PlayBook: depending on how much integrated storage you want, you'll have to pay up £400 (16GB), £480 (32GB), or £560 (64GB) for your slate, starting from June 16th. Aside from the gigabytes, you'll be getting the gigahertz too, with a dual-core 1,000MHz TI OMAP4430 processor keeping the PlayBook's insides warm and its outsides responsive. 

Availability will be widespread, with Carphone Warehouse, Phones 4u, and Best Buy UK having already announced they'll be stocking the tablet. You can even pre-order it here.

 

 

Lenovo Ultraslim ThinkCentre 91z

Not surprisingly, the company's really playing up aesthetics with the ThinkCentre Edge 91z, calling it the thinnest AIO, at 2.5 inches -- and certainly its thinner than, say, the HP TouchSmart 610. The centerpiece of the system is that glossy 21.5-inch widescreen HD Infinity LED display (1920 x 1200), which is capable of playing back HD video with ease.

The system ships with an optional spill-proof wireless keyboard, also packs built-in speakers, a 2MP webcam, six USB ports, Windows 7, and a 6-in-1 card reader.

At the high end, you'll get an Intel Core i7 quad-core processor, AMD Radeon HD6650A 1GB graphics, 8GB of DDR3 memory, and either a 1TB 7,200 RPM SATA HDD or an 80GB mSATA SSD -- either way, Lenovo says the system boots 30 percent quicker than "non-optimized" systems, though the latter promises to have you up and running in a breezy 20 seconds. It'll begin shipping in June, with pricing starting at $699.

 

 

Apple Offers Free Repairs for iPhones Damaged in Japan Quake

Apple customers with Macs, displays, and iOS devices that were directly damaged in the Japan earthquake and tsunami may be eligible for free repairs. The offer, posted on the company's Japanese website, excludes iPod classic, nano, and shuffle, and only applies to customers living in areas covered by the Ministry of Health's Disaster Relief Act.

 Considering water and other accidental damage typically voids a device's warranty, you'll want to give AppleCare a call soon -- the acceptance period only runs through June 30th.

NEC MEDIAS WP N-06C Announced in Japan With Waterproof Body

Seriously, why does Japan get all the fun toys? The launch date: fans will be able to nab this device around June or July, meaning owners need not seal this waterproof phone in a plastic bag before heading out for a summer swim.

 

 

PlayStation Network Restoration Spreads Across the World

Now that North America has been thoroughly blanketed in the beautiful green light of a working PlayStation Network, it's time for other countries to sign on too, and the first out of the gate are the United Kingdom, Ireland and unspecified nations in the Middle East. 

Sony's official PlayStation Europe Twitter account reports that parts of the EMEA are beginning to light up now, and while there's no convenient map for you to monitor the rollout this time around, you can still get updates straight from the source.

 

 

Ring Mouse Just in Time for Your Nerd Wedding Proposal

Sure, Ring Mouse sounds like something you might catch from an out-of-control rodent population while on vacation in a foreign country. And yes, the whole concept sounds a bit awkward to those who have spent their entire computing lives using more input devices, but some compelling feedback from those actually tried Genius's wearable wireless peripheral turns out that the thing is actually usable. For $70, you can get your hands on -- or, rather, in -- one of these things, if you're a Windows user. Of course, you could use it for an engagement ring; just plan on being single for a very long time.

 

 

HTC Thunderbolt Inductive Charging

That inductive-charging backplate for the HTC Thunderbolt just came out, which means keeping the battery-devouring device juiced is about to get a little less inconvenient. Instead of having to plug in three times a day just to keep that LTE radio happy you'll simply be able to rest it on a charging mat... three times a day. The part made a brief appearance in the Verizon shop for $39, but the rumored April release date came and went without so much as a peep from Big Red. 

 

 

1080p Mobile Screen Slaps Retina Display in the Mouth

The iPhone 4's screen looks delicious—but Ortus Technology's got an even dreamier looking display, packing a 1920x1080 resolution into a scant 4.8 inches. That's 458 pixels per inch, as opposed to the iPhone's 326.

Now roughly five inch display—though the world's smallest 1080p—is in awkward place. It's way too big for a phone, and way too small for a tablet. 

 

 

Apple Patent Keyboard Blows Air

A patent application from Apple, filed in 2009 now revealed, aims to improve the user experience by "expelling air from the input device proximate the key when user selection is imminent." That's right -- your keyboard could blow on your fingertips as you blow my mind in the comments. Another solution in the patent would function like a vacuum to pull keys away when a proximity sensor detects that you're about to type, providing simulated feedback. If this concept takes off in the future, your next MacBook Air could really live up to its name.

Samsung’s Foldable Display Will Let You Stuff Giant Tablets in Your Pants

Tiny tablets' major advantage over the 10-inch crowd: They'll fit in your pocket. Samsung's latest foldable, creaseless AMOLED display will let you fold a tablet in half—effectively making bigger tablets pocketable.

Back in 2008, the South Korean company showcased a foldable OLED mobile phone at the FPD conference for display manufacturers. The technology was stunning back then but it suffered from one major flaw — the hinge required for folding produced a crease in the middle of the display.

The electronics manufacturer has removed this imperfection using a combination of silicone rubber, two protective glass panels and a pair of AMOLED displays. The AMOLED displays are mounted seamlessly next to each other on a flat piece of silicone rubber, two glass panels are placed on top of the AMOLED panels, both to protect the displays and let you use them as touchscreens. This rubber sandwich is then mounted in a case and folded in half.

The magic in this equation lies in the silicone rubber which is hyper-elastic and lets you fold it 180 degrees with a hinge less than 1mm. The researchers were able to fold the display over 100,000 times with minimal effect on the optical quality of the AMOLED (just a 6 percent brightness loss at the crease) or the elasticity of the rubber. This system is better than other foldable OLED technologies as it uses components that are readily available and relatively inexpensive.

 

 

Fujitsu's TH40/D Convertible Tablet Slides Into Japan, Packs Atom Z670 and Windows 7

A slide-out tablet running on Windows 7, you say? Inside this 2.4-pound convertible laptop you'll find a 1.5GHz Oak Trail Atom Z670, 1GB of non-expandable DDR2 RAM, a 10.1-inch 1,024 x 600 touchscreen, a 120GB 4200rpm hard drive, and a battery life of around 6 hours. Other tidbits include 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 3.0, a couple of USB 2.0 ports, HDMI-out, an SD card slot, and a teeny optical trackpad placed next to the short space bar. If you still want one, then be ready to fork out about ¥80,000 ($990) at the end of June.

 

 

Adapter-Friendly Power Strips Never Get Old

The Pivot Power strip isn't the first to try and solve the bulky power adapter problem. And like others, its rotating design probably won't top the Power Squid in sheer utility. But others aren't nearly as attractive as this one.

 

 

Why You Should Never Ever Post Your Mom’s Photo on a Message Board

The internet is a cruel place. We're all pretty well caught up on that by now, yes? More so, anyhow, than this unfortunate LSU Tigers fan, who asked a message board at Tigerdroppings to fix up a picture of his blessed mum. You can probably guess what happened next.

The torrent of Photoshops and gifs was unrelenting; everything from the Mona Lisa to Austin Powers.

Play Angry Birds Online, Right Now, for Free

Google isn't above killing a little productivity to prove the power of its web browser. The search engine king has released a special free browser-based version of Rovio's avian-flinging sensation Angry Birds on the Chrome Web Store, just to prove it can be done.

Announced earlier today at the Google I/O Conference in San Francisco, the new browser-based version of Angry Birds is a testament to how far Google's Chrome browser has come in a short time. According to Sundar Pichai, Google's senior vice president of Chrome, Angry Birds in a web browser wouldn't have been possible a year ago. With a graphics rendering speed ten-times-faster than earlier versions, today's Chrome can make it happen.

The free version of Angry Birds features the game's first level, Poached Eggs, along with a set of exclusive Chrome-themed levels. You can install it now via the Chrome Web Store. It runs rather nicely, and as an added bonus, remains cached for offline play.

Now if you'll excuse me, I've got pigs to kill.

An iPad Keyboard That Lays On Top of the iPad

The iKeyboard lays on top of your iPad and has cutouts that fit the iPad's keyboard perfectly. There's a thin layer of film within each key cutout that when pressed, presses into the iPad key. Not only does that film let you rest your hands on the keyboard without touching the screen, it gives you that tactile feedback that most of us need. And since it's not really a keyboard itself, the overall size of the iKeyboard is much smaller than the Apple Bluetooth keyboard. You can find it here.

 

 

Sharp Aquos Phone SH-12C Has 3D Cameras

The HTC EVO 3D and LG Optimus 3D just got themselves a new buddy in the three-dee picture-taking arena in the shape of Sharp's Aquos Phone SH-12C. We know, that name just rolls off the tongue. What's remarkable about the 12C is that the dual cameras on its back go all the way up to 8 megapixels (to the EVO 3D's 5), which will be creating quite the tasty workload for the 1.4GHz Qualcomm MSM8255 chip contained within. A qHD (540 x 960) screen resolution also keeps up with HTC's latest, though the 4.2-inch, 3D-capable display on the Aquos offers more pixel density and less in absolute real estate. Android 2.3, replete with some evident customizations, will serve as the OS, and 720p video recording in 3D will also be available when Sharp launches the 12C in Japan on May 20th.

 

 

Google Ice Cream Sandwich

"One OS that runs everywhere." There you have it, folks! Google intends to meld its Honeycomb tablet wares and Gingerbread smartphone software into one delicious Ice Cream Sandwich. Maybe that's why the "sandwich" bit is in the name? Either way, it'll be a universal OS that runs on everything from teeny tiny Android phones to 10-inch tablets and will intelligently adapt to each form factor with things like a resizable status bar. Some other fancy new additions were added, including face-tracking and camera focus shifting based on voice recognition, but most of the salient details remain under lock and key for now. 

 

 

This iPhone Finds Landmines

Your iPhone can find a lot of stuff: taxis, toilets, cafés, nearby sexual partners. How cute! And pitiable. While you've been scouting the best place to poop, Harvard researchers are working on an app that finds landmines.

Landmines detection is still surprisingly rudimentary: a human being waves a metal detector over the ground, and listens for audible cues that's there's something metal underground. But that poses a lot of problems. There's a lot of metal junk in the ground where stuff is blowing up all the time. Worse, operators have to be able to pick out mines from debris without losing life or limb. They do that by listening to beeps as they make passes trying to figure out what shape that metal thing underground is. It's hard!

Enter PETALS: pattern enhancement tool for assisting land mine sensing. The basic idea is that it allows anyone, even an inexperienced sweeper, to determine if there's a landmine and where it is. The app receives data from a metal detector and creates a visualization of the spatial pattern below ground. It helps reduce judgement calls in determining if something is or isn't a mine, making de-mining easier, safer and faster.