Nate the greatest writes “It looks like those 4 month old rumors are true. Amazon has confirmed today that they have bought Liquavista, a Netherlands based screen tech company. There’s no info yet on how much Amazon paid to Samsung, but previous rumors suggested that the asking price was under $ 100 million. Amazon also isn’t talking about how they plan to use the electrowetting screen tech, but many are assuming that a Color Kindle is in the works.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
AchilleTalon writes “One of the only well preserved dinosaur skin samples ever found is being tested at the Canadian Light Source (CLS) synchrotron to determine skin color and to explain why the fossilized specimen remained intact after 70-million years. University of Regina physicist Mauricio Barbi said the hadrosaur, a duck-billed dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous period (100-65 million years ago), was found close to a river bed near Grand Prairie, Alberta.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
In Japan, Sony slices the price of the PlayStation Vita and also introduces a new color for the powerful gaming device. [Read more]
CNET News
Panasonic has created micro color splitters, which split the light directed at image sensors to create bright images in low-light situations. This both eliminates the needs for color filters and boosts the color sensitivity two-fold when compared to your average image sensor with color filters. This could have a positive impact on mobile device cameras
This is the moment we’ve all been waiting for. The Galaxy Note 2, arguably the next big thing, will be available in Brown and Red along with its usual blue and white options. The only bad news is that the new color flavors are only available in Korea at the moment, but it’s entirely possible they’ll make their way stateside eventually. This is big news for fans of warmer color schemes and earth tones. All joking aside, it’s clear that Samsung has big plans for its Note line. The original Galaxy Note phablet, which was received with curiosity and awe, sold over 5 million units in the first five months it was available. The Galaxy Note II achieved the same sales twice as fast. And let’s not forget today’s hottest leak: the Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 tablet, which we expect to see at Mobile World Congress in February. But just in case you’ve missed the last year of Galaxy Note glory, here’s the run-down on the device. The Galaxy Note line of smartphones are exceptionally larger than most phones with the newest generation sporting a 5.5-inch 720p display. The other distinguishing feature in the line is a Wacom-style S-Pen, that features pressure sensitivity, screen grab functionality and more. [via Unwired View]
TechCrunch
skade88 writes “Do you remember those large TI-8X line of calculators with a BW display from when you were growing up and learning all about math? Yeah well, you can still get them because TI has yet to update or change their line of TI-8X calculators from their 96×64 display, processors designed in the 1980s with just a few kilobytes of user accessible memory. They still cost in the $ 100.00 to $ 150.00 range. That is all about to change now that the TI-8X line of calculators is 22 years old. Their new TI-84+C-Silver edition will come with a 320×240 16-bit color display, 3.5MB of flash ROM, and 21KB of RAM. Ars has a good preview of the device along with speculation on why it took so so so very long for TI to finally bring calculators up to a level of technology that could have been delivered a decade ago.”Last month some photos and a few details of the new TI-84+C were leaked.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
You scrolled right past the old design for Facebook’s “Pages You Might Like” mobile ads. Too much gray, not enough description. But they just got updated to show colorful banners and explain what a business does. Their designer Jeff Kanter thinks you’ll stop to give them a look. Maybe even a tap. With style and targeting, Facebook is turning limited mobile ad space into its secret weapon.
Today, Adam Witherspoon (pictured left in his LinkedIn profile photo), a founding employee of Color Labs who was laid off during the photo and video sharing startup’s recent wind-down period, is filing suit against the company and its CEO Bill Nguyen alleging that Witherspoon has been the victim of retaliation and “intentional infliction of emotional distress.”
We’ve obtained the legal document, which is currently being filed in Superior Court in Santa Clara, and it is embedded below.
TechCrunch
Lately there’ve been a number of LED lights turn up seeking funding to come to market on various crowd-sourced funding sites that allow users to customize the color of the light. Two of the most recent we have talked about have been LED light bulbs that are screwed into normal light sockets. Today another LED
Texas Instrument’s TI-84 makes quick work of graphs and equations like nobody’s business, but it’s done so for years while clinging to an outdated black and white screen. Now, however, it looks like that’ll change for at least one flavor of the souped-up digital abacus. Cemetech forum user 0rac343 posted a photo of a TI-84+ C Silver Edition, claiming that it was one of 24 provided by TI for in-classroom testing and that it’s slated to launch next spring. Tech Powered Math reports that a contact who’s worked with Texas Instruments has confirmed that the calculator is the real McCoy. In fact, the firm’s website has a page where visitors can sign up for updates about the number cruncher in question. With the help of the refreshed TI-84, we might finally be able to tell if Blinky, Inky, Pinky or Clyde is the ghost chasing us down in the hardware’s Pac-Man clone.
TI-84 calculator with color screen surfaces, geeks giddy with anticipation originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 10 Nov 2012 08:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Ars Technica, Tech Powered Math | 
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Engadget
Another innovation from Japan Display. Could it catch on?
Japan Display, the entity that pools resources from Sony, Toshiba, and Hitachi that I wrote about last week, has showed off another neat display at FPD International 2012, and again the Japanese-savvy Diginfo has the scoop (and video). The display is a paper-like LCD that can show video. On top of that, the display is low-power, relatively speaking. The results could be of great use to device makers who want to simulate a paper-like experience while adding the capabilities of color video.
Barnes & Noble recently took the wraps of two new tablets, updating its range (along with everyone else it seems) in preparation for next year. That doesn’t mean it’s washed its hands with the OG Nook tablet and Nook Color — in fact, both just got another price cut. Starting tomorrow, you’ll be able to pick up the original 8GB tablet for $ 159, the 16GB version for $ 179 and the Nook Color for $ 139. With two price cuts in three months, anyone would think it was trying to get rid of stock. This still puts last year’s lower capacity model shoulder to shoulder with Amazon’s 2012 Kindle Fire (with ad subsidies), but with Christmas just around the corner, we’re not complaining about more choice for less dollars.
Filed under: Tablets
Barnes & Noble cut the price of Nook Tablet, Nook Color once more, really wants to be on your Christmas list originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Nov 2012 14:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
With the release of the new Nook HD and Nook HD+, B&N is discounting its older tablets — the Nook Color is down to $ 139. [Read more]
CNET News
After news that the hyped startup was shutting down, rumors now say that Apple may be setting its sites on the photo-and-video-sharing social network. [Read more]
CNET News
It’s been a crazy day for Color. Actually, it’s been a crazy few months.
But now it’s looking possible that it could be coming to a happier ending than most embattled startups can dream of: After all that’s happened, Color might still be able to say that it has been acquired by a major technology company for millions of dollars. Or, more accurately, that some of its assets have been acquired.
TechCrunch
Color, the photo-sharing website which became well-known for securing $ 40 million in venture capital but has since had a bumpy road with lagging user numbers and turmoil at the executive levels, is not winding down operations, contrary to an anonymously-sourced report first published by VentureBeat that is circulating today.
TechCrunch
Sources tell us there is turmoil at the executive levels of Color Labs, the startup that launched with a focus on photo-sharing but quickly became a poster child for Silicon Valley hype after landing more than $ 40 million in Series A funding but failing to gain any real user traction. In recent months the company’s leadership has been in a state of flux, we’re told — and some are attributing the instability to Color’s charismatic but controversial founder Bill Nguyen.
As with any startup drama, there are many moving pieces here. But after weeks of discussions with multiple sources very close to the situation, we’re pretty confident that Nguyen has backed away from the typical duties of being CEO, although he retains the title in name.
TechCrunch
ROCCAT’s latest addition to its family of mice is the Kone Pure, toned down to 91 percent the size of the original Kone. Now both smaller and flatter, it’s dropped the menu button above the four-direction scroll wheel, and that scroll wheel now goes only up and down. It’s a trade-off, but ROCCAT has added a new ‘easy shift’ side trigger which it hopes will ameliorate that fall in the button-count. This acts as a mouse-based shift function and you can customize how all of the device’s other buttons behave when the side-trigger is depressed. ROCCAT also threw in a new FX version of its ISKU keyboard here at Gamescom, adding some customizable color skills and upgraded keys that are far more legible when not backlit — a common complaint with the original ISKU keyboard. Switching from black to white fittings under the keys has also improved the keys’ visibility. Take a tour of both devices in the galleries, then jump after the break for a little more detail — including a new prototype.
Gallery: ROCCAT Kone Pure mouse hands-on
Gallery: ROCCAT ISKU FX keyboard hands-on
Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals
ROCCAT’s new Kone Pure mouse streamlines things, while ISKU FX keyboard adds some color (hands-on) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 15 Aug 2012 14:17:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
In perhaps one answer to the question of how tablet makers will react to a more crowded market for small screen tablets, the L.A. Times reports that Barnes and Noble is dropping the price on its Nook tablet by 10 percent, undercutting the Amazon Kindle Fire by $ 20. The company’s Nook Color is also shedding $ 20, and will now cost $ 149. I’ glad to hear it; I’ve been using a Nexus 7 lately, and finding the size (like a trade paperback, including a protective case) far handier and more often used than any of the 10″ tablets I’ve tried.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
ananyo writes “The highest possible resolution images — about 100,000 dots per inch — have been achieved, and in full-colour, with a printing method that uses tiny pillars a few tens of nanometres tall. The method could be used to print tiny watermarks or secret messages for security purposes, and to make high-density data-storage discs. Each pixel in these ultra-resolution images is made up of four nanoscale posts capped with silver and gold nanodisks. By varying the diameters of the structures (which are tens of nanometres) and the spaces between them, it’s possible to control what colour of light they reflect. As a proof of principle, researchers printed a 50×50-micrometre version of the ‘Lena’ test image, a richly coloured portrait of a woman that is commonly used as a printing standard (abstract). Even under the best microscope, optical images have an ultimate resolution limit, and this method hits it.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
We’ve seen attempts to bring mapping functionality to Barnes & Noble’s Nook Color in the past, but Skobbler’s going full out with the arrival of ForeverMap 2 for that device and its more clearly defined tablet successor. The app utilizes WiFi positioning, offers route guidance and features both global and local maps. The standard version is free and a pro version can be picked up for $ 5, offering up added functionality like unlimited offline map downloads. Skobbler also used today’s launch to announce that it’s working on broader implementation by making it available to Nook app developers.
Continue reading Skobbler brings maps to Nook Tablet, Color with ForeverMap 2
Filed under: GPS, Tablet PCs, Software
Skobbler brings maps to Nook Tablet, Color with ForeverMap 2 originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Jul 2012 11:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
An anonymous reader tips a story at VentureBeat about a company that helps game developers analyze data gathered from their games to detect cheaters. But now, the company says this data can also be used to determine other traits of the players, like whether they’re minors, or whether they like to gamble. Their CEO, Lukasz Twardowski, expects such analysis will soon be able to reveal even more traits, like whether a player is color blind, has a developmental disorder, or has Alzheimer’s disease.
“‘Games are the richest and the most meaningful form of human-computer interaction. …By tracking how they play games, we can learn a lot about people,’ Twardowski explained. Hesitatingly, he added: ‘That will be a huge responsibility for us later on.’ … Academics have begun to take games more seriously, as a window into the human psyche. Games are addictive and immersive and are built to command hours of our time and attention. What better testbed for myriad psychological and medical conditions? A good game pushes us to our limits, challenging us to use both the analytical and intuitive sides of our brain.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
What’s rectangular, coated in a royal bronze finish, opens like a clam and lasts for up to seven and a half hours? If you answered MSI’s new CR41 notebook, you’d be right (though we would’ve accepted self-destructing jewelry boxes as an answer). The 14-inch multimedia “mobile companion,” announced just today, packs a 1,366 x 768 HD display, dedicated HM76 graphics chipset, choice of Intel’s third-generation Core i processors and comes in a variety of storage configurations: 500 GB, 640GB or 720GB. Weighing in at 5.3 pounds (2.4kg) and measuring 13.8 x 9.2 x 1.3 inches (349.7 x 234.8 x 32mm), the laptop also features a six-cell 4,400mAh battery, support for Bluetooth 4.0 and WiFi b/g/n, an optical drive, ports for HDMI, USB 3.0 (x2), USB 2.0 (x2), an SD slot and the requisite headphone jack. So far no official pricing or release dates have been made public for the Windows 7 rig, but when it does hit retailers’ shelves, rest assured it’ll be upgrade-ready for Redmond’s next great OS. Follow on past the break for the official PR.
Continue reading MSI outs new CR41 notebook, hopes you like the color royal bronze
Filed under: Laptops
MSI outs new CR41 notebook, hopes you like the color royal bronze originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 27 Jul 2012 19:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
The company says it will no longer make or sell the once-promising display technology.
Qualcomm has announced that it will no longer manufacture and sell its Mirasol reflective color screen technology. Although a handful of Chinese e-readers come with Mirasol screens (see “Color E-Readers Finally Available to Consumers”), and Qualcomm says it will license the technology to other manufacturers, it seems like the end for this once promising idea.
Welcome to the land of good complexions, whiny mopeds and surprisingly early Canon hands-on videos. While English-speaking journos have only been given the briefest glimpse of the new $ 800 mirrorless EOS M, Italian site PMStudioNews has posted a full hands-on video to YouTube. It shows a red variant of the 18-megapixel, APS-C shooter, in addition to the black and white models we’ve already seen, plus a beige leather case if you fast-forward around seven minutes. More importantly though, it shows off the touchscreen UI in some detail, including touch-to-shoot and a screen layout that looks quite different to what we’ve known from the button- and dial-heavy G1 X and its predecessors. Sure, it offers full manual control, but it also looks kinda fiddly — something we’ll look out for when it comes to review time in the Fall.
Continue reading Canon EOS M video shows off touchscreen UI, accessories, color variants
Filed under: Digital Cameras
Canon EOS M video shows off touchscreen UI, accessories, color variants originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 23 Jul 2012 05:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
Adobe SpeedGrade CS6 is a color grading software program that used to cost upwards of $ 20,000 when it was sold as a professional stand-alone package from Iridas. But following that company’s purchase by Adobe, SpeedGrade is now included with the CS6 Production Premium, Master Collection, and Creative Cloud bundles, or sold separately for $ 999. Using what Adobe calls the Lumetri Deep Color Engine, SpeedGrade allows you to perform professional color grading on your video footage–either in its raw format or as an edited composition derived from Premiere Pro CS6 ( Macworld rated 4 out of 5 mice ).
Computerworld News
Plastic Logic revealed a big shift in strategy last month, pushing its own flexible plastic-based epaper displays for third-party products, and its new video-capable color panels are top of the agenda. SlashGear caught up with Plastic Logic at the company’s Cambridge, UK, R&D center today to see one of the very first demonstrations of the new
ArmageddonLord writes with this news from the IEEE Spectrum, reporting on display industry gathering Display Week: “Liquid crystal displays dominate today’s big, bright world of color TVs. But they’re inefficient and don’t produce the vibrant, richly hued images of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) screens, which are expensive to make in large sizes. Now, a handful of start-up companies aim to improve the LCD by adding quantum dots, the light-emitting semiconductor nanocrystals that shine pure colors when excited by electric current or light. When integrated into the back of LCD panels, the quantum dots promise to cut power consumption in half while generating 50 percent more colors. Quantum-dot developer Nanosys says an LCD film it developed with 3M is now being tested, and a 17-inch notebook incorporating the technology should be on shelves by year’s end.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
While it’s definitely good news that Time Warner Cable is revisiting its Navigator guide again, the bad news is that at least in terms of appearance, very little has changed. The screenshots above show the old guide (left) next to the new one (right) and as you can see, other than a color scheme adjustment to match its new apps, things are almost entirely the same. In terms of functional adjustments, names have changed for some of the menus, and now the A button on the remote pulls up channels listed by category, the B button searches by title and the select button lets you know if features like Start Over, Look Back or VOD are available. According to CED Magazine, the guide’s (slight) facelift also goes hand in hand with a new cloud-based video on-demand portal that includes with richer graphics and metadata, as a prelude to more cloud-provided navigation and IPTV set-top boxes. So far we’re seeing notes that the new guide is being delivered in Syracuse and Charlotte, if you haven’t received it yet Time Warner Cable says it will be running newspaper ads ahead of the change in each area — people still read newspapers, right?
Time Warner Cable starts rolling out lightly refreshed guide with new color scheme, cloud VOD search originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 Jun 2012 00:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
Color us shocked and jealous at the new Android 4.0 phone from Sharp — strange and wonderful even by Japan’s highly elevated standards. The eight colors of the 3.7-inch Pantone branded phone from carrier Softbank are nice for sure, but the ability to sense between .005 and 9.99 μSv/h of radiation is in a new category altogether. Though Sharp has hedged a bit by describing the detector as “non-compliant” with Japan standards at this point, the possibilities seem endless for such a feature — the ability to constantly report your location and radiation level to Facebook comes to mind, for instance. It will be offered — in Japan only, we presume — with a 4-megapixel rear camera, eight Pantone colors, 0.3-megapixel front camera, 854 x 480 resolution, and will be dust-proof and waterproof. The price hasn’t been discussed yet, but we can’t imagine too much quibbling whatever it is, for a phone that could keep you gamma-ray safe.
Sharp Pantone 5 ICS phone has 8 color choices, 3.7-inch screen — oh, and a radiation detector originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 29 May 2012 02:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Plastic Logic has getting by with some eastern love since last year, when RUSNANO’s $ 700 million investment helped the e-reader maker land its Plastic Logic 100 in Russian schools. The latest fruit of that partnership is a prototype of its first flexible color e-reader display, which delivers 4,000-plus hues at a resolution of 75 ppi. The screen contains some 1.2 million plastic transistors, and it’s able to bend without distorting images thanks to a filter and display that flex at the same rate. Skip past the break for a demo clip of the tech in action, appropriately featuring some Matryoshka dolls.
Continue reading Plastic Logic demoes flexible color display for e-readers (video)
Plastic Logic demoes flexible color display for e-readers (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 May 2012 15:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Permalink The Digital Reader | Digit.ru | Email this | Comments
Engadget
Back when we reviewed HP’s latest Envy 15, we found a glaring issue with its otherwise spectacular 1080p IPS display — namely, its less-than-pleasing color reproduction. Making good on a promise it made back in March, HP has finally released its On-Screen Display Utility software for the machine in hopes of quelling user complaints. If you’ll recall, HP stated that the displays are of a higher quality than other laptop panels, which can make colors look odd in comparison. That said, while this gesture is certainly welcome, at least one tipster wrote into complain that he “wasn’t able to get a satisfactory change. It’s basically just gamma adjustment and r/g/b sliders.” Of course, we’ve only cited one anecdote here, so if you’ve got an Envy 15 you’d like to test this on, hit up the source link below. Be sure to let us know your results in the comments.
[Thanks, Anthony]
HP’s On-Screen Display Utility released, aims to alleviate Envy 15 screen color complaints originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Apr 2012 03:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
Nokia no doubt won over a few undecided minds last month when it ran a promotion gifting new members to the Lumia 710 owners club with a colorful cover of their choice. We assume it was successful, because it’s back. Yes, for the month of April, US-based adopters — both new and old — of the mid-level Nokia phone can claim a free chromatic cover. All you have to do is visit the source link below and punch in a few details, Nokia will then ship it out free of charge. We’re not trying to influence you, of course, but the Engadget blue one looks pretty good.
Nokia’s free color 710 covers are amazing every day, during April at least originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 07 Apr 2012 16:37:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
According to a study released this week, the technology behind the vibrant colors of the new iPad’s gorgeous Retina display contributes to a 20 to 30 percent increase in power consumption. It’s no surprise that the higher-resolution Retina display would be more power hungry, but it’s interesting to note that a portion of that may
HP understands that some customers have expressed concern regarding the appearance of the color red in the ENVY 15 full High Definition (HD) panel, and we wanted to reassure our customers that this panel is functioning properly.HP ENVY Series notebooks use optional premium LED-backlit display panels that have a higher color gamut (range of viewable colors), brightness and viewing angles than many display panels. This means that some colors may appear differently than they do on other displays.
HP acknowledges complaints about the HP Envy 15′s color calibration, will release a tuning utility in the ‘coming weeks’ originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 08 Mar 2012 13:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
Tablets stole the show, but they’re not true analogs for paper.
For those of us who still think tablets are a less enjoyable reading experience than plain old glossy magazine paper, the good news is that the elves at Qualcomm have been busy turning their Mirasol color e-ink display into something more than perennial vaporware. Displays like this one are different from the backlit LCD panels on tablets in that they are reflective and require an external light source to be viewable. Ultimately, it’s this sort of display that will give us true replacements for printed material.
Ectaco jetBook Color offers your eyes a break for $ 500, ships in January originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 07 Dec 2011 22:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Engadget
You’ll need an eBay account to snag this KILLER DEAL from Barnes & Noble. It’s a refurbished Nook, but so what? You still get a one-year warranty.
CNET News
Mirasol’s reflective display is being tested by device manufacturers, and could appear on shelves next year.
Even as the processing power and download speeds of mobile devices surge, one component still lags behind: the screen. LCD panels use significantly more power than any other component of a phone or tablet because of their need to pump out bright light to form an image.
The move supports speculation that after this coming Monday’s all-but-certain unveiling of a new Nook, B&N may leave the original Nook Color on the market at this reduced price as an added weapon against rival Amazon’s $ 199 Kindle Fire tablet.
CNET News
Barnes & Noble has scheduled an event seemingly to launch the company’s new NOOK ereader, with the New York City press conference taking place on Monday, November 7. While the invite itself makes no mention of the ereader, the NOOK logo features prominently; leaks last week suggested that B&N would indeed launch the NOOK Color 2 [...]
SlashGear
Barnes & Noble is tipped to be readying a new NOOK Color model for launch on November 7, with company employees suggesting the retailer is preparing eye-catching “NOOK boutiques” in its stores to push the new ereader. Multiple sources speaking to The Digital Reader have supposedly confirmed the early November launch, a timeframe which would see the [...]
SlashGear
In addition to refreshing their line of MacBook Pros, it seems as though Apple couldn’t resist the opportunity to tweak their iPad 2 Smart Cover lineup today.
It’s with a heavy heart that I report the orange polyurethane Smart Cover has shuffled off this mortal coil, and has been replaced with a more staid dark grey option. Tragic, I know.
TechCrunch
We are all familiar with Colorware, this is the company that will take your gadget and paint it up for you in whatever retina burning hue you so desire. Colorware has done this for all sorts of gadgets for a long time including the iPad and previous iPhones. It is now offering up the new [...]
SlashGear
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