Future tech

This month's Living with Technology package on CNET.com is a must-see for anyone who values form over function, or function over form, or form that enhances function.

As you may have already gathered, the key word here is form. This month, Living with Technology is all about design: the good, the bad, the future, and the new philosophies that are budding in today's designers.

There's tons of good stuff to see: videos, slide shows, and good old text-based articles. Visit Living with Technology: Eye on design to get the full menu of goods, or just click … Read more

Bluetooth developer Open Interface announced today that it has a new lossless audio codec that leaves the existing A2DP (Advanced Audio Distribution Profile) standard in the dust. The codec is called SoundAbout Lossless and promises low-latency, low-complexity, multichannel Bluetooth audio, without compromising audio fidelity. Open Interface's Chief Operating Officer Rick Romatowski ran a demo of the new Bluetooth codec at our CNET offices last week, and we were definitely impressed. Jasmine France and I viewed a few scenes from House of Flying Daggers and were blown away by both the sound quality and the undetectable latency introduced by the … Read more

According to this story in the Los Angeles Times, the semi-classic car featured in Back to the Future may be primed for a limited-run comeback.

DeLorean Motor Co. Vice President James Espey has 200 of the original V-6 engines in stock. While DeLorean Motor Co. still stays in business refurbishing and servicing early-1980s DeLoreans, Espey says they may start building new ones from the stock parts in the next few years.

Don't expect to see new DeLoreans all over the place. If it happens, Espey is quoted as saying new car production will be limited to about 20 per … Read more

Eclipse Aviation has started bidding for an early production model of the much-anticipated Eclipse 500.

CNET's written at length about the wonders and woes that the Eclipse 500 may bring to the flying world.

The six-person jet's relatively inexpensive list price of about $1.5 million has companies looking for an alternative to luxury jets and those running air taxi services salivating. But it can also mean there will soon be many, many more people flying the already crowded skies.

CNET News.com has an exclusive photo gallery of the Eclipse 500's dashboard, interior and detailing.

As … Read more

Leave it to Harvard to replace spies with flies.

According to the MIT Technology Review, robotic insects may be the future of military surveillance.

With funding from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, a team of Harvard researchers led by Robert Wood have developed a robotic fly that could be used for surveillance and chemical-detecting missions.

Videos of the fly taking off and a slow-motion clip of the wing mechanics are available on the Technology Review site.

With a wingspan of 3 centimeters and a scant weight of just 60 milligrams, the fly's tiny robotic parts are … Read more

Musician and inventor Aleksei R. Stevens has created a concept product called the SoundBall. The SoundBall is a soccer ball that is filled with motion sensors that detect when the ball is being rolled, dropped, kicked, or spun. The motion data is then transmitted over Bluetooth to a local computer that bleeps out corresponding electronic noises.

My guess is that he's got some kind of Arduino or Parallax board inside the ball and Cycling '74 Max/MSP music software running on his computer. Whatever he's using, it looks like a fun way to kill some time and annoy … Read more

Yes, Crave looks all new-wave and fancy and youthful, but did you know it just turned 5,000? That's right.

On Friday, July 27, Crave celebrated its 5,000th post. With this monumental occasion, it gives us an opportunity to look back on the magic we've experienced since last October.

So here we go: the best and worst that Crave has to offer. We may even add new awesomeness and atrocities as our collective memory bank kicks in.

Best convergence of Crave obsessions: Hello Kitty pirate cell phone charm Cravers Mike Yamamoto and Caroline McCarthy … Read more

Did it ever occur to you that light switches could be warm and cuddly? No, I didn't think so either, but apparently nothing's impossible these days. This Essential Wall Dimmer, which retails for $99, looks a bit like a fuzzy caterpillar but promises to actually turn your lights on and off.

Here's how it works: give it a nice little stroke, and its "Plush Touch Screening Technology" will turn the light on or off, or dim it to suit your personal illumination preferences. Simple as that--at least it's supposed to work that way.

The … Read more

Researchers at Intel this week are showing off an silicon modulator that can pass 40 gigabits of data in a second, a new record that indicates that fiber-inside-computers is really coming.

A modulator is an component from the fiber optic industry. It essentially chops up light from a laser into blips that ultimately will be understood as 1s and 0s by a computer. Right now, computers (and chips) pass signals via electrons traveling along metal wires. Metal wires give off heat, which has created an energy crisis inside computer.

By contrast, fiber optics transmit data with photons, which are faster … Read more