led

An LED that can go 80 years on a battery charge?

CORK, Ireland--William Henry, an applications specialist at Ireland's Tyndall National Institute, can't tell you exactly how long one of the miniature LEDs the organization has developed will emit light. But it's a long time.

The micro LED--which is significantly smaller than conventional light-emitting diodes--requires only a few billionths of an amp to operate. Thus, it can survive for quite a while on a limited power source. One of the researchers on the project had one running constantly for two-and-a-half years on his desk. Then someone damaged it while moving it around. One member of the group calculated … Read more

Can we actually reduce energy usage without hurting GDP?

I was thinking today, in cleantech we often talk a lot about energy efficiency. Californians often cite that this state has grown its economy for the last 20 years without a significant increase in energy usage per capita, compared to the rest of the country, where GDP per capita goes up, and energy usage goes up just as much. But of course, California has lost much of its manufacturing sector over that same 20 year period, too. Perhaps no coincidence?

But if we wanted to actually do it, where could we actually save energy without impacting GDP growth, make a … Read more

All-star LED team quietly working on Blu-ray successors

Blu-ray is finally getting some momentum in the market, and two secretive start-ups are already looking at ways to replace the standard, or at least retrofit it.

Kaai and Soraa are trying to develop lasers and LEDs that could, conceivably, replace conventional LEDs in the lighting market and serve as a standard for optical data storage, Ford Tamer, the newest partner at Khosla Ventures, said in an interview. The firm has invested in both companies.

Tamer didn't provide many details on the companies, but that's par for the Khosla Ventures course. The company is placing many investments in companies that are still in the exploratory and scientific discovery phase and thus wants to keep a lid on details. Tamer did, however, say that Kaai and Soraa are both interested in the lighting and data storage markets. (And if anyone can ferret clues out of the "aa" in both company names, send it along.) … Read more

Austin joins LED cities group

Austin, Texas, wants to replace the cobra with solid state lighting.

The city, which has been experimenting with several green technologies and trying to encourage green companies to locate there, will evaluate the cost-effectiveness of replacing 250-watt high pressure sodium "Cobra-head" street lights with LED street lights, which consume far less energy. The city estimates it could save up to $500,000 a year in utility bills by inserting LEDs in 5,000 street lights alone.

Maintenance costs would also likely decline because LEDs last longer. Although LEDs cost more, advocates say that the total cost of ownership, … Read more

A shrink might find this clock useful

There's still no good purpose for indecipherable watches as far as we're concerned, but we may have actually figured out why people would want a mystery wall clock.

This binary LED table clock could come in handy, for example, in awkward social situations when you're pressed for time but don't want a guest to know you're counting down the seconds till you have to kick them out of the house. Or maybe a therapist could strategically place on a shelf and pretend it's conversation piece.

Better yet, they could be used in casinos, which … Read more

Another reason watch the game at home

Anyone who's witnessed the flash-bulb fusillade that accompanies every swing of Barry Bonds' bat knows how distracting they can be to the rest of the crowd. So we shudder to think what a massive LED barrage would look like if it becomes a stadium standard.

The "Fan Light" from FoxFury--which is already trying to make coal miners out of all of us with its headlamps--is peddling its latest bulbs as a way to show your team's true colors, or at least two of them, while in the stands. "With each shake of the arm, … Read more

Asus shows off fashion-forward U2E

Ultraportable laptops are usually pretty sharp-looking, but dressing one up in a leather-covered chassis is even better. Taiwanese PC maker Asus has had leather laptops for a couple of years now, but the latest version, called the U2E, packs in plenty of high-end computing features on top of the slick looks.

This 11-inch notebook weighs about 2 pounds and features a 32GB solid state drive, which helps with weight and heat, as well as power consumption. The LED backlit display also consumes less power and allows the screen to be thinner than traditional LCD screens.

The built-in Webcam offers an … Read more

LG's best LCD gets LED backlight

Today LG announced a total of eight (!) series of LCD televisions for 2008, all of which include the letters "LG" in the model number. The flagship model, the 47-inch 47LG75, is the company's first to include an LED-powered backlight. Samsung was the first large-screen LCD maker to mass-produce LED backlights with its LN-T81F series, of which we reviewed the 46-inch LN-T4681F, and in that model we really liked the improved contrast ratio caused by the LEDs' ability to turn off, and so produce a darker shade of black. The LG75 promises similar technology, and a similar six-figure … Read more

10 predictions for 2008

I've always preferred prognostication to nostalgia, so rather than replay the best of 2007, I'll use these late December doldrums to make 10 predictions for the coming year. Some editors will warn you that this kind of list is suicide--it's too easy for everybody to look back a year later and see where you were wrong--but it hasn't hurt Cringely, so here goes. In no particular order.

DRM will die. The trendline is clear--Apple's been selling DRM-free tunes on iTunes since May, Amazon's DRM-free MP3 store has three of the four majors signed up, … Read more