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Production of Apple's next iPhone is said to be in full swing, with the company on track to have some 5 million to 6 million phones ready by the end of the month, according to a new report.

Citing anonymous industry sources, supply chain tracker DigiTimes today said original equipment manufacturer Foxconn Electronics, which has made Apple goods in the past, is currently producing 150,000 iPhone 5 units a day.

DigiTimes added that Foxconn is joined by Pegatron Technology, which will produce around 15 percent of the devices for Apple, but those units may not ship until 2012. … Read more

Anomaly Warzone Earth takes a different tack with the tower defense genre by having you play as the invading force, completing missions on a (somewhat) fixed path against a number of deadly turrets. Your heavily armored squad of vehicles and units has guns of its own, but as with every tower defense game, the more turrets you're up against, the harder it will be to stay healthy and reach your goal.

Fortunately, as you progress through the game, you'll gain abilities that will repair your vehicles and make it harder for enemies to hit you. You'll be … Read more

TowerMadness has been around for a while now, but the unique challenge and several updates over time make it a must-have for tower defense fans. Featuring 3D graphics that look great on the Retina Display, TowerMadness challenges you to defend a flock of sheep from an onslaught of attacking aliens. You can view the action from above or use a reverse-pinch gesture to zoom in on the action. You'll play on 49 included maps, but you can purchase 28 expansion maps from within the game. A recent update added 5 more maps, and two new weapon upgrades to add … Read more

Sentinel 3: Homeworld is the latest installment (released late in 2010) of the Sentinel tower defense franchise, offering more units to choose from, new maps, and new abilities that help you stave off wave after wave of alien enemies. The interface is like many in the fixed-path tower defense genre, letting you drag and drop units on the edges of a path to fortify your defenses against each wave of enemies. Sentinel 3 comes with a 20-level, 14-map campaign and an endless mode, and also offers in-app purchases if you want to add even more levels and maps.

Sentinel 3: … Read more

United Airlines today announced its cockpits will go paperless by swapping out printed flight manuals in favor of Apple's iPad.

As part of the swap, the carrier is giving 11,000 iPads to all United and Continental pilots. The iPads are loaded with Jeppesen Mobile FliteDeck, an app that contains navigational charts and local airport information.

United estimates that the change from paper will save it 326,000 gallons of jet fuel a year, based on the paper the iPads are replacing.

"Each iPad, which weighs less than 1.5 pounds, will replace approximately 38 pounds of paper operating manuals, navigation charts, reference handbooks, flight checklists, logbooks and weather information in a pilot's flight bag," the company said in a statement. "A conventional flight bag full of paper materials contains an average of 12,000 sheets of paper per pilot."

United says it began doling out iPads to pilots a few weeks ago and that all its pilots will have them by the end of the year.

Both Delta Airlines and Alaska Airlines began testing iPads for navigational purposes earlier this year as part of a trial program. Executive Jet Management, a unit of NetJets, announced in February that it had gained approval from the Federal Aviation Administration to use Jeppesen's app as well. … Read more

There's an endless supply of Web-based tools that can convert just about any measurement from one unit to another. If you need to convert really obscure units, though, or need a conversion tool on a regular basis, try Unit Conversion Professional from Inventive Design. It's a free Flash-based tool that converts more than 800 pairs of units in 32 categories. It also includes a calculator and a library of scientific formulas.

Unit Conversion Professional's dialog-style interface opens with its menu page, which offers two scrolling lists, View Formulas and Convert Units. The conversion units are categorized from … Read more

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--NASA's $2.4 billion Mars Science Laboratory has completed an exhaustive series of functional tests to verify the car-size rover's readiness for launch in November on an eight-and-a-half-month voyage to the Red Planet and a dramatic rocket-powered "sky crane" descent to the surface, officials said today.

Engineers now plan to carefully fold up the rover's robot arm, camera mast, wheels, and suspension so it can be packed inside a protective aeroshell that, in turn, will be attached to the bottom of a rocket-powered descent stage. The entire spacecraft then will be … Read more

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--A powerful United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket roared to life today and launched NASA's solar-powered Juno space probe on a five-year voyage to Jupiter, the first step in a $1.1 billion mission to look for clues about the origins of the solar system in the hidden heart of its largest planet.

"What we're really going after are some of the most fundamental questions of our solar system--how Jupiter formed, how it evolved, what really happened early in the solar system that eventually led to all of us and the terrestrial planets," said Scott Bolton, the principal investigator. "These are really basic questions: who are we, where did we come from, how did we get here?

"We're kind of going after this recipe of how planets are made. We're getting the ingredients of Jupiter, we're going to understand what the structure is like inside, how was it built, and that will give us guidance as to what happened in that early time that eventually led to us."

The towering 197-foot-tall Atlas 5, equipped with five solid-fuel strap-on boosters for extra power, ignited with a ground-shaking roar at 12:25 p.m. EDT, generating 2.5 million pounds of thrust and instantly pushing the spacecraft away from launch complex 41 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. It was only the second launch of a five strap-on Atlas 5, the most powerful version offered by United Launch Alliance.

Liftoff was delayed 51 minutes to resolve two technical issues and to make sure a boat that strayed into the launch danger zone cleared the area.

Climbing away atop a brilliant plume of fiery exhaust, the rocket accelerated through the sound barrier 34 seconds after liftoff, arcing away to the east and putting on a spectacular lunchtime show for tourists and area residents. The strap-on boosters burned out and peeled off about a minute later and the first stage shut down and fell away as planned four and a half minutes after launch.

The rocket's hydrogen-fueled Centaur upper stage then carried out a six-minute burn to boost the spacecraft into a temporary parking orbit. A second nine-minute Centaur firing 31 minutes later accelerated Juno to 25,000 mph, or 7 miles per second--interplanetary escape velocity--and three minutes later, the 4-ton spacecraft separated from the Centaur to fly on its own.… Read more

Boeing will use United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rockets for initial test flights of the company's proposed CST-100 manned spacecraft, a seven-seat capsule being developed for commercial missions to and from government and private-sector space stations in low-Earth orbit, company officials announced today.

John Elbon, vice president and program manager of Boeing commercial crew transportation systems, said four test flights of the CST-100 spacecraft are envisioned, assuming continued NASA funding, including an on-the-launch-pad abort test in 2014 that will not require a booster.

The other three flights will use a version of the Atlas 5 that includes one solid-fuel … Read more