2005

Lenovo unveils three new Android tablets--5, 7, and 10 inchers

Lenovo is hoping to shake up the tablet market with three new devices scheduled to hit its home base of China as early as December.

Ranging in size from 5 to 10 inches, the new tablets will be branded under Lenovo's LePad name in China but will be known as the IdeaPad in other countries, follow-ups to the current IdeaPad K1.

At a mere 5 inches, the LePad S2005 is somewhat of a cross between a phone and a tablet in size, prompting Engadget to dub the device a tabletphone.

Outfitted with Android 2.3, the S2005 is powered … Read more

Giant asteroid to get closer than moon

Never mind the recent spate of satellite showers. An asteroid the size of an aircraft carrier is sailing toward Earth, NASA says.

Never fear, however. The space agency says that although next week's flyby of Asteroid 2005 YU55 will bring the rock closer to our home planet than even the moon gets, the asteroid will cruise safely past, leaving in its wake not destruction but data.

The agency has already begun using radio waves to scan the 1,300-foot-wide space rock, which will get closest to Earth on Tuesday at about 3:30 p.m. PT. With antennas at its Deep Space Network at Goldstone, Calif., and the Arecibo Planetary Radar Facility in Puerto Rico, NASA hopes to gather a wealth of detail about the asteroid's surface features, shape, dimensions, and other physical properties.… Read more

Retro Gadget: An ode to my Game Boy Micro

Oh, GBM, you've been hiding. In a plastic drawer, under some socks and a 60GB iPod, you lay upside down next to your coiled-up charger. I admit I've ignored you in recent years, what with the Nintendo DS Lite and iPhone (and sometimes PSP) vying for my mobile attention. Your little plastic case, and the Game Boy Advance cartridges you played, were overlooked.

Recently, though, I pulled you out again. It all happened because the Nintendo DSi, while an excellent handheld, cannot play GBA cartridges anymore. To play Super Mario Bros. 3, I needed your services. Removing you from the gear drawer, I was impressed that you still seemed small. Smaller, in fact, than any of my other gadgets, except for the iPod Shuffle. You make the iPhone seem bulky. While your screen is miniature, it still looks bright and crisp compared with any other handheld screen. Even more amazingly, the battery still worked when I turned you on. I can't even recall another gadget whose battery has lasted that long in disuse.

The Game Boy Micro was Nintendo's attempt at a Game Boy swan song.… Read more