The RG3 robot lawn mower is "whisper quiet," according to one of its inventors.
(Credit: Precise Path)What's green, weighs 650 pounds, goes 3.5 mph, and costs more than $25,000?
Not something you or I will ever buy, but a gadget golf course superintendents may go gaga over.
The RG3 (Robotic Greens Mower 3) from Precise Path debuted a few weeks ago at the 2009 Golf Industry Show in New Orleans. It's a robot lawnmower that uses two lead acid batteries to run its 24-volt DC motor, and one to run its computer, offering about three hours of mowing before needing to be recharged.
"Our robot could provide the human precision necessary to upkeep, actually better than a human is capable of, and not costing the large amount in intensive labor costs," Precise Path co-founder, president, and CTO Doug Traster told CNET News in a phone interview.
The founders of the company decided to craft a robot lawnmower for the golf industry because they saw a need that could be filled with a bot, and an industry that would not scoff at a hefty price tag for high-tech maintenance equipment. While the company hopes to continue to develop the tech to bring the price down, right now the RG3 has a suggested retail price of $29,500.
In addition to mowing golf greens, the company is developing add-ons for the device that would allow golf course superintendents to use the robots to also mow fairways, rake sand traps, and spot treat with pesticides and fertilizers.
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Dell's new mobile workstation, the 17-inch Precision M6400.
(Credit: Dell)Dell introduced two new 15-inch mobile workstations last month while playing coy with the accompanying 17-inch model. And if you're shopping for a mobile workstation, odds are you're looking to go big with it. Today, the "next-generation 17-inch mobile workstation concept" Dell previously hinted at takes shape as the Precision M6400.
The M6400 workstation starts at $2,299. Dell is taking orders and expects to start shipping units on October 22. The system uses the Intel Q43 Express chipset and offers a number of Core 2 Duo processors, from the P8400 to the X9100, along with a quad-core Core 2 Quad QX9300 chip. The system supports up to 16GB of memory (should you choose 64-bit Vista), but Dell is offering a max of 4GB currently. A pair of Nvidia Quadro cards give you a choice between the 512MB FX2700M and the 1GB FX3700M. You can outfit the M6400 with one or two hard drives, in RAID 0 or 1 configurations. (Dell's Web site claims 500GB spinning drives and 128GB solid-state drives will be offered, but they are not showing up on the online configuration tool for the system at present. The highest capacity drives currently offered are 320GB and 64GB, respectively.)
The 17-inch display features a 1,440x900 resolution, though you can upgrade to a 1,920x1,200 resolution, which is LED backlit and supports 100 percent of Adobe's RGB color gamut. HD video editors or anyone looking for high-capacity optical storage will be dismayed to see that a Blu-ray drive is not offered.
The Precision M6400 measures 15.4 inches wide by 11 inches deep by 1.35 inches high. It weighs 8.54 pounds, which is very reasonable for a 17-inch laptop with a 9-cell battery. The system includes a touchpad and pointing stick. The touchpad has jog/shuttle dial controls that play nice with video- and audio-editing apps.
Networking options abound. In addition to 802.11b/g and a/g/n Wi-Fi, you can outfit the laptop with mobile broadband from Verizon or Sprint (EV-DO) or AT&T (HSDPA). Bluetooth and ultra-wideband Bluetooth are offered, too. Notable connections include eSATA, FireWire, and DisplayPort ports.
(Via Engadget)
The Dell Precision M2400 uses an LED-backlit display.
(Credit: Dell)Dell announced on Wednesday that within 12 months, all displays in its new laptops will be light-emitting diode (LED)-based.
Dell says that as of December 15, two-thirds of its Latitude E-Family laptops, as well as its Precision line, will be shipped with mercury-free LED backlighting as standard.
LED backlights are known to be mercury-free and very recyclable. Compared to cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL) technology, which most LCD displays use today, LED displays are much more energy efficient. Dell says that its 15-inch LED displays consume an average of 43 percent less power at maximum brightness.
Dell estimates that, overall, this could save consumers approximately $20 million and 220 million kilowatt-hours in 2010 and 2011 combined, the equivalent of the annual CO2 emissions of more than 10,000 homes' energy use. This figure was based on Dell's internal analysis using U.S. EPA carbon-conversion calculators.
By the end of 2009, Dell plans to have at least 80 percent of all of its laptops delivered with LED backlit displays. By 2010, it expects that number to rise to 100 percent.
Over the past year or so Dell has been committed to "Hulking out" (you know, turning green?) as a company. In June 2007, Dell announced plans to reduce its corporate carbon footprint by 15 percent or more within 5 years. In May 2008, it announced its desire to cut PC-energy use by 25 percent. In June of this year, Dell said that it had become the first company to introduce a "80 PLUS Gold-certified" power supply for servers. It launched its Studio Hybrid in July, which, according to Dell, uses 70 percent less energy than a traditional desktop.
Intel's newest Core 2 Duo processor has finally found its way into most models in the world's two largest PC makers' notebook lines.
With some exceptions. Hewlett-Packard (HP) will offer the 45-nanometer Penryn processor for the first time in its 8700 performance line in the next two weeks.
HP 8700 performance series will get Penryn chip upgrade in the coming weeks.
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)Intel's 45nm Core 2 Duo Penryn processor was announced back in January as a significant upgrade from the previous "Merom" 65nm processors. Penryn boasts improved power saving features and generally better (though not phenomenally) performance at the same clock speed due, among other things, to a larger cache memory. On certain multimedia tasks, there is up to a 40 percent improvement in applications using Penryn's new SSE4 instructions.
Dell's newest Penryn-based offerings include Latitude and Precision notebooks, which are business and engineering lines respectively. Dell is already offering Penryn on its consumer line of notebooks, including the Inspiron and XPS lines. Certain high-end XPS models on Dell's Web site, such as the XPS M1730, can be configured with Penryn processors only. One M1730 SKU offers Penryn T9300 (2.5GHz), T9500 (2.6GHz), and X9000 (2.8GHz) chips only.
One of the notable exceptions is the low-end Dell Vostro line which offers only the older line of Core 2 Duo processors and AMD's Turion 64 X2 chip.
While HP was very quick to bring Penryn to its consumer and business lines, there are only limited processor selections in its business line. The HP 6510, 6710, 6720, and 6820 models offer either the Penryn T8100 or T8300, according to HP spokesperson Mike Hockey. But online configuration options are not offered with faster Penryn chips.
The HP 8700 performance line, which includes mobile workstation models, does not offer the Penryn chip yet. This is expected to change in the next week or so when HP, for the first time, includes configurations with the processor, Hockey said.
(Credit:
Hammacher Schlemmer)
The craze over guitars may be getting bigger by the day, but at least one gadget maker is looking to shrink them--to the point of the "smallest precision electric guitar" available.
How small? It measures just 26.5 inches long yet still includes 20 frets, according to its product description. (But we'll spare you the marketing-speak about reproducing the "cellular structure of wood" and such.)
Of course, there's always the question of why someone would want one of these, not to mention spend $800 for it. Especially when there are "Pac-Man Guitars" to be had.
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