US Navy’s solar drone flies from and lands on water

Unlike most quadcopters, the Aqua-Quad doesn’t take off from solid ground. Dr. Kevin Jones and his team from the Naval Postgraduate School developed it to fly straight up from the ocean or any body of water. And it can land back on water after it has fulfilled its mission, staying on or under the surface until it’s deployed again. According to New Scientist, the Aqua-Quad (PDF) could be used to replace sonobuoys to search for submarines, especially enemy subs that might be lurking in the depths of the country’s oceans.

They’re even better than the actual expendable sonar systems, because they’re not constrained by battery life: the drone’s rotors are covered in solar cells and can generate power after a little time under the sun. In addition, it can hunt for subs in flocks in case the Navy wants to scour a big area more quickly. Jones told the publication that as a sonobuoy replacement, the drone “[will] be on the water 23 hours a day, and flying maybe one hour a day.” It was designed as a “launch and forget” system with a water-tight enclosure, though, so we’re guessing it’s tough enough to endure the ocean’s harsh conditions.

Speaking of drones that can take off from water, researchers from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory created a similar machine called CRACUNS. It can stay hundreds of feet underwater for months at a time until its operator sends it out to do his bidding.

Via: New Scientist

Source: Naval Postgraduate School (PDF)

HP Claims Innovation Over Apple With ‘World’s Thinnest Laptop’

Amid rumors that Apple is working on ultra-thin 13 and 15-inch “MacBooks”, HP yesterday announced the “world’s thinnest laptop” in the form of the Core-i powered 13.3-inch Spectre, with a design that the company said offered proof that it is driving innovation faster than Apple.

Created with a focus on “luxury and artisanal craftsmanship”, the HP Spectre is 10.4mm thick and weighs in at 2.45lbs, sporting a twin-tone aluminum and carbon fiber chassis with an edge-to-edge Corning Gorilla Glass IPS 1080p display. Apple’s 12-inch Retina MacBook is 13.1mm thick and weighs 2.03lbs by comparison.

The copper and dark gray body has contrast bronze edging and a full-size, recessed backlit keyboard with 1.3 mm travel, and includes a pair of arcing piston hinges that fold flush for a “nearly hingeless look” when the laptop is closed. HP says the design is inspired by high-end furniture details.

The laptop is powered by an Intel Core i5 or i7 Skylake processor, rather than the significantly slower ultra low-voltage Core M CPU specifically designed for ultra-thin notebooks and found in the 12-inch MacBook.

HP claims this is made possible by the Spectre’s integration of Intel’s “breakthrough hyperbaric cooling system”, which features two ultra-thin fans, a heat-pipe and a copper radiator, allowing the system to not only extract heat but also draw in cool air and direct it over the processor.

HP used two differently sized polymer batteries in the Spectre, making up four cells in total for a claimed battery life of up to 9.5 hours. HP also used a new variant of its logo on the rear of the display to set apart the laptop from its other ranges.

Other specifications include a glass trackpad, three USB-C ports (two of which support Thunderbolt 3), up to 512GB PCIe SSD storage, a maximum of 8GB RAM, dual speakers part-designed by Bang & Olufsen, and Intel HD Graphics 520. Early indications are that the SSD and memory are soldered onto the mainboard, suggesting HP sacrificed repairability for thinness.

HP says the Spectre will be be available for pre-order on April 25 and begin shipping sometime in May. Prices will start at $1,170. In addition, a Bluetooth mouse, carry bag and leather sleeve that match the design of the Spectre notebook will be sold as accessories.

Speaking ahead of the Spectre’s unveiling at the New York Times’ International Luxury Conference in Paris, the company’s PC chief Ron Coughlin said that the laptop is an example of HP’s determination to lead the way in the PC industry. “For years, Apple has been seen as the innovator and the driver of innovation [but now] HP is really taking over that mantle,” Coughlin said.

HP has had to defend its laptops in the past over perceived design similarities with Apple’s notebooks, but the company is clearly attempting to push its latest “luxury” model as a trendsetter in the premium PC laptop market. At the CES in January, HP unveiled its more business-focused Elitebook Folio, measuring less than half an inch in thickness.

A recent DigiTimes report claimed that Apple’s upcoming “ultra-thin” MacBooks will “share a design similar to the existing 12-inch MacBook” and be “thinner than [the] existing MacBook Air,” but failed to specify which MacBook lineup the new design is destined for.

New Macs could feasibly be introduced by WWDC 2016, which will likely take place between June 13-17 based on scheduling information available from the Moscone Center.

Apple’s refreshed Mac lineup is expected to feature Intel’s faster Skylake processors and Thunderbolt 3 with USB-C, while the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are also deserving candidates for an overall redesign.

Related Roundup: Retina MacBook
Tag: HP
Buyer’s Guide: MacBook (Don’t Buy)
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Apple Watch Hermès Bands to be Sold Separately, New Colors Coming April 19

Apple revealed an expansion to its collection of Hermès Apple Watch bands today, with four additional colors becoming available to buy separately later this month.

Apple’s refreshed collaboration with the French fashion house brings sapphire blue, peacock blue, white and orange to the existing collection of Fauve (deer brown), Etain, Capucine, and Bleu Jean.

In the past, Hermès leather bands were only available if customers bought the watch and band at the same time, meaning Hermès bands will become available individually for the first time.

Availability varies with model size, so not all colors are available for both models of Apple Watch. Prices for the new bands will be $340 for the Single Tour (38mm and 42mm). The 42mm model will be available in sapphire blue, deer brown, fire orange and black, while the 38mm version can also be had in white and peacock blue.

The Double Tour is only available for 38mm Apple Watch models and sells for $490 in both regular and long strap lengths. Regular length will be available in white, peacock blue, sapphire blue, tin gray, deer brown and fire orange, while the longer length band comes in deer brown. The Cuff will sell for $690 and is limited to the 42mm size in deer brown.

The new editions will be available at Apple Stores and Hermès outlets from April 19. Apple has updated its website to reflect the change.

Apple and Hermès began offering the special edition Apple Watch Hermès via their online storefronts on January 22. Prior to that, the Apple Watch Hermès collection was only available for purchase in select boutique and Apple retail locations in major cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Toronto, Milan, Paris, London, Tokyo, and Beijing.

(via A Blog To Watch.)

Related Roundups: Apple Watch, watchOS 2
Buyer’s Guide: Apple Watch (Buy Now)
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HTC responds to Huawei P9 best camera claims with HTC 10 teaser of its own

HTC will finally unveil the HTC 10 flagship smartphone on 12 April at its “#Powerof10” events around the globe, which is just around the corner. But that hasn’t stopped it teasing the device’s capabilities on the build up.

The latest is in the form of a short video that trails the phone’s camera abilities. It’s also cunningly timed considering a major rival launched its own flagship device yesterday. The Huawei P9’s most-talked about new feature is also camera-related, so we could soon see a major face-off on which device can provide the best photographic results.

Certainly HTC’s boast in the video clip posted on its Twitter feed sets things up for an interesting scrap: “We’re obsessed with providing you with the best ever smartphone for shooting photos and videos.”

We’re obsessed with perfecting every image and video experience. You’ll see it. 4/12. #powerof10https://t.co/P2fWmNHatX

— HTC (@htc) April 6, 2016

With Huawei partnering with Leica and providing two different sensors inside its latest device, HTC will have to go some.

Rumours have it that the HTC 10 will have laser autofocus, much like the P9, and a 12-megapixel sensor with 1.55µm pixels. And while that might be true, according to a hint in the video, HTC will continue with the UltraPixel naming convention. It will also definitely have optical image stabilisation and the ability to shoot 4K video – but then, most phones do these days.

You can be sure that the moment we get our hands on one, we’ll be testing the camera against the Huawei P9 (and other rivals) to find out which really is the “best ever smartphone for shooting photos and videos”.

READ: HTC 10/M10/Perfume: Release date, rumours and everything you need to know

Is Dyson about to blow away the beauty world with its quiet hair dryer? Hairblade?

Dyson, the master of creating suction and blowing products, has announced it is about to enter the world of beauty with its latest technology. Is the quiet Dyson hair dryer going to arrive at last?

Back in 2013 we reported on Dyson patents for its own hair dryer, which we fancied as the Dyson Hairblade. This product aimed to offer a low-noise unit that was near vibration free yet produced plenty of power.

Now members of the press have been sent a small fan-like component with a note declaring Dyson’s intentions to enter the beauty world. It’s pretty likely this will be the reveal for its first hair dryer.

In the Dyson patents the hair dryer was described as featuring a zig-zagged path for air flow, to aid in silencing.

Dyson’s words on the patent were: “The provision of a hairdryer in which the fan assembly only processes part of the flow is advantageous for a number of reasons. As less fluid is drawn in, the motor of the fan assembly can be smaller and lighter in weight, the noise produced by the fan assembly can be reduced as there is less flow thorough the fan, this can result in a smaller and or more compact hairdryer which uses less power.”

The inclusion of a tiny rotary part in the recent tease does seem to line up with these design descriptions. Here’s hoping Dyson’s hair dryer is as revolutionary as its vacuum cleaners and hand driers have proved to be.

READ: Dyson working on a silent hairdryer? Hairblade?

Porsche 911 Turbo S (2017) first drive: Ready to launch

In a world of McLarens, Ferraris and Porsche’s own 918 supercar, it’s easy to forget about the shock and awe that the Porsche 911 Turbo was once capable of inducing. The original, usable supercar was once considered to be almost antisocially fast. Is it wrong to assume that it’s been left behind in a power war that continues to be fought between German, British, Italian and Swedish supercars?

Well, yes. Wrong because, in new and improved Turbo S form it now offers 580 horsepower, has four-wheel drive, a super-fast shifting 7-speed PDK gearbox and weighs only 1,600kg. And to help visualise how that all feels when you really need to get a move-on, we’re sat at the bottom of the acceleration straight on Porsche’s dedicated track that’s part of its Silverstone Experience centre. We’re about to “launch” the Turbo S.

To try and get it off the line as fast as is possible – which can be a tricky experience in many cars, where you’re managing clutch bite point, wheel spin and trying not to bog down – in the new Turbo S with launch control it’s disturbingly easy.

Pocket-lint

We roll up to the line, twist the (new for this generation) drive mode wheel on the steering wheel round to “S+”, then turn PSM (the stability and traction control systems) off, followed by doing the only unusual thing in the entire process: planting our left foot hard on the brake (for those of you wondering, that’s the foot you don’t normally use for the brake). Foot firmly pressed, now it’s time to floor the accelerator with our right foot. The revs jump to between 5-6,000rpm and the display in the instrument cluster lights up “launch control ready”.

What happens next, even if you’re used to driving fast cars, our brain kind of struggles to process. In a good way. With the revs blaring away at 6,000rpm, and launch control flashing, we move our left foot off the brake as sharply as possible. And despite knowing what’s coming, we’re never quite prepared for the violence of the jolt up the backside the new 911 exerts as it immediately seems to hook-up all four wheels, and hurls itself down the race track.

We tend to avoid clichés on Pocket-Lint, but for once, lets use one — it feels like you’ve just been shunted from behind by a fast-moving express train. Literally holding on to the steering wheel trying to keep the thing in a straight line, as the PDK gearbox smashes its way through the gears and rips through the 62mph standard acceleration test in 2.8-seconds. About a second later, the number on the speed reads 95mph as we cross the white line on the race track and realise we’re now worryingly close to the cones that mark the end of the acceleration straight. Steve from Porsche who has been sat alongside us the whole time (and is clearly amused at the slow stream of expletives coming from our mouth), yells “brake!”.

Pocket-lint

Putting all the force we can into the middle pedal, we trigger that familiar pulse of the ABS system, as the 911 Turbo S’s carbon ceramic brakes haul us back to zero in a way that’s literally more breath-taking than the acceleration we’ve just experienced. As we come to a half, we’re literally suspended in mid-air, the seat-belt holding us in like we’re on some kind of space simulator guinea pig. Cartoon-like, we come to a halt, hang in the air for what must be a millisecond, before physics catches up and we rebound into the seat.

A look in the rear view mirrors, and the line we crossed at 95mph looks just a few dozen feet away. A piece of potentially useless advice? If you’re following a 911 with carbon brakes and it decides to do an emergency stop, we suggest you’ll be in trouble — because it can probably stop quicker than the car you’re driving. The things laughs in the face of highway code stopping distances.

The joy of the Turbo S is that all of this would be of little use if the car felt fragile. But unlike some supercar brands we could name that explicitly told us not to launch-control test its cars for fear of them breaking, we repeat this experience four times in a row in the Turbo S. Then drive it round the track for several laps, going as fast as we dare.

Nor would it be much use if the Turbo S was an uncontrolled monster out on the public road. But later on in the day, a 45-minute solo strop on the roads around Silverstone reveals the Turbo S excels for the reasons people have always liked 911 Turbos. It’s happy to potter along at 30mph, it’s comfortable and reasonably quiet at a 70mph cruise, and as long as you don’t get one in “speed yellow” most other road users won’t look at you twice. And thanks to the four-wheel drive system, come rain (and even snow) the Turbo S is not going to try and throw you in a ditch.

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There are two problems though.

The first is resisting the urge to dip into that obviously huge reserve of power out on the road. As our acceleration test showed, a two or three second stab of full throttle is enough to have your license taken away. Best to make do with the insane overtaking capability, aided and abetted by the Sport Response function – simply hit the button in the centre of the steering wheel mounted drive mode selector and the Turbo S grants you 20-seconds of optimum power functionality, selecting the lowest gear possible and flicking all the systems into sport plus for immediate, ultra response.

The second issue, which is nit-picking, is that at times the Turbo S feels like it’s doing all the work. It’s true to say this isn’t the most involving 911 as far as driver experience goes. For that, you might want to try a GT3. But the Turbo has perhaps never been the purist’s 911, and given the choice the 911 range provides, we think it’s well judged. Plus, you could hardly call it boring.

On board, a new infotainment system – including a capacitive touchscreen, new mapping technologies which include Google Earth and Streetview, and a new suite of connected services, including Porsche Apps – is something we’ll cover in greater depth in the future 911 review. But it’s responsive and easy-to-use, and certainly brings the Turbo S up on par with other supercars as far as on-board technology is concerned.

Pocket-lint

At £145,773 you’d probably argue that it well should, too. But while the price in isolation seems steep, compared to the supercar competition to which it must be compared, the Turbo S is competitively priced. For nearly £20k less, £126,925 buys you the standard Turbo – which is hardly short on poke, with 540bhp and hitting 0-62 in 3-seconds dead. But it’s not quite as rabid as the Turbo S – and given our launch control experience, if you’re after the ultimate, usable, fastest car in the real-world supercar, then we’d take the full-fat Turbo S 911 experience every time.

You can play old SNES games on an original Game Boy, thanks to Raspberry Pi

There have been plenty of Raspberry Pi projects that have stood out since the first of the diminutive computers was released, but few have caught the eye quite as must as Wermy’s reuse of a Nintendo Game Boy.

Taking the original Game Boy shell, he replaced the innards with a Raspberry Pi Zero, swapped the screen with a 3.5-inch composite, colour display, and drilled two new button holes to create the best handheld games machine ever.

Now, thanks to Retropie software and a whole stack of games ROMs, Wermy’s new Game Boy can play SNES, NES and even Megadrive titles, yet still retaining the unique feel of Nintendo’s ground breaking handheld.

Wermy even made his own SD card reader out of an old Game Boy cartridge, so it feels like he’s using the classic console in the correct manner by slotting it in each time before play.

A 2,000mAh battery was also incorporated into the build so the modified Game Boy could be recharged – the original required a host of AA batteries.

You will need a fair amount of knowledge and technical skill to repeat the modder’s work, which rules us out, but you can still build an amazing retro games console using a Raspberry Pi without quite so much effort. Stick with us and we’re soon to tell you how. Watch this space.

Samsung contact lens displays will put AR video and cameras in your eyes

The ultimate goal of augmented reality is to seamlessly blend the real world and the virtual, which is done best without a headset. Now Samsung has won a patent for a contact lens display that will do that and more.

Samsung’s contact lens patent, which was just awarded in Korea, shows that these lenses will be more than just screens worn on the eyes. The contact lenses will also include a tiny camera, motion sensors and transmitter.

These should mean users will be able to take photos by simply blinking and can then view them right away. It will also mean viewing images and video from a connected smartphone is possible.

Imagine walking or driving with the road lit up blue to show the route you’re supposed to be taking. Or you could take a stroll in nature and have the option to see each kind of flower annotated so you know what you’re seeing. Perhaps you could look at a restaurant and see the menu without even going near. The options are many.

The contact lenses themselves will feature some wiring, according to the patent. But this would all be kept to the outer edges and should not affect the user’s perspective.

Of course this is at the patent stage still so how the screen will be powered or remain clear when inactive is unclear. What is clear is that this is the way gadget manufacturers are going with Google Glass and Microsoft HoloLens already showing a glimmer of what’s possible with augmented reality.

READ: Microsoft HoloLens preview

Samsung

Ubisoft breaks out the banhammer for ‘The Division’ cheaters

Ubisoft knows that cheating is running rampant in Tom Clancy’s The Division and it’s out to change that. Between hacks where enemy bullets can travel through walls to homing bullets, trying to enjoy the game the way its meant to be played is a bit fraught at the moment. But come the game’s April 12th update, PC players, at least, will have platform-specific tools at their disposal to report the jerks according to a Ubisoft Twitch stream.

Typing “/report [username]” while playing will flag the possible offender’s account for Ubisoft to look at, and if the gaming company determines nefariousness is at play they’ll get a three day suspension. Repeat offenders? That’s grounds for a permaban. It’s a reasonable expectation that if this doesn’t curb the cheaters, the three-day time-out will give way to nothing but permabans a la what Ubisoft did with Rainbow Six: Siege hackers in January.

There are some pretty welcome glitch fixes en route as well. Those address issues where missions wouldn’t start, wouldn’t complete, non-player characters are able to shoot through walls and glitches where folks could get stuck in place on a piece of architecture in the environment, among other bugs.

Via: Destructoid

Source: The Division (Twitch)

FAA considers rules allowing small drones to fly over people

Late last year the FAA implemented rules on drone registration, and now its working group of experts has submitted another set of recommendations. This time the focus is on rules for unmanned aircraft flights over people (who aren’t directly involved in the flight of the aircraft), and just as earlier rumors indicated, the group decided that the best way to set regulations is based on the weight of the machine in question. Small drones weighing under 250g (0.55 pounds) could fly over people, depending on their design, while larger drones up to 4 – 5 pounds (the DJI Phantom 4 pictured above weighs 3 pounds) could do the same, depending on their design, if they stay 20 feet overhead or 10 feet away laterally.

Larger or riskier drones that could cause serious injury — as determined by yet-to-be-implemented crash tests — up to 55 pounds could not be flown over crowds, and would have more limitations. Finally, the fourth group of drones that also pose a potentially serious risk but are intended to be used over crowds would have the most rules, with documented plans for risk mitigation, higher operator qualifications, and possibly coordination with the FAA or local law enforcement. Most of the committee members felt like a requirement for in-person testing would be ignored, suggesting online testing with no background checks for operators of the smallest drones.

DJI VP Brendan Schulman called the recommendation a “progressive approach,” that balanced the benefits of drones and public safety. His company was one of 27 groups (like 3DRobotics, GoPro, Google X, Intel and AT&T) that participated in the Micro Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Aviation Rulemaking Committee, and the FAA will use its information to develop new rules. Unfortunately, this will not be a part of the finalized small UAS rule (governing commercial use of drones under 55 pounds) that we are expecting to see in June. In the meantime you can read the full report for yourself (PDF) and practice some safe drone flying away from innocent bystanders.

Source: FAA (PDF)