Kano is seeking funding for three new coding kits: Camera, Speaker and Pixel

Following the success of its Computer kit, British-based coding kit company Kano is back with three new packs to get young minds learning about the way things are made.

The three new kits are camera, which lets you build a camera and programming filters, tripwire sensors and more, Pixel, which is a grid of lights that can show sports scores, games and art, and Speaker, which is a Bluetooth speaker that lets you make music.

• Kano allows children of all ages to build a computer from scratch, like Lego

Like we saw with the Computer kit, all the pieces snap together like Lego and to programme code you simply drag and drop preset lines of code into order using the free software.

All three are currently seeking funding on Kickstarter where they’ve raised $135,000 at the time of writing of a $500,000 goal.

Camera kit

If you’ve seen or used Kano’s computing kit before, then you’ll instantly recognise any of the new coding kits. All are made to be colourful and fun to help engage kids and get them coding. To build the Camera kit it’s just a case of plugging all the supplied parts into the right places, connect it to the Kano brain and that’s it, you’ve got a working camera. You can add a tripwire sensor to take a picture every time someone or something goes past, but the real fun comes in the coding.

You use the free Kano Code software, which lets you programme the camera to take a picture at set time intervals, or when it’s sunny outside to recording timelapse videos.

Pixel kit

Pixel is a lightboard that can display virtually anything, including weather, stocks, scores, games, art, animations and more. Again you just clip the pieces together like Lego add the included tilt sensor and you’re done.

Speaker kit

The Speaker kit is a Bluetooth speaker and synthesizer in one. You can stream music to it, loop sounds, learn electronic music or turn it into an instrument. You can programme a drum machine and add a gesture sensor to change the volume, distort the sound and switch tracks.

All three kits are avaialble to pre-order now with a $99 pledge or you can get all three for $249 for a limited time. The Pixel kit is expected to ship in January 2017, the Camera kit May 2017 and the Speaker kit July 2017.

Audeze iSine are the world’s first planar magnetic in-ear headphones, we have a listen

High-end, California-based headphone manufacturer Audeze has taken much of the same technology found in the excellent Sine on-ear headphones, and put it into two dinky pairs of in-ears. The iSine 10 and iSine 20 bear a slight resemblance to the Millennium Falcon and the technology found inside the casings really is space-age. Rather than use a traditional configuration of a mid/bass driver and a tweeter, the iSine use planar magnetic technology. 

This setup marries Fluxor magnets with 30mm planar magnetic diaphragms, which also happen to feature patented Uniform Voice-coil technology. Audeze says the result should be “precise control and fast response times without distortion”.

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We’re inclined to agree, as some brief hands-on time with the iSine 10 proved they sounded incredibly spacious and almost as if we were wearing a pair of over-ear headphones instead. Bear in mind, they’re semi-open-backed, so passengers around you on a train may be able to hear what you’re listening to. Here’s looking at you One Direction fans.

Pocket-lint

They’re relatively heavy for in-ear headphones too, mainly because of the 24-bit DAC found halfway down the cable. It’s this DAC that helps the iSine sound so good, as it takes the audio signal from your iPhone – and only the iPhone, as the iSine connect via the Lightning connection – and puts it through the built-in DSP to improve the sound. 

Put them on though and that weight becomes barely noticeable, as they come with transparent ear hooks to fit over your ears, ensuring they stay in place, although we probably wouldn’t recommend you wear them on a run. 

The difference between the iSine 10 and 20 is that the 20 get a longer Uniforce voice coil which covers even more of the planar magnetic diaphragms. Audeze says the extra coverage enables “better control and responsiveness for enhanced bass, clarity and imaging”.

The Audeze iSine 10 in-ears will be available from October for £379 while the iSine 20 can be had for £579.

BlackBerry DTEK60 images leak ahead of official unveil

It looks like BlackBerry is all set to announce a follow-up to the DTEK50, dubbed the DTEK60. The phone is slated to make its debut on October 11, and ahead of its unveil, press renders have leaked out showcasing the device from all angles.

Unlike the mid-range DTEK50, BlackBerry’s upcoming phone will be targeted at the high-end segment. Our sister site CrackBerry has details on the specs, which include a 5.5-inch QHD display, Snapdragon 820 SoC, 4GB of RAM, 32GB storage, USB-C, fingerprint sensor, and a 3000mAh battery.

Head on over to CrackBerry for more on the DTEK60.

Google Play Music finally launches in India!

Google Play Music is here, and it’s everything you’ve been waiting for.

After several false starts, the moment we’ve all been waiting for is here. Google Play Music is finally available in India, and at an initial glance, it looks like the entire catalog is available for customers in the country.

Individual tracks are priced at ₹15, which is costlier than what you’d find on Apple Music (₹9 per song), and you can purchase albums for as low as ₹70 (Iron Maiden’s excellent The Number of the Beast), with prices going up to ₹210 (Metallica’s S&M). If you’re into regional music, Play Music has most Bollywood albums released in the last 20 years.

It doesn’t look like you can subscribe to Play Music All Access just yet, but you can upload up to 50,000 songs from your own music collection into the service.

Indian readers, what are you liking the most about Google Play Music? Let us know in the comments.

Mercury is the first planet after Earth with tectonic activity

To date, Earth has been the only planet in the Solar System known to demonstrate tectonic activity. Other planets are geologically active, but not much more than that. However, it now looks like our homeworld isn’t alone. Smithsonian researchers combing through high-resolution images from NASA’s Messenger spacecraft have determined that Mercury is still tectonically active. The team spotted many relatively young fault scarps (surface offsets), which are strong indicators that the minuscule planet’s crust is still shrinking as the core cools down. As Gizmodo notes, common wisdom previously dictated that Mercury’s interior would have settled down billions of years ago.

Messenger also picked up signs of a magnetic field, which you should see in a planet where at least some of the core is still molten and thus active.

This doesn’t meant that Mercury’s activity is a carbon copy of what you see on Earth, mind you. There are no tectonic plates shuffling around, so you’re not about to see continents or other familiar features. The shrinking crust might be triggering quakes even now, however, and it might only take a seismic probe to confirm that the planet is rumbling.

The scarps could prompt a rethink of planetary development. If Mercury can take so long to completely cool down, what does that say about Earth and other terrestrial planets? While the discovery isn’t likely to fundamentally challenge geology, it shows that humans still have a lot to learn about other worlds.

Via: Gizmodo

Source: Nature, Smithsonian