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Lenovo's Virtual Care service helps chronically ill patients track their health
Lenovo has jumped into digital healthcare with a service called Virtual Care designed to help chronically ill patients better track their health.
ASUS' Zenbo proves our robot butler dreams remain just that
Another robot wants to join your family. Announced earlier this week, ASUS' Zenbo is aimed at providing "assistance, entertainment and companionship." Like numerous home robots that have (literally) rolled out before Zenbo, it involves voice-activated commands, cameras, an internet connection and a touchscreen. It can't wash your clothes or clear the table and you still need separate robots to vacuum your house, or get you from A to B. ASUS says Zenbo can help with cooking, but that just means it can read out recipes. It's not chopping onions for you -- it doesn't even have arms. Let's take a look at the promo video.
ICYMI: Tricksy smartphones, fake kidney implants and more
#fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170{width:100%;display:block;} try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170").style.display="none";}catch(e){} #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170{width:570px;display:block;} try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-25170").style.display="none";}catch(e){} Today on In Case You Missed It: Brand new Mobile World Congress smartphones can both take heat map selfies and charge your phone with a power pack using salt and water (aka break-up tears). Vanderbilt University researchers developed an artificial kidney that uses the patient's own kidney cells to filter blood and avoid rejection. And it turns out cancer cells get healthy cells to to join their tumor party by engaging in some old-fashioned arm-twisting. Researchers recorded cancer cells extending fibers to reel other cells in and it is not a pretty sight.
Robots make breakfast for scientists, bide time (video)
Breakfast is the most important meal of the day for a growing robot -- it's also an easy and relatively quick way to lull a group of scientists into a false sense of security. Now, we're not saying that James and Rosie here had an ulterior motive when they put together a breakfast of Bavarian sausage and baguettes for a group of researchers at Munich's CoTeSys lab -- as far as robotic couples go, they seem very nice. James, a US-designed PR2 robot, sliced the bread, while German-designed Rosie boiled up some sausages, as some hungry roboticists looked on patiently. Oddly, this isn't the first time we've seen a robot prepare a morning meal -- it's nice to know, however, that after the robot apocalypse, at least we'll all still be well fed. Super sped up video of cooking robots after the break.
A steampunk USB drive that could clean H. G. Wells' house
Site ChipChick nailed it when noting the similarity between this 8GB steampunk USB drive and Rosie the Robot of Jetsons yore. The drive's creator, however, says it was inspired by a "narrow bridge" sign seen on a old country road. Really? Just look at that barrel-shaped cap staring down at you from atop a frilly gear collar; hands on hips in a tempestuous pose that makes us feel like we've somehow wronged her. Regardless, for $300 she'll make a fine addition to your alternate-history abode.
HTC launching new Android phone in London tomorrow? We'll be there!
We'd already pretty much figured that HTC's London event tomorrow would have something to do with Android -- the invite for the shindig playfully teases us with a rose in the picture, after all, which is probably a reference to HTC's Rosie UI that's been circulating in leaked ROM form for a while now. Indeed, Pocket-lint points to a fellow journalist whose "colleague" has apparently played with the new hardware and gives it a "rave review," so we're excited to find out what it is exactly that HTC's got brewing -- and as we've said before, it certainly lines up nicely with T-Mobile UK's promise of more G1 Touch details "soon." At any rate, we'll be on hand to find out what's good as it happens, so stay tuned for all the HTC news that's fit to print starting at 6:30AM ET, 11:30AM London time.
HTC Hero approved by Global Certification Forum, rocking GSM and HSPA
We're unfortunately light on details here, but The Unwired is reporting that HTC's Hero has been approved by the Global Certification Forum, listed here as "HERO100," with support for quadband GSM/GPRS/EDGE and dualband UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA at 1800/2100 MHz. With the company's touted London event just around the corner -- this Wednesday, to be exact -- we wouldn't be surprised to see the phone and its oft-rumored "Rosie" Android UI take center stage, in possibly two variations. Other than frequency bands and the associative name, the GCF isn't giving us anything else to work with, so for now just sit back and hope this uncertainty is cleared up sooner rather than later.
Savant's new Rosie Virtual Control uses your home for the interface, your car to impress girls
Home automation fans, head's up: Savant is cooking up a new Rosie control interface that replaces traditional menus and icons with actual 360 degree photos of your location. Users turn on a light, f'rinstance, by touching the light that they want to activate, and control the dimmer switch by swiping up or down. The heart of the system is a rather familiar-looking 9-inch capacitive touchscreen device that displays the current location on the majority of the screen, with the other rooms scrolling across the bottom. Currently being pimped by the company at its Dealer Conference in Hyannis, there is no word on release date or cost, but we're guessing it's gonna be rather pricey -- the service includes a visit by the company's Professional Services Division, who photograph your home for you. Just make sure you straighten up a bit before they arrive. See the thing in the action after the break.
HTC Hero / Lancaster running Android and "Rosie" UI launching on June 24th?
While the Economic Daily News doesn't cite any sources, its claim that HTC will launch its Android-powered Hero handset on June 24th makes a lot of sense to us. Something's up on that day since we've already seen the press invite to a June 24th event in London, the same place that witnessed the launch of the HTC Touch Diamond last year. The EDN reports two variations of the Hero: one without the QWERTY and another, the HTC Memphis (better known as the HTC Lancaster around AT&T) with full keyboard in tow. What confuses us though is the EDN claim that the Memphis/Lancaster will be an AT&T exclusive for 6 months when it ships in Q3... so why the London launch then?
HTC Hero "Rosie" ROM demoed on G1
The process for getting HTC's Hero ROM with the so-called Rosie UI onto your G1 isn't necessarily for the faint of heart, so for those looking for a slightly more hands-off experience until HTC gets around to introducing this stuff officially, an installer went ahead and threw together a convenient little demo of some of the Android skin's capabilities. Everything we see here reinforces the understanding that this is a thorough, deep customization of Android, taking UI polish and functionality to the next level -- and happily, HTC appears to have really tailored the experience to Android rather than simply taking TouchFLO and retooling it for another platform. A good example of that is widget support -- we see weather and Twitter widgets demoed here, and there appear to be plenty of others available in the list. There's no telling whether we'll see this skin come to Dreams, Magics, and G1s, but it's at least heartening to know that the G1 has enough horsepower to effectively run the stuff. Follow the break for the video.
Video: HTC Hero with 'rosie' Android UI leaked?
After making a brief appearance on YouTube this morning, what seems to be a promotional video for the HTC Hero has been resurrected courtesy of Android Community. Not only do we see Hero in 7 different colors, but we get another glimpse at HTC's purported "rosie" Android UI already seen in that supposed tutorial video a few weeks back. So sit back and click on through, don't cost nothin' but 89 seconds that you were just going to dither away anyway.
Hands-on with Savant's $35000 ROSIE Coffee Table
Savant's ROSIE Coffee Table seemed like it would be a mighty fine addition to any geek's den, and after seeing one in person, our hunch has been substantiated. The table was on display and constantly surrounded by onlookers today at CEDIA, but we managed to squeeze through the crowd and snag a few pics of the device in action. We'll be the first to say that the resolution on the screen could certainly be improved, and the touch response seemed quirky as well, but the table in Denver will reportedly be tweaked a bit more before being loosed on the public. Speaking of which, we were able to step aside with a Savant employee in order to learn a bit more about this forthcoming unit, so here's the skinny...Apparently, nailing down a spill-proof top is the final (major) hurdle standing in the way of a release, and the company hopes to have this bad boy ready for shipment by October / November. Moreover, the system within will indeed be based around OS X, play nice with other ROSIE equipment, and will purportedly tout an Intel processor, 500GB of internal storage, 2GB - 4GB of RAM, and no user-accessible optical drive. Lastly, we were informed that the ROSIE Coffee Table will ring up at a staggering $35,000 MSRP, so it's fairly safe to say that only the affluent will be seriously considering this one for their own domicile.%Gallery-7136%
Savant marries a touchscreen with iTunes; calls it "Apple Surface"
Look, we're all about innovation, and you know deep down we really want our computers to be big-ass tables, but Savant's press release touting "the first Apple-based coffee table surface product" just made us cringe. Savant's Rosie touchscreen home-automation products are already well-respected, so there's no need to try and grab any tailfeathers here -- in fact, we think the specs sort of sell themselves: you're looking at a 40-inch touchscreen that sports iTunes integration, access to photos and movies, home-automation through the Rosie system, and, yes, runs on an internally-mounted Mac of some sort. More important than that, however, is the one spec that Microsoft's Surface can't currently match: Savant is getting ready to sell these to consumers, and soon. See? No need to to get crazy with the hype, now was there? Now just set a price and tell us when these'll ship, and we'll be all set.[Via ShinyShiny]
Coffee Table Mac?
Remember the Microsoft Surface? It was a prototype device bringing an iPhone-like touch interface to a full sized table computer. The specialty home automation vendor Savant Systems has announced the "Apple-based" "ROSIE Coffee Table Touchpanel Controller." Apparently it duplicates the functionality of the company's in-wall touch-screen controllers, but in a 40" display mounted into the top of a coffee table. They don't specify in what way it's "Apple-based," but I would guess this thing probably integrates a Mac mini and one of the main selling points is its iTunes integration. They also don't say anything about it being multi-touch, so I suspect it's just a really big touchscreen. At the moment this thing is still vapor-ware, and of course there's no pricing info, but I wouldn't expect something like this to come cheap.
Rosie and Pogo.com helping the children
OK, we get it, a lot of people don't like Rosie O'Donnell, we understand. Curiously her charity is hooking up with Pogo.com, which is owned by the lambasted Electronic Arts, another target of the ire police. Anyway, the two of them are getting together to launch "Pogo Cares Benefiting Rosie's For All Kids Foundation." Over two months EA's casual game site Pogo.com will raise awareness of Rosie's "For All Kids Foundation" to its 11 million players and donate $30,000 to the organization which has helped build 27 day care centers in low- income areas and provided $24.6 million in grants to over 900 child-related programs.Wait, EA is only donating $30,000 and some web ad space to an organization that is essentially raising their future customers? Have they learned nothing from the tobacco industry? The more money they dump into an organization like this, the more well-adjusted adults the program has a probability of producing. Especially in the casual gamer space, which continues to grow and will make up a huge share of the market. Oh well, at least EA's doing something nice, but two months of advertising and $30k doesn't sound very charitable for the rewards they can reap from such a deal.
Rosie home control modular system integrates it all
Though Savant Systems' "Rosie" home control system is in pre-beta right now, its aims for the home automation and media server markets are still quite lofty, and the team seems to have the chops to back it up. The modular system is centered around the Rosie Server, which features dual Xeon 5100 procs, 32GB of DDR RAM and 2.25TB of RAID 5 storage. It's all controlled from an interesting touchwheel remote (that weird bowl-ish thing in the picture above) and various touchpanels, and can pipe high quality audio, 1080p video, and home automation commands throughout your home. Setup is purportedly 1/100th of the time of competing solutions, thanks to some fancy modular design. Savant is planning several packages for its system, including the Rosie Control, which includes a full complement of home control serial, GPIO and IR ports; the Rosie Video Switch, which packages the Rosie Control with an 8 x 8 HDMI switch; the Rosie Audio, which features iTunes-based media management and all sorts of high-end audio specs and outputs; and the Rosie Combo which throws it all together in one, and we're sure will cost your life savings. No word on when this is due or what it'll cost, but we'll be keeping an eye out for sure.
ABC's The View going high-def September 5
One of the two TV shows needed to bring women to high definition is now going 720p. The View will switch to HDTV format September 5 as they add new host Rosie O'Donnell. While Oprah is still in SD, ABC also broadcasts Good Morning America in high def. Jessica Simpson will be a special guest on the episode, in case you needed a better reason to get up before noon other than seeing Barbara Walters (but not Star Jones) in 720 stunning vertical lines of resolution. With MHD, Food Network and now daytime television following primetime programming to HDTVs, the day when your mother/daughter/sister calls you to ask "What do you think about LCD vs. plasma TVs?" draws that much closer.
