WorldExpo2010
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Canon Wonder Camera Concept promises single-lens perfection (video)
You know all those precious lenses you've been stockpiling for your SLR since the 90s? They're still safe for another couple of decades, but in round about 2030, you're gonna be trashing all that glassware and buying yourself a Wonder Camera. Why would that be? Canon is pretty confident that by then it'll have figured out how to do a single lens capable of going from macro shots all the way out to a 5000mm focal length. And yes, apparently it's small enough to fit in a young girl's hands. This non-interchangeable lens is backed by an all-touch interface (say sayonara to your knobs and dials), an extremely high-resolution sensor, and image stabilization so advanced as to make shooting at that unspeakably high zoom range a viable option. Finally, the whole lurid dream is topped off with video-only capture. Canon argues you won't need to shoot stills when its video is capable of keeping everything in focus all the time -- you'll just pick out your favorite scene from the movie reel. Go past the break to see the highfaultin video demo.
QderoPateo Ouidoo to pack 26-core chip, looks like Palm Pre and Windows Phone 7 love child
Really now? KIRFing a phone and a UI is one thing, but claiming to have a 26-core CPU (!) capable of 8-gigaflop (!) floating point operation -- or the "equivalent of four iPads combined," apparently -- is one helluva stretch for a smartphone. This is apparently how awesome the QderoPateo Ouidoo will be. According to the launch event at the Shanghai World Expo on Friday, the too-good-to-be-true Divinitus CPU will help power the Ouidoo OS's augmented reality articulated naturality apps and 3D social-networking virtual world. The rest of the specs include 512MB RAM, 4GB ROM, 28GB of built-in storage, microSD expansion, Bluetooth, WiFi, GPS, built-in 3D map, accelerometer, digital compass, 5-megapixel camera with flash, 220 hours of standby battery life, and a sharp 3.5-inch 800 x 480 screen. No prices or even videos of the UI available yet, but our friends over at Engadget Chinese are promised a review unit in July or August -- around the time of the global launch (followed by an LTE revision in 2011), so it won't be long before we find out whether this is just some absurd vaporware. A couple of pictures of the prototype after the break. Update: Recombu has pinged us a link to Oxford University's PTAM (Parallel Tracking and Mapping) augmented reality software, which is licensed to QderoPateo. You can see it demoed on an iPhone 3G after the break. [Thanks, xleung]
