Author: kenmay

US military working on turning soldiers into the Wolverine

Not only the US military want to make an Iron Man suit, they also want to give the soldiers the same self-healing powers of the Wolverine, the Marvel superhero that can accelerate the healing of injuries and chronic diseases. DARPA calls the project ElectRx. Their description is fascinating. Read more…

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US military working on turning soldiers into the Wolverine

A big chunk of the Sierra Nevada caught fracturing on video

If you like geology, you’re used to relying on an active imagination. Most geologic processes occur too slowly to see them play out for yourself. Many of the exceptions are dangerous enough that you might not want a front row seat or rare enough that the odds of being there to witness it are disheartening. Sometimes, though, the Earth throws us a bone—or in this case, a gigantic slab of granite. One interesting way that rocks weather and crumble apart is called “exfoliation.” Like the skin-scrubbing technique, this involves the outermost layers of exposed igneous or metamorphic bedrock sloughing off in a sheet. Over time, this tends to smooth and round the outcrop—Yosemite’s Half Dome  providing a spectacular example. We’re not entirely sure just what drives the peeling of an outcrop’s skin like this, but the classic explanation is that it’s the result of bringing rocks that formed at great pressure up to the surface. Once there, the outer layers can expand slightly, creating a physical mismatch with the layers below them. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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A big chunk of the Sierra Nevada caught fracturing on video

Intel Releases SD-Card-Sized PC, Unveils Next 14nm Chip

szczys writes: Intel is upping their bid for a place at the efficient-yet-powerful device table. They’ve launched their Edison board, which features an x86 based SoC running at 100 MHz. The footprint measures 35.5mm x 25.0mm and offers a 70-pin connector to break out 40 pins for add-on hardware. Also at the Intel Developer Forum today, the company demonstrated a PC running on Skylake, a new CPU microarchitecture based on the 14nm process used for Broadwell. Intel is pushing to break into both wearable devices and household devices, as it sees both as huge opportunities for growth. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Intel Releases SD-Card-Sized PC, Unveils Next 14nm Chip

Apple reveals new iCloud pricing, but you still only get 5GB of space for free

It used to be that if you compared iCloud pricing to other online storage services, Apple didn’t look so hot. (Twenty bucks a year for 10GB?! Bye, Felicia .) Now, in a bid to better compete with bigwigs like Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive, Apple is revising its iCloud plans so that they’re a little more affordable. Now, 20GB costs 99 cents a month; 200GB costs $4; 500GB is $10; and 1TB is $20 a month. All told, that’s an improvement — at least compared to the Apple of years past. It must be noted, though, that the free storage plan still only includes 5GB of space — a bit stingy considering Google and Microsoft both offer 15GB gratis. Also, as low as Apple’s prices are compared to the olden days, Google’s are still better: Google charges $10 a month for 1TB, not $20, and it also offers a more inexpensive 100GB option, which Apple doesn’t do. Filed under: Internet , Apple Comments Via: 9to5Mac

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Apple reveals new iCloud pricing, but you still only get 5GB of space for free

Visa’s Token Service generates fake CC numbers to keep your real ones safe

If you haven’t heard yet, Cupertino just launched a digital wallet called Apple Pay that randomizes your credit cards’ numbers. The one responsible for generating those fake numbers for Visa cards in particular, is Visa itself, through its new Token service , which the world’s largest credit and debit card company has announced right after Apple’s big reveal. These “tokens” are random numbers not associated with your name or real card numbers. You can use them to purchase anything online or by using mobile to pay via contactless payment systems in brick-and-mortar stores. Visa’s system can even generate different tokens for each merchant, device or type of purchase, if you want to be even more secure. The great thing about using tokens is that you won’t have to scramble to cancel and replace your card with a new one in case a retailer or a website suffers a security breach, because they never had your real CC details in the first place. As you’ve probably guessed, Apple Pay users will get the first crack at using Visa’s Token Service, starting in October for folks in the US and in 2015 for the rest of the world. The technology was designed to work with all major platforms, though, so it’ll eventually be available to its other customers (read: those using other devices through other digital wallets) in the future. [Image credit: Alamy] Comments Via: Reuters Source: Visa (1) , (2)

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Visa’s Token Service generates fake CC numbers to keep your real ones safe

How the iPhone 6 Stacks Up Against Its Toughest Competition

The iPhone 6 is here! It’s sleek and rounded, just like the leaked photos we’ve been seeing for months. But now we finally know what’s inside that Jony Ive-designed shell. How’s it measure up to the stiff smartphone competition? Let’s see. Read more…

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How the iPhone 6 Stacks Up Against Its Toughest Competition

[Update] iFixit cracks open the Moto 360, finds smaller battery than advertised

Hey that’s not 320 mAh. iFixit/Ron Amadeo iFixit  has gotten ahold of the Moto 360 and applied the usual spudgers and heat packs to rip open the little round smartwatch. There weren’t too many surprises (everything is round!) except for the battery: it’s smaller than advertised. In iFixit’s pictures, the 360’s battery is only labeled as 300 mAh, 20 mAh less than advertised . The 300 mAh battery has only 75 percent of the capacity of the 400 mAh battery found in the LG G Watch, and together with the OMAP 3 processor, it’s not a great combination for all-day battery life. We’ve asked Motorola for a comment about the smaller battery in iFixit’s 360, but the company hasn’t gotten back to us yet. We’ll update this post if we hear anything. The company’s response is below. As for the rest of the device, the round LCD looks pretty much the same as it does on the outside, and even the main PCB is round. iFixit managed to nail the processor down to an  OMAP3630 , which as we suspected is built on a 45nm process. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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[Update] iFixit cracks open the Moto 360, finds smaller battery than advertised