Acer’s Aspire 3951 leaks with MacBook Air-like specs, available in October?

It looks like Acer may be dropping down to the lightweight laptop division, now that images of its so-called Aspire 3951 have leaked out of Vietnam. An ostensible rival to the recently refreshed MacBook Air, the 13.3-inch 3951 reportedly boasts a similarly slim design, measuring 13mm thick and weighing less than 1.4 kilograms (about three pounds). According to Sohoa, the aluminum-cased device is powered by a second generation Intel Core processor, features an optional 160GB SSD, and offers more than six hours of battery life, along with Bluetooth 4.0 support. Much like the Air, this Aspire can purportedly boot up pretty fast, as well, rousing from sleep mode in just 1.7 seconds. It’s rumored that Acer will release this new line in October within the curiously affordable price range between $770 and $960, but we’ll have to wait and see whether that actually comes to fruition. In the meantime, you can check out an extra image of the Aspire 3951 below, or hit the source link for the full collection.

[Thanks, @tranquochuyvn]

Continue reading Acer’s Aspire 3951 leaks with MacBook Air-like specs, available in October?

Acer’s Aspire 3951 leaks with MacBook Air-like specs, available in October? originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Aug 2011 07:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Optical ‘diode’ lends hope to photonic computing, rayguns

The trouble with pesky Photon, at least as far as ultra-fast optical computing is concerned, is that he keeps coming back. If a data-carrying beam of light collides with reflections bouncing around between the components of a chip, it can suffer enough interference to make people yearn for the good old days of electrons. What’s needed is the optical equivalent of a diode, which only allows light to pass one way, and that’s exactly what researchers at Caltech and the University of California claim to have developed. As you’ll see in the photo after the break, their metallic-silicon optical waveguide allows light to travel smoothly from left to right, but it breaks up and dissipates any photons traveling in the opposite direction. This is all good, because there’s no point having futuristic 50Gbps optical interconnects if our CPUs lag behind. Light up the source link for a fuller explanation.

Continue reading Optical ‘diode’ lends hope to photonic computing, rayguns

Optical ‘diode’ lends hope to photonic computing, rayguns originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 08 Aug 2011 15:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sony intros 200-pound battery to power businesses, government agencies during a blackout

In the five months since a tsunami and 9.0 magnitude earthquake hit Japan, we’ve seen various technology companies struggle to get their manufacturing operations back in order, but Sony appears to be the first to introduce a product seemingly inspired by the disaster itself. The outfit's Japanese division just announced the ESSP-2000, a 90kg (198-pound)battery whose 2.4kWh of power should keep businesses and government agencies afloat for at least a few hours in the event of a blackout or natural disaster. All told, the battery can support a maximum load of 1000VA, and can recharge to 95 percent in about two hours — not bad, considering the capacity of this thing. Sony also went with olivine-type lithium-ion iron phosphate batteries, which it says will last ten years. With a price of ¥2 million ($25,700), this battery's clearly not meant to be a savior for home users, though for businesses it could be a small price to pay for an uninterrupted power supply.

Sony intros 200-pound battery to power businesses, government agencies during a blackout originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 08 Aug 2011 11:17:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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What processor should I buy? Intel’s crazy pricing makes my head hurt



The time has come for me to put together a new PC. The Core 2 Duo E6700 I bought within a few weeks of its release is now five years old, and though it’s served me well, when it comes to playing the latest games and building software in Visual Studio, it’s just not that quick. Both the processor and my video card, a Radeon HD 4830, need replacing with something newer and better. The October release of Battlefield 3 has finally pushed me over the edge: I need a new computer to play that game in all its glory.

This is going to be a major upgrade. I’m going to keep my hard disk, beloved Dell clicky keyboard, and twin Dell U2410 monitors, but everything else is going to go; motherboard, CPU, RAM, video card, TV tuner, optical drive, and case are all up for replacement. Optical drive, too; I have enough old games on CD and DVD that ditching optical media isn’t really viable yet.

Many of the component choices are easy enough. But when it comes to processors and motherboards, I’m flummoxed. Intel’s Sandy Bridge processors have the clear performance lead, so they’re the natural choice for any system build. But then I fall foul of Intel’s pricing scheme; which one should I buy?

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What processor should I buy? Intel’s crazy pricing makes my head hurt

45,000 Verizon Workers On Strike Over New Contract

Trouble with your landline? If you have Verizon, especially on the east coast, it might not be the best time to have it fixed; The Daily Mail reports that “Forty-five thousand Verizon workers from Massachusetts to Washington, D.C., are on the picket line Sunday as labour contract talks fizzled. More than a fifth of the wireless giant’s work force has gone on strike as contract negotiations for the wireline division broke down last night.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.


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45,000 Verizon Workers On Strike Over New Contract

Antibacterial Hand Sanitizer May Actually Make You Sicker

Before
you reach for that hand sanitizer, consider this: rather than killing
germs, that action is actually more likely to make you – and society –
sicker.

What is worse, perhaps the most comprehensive study of the effectiveness
of antibiotic and non-antibiotic soaps in the U.S., led by Elaine Larson
at Columbia University (with Aiello as a coauthor), found that while
for healthy hand washers there was no difference between the effects
of the two, for chronically sick patients (those with asthma and diabetes,
for example) antibiotic soaps were actually associated with increases
in the frequencies of fevers, runny noses and coughs [4]. In other words,
antibiotic soaps appeared to have made those patients sicker. Let me
say that again: Most people who use antibiotic soap are no healthier
than those who use normal soap. AND those individuals who are chronically
sick and use antibiotic soap appear to get SICKER.

Rob Dunn wrote a guest blog over at Scientific America that every germophobe
should read: Link
(Illustration: Don Smith) – via We,
Beasties

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Antibacterial Hand Sanitizer May Actually Make You Sicker