A user at Niketalk forums posted up these images of an iPod nano that went up in smoke this morning. The forum user, MJair was awoken at 2AM by the fire alarm going off. On a quick panicked inspection of the room, an “orange glow” near his PS3 was seen. That orange glow was nothing less than a fire, approximately a foot wide in length, which was said to be rapidly spreading. Checkout more images of the nano wreckage below.

Luckily, neither MJair or his PS3 were harmed, but the source of the fire seems to have been his first gen iPod nano. Unfortunately, the nano was not as robust as the iPhone that took on a semi, meaning its thin, MP3 playing days are now truly up. Unless we want to go the way of the nano, we really should replace the batteries in our own fire alarm. [Niketalk; Thanks, Vince]

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Although we think CeBIT is largely a waste of convention center, one standout was Korean PC-case master GMC (no relation to America’s own troubled automotive titan). Its sexiest case concept was by far the disc-shaped red-and-black beauty captured by Aving above. Even its simple name, “Pot,” evokes a feeling of peace and ease, tinged with faint pangs of hunger. The other designs below are innovative and practical, though some suffered from designer overkill, not to mention an overwhelming reliance on the color green. [Aving USA; GMC]

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The European Space Agency is launching the first Automated Transfer Vehicle tomorrow in French Guyana. Though it looks like a satellite, the ATV, christened Jules Verne, is really an unmanned cargo-hauling robot capable of carting 7.6 tons of supplies and other astro-crap up from earth, and even tow the International Space Station itself to a higher orbit. And it’ll do a lot of this stuff with no guidance from the carbon units:

The most notable is the ATV’s automatic rendezvous and docking technology - the ship can find its own way to the station and attach itself without any human intervention.

Other vehicles are manually driven in—optical sensors on the ATV steer and line up the truck for docking, as you can see in the images below (taken from the amazing BBC News video you can jump to below). Yes, the ESA refers to this automated linkup of ATV and ISS as “mating.”
Note to self: Space stations are not safe hideouts during robot revolts.

Tomorrow’s launch will be carried off by an Ariane 5 rocket, and the double-decker-bus-sized ATV will be the heaviest payload ever carried by one. The maneuver will be trickier than usual, with the upper stage of the rocket igniting twice, to get it up there and then again to boost it safely over the Pacific Ocean. [BBC News]

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Although we think CeBIT is largely a waste of convention center, one standout was Korean PC-case master GMC (no relation to America’s own troubled automotive titan). Its sexiest case concept was by far the disc-shaped red-and-black beauty captured by Aving above. Even its simple name, “Pot,” evokes a feeling of peace and ease, tinged with faint pangs of hunger. The other designs below are innovative and practical, though some suffered from designer overkill, not to mention an overwhelming reliance on the color green. [Aving USA; GMC]

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The Masdar HQ in Abu Dhabi has big ambitions; the site is planned to be the world’s first positive energy building, meaning it will create more energy than it consumes. Checkout some more fantastic images by clicking through the gallery.

The project is expected to cost $300 million, and it will form an impressive center piece to Masdar City, which will be a $22 billion development stretching out beyond Abu Dhabi. The Masdar HQ is the very vision of a greener future. In fact, a roof pier will be the first part of the building to be hoisted into place, which will be covered in solar panels that will generate energy for its own construction. The complete structure will encompass some 1.3 million square feet, and we think the term “intelligent design” should now be redefined to accommodate the Masdar HQ’s structural plans. [Product Page via Dvice]

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The Product: Timbuk 2 is famous for their trendy, customizable messenger bags with rock solid construction. You can pick different colors for each of the three panels of your bag to create a personalized product. Now Timbuk2 has added specialty (premium) fabrics to their designs.

The Price: A custom medium sized laptop messenger runs $140, plus $23 per specialty fabric panel.

The Verdict:

As you can see, my test subject (aka wife) stuffed the bag to the brim with lady-themed folders, various tiny containers and her Macbook. The Timbuk2s expand a ton and their shape holds up pretty well considering the load.

And while the new premium fabrics look and feel nice enough, it’s Timbuk2’s staple internal corduroy laptop liner that sells the bag. It simply feels safe to when your laptop slips in, and a Velcro strap wraps over the top to make sure that your computer can’t come loose.

The only real downside to the new fabrics are their price—$23 is a pretty steep upsell if multiplied out to three panels—and a fairly limited pattern selection with only eight choices. Sure, you can still mix and match your standard colors for no additional fee, but we really like the idea of these specialty patterns and wish there were more styles.

Either way, the new fabrics are only adding more options to the Timbuk2 line. It seems like a good thing just got a little bit better. [Timbuk2]

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The Masdar HQ in Abu Dhabi has big ambitions; the site is planned to be the world’s first positive energy building, meaning it will create more energy than it consumes. Checkout some more fantastic images by clicking through the gallery.

The project is expected to cost $300 million, and it will form an impressive center piece to Masdar City, which will be a $22 billion development stretching out beyond Abu Dhabi. The Masdar HQ is the very vision of a greener future. In fact, a roof pier will be the first part of the building to be hoisted into place, which will be covered in solar panels that will generate energy for its own construction. The complete structure will encompass some 1.3 million square feet, and we think the term “intelligent design” should now be redefined to accommodate the Masdar HQ’s structural plans. [Product Page via Dvice]

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The Product: Timbuk 2 is famous for their trendy, customizable messenger bags with rock solid construction. You can pick different colors for each of the three panels of your bag to create a personalized product. Now Timbuk2 has added specialty (premium) fabrics to their designs.

The Price: A custom medium sized laptop messenger runs $140, plus $23 per specialty fabric panel.

The Verdict:

As you can see, my test subject (aka wife) stuffed the bag to the brim with lady-themed folders, various tiny containers and her Macbook. The Timbuk2s expand a ton and their shape holds up pretty well considering the load.

And while the new premium fabrics look and feel nice enough, it’s Timbuk2’s staple internal corduroy laptop liner that sells the bag. It simply feels safe to when your laptop slips in, and a Velcro strap wraps over the top to make sure that your computer can’t come loose.

The only real downside to the new fabrics are their price—$23 is a pretty steep upsell if multiplied out to three panels—and a fairly limited pattern selection with only eight choices. Sure, you can still mix and match your standard colors for no additional fee, but we really like the idea of these specialty patterns and wish there were more styles.

Either way, the new fabrics are only adding more options to the Timbuk2 line. It seems like a good thing just got a little bit better. [Timbuk2]

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The Jupiter Mouse is made of wood, easily fits the palm of your hand and controls the on-screen cursor by using tilting gestures. The astronomically great mouse retails at ¥13,980 ($136.10), and the control method actually seems quite interesting; tilting the mouse results in cursor movement in the relevant direction, and the magnitude of the tilt determines the pointer’s velocity. Further, it comes equipped with a stand to stop your rolling roller getting lost in orbit. Sorry. [Kilian Nakamura]

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The $300-million Masdar HQ in Abu Dhabi is claimed to be the world’s first “positive energy” building — creates more energy than it uses. Click here for first picture in gallery.

The Masdar HQ is the very vision of a greener future. In fact, a roof pier will be the first part of the building to be hoisted into place, which will be covered in solar panels that will generate energy for its own construction

[via Gizmodo]

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