5250-Foot Tower Will Make Burj Dubai Look Like Pencil [Mile High]

Sure, the Burj Dubai tower looks amazingly tall, but it’s final height— currently projected to be 2,300 feet— is less than half that of a new building planned for Saudi Arabia. It’s going to be 5,250 feet high. Yup, that’s just 30 feet short of a mile tall: taller than anything under construction anywhere, and making it easily the world’s tallest building. Think they should stick a TV antenna on the top and go for that extra 30 feet? I sure do.

It’s going to be built in a new city near Jeddah on the Red Sea and is funded by billionaire Prince al-Walid bin Talal. He bought London’s Savoy hotel for a cool $2.5 billion in 2005. So you can suspect that there’ll be a hotel in the building somewhere. By my calculations, the tower will have somewhere between 320 and 350 floors, so perhaps that should be “several hotels”.

Not much is known about the details yet, other than the fact that it’ll have two supporting flying-buttress towers to help keep it up (both more than 800 feet high). It will also have advanced damping systems to stop the swaying at high floors from making people sick, and it’s going to need amazing engineering to cope with freezing wind at the top and desert heat at the bottom.

It’s so tall that much of the ferrying of material and construction workers will have to be by helicopter. And that’s just cool. [Daily Mail]

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Filed under: Home Entertainment, Portable Audio, Robots

Sony just turned out the Rolly music player in black. A surprise blown by the FCC just last week. At least we can wonder at the colorful end-caps at a cost of ¥1,500 (about $15) per. Of course, if you scoffed at the original Rolly, then the April 19th, Japanese release of the new ¥40,000 (about $400) dancing-speaker bot won’t likely tug at your pawnshopped heartstrings either.

[Via Impress]

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Via [Engadget]

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Sony Ericsson’s First 3G Phone for US, the Cheap Z750a, Finally Arrives [Cellphones]

Sony Ericsson may not be good at delivering promised goods in a timely manner, but when it does finally deliver something—say, its first HSDPA phone for the US market—it does it with style and a shockingly low price. The Z750a is hitting AT&T for just $50 (after a $100 mail-in rebate that you damn well better fill out). The clamshell with the signature-Sony OLED see-through exterior will come in three colors: Mysterious Purple, Phantom Grey and Rose Pink. US availability details and bonus pic after the jump.

Sony Ericsson Blends Style, Sophistication and Speed with New Z750a Clamshell

New Mobile Broadband Handset Available in the U.S. Only from AT&T
RALEIGH, N.C. —(Business Wire)— Mar. 31, 2008 Mobile phone owners no longer have to decide between high performance and attractive design when choosing a new handset with the new Sony Ericsson Z750a. Available in the U.S. exclusively at AT&T, the Z750a is an affordable and stylish handset with a mirrored clamshell design and a hidden exterior display that illuminates when the phone is in use. As Sony Ericsson’s first 3G/HSDPA handset for the U.S. market, the Z750a features mobile broadband for a high-speed Internet(1)connection and access to multimedia content that complements its multimedia player, 2.0 megapixel camera, Internet(1) browser and e-mail(2) capability using AT&T’s Mobile Email application.

“Sony Ericsson continues to expand its North American portfolio with a distinctive and signature design that combines entertainment, style and speed in a sleek device,” said Karen Morris, vice president of marketing for Sony Ericsson North America. “Representing one of our most distinctive and colorful 3G clamshells, the Z750a will appeal to those who want to do more with their phone - share music, high-quality pictures, browse the Internet - and project a sophisticated image all their own. We are delighted that AT&T will offer this device in the U.S. along with the hugely successful W580 Walkman(R) Phone.”

The Z750a works hard, offering features such as data download transfer speeds from 600 to 1400 kbps from AT&T’s High Speed Packet Access (HSPA) 3G network, support for AT&T’s Mobile Email, a 2.0 megapixel camera, full HTML web browsing(1) capabilities and stereo Bluetooth(R)(3) support (A2DP). The Z750a also plays hard with 3D gaming capabilities, a media player that supports numerous media file types for listening to your favorite music tracks and video. The phone has up to 26MB(4) of internal memory and is Memory Stick Micro(TM) (M2(TM)) compatible - currently upgradeable to 8GB(5) - providing ample storage space for photos, videos, music, games and more.

No matter how smart and powerful the Z750a may be on the inside, it still dares to be sleek and sophisticated on the outside. The Z750a has a reflective mirror clamshell casing and hidden organic light-emitting diode (OLED) reflective display screen on the front of the phone that discretely illuminates when receiving a call, displaying caller identification. When active, it also displays battery life, text message alerts and other useful information. To match anyone’s personal style, the Z750a launches in three tantalizing color choices: Mysterious Purple, Phantom Grey and Rose Pink.

The Sony Ericsson Z750a will be available at AT&T stores and authorized dealers in early April for $49.99 after a $100 mail-in-rebate and new two-year service contract.

Z750a Phone At-A-Glance

Sony Ericsson packed innovative features into the Z750a, but didn’t compromise looks or quality to get the job done.

— Weight: 3.9 oz

— Size: 3.8 x 1.9 x 0.8 inches (approx.)

— Talk Time(6): Up to 9 hours GSM; up to 3.5 hours UMTS

— Standby Time(6): Up to 400 hours GSM; up to 350 hours UMTS

— 2.0 megapixel camera

— PictBridge(TM) compatible

— Media Player

— AT&T’s Music ID music recognition application

— AT&T CV video service

— Memory Stick Micro(TM) (M2(TM)) support (up to 8GB(5))

— Tri-band HSPDA (850/1900/2100)

— Quad-band EDGE (850/900/1800/1900)

— Bluetooth(R) stereo (A2DP) support(3)

— USB 2.0 capable

— Full HTML browser

— AT&T Mobile Email

— 2.2″ QVGA 262k Color TFT display

— OLED External Sub Display

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Radioactive Tritium Makes Keychain Light Glow For 10 Years [Keychain]

Besides being somewhat dim, most keychain lights have batteries that only last a couple months before needing to be replaced—which often never happens since nobody has watch batteries lying around. But what if you could have this Mini Tritium Keychain which lasts about 10 years without needing to be replaced. If you’re worried that keeping something radioactive in your pocket next to your gonads is a bad idea, keep in mind that the particles emitted are supposedly so weak they don’t even penetrate your skin. Also keep in mind that science has been wrong about stuff before. [DealExtreme via Gear Diary via Oh Gizmo]

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Large Hadron Collider Won’t Destroy Earth. Of Course Not, say Scientists [Lhc]

Contrary to the somewhat feverish claims laid out in an recent lawsuit, when our favorite particle-smashing, Force-finding Large Hadron Collider is switched on soon it will not result in the destruction of life as we know it. Such claims are “complete nonsense” say the scientists at CERN, in response to the suit. They should know: it’s their machine, they designed it and they’ve been telling everyone for a while that their research shows it’s safe.

The lawsuit filed by a group of Hawaii residents is alleging that not enough safety checks have been made by CERN to prevent disaster when the LHC goes live in the coming weeks. It may “create unsafe conditions of physics” which may have disastrous effects. How? Well, you may imagine a micro black hole gobbling up everything unstoppably, while a strangelet (a hypothetical clump of particles including strange quarks) may run amok converting all nearby matter into strange matter, also wrecking the Earth.

James Gillies, a CERN spokesman, suggests this is rubbish in this response to the New Scientist: “The LHC will start up this year, and it will produce all sorts of exciting new physics and knowledge about the universe.” It’s no threat at all, he says: “A year from now, the world will still be here.” The LHC is actually designed to probe the boundaries of physics, and while a 2003 safety study did conceed that micro black holes or magnetic monopoles may be formed, they would be short-lived and offer no threat.

CERN physicists will be talking about safety in an open house discussion on April 6. [New Scientist]

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5250-Foot Tower Will Make Burj Dubai Look Like Pencil [Mile High]

Sure, the Burj Dubai tower looks amazingly tall, but it’s final height— currently projected to be 2,300 feet— is less than half that of a new building planned for Saudi Arabia. It’s going to be 5,250 feet high. Yup, that’s just 30 feet short of a mile tall: taller than anything under construction anywhere, and making it easily the world’s tallest building. Think they should stick a TV antenna on the top and go for that extra 30 feet? I sure do.

It’s going to be built in a new city near Jeddah on the Red Sea and is funded by billionaire Prince al-Walid bin Talal. He bought London’s Savoy hotel for a cool $2.5 billion in 2005. So you can suspect that there’ll be a hotel in the building somewhere. By my calculations, the tower will have somewhere between 320 and 350 floors, so perhaps that should be “several hotels”.

Not much is known about the details yet, other than the fact that it’ll have two supporting flying-buttress towers to help keep it up (both more than 800 feet high). It will also have advanced damping systems to stop the swaying at high floors from making people sick, and it’s going to need amazing engineering to cope with freezing wind at the top and desert heat at the bottom.

It’s so tall that much of the ferrying of material and construction workers will have to be by helicopter. And that’s just cool. [Daily Mail]

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Filed under: Home Entertainment, Portable Audio, Robots

Sony just turned out the Rolly music player in black. A surprise blown by the FCC just last week. At least we can wonder at the colorful end-caps at a cost of ¥1,500 (about $15) per. Of course, if you scoffed at the original Rolly, then the April 19th, Japanese release of the new ¥40,000 (about $400) dancing-speaker bot won’t likely tug at your pawnshopped heartstrings either.

[Via Impress]

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Via [Engadget]

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Self Inflating Tires Do Just That [Auto]

If Coda’s claims are true, their Self Inflating Tires in development now seem like an inevitable future for car owners. The simple mechanism works with classic principles of a peristaltic pump: a tube is placed in each tire’s sidewall. As it’s run over, the tube’s compression forces air in (filling the tire). A cut-off makes sure the tire doesn’t explode. That’s it. Sound too good to be true? Maybe. But having all tires on the road at optimal inflation could lead to a huge gas/energy savings every year (and as our friends at Jalopnik point out, it’s pretty good for safety as well). So our ears are perked waiting for more information. (Note: the choice for no hyphen was that of the manufacturer, not our editors.) [product via “>jalopnik]

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Windows XP-powered Eee PC laptop: $400, April 9th

Filed under: Laptops

Sounds like we’ve finally got a price and a date for the XP powered Eee PC: $400, and April 9th. The hardware’s identical to current-gen Eee PCs, though, so if you’re happy with your little white lappy and are itching for XP you might try to pick up a license on eBay. Still, if all goes well for ASUS, they’ll be selling 4x what they did the first time around, innit?

P.S. -If you are, for whatever reason, itching to read more about current hardware running the 7 year old OS, Laptop’s got a hands-on. Nothing that wasn’t already out there though.

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Duo steals hundreds of iPhones, sells them all to one person

Filed under: Cellphones

Apple’s no stranger to having its wares ganked (a lot), but this one really has us scratching our noggins some kind of fierce. Apparently a couple of meddlesome 20-somethings working at a Salem, New Hampshire Apple store managed to scoot away with somewhere between 330 and 700 iPhones. After somehow stuffing that many handsets into a panel van / pickup truck / privately owned C-130, they seemingly sweet talked a single high-roller into snatching up their entire stash for upwards of $138,000 — which could be a bargain (or not) depending on the actual quantity included in the deal, internal capacity, etc. Minutiae aside, both individuals are currently residing under the strong arm of the law (surveillance cameras are hard to dodge), but curiously, nothing is mentioned about the buyer who didn’t find spending over a hundred large with a couple of average joes (who just happened to have an inordinately large amount of iPhones for sale) the least bit odd.

[Thanks, Scott]

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