"Printed" solar cells coming to windows, clothing

Solar company Konarka wants to bring plastics to life with the sun.

Konarka has developed technology to create rolls of plastic that can convert light to electricity--a design that will result in solar power being embedded in everything from flashing Coke bottles to wireless sensors, the company claims.

Earlier this month, Konarka said that it has demonstrated the use of inkjet printing to manufacture its solar cells. And at a recent investor conference here, chairman and founder Howard Berke described Konarka's longer-term plans to embed small solar plastic cells in hundreds of products.

In the second half of this year, Berke said, Konarka will make its first shipments to customers and will announce the location of a factory.
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Mooon Concept Phone

Here's an idea we bet could easily become the most copied design, after the iPhone. Check out the Mooon+. And yes, that's three "o's, presumably since that will be your expression of awe when you first clap eyes on this concept phone and start mooning over it. It isn't so much the iPhone-ish touchscreen and sleek lines that will wow you since we've seen plenty of imitators, but designer Sunman Kwon's clever twist at the end.

Indeed, snap off the top piece and, voila, you get a Bluetooth headset that's been craftily docked all this time onto the handset. There're no other specs to speak of, but who cares? We just want to see this going to market and eclipsing the iPhone's hype just a little.



Via Yanko Design

Safekeep your "memories" here

We are looking forward to the day when all the electronic giants will make peace with each other and standardize the kind of memory media their gadgets use. For now, we'll have to contend with this interesting concept by Tom Kenworthy. His memory card holder slides open horizontally to reveal three drawers. These drawers have the indents of different kinds of memory media so you can rest assured your flash card won't slip out.

While there are memory media cases in the market now, most can store only a limited number and type of cards.

Although it is still in concept stage, we are hoping to see this product on shelves soon. Until then, we'll dream of the day when one memory media will rule them all.

A printer that sits on your notebook lid

While the image of a printer has always been a beige and bulky contraception that takes up too much space on the desk, designer Hung Chih Wang wants to change that by introducing Trak.

His mobile printer fits comfortably on the back of the screen of a notebook and is powered by USB, so there are no messy power cables looping around. The printer head is detachable, and zips along a track on the printer itself to get the job done.

The pictures on the Web show black-and-white printouts, but we hope a color version will come out soon. With a detachable printhead, this shouldn't be a difficult task.

While it seems that this is still in development, we can see Trak going a long way as an indispensable companion for road warriors who need to get work done while on the road.

Via Yanko Design

Sony demos 5x boost in hard drive storage

Imagine a 2.5-inch notebook hard drive that can store up to 2.5TB of data. Well, according to Sony, this is actually possible with its new hybrid hard drive technology. Using a combination of magnetic and optical techologies (rather than the current magnetic data recording), the Japanese electronics giant claims the storage density can be significantly increased. (1TB = 1,000GB)

Sony estimates that 125GB of data can be stored on one square inch. This means the recently launched 500GB 2.5-inch hard drives can theoretically store as much as 2.5TB using Sony's new technology. Just think of the exponential space increase you'll be getting out of your 3.5-inch hard drives.

Unfortunately, Sony has not released any plans on when it will introduce the new technology commercially, so we are not expecting to see the new capacity-enhanced hard drives anytime soon.

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