It's a dog-eat-bot race, with Sanyo's Eneloopy mascot mutt giving Panasonic's Evolta mascot robot a run for its money. But whereas the latter risked battery life and limb to show off Panasonic's AA cells' endurance in a harrowing climb up the Grand Canyon, the Eneloopy doggie prefers to play cute and "nosey" with your AA- and AAA-sized rechargeables.
Just in time for the holidays and facing heavy competition from Barnes & Noble's upcoming Nook e-book reader, Amazon has announced that it has improved the Kindle's battery life when the wireless connection is turned on and will now be offering native PDF support for its e-book reader. Both the battery-life boost and native PDF support will be available to owners of new Kindles and some older models via a firmware upgrade.
In a press release, Amazon says the Kindle now has battery life of up to seven days with wireless turned on compared with four days previously. However, battery life with wireless turned off remains the same (around two weeks).
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Though Amazon and Barnes and Noble are grabbing headlines with e-readers aimed at consumers, Ditto Book--a CES 2010 exhibitor--is marketing its device for niche markets.
The US$249 e-reader doesn't compete with Nook and Kindle specifications, as it is not wireless, has a 6-inch screen in four shades of gray, and doesn't support the standard ePub format yet.
Its focus is on customization; companies interested in ordering the e-reader in bulk can add a logo, brand name, color, and welcome screen. A unique option is to load the e-readers with bundled content.
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Texas Instruments on Monday announced the eZ430-Chronos, the world’s first customizable development environment within a sports watch.
The eZ430-Chronos is a highly integrated, wearable wireless development system in a sports watch. Its development tool kit allows developers to harness the ultra-low power and wireless capabilities of TI’s CC430 microcontroller, and allows for development of wireless networking applications. Read more »
Kindle competitors such as the Sony and Barnes & Noble make a big deal of
the fact that their e-book readers are compatible with the ePub file format.
That means, unlike the Kindle, that the Sony
Reader and forthcoming B&N
Nook (as well as other e-readers) can be used to read tens of thousands of
free
Google Books. Just choose a title, download the ePub version, and transfer
it to the compatible reader of your choice.
Yes, nearly all of the books and essays in question are public domain classics (and not-so-classic) of
yesteryear--the works of authors such as Arthur Conan Doyle, Jules Verne, Mark
Twain, William Shakespeare, Jane Austen, and the like. But free's free, and
these are the sort of canonical works of art that bookworms appreciate reading
and re-reading ad infinitum.
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