Kinect-powered hacks are not new but this Kinect hack developed by a team of Indian engineers is pretty unique and helpful to the visually impaired. Dubbed as viSparsh, it’s a haptic belt that detects obstacles and vibrates so as to signify oncoming obstacles to the visually impaired.

Basically, the Kinect sensor attached to the belt becomes the eyes for the wearer and transmits signals to the vibration motors, depending on the distance of the obstacle as well as its location.

Here’s a 9-minute video that shows how the device works.

viSparsh

[Thanks, Rakesh!]

Transparent display market is estimated to grow big in the next few years and to cash in on the upcoming technology, Samsung has announced to mass produce its second and a larger transparent display from this month. The new 46-inch transparent displays will complement Samsung’s existing 22-inchers which can be used for various purposes like showcasing products, using it as a freezer door, information kiosk, medical equipment and more.

On the technical front, the 46-inch transparent display supports a resolution of 1366×768 pixels, has a contrast ratio of 4500:1 and a color gamut of 70 percent.

Broadcom Corporation, one of the leading semiconductor solutions company introduced its first family of 802.11ac (5G WiFi) chips designed for a broad range of product segments. The new IEEE 802.11ac chips are three times faster and up to six times more power efficient than equivalent 802.11n solutions.

Based on 802.11ac, 5G WiFi is a major evolutionary step from the existing 802.11a/b/g/n networks. Broadcom’s 5G WiFi dramatically improves the wireless range in the home, allowing consumers to watch HD-quality video from more devices, in more places, simultaneously.

By creating more reliable whole-home coverage, Broadcom’s 5G WiFi technology overcomes the digital content and wireless device challenge. Broadcom’s family of 5G WiFi solutions includes the BCM4360, BCM4352, BCM43526 and BCM43516.

Chips with the PCIe interface are ideal for access points, routers, DSL/cable gateways and PC products; chips that use USB are ideal for consumer electronics devices including televisions, set-top boxes and Blu-Ray players. Broadcom’s new 5G WiFi chips deliver better coverage and longer battery life in a small form factor that is interoperable and compatible with existing technologies.

Beamforming helps steer content in the direction of the intended receiver, increasing reliability and extending range; this is well complemented by STBC and LDPC code support.By transferring the same volume of data at a much faster rate, devices go into a low-power mode faster than existing 802.11n solutions.Designed on 40nm manufacturing process, the new chips are smaller and more power efficient, giving customers more design freedom.

Broadcom’s 5G WiFi solutions work with all legacy 802.11 standards and complement other wireless technologies – like Wi-Fi Direct, Bluetooth and NFC.

Broadcom is sampling 5G WiFi solutions to its early access partners including retail and PC OEMs, service providers and carriers, and will be demonstrating 5G WiFi capabilities at CES 2012.

Product highlights and other information can be found at www.broadcom.com.

Shopping carts are generally used to lug around all the shopped goods but with the new Smart Cart from SK Telecom, the age-old cart will be able to do a lot more. Undergoing as a pilot test in China’s Shanghai Lotus Supermarket Chain Store, the Smart Cart works with the help of a smartphone and a shopping cart equipped with a tablet PC to show various shopping-related information.

After installing the app in the smartphone, a user can search for products, coupons as well as create a shopping list. The information on the phone can then be synced with the Smart Cart which can be used to get product information, offers or receive coupons using augmented reality. The Smart Cart uses indoor positioning technology to give consumers real-time information inside the store and also facilitates during check out by showing the purchased items etc.

SK Telecom will also pilot test the Smart Cart in South Korea soon.

[Thanks, Louise!]

Global System for Mobile communications or fondly called as GSM has completed two decades of its service today. The GSM standard first came into existence in 1991 where the very first call was made between Finland’s former prime minister, Harri Holkeri, and the mayor of Tampere, Kaarina Suonio over a network jointly developed by Telenokia and Siemens Network (present day Nokia Siemens Network).

GSM as we know now has garnered more than 4.2 billion subscribers and is also the foundation of many new technology standards like EDGE, 3G and LTE.

[Via Nokia Conversations]

Sony today announced that they’ve developed an integrated Augmented Reality technology dubbed as Smart AR. Although we already have some AR solutions, Sony prides its tech by combining object recognition technology and own 3D space recognition technology, which was used in Sony robots like AIBO and QRIO.

Smart AR allows objects to be recognized and tracked at high-speed and also display virtual objects or additional image or text information over the real-life image.

Sony will showcase the technology from tomorrow till May 22 in the Sony Building in Ginza (Tokyo).

Press Release

LG’s display making subsidiary, LG Display has announced that they’ll showcase their full range of Advanced High Performance In-Plane Switching (AH-IPS) products at the SID 2011 expo that begins on May 15. LG is trying to play coy by not mentioning the exact resolution but has confirmed to show the panels for different sizes – 3.5-inch and 4.5-inch for smartphones, 7-inch and 9.7-inch for tablets and 55-inch and 84-inch for TVs.

According to LG Display, AH-IPS is the successive form of IPS that enables 1.5 to 2 times of resolution than conventional LCD panels, improved color accuracy and greater light transmission making it more power efficient.

LG Display already produces a 3.5-inch IPS panel with 960×640 which is used by Apple in its iPhone 4 and iPod touch devices.

Toshiba’s Mobile Display arm has created a new 7-inch low-temperature poly-silicon (LTPS) TFT LCD display that enables multi-touch input without the need to install an additional touch panel. The screen is developed for vehicle-mounted and industrial devices and integrates touch panel function by forming display pixel electrodes, thus reducing thickness by 57 percent and weight by 48 percent as compared to conventional LCDs.

The panel will be showcased at SID 2011 International Symposium in USA in May.

[Via Electronista]

Transparent displays will soon become a reality as Samsung has started mass producing 22-inch transparent panels. The panels will be produced in black-and-white as well as color that boasts a transparency rate of over 20 percent and 5 percent respectively. Transparent panels are also said to be energy efficient, thanks to the use of ambient light and helps to reduce energy consumption by a whopping 90 percent as compared to regular LCDs.

Samsung says the display can be useful for marketers for outdoor displays, corporations and even schools.

As for other features, the 22-inch display supports WSXGA+(1680×1050) resolution, has a contrast ratio of 500:1, HDMI and USB support.

Tegra 2-powered devices may rule this year’s Mobile World Congress but the day isn’t far enough where this dual-core baby will be obsolete. At the MWC, Nvidia showcased its next-generation Tegra platform which is dubbed as Project Kal-El. The chip will be the world’s first quad-core mobile processor and was demonstrated in an Android tablet that was able to browse the web, run games and even stream HD videos.

Some interesting facts about the new SoC are that it will take the resolution support beyond full HD (2560×1600 pixels, 1440p), increase the display DPI to up to 300 and features 12 GeForce GPU cores to handle intensive graphics. In short, Kal-El-based Tegra will be 5 times superior to current breed of Tegra processors. New Tegra SoC is currently being sampled and production is slated for August.

Additionally, Nvidia also threw some light on its Tegra roadmap and according to it, Nvidia will follow a yearly-release schedule for new Tegra chips. Wayne, Logan and Stark are expected in 2012, 2013 and 2014 respectively with Stark touting to be 75x better than Tegra 2.

[Via Nvidia]