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It goes to say a whole lot when even PC makers themselves want to extend Microsoft Windows XP’s shelf life beyond what the software giant themselves want. Currently, the deadline stands at June 30 where PC makers can no longer sell PCs with Windows XP after that date, and it is interesting to see some of the different PC makers take a creative approach to this apparent dilemma. Both HP and Dell plan to offer machines running on Windows XP way after June, taking advantage of the “downgrade rights” offered as part of the Windows Vista license agreement. Pretty interesting, as these computers are actually Vista Business or Vista Ultimate machines which have been factory downgraded to XP at the customer’s request. (Read the full post about ‘PC makers want to extend XP’s life’…)

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Panic Button Key The most important button that computer manufacturers failed to supply is now available! You can have this for ?2.95 (Read the full post about ‘Panic Button Key’…)

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Brent Hatch must’ve gotten sick and tired of paying ever higher prices for gas, driving him to create this DIY Solar Electric Bike from scratch. Apparently, his gas bill has surpassed the $700 mark (both he and his wife has seven children), causing him to purchase an 8-seater bicycle while affixing a bunch of roof-mounted solar panels to rev up an electric motor. You won’t go very fast with this puppy, but at least short commutes to and from school to pick up the young ‘uns will be much easier on the wallet. Hopefully the other kids play nice and won’t ridicule Brent’s offspring. (Read the full post about ‘Man Builds own Solar-Electric Bike’…)

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Haptic feedback would go a long way to silencing complaints about the iPhone’s on-screen keyboard. If it worked, that is. I tried out several force-feedback handsets at this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, and was consistently disappointed. The only advantage is that you know the phone has recognized your button press. The small vibrations do nothing to help you navigate a keyboard by touch. In short, current haptics do nothing that a click or beep couldn’t do. That hasn’t stopped loose-lipped execs from Immersion Corporation bragging that their company is in talks with Apple about a licensing deal. Immersion provides haptic solutions to many phone companies already. (Read the full post about ‘Haptic Feedback Coming To iPhone?’…)

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The Apple Store showed its familiar “Back Soon” sticky note this morning, and then popped back up with a shiny new selection of iMacs. The top of the line 24″ iMac now sports a 45nm 3.06Ghz Core 2 Duo Penryn processor and an NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS with 512MB memory. Hard drive sizes range from 250GB to 500GB, all models contain a SuperDrive and all but the lowly 2.4 GHz, 20″ models get 2GB RAM as standard (the baby has to make do with just 1GB). All models still display the controversial “millions of colors”, if you feel like counting them. Prices still start at $1200 and top out at $2200. You can, of course, beef up the specs with custom options and arrive at $2650. (Read the full post about ‘Apple Bumps iMac Specs’…)

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Big memory makers Samsung, Toshiba and Hynix are undoubtedly very sad to see this trend in flash memory prices. Consumers on the other hand… well, they’re about ready to throw a party.

Flash memory chips, the individual components used internally to create the final products, such as SD, MMC and other embedded formats (like cell phones, solid state hard drives, etc.) are being sold at up to 25% below cost. The reason? They are so plentiful in the marketplace that buyers can dictate terms of who they’ll buy from, how much, and so on.

End consumers aren’t directly reaping the savings in terms of a lower cash outlay, but rather are seeing more features for the same cash outlay.

(Read the full post about ‘Flash memory selling by nearly 25% below manufacturing cost’…)

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A laser pointer is a small (often battery-operated) laser device designed for pointing at objects by illuminating them with a collimated visible laser beam. The typical use of a hand-held laser pointer is to point at some screen or chart during a presentation. The output power of a laser pointer is measured in milliwatts (mW). The laser pointer is generated by combining three different beams in three orthogonal transverse modes, two of them in a squeezed-vacuum state and one in an intense coherent field. A basic low power office type laser pointer is still clearly visible in a brightly lit room at distances over 100 feet. (Read the full post about ‘Cool gadgets the laser pointers’…)

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Epson has announced a new notebook, the Endeavor NA104. Without much excitement the NA104 offers some pretty standard features as well as an overall basic look and design. To begin with the NA104 offers a 12.1-inch display with either a 1.20GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor on the high-end or a 933MHz Celeron M523 processor on the low-end. Additional features include 512MB up to 1.5GB of RAM and an 80GB hard drive. The NA104 will offer a choice to come with either Windows XP or Vista installed. Like we mentioned, nothing special. Via [Akihabara News] Keep up with the latest gadget goodness! - Subscribe to our feed → (Read the full post about ‘Epson announces their plain-jane Endeavor NA104 notebook’…)

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There are so many small MP3 players on the market today, most of which are pretty nice. This makes it hard to decide which one to choose, however, the good guys at Generation MP3 recently offered up a nice comparison chart to offer some comparison between four players that are currently on the market. The four MP3 players being compared include the iPod Shuffle, Samsung’s new S2, iriver’s MPlayer, and the Creative Zen Stone. All of these MP3 players are really good and they all come with their own unique features. Let the battle begin! So far, the lightest music player is Samsung’s Pebble, or the S2, weighing in at 13.6 grams. The next lightest being the iPod Shuffle. (Read the full post about ‘Comparing the iPod Shuffle, Samsung S2, iriver MPlayer, Zen Stone’…)

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Fancy getting an adrenaline rush? Why not check out the RolerBall - do make sure you take the necessary precautions beforehand though. Once inflated this behemoth stands about three metres high, and is rather like a spherical cushioned igloo. The idea, which sounds insane, is to put it at the top of a slope (we suggest a very gentle one with a long unobstructed run-off), strap yourself in, and then roll down the hill trying not to lose your lunch. Inside the centre shell are two harnesses, so you could have two people feeling the adrenalin rush, and probably the queasiness, together. There is a version of this mad sport that requires you to remove the harnesses, add a bucket or two of water, tie in the seal (which comes with the ball and straps into the opening), and launch yourself off. (Read the full post about ‘RolerBall for summer fun’…)

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