Consumer Electronics

April 08, 2002

You've probably faced this problem before, maybe more than once. You need to incorporate computer control into a product you're designing, but embedded systems are frighteningly unfamiliar to you. How can you ever learn enough-in time, starting from zero-to accomplish what you need to do? Consider...

Computing device transforms computer concepts

April 08, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

"We have become used to interacting with computers on their terms," says Ken Ocheltree, manager for the next-generation mobile equipment at IBM research. "The MetaPad is about allowing people to use their computers everywhere and access them the way they need to." IBM's new 9-oz portable MetaPad...

Computer Productivity Tools

March 25, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

Machining software PowerMILL 3.1 machining software is designed to offer five-axis toolpaths to or through a point or to or from a line. According to the company, automatic tilt angle adjustment is used for lead and lag to create better gouge-free, cutting conditions. A reference surface displays...

Ultrasound turns clothes "ultraclean"

March 25, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

In the effort to improve the performance of appliances, two Japanese companies have hit upon the idea of applying ultrasound to washing machines, though they came up with very different applications of the technology. Sanyo Electric Co. recently put on sale a washing machine that doesn't require...

Soft footing for hard drives

March 25, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

Two-point installation and small size permit easy isolation of individual system components. Shock and vibration are enemies to sensitive electronics found in CD-ROM and computer hard drives, flat panel displays, medical equipment, small pumps and motors, or aircraft avionics components. However,...

Innovative Computer Peripheral Products

March 11, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

How to fit 20 Gbytes in your hand Toshiba's newest 1.8-inch embedded hard-disk drives (HDDs) are available in 10- and 20-Gbyte capacities. These mini-drives are designed to provide storage for mobile and handheld products, such as music players, handheld PCs, PDAs, digital video cameras, and car...

Controller impacts torque wrench

March 11, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

Impact wrenches can squeeze plenty of torque out of a hand-held tool. But because they provide only a weak link between applied torque and what the operator feels, they can have a problem with accuracy. "In automotive tire shops, where impact wrenches are used, it's not uncommon for lug nuts to be...

Magnetic films increase data density

March 11, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

IBM expects that its new magnetic recording media with anti-ferromagnetically coupled (AFC) film will quadruple the data density of hard-disk drive products. "A primary limit to data density is the superparamagnetic effect," explains IBM's Currie Munce, a researcher, scientist, and director of...

Engineers experiment with XP

March 11, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

Windows XP is supposed to offer stability and Web-connectivity-great attributes for design engineers creating products in a digital world. Shorthand for "experience," the new operating system comes as Home Edition, XP Professional, or XP Embedded (a version for thin clients such as set-top boxes...

Mower uses water hydraulics

February 18, 2002

Consumer Electronics

DN Staff

Gary Kurtz estimates that using water instead of petroleum fluids in hydraulic systems could save 500 million gallons of gasoline in the U.S. alone. Saving fuel is one reason the professor of agricultural engineering and his students at Purdue University built a lawn mower that is propelled and...