Last year when Todd talked to John about Spot, we learned that GPS tracking can be vital for those who go off the beaten path. The device has been used in over 500 rescues. This year, they are back with the new SPOT GPS Messanger.

Scott talks with Derek about this new version of the GPS tracker. The device sends a geolocation message to check in. If you are in trouble, the device will send an SOS. It will also send an automated tracking mode that can update Googlemaps on a 10 min interval. Real-time data can be sent to friends and family, or to a social network like Facebook or Twitter.

The service is $100 per year, and utilizes the SPOT Satellite Network .

Height: 3.7″ (9.4 cm)
Width:  2.6″ (6.6 cm)
Thickness:   1″ (2.5 cm)
Weight: 5.2 oz (147.4g)
Operating Temp: -30C to 60C (-22F to 140F)
Operating Altitude: -100m to +6,500m(-328ft to +21,320ft)
Humidity Rated:MIL-STD-810F, Method 507.3, 95% to 100% cond.
Vibration Rated:Per SAE J1455
Battery:  3 AAA Energizer™ Lithium Ultimate 8X

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Other Posts of Interest:

• Findmespot GPS Locator from DeLorme
• 5 Tech Things – Your iPhone buys the Starbucks coffee

Running out of battery on your iPhone – and soon iPad – can become a pain. You just want to get that one thing done and – as Scotty would say – “I just don’t have enough power, captain”. If you are in an important college lecture or business meeting, for instance, and forgot to charge the device the night before, this can become a real nightmare.

Enter in Hypershop. They have the Hypermac Mini, Hypermac micro and Hypermac nano to charge your different Apple devices. Todd Cochrane talks with Jennifer about these great products.

The nano is the smallest and most impressive. With 1800mAh, you should be able to get about 2 charges out of this device that is as small as a lighter. Compared to a Mophie (1200mAh), the Hypermac Nano will charge faster and give you at least one full charge, which is good for the battery.

The Hypermac Micro and Mini are great for Camping, Outdoor events, or the meeting or lecture that doesn’t have any access to a power source. The iPad battery is 25W, so even the 60Wh model should be able to give you a few more hours of work time.

Each battery is of Millitary grade and will be good for 1000 charges. Each device will even come with cables so you don’t have to move them around from one area to another.

If you don’t have an Apple product, that is O.K. Hypermac also makes a mini for your Blackberry, HTC or any device with a mini USB connector.

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Other Posts of Interest:

• Inada Reclining Chair Give Shiatsu Style Massage – CES 2010
• Intel Light Peak Technology Will Let You Transfer Blu-Ray in Under 30 Seconds – CES 2010

We saw this wall before CES happened. You can touch the wall and check out what people are saying about Intel. The Core i7 processor was running 500 live links with 20,000 sources. This shows how green a computer can be when you have one i7 on a single power supply instead of 7 or more computers running .

Todd Cochrane talks with Sam on the infoscape proof of concept piece. Two - 7′ x 7′ – 1920×1920 resultion – double-touch screen glass walls. But think about it – How much process in 1 processor can you have?

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Other Posts of Interest:

• Intel Light Peak Technology Will Let You Transfer Blu-Ray in Under 30 Seconds – CES 2010
• Compulab FitPC2 – Smallest PC – CES 2010

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Other Historical Events in Technology

• Craig Neidorf (Knight Lightning) is arrested
• Bandai unveils the Pippen Atmark Computer
• Yahoo refuses Microsoft’s offer

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As an IT administrator in a previous life, I know that keeping data safe is key #1. It would have been nice to have this product on all the notebooks in the office. Especially one instance where the employee found a legal way around keeping their machine with all of our data on it.

LoJack for Laptops / Computrace creates a partnership with Intel for Anti-Theft Technology – Think of it like a Kill switch if your machine gets lost, stolen, or taken in any way possible. The laptop will be rendered useless until it comes back to the owner, in which they can then turn the machine back on. It litterally Bricks the machine.

Andy McCaskey talks with Stephen at CES about this “poison pill” technology. Best part is this option is incorporated in the laptop – Like a Dell laptop, in where you get a 1 year membership. Even a “wiped” hard drive can be detected and LoJack will load their software to brick the device.

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While we were working at CES, Todd Cochrane found a way to get a little break and relax a bit.

The Inada chair – when not reclined – kinda looks like a captains chair from Star Trek. But when reclined, you get a full body massage. The chair uses propriatary technologies to really give you a Shiatsu style massage.

Todd talks with Monica on these great massage chairs. The price is $6499, but compared to other chairs, you get more for your money. It will work on 1,200 square inches of the body. The chair uses air and rollers, although Todd notes you cannot really feel those rollers.

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Bottlenecks. That is one thing companies have to deal with when putting out a faster device. The product may revolutionize in speed, but if the rest of the computer can’t handle it, you have to wait for one to catch up to the other.

Intel always works on that area. They wanted to address the connection throughout a home or business with the speed needed. Enter Light Peak technology. The hope is to eventually replace copper wiring within the house simply because it will become the bottleneck.

Todd Cochrane talks with Robert on this new technology at CES. It won’t be out until next year, but the prototype is pretty impressive. The transfer on LightPeak is 10 Gbps. In the demonstration they have 2 – 4 Gbps 1080p streams running at the same time. Therefore, the parents could be watching an action flick in the living room and the children could be watching a cartoon in 1080p and the network will not be taxed.

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Google has done a lot with mapping. Google streetview gives you a good idea what to look for in a location. I have virtually walked down a street so I could be familiar with landmarks before I even get to the location. Well, what if I could have a better representation than what Google gives? What if I could have a full 3D – 360 view of a street?

Enter Navteq - a company that will take mapping to a whole new level. They have been in the mapping industry for 25 years. With a technology known as LIDAR Scanning, the mapping – like in Google Maps – will take your map from a 2D realm to a 3D level.

The Car looks like it has a weird device on top that spins at 600 revolutions per minute. It has 64 lasers collecting data at 1.5 million points. The Navteq car also has a panoramic camera and 6 other cameras that  take Hi-res photos of signs, trees and other data.

Andy McCaskey talks with Alwil about this very interesting project. Of course, the end result is a new mapping system that might just power your next Tom Tom or Garmin system. With this option, You can bring out specifics, such as if you are looking for a Starbucks, it can point that coffee shop out.

The technology is a couple years out for consumer GPS. But what a great find for us at CES!

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Last Year at CES, we talked to C.Crane. We learned that they made more than internet radio – Which included a great new idea in LED Lightbulbs. The price point was a little high, but the bulbs were pretty darned impressive.

This year, C.Crane has come back with better bulbs and a better price. Todd Cochrane talks with Jessica once again on the C.Crane GeoBulb. This year the price is at $69.99, down $30 from last year, but if you think about it, the price will cover any electricity and bulb replacement costs. Plus they have a 5 year warranty on the bulb.

C.Crane also showed off the MR16. It’s a low voltage tract lighting system bulb that will replace a 20 watt with 2. Those cost $49.95, but as the web site says:

*An incandescent or halogen bulb costs: 8736 hours in a year X 20 Watts X 5 (years) = 873,600 Watt hours (873.6 kWh) @ $.12 KW = $104.83 in electricity saving plus the cost of replacing four bulbs per year for five years (20 bulbs) @ $7.95 = $159.00 for a total cost of$263.83. Your savings will vary according to your local electricity costs.

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I had a lot of discontinued items in my possession. The one thing that really got my goat is when something broke, I was out of luck. That is, unless I was to re-fabricate it myself.

Well that seems to be more of a reality nowadays. Last year at CES we talked with Shapeways and how you can send stuff to them to turn into reality. This year, the Makerbot Cupcake CNC is the big device.

It’s deemed “an open source, affordable printer”. The Cupcake CNC is a desktop printer that makes 3D models. You can design files, or you can go to Thingaverse to make other people’s designs.

Andy McCaskey talks with Bre Pettis on this great new device and the community that surrounds it. The kit costs $750 and you build it yourself, which means you can also pimp it out or add to it. The material is the same that makes Legos. It goes into the Makerbot and heats up, then the system will turn and layer your project together.

The Cupcake will cost $950, or $750 if you have some of the electronics already. You just need a good 3D modeling program (there are open source programs out there).

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This is a short video we shot at the Zune booth to show off the new Zune store. Our friends at Zune had done something that we were ecstatic over. They featured the Techpodcast coverage of CES in their Marketplace. You could see Todd Cochrane, Andy McCaskey and Jeffrey Powers right at the top.

Thanks Zune for the support!

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