Rants N’ Jibes

Graphene is a derivative of Graphite (hexagonally bonded carbon). Scientists of the Manchester research team have found a way to use Graphene as electrodes in Liquid Crystal Displays which will help in making extremely thin displays. This is possible because the graphene layer is only one atom thick!!!

The research is still going on and the final products are expected to hit the market in the coming few years.

I guess postpone my plans of setting that Home theater…

New phones with roll up screen extension may not be that far off now!!!

AMD will present the first live demonstration of the world’s only triple-core processor, the AMD Phenom X3 and the 780 chipset in the Middle East.

They will also demonstrate their Spider high-performance platform, which combines AMD Phenom quad core processors with the AMD 790 chipset, to enable support for up to four GPUs with power consumption of under 65 watts, for superior gaming performance.

Gautam Srivastava, Vice President , sales and marketing and managing director for AMD, Middle East, Africa and Pakistan, commented: “Through our regional distribution partner, Almasa, we want to educate customers about AMD’s compelling line of solutions that are designed to empower a broad range of customers to experience the performance and multi-tasking capability of true multi-core technology.”

“Regionally, we are seeing a strong demand from customers who want a greater visual experience, by increasing the performance and multi-core capabilities from their desktop PC systems. With the expanded portfolio of new graphics solutions and the new CPU’s based on AMD Phenom Triple-Core and Quad-Core processors, we are meeting the needs of all PC users - from both performance hungry gamers to digital media enthusiasts,” added Srivastava.

You don’t really have to miss an important news or highlight if you subscribe to a podcast on the station web site. Offering a mix of traditional and new media sources.

For example, here are the top sources for online news, ranked by the number of visitors (from Ars Technica):

Yahoo News
MSNBC
CNN
AOL News
New York Times
Gannett
ABC News
Google News
USA Today
CBS News

While most of these sites are offering short video and/or audio clips, some media sites are now offering premium content that they normally reserve for television or radio (together with new advertising). Did anyone see the NCAA Basketball finals on CBS.com? Did you miss seeing who was eliminated from American Idol on Fox? (you can also see their recent performances on their web site)

Most of these sites are using Adobe Flash streaming technology (like YouTube), but others are starting to use HD video plugins such as those created by American Fork, Utah company, Move Networks, including ABC, Discovery, FOX, ESPN, and Oprah.com.

BYU Television, also using Move Networks’ HD video plugin, is one of the first stations that has around the clock broadcasting content on their site.

In comparison, the lds.org site will host transcripts, video, and audio downloads of LDS General Conference once they become available, but BYU.tv promises to include live HD video of for all morning and afternoon sessions. LDS Church members in Utah may not appreciate how rare it is to be able to watch Conference in your own home around the world as it is being broadcast.