Amazon launches new Kindle

CrunchGear reports: [edited]

Amazon today unveiled the new Kindle e-reader. The new device has a 6″ display like the old Kindle, but is the newer type of E-ink display found in the Kindle DX Graphite. There are other differences, but the main one is price. The WiFi-only model will sell for £109 and the 3G version for £149.


In addition to the price and screen change, the redesigned body is 21% smaller and 15% lighter, down to about 8.5oz. If their press release is to be believed, it’s also got twice the storage (4GB) and significantly improved battery life over the old Kindle.

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Brett's 2p'orth: This is the least-ugly Kindle yet. However, my ambivalence continues. If all I wanted to do was read a text-only book, I would purchase a paperback. The reason the larger, costlier iPad is selling millions is because it does everything the Kindle does, plus web-browsing, music, movies, iPlayer, YouTube, FaceBook, photographs, games...
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Free Font - St Marie

St Marie is skinny slab serif, with 'real' numerals. Available from Font Squirrel.
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Apple Magic Trackpad

Apple reports: [edited]

Magic Trackpad is just like the trackpad on the MacBook Pro — but bigger. With nearly 80 percent more area, it’s the largest multi-touch trackpad made by Apple. So there’s even more room for you to scroll, swipe, pinch, and rotate to your fingers’ content. And since the entire surface is a button that clicks, you can use it in place of a mouse.

It features the same sculpted aluminum design as the Apple Wireless Keyboard, and side by side the two sit flush at the same angle and height. Go from typing to gesturing in one motion, or do both at the same time.


It connects to your Mac via Bluetooth. Use it in conjunction with the Apple Wireless Keyboard for a cable-free, uncluttered workspace. And if you feel like venturing away from your desk, Magic Trackpad maintains a reliable and secure connection up to 10 metres away from your Mac.

Price £59.00

For a 'first-impressions' review, click here.
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Boattail Racer

Auditorium Toy Co. reports: [edited]

Inspired by the slippery lines of early 20th century low-drag coachwork — designs formulated by the science of aerodynamics, yet strikingly gorgeous.

The wooden bodywork is sculpted from rugged 13 ply Baltic birch. 77.5 millimeter carnelian-core industrial grade wheels on precision bearings. Solid stainless steel axles and fasteners.

Price: $350
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Newport

One of the funniest parodies I've seen for a long time.

Thanks to Coel for the link
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Expensive iPod/iPod touch/iPhone speakers

Register Hardware have published a review of ten amp/speaker units in the 'over £300' category.

The £400 Philips Fidelio DS9000 (pictured) gets a 95% rating.
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iCade

Think Geek reports: [edited]

Knowing that many of our loyal geeky customers would eventually get their retractable claws on an iPad at some point, we knew we needed to take it to the next level. What cool things could we do with the iPad that you, our lovely geek customers, would squee over? A few brainstorming sessions later, the idea of a MAME cabinet came up and we knew we'd struck gold. How cool would it be to slide your iPad into a desktop-sized arcade cabinet and rock it old school with some Pac-Man or Space Invaders?

Enter the iCade iPad Arcade Cabinet! To use the iCade, gently slide the iPad into the docking cradle. The docking cradle uses a standard 30 pin connector to link the iPad to the professional-grade arcade controls. Once the iPad is in place, launch the iCade App and it's game on!

Price $149.99
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E-books outselling hardcover equivalents

Wired reports: [edited]

E-books have hit the mainstream, and for the first time are consistently outselling their pulp-and-ink brethren, according to Amazon.com.

Amazon hit a symbolic milestone last holiday season, when for one day its sales of e-books exceeded the number of dead-tree books it had sold.

Now the company has hit a more significant milestone, selling 143 e-books for every 100 hardcover books sold over the course of the second quarter. The rate is accelerating: For the past month, Amazon sold 180 e-books for every 100 hardcovers, and it sold three times as many e-books in the first six months of this year as it did in the first half of 2009.

Amazon’s Kindle bookstore now offers more than 630,000 books, Amazon says, plus 1.8 million free, out-of-copyright titles.
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Sennheiser/Adidas PMX 680 headphones

I don't like wearing headphones. However, there are times when they are the only practical way to listen to my iPod/iPhone. To this end I have worked my way through...

Westone 1 (excellent sound quality, disliked the wires)

Motorola S9 (liked the fit, poor sound quality)

Bluetrek (OK fit, average sound quality)

I was happy with the Bluetrek, however my recently purchased iPhone 4 has refused to play nicely with it, resulting in frequent, infuriating cut-outs in the signal transmission. The final straw came half-way through a 6-mile run when the signal died completely.

I saw the PMX 680 on Amazon for £35.00, and decided to give it a try, and am very glad I did.

- The fit is snug and comfortable.

- The sound quality is clear and involving. Not as good as the Westone 1, but much better than the Motorola S9 and Bluetake.

- My main reservation, the wire, is mitigated by the fact that the primary section is very short. When used with the iPhone in my armband it doesn't irritate me at all.

- I haven't used the 'extension/volume control' wire for any amount of time yet, but it works as advertised.
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Free Font - Franchise

Derek Weathersbie reports: [edited]

Franchise is at home on the front of a donut shop and the scoreboard at a football stadium. The face was created & kerned by someone who deals with type every day, so with Franchise, you won’t be spending all day fixing the space between As and Ys.

(Email address required before download)
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DNA/RNA Friendship Necklace

Makers Market reports: [edited]

Celebrate a friendship with someone with whom you pair well by giving your friend one side of the pair and keeping the other.

Genes are written in DNA and RNA molecules using a code of chemical units called bases. These bases form pairs, which is critical to their function. In DNA, A (adenine) pairs with T (thymine) and G (guanine) pairs with C (cytosine). In RNA, G pairs with C and A pairs with U (uracil).

The charms are based on shapes of the base molecules. They are strung onto a chain at the place where they would normally connect to the sugar-phosphate backbone.

This set of two necklaces comes with your choice of A-T, A-U, or G-C. The charms are about 3/4 inches long, are made with high-quality reclaimed/recycled sterling silver, and strung on a 16 in sterling silver snake chain.

These come in a pretty, recycled gift box and include an informational card about the molecules.

via Boing Boing
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Free Font - Kilogram

Kilogram is a super-heavy, caps-only display font with a useful range of alternate characters. Designed by Karl Martin Sætren, based on Nick Curtis' Anagram typeface.

To view examples click here

To download click here
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Dropbox

Dropbox is is a web-based file hosting service which enables users to store and share files. It works on Windows, OSX, Linux, iPhone, iPad and Android platforms.

There are both free and paid services, with the free option providing 2 GB of online storage.

Once installed on my Mac, a Dropbox icon appears in the menu bar (and in every window's menu bar). Any file dragged onto the icon is uploaded to the Dropbox servers, and then becomes available to any other machine that has permission to access your account.

I've been using it for a couple of weeks, and find it convenient for dropping files that I may or may not need to look at later. And if I do decide I need to look at them, it provides me with access from whichever device I am using at the time, iPhone, iPad, desktop or laptop computer.
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Veyron breaks production car speed record

0-60 Magazine reports: [edited]

Last week, Bugatti test driver, Pierre Henri Raphanel set the production-car speed record in Bugatti’s Veyron Supersports 16.4 with timed runs of 265.9 and 269.8 mph on Volkswagen’s Ehra-Lessien test track.

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Brett's 2p'orth: The article features an interview with Pierre. His reflections on travelling at 120 metres-per-second include:

"At that speed, if anything happens, you can be sure that you won’t be coming back to the pits to tell what was the problem. The night before I could not sleep because I was so stressed."

"When you start to go 260, 265, 270 the car is following where the tarmac is telling to the car to go. And it’s a strange feeling because you are not really in control as a driver."
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