LCD monitor designed for the colorblind

This is one of those random facts that, if true, makes one wonder why technology hasn't caught up with reality: More than 200 million people worldwide are thought to be colorblind, according to some estimates, with more than 10 million of them in the US. If even part of those statistics are accurate, it makes sense that companies would step up efforts to market products for that population.

Although technologies for the colorblind have been developed in the past, Japan's Eizo believes it has come up with a unique system that will allow colorblind individuals to "see" the graphic displays on its new 24-inch LCD, according to Akihabara News. Through Color Universal Design principles, it uses such techniques as lighting, shapes, positions, patterns, and labeling to help those who can't discern differences in color.

Eizo's FlexScan system is on the Japanese market at present, but it's not hard to imagine something like this taking off worldwide if it proves effective. After all, if anything transcends language and cultural barriers, it would seem to be something like this.

Via Crave CNET

Solar mat charger goes on a roll

It may be getting easier and cheaper to harness the sun's energy, but all too often the equipment needed to do so isn't the most portable. At least one manufacturer has figured this out, however, and is apparently responding to that inconvenience.

Brunton started shrinking its solar chargers a year ago with its "SolarPort" and is continuing its weight-loss program now with the "SolarRoll," according to Newlaunches. As its name indicates, the latter is basically a mat of solar panels that can be rolled up and carried around in a bag or even a coat pocket, not unlike some rollaway keyboards we've seen.

The company says the SolarRoll, which comes in three sizes, can even charge a car battery. But judging by the weather these days, we wouldn't recommend trying it until spring.

Via Crave CNET

Hard drives join touchscreen bandwagon, too

As if Apple and others aren't already turning everything into touchscreens, now we have one popping up on one of the most unlikely of places: An external hard drive.

Perhaps indicated by a name that appears to be encrypted itself, Iotek's "ezSECU ez850" has a touchscreen that serves as a digital combination lock with a secret code, according to OhGizmo. The Korean-made system, which supports only 2.5-inch SATA drives, is an alternative to fingerprint recognition and other security technologies used increasingly to protect external storage devices, even in the smallest forms. It's also yet another indication of the hard drive's attempt to get a little respect as something more than just a storage bin.

Via Crave CNET

LG Flatron L226WTQ: Highest contrast ratio ever

Most monitors are pretty much the same. There's a small percentage that are dreadful, a small percentage that are spectacular, and a small percentage you can punch really hard. But most are just alright, really. One monitor that's a good bet for the spectacular category is the LG Flatron L226WTQ--the world's first LCD computer monitor with a claimed 5,000:1 contrast ratio.

A high-contrast ratio, for those not in the know, stops images looking "washed-out". You get very dark blacks, very bright whites, and ultimately a better picture. It's not that useful when you're editing images, doing desktop publishing or other dull office tasks, but it's jolly good for watching movies.

We've been playing with an L226WTQ for the last few days and while we can't verify the exact contrast ratio (few people can) it's packing some seriously black blacks. And don't even get us started on those whites. The colour reproduction seems pretty good too, plus you get 2ms grey-to-grey response time, HDCP over DVI-I for high-definition content, and a one-touch zoom function that lets you switch to lower resolutions if your eyes can't cope with 1,680 x 1,050 pixels.

The L226WTQ is available in black or a rather unattractive shade of grey for around £185 (US$382.50). It'll be in stores in plenty of time for Christmas.

Via Crave UK

Nvidia's new GeForce card aims to bring 3D power to the masses

Nvidia seems to be offering a steal of a video card this morning. Its new GeForce 8800 GT will go for about S$400 (US$294.12), and Nvidia claims it's faster than the ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT, and Nvidia's own GeForce 8800 GTS cards. Based on the results of a handful of review sites, Nvidia seems to have delivered a bargain here, taking out both its own and ATI's previous bang-for-the-buck winners.

Aside from the price-performance value, the GeForce 8800 GT has a few other notable features. It's the first graphics card to come with PCI Express 2.0 support. That won't mean much today, because few motherboards offer the wider-bandwidth slot and PCI Express 1.1 still provides a wide-enough data pipe. But it's nice to know that when that might matter, these new cards will be able to take advantage.

The other benefit is that the 8800 GT also seems to be a single-slot card. Both the GeForce 8800 GTX and the 8800 GTS have double-wide fan and heat-sink hardware, which takes up a ton of space inside your PC. The single-slot 8800 GT not only makes it easier to add one card, it also means you can run two of them in SLI mode in a wider variety of systems and without sacrificing as many expansion slots.

And it's a good thing this new card is so SLI-friendly, because from the look of early benchmarks and Nvidia's own testing, even a single high-end GeForce 8800 GTX card won't deliver truly smooth, 60 frames per second gameplay when you turn all of the DirectX 10 graphics features on in next-gen poster-child Crysis. But with two 8800 GT cards, which cost less than a single 8800 GTX, you might be able to get better performance by doubling up on two of the new midrange cards. The single player Crysis demo that went online over the weekend can't tell us because it has no SLI support, so we'll have to wait for the full version to be sure.

Via CNET Crave

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