TOP TECHNOLOGY NEWS

Samsung has announced its new flagship model, the NV100HD, and the clue, as they say, is in the name. The HD stands for High Definition, and the camera will record 720p video at 30 frames per second and play it back either on the 3" LED touchscreen or via an HDMI-out.

But this is really a stills camera, and Samsung has managed to pack 14.7 Megapixels onto the chip, something a little worrying considering the physical size of these compact camera sensors. Only a test will tell us if the image noise is excessive, but Samsung has also included a top ISO level of 3200, which means that it might not be too bad.

Apparently fast wireless data  isn’t the number-one selling point for the new iPhone: The multimedia handset is sold out in 21 states — including those whose 3G coverage is scanty to nonexistent.

Fortune 500 reported that as of 9 a.m. PDT Tuesday, 117 Apple stores were sold out of iPhones in Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky,
Louisiana,
Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New
Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Utah, Washington and
Wisconsin.

One unfathomable problem with the iPhone, both old and new, is the lack of stereo Bluetooth (A2DP) capability. As the phone supports regular Bluetooth for phone calls, we can only assume that Steve Jobs isn’t happy with the sound quality and therefore refuses to give his customers a choice of their own.

The iPhone 3G has launched to a minor frenzy of excitement in the Pacific Rim — and the wave of excitement is moving around the world to the west.

Although the U.S. launch of the iPhone 3G is still a few hours off, it’s already gone on sale in New Zealand and in Japan — and, by all accounts, it’s been met with a great deal of excitement. The intrepid folks at iFixit have even disassembled the iPhone 3G already.

Of course, this is the first chance people in most countries have had to get their hands on a legitimate iPhone, since Apple restricted the first-gen iPhone to a small handful of countries.

Apple’s retail boss, Ron Johnson, realizes just what a period of abstention can do for the libido. After a couple of months with no iPhones on sale, frustrated customers will be able to explode in an orgasmic ten minute session at the Apple Store, after which they will throw $200 onto the dresser and walk out sated, endorphins spinning through their spent bodies.

Meanwhile, the Genius will splash himself clean and head back to the bar, ready to start over with another, similarly pent-up client.

It’s one of the most inspired and ridiculous patent designs we’ve ever heard: A machine with over 200 different parts whose sole purpose is to change a light bulb. 

The joke is too obvious right? So much so that you have to wonder whether the inventor created it with ridicule in mind.

According to the United States Patent # 6826983, the light bulb apparatus seen above instantly detects a burned out bulb (with the help of a detecting sensor, and some hardware to build a mechanical trigger). Once its detected, it is automatically replaced when an outer cup-like swivel grabs on to the bulb and rotates it off the light fixture, ending up in a nice cone-shaped sleeve.

When Apple unveiled the MacBook Air, it unwittingly turned the humble inter-office mailing envelope into an icon. A slew of semi-ironic takes on this followed in the shape of vinyl and hemp cases, but they are, as we now know, so January 2008.

Orbino’s Aria, on the other hand, fulfills all the criteria to get yet another laptop case featured on the Gadget Lab.

You’ve read our in depth review of the iPhone 3G, right? No. Because we don’t have one yet. And, neither does iSuppli, a company that analyses the costs of electronic components.

Which hasn’t stopped it drumming up a little publicity by guessing that the new 3G handset might cost just $164 in parts, plus assembly costs of $9. We’ll be lenient here: the internals of the iPhone won’t be fully disclosed until the first tear-down (which we hope goes better than Gadget Lab last drunken effort) but we have a fair idea of what is inside. But then iSuppli goes on to guess that carriers are paying Apple another $300 on top, based on nothing but speculation.