Exclusive: HP’s Zeen C510 Android tablet in the wild
Well, thar she blows — we just got this shot of the HP’s seven-inch Zeen Android tablet that’s shipping with the leaked PhotoSmart eStation C510 printer system just straight chilling in the wilds of China. Apparently this unit is a little bit closer to final than the one our other tipsters have been playing with — and unfortunately, the stock Android homescreen has been totally removed in favor of the TouchSmart UI. As we’d guessed, there’s also no Gmail app or Market access, although there is a homegrown email client and a fair bit of integration with Yahoo services like Mail and Messenger. Facebook is also preloaded, and the screenshot shows apps for 60 Minutes, MSNBC, and Dreamworks, so it looks like there’ll be some video action going on — and that Barnes & Noble logo all but confirms the Nook compatibility our previous tipsters had mentioned. There’s also a printing app and that Coupons app, which we’re guessing… prints coupons, but maybe HP’s trying to surprise us.
We’re told the software is better than on earlier Zeen units and that the previously-bad touchscreen has been improved, but that there’s still work to be done before the projected late September launch. Don’t get your hopes up about snagging this one without a printer, though — we’re told the solo SKU has been canceled, and only the $399 bundle with the Zeus printer will be available. Makes sense — we’re guessing it’s all webOS for HP from here on out. One more pic after the break.
Continue reading Exclusive: HP’s Zeen C510 Android tablet in the wild
Exclusive: HP’s Zeen C510 Android tablet in the wild originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Sep 2010 17:38:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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HP sues former CEO Mark Hurd, doesn’t want him working at Oracle
Hey, remember when HP fired former CEO Mark Hurd for fudging his expense reports in connection with some shady potential hanky-panky surrounding a former marketing contractor? And then gave him a $40-50m severance package that included $12m in straight cash to keep his mouth shut and not sue anyone? And then Oracle CEO Larry Ellison called HP’s board “idiots” for firing Hurd? Well, over the weekend Larry put his money where his mouth is and hired ol’ Mark as Oracle’s new president, and that seems to have been the last straw for HP — the company just announced that it’s suing Mark Hurd for breach of contract and “threatened misappropriation of trade secrets.”
HP says that Hurd was deeply involved in creating HP’s business plans for the next two years, including specific plans to compete with Oracle in the enterprise market, and that there’s no way Hurd can do his job at Oracle without revealing trade secrets and other confidential information he agreed to keep under wraps when he signed his employment contract with HP. What’s more, he reaffirmed those commitments when he signed his severance package, so that’s a double whammy — and although California is usually pretty hostile to noncompete agreements, HP’s trying to say Hurd violated one of those, too. HP’s asked the court to prevent Hurd from working for Oracle or any other competitors at all, so we’re guessing this one’s going to be a fight — we’ll let you know if Larry Ellison says something bonkers again anything good happens.
P.S.- The WSJ piece linked in More Coverage says there’s no noncompete agreement in play here, but we’re reading the complaint and HP specifically references a protective covenant forbidding Hurd from working for a competitor under certain conditions — that certainly looks like a noncompete clause to us.
HP sues former CEO Mark Hurd, doesn’t want him working at Oracle originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Sep 2010 14:59:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Self-repairing solar cells could also fix our energy dependency
It doesn’t take much for a photovoltaic cell to not work quite as well as it used to. Sure, a big hail storm or the like will do a number on your megabucks rooftop installation, but the sun itself, the very thing those cells are designed to capture, gradually damages their internals, reducing efficiency. The fix, according to a team at MIT, is self-assembling (and therefore self-repairing) solar cells made up of a synthetic molecular soup containing phospholipids that, when mixed with a solution, attach themselves to a series of carbon nanotubes for alignment. Other molecules that react with light then attach to the phospholipids and, with a little illumination, start firing out electrons like mad. After a few hours of solar pummeling the whole thing can be broken down and automatically re-created, returning efficiency to maximum. Overall efficiency of the system is extremely low currently, thanks to a low concentration of those photon-catching structures, but individually they capture about 40 percent of the light’s energy, meaning a higher concentration could make for very hearty soup indeed.
Self-repairing solar cells could also fix our energy dependency originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Sep 2010 11:42:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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TomTom rolls out Go Live 1000 series navigation units
TomTom rolls out Go Live 1000 series navigation units originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Sep 2010 09:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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