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How about components embedded inside the PCB ?

https://www.electronicproducts...

"Here’s what you need to know about dimming fluorescent lighting" link

Look into ways to make PCBs at home. I prefer the glossy paper/clothes iron toner transfer method, but direct milling is easier if you have a CNC minimill. With a little practice, toner and etchant gives finer features than milling.

For those who, like me, hadn't even heard of this until recently when I saw these articles. (The first is just a version of the second with the text cleaned up for readability -- English isn't second article author's native tongue.)

As for the rest, I like your list. Often overlooked, since it's just sitting there covered with all the other stuff, is a nice (anti-) static mat.

Here is an IQ chart

http://www.iqtestforfree.net/IQ-chart.html
As you can see, if you have an IQ of at leat 115, you are smarter than 86% of the population.

As you can see on this chart, the average software engineer has an IQ of 116
http://anepigone.blogspot.com/2011/01/average-iq-by-occupation-estimated-from.html

Here is another chart that shows that 75% of computers occs have an IQ of 101 or greater
http://www2.electronicproducts.com/Engineer_vs_engineer_Who_has_the_higher_IQ-article-fajb_engineer_vs_engineer_jun2012-html.aspx

So yes, most "nerds" are arrogant in the fact that they are smarter than everyone else, and they are correct in that assumption in a majority of cases.

It would probably be most accurate to think of this "uSSD" as a faster, more PC-architecture-oriented version of the "eMMC" JEDEC standard for soldering flash directly onto a motherboard, with a lower board space, pin count, and controller requirement than raw flash chips.

"eMMC", which is basically an MMC card's guts in a BGA package, is already quite popular in things like cellphones(ever wonder why some cellphones filesystem names suggest that they have an MMC card that they don't really? It's because they do, in software terms...) "uSSD" will, presumably, be the big brother of that standard, putting SATA signals and power over a standardized BGA arrangement, rather than using MMC signals and power...

I was amazed at how good the headphones that came with my BlackBerry Bold 9000 are, as well as the quality of the output of the phone.

I doubt that they use more than 12bit dacs anyway.

SoAnIs from hydrogenaudio also gives an interesting perspective on the 24-bit thingy.

I did some digging and it looks like the Bold 9000 uses the Texas Instruments TLV320AIC3106 stereo audio DAC rated at 102 dBa S/N, 16,20,24,32-bit data, and 8 kHz - 96 kHz sample rates. I don't pretend to know if the Bold actually outputs at the full capability of the chip, but why bother using such a chip if you're not going to make the features available?

There is no doubt in my mind that 24-bit and higher is better than anything analog, but I guess I'm old enough that someone will have to prove to me that CD's can be better than reel-to-reel. I'll also add that there is simply no comparison between reel-to-reel and vinyl. Have you ever listened to a good quality reel-to-reel? One roughly the size of a 24" CRT (ca. 1995)? They really do sound quite good,not that I'd ever buy one.

If Panasonic was concerned about 3rd party suppliers selling unsafe batteries, it could sell licenses with strict requirements or set up a certification program to test the safety of the batteries sold by these suppliers.

It is a bit easier to sell licenses if third parties are also unable to make compatible batteries without access to a particular technology. Otherwise, third parties can simply put their competing products on the market without bothering to go through the certification process (anticipating that most consumers won't bother to look for the certification markings).

Locking out competition to create an artificial tie-in between the camera and the battery is anti-competitive, in my opinion. There are ways to ensure the safety of customers without a tie-in that undermines market-based competition.

The problem for Panasonic isn't just that third-party battery manufacturers might be lowering the cost of replacement batteries. Some third-party battery manufacturers probably produce low-quality batteries and then sell them as counterfeit Panasonic batteries. If one of those batteries blows up, Panasonic gets all the blame even without being at fault because the injured consumer thought he or she had a Panasonic battery.

Fortunately, there is a big market for digital cameras with a fair number of suppliers. Even if Panasonic is just trying to increase replacement battery profit margins, they can only go so far without consumers deciding to purchase cameras from someone else.

I do know that part of the issue is power dissipation. When you're converting 5V (from usb) to what the charger circuit in the cell phone needs, the difference ends affecting power dissipation (in the form of heat). Voltage difference between power source and charger times max current draw = amount of power you need to dissipate at that stage (or simply P=I*V). A charger made specifically with that battery in mind would minimize power wasted (on charging) and would mean less electronics on the phone.

Now as technology evolves were moving electronics to lower and lower voltages , the batteries that power these would follow suit, and so old power adapters would quickly become excessive. The link shows the trend for RF devices, but the same thing is observed with CPUs.
       

I don't think it will challenge TV-sized media applications anytime soon due to the infrastructure and backplane developement that still needs to be done. On the small scale it would have to compete with electrowetting and e-ink based displays. This technology may provide a very cost-effective solution (no pun intended) for large-scale display applications.

I wonder how tightly the magnetic field needs to be controlled to maintain color accuracy as well as how closely the pixels can be placed together without the field changes in one pixel affecting those adjacent.

I think I'm going to try making that North-buzzing belt. All it takes is an electronic compass, some vibrators, a belt and some controller logic.

A quick Google search came up with:
Electronic Compass for $5
Vibrators for $1 each.
The belt and the controller can't be that expensive. You could probably do the whole thing for under $30, even accounting for frying a few ICs trying to get it to work. Right?

Am I an ubernerd or does this sound ridiculously cool to anyone else?

Ultracapacitors are good for hundreds of thousands of cycles. It's one of their advantages over a rechargeable battery.

Introduced in 2002, the Wire-Free Electricity Base by Mobilewise was the first device to interrogate loads placed upon it in order to deliver tailored power. Sadly, there were no takers and it faded away.

In 2003, a group of researchers at the U of Toronto unveiled a prototype photonic crystal gel technology for electronic paper. I looked it up again, but nothing has been published on it since.

I'll jump on the bandwagon when we can get rid of the power cable. When is power over wireless coming to computer peripherals?

A few years ago I read about a technology that does intend to get rid of the power cables. It's a mat you can plug in and then place on the desk. Any compatible device placed on top of the mat is then able to draw power directly from that. The interesting thing is that you can place several devices on it at once, each one draws the appropriate voltage and current for its operation, and the whole thing is safe for you to put your hands on. The last I heard, there was already a small version for sale (maybe 12x12 inches) and you could also get simple conversion kits for devices like phones and music players, so that you could charge them up by just placing them on the mat.

Ah ha! I found it, the MobileWise Wire-Free Electric Power: ABC news story, another link, and one more. The company's website (mobilewise.com) appears to be something else entirely now, though.

Let's be careful when talking about this tech, as it is a wire-building tech, not a power generation tech. This technology will be able to create the conductive structures needed in those next-gen fuel cells and batteries, but this is not microbial fuel cell technology.

Here :

http://www.edn.com/article-partner/CA503389.html

"The endurance of MLC Flash memory is a minimum of 10,000 write/erase cycles per cell, compared to around 100,000 cycles for SLC Flash."

http://www.electronicproducts.com/ShowPage.asp?SEC TION=3700&PRIMID=&FileName=TOSHIBA.apr2004.HTML

"Currently, life expectancy of SLC flash is rated at approximately 100,000 cycles and MLC flash is rated to have approximately 10,000 cycles."

and so on, better? Anybody with a clue about flash memory knows that. Guy from Anandtech was a consumer, not an engineer, that why this "test" is just a "test".

At the recent Society for Information Display show almost every major player had a flavor of electronic ink prototype at their booth.

You guys need to look around at what else is out there before you get too excited about a flashy news announcement.

Laser power would be interesting, though only in a line-of-sight manner (possibly with beams from UAVs), since you could use the laser to do networking instead of bluetooth...

Also, perhaps a higher-density power source like a fuel cell? Or can they not be built small enough..

(or a nanotube-based fuel cell...)

Hmm, they may have some competition on the speedy recharge front, Moore improvements yet?

350 F, 2.5 V UltraCapacitors in D cell size from Maxwell Technologies.

Actuality Systems' 3D display is a true 3D monitor, capable of being viewed from 360 degrees. The image looks like a solid model inside of a globe.

Nobody in the industry was paying attention to Clairvoyant until I gave them recognition in Electronic Products magazine last month.

Nobody in the industry was paying attention to Clairvoyant until I gave them recognition in Electronic Products magazine last month.

The light-emitting elements will also be significantly cheaper, and as has been pointed out, will require less power, fewer manufacturing steps, and will be capable of creating much larger displays in the future than Plasma or any other silicon-based technology:Light-emitting polymers broaden display options. In addition, companies like Cambridge Display Technology are working on ink-jettable organic light-emitting polymer technology that will allow the manufacture of cheap displays of any size, allowing entire animated video billboards.

I'd pay $500 every 3-5 years for a 60-inch(or larger) screen.

The light-emitting elements will also be significantly cheaper, and as has been pointed out, will require less power, fewer manufacturing steps, and will be capable of creating much larger displays in the future than Plasma or any other silicon-based technology:Light-emitting polymers broaden display options. In addition, companies like Cambridge Display Technology are working on ink-jettable organic light-emitting polymer technology that will allow the manufacture of cheap displays of any size, allowing entire animated video billboards.

I'd pay $500 every 3-5 years for a 60-inch(or larger) screen.

Reading about attempts to expand LCD technology beyond its current boundaries is interesting, but the fact is that future large-screen display applications will be met by newer display technologies such as organic light-emitting polymers.

This has actually been out since last year. This and other related technologies are heating up, as improved processing techniques and new applications for existing technology provide design engineers with ideas. The problem with false results are due more to poor data processing than to poor information acquisition. On a related note, Texas Instruments has developed a device that can analyze any liquid sample and give results on-site without using a mass spectrometer. Spreeta Sensor. It is the size of a phono cartridge.

I noticed that the designers have not gotten the laser design finalized. There is some interesting work currently being done on microcavity lasers by Nanovation. This should allow them to squeeze a few mils off of the device.