Mobile phone projector - Part 2

As it was discussed in the earlier blog that Mobile phone projector will become reality, it seems time has arrived. 3M has unveiled first prototype of mobile phone projector at the recent CES 2008 conference. 3M has promised to bring into market by end of this year or early next year. The projector is capable of displaying 50in image. According reports, it has impressive VGA resolution. I presume, initially it will be used for impromptu business presentation, photos, and short videos. Similar to other products we will get refined and better version in next 2-3 years.

Check out this cool photos..

So, that will be the size of the projector, which will be embedded into mobile phone, so your mobile phone display can be projected on any surface to get bigger display.






Hence, when other technologies like processor and memory chip also matures and can hold large memories into very tiny chip(IBM is already working on such memory chip that can store 1 terabyte of data) and nano processors with high processing power, computers and TV will become obsolete. Mobile will become all purpose device. I presume it will happen in next 5 years.

Sports Amphibious Plane Icon A5

I was thrilled to see the Icon A5 sports plane. It is compact, has flexible wings, and can land or fly from water, truly an amphibious plane. According Icon aircraft (Icon) It costs around 140k to own the plane. A person needs to spend 2 -3k for 20 hours of training to get the pilot license. Interesting thing is that it can be parked in the garage just like a boat, if you have large house. check out this snaps and video.

Mobile phone projector

Often many of us have pondered about Mobile's screen size. can it be larger, wider just like a TV or laptop? Though with emergence of iphone (touch screen mobile) like phone,we certainly have larger screen size, but, as we all know, the screen size can be as large as the phone only. Researchers, however it seems have found a solution by installing a micro projector in a mobile phone, which will project the screen on any surface. Thus a screen can be larger than the phone and a phone size can be as small as a button.

hmm.. the concept seems interesting. And, it is not just an idea anymore, companies have started working on this idea and they have rolled-out initial prototype as well. Light Blue optics (LBO) is one such start-up, which is working on this problem and may have such phone available in the market in very near future. Microvision is another such company,which is working on this issue and has unveiled an initial prototype at recent consumer electronics show.

The interesting questions though is, how this will revolutionize the mobile-phone technology, for what other purposes a mobile-phone will be used, how will this affect the business and ultimately our life?

According to me, the immediate uses will be for video, TV, photos, and internet. Though it is being used for all these purposes, it will gain wider user acceptance and will probably replace the PCs and Laptop. If the technology matures further, mobile may become all purpose device.

If mobile becomes all purpose device, most of the business, like buying products, credit card usage(we may not need a credit card), advertising, entertainment, news, will be happening on mobile platform. Imagine, how different the world would be! Get used to using mobile, PC may become obsolete.

Another interesting aspect is that similar to mobile screen projection, keypads can also be projected on any surface with such micro projector. This will literally transform a mobile into buttons. Looking forward to using a Button-Mobile.

Wireless Electricity

Wow! Is it really possible?, I have heard of wireless mouse, wireless keyboard, wireless headphone, but electricity that seems impossible. how can you transfer electricity without wires? What about things and people coming in between the transfer. Won't they catch fire? Well, it may or may not catch fire, we don't know about that. However, recently MIT scientists have successfully demonstrated that electricity can be transferred through wireless. They successfully illuminated a 60W bulb located at approximately at 7 feet or 2 meter distance with a small interference (wall) in between power source and bulb. The MIT scientist dubbed this technique as WiTricity. WiTricity is based on coupled resonant object approach. Two resonant objects with same resonant frequency are able to exchange energy efficiently. Although there are various types of resonances like acoustic, magnetic, mechanical, electromagnetic etc., MIT scientist used magnetic resonant objects. The scientist informed that magnetic coupling is suitable for day to day application, as most common materials interact very weakly with magnetic field, and thus reducing the extraneous interference. Furthermore, magnetic resonance interacts weakly with biological organisms , hence, it is safe as well.

The scientist mentioned that it will primarily be useful for small household devices, which need to be recharged at regular interval. The initial candidates are laptop, house hold music devices, and small bulbs. It is very early to predict how useful and widespread WiTricity will be, but, it is not too far when wires will become obsolete. "Miracles do happen" isn't it ?