Straight out of the University of Texas at Austin comes the world’s most powerful laser. I just assumed that most lasers were very powerful, but apparently the great state of Texas has the best one until someone else can come along and build an even more powerful laser or mounts this same laser to a shark’s head. → Read More
In a smashing blow against my neighbor Carmine, Australia has outlawed high power laser pointers. Like Carmine, Australians cannot be trusted with high powered lasers and, like Carmine one night last summer, they’ve been shooting them at airplanes. WA Police have reported people pointing lasers at a Royal Flying Doctor plane, a police helicopter, a rescue helicopter, and several commercial… → Read More
Remember the Laser TV from Mitsubishi that was unveiled at CES? Well, Mitsu finally dated and named the new fangled TV this morning. The LaserVue will launch Q3, but still no word on pricing. Along with news of the LaserVue, Mitsu announced a slew of new 1080p DLP HDTVs ranging in size from 60- to 73-inches dubbed Diamond. The Diamond series features 120Hz, something called Dark Detailer for high… → Read More
test You don’t need an imaginary cellphone to project text onto someone’s person. This device, which can be put together after a quick trip to the hardware store, places laser text onto any surface; it’s powered by magic, as a matter of fact. You’re given a maximum of 20 characters to play with at any one time, which is more than enough to project dumb slogans like… → Read More
[photopress:7579_large_mechrobot.jpg,full,center] Right now, plugged into my Mac I have an iPod Touch, an SD card reader, and a currently charging Palm Centro. Did you know that you can also control a laser-guided robot with your Mac? It’s true! Scienticians from Georgia Tech and Emory University have developed just such a robot, called the EL-E, which is capable of tracking objects targeted… → Read More
[photopress:lasershealth.jpg,full,right] You know how much I like tech with a purpose that’s something other than more and more megawidgets or terabloops. Hence, a line or two on this laser than can detect diseases. Developed by a team at the University of Colorado at Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a laser device that detects molecules in one’s breath… → Read More
I’m currently debating whether I should feel safe or frightened knowing that Boeing’s Advanced Tactical Laser has been successfully installed on a C-130H. The high energy chemical laser was completed on the 4th of this month in New Mexico at Kirtland Air Force Base. The entire system weighs an astonishing 12,000-pounds. Testing of the system along with a demonstration will occur… → Read More
The Germans have invented what is supposedly the world’s first backpack-mounted laser cleaner. Clearly there was a need for such high-powered cleaners. There’s no real explanation of how the laser cleans, but we can assume that it burns away layers of dirt. Probably not for use by children under three years of age, or any of us here, really. The laser will make the rounds in the UK in… → Read More
Wicked Lasers has been making high-powered handheld lasers in China since 2003, and I finally got my pyromaniac responsible hands on one. While playing with the Wicked Fusion for several days, I tried to burn plenty of things (yes, including myself… real tattoos are expensive, y’know!), but I had the most fun pointing out stars and buildings. Okay, that’s not true: I spent most of… → Read More
An egghead at Raboud University Nijmegen (The Netherlands’ third biggest party school) has published a paper describing a method of using dynamic, polarized light to write and retrieve hard drive data at blazingly fast speeds – up to 100x faster than conventional hard drive speeds. Conventional hard drives use magnets to read and write data. This new method would use lasers to write… → Read More
I am 30 years old, and I am losing my hair. It’s an uncomfortable fact, but one that nearly half of American men, and Britney, face at some point. Science has yet been unable to stop the slow retreat of our follicles, but that doesn’t mean it can’t slow it down. Or at least try. The laser comb is a $545 battery-powered device that zaps your scalp with a Flash Gordon-style laser… → Read More
Perhaps this is what Paul Simon was talking about when he sang about “lasers in the the jungle” — a crazy-powerful 95 milliwatt green laser from Wicked Lasers. I’ve seen these things before and my neighbor even shot mine up at a passing helicopter, causing us all to scamper into the house and cower in the basement. However, Oliver at MobileCrunch did no such thing and… → Read More
Phil Torrone is really the only guy I know who does what everybody else dreams of doing — playing with lasers, making rockets and jetting around the world telling people how to build stuff. Here is some video of the etching laser in action. One more after the jump… → Read More
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