The company Spring Design has announced today that they will soon be launching an e-reader which runs Google’s Android OS.

The design is called “Alex,” and will feature two screens: a 6” E-Ink EPD display, and a 3.5” color LCD. This design affords buyers the readability of E-Ink, while offering the multimedia performance of an LCD. Images and hyperlinks from text content will automatically display on the lower LCD, in what Spring Design is calling the “Duet Navigator” dual-screen technology.

The LCD screen is an “integrated Android mobile device,” which will allow users to browse the web over WiFi or any place served by 3G (GSM or CDMA). The OS has been specifically tweaked to optimize battery life between the LCD and E-Ink screens, and users can manually move items between screens to further conserve power. Lastly, Alex will ship with a removable SD card, earphones and speakers.

There is currently no word on where Alex will be sold, or what wireless carriers will support it, but Spring Design says that it will be available by the end of the year.

Following the industry trend towards developing TVs capable of producing a 3D image without glasses, Sony has followed suit with a unique take on the idea.

To be capable of displaying an image that appears 3D without the use of glasses, the display needs to give a sense of depth; to simulate that necessary depth, Sony has used a 24-bit cylindrical viewing area.

It is not yet clear, however, whether the viewer’s angle and position relative to the display compromises the 3D effect. It is also not yet clear whether viewers at different positions to the display see different sides of the image, or the same thing.

Sony is planning to demo the unit at the beginning of the 2009 Digital Contents Expo in Tokyo on October 22. Research and development on this technology is still ongoing, but 3D images previously only seen on science fiction programs such as Star Trek may be on the horizon.

Is it a sin to leave your cell phone plugged in overnight?

BucketVac turns a standard 5-gal bucket into a wet/dry vac. How very clever. [via]

We walked up to Bug Labs’ booth in the Sands Expo Center, and we asked them “well, what does it do?” Marketing rep Mehrshad Mansouri said “everything.” Of course, we were wondering just what the hell “everything” meant, but he wasn’t even kidding.

The Bug Labs’ bug is like LEGO for electronics. It all starts with the BUG Base unit which can accept a variety of modules like GPS, camera, sound, LCD, and more. The modules are smaller than a deck of cards, and a fully-equipped BUG Base unit isn’t much larger than a few chocolate bars stacked on top of one another.

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Wired steps up to the plate and shows us 12 cool and inexpensive gadgets for tough economic times.

It’s that time! We’ve wiled away the weeks waiting for an assortment of suitably-awesome gadgets to arrive, and this festive slice of the year is just such an occasion. Put your peepers on these bizarre (or awesomely bizarre) doodads below.

• This hideous baseball cap boombox is allegedly capable of saving lives… Probably by scaring away anyone who could ever hurt you.
• The Specimen XL Horn Speakers look like something that jumped straight out of Whoville.
• This Sony Ericsson cell phone has been modded to detect AIDS, Malaria and other nasty bugs.
• Nothing spells f-e-s-t-i-v-e like a buckshot of tinsel, fake snow, and somewhat unwilling targets.
• Vacuum tubes, swear words, and time-keeping. What’s not to love?
• LEDs, microcontrollers, and sensors, oh my! It’s called beer pong, not Beirut.

Fin.

I had to promise Microsoft’s Zune PR rep last week that we wouldn’t talk about the new Zune models. I mean, twice. I seriously had to email the guy twice and tell him “we won’t say anything until the 16th.”

Poor guy probably had an aneurysm when Fry’s just stuck them on their shelves without any fanfare. An astute shopper grabbed one and immediately posted pics and specs on the webnets.

So imagine my utter ’shock’ and ’surprise’ when the Zune PR manager emailed me today and said the embargo had been moved forward to today. “Go ahead and publish” we were told. Hahahahahaha.

The new Zune’s feature list is kinda cool. For example, “Buy from FM” allows you to tag a song you’re hearing on the radio band – you can buy it next time you have an internet connection.

The new models are available in more colors, and in two new sizes, 16gb and 120gb. If we can get our hands on a review sample, I’m interested in the audio quality; I want to see if it stacks up to the stellar quality on the Sony Walkman A818 that we reviewed last year.

The Aerocool Modern V is a fan controller and temp display that looks like it’s straight out of Knight Rider.

The New York Times has some juicy info for us; T-Mobile will be the first American provider to sell phones based on Google’s Android OS.

The phones are being designed and manufactured by HTC. T-Mobile expects to have Android-based phones available as soon as October, to make a move on the holiday shopping season.

For someone like me, who is taking a wait-n-see approach to a future smartphone purchase, this news is simultaneously disconcerting and exciting. I’ve been waffling between an iPhone and the Blackberry Bold for a couple of months now. Of course after this announcement, I’m going to have to see what Android is all about.

Choices, choices, choices!

Samsung’s solid state camcorder gives a ton of features in a tiny package.

PRNewsFoto/Netflix, Inc.

If you haven’t ditched Blockbuster yet now might be a good time because Netflix is bring out the big guns. First it was the Xbox 360 and now a set-top box with LG Electronics.

With a little help and love from Netflix, today LG Electronics announced the LG BD300 Network Blu-ray Disc Player.

Available this fall, the LG BD300 Network Blu-ray Disc Player will play
high definition Blu-ray discs, up-convert standard DVDs to 1080p and allow
Netflix subscribers to instantly stream more than 12,000 choices of movies
and TV episodes from Netflix to the TV for no additional charge.

Unfortunately the press release is missing two key elements: suggested price and any mention of HD streaming.