The Air Force will say only that the shuttle-style X-37B is “a flexible space test platform. The U.S. Air Force successfully launched an unmanned space plane Thursday carrying an undisclosed payload. The Air Force’s Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV), also known as the X-37B, lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 7:52 p.m. EDT. The ship, built by Boeing, was carried aloft by an Atlas V rocket launched by United Launch Alliance, a Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture. // < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ function showDesc(img) { var element = document.getElementById("videoBoxDisplayAreaText"); if(element) element.innerHTML [...]

Continue Reading...

Aston Martin is a name that needs very little introduction. It is a brand that has always stood for high performance sports cars designed and produced by skilled craftsmen. The British automaker has recently brought to light its intent to be known for not only offering a lavish sports car, but a fuel efficient one as well. The new city cars will focus on the duties of transportation and not just getting from zero to 60 as quickly as possible. Originally, Aston Martin was known primarily in the racing circles. By the time the 1920′s had rolled around, the brand had made its first [...]

Continue Reading...

So, what justifies a $52,000 price tag on a damn golf cart? Cold beer, apparently. And just cold beer. For that kind of cash, I want to be able to tell you that Monaco’s Garia Soleil de Minuit cart is driven by a robot chauffeur or uses jump-jets to hop from one course to the next. Not so, dear reader: you’re pretty much paying for a fancy built-in ice box. Besides the fridge, the Monaco leans on its industrial parentage. The thing’s assembled at the Valmet Automotive factory in Finland, which rolls out Porches alongside this thing, and it’s got parts in it from the same [...]

Continue Reading...

Ever since the glory days of the Fall Guy in the 1980s any self-respecting gadget geek has craved a workable jetpack. The new Martin Jetpack is priced at $86,000 (£57,675) and is the world’s first commercially available personal flying machine. This beast of a machine will allow you a full 30 minutes of flight time, so just be careful you are not too high when you are reaching that 28-minute point in your flight across from the top of London’s Centrepoint to the top of the BT Tower. The machine’s rotors are built from a carbon / Kevlar composite and powered by a 200hp two-liter [...]

Continue Reading...

It’s been a long time coming. While Arthur C. Clarke’s satellites have taken to space, and James Bond’s futuristic mobile technology has become common place, still the dream of sustained personal flight has eluded us. But the future is here! Finally we can all take flight as Martin Aircraft in New Zealand releases the first commercially-available jet pack! A bit of history… Like many science fiction concepts, the jetpack design has become firmly entrenched in the collective psyche: ask anyone to draw you a jetpack and they will give you a man with two fiery pods [...]

Continue Reading...

Rocketeers, rejoice! That Martin Aircraft Company jetpack we’ve been teasing you about for a while is going to be produced at a rate of 500 units a year and sold. For a cool $75,000, you’re looking at a 200-horsepower, dual propeller flying machine, one that reaches heights of nearly 8,000 feet and cruises along at 60 miles per hour. With a range of 30 miles on one tank of fuel, it’s perfect for trips to the grocery store! Also, fun for your neighbors: weighing in at less than 254 pounds means that Martin jetpacks don’t require a pilot’s license to operate. Who thought [...]

Continue Reading...

Previous speakers made from glass have tended to sound rather brittle and bright, but then the construction of a glass speaker is an extremely bold move. Not only is the production process highly complex and expensive, but there are also serious sound quality concerns. But, by incorporating sophisticated damping techniques, Waterfall has refined the process to the point where its latest Evo range is in no way compromised by the material itself. Instead, what you get is a distinctive speaker with the positive benefits of glass, such as high density and rigidity. The question is, can function [...]

Continue Reading...

Boeing straight-up stepped out of our dreams and into our hearts with its 747-mounted airborne laser designed to shoot down ballistic missiles. A project we once feared to be dead, not only is the airborne laser very much alive, but now there’s even a video of the whole thing. From our previous coverage: For the first time ever, an airborne laser weapon mounted aboard a Boeing 747-400F blew up a sea-launched liquid-fueled ballistic missile. The light-speed laser beam shot “directed energy” from the Airborne Laser Testbed (ALTB), consisting of a Northrop Grumman higher-energy [...]

Continue Reading...

Thanks to Martin Owens, there’s now an Ubuntu-Artists group at DeviantArt. Martin wants anyone who is involved in Ubuntu related art/design and uses or is interested in Ubuntu to join. He also want to favorites contain artworks made using Ubuntu, and the galleries to contain things that were made for Ubuntu (wallpapers, ui mockups, tans, fan-art, etc). Martin writes: I have only today noticed the a new feature in DeviantArt called Groups, this allows people to get together and form communities. So I have applied to create a social group called “Ubuntu-Artists” which will hopefully act [...]

Continue Reading...

The Defense Ministry has told the Pentagon that the Israeli Air Force may only purchase 20 Joint Strike Fighters – and not 25 as planned – if the price of the aircraft is significantly higher than $100 million, defense officials said this week. The Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Photo: Courtesy SLIDESHOW: Israel & Region | World In a Letter of Request (LOR) which the Defense Ministry submitted in July, Israel asked the Pentagon to purchase 25 JSF F-35 [...]

Continue Reading...