CrunchGear

HP Shifts Consumer Notebook Production From China To Japan
Sharp Reaches Record Conversion Efficiency With New Solar Cell
Video: Telepresence Robot Avatar TELESAR V
Gadgets Week in Review: Footrace

HP Shifts Consumer Notebook Production From China To Japan

Posted: 07 Nov 2011 04:32 AM PST

Back in June, HP announced something very unusual: a plan to shift production of business notebooks for the Japanese market from China to Japan. The company then actually started manufacturing these devices in its plant in Akishima near Tokyo, in August.

It appears the US company is seeing some potential in the move, as now Japan’s biggest business daily The Nikkei is reporting that HP will bring the production of notebooks for the consumer market in the country from China to Japan, too. The goal is to reduce delivery time, use the “made-in-Japan” moniker in marketing, and simplify logistics.

One of the models that will be produced in Japan soon is the 15.6-inch Pavilion dv6-6b00, for example. HP says that with the move, notebooks can be shipped to customers in just five days after an order comes in, significantly less than the 14 days it takes from plants in China.

HP plans, by February next year, to manufacture a total of 500,000 notebooks yearly in Japan. The company also produces all desktop PCs sold in the country in its plant in Akishima.

Sharp Reaches Record Conversion Efficiency With New Solar Cell

Posted: 07 Nov 2011 03:41 AM PST

Solar energy has just made one step forward: Sharp announced that it has developed a solar cell boasting the world’s highest conversion efficiency of 36.9%. This number is 1.1 points higher than for the company’s last cell, which was unveiled in October 2009.

The new 1cm²solar cell consists of three layers made of indium gallium phosphide, gallium arsenide and indium gallium arsenide (see below). Sharp says it was able to increase the conversion efficiency by using new materials and reducing the resistance of the junctions connecting the layers.

The plans now is to commercialize the solar cell in 2014 for use in “space satellites and for flight craft and land vehicles”.

Video: Telepresence Robot Avatar TELESAR V

Posted: 07 Nov 2011 02:11 AM PST

Professor Tachi from Japan’s Keio University has been working on telepresence robots since the 1980s, and TELESAR V, a so-called telexistence robot avatar, is the finest work of his lab yet. The robot makes it possible to transmit sight, hearing and even touch in order “to free people from time and space constraints”.

The way it works is that the robot becomes your alter ego (or “avatar”) at a distant location: the human operator sees what the robot sees and hears what the robot hears. With model V, operators can Telesar can even “feel” the shape and temperature of objects, thanks to a set of sensors built into the hands.

This video (shot by Diginfo TV, in English) provides more insight on TELESAR V: