CrunchGear

Robovie-PC Wins World’s First Robot Marathon
CrunchGear Week in Review: New Species Edition
Sony Buys Chip Manufacturing Facility From Toshiba For $650 Million

Robovie-PC Wins World’s First Robot Marathon

Posted: 28 Feb 2011 01:50 AM PST

The world’s first robot marathon, which was started on Friday in Osaka, Japan, ended on Sunday evening, with mini humanoid Robovie PC emerging as the winner. Mini humanoid Robovie-PC stands 40cm tall, weighs 24.kg, and has 20 joints.

A group of five robots ran around a 100m long course exactly 421 times plus another 95m to complete a full marathon (42.195km). Robovie-PC beat his closest rival by “just a second” (yeah, right – see pic below). He completed the marathon after about 55 hours of running.

Organizer Vstone says the average speed of all participants was 0.77 km/h.

The company also said that it plans to bring the robo marathon to other countries in the future.

CrunchGear Week in Review: New Species Edition

Posted: 28 Feb 2011 12:00 AM PST

Here are some stories from the past week on CrunchGear:

Weekend Giveaway: Rebtel Wants You To Have A Motorola Atrix
The Creditor Carbon Fiber Money Clip Knife Keeps Your Money Safe
What Is Thunderbolt And Will It Change Your Life?
Little Magic Stories: Interactive Art With The Kinect
Thodio iBox Is A Cute And Customizable iPod Dock

Sony Buys Chip Manufacturing Facility From Toshiba For $650 Million

Posted: 27 Feb 2011 11:23 PM PST

The consolidation in Japan’s electronics industry continues: Sony just announced it has bought a chip manufacturing facility in Nagasaki Prefecture, western Japan, from Toshiba. The deal is supposed to be closed by April 1 this year and is worth $650 million.

Both companies actually reached a a basic accord to sell the facility in December. The production line was used for system large scale integration chips so far, but Sony wants to convert the line to produce sensors.

Big S already commands 70% of the global market for sensor but plans to double the total output capacity for image sensors to 50,000 wafers monthly by March 2012, by investing $1.2 billion. Now we have final confirmation where more than half of that sum has landed.

Play N600 HD Wireless Dual-Band N+ Router review

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Best Buy has buy 2 get 1 free promotion on select PSP, PS3 games

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FROM APPLETELL - “The iTunes Music Library file cannot be saved. You do not have enough access privileges for this operation.” Those words have plagued my nightmares for the past week. Thank the Force, I’ve stumbled upon a solution.
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