You can already hook a Kinect up to a PC

You can already hook a Kinect up to a PC, and the Leap Motion will be available from Best Buy starting on May 19. There’s also the MYO, an armband that attempts to give you gesture controls on your PC. Gesture control is the new thing, whether we like Minority Report or not. Now, enter the CamBoard Pico, a device that boasts more precise gesture control than the Leap Motion, and in a smaller package.

Created by pmdtechnologies, the Pico is a 3D depth sensor stuffed into a small sensor bar. Compared to the Leap Motion, which simply measures the distance of fingertips to provide gesture control, the CamBoard Pico uses “time-of-flight” data to create a point cloud. You can move your hand (or air stylus!) around in the point cloud, and the CamBoard is able to recognize the gestures and respond accordingly.

The demonstration in the video shows the CamBoard Pico returning some accurate results, from a hand performing swiping functions to navigate between webpages and scroll through text, to using a finger to play Fruit Ninja without making mistakes. The video also shows a user writing in the air, and the Pico capturing the text and displaying it on screen. Granted, the “writing” is more akin to “incoherent scribbling,” but the Pico captures the scribbles precisely, and without too much lag.

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Desktop PCs may not be the sexiest pieces of technology

Desktop PCs may not be the sexiest pieces of technology, but let’s not kid ourselves: they offer a huge amount of bang for your buck. You get more performance, features, and longevity out of your components with a desktop than any other type of computer, even if they aren’t as exciting (or portable).

Our deal today embodies this. It may not be pretty, but it will get the job done and then some. Dell’s Optiplex lineup is designed for corporate use, ensuring it will last through years of constant use and abuse. The components are all easily accessible for replacement or upgrading and you will be able to find replacement parts for years to come; corporations can’t cope with the twice a year update cycle most consumer PCs see, so parts have to be around for a while longer with business models.

The Optiplex 3010 is a pretty slim mini tower chassis, with our model coming equipped with a 3rd gen Core i5 quad-core processor, 4GB of RAM, and 500GB hard drive. Intel’s 3rd gen platform, known as Ivy Bridge, offers a serious performance for the dollar and you won’t find anything this machine won’t handle outside of extensive 3D work or more number crunching than NASA.

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There have been convertible tablet PCs in one form or another for years now

There have been convertible tablet PCs in one form or another for years now, but slate-only versions were never practical due to the plain and simple fact that Windows was never very suitable for touch interaction. This has all changed with the introduction of Windows 8 and now consumers have the opportunity to carry around a full-fledged PC experience in a very similar form factor as their Android or iOS tablets.

Dell’s Latitude 10 is one of these new tablets and, being part of the Latitude line, is designed for business users. Inside, it is powered by one of Intel’s latest Atom dual-core processors, giving sufficient performance to handle the full-fledged PC version of Windows 8 and your typical office and web tasks. While Windows RT, Android, or iOS may be suitable for some users, many of us still need the full Windows experience.

The 10.1-inch display supports multi-touch and sports HD resolution, with a layer of Gorilla Glass ensuring added durability. It even has a mix of the ports and connectivity you find in both PCs and tablets, including a full-size USB port, full-size SD card slot, micro-USB for charging, and mini-HDMI video out.

One thing we really like about the Latitude 10 over nearly any other mobile device on the market is its removable battery, making it easy to extend run-time and replace a worn out unit. An optional docking station allows you to hook up a keyboard, mouse, monitor, and other peripherals when at your desk.

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Since the launch of Windows 8 and Windows RT

Since the launch of Windows 8 and Windows RT, users haven’t had wide-open access to Adobe Flash content on the web. Microsoft had opted to restrict Flash playback to certain sites that it believed to offer an acceptable “Windows experience for touch.”

That’s changed today, with Microsoft announcing that Flash playback will now be switched on by default for Internet Explorer 10 on both Windows 8 and Windows RT. The change applies to both the immersive and desktop versions of IE10 On Windows 8. Additionally, the IE10 desktop browser on Windows 8 will play all Flash content by default.

Other versions of Internet Explorer 10 will follow a new list. While most content should just play, certain sites that are known to be incompatible will be blacklisted. Microsoft says it’s a small list, but doesn’t offer any specifics. If you happen to stumble across a site that streams video using Flash and it doesn’t work, you’ll know you found an IE10 blacklist entry.

One reason Microsoft cites for making the change now is that web developers have clearly been working hard to make sure their Flash-based apps are working well with Windows 8. Fewer than 4% of the thousands of domains that Microsoft tests for compatibility are still causing issues just six months after the Windows 8 retail launch.

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Hardware authentication tokens aren’t a new concept

Hardware authentication tokens aren’t a new concept, but Google thinks it’s time to bring these devices to a much broader audience. First whispered about back in January, Google has taken to the stage at the RSA conference this week to offer some insight about what it hopes to accomplish with the Google One (password) ring. That’s not it pictured above, by the way, but hopefully it’s just as cool-looking.

Right now, Google is testing a USB dongle — which is exactly what many banks distribute to their corporate clients who need strong authentication measures to access online account services. Engineer Mayank Upadhyay notes that there’s one key difference with Google’s stick: it also features an NFC chip. That would potentially allow a users to kick start the login process by placing a phone or tablet within range.

But a small, wearable device would work, too. That’s where the ring comes in. An innocuous ring that could validate a user’s identity (assuming the companion USB token is also within range) would help solve several of today’s most serious computer security issues. If the token and ring are being used to authenticate, users wouldn’t fall into the trap of re-using the same password across dozens of sites. The hardware pair would also ensure that those ridiculous passwords we see every year on the top 100 leaked passwords list aren’t still going to be causing problems five years from now.

So what’s Google’s interest in all this? There’s got to be an angle, and it’s probably safe to assume that tight integration with Chrome (which recently received an optional strong password generator), Chrome OS,  and Android. The same hardware present in the USB dongle could be easily built in to phones, tablets, and laptops to give users a more convenient way to utilize their rings.

Google’s also got a thing for analytics, and the company would almost certainly be keeping tabs (anonymously, of course) on which services users are signing in to and what’s going on behind the scenes — like shopping or banking — to build an even better advertising profile.

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Google Glass demonstration videos from Google

• We’ve all seen the Google Glass demonstration videos from Google, but the app driven ecosystem we live in today demands that there be a little more than Google juice flowing through the headset. During a recent SXSW presentation, Google took to the stage to show off early app partners for the launch of Glass.
  
  The core concepts surrounding Glass focus on being able to deliver short bursts of information as the core content system. Similar to how notifications are delivered in Android, Glass can only display small blocks of text or icons in the tiny projector screen. This design also ensures that there’s never enough information on the screen to take your attention off of things like the road in front of you. Google has made it clear in the past that the bulk of Glass apps would be based on RESTful services, so almost everything you’ll be doing with those apps will require a data connection. Google’s presentation gives a deeper look at what you can expect from the experience in general.

Photos and video are an integral part of Google Glass. Using your voice or just touching the side of the headset, you an capture the world around you from the perspective of your eye. Once the photo is taken, you can share it through services like Skitch or Path. Instead of forcing you to do those things right when the photo is taken, the option is added to your timeline. These apps are stripped out, super simple versions of the apps used on smartphones and tablets today. You can share to existing groups, or in the case of Path, you can interact with shared photos through Path emoticons that now take up the whole screen.

When text messages and emails come in to Glass, you are offered a brief pop up on the headset with the information. You can choose to have the text read to you by Glass, or hover for a moment while you scan over it. When you want to reply, you can use your voice to populate the fields. This same setup can be applied to any service that displays text on the headset. For example, when demonstrating The New York Times app for Glass, the user is shown the headline for the article with the featured image in the background. When you find an article you like, you can tap and have it read to you. Sharing options from here are similar to Path or Skitch, with simple minimal feature sets.

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The list price for the PS Vita 3G is currently $299.99

The list price for the PS Vita 3G is currently $299.99. The WiFi-only model is slightly cheaper at $249.99. But if you go into most Sony stores today, you’ll find $100 knocked off the price of the 3G model, making it a bit of a bargain at just $199.97.So why has Sony decided to reduce the price of the PS Vita 3G well below even the price of the WiFi model? Sony isn’t saying yet, but Joystiq has confirmed that at least 22 Sony stores are using the new price point, and chances are all Sony’s outlets are.. 

Two of those stores have also suggested that Sony is dropping the price in order to get rid of stock because the 3G model is being discontinued. This is backed up by the fact Sony’s sales system isn’t listing an end date for the sale.

Looking at Sony’s online store the 3G model is also on sale, but the price has only been reduced to match the WiFi model.

The PS Vita 3G was always a hard sell due to the combination of a high price point and need to purchase a service plan, which cost between $14.99 and $30 per month. It’s also unlikely most gamers opted for 3G as playing online with friends is more typically going to be done when there’s a (faster and more reliable) WiFi connection available.

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