I love technology (.org)

When buying a laptop, many people focus on the look or the features. But what about the weight? 

Scientific research (well, kind of!)

I’m getting ready to move to a new house, and part of my new lifestyle will include getting a laptop to do some work on the move. So today, I head over to PC World to check out a few laptops. 

I had a big surprise. However, it was a bad surprise. Laptops are bloody heavy!

Check what your laptop is designed for 

I noticed that PC World divided laptops in two categories: laptops for the home and office, and laptops on the move. Needless to say, those in the latter category were lighter but there were few and far between.

The lighter laptops are usually designed for the entertainment market, principally for the use of watching DVDs or playing games while travelling. 

The results 

Following the criteria that a laptop should weight under 2 kilos, i started searching across many websites and i found the following:

• brands like Dell, HP and Toshiba offer laptops just under 2 kilos for about £600-£700; these laptops are marketed at people wanting to divert themselves while travelling
• brands like Compaq didn’t seem to have any
• the lightest laptop is Sony TZ series, at 1.2 kg (that’s inclusive of the battery!), at about £1,500; this laptop is marketed at businessmen on the move, hence the price tag

Additional resources:
Notebook As Indispensable Tool For Modern Executives
The search for a light-weight and small laptop
First Impressions of the EeePC as a Travel Laptop

Most cities now develop their journey planners, to help people find their way around using various modes of transport. London’s TfL Journey Planner is useful but the best i have found and used so far is Brighton’s Journey On.

Not only it provides you with a neat table detailing the various options (walking, cycling, public transport, car), but it also gives estimated cost, estimated carbon emissions, and the amount of calories you would burn.

And if all this information above wasn’t enough, it also provides you with an altitude profile for the cycling option, which is really useful as Brighton is very hilly.

The design is simple and effective.  The main colours are black and white, with an additional touch of purple pink used for links and part of the logo. Additionally, while the website carries out the search, it displays a funny or surprising anecdote or statistics about transport underneath the customary “loading” icon.

An example of simple, beautiful, user friendly and efficient design for all other journey planners websites to be benchmarked against.

Edit (17th April 2008):

Following comments from reader Mark Aberdour from Bricycles (Brighton, Hove and District Cycling Group at http://www.bricycles.org.uk/), it appears that there is a problem with the backend of the website, whereby it doesn’t always display the best cycling route, and recommends cycling routes similar to the car routes. This is clearly an issue and indicates that all the design efforts have gone into the front end, which is really neat and user friendly, but isn’t actually efficient at delivering the information people go there for in the first place.

What about your city’s journey planner? Is it user friendly and accurate?

Additional resources:

Brighton’s Journey Planner http://www.journeyon.co.uk/ 

Legible London http://www.legiblelondon.info

Back in the mid 90s, British inventor Trevor Baylis  came up with his most famous invention, the wind-up radio (also known as clockwork radio). The idea was simple; to make do without batteries/mains connections.

You wind the device up and then it works for a certain amount of time. When it runs out, you can wind it up again.

Since then, a few other devices have been developped based on a similar design. Wind-up torches are now very popular, wind-up mobile chargers are starting to emerge, and Tevor Baylis’ company, Freeplay, has announced the wind-up media player.

I might be asking for too much technically but i’d like it if someone came up with a design for a wind-up kettle, a wind-up digital camera, and a wind-up alarm-clock. 

Additional resources:

 Wind-up radio http://keetsa.com/blog/eco-friendly/wind-up-radio/

Eco media player cranks up the volume http://stephenfry.com/blog/?p=28

Redland Shire Council, Australia, is using Orion solar bollard as part of two schemes on the highway.

The bollards use solar energy to generate lighting for pedestrian walkways. Not only are they good for the environment, they are also quicker and cheaper to install, as they require no digging of ducting trenches into the ground.

While this solution might not be adequate in countries with low sunlight, more and more companies provide such devices.

Solion is one of them, and is based in the UK. Their website does not give details of who their clients are but there is a picture of a curved sollar cell for street furniture attached to the top of a London bus stop flag. As a londoner, i cannot say i have noticed them so far but i will keep my eyes open

Additional resources:

Source article on Redlang Shire Council  http://www.infolink.com.au/articles/Solar-power-lights-up-the-Sunshine-State_z159353.htm

Solion http://www.solion.co.uk/commercial.htm

British 23 year old Dan Sheridan has designed a see-saw that could provide electricity for a school.

Following a trip to Kenya, the student was inspired by the energy of the children and kept thinking about ways to use this to generate electricity.

He hit upon the idea of a see-saw and started work on his design. He has since won two grants, which will enable him to develop and test his see-saw design. His dream now is to design a whole energy-generating playground.

Simple inventions are often the best. For me, this is in the same category as wind-up radios and torches. So simple, yet so effective.

Additional resources:

BBC News article on Dan Sheridan http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7301354.stm

Coventry University news item on Dan Sheridan http://www.coventry.ac.uk/latestnewsandevents/a/4352