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Next Generation Xybernaut Wearable 151

Posted by CmdrTaco from the fashion-trends-I-can-get-behind dept.
shanenewsom sent in linkage to a story running on the BBC which talks about the new Xybernaut Poma. A little light on the specs, although the headmounted screen is 640x480 and it runs WinCE. But it really does look like the first practical wearable. It should be available in March. Update: 01/21 18:52 GMT by T : Reader Eureses points out that the display is actually 800x600 rather than 640x480.
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Next Generation Xybernaut Wearable More

Next Generation Xybernaut Wearable

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  • Nice price!!! (Score:2, Funny)

    by Saint ( 12232 )
    $1500? Sheesh!
  • ...you`ll be laughing at this in a few years!

    `Check this one out! Check your email on the move!! Yeah, but wait until you get home before you can reply!`

    Surely the future of communications is speech, not converting what you would normally have said into words, and then typing them in?
  • I won't get one till it comes with a Microvision display.
  • I can imagine 1001 uses for something like this. I think the price is about right, too. (Of course it costs more than a desktop with similar specs, but this isn't meant for the desktop market.)
  • I read an article a few years ago that said that linux was the OS of choice for wearable computers because its smaller drain on the processor meant less heat and therefore less discomfort. You also don't want your borg hardware crashing on you ;)
  • When I take my laptop down the bar, girls might find me attractive. They might confuse me with a writer or something.

    That'll never happen with one of these.

  • No Bluetooth? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by ragnarok ( 6947 )
    I thought this was the kind of stuff Bluetooth was designed for. Where's my PAN?
    • i think it's a bigger shortcoming that there's only one cf slot (at least it's type 2). kind of a bummer to have to choose between hard disk or network connectivity.

      but using bluetooth to untether the input device would be great. i'd say the display too, but there's still the matter of power.
  • Gargoyles [everything2.com] anyone?

  • new excuse... (Score:4, Funny)

    by bje2 ( 533276 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:13PM (#2877110)
    now the excuse can go from:

    "Sorry officer, I didn't see that other car, i was too busy shaving and drinking my coffee..."
    to...
    "Sorry office, I didn't see that other car, i was too busy checking my e-mail and reading the latest stories on slashdot...."
    • Reminds me of a time way back in high school. I saw some guy driving with a laptop, somehow, balanced on his steering wheel. And this was back before laptops were fashionable. Talk about an accident waiting to happen.

      Talk about the future of geekdom...Xybernaut + Segway...

      I'm waiting for the day when we have head mounted HUDs which detect head movement while driving. If your head deviates more than 1 degree off center your car automatically pulls to the side of the road and shuts itself off. Hey, they already have crude versions for truckers falling asleep... Only a matter of time.
    • Yep, people will apologize to offices instead of officers because they can't tell the difference, they just see one all encompassing BSOD.

  • C'mon (Score:1, Insightful)

    by DwarfGoanna ( 447841 )
    I understand there are many possible (and valid) applications for technology like this, but is there really anything I can do on one of these that I couldn't do with a PDA, and still manage to keep my dignity intact? =)


    Somehow, I don't think consumer application and adoption of this stuff will happen anytime soon. The whole "wearable computing" movement seems to survive of sci-fi fumes alone.

    • Re:C'mon (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Glytch ( 4881 )
      One use I'd heard of is in construction work where there's limited room to move around. Instead of constantly moving in and out of small spaces to check a paper contruction plan, one could just put on a wearable, review the design without having to get out, and in the end be able to get the job done a lot quicker. Might be useful for diving, too. Wearables seem destined for industrial use in the near future. And maybe those who really, really want to be gargoyles. But I'm probably 100% wrong. :)

  • Hey! It might run Linux. (Score:4, Informative)

    by dbarclay10 ( 70443 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:13PM (#2877117)
    I saw an interview with a head honcho from Xybernaut a month or two ago on the Space channel. They showed this thing, and I'm almost positive he said it would run either Windows CE or Linux.

    IIRC, though, it was still priced pretty high(several thousand dollars).

  • Effects on the eye (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Infonaut ( 96956 ) <infonaut@gmail.com> on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:14PM (#2877123) Homepage Journal
    The only thing that makes me nervous about these things is that essentially your eyeball is just a few millimeters from a bright light source. Has anyone seen any research information about the long-term effects of close-proximity displays? I've got a gut feeling that it just can't be good for your eyes.

    • I think it's only relatively bright. Since it's so close, it's actually probably fairly dim. If you had it at arms length, I'd bet it would be almost unreadable (even accounting for the size).

      Not having seen one first hand, that's all conjecture, of course. :)
    • We had a couple of their products in our lab - I think they were the MA TC type. These ran Windows 98 and they were huge hulking beasts that could hardly be called wearable. Anyway, my experience with the display was that it wasn't too bright. In fact, they projected on to a half silvered mirror so that you could supposedly see through it. The people in my lab found the half silvered mirror to be a bad idea because you couldn't really concentrate on the screen or the environment very well. It was especially difficult to try to keep track of a mouse cursor when it was half transparent and things were moving in the background. To get any use out of it at all you basically had to go stare at a blank wall. Don't know if this version also has a transparent display - hope they actually ran some user studies.
      • Very true. Especially since this is a single eye device. I would think anything longer than a couple of minutes would result in a major headache. Of course, I haven't tried one, but from experiences with telescopes and gun sites using both eyes while focusing through a monocle tends to cause eye fatigue quite quickly, at least for me. Closing one eye would help but would defeat the primary purpose of the device.

        Probably the least intrusive approach would be a direct projection on the retina, but who's going to buy a device that projects light into your eye??? This would have a similar effect as eye "floaties" which are visible but can be easily ignored since you can't technically focus on them and, being so small, are nearly transparent...

    • Incas (Score:1)

      by Jhan ( 542783 )

      From what I've heard, this is how the Incas use to breed carvers. They would appoint certain newborns to become future carvers, and bind wooden slabs to their heads, centimeters from the eyes.

      The slabs would be kept on every day, all day, for years. Eventually the kids would grow up to be profoundly nearsighted, allowing them to work small carvings to fanatical detail.

    • Re:Effects on the eye (Score:4, Insightful)

      by stereo_Barryo ( 530287 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @03:30PM (#2877664)
      I played around with the MA IV and found the curved silvered mirror to be comfortable and easy on the eye. I don't believe the light source could get to the "dangerous" level. I'd be happy to use the head display for an extended period of time, but the MA IV was heavy in the vest we wore. Since the company has moved on to smaller devices the weight might not be relevant now. Also, according to this: http://www.xybernautonline.com/eCommerce/Poma/Plac _Poma.htm the screen is 640x480, not 800x600.

    • Re:Effects on the eye (Score:2, Interesting)

      by HKTiger ( 527586 )
      Apparently (I can't provide a source, since it's "someone who read something somewhere told me"), some stats from new entrants into the Singapore armed forces with regard to shortsightedness:

      In 196x, about 23% (?) of the entrants were nearsighted. In 1999, that figure was of the order of 93%. This was attributed to the high urban density, and the lack of things in the distance to look at (forgive my crappy grammar, I've not had my morning coffee).

      Anyway, even accounting for the various ways to skew statistical results, that indicates a worrying increase over a short time. What would one of these (admittedly funky) things do? Imagine those tension headaches now, when one eye is pointed at something with a focal length in millimetres, while the other's trying to watch that babe across the street. And perhaps I've been out of things for a while, but Marty Feldman's eyes have never been considered sexy...

      • ah, they may be close, but they can have long apparant distances, as I understand it. Thus, they could be much better, with your eye thinking it is meters away, and meters across.

  • Segway Computing (Score:2, Interesting)

    by segvio ( 540235 )
    Sure, a wearable computer sounds like a great idea, and it is. But, will it be socially acceptable in this day and age, or will we have to all be on Segways first?
  • first practical wearable, running WinCE.

    Sounds like an oxymoron to me ;-)

    I can see this for certain tasks where you need push data and you need to be mobile. But for most folks, it is nice to get away from the cubicle and the world of the corporate data interface.

    most people to not want to be more integrated into the work place, although this would be a dream come true for someone whose has always lived their lives as a manager.

  • 640x480? (Score:2, Informative)

    by meggito ( 516763 )
    The article says the resolution is 800x600 and not, as the snippet on slashdot says, 640x480.
  • I've been wanting something like this for years... avoids all the neck aches, back aches, etc. But this one is way too expensive, not beefy enough of a machine to develop on, and is in desperate need of some pants with built in split keyboard.
  • I e-mailed Xybernaut about a month ago when I first ran across this. Never got a reply.

    I was searching for a replacement for my Visor Prism which was running short on power for the things I wanted to do.

    I considered a wearable, ready-made or building one, and a Linux based Sharp Zaurus. Well, the pricing was too high for me for any of the ready made models and even to build one, mostly due to the cost of a good head mounted display.

    So, now I am waiting for new Zaurus.
  • From what I can see from the page, the screen sits in front of one eye. Wouldn't you have to wink to be able to see properly? That'd get real annoying real fast...
    • You're right, if you don't you'll get a double image from the other eye superimposed with the image from the screen. This would probably be very distracting when trying to read small words on a small screen.
    • Also, it seems to sit in front of the left eye (most right-handed people are left eye dominant). Being RIGHT eyed dominent (and thus, left handed), I'm wondering if this device would work for me.

      • Re:Odd (Score:2, Interesting)

        by good-n-nappy ( 412814 )
        I used one of their older models - something like the MA TC - I didn't really have a problem with using only one eye. I'm not sure why but I don't remember needing to wink. However, the eyepiece was semitransparent so I did have problems if there was anything moving in the background. The version we had was running Win98 at 800x600 (I think) so buttons and normal size text were basically unreadable. Tracking the mouse cursor was also a lost cause. Switching to one of the accessibility themes (big fonts and high contrast colors) in Windows helped out but effectively reduced the size of the display.

        This is one of those things where its hard to tell if a few details were wrong or if its an overall bad idea. My intuition is that its probably just the details.

    • Re:Odd (Score:2, Informative)

      by thraxil ( 54926 )
      other single-eye head-mounted displays i've played with have been quite easy to see. no winking needed. they're generally designed so that the light from the screen comes in perfectly parallel so it's like looking at an infinately large screen that is infinitely far away; very easy for your eyes to focus on. there are plenty of people like Steve Mann or Greg Priest-Dorman who have been wearing them for *years* without problems. furthermore, the single eye displays tend to have fewer problems with making people dizzy.

      for a real wearable that you're actually wearing 16 hours a day, the most problematic thing is usually the comfort of the physical device. ordinary glasses get uncomfortable after awhile; glasses with bulky LCD display units attached to them get really uncomfortable if they don't fit *perfectly*.

  • Help! (Score:4, Funny)

    by NiftyNews ( 537829 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:19PM (#2877157) Homepage
    Help! My shoes have a virus and my jacket just got caught in a nonzero loop!
  • Sitting staring at a CRT causes me enough eye strain as it is. I'm trying to imagine how staring at a 800x600 screen zapping straight into my brain could possibly be safe for me.

  • Dork (Score:5, Funny)

    by Konster ( 252488 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:23PM (#2877183)
    It's bad enough that I'm a dork. Now I have to look like one, too?

    $1500 bucks for an embedded processor, Windows CE driven headgear that will scare away potential mates and attract the law enforcement?

    Thanks, but I'll pass.
    • attract the law enforcement?

      !!

      wow, in the country where I live nobody would ever have this idea. Not even for a joke. I just would not come to mind.

      I must be a had place to live where you live ;^)

      ciao
  • added to which, it doesn't look all that comfortable to wear or use, either.

    Incidentally, if the submitter sent in a link to the BBC talking about the new xybernaut [xybernaut.com]Poma, maybe it would have been a good idea to include that link?

    I assume it was this story [bbc.co.uk].

    And the image on that page really does show off how stupid a user can look. It's shown off by Xybernaut president Edward Newman and he really does look daft with all those wires dangling off his headband.

    They say that in the future the screens will be 'integrated into the lenses of glasses'. Until that day I think they'd be better off keeping to a good sound card for output device, even though it requires more effort (short-term memory usage) to listen to something than read it. This unit is somewhat underpowered for decent speech synthesis though, at 128 mhz it would be something of an effort.

    Oh, and finally, would you really enjoy using an 'equivalent to a 15 inch colour screen' at 640x480? Somebody in a past slashdot discussion described this phenomenon as 'pixels the size of fists'. Ouch.
    • Apologies for replying to myself:

      The BBC article says 640x480. As I don't believe they'd have made that mistake, I'm assuming that the version they saw is different to the one on the homepage... an early version, maybe? or maybe the BBC's technical staff are all MCSE... It's not out until March according to the BBC so maybe it's a prototype.
  • Sure, the title might look similar, but the real purpose is a little more obvious when you use the right name. The Porna is the next-generation airplane entertainment device. And it works with your palm, if you get my drift.
  • 640x480?

    The article says, "The one-inch full color 800 x 600 SVGA viewing screen sits below your eye."

    This should have been right on Slashdot.
  • A little light on the specs, although the headmounted screen is 640x480 and it runs WinCE.

    Actually the display looks to be 800 x 600, according to the link you posted [xybernaut.com]:

    A better view of the world
    Forget about trying to view graphics on a tiny PDA screen. Poma's headmount display is built for optimum comfort and functionality. The one-inch full color 800 x 600 SVGA viewing screen sits below your eye, weighs approximately 3 ounces and provides a viewing area resolution similar to that of a desktop monitor from two feet away.
  • how long can that last?? (1300mah)

  • Some uses... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Meowharishi ( 550240 )
    The best uses I can think of for something like this would be for passive applications which require real-time feedback.. A GPS system in your car would be good.

    The only business application I can think of would be for IT people to monitor network and server conditions..

    Other than that this seems like a neat toy but has no other practical uses...

    I wouldn't invest in this company anytime soon..
    • The only business application I can think of

      • Military - view from various battlefield cams
      • Medical - charts, drug info
      • Mechanics - schematics, analyzer info
      • Teachers - the ultimate (eyes in the back if the head)

      And that's just off the top of my head....
      • Military - view from various battlefield cams.. Well, that technology has already been available to the military for quite some time... Medical - charts, drug info You mean you're going to trust a doctor more if he walks into the waiting room with a big gadget on his head, staring right at you but not staring at you as he surfs through his files looking for info, versus the traditional way when they walk in with your charts in hand and a good knowledge of what they're doing anyway? Mechanics - schematics, analyzer info Again, we already have lots of machines for this sort of work anyway... Teachers - the ultimate (eyes in the back if the head) And that's just off the top of my head.... Sorry but I'm not sold... I'm still waiting for the magnificent revolution having the web on my cell phone will bring to my life.
        • You miss the point. While there are devices that do this, they are expensive. This one is relatively cheap.

          And as for the doctor, I would rather trust a doctor that uses a reference book than one that tries to impress me by "knowing everything"(TM).

          Also, the electronic chart he is looking at might contain information that was gathered at a different hospital or treatment centre. Which I do want him to know about in case there are interactions between what he/she wants to do and what was done before.

          These types of device are not revolutionary but evolutionary.
  • These things have been ridiculous since they came out. They simply look stupid. Regardless of the tech specs, the price and the appearence of the device were enough to turn me off. The only way I'd buy one is if it were in the dollar bin. Me? I'm waiting for cybernetics to become common place.
  • Runs Windows CE you say? Seems I've seen something like this before [slashdot.org]...

  • Ergonomic Nightmare (Score:3, Interesting)

    by guttentag ( 313541 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:36PM (#2877284) Journal
    The device puts a one inch box directly in front of your nose and expects you to read text from it? Can you imagine the number of people who are going to end up cross-eyed?

    "Sure, my carpal tunnel syndrome is gone, but I broke my right arm when I tripped over a desk in the office."

    • Re:Ergonomic Nightmare (Score:3, Informative)

      by ruzel ( 216220 )
      Moreover, you don't have to be an ergonomic engineering genius to figure out that the design they have is not going to stay where you put it. Even one ounce eyeglasses need to have nose braces to keep them from falling off. Besides that, without semi-transparency (like these guys [mvis.com]), the device just blinds you -- fine for a desk but it can't help mobility any. (Ever tried working on an old style microscope for several hours?)

      Incidentally, according to an old CNN article [cnn.com], Xybernaut cut a deal with microvision to distribute head-mounted laser displays within the year. Since the article is old, maybe its not happening anymore, but it would seem to be a good reason to wait on these devices improving a little.
      _________________

    • Re:Ergonomic Nightmare (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      a one inch box directly in front of your nose and expects you to read text from it? Can you imagine the number of people who are going to end up cross-eyed?

      Hmm, this wasn't invented by Steve Martin was it? :o)
  • Maybe now we can finally compare internet prices while shopping at the store. No more printing out ridiculous sheets of amazon.com's catalog or writing down numerous prices for different items. Very cool.
  • Looks good, but I also want a microphone, a speech recognition based interface, an integrated cell phone (eg: "computer phone home"), wireless internet access (now that GSM is generally available everywhere except the U.S.) and a separate full size bluetooth connected keyboard that I can put on my lap or a table and start typing on for tasks that aren't suitable for the voice recognition interface.

    BTW, this machine sounds a bit underpowered for decent voice recognition, although I'd like to be proved wrong.

    Doug Moen.
  • The Website says 800x600 for resolution, not 640x480 as the article suggests.
  • There's a little more in the article [com.com] at news.com
  • shanenewsom sent in linkage to a story running on the BBC which talks about the new Xybernaut Poma.

    But slashdot posted a link to a press release.

    I believe this [bbc.co.uk] is the BBC story alluded to.

  • Linux and Divx (Score:4, Informative)

    by LuxuryYacht ( 229372 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:49PM (#2877365) Homepage
    Debian already runs on the SH4. The SH7751V they seem to have chosen has a 0.9GFLOP FPU so it's capable of pretty decent Divx encodes and decodes. This unit could make for a pretty decent portable DVR.
  • I've been following this company for a couple of years. I have to admit I was pretty excited when I saw this new product--they've really come quite long way. I especially like the use of standardized equipment (microdrives, usb, etc).

    One the things I had a laugh about is how they spin it's usefulness: "You stay connected to breaking news, stock prices, game scores and what's happening at work or with friends." Yeah, that's what I'd use it for!

    But what a hell of an mp3 player!
  • The CPU is attatched to a tiny earpiece and transmits to say... zeiss optical contact lenses that would provide a variable translucancy Heads Up Display overlayed against my cornea. That would be Schweet. We could all reference google during light conversation and perhaps be able to hold some worth having. I might not even mind it running WinCE... You can't wear this thing anywhere but college towns. This thing pretty much screams, "mug me, I have surplus cash on me at all time,also: I am a helpless sheep"

  • Xyber-snatching? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Dan Crash ( 22904 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @02:56PM (#2877407) Journal
    I admit that the wearable idea is pretty intriguing, but wouldn't this be even easier to steal than a laptop?

    Imagine walking down the street, surfing the web, when suddenly you feel someone jostle your side. Your expensive new Xybernaut is yoinked off you and the thief takes off at Mach 1 while you're still trying to click the Back button.

    Until the price of wearable PCs drops down to the price of a cell phone (or world peace spontaneously occurs), a wearable PC will be like a sign that says "I'm a big, rich, nerd. Please rob me."
  • windows media 6.4 and directX....anyone for head-to-head quake2 over 802.11b?
    please excuse the pun.
  • Perhaps this is due to a limited production run, but 1500$ for one of these buggers? Wheres the cost breakdown? Does a 800x600 LCD head unit truely cost THAT much?

    This reminds me of the high cost associated with the Netwinder boxes, truely. They also where priced fairly high for a comparible box. I assume the cost must be in the limited production runs of the devices. *sigh*
  • Seriously - I can believe that they may have scraped up some cash from the military for some R & D and maybe even some production models, but they're not targeting military customers with lines like "... instant, seamless access to ... e-mail accounts, attachments, Internet sites and games."

    So who is *buying* these things?! Who wears one of these things around town? I work right next to the Xybernaut office (Fairfax, VA), and I've never even seen one of their *employees* wearing one around.
    • I work at a Defense Contractor...we have one of their older ones. Too breakable though IMHO...and you're right about their marketing angle. I want development and interface capabilities for maintenance and operations support.
      But what I really want to know is...from how high can I drop it and at what velocity can it withstand a shot against a bulkhead?
      • But what I really want to know is...from how high can I drop it and at what velocity can it withstand a shot against a bulkhead?

        That's what I'm thinking - what their *real* customers will be worried about is whether these things will take an AK-47 round and keep ticking.

        I don't think they've thought out very well what the average joe will *need* one of these things for. Why should I spend $1500 on an underpowered PC when I can get a laptop or a palmtop for significantly less money?

        It's like the sad saga of Iridium all over again - a really cool novelty product in desperate search of a practical market.
  • to have at a museum. Now I know that at some places you can get headphones with info about the art or whatever is on display. But what if you could get one of these with info about the exibit? You could get movies and background info... all sorts of stuff from this while you were looking at the real object. Be it a dinosaur or a painting. All you'd have to do it walk up to an object and it could be programmed to tell you about it. Like your own personal tour guide.

  • I can see a ton of uses for this... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by acidfast7 ( 551610 ) on Monday January 21, 2002 @03:15PM (#2877569)
    in my field and in others. Imagine if Dragon came out with a WinCE version of the popular Dragon Dictate software. I would be able to take notes while performing experiments at the bench. I could keep an electronic lab notebook on the fly because my hands would be free.

    Also, it would be of great use to physicians, especially those in the ER. As an emergency patient rolled in, the doctor could fill out all the forms electronically (once again with Dragon Dictate-style software) and electronically send them to the nursing station and the "board". It would be very efficient and save critical time.

    I do have a question about the hardware. Does the display track retinal movements to position the mouse pointer? That would eliminate the need to open all of the software and menus with vioce-operated commands (perhaps an extended blink could serve as a mouse click).

    All in all it's an interesting concept, perhaps not for the general popultaion.

  • that we've seen similar threads [slashdot.org] before... I pop this big question.

    Most people who want a wearable, at the current time, are complete geeks. Usually these types of people want stuff THEIR way, and they try to be economical when doing it, so why buy something like this?

    I too want a wearable, and one that attracts the GOOD kind of attention, not the bad kind.. I decided to set about making one, and learned a LOT from various [blu.org] websites [essex.ac.uk].

    Of course, going the PC-104 route will still cost you a pretty penny, you can get a unit with a LOT more storage and custom input and display options. There are several pages on the net that go into detail on how to modify visor type displays and conceal them behind a normal pair of sunglasses.

    For anyone serious about making a wearable, I say grow your own. It is a learning experience you can be proud of, instead of a product that you blew a pay check on, and then complain.. "I wish it did this, and that"

    -fc
  • Name----Product Description-----------Part #---Price
    POMA*---wearable internet device------K50------1499.00
  • Imagine a beowulf cluster of these...

    • Several on your head...
    • Several on each arm and leg...
    • Several modified to cover your torso...
    • Add an 802.11 card and a Passport account and you can truly join Borg collective

    I know what I'm wearing for Halloween next year...

    • Ha! You nailed it.

      We had a couple of the early MA TC versions in our lab (i.e. the ones with a standard Intel processor) and a person wearing one of them looked absolutely ridiculous. There were cables everywhere. The headset had an eyepiece and earphones so it covered a good part of your head. The actual processor was mounted on a belt along with a sizable battery. Then there were the extensions - a huge wrist-mounted touchpad display, a head mounted camera, and a mini-keyboard. (Who needs eyes anyway? I just watch the world through a camera projecting onto a head mounted LCD :)

      Needless to say, we never used them for anything except when two of us wore them as a halloween costume at the CS department party. Boot me up!
  • Here is a link to a previous /. post on this thing from August. A little more info in the links too.
    Affordable Wearables May Arrive By Christmas [slashdot.org]
  • The Dreamcast also runs a Hitachi SH-4 processor. Since so much work has been done to port Linux to that device, I'm sure not a whole lot of rework is needed to get linux on this little thing. I'm assuming the ROM on this Xybernaut is flashable.
  • "Gargoyle"

    (Per Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash")

    As I recall, it was a term that was kinda looked down upon...kinda like the view some of these posts project.
  • The website doesn't mention what kind of technology is used for the display. If this is done with technology from Microvision [mvis.com], then I will be impressed, I think that looks like good technology. If it's just a damn little hi-res LCD or something, then I would be less impressed, although OLED wouldn't be bad, I would think.

    Cheers, Joshua

  • It would limit the range but it seems to me this would work better if you used it with a wireless connection to a more powerful computer. Then you wouldn't be limited by the wearable's hardware or software capacity.

    Also I think they should work on making this less obvious. If they could get this into a normal looking pair of glasses or sun glasses with a switch between a translucent, a uninhibited data view and a uninhibited natural view, then I could see this taking off. A mouse pointer controlled by eye movement would be even better.

    A wireless data connection is the big missing piece here.
  • it's hardly any more than an ipaq (different processor) with a HUD. Heck, I think I'd rather have a new ipaq.

    I don't want to be down on Xybernaut, because it's a tough market, but what needs to go into a wearable seems pretty obvious.

    Integrate one of the following
    1) 2 compact flash slots
    2) a microdrive
    3) 802.11b ethernet.

    The point is that you virtually need a network with something like this to make it anymore than a pda that you don't need hands for.

    And for the love of all that is holy, why WinCE? At least put Win95 on it or something. You pretty much doomed it to be a pda, and that's it.

    It's pretty straight forward to me. Wireless ethernet, a modest amount of storage ( 1gig>storage>256 megs ), audio pumped through the headset, and voice possibilities (not necessarily voice recognition).

    I'd even be happy with one of the new ipaqs with an SD card, CF 802.11b card, HUD, and pointing device.
  • Most any geek that has strong interest in wearables have had one for years now. I retired my wearable back in 2000 (in fact if anyone wants to buy my M1 head mounted display for $100.00 let me know.) The best work was done by Steve Mann at the University of Toronto.

    This is nothing but a pre-packaged buy-and-drive unit.. you can get better,faster, and more configurable by building your own. Just search google for wearable computing, you'll find everything you need.
  • ..this new Poma [xybernaut.com] doesn't seem to use the same cables as the other Poma [pomagroup.com]..

  • Wearables could be used to do some really cool stuff like this [atr.co.jp].

    ...though I don't believe you could run an augmented reality application on WinCE.

  • Call me when those devices that project the image onto either the Retina or the back of the Eyelid come out.

    Damn I want one of those, spiffy. Especialy the eyelid ones, hehe, blink and see a map of where you are going. :)

    Ah, or even better, direct optic nerve interface. :) Uh, could I get a replacement optic never for my right eye while your at it? The current one doesn't quite work. ^_^ (bleh)

    Ah, oh well, in the future, in the future. (and if not I'm going to seriously start bitching!)
  • ... at the CEATEC Japan exhibition last Fall, and it was frankly incredible. For all that it's sitting an inch in front of your eye it looks like it's a couple of feet away, and it's very easy to read; they had an automated demo running, showing things like maps and train schedules. The pointer is controlled by a pressure-sensitive controller you operate with your thumb, sort of ilke the "knobs" in some laptop computers. While it was admittedly a bit disorienting to have the display in one eye while seeing the rest of the world from the other, I'd imagine that's something you could get used to without too much difficulty, though I'd be concerned about the loss of depth vision.

    At any rate, it's a fascinating little gizmo... but I think I'll wait for the price to come down before I look into it. ;)

  • I wouldn't be caught wearing one of these. Walking down the street will have you being named called, spat upon, mugged, and beaten to death. No way... especially when it's a sign of dickheadedness.
  • IMHO simply strapping a desktop style user interface (text or GUI with keyboard and pointer) to your skull seems wasteful. It would be much more efficient to use a palmtop or laptop form factor in most aplications. No matter how compact you make the hardware or how high res the display it will never be more than a geek toy unless you change the way you interact with it. If your display is superimposed over reality, then your computer should interact with reality.

    GPS adds some interesting posibilities (see the article on GPS tags). Scanning RFID or barcodes also lets you gather information. Take a picture of a sign, OCR the text then run it through a translation program and you can find the bathroom at any airport in the world. Do the same with speach to text and reality has subtitles. If your display seems to "hover" out in front of you, then why not treat it as being there? Point your stylus in the air where you see an icon to click on it.

    I have long thought that the "killer app" for wearables would involve GPS and some way of determaning what direction the user was facing. You could then overlay the virtual on top of the real. Instead of a map or direcions how about a "yellow brick road" to follow and a giant arrow floating in the sky over your destination. I realise that most of this is pie in the sky with the current technology but wearables will never go mainstream untill you give people an application worth looking like a borg drone for.

  • Hmmm (Score:1)

    by MoneyT ( 548795 )
    I'll admit the idea is a great one, and if just for the fac that I could say I had one, I would buy it, I can't see this becoming very popular. Not until it gets better hardware.

    Currently, all you could really do with this is search the web (but with what? Unless you wanted to plug yourself into the wall, which sorta defeats the purpose. Yeah I know cell connections and satelite, but I know alot of people who don't want to pay for that.) Write text docs, do spreadsheets and listen to music.

    Now, if we really wanted to see the popularity of theese things take off. Make it so that it can run Quake or UT and watch as the geeks congregate everywhere (study hall death match anyone?) and play away. Don't laugh, I've been witness to a Marathon LAN gam played in the middle of a park in San Antonio, Texas. I you want the details ask me, but let's just say after that, geeks using a wearable to play Quake in the middle of school wouldn't suprise me at all.

    When it gets more power, I'll buy it, but it's too underpowered for now.
  • One entry found for wince.
    Main Entry: wince
    Pronunciation: 'win(t)s
    Function: intransitive verb
    Inflected Form(s): winced; wincing
    Etymology: Middle English wynsen to kick impatiently, from (assumed) Old North French wincier to turn aside, of Germanic origin; akin to Old High German wankOn to totter -- more at WENCH
    Date: circa 1748
    : to shrink back involuntarily (as from pain) : FLINCH
    synonym see RECOIL
    - wince noun

    good name for a MS product, ej?
  • Seems the Sharper Image catalog from some time ago had a pair of spectacles with a translucent video screen embedded.

    These were for TV, of course, not hi-res computer displays, but I have always fancied the technology for wearable computers.

    Anyone know what became of this "TV glasses" concept and if it would be feasible display technology for a wearable PC?

    Vortran out

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