Gefen Promises WUSB Extender at CES 2007

It was a year ago that Gefen promised to deliver Freescale-friendly Cable-Free USB extender. We kinda forgot about vaporware until the company threw at us another press release that a real 4-port USB extender will finally hit the street next month. The extender core will be powered by Wisair's UWB MAC, whose maker is a member of the WiMedia Alliance. I guess this kinda means the UWB war is coming to an end as first-tier partners mostly side with WiMedia. Belkin has already made the switch last month to WiMedia standard, but their WUSB hub isn't exactly compliant with USB-IF Certified Wireless USB. Moreover, WiFiNetNews also hinted that Freescale is now downplaying its role in pushing Cable-Free USB (at least on their website).

(c) www.everythingusb.com

Alvarion launches WiFi / WiMAX-enabled BreezeMAX lineup

Being that Intel's gone and released WiMAX / WiFi hybrid chips, it's only right that we start seeing a few svelte pieces of kit hit the mainstream in order to take full advantage. For those of us not lucky enough to board British trains loaded with such niceties, Alvarion is launching a new branch of BreezeMAX products to take advantage of WiMAX where available. Marketed specifically towards carriers looking to "capture additional revenues while moving towards advanced personal broadband services," the BreezeMAX WI2 (along with the BreezeACCESS WI2) purportedly provide a "powerful converged network" that combines the lovability of WiFi with the novelty of WiMAX. Each WI2 setup consists of an outdoor WiFi access point with an integrated power module capable of connecting to various commercial power sources, as well as the ability to sync with the company's backhaul units for "network management" tasks. We're not certain how much coinage Alvarion plans on charging for these integrated units, but each step we take towards worldwide wireless coverage is worth every red cent.

(c) www.engadget.com

Wave Bubble: the portable, undercover FM jammer

There's no better way to celebrate the one hundredth birthday of broadcast radio -- or to completely enrage your sibling by rendering that brand new cellphone useless -- than to craft your very own FM jammer. Branching out from the many other jammers we've already seen, the Wave Bubble touts itself as being a "self-tuning, wide-bandwidth" rig that doesn't require a spectrum analyzer, and can "jam many different frequency bands" all in a pocket-friendly enclosure. Powered by an internal Li-ion cell, this bad boy provides self-tuning via "dual PLL," and you can manually enter new frequencies to vex by simply plugging it into your PC's USB port and inputting the data when prompted. It can purportedly provide up to two hours of jamming on dual bands (such as "cellphones") or four hours on single bands such as "cordless phones, GPS, WiFi, Bluetooth, etc." Additionally, the output power ranges from 0.1-watts (high bands) to 0.3-watts (low bands), and the handy device sports an approximate range of about 20 feet with "well-tuned antennas." Of course, you aren't apt to find this for sale anywhere considering the fit the FCC would undoubtedly throw, but if you consider yourself a master of the DIY craft, be sure to tag the read link for some in-depth pedagogy.

(c) www.engadget.com

Parrot Bluetooth photo frame

WiFi-enabled photo frames are old hat by now, and in line with technological tradition, a new kind of wireless photo frames have arrived to take their rightful place atop the hill. Parrot has unveiled its new Bluetooth photo frames that enable you to transfer photos from your Bluetooth-powered cellphone or digital camera in a flash. Each of these photo frames come with a 3.5" 262k color TFT LCD display in 320 x 234 pixels, a built-in light sensor that turns on the backlight automatically, 32MB of internal memory, and a portrait or landscape position sensor. Too bad it does not come with a memory card slot of any kind, as 100 photos don't just quite make the cut these days. There's no word on pricing details at the moment.

[source: www.ubergizmo.com]