Xiaomi’s Black Shark 2 gaming phone packs a pressure-sensitive display

Posted on 19/03/2019 by Engadget RSS Feed

Xiaomi released its third gaming phone today, the Black Shark 2, and this time around, it's using a pressure-sensitive display to cram in even more controls. Not only does the phone have an in-display fingerprint sensor by Samsung, the pressure-sensi...

Seaboard Musical Instrument Has Truly Pressure Sensitive Keys: Piano 3.0

Posted on 10/03/2013 by Lambert Varias

…if you know how to play the piano or any other chordophone you might be thinking, “All keyboards are pressure sensitive!” Which is true: the harder you strike a key on a piano, the louder the sound it makes. But the Seaboard’s keys not only let you control volume, they also let you alter a key’s pitch and timbre. In other words, you can make it sound like a string instrument even though you’re playing on keys.

roli seaboard

The Seaboard was invented by Roland Lamb. It’s one of the first applications of Lamb’s SEA (Sensory, Elastic and Adaptive) Interface, a “three-dimensional pressure-sensing” interface. The best thing about the Seaboard is that you don’t have to know how this fancy technology works because it’s very intuitive to operate:

Dougal Shaw of BBC News recently talked with Lamb about the Seaboard (there’s a copy of this video on YouTube as well):

Lamb’s company Roli will soon be offering the first edition of the Seaboard called the Grand. Only 88 units will be sold, each named after a note on a keyboard. I also wouldn’t be surprised if each one cost 88 grand. It seems that the instrument will also come with a complementary program called SoundDial. Pre-orders for the Seaboard Grand will begin on April; you can register on Roli’s website if you want to be notified about the Grand’s availability.

[via Roli & BBC via Reddit]

Delta Six controller brings fragging to life, worries your friends

Posted on 04/10/2012 by Jamie Rigg

Chances are you know someone who takes their CoD a little too seriously -- well, this peripheral is for them. The Delta Six controller is the latest brainchild of Avenger inventor David Kotkin, made to please hardcore FPS gamers with immersive and responsive input. A built-in accelerometer is used for aiming, while the faux recoil and acting out a reload will put you closer to real combat than an appearance on Stars Earn Stripes. The hardware also features a scattering of pressure sensors -- allowing you, for example, to bring up the sights by meeting cheek with gun body, or if you're feeling lazy, squeezing the side of it instead. Depending on your class bias, you can add and retract plastic from the main frame for an SMG, assault or sniper rifle form factor (see below for the gist). There's no word on availability, or if it will actually improve your game, but the price is slated as $89 at launch. After the break is a short product demo in video form, although we suggest you skip straight to 1:30 to avoid the awkward live-action CTF scene.

Continue reading Delta Six controller brings fragging to life, worries your friends

Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals

Delta Six controller brings fragging to life, worries your friends originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 04 Oct 2012 04:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ten One ships $80 Pogo Connect, a pressure-sensitive Bluetooth 4.0 stylus for iPad

Posted on 01/10/2012 by Nicole Lee

While there are many third-party capacitive pens for the iPad on the market, none are as precise as pressure-sensitive models like the ones Samsung Galaxy Note aficionados have enjoyed for some time. Enter the Pogo Connect, which is described as the world's first pressure-sensitive Bluetooth 4.0 iPad stylus. Brought to you by Ten One Design, the Pogo Connect was originally codenamed "Project Blue Tiger" back in March. The benefits of Bluetooth seem to be key here, as it offers full pressure sensitivity thanks to a "Crescendo Sensor" technology that works at multiple angles and without calibration. You also get palm rejection capabilities so the page doesn't get smudged from your hand resting on the surface. The pen has a removable magnetic tip, leaving room for interchangeable tips in the future.

There's also an LED status light, an integrated radio transmitter to let you know its location in case you lose it, and it runs on a single AAA battery. Be aware that the Connect is only compatible with around 16 apps for now -- they include Brushes, SketchBook Pro, Paper by FiftyThree, and PDFPen -- but Ten One hopes to add to the list over time. You can pre-order one now for $79.95, and if you're one of the first 2,000 to do so, you'll get a special edition pen with a laser-engraved tiger. Those intrigued can get a peek at the company's promo video as well as the PR after the break.

Continue reading Ten One ships $80 Pogo Connect, a pressure-sensitive Bluetooth 4.0 stylus for iPad

Filed under: Peripherals, Tablets

Ten One ships $80 Pogo Connect, a pressure-sensitive Bluetooth 4.0 stylus for iPad originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 01 Oct 2012 18:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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PressurePen goes up for pre-order, is expected to ship in November

Posted on 18/09/2012 by Edgar Alvarez

With its recent Kickstarter success now in the history books, it's time for that open-sourced PressurePen to offer its stylus services to folks who missed out on the crowd-funded party. Luckily for those people, though, the pressure-sensitive instrument is now available for pre-order straight from the creator's site, so they, too, can snag one for themselves. The PressurePen starts off at a not-too-shabby $30 for the "kit" only, which doesn't include the plastic shell but is perfect for savvy tinkerers; meanwhile, the PressurePen with Stylus bundle costs $60, or $20 more if you'd like two additional tips. Units are expected to start shipping at some point in November, but better hurry as the company's saying there are only "a limited number available at this price."

Filed under: Misc, Peripherals, Tablets

PressurePen goes up for pre-order, is expected to ship in November originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Sep 2012 02:38:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pressure-sensing PC technology knows when you’re busy, blocks notifications accordingly

Posted on 14/09/2012 by Jamie Rigg

We know better than most that when you're working to a deadline, constant pop-ups, notifications and pings can be a real pain. Our frustrations might soon become a thing of the past, however, with some help from boffins at the Graduate University for Advanced Studies in Japan. They are working on technology which monitors keyboard pressure and silences those distractions until it deems you're not busy, showing over 80 percent accuracy during volunteer testing. Understanding that quiet time is also appreciated for other tasks, they plan to use similar techniques to spot when you're staring intently at that report or -- more importantly -- attending to a beverage. It's still early days for the project, but if the stress-saving tech ever spawns a product, we'll take two please.

[Image Credit: Getty Images / Jean Louis Batt]

Filed under: Desktops, Laptops, Software

Pressure-sensing PC technology knows when you're busy, blocks notifications accordingly originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pogo Connect iPad Pressure Sensitive Stylus Price and Release Date Announced

Posted on 05/09/2012 by Range

Styluses aren’t just for Samsung devices, there are plenty available for iPads and iPhones. While most of them are pretty crappy, the most interesting are the ones that can connect to your iPad via Bluetooth and convey pressure sensitive information.

pogo connect lap stylus ipad drawing

Ten One Design’s Pogo Connect will start shipping this October. You’ll get months of battery life from a single AAA battery, and thanks to Bluetooth 4.0, there’s no need to turn it off. It uses solid state pressure sensing, offering hundreds of levels of sensitivity with no moving parts. Unfortunately, the stylus still has to have a relatively fat 7mm tip in order to work with the iPad’s capacitive screen.

If you don’t have the new iPad, there will be an app available that will allow you to make the Pogo Connect work with the iPad 1 and 2 as well – but this requires access to an iPhone 4S (or the upcoming new iPhone 5) to act as a Bluetooth 4.0 bridge. The Connect relies on third-party app makers to build support for it, as Apple doesn’t offer any system-level protocol for dealing with pressure sensitivity over Bluetooth. However, there are already a number of apps, including Paper, Procreate and Sketchbook Pro, which will be compatible with it.

pogo connect stylus ipad drawing

The stylus retails for $79.95(USD), and if you’re one of the first 2,000 pre-orders, then you’ll get custom laser engraving on the pen as well.

pogo connect stylus ipad drawing paper

[via TechCrunch]

Samsung Galaxy Note II getting redesigned S Pen with rubber tip, improved grip

Posted on 29/08/2012 by Dana Wollman

Samsung Galaxy Note II getting redesigned S Pen with rubber tip, improved grip, same 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity

Today at its IFA 2012 press conference, Samsung confirmed that the newly announced Galaxy Note II will make use of a new, redesigned S Pen. In addition to boasting an improved 8mm grip, it has a rubber tip. It also recognizes 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity, which is already true of the Galaxy Note 10.1 tablet. Other than that, Samsung hasn't shared much in the way of specifics, but if you'd like to see video of the new Note in action, we can at least offer that.

Filed under: Tablets

Samsung Galaxy Note II getting redesigned S Pen with rubber tip, improved grip originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 29 Aug 2012 13:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Synaptics spills more details on ForcePad, a pressure-sensitive trackpad coming to laptops in 2013

Posted on 20/08/2012 by Dana Wollman

We spend an awful lot of time in laptop reviews railing against modern trackpads -- you know, the ones that mistake left clicks for right ones, or have a really stiff button mechanism. Well, it looks like relief might be on the way. Synaptics (easily the largest touchpad maker of 'em all) just spilled more details on ForcePad, a pressure-sensitive pad that responds differently depending on how much you bear down with your fingers. Before we get into possible use cases, though, it's important to clarify this: there is no mechanical touch button, meaning those stiff hinges we've been complaining about should be moot. Rather, if you want to "left click" or "right click" you'll need to push against the pad with your finger. When you do this, you'll get the littlest bit of tactile feedback, along with a sound effect. (You can turn those off.)

All told, the pad responds to up to 1,000 grams of pressure, and recognizes 64 different levels of sensitivity. As you can imagine, this feature is likely to come in handy with drawing apps, but Synaptics also imagines it being used in gaming. With scrolling, too, you can page through documents quickly or slowly, depending on how hard you press the trackpad. Additionally, the pad recognizes up to five fingers at once, and can tell when you're applying more pressure with one finger than another. For now, Synaptics won't name any future products that will use this technology, so don't put any stock in that Lenovo machine used in the first demo video below -- it's just a U300s retrofitted with a ForcePad. But, a company rep did say we'd start seeing ForcePad-enabled laptops at CES in January, so expect lots of notebook news then.

Gallery: Synaptics ForcePad