Flash Virtualization Software Unveiled

FlashSoft announced that it has secured $3 million in financing and used that opportunity to come out of hiding and provide a few details about its flash virtualization software, called FlashSoft SE.

The company uses software to enable SSDs and PCIe flash memory devices as server-tier read-write cache and accelerate the overall performance of databases and other applications on servers.

The software addresses a general cost and performance problem in data centers. While flash processes data much faster than hard drives, the cost is often prohibitive. However, Flash virtualization can cut the amount of necessary Flash memory significantly, while increasing the application performance by a factor of four to ten, FlashSoft claims.

Solar Powered 3D Printer Uses Sand to Print

Student creates 3D printer that utilizes the desert's sun and sand to create objects.

Designed by Markus Kayser, this innovative 3D printer utilizes the desert's virtually endless sun and sand to create 3D objects. Dubbed the Solar Sinter, this 3D printer utilizes solar panels to create sustainable energy that harnesses the sun's heat rays to melt the silica in the desert's sand and create 3D objects. Although the objects may not be as precise as a 3D laser printer, the fact that this device creates anything out of the sun and sand is incredible.

Patriot, Super Talent Launch SSDs with SF-220

Both Patriot Memory and Super Talent have launched new SSDs using SandForce's SF-2200 controller.

On Monday Patriot Memory said that it's now shipping the new series of Wildfire SSDs featuring the SandForce SF-2200 controller. This provides the new line with up to 555 MB/s sequential read and up to 520 MB/s sequential write speeds when connected to a SATA 6 Gb/s interface.

"The Patriot Wildfire is the fastest SSD drive we have ever released," says William Lai, Patriot Memory's Product Manager. "Although we are a bit late to market, we wanted to ensure that the technology was rock-solid. We are confident with the latest firmware, Patriot’s reputation for quality and performance stand second-to-none."

Sony Hacker GeoHot Now Working at Facebook

George Hotz, better known in some circles as GeoHot, garnered quite a lot of attention when he was sued by Sony for his PlayStation 3 hack. However, it seems things are going quite well for the 21-year-old now.

Hacker George Hotz is best known for his work in cracking the iPhone and the PS3, but it seems he's now picked up a day job at Facebook. TechUnwrapped reports that Joshua Hill, a member of the Chronic-Dev Team group responsible for iOS jailbreak tool greenpois0n, said during a recent interview that Hotz had declined a challenge to find a bootrom exploit for the iPad 2. Hotz apparently said no because he wanted to keep publicity to a minimum and focus on his day job at Facebook.

VOTW: A Dual-screen Folding Smartphone Tablet

We’ve seen dual-screen tablets from several companies but have we seen a dual-screen, folding phone?

This is a tablet phone prototype from a company called Imerj. The device is an Android 2.3 Gingerbread smartphone that can turn into a 6-inch tablet at a moments notice. When in its smartphone state, the Imerj prototype is about 50 percent thicker than an iPhone. When unfolded, it’s thinner than a Galaxy Tab 10.1 (one of the skinniest tablets available today).

Specswise, you’re looking at two 4-inch WVGA AMOLED displays, a dual-core TI OMAP CPU (clock speed not yet known), 1GB of DDR3 RAM, up to 128GB of storage, and a 1,750mAh battery. No word on pricing and availability just yet, but we’ll let you know if we hear anything.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbhaWn_AWQw&feature=player_embedded