Nissan steers toward new smart-car system
To make driving safer, Japanese automaker Nissan Motor Co. is developing a car that swerves back into its lane on its own and features a video system that makes parking a breeze.
“Lane Departure Prevention” combines a camera and computerized devices that control braking for front and rear wheels, nudging the car in the right direction. The feature disengages when you hit the turn signal, so you can change lanes and make turns.
Nissan has a system to make squeezing into parking spots easier. Four cameras in the front, back and on the side-mirrors relay live video.
Images from all sides are shown as they would appear from above, the car displayed as a computer graphic in the middle.
The automaker has yet to decide on when it will offer either system, and rival automakers have similar smart-car features in the works.
Nissan also showed a computerized system that controls the steering of front and rear wheels to stabilize driving when a car switches directions quickly.
Sony, Pizza Hut add a slice to life
Demonstrating a deep understanding of what its computer-gaming audience, Sony has built the ability to order pizza into its latest online multiplayer game.
Type the command “/pizza” while playing Everquest II, a fantasy game with 330,000 active players, and get the Pizza Hut Web site, where you can place orders for delivery.
Chris Kramer, spokesman for Sony Online Entertainment, said he believes this is the first time a game accepts orders for real-world items.
Sony plans to integrate the pizza function more tightly into the game, so players can charge pizza to their monthly game subscription bill.
“The goal for the future is to eventually let people do more things like this,” Kramer said. “They could type /harry potter and get the new Harry Potter book delivered or /star wars and get the new Star Wars DVD.”
Many games incorporate ads and product placements, but such opportunities are limited with fantasy games like Everquest.
Seagate, Hitachi boost hard drives
Two hard-drive makers have expanded the capacities of their 1-inch drives to 6 gigabytes, catering to consumers’ growing appetites for more storage in tiny packages.
The new drives by Seagate Technology LLC and Hitachi Global Storage Technologies put the world’s top two hard-drive manufacturers in head-to-head competition.
Hitachi, which supplies components for Apple Computer Inc.’s iPod mini portable music players, previously made its “Microdrives” with a maximum capacity of 4 GB. Seagate introduced its first line of 1-inch-diameter disk drives last fall in 2.5 GB and 5 GB flavors.