"Unlocked" iPad Won't Work on T-Mobile 3G

When Apple says AT&T exclusive, they mean AT&T exclusive.

In a twist of the knife familiar to iPhone owners, the iPad won't run on T-Mobile's 3G network, even if you put a T-Mobile "Micro SIM" into it.

The reason, as usual, has to do with frequency bands. Apple advertises the iPad as running on UMTS/HSDPA 850/1900/2100 Mhz. T-Mobile's HSDPA network runs on the AWS band, at 1700 Mhz. No AWS band, no T-Mobile 3G.

The iPad will run on T-Mobile's EDGE network, which delivers speeds of about 120-200 kbps/sec. But that's pretty slow for Web browsing, as anyone who's had an iPhone stuck in EDGE mode knows.

Of course, T-Mobile users get the Google Nexus One, which won't work on AT&T's band. Until someone starts building chipsets that support both HSDPA bands - I haven't seen many of those yet - Americans are just going to have to remain used to their one-carrier phones.

Report: Liquid Diamond Flows on Neptune and Uranus

It could be like the 1848 Gold Rush--except for diamond, and on another planet.
Discovery News reports that oceans of liquid diamond, complete with solid diamond icebergs, could be flowing on both Neptune and Uranus. The research, first reported in the journal Nature Physics, found that diamond behaves just like water when freezing or melting, with solid forms floating on top of liquid forms, the report said.

What's interesting about this is that diamond is very difficult to melt. It's very hard, and tends to turn into graphite at very high temperatures. That graphite is what melts in the end, the report said. When researchers liquefied the diamond at super-high pressures similar to those found on Uranus and Neptune, and then reduced the temperature later, solid pieces of diamond began to appear that didn't sink.

Diamond oceans--already theorized numerous times in the past, but even more likely in light of this latest research--could also explain the orientation of Uranus and Neptune's magnetic fields, the report said. We won't know the composition for sure without either sending spacecraft there, or simulating the conditions here on Earth; both of which require oodles of money.

And for the record, I was joking about a new Gold Rush. Because that's all we need: Richard Branson in his SpaceShipTwo flying to Neptune and sticking a flag in its (gaseous) surface.

NASA’s Puffin Is Way Cooler Than a Jetpack

The engineers at NASA have combined every one of our geeky transportation dreams into a single little vehicle called the Puffin.

It takes off like a helicopter and flies like a plane. It can cruise at 140 mph and, with a boost mode, hit about twice that. Oh — and it’s electric.

If that sounds too good to be true, it is — for the moment. But give it time. NASA unveiled the concept today at the American Helicopter Society meeting in San Francisco.

The tilt-rotor Puffin has a flight system similar to the V-22 Osprey, but instead of carrying a bunch of Marines and their gear, the Puffin carries one person in the prone position. The rotors are nearly 7.5 feet in diameter and the aircraft has a wingspan just over 13 feet. Thanks to carbon composite construction, the Puffin weighs in at less than 400 pounds including the lithium phosphate batteries.

The Puffin is designed to stand on its tail, which serves as the landing gear (check out the video). Once the Puffin transitions to horizontal flight, the pilot can cruise at more than 140 miles per hour. Hit the boost mode and this bird will do nearly 300 mph. The projected range is 50 miles on a charge. Yeah, that’s not much, but using electricity means the Puffin’s powerplant won’t be limited by air density. NASA says it should be able to climb under full power to around 30,000 feet before the battery pack would be depleted enough to require coming back down.

So why call it the Puffin?

“If you’ve ever seen a puffin on the ground, it looks very awkward, with wings too small to fly, and that’s exactly what our vehicle looks like,” Mark Moore, an aerospace engineer at NASA Langley Research Center, told Scientific American. “But it’s also apparently called the most environmentally friendly bird because it hides its poop, and we’re environmentally friendly because we have essentially no emissions. Also, puffins tend to live in solitude, only ever coming together on land to mate, and ours is a one-person vehicle.”

No word on when the Puffin will make its first manned flight, though NASA plans to finish a one-third size demonstrator by March and see how well it transitions from cruising to hovering. But it’s safe to say that if this bird flies — and that’s a very big if — we’ll no longer be dreaming of having our own jetpack.