Mercedes-Benz SLK gets Magic Sky Control roof, turns transparent at the touch of a button

Put down those iPads, Mercedes owners, and look to the sky. There's a word of wonder up there and, if you had yourself an SLK with the Magic Sky Control vario-roof, you could be looking at it. Well, of course, you could already be looking at the sky if you had an SLK because, you know, it's a convertible. But, let's say you want to do it without actually having to experience nature. Now we're talking. The vario-roof is a glass panel in the center of the SLK's retractable hardtop and now, if you tick the 2000 euro ($2,800) Magic Sky Control option, you can control that sky, tinting the glass panel at will by re-aligning the light-blocking crystals embedded within. It's like a big pixel on an LCD with the whole sun as your backlight.

Parrot Minikit Smart windshield mount cradles your phone, caresses its Bluetooth, charges its battery

Technology has made life so much easier for us. Here is another device that will solve all of your smartphone car problems in one go. Smartphones make great navigation devices (where still allowed by law), but trying to read the things while they slide about on the dash or peek out of a cupholder is hardly ideal. Universal windshield holders help, but none are as smart as the Parrot's latest. How smart is it? Why, it's right there in the title. The Minikit Smart will hold smartphones "whatever their size" -- so long as that size is between 56 and 70mm in width. It has an integrated speaker and telescoping microphone that connects to your phone over Bluetooth, boosting your celly's paltry internal speaker so that you can better hear directions and, of course, make hands-free calls. There's also a USB pass-through, so that you can not only charge this unit while driving but charge your phone.

Blekko enters the search business - Is Google untouchable?

Google is no doubt a giant in the internet business. So much so that it is slowly spreading into each and everything that we do online. Yet Google's core business still remains its search engine. In years that have gone by, many people have come up dethrone the giant and have failed. Here is an interesting article I would like you to read about another company that is challenging Google's search business by offering a somewhat competitive product and a nice new way to search. So will Google budge? Read on.

So long, stethoscope: the future of medicine is wireless

The future of medicine is wireless. That’s what cardiologist and geneticist Eric Topol says in a new video, where he explains how we’ll soon use our smartphones to monitor our vital signs and chronic conditions.

Speaking at TEDMED 2009 in San Diego, Calif., Topol highlights several smart, connected wireless devices that can be used in medicine today. The goal? Keep more of us out of hospital beds and on our feet. Hit read more for details.

Video : Google rolls out NFC-equipped Places business kits

The company's embedded near-field communications chips into each and every one of these "Recommended on Google Places" window stickers, which you'll be able to trigger with a shiny new Nexus S -- just hold your handset up to the black dot, and voila, your phone gets a "tag." Google's now distributing the signs on a trial basis to Portland, Oregon businesses as part of a larger Google Places kit, though it doesn't explain how (or if) they'll be able to program the chips. Find the sign-up form at our more coverage link, or watch a Nexus S doing its thing after the break.

LG commits to upgrading Optimus Ones to Gingerbread

Well, we've got to hand it to LG for quickly doing the right thing here by keeping people informed and ultimately making the best decision for its customers. Just two days after a Facebook spat that suggested the Optimus series of midrange Android handsets wouldn't be getting Android 2.3 Gingerbread thanks to a seemingly made-up 1GHz processor requirement, they've reversed the decision, saying that "all" of the models that fall under the Optimus One guise (presumably including the Vortex,Optimus T, Optimus S, Optimus M, and Optimus U) would be getting upgraded. Here's the full statement:

"LG will upgrade all Optimus One smartphones currently using the Froyo OS to the next version of the Android OS, Gingerbread. Details of the upgrade schedule will be announced locally in due course. We sincerely apologize for the confusion and misunderstanding that was caused regarding this issue."

Windows Phone 7 in trouble?

 There are no official data in public domain on sales of Windows Phone 7 yet. As you might remember, when the iPhone is launched, within weeks you tart getting figures of the high number of sales the phones generate. Sometimes even in days. No such data is avaiable for Windows Phone 7 (WP7 from now on). Does this mean that the platform is in trouble? Well not really but it does have some indications. Hit read more for details.

Video : Google Chrome OS gets detailed, first laptops from Acer and Samsung coming mid-2011

Google demoed Chrome OS running on a piece of reference hardware at its event in San Fransisco. It just takes four steps and less than a minute to set up a brand-new Chrome OS machine -- it pulls all your Chrome themes and settings from the cloud, so it's ready to go almost right away, and changes can propagate in less than a second in some cases. The reference machine demoed was able to come back up from sleep almost instantly -- Google says the limiting factor is actually how fast the user can move their hand. Hit read more for the complete article.

Video : BMW UNVEILS 1 SERIES M COUPE

BMW won’t officially spill the beans about its upcoming 1 Series M Coupe until later tonight, but the automaker has released one final, detailed video showing the high-performance two-door on the road and fully undisguised.

Samsung first undecided, Now ready for Gingerbread updates on the Galaxy S line!

We all know the Nexus S is basically a Galaxy S in Gingerbread disguise, you'd think Samsung would be bursting at the seams to offer a software upgrade for all the phones it's already sold from that family. Well, Pocket-lint prodded Samsung on just that point and managed to finagle the following response from a local UK contact presumably speaking on behalf of the mothership:

"In case a new version of Android operating system is publicly announced and released, Samsung will review the possibility of implementation of such new version to the existing Samsung products with Android operating system ("Update").

Such a review will be based on various factors including, without limitation, the overall effect of such Update to Samsung products, the system requirements, the structural limitations, and the level of cooperation from the component suppliers and the software licensors".

Hit read more for the complete post.