Huge 2005 yu55 Asteroid to Pass Near Earth in November

The near-Earth asteroid 2005 YU55 — on the list of potentially dangerous asteroids — was observed with the Arecibo Telescope's planetary radar on April 19, 2010, when it was about 1.5 million miles from Earth. CREDIT: Arecibo Observatory/Michael Nolan

Mark your calendars for an impressive and upcoming flyby of an asteroid that’s one of the larger potentially perilous space rocks in the heavens – in terms of smacking the Earth in the future.

It’s the case of asteroid 2005 YU55, a round mini-world that is about 1,300 feet (400 meters) in diameter. In early November, this asteroid will approach Earth within a scant 0.85 lunar distances. [Photo of Asteroid 2005 YU55]

Due the object’s size and whisking by so close to Earth, an extensive campaign of radar, visual and infrared observations are being planned.

Asteroid 2005 YU55 was discovered by Spacewatch at the University of Arizona, Tucson’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory on Dec. 28, 2005. En route and headed our way, the cosmic wanderer is another reminder about life here on our sitting duck of a planet

Close and big

“The close Earth approach of 2005 YU55 on Nov. 8, is unusual since it is close and big. On average, one wouldn’t expect an object this big to pass this close but every 30 years,” said Don Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program Office and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. [Photos: Asteroids in Deep Space]

Yeomans said that with new radar capabilities at Goldstone in California — part of NASA’s Deep Space Network — there is a good chance of obtaining radar imaging of 2005 YU55 down to the 5-meter resolution level. Doing so, he said, would mean obtaining higher spatial resolution of the object than that attained by recent spacecraft flyby missions.

“So we like to think of this opportunity as a close flyby mission with Earth as the spacecraft,” Yeomans told SPACE.com. “When combined with ground-based optical and near-infrared observations, the radar data should provide a fairly complete picture of one of the larger potentially hazardous asteroids,” he said.

Asteroid 2005 YU55 is a slow rotator. Because of its size and proximity to Earth, the Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, Mass., has designated the space rock as a “potentially hazardous asteroid.” [5 Reasons to Care About Asteroids]

Dishing it out

“We’re already preparing for the 2005 YU55 flyby,” said Lance Benner, a research scientist at JPL and a specialist on radar imaging of near-Earth objects. He said part of the plan is to observe the asteroid with radar using both the huge Arecibo dish in Puerto Rico and equipment at Goldstone.

“The asteroid will approach from the south, so Goldstone has the first chance to observe it due to its declination coverage,” Benner told SPACE.com.

To help coordinate the observing campaigns, “Radar Observations Planning” websites have been set up for this unusual occasion, Benner said.

“This flyby will be the closest by any near-Earth asteroid with an absolute magnitude this bright since 1976 and until 2028,” Benner added. “Having said that, nobody saw 2010 XC15 during its close flyby within 0.5 lunar distance in 1976,” he said, noting that this asteroid wasn’t discovered until late in 2010.

“Thus, the flyby by 2005 YU55 will be the closest actually observed by something this large, so it represents a unique opportunity,” Benner said. “In a real sense, this will provide imaging resolution comparable to or even better than a spacecraft mission flyby.”

Radar paint

Benner said that because the asteroid is zooming by Earth so very close, radar echoes will be extremely strong. One facility at Goldstone will be used to transmit and “radar paint” the object…another Goldstone dish is on tap to snag the reflected echo of radar data.

What can radar do?

Information collected by this technique, for example, can be transformed into 3-D shapes, with surface features and spin rates identified. The asteroid’s roughness and density can also be assessed. Furthermore, radar can improve the whereabouts of the object. By greatly shrinking uncertainties for newly discovered meandering NEOs, that in turn enables motion prediction for decades to centuries.

As for seeing the asteroid with small telescopes, start getting your gear ready.

Initially, the object will be too close to the sun and too faint for optical observers. But late in the day (Universal Time) on Nov. 8, the solar elongation will grow sufficiently to see it. Early on Nov. 9, the asteroid could reach about 11th magnitude for several hours before it fades as its distance rapidly increases, Benner explained.

Leonard David has been reporting on the space industry for more than five decades. He is past editor-in-chief of the National Space Society's Ad Astra and Space World magazines and has written for SPACE.com since 1999.

Review: AT&T Tilt – HTC TyTN II

If you were to make a list of the most highly anticipated mobile phones of 2007, the iPhone would definitely be at the top. No surprise there, but number two might just be the Tilt. In many ways it can be seen as just another Windows Mobile 6 device, but don’t let the boring name and commonplace OS fool you–people have been looking forward to it for a reason.

The Tilt is the predecessor to another HTC phone, one most recognizable as the Sprint Mogul and the AT&T 8525. Before it found a home at AT&T, the Tilt has a number of different names, like the TyTN II and Kaiser, so you might be more familiar with it than you think.

Tilt closed

Tilt open

Looking at the Tilt we can see that it is a better looking phone than the previous generation and the overall look is much cleaner. The buttons on the device’s face have been changed to a polished finish and the combination of glossy black and a rubberized bottom make for an attractive outside. The top and bottom halves of the phone are able to slide apart from one another revealing a keyboard that is very much like that on the Mogul and a few other HTC devices. The keys are small and slightly domed, and yield one of the better mobile typing experiences available today. The big change of course is that the display, once slid out, can be tilted up for a better viewing experience. The downside to this is that the tilt action is not spring-loaded and when pushed up the display partially blocks the soft buttons. As for size and weight, these are the Tilt’s weakest areas- the phone is 4.4 x 2.3 x 0.73 inches and weighs in at a hefty 6 ounces.

The phone has some other nice frills, like 4 hours of talk time, 8 days of standby, a stereo Bluetooth 2.0, a 3 megapixel camera, and built-in GPS. The best feature though is that the phone has Wi-Fi so web surfing can be done at speed when you are in a hotspot, at home, or in the office. Another nice feature is the 2.8″ 240×320 touchscreen which looks good–though it’s no industry leader– and feels a lot more responsive than that on the older models. It has microSD expansion that can be accessed without opening the device up and includes support for Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 MHz and 3.6 Mbps Tri-band UMTS/HSDPA 850/1900/2100.

With the Tilt, HTC and the carriers that will be using it, wanted to put out a performance Windows Mobile phone for high demand users (the type of people willing to sacrifice some size and weight for performance). As far as being a Windows Mobile device, there is not a lot to say–the Tilt is one of the best implementations of the OS because of it’s design and processing power, but they are not reinventing the wheel here. There was the occasional slowdown (switching from landscape to portrait mode when opening the device should be faster), but overall Windows Mobile runs very well on the device and it is definitely ready for some customization, which can greatly improve usability and aesthetics.

The Tilt is at its best when communicating. It combines very good call quality with quick messaging so whether you’re texting, emailing, or calling it can hold its own against some of the best phones available today. The speaker phone was surprisingly not up to snuff, but this was one of the phone’s only weak points when it came to communicating. It can also be tethered to a notebook and work with the built-in GPS, though performance here was hit and miss. As far as Internet browsing goes, the phone is very solid, thanks to Wi-Fi or a high speed mobile signal, but it is limited by Internet Explorer, which is outclassed by other mobile browsers, like Opera.

call buttons

During testing the Tilt’s battery life came in at a little under five hours of talk time, making this phone the type of all-day business tool that many people will be looking for. Though if you start taking advantage of all the multimedia tools this can have a significant impact.

Overall, the Tilt is one of the better, probably even the best, Windows Mobile phones currently on the market. It gets the proven design of the 8525 and throws in some upgrades to make for a very solid device. You have to be a Windows Mobile fan to really appreciate what is being done here–and Nokia N95 and iPhone owners will have a number of shortcomings to point out– but as Windows Mobile devices go, the Tilt is an appreciable step forward.

As a side note, Joel had a different experience (detailed in the Geek.com Newsletter), but to be fair he prefers the iPhone and the Windows Mobile Standard (non-touch screen) experience over the Professional one that the Tilt provides.

Motorola Droid RAZR (Spyder or Droid HD)

Motorola Droid RAZR (Spyder or Droid HD) – As we in Q4, more devices began to materialize in order to create some noise for the important holiday shopping season. This highly anticipated weekend two Motorola devices that happened to leak at a time. Read on for details and updated information on Xoom Droid RAZR 2.

Motorola Droid RAZR (Spyder or Droid HD)

First we have another aspect of Droid RAZR found by Niley Patel, is located next to me. Niley reports that the phone has a code name Spyder and also referred to as the Droid HD. We’ve seen several times by telephone, but we now have a better idea of ​​the final hardware specifications.

Motorola Droid RAZR specifications include:

* 4.3-inch 960 x 540 QHD AMOLED Super

* Not mentioned dual-core 1.2 GHz processor

* 8 megapixel camera with 1080p video recording and image stabilization

“HD” front camera

* 1 GB of RAM

* Gorilla Glass and Kevlar cover with careless presentation layer

* Support and accessories Webtop Lapdock

* 4G LTE

In general, it seems that the phone is shaping up to be the sister of the new Bionic Droid is released. We have another 4G LTE phones with large screens and dual-core processors. However, the RAZR has led to the first bionic super QHD AMOLED screen and 1.2 GHz processor for faster

Taking into consideration the specifications of this phone, one would expect to land on Verizon in time for the holiday shopping season. Weather is strange, because Verizon has launched the Motorola Droid Bionic, so you can wait a while, because they stretch the release date.

Hands On With the Motorola Droid RAZR

The Motorola Droid RAZR is the most gorgeous Android phone yet, and it definitely lives up to its name. I spent some time playing with the phone and talking to Motorola's engineers about how they got it to be so thin.

The Droid RAZR is one of those phones that feels even better in the hand than it does in pictures. Yes, it's ridiculously thin at 0.28 inches, smooth, and its material textures are a bit strange. My fingers couldn't quite place the feeling of the Kevlar back panel. It feels like plastic, but a little silkier. The 960-by-540, blessedly not-PenTile-format screen is an absolute stunner. It uses Samsung Super AMOLED Plus technology, Motorola said, but it's higher-res than any Samsung phone we've seen so far. The colors looked almost painted on.

This is a big phone, that's for sure, but that's the case with all 4.3-inch-display phones. There's also a considerable bezel around the screen, something Motorola's designers said they were working on reducing in future models. But it's still very handle-able, just because it's so darn thin.

The phone has the usual complement of ports, The top edge has a bulge for the 8-megapixel camera, so that's where Motorola also stuck the USB, HDMI, and headset jacks. On the side, there's a little door revealing the LTE SIM and MicroSD memory card slots. I couldn't find any way to remove the 1,800 mAh battery.

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The phone runs a Moto-rized version of Android 2.3.5, with Motorola's social-networking widgets, a new power manager, and a bunch of extra apps. Stock Android fans won't be impressed, but everything ran apparently smoothly. To tell the truth, I kept stopping to go "ooh, pretty" about the screen. Madden 2012, for instance, was show-stoppingly beautiful. This screen is going to sell a lot of phones.

How's It So Thin?

The Droid RAZR uses a standard 1.2GHz dual-core TI OMAP4 (correction: I was earlier misinformed that it was Qualcomm) processor with separate CDMA and LTE modems, not the single-chip Qualcomm 8960 solution that's coming next year. The need to include a separate LTE chip has been cited by several manufacturers as why they can't get their phones razor-thin yet. So how did Motorola do it?

The company pared away layers and pieces that other phones take for granted, Motorola designers told me. For instance: most phones with removable batteries have a lining around the battery cavity. Not so with the Droid RAZR. Other phones, for instance the iPhone 4S, have their antennas perpendicular to the body of the phone. The Droid RAZR's antennas lie flat.

Using a dual-layer Samsung Super AMOLED Plus display helped save thickness over both LCD displays (because of the lack of a backlight) and standard Super AMOLED (because of a reduced number of process layers.)

The total re-engineering of internal design in the Droid RAZR reminds me a lot of the original RAZR, which at the time of its launch was also a radical experiment in materials design. And like with the original RAZR, we may see the Droid RAZR's advances coming to a family of phones, the designers said. I asked about flip phones; they parried back with "folding phones" and phones that, in some way, start out smaller and become larger. A physically smaller, but still slab-shaped Droid RAZR variant may also be possible.

Droid RAZR With a Side of Ice Cream?

The Droid RAZR comes at a strange time, and in a strange place. It wipes away the Droid Bionic, Motorola's excellent smartphone that the company released just a few weeks ago, but it comes just a few hours before Google—Motorola's parent company—announces Ice Cream Sandwich, the new version of the Android OS, in Hong Kong.

As if to cement Google's support, Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt was sitting near me at the launch. But he didn't get up and didn't say a word.

Motorola spokeswoman Juli Burda said the company had nothing to say about Ice Cream Sandwich. Ditto for Verizon Wireless spokeswoman Brenda Raney. But we'll see if they change their tunes tomorrow.

The Motorola Droid RAZR goes on pre-sale on Oct. 27 for $299 with a two-year contract.

Motorola Droid RAZR Car Dock

Looking for Droid RAZR accessories? Let's start with the excellent car dock. It's sort of your standard kit, with a ball-and-socket mounting assemble that can attach to your windshield, or your dash (with the help of a plasting mounting disc). There's a locking nut to make sure the whole unit stays put while still allowing articulation for that perfect viewing angle. And then it's time to get down to business.

Because the microUSB charging port is on top of the device, you'll slide the phone into the dock sideways, then snap in the bottom edge which is now on the right. It can take a little bit of practice at first because you also have to get the HSMI port to fit just right. (That's all where you see that big hump on the left.)

Once you're plugged in, Motorola's excellent car app takes over. You're greated with options for Navigation, Calling, Voice Search, Music and Main, and each button takes you to car versions of the respective apps, with large, easy-to-press buttons.

We're quite impressed with what Motorola's done here. It's a thoughtless process, which in turn shows the thoughtfulness of those who designed it. Because if you are going to use your phone at all in a vehicle, you need to think about it as little as possible and concentrate on driving.

We've got more pics and examples of the car apps after the break.

Motorola Droid Razr: Verizon’s favorite Android phone?

Report says Verizon Wireless will focus on promoting the Motorola Droid Razr this quarter.

Verizon Wireless will focus on promoting the new Long Term Evolution Android smartphone by Motorola Mobility, the Motorola Droid Razr, according to a report posted by Reuters.

The new Motorola Droid Razr will hit stores this month. A report is claiming that the new Motorola smartphone is Verizon's "favorite" smartphone.

The company’s spokesman has confirmed that the new Razr with the Google Android operating system will receive “tremendous advertising weight” this quarter that will surely attract the wider consumer audience, obviously leaving other Android smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy Nexus and the HTC Rezound as “alternatives” to Motorola’s sexiest Android smartphone to date.

The new Motorola Droid Razr is the thinnest Android smartphone yet, only 7.1 mm and surprisingly thinner than the Samsung Galaxy S II and Apple iPhone 4/iPhone 4S. However, the Droid Razr will offer an “older” Android operating system version, the Android Gingerbread 2.3, making it less attractive to advanced smartphone users.

Samsung’s new smartphone, the Google Galaxy Nexus, is the first Android Ice Cream Sandwich device, and the only smartphone that will offer the “most beautiful” Android version this year. However, Motorola has confirmed that the Droid Razr will get the Android Ice Cream Sandwich update next year — a strategic business decision that will challenge Samsung’s “pure Android” smartphone.

The Motorola Droid Razr, without the “Droid” branding, is also expected to compete against the Galaxy Nexus in other countries including China, countries in Europe and Central and South America.

The Motorola Droid Razr is powered by 1.2GHz dual-core CPU and 1GB of RAM, sports a 4.3-inch Super AMOLED screen with 540 x 960 pixels resolution, can shoot HD photos and videos courtesy of an 8-megapixel primary camera and can also initiate and receive video calls courtesy of the phone’s 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera.

Meanwhile, HTC is also trying its best to compete against Samsung and Motorola. The company’s new smartphone, the HTC Rezound, also created a buzz this week courtesy of the phone’s top of the line 720p HD screen and the free Beats Audio ear buds. Similar to the Motorola Droid Razr, the new HTC Rezound will ship with Android 2.3 Gingerbread — and similar to Motorola’s business strategy, HTC is promising an update to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich “early next year.”

Can the Razr plus Android, and Verizon’s ad blitz, deliver an impressive sales?

This report was originally posted on PopHerald.com as Motorola Droid Razr: Verizon’s favorite Android phone?, under Gadgets and Mobile Category. Source: Reuters Blog.

DROID RAZR Hands-On Demo

The first thing you notice when you have the DROID RAZR in your hand is how light and thin it is. Right now its lighter than the Samsung Galaxy S II Smartphones. It comes with a 4.3 inch Super AMOLED qHD res display that looks awesome and will make those Netflix movies that will stream on here in HD look amazing. This will be the first phone that will support Netflix HD streaming on a smartphone. Its powered by a 1.2 Ghz Dual Core Processor, 1 GB of Ram, 16 GB of built in storage and 16 GB of micro SD Card storage for a total of 32 GB. It also has a 8 megapixel camera, 1080p HD video capture and 4G LTE and runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread with Motorola’s user experience running the show. Its an impressive device all around at first glance and should be a solid competitor in the smartphone market. Check out our hands-on video and pictures below.