Greenpeace’s latest edition (12th) of their Guide to Greener Electronics still has Nokia at the top with Samsung and Sony Ericsson rounding out the top 3. Holding extremely poor scores, Nintendo, Lenovo, Fujitsu and Microsoft are at the bottom of the 17 company list. While this isn’t meant to be an all out examination of every electronics manufacturer out there, covering the top vendors makes sense as they would contribute directly or indirectly to pollution and environmental damage.

Greenpeace has the latest rankings at their website, and you can download the full report in PDF format as well.

Right after we blogged about the INSTEON I/O Linc Doorbell and Phone Ring Alert Kit, we found out that Smarthome is offering a free shipping weekend special for the 4th of July holiday. Orders over $100 get free shipping.

Use the promo code: ESHIPF when you checkout.

Here’s another cool add-on for your INSTEON home automation system - the I/O Linc Doorbell and Phone Ring Alert Kit. Use this kit to generate a visual alert when the phone or doorbell rings.

This is great for when you’re in a noisy environment - listening to music, working in the backyard/garage, partying. Also great if you’re hearing impaired or have trouble with certain frequencies.

This I/O Linc kit is easy to connect yourself and can be linked to a remote INSTEON-controlled device. Remember too that there is a host of I/O Linc kits available, including rain sensors, garage door control, freeze sensors and more.

Buy now!

More info from the manufacturer
Price: $89.99
(Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting)

Microsoft seem to be filing patents left, right and center these days, and the latest discovery is one that may sound ridiculous at the moment, but it is quite easy to imagine it being common practice in the future - the ‘Magic Wand’. This ‘wand’ doesn’t have quite as many uses as a wizard’s, but does sound pretty handy; it can support connections between various types of technology in your home, whether it be your home cinema or pool cover.

Okay, you say - just another home automation remote control. But wait. This new ‘Wand’ sounds like it could take on a more advanced form of the Nintendo Wii control, whereby accelerometers (like in the high-end Nokia N-series and various other phones), various speed sensors, pre-existing communication frequencies and even by video cameras on the device! Maybe it could be left on a desk and programmed to hide all your games when your boss walks in the room? Let’s hope the patent gets granted!

Patent Filing

Remember the Nokia N-Gage? No? You know, it was that phone made by Nokia and SEGA that people were supposed to be able to play games on like a games console? The point here is it never took off. A bit of de ja vu here - Sony Ericsson and Sony have teamed up in an effort to produce what looks like could be the PlayStation Phone.

So far we’ve seen the Aino - a touch screen gadget that allows media exchange with the PS3 and boasts an impressive 8.1MP camera. There’s another range of similar devices being announced along with this, which does seem to be pointing towards the possibility of a PlaySation Phone. Nice.

How would you like to use less printer ink, thus saving money and helping the environment, and even making your print job go a tad faster? Try out the aptly named Ecofont. Ecofont is essentially a sans serif Verdana font but with lots of white holes in the lettering that you don’t really notice at small print sizes (around a 9 or 10 font size). This results in an up to 20% reduction in ink usage.

You can download Ecofont for free for PC, Mac or Linux.

Only 99% of American teenage boys (12-17) play video games? What happened to the other 1% is what I’d like to know! As for girls, 94% of them play vid games. If you’d like the whole boring report, Pew Research has it on their site.

They were always 3 choices in the operating system market - MacOS, Windows or Linux, with the latter being free but not much good for those who struggled with technology, and the others being quite pricey. Now Google have added Android to the mix, offering a free operating system that (hopefully!) will be easier to use than the Linux base - ironic, isn’t it? Android is built on a Linux operating system and now could possibly replace it.

Android was released in late 2007 as an open source software platform for phones, and contributed to Google’s sector entrance with the G1 which has become quite popular. Google are now hoping to pass on this popularity and familiararity to persuade users to adopt this OS for their computers, and manufacturers are looking to cash in on this to provide low cost laptops with the new operating system without having to resort to XP or a rather more complicated operating system.

Here’s the quick recap for the week:

• Skyhook Wireless has a new positioning service that works via WiFi
• Metal detecting sandals
• IEEE has a video contest to celebrate their 125th anniversary.
• Guitar Hero 5 on its way!.
• Really Easy Reader can help speed up your reading
• Google could add number portability to Google Voice, and Google Voice is opening up to new users.
• The 1.4 HDMI spec is out

Heinz’s new innovation is not a new type of super-bean, but in fact a microwave. Talk about diversification! This particular item was designed by Gordon Andrews and Stephen Frazer who entered a partnership with Heinz to produce this for Heinz’s small ‘Snap Pots’ which would benefit from an ultra-portable microwave to cook them with and rather aptly named it the ‘Beanzawave’.

For the technically gifted of you out there, the device users a range of mobile phone radio frequencies to cook the food on the inside and the outside at the same time and it conforms to all the relevant microwave safety regulations. There are also plans a-foot to power the microwave via rechargeable lithium ion batteries to make it truly portable. Pricing currently stands at £100 (approx. $163) but the manufacturers are looking to drive this down in the long run.