It seems that 2012 is the year of ‘waterproofing’. I find this ironic, since in the movie “2012”, the world is destroyed by a variety of disasters, ending in massive flooding.

Maybe companies are thinking, “Hmm… just in case?”  All jokes aside, we’ve seen some interesting pushes towards waterproofing technology such as P2i’s Aridion technology, and the new waterproof Pantech Element.

Now it seems that both Apple and Samsung might be making a move down this road as well, as both are actively looking into a hi-tech spray that make smartphones waterproof, and such technology could even arrive with the iPhone 5.

Keep in mind that this technology isn’t about deep scuba diving or water-sports, but it is still an innovative way to ensure that you don’t have your phone destroyed by accidental water damage.

I can personally attest to how you useful this could be, since about a year ago my then 1 ½ year old daughter actually did manage to get ahold of my phone and took it to meet the bathroom sink. While I was wise enough to have a replacement plan, having waterproofing like this would have made things a whole lot easier.

In recent demonstrations, a working iPhone and Samsung Galaxy, using this type of coating, were dunked into a bowl of water and were still working even below the surface.

The hi-tech coating will be available ‘pre-sprayed’ on iPods and other Apple devices in the near future it seems. Even if Apple and Samsung don’t officially offer devices that are pre-sprayed, part of the company, Zagg, is to incorporate the HZO coating into custom iPhones next year, and offer pre-treated phones for sale.

So will 2012 be the year of waterproof smartphones and tablets? It certainly looks that way.

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While the Sony PSPgo has only been out for a very short time, it seems that Sony is already itching to refresh the line with a splash of color. A UK market research company recently approached a number of individuals to see if they would be interested in a new color of PSPgo, asking which one they would most likely want to buy.

For the record, the PSPgo is currently available in only the monochromatic options of black or white, so it wouldn’t hurt to have a few more color options thrown into the mix. It is a little disconcerting, however, that Sony is seemingly looking for new ways to bump up sales already. Is the PSPgo really performing that badly?

Looking at the image embedded here, I think the camo green could be a good tie-in to some army-related title and the ocean blue could be pretty popular on its own. The lemon and turquoise hurt my eyes a little though.

Source: Kotaku

I wouldn’t say that the Sony PSPgo completely came out of left field, but it still had a few surprises for us to consider when it was officially unveiled at E3 2009. As it turns out, Sony had been planning to release a PSP without a UMD drive for quite some time. The PSPgo is just the final fruition of that vision.

The biggest kicker is that Sony didn’t suddenly come up with plans to remove the UMD drive in the last six months or so. Instead, they are saying that they had major plans to make a PSP without the UMD drive right from the beginning of the system’s life.

Remember when the original Sony PSP first hit the market? It introduced the UMD drive, but I guess Sony saw that format as a temporary solution. So, they wanted to build “the right environment” for it first, whatever that means. Sony had been working on a PSP sans UMD for the last two years.

Now that digital delivery has become so incredibly popular, thanks largely to the iPhone and the App Store, it only makes sense that the PSP Go is able to grab new games without having to mess with physical media. Sony can cut costs, games can (hopefully) become cheaper, and everyone can win, right?

Source: 1Up