Washington Research Firm, located in Seattle, Washington, is claiming that one of its scientists was awarded a patent for some of the technology used in Bluetooth back in 1999. The firm is claiming damages for infringement on the use of “simplified high frequency broadband tuner and tuning method.”

The firm is suing Nokia, Samsung and Panasonic claiming that these cell phone makers “have manufactured, used, imported into the United States, sold and offered for sale devices which, or the use of which, infringes at least the ’963′ patent.” …

Panasonic has recently unveiled two new high definition camcorders with some big screen features in tiny packages. The HDC-SD1 and HDC-DX1 are similar camcorders but both record high def in slightly different ways. The HDC-DX1 (pictured on the left) records onto DVD discs, and the HDC-SD1 records onto small (in size not capacity) SDHC memory cards.

The HDC-SD1 has some advantages with recording onto the memory cards by having no moving parts required in order to save the data. It has fewer parts to break, and is more resistant to shock. …

Panasonic has come out with the latest in small AVCHD camcorders which will record High-Def video. The video is recorded onto a 4GB SDHC memory card that can hold between 40 and 90 minutes of video depending on the Mbps that the video is recorded at, and it has a battery that allows continuous recording for up to 65 minutes.

Using the 3CCD sensor the HDC-SD1 camcorder can record in full HD 1080i (1920 x 1080) and provide digital and optical zoom at 12X and 30X, respectively. …