摘要：
最新型的可穿着电脑产品在外观方面与普通衣物几乎没有什么两样，而售价的降低和功能的丰富也许会使它成为未来人类不可或缺的工具之一。
The latest generation of these ever-smarter
garments look like ordinary clothes, assembled together with
Velcro that conducts electricity, these pieces form a bag that
looks, feels, and weighs like your typical leather purse.
你能否想象一台仅仅4英寸大小的电脑？用户可以方便地随身携带，重量与一件普通的皮夹克差不多。它，就是“可穿着式电脑”。最新型的可穿着电脑产品在外观方面与普通衣物几乎没有什么两样，而售价的降低和功能的丰富也许会使它成为未来人类不可或缺的工具之一。
据美国《商业周刊》3月8日报道，这种“小家伙”可以帮助用户通过无线方式与主人的其他财物保持联系，并随时随地提醒用户一些生活细节。当用户离开房间的时候，它会乖巧地提醒主人不要忘记携带钱包；在主人出行时，它会自动查询天气预报，帮助主人做到未雨绸缪；它甚至还可以在主人穿着的围脖中加入喜欢的歌曲。
的确，这些高科技的电脑更多情况下只能出现在科幻小说的情节当中。不过，根据市场调查机构IDC提供的预测数据，下一代“可穿着式电脑”产品在未来几年中将成为市场上的常见商品。IDC预测，这种高科技产品的销量，包括电脑钱包、电脑手表、电脑T恤，将从去年的26万台提高到2008年的139万台。
高科技电脑产品的背后都有着坚实的技术支柱。过去两年中，美国杜邦公司发明了一种新型的纤维材质，名为Aracon。这种材料具有超高强度并可导电，最重要的是，它可以被任意地折叠并制作成衣服。芯片制造商英飞凌（Infineon）公司也开发了一款专门用于可穿着电脑产品的芯片包，这种芯片包可以在衣物电脑被水洗的过程中保护芯片的安全。
与上一代昂贵的可穿着电脑不同，新型产品在售价方面更加廉价。IDC预计，在未来两到三年内，可穿着电脑的平均售价将降至每台150美元。这个价格已接近普通皮夹克的售价，为产品的普及奠定了坚实的基础。
目前，这种产品已被应用于医疗服务领域。美国经营健康产品的Apex公司计划在本月晚些时候，将这种可穿着式电脑应用于帮助用户减肥方面，此款产品可随时计算出用户所消耗的热量并科学地调节减肥者的膳食结构；加州一些医学院及制药公司则将可穿着电脑应用于病人实时监控方面，以便让医生随时观察病人的心跳、血压、呼吸等数据。
随着可穿着电脑产品的广泛应用，也许再过几年电影《星球大战》中描述的那种科学世界将真正来临。
（李远）
Gauri Nanda sees a
wearable computer as a...handbag -- one that's built out of
four-inch squares and triangles of fabric, with tiny computer
chips embedded in it.
Assembled together with
Velcro that conducts electricity, these pieces form a bag that
looks, feels, and weighs like your typical leather purse.
That's where the
similarities end: This bag can wirelessly keep tabs on your
belongings and remind you, just as you're about to leave the
house, to take your wallet. It can review the weather report and
suggest that you grab an umbrella -- or your sunshades. This purse
can even upload your favorite songs onto your scarf.
Sure, a computing purse
and scarf set may seem like the stuff of science fiction. But
these devices, part of next generation of wearable computers,
could become commonplace within a few years. Unit shipments of
such wearable computers -- purses, watches, shirts -- should rise
from 261,000 last year to 1.39 million in 2008, according to the
tech research firm IDC.
Powering this market are
advancements in design and in fabric-embedded electronics. Over
the last two years, DuPont (DD ) created new fibers called Aracon,
made of Kevlar, that are superstrong, can conduct electricity, and
can be woven into ordinary-looking clothes. And chipmaker Infineon
(IFX ) developed chip packaging allowing wearable computers to be
washed, even in the heavy-duty cycle.
As a result, these new
wearables are a far cry from the clunky and downright silly
versions of the recent past, which often required users to be
wrapped in wires, type on their stomachs, and sport an unseemly
display on their foreheads. "Cyborg computing was very
clunky, very bulky machines that people didn't want to carry
around," says Nanda, a researcher at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass. "Our bags feel
and look like bags."
Unlike their
predecessors, these new wearable computers also make economic
sense. When her bag becomes commercially available in two to three
years, Nanda expects it will cost around $150, which is the price
of an average leather purse. Only "it's fun, you can rip
apart and put together a computer," she says.
Here's how the bag works:
You place a special radio-signal-transmitting chip onto your
wallet. A similar radio in your purse picks up the signal and
notifies you that you've forgotten to take your wallet. In turn,
sensors on your purse's handles will notify the computer that
you've picked up the purse and are ready to go.
Such unobtrusive,
inconspicuous, and fun devices should grab more than 80% of the
total wearable computing market by 2008, while cyborgian wearable
PCs will remain a niche, says IDC analyst Kevin Burden. Already,
these new kinds of wearables are being adopted for use in markets
like auto repair, emergency services, medical monitoring -- and
even, increasingly, for consumers at large.
Wearables are also slowly
making their way into the auto-repair market. A company called
Microvision (MVIS ) recently introduced its Nomad head-mounted
display. It covers one eye, but it's see-through, allowing auto
technicians to examine the innards of a car and check them against
on-screen computer drawings at the same time. It comes as a
baseball cap clip-on, to be more unobtrusive.
So far, it's a hit: At
Jim Fisher Volvo dealership in Portland, Ore., which has been
testing the system for about seven months, productivity of
technicians went up 10% to 20%, says Service Manager John Prosser.
Better yet, customers talking to technicians who are wearing these
contraptions also are more likely to agree to repairs, pushing
revenue up 15% to 18%. Says Prosser: "This makes
[technicians] want to get involved and to cross this bridge of
reluctance" in using a new technology.
Indeed, many more people
will want to cross that bridge in the coming years -- making for a
booming market for wearable computers that don't look like
something out of an old Star Trek episode.
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