Made By Monkeys

Here's a quick video that caught my eye, on the topic of thoroughly testing a product...

As we've said before, 'testing' (or its absence) is a major underlying theme of Made By Monkeys, and test-related posts certainly prove popular. In this vein, I've only just come across the large-scale Research centre, of the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS).

Opened in October 2010, it is an applied research and training facility - built on 90-acres in Chester County, South Carolina - and it provides some spectactular large-scale test opportunities.

"This facility will significantly advance building science by enabling researchers to more fully and accurately evaluate various residential and commercial construction materials and systems," states the IBHS.

Don't try this at home, is the first thing to say, even if you could afford to do it! And I don't like to see him, riskily, trying to break the glass by hand.

But anyhoo, this is a very striking display of the screen improvements from the Apple iPad 1 to the iPad2 - iPad 1 vs iPad 2 strength test

A 1-inch flex test was enough to see off the original iPad screen, but the iPad 2 is made of sterner stuff...

How do we test touch on our LED screens?
By building a Lego robot of course.

Thus begins an interesting video from Kno, looking behind the scenes at the Product Design team of the tablet maker.

The company uses a couple of Logo roots in its "accelerated life test apparatus" to do stylus testing on their touch screens, mimicking the strokes, sweeps and flicks of end-users.

Given all the news about Apple and the performance of its wireless antennas, this is an interesting view behind the scenes of the company's antenna design and test labs.

According to the video, it is the place where Apple engineers and validates all its wireless products. Made up of 17 anechoic chambers, they say it is the only way to accurately measure antenna performance, eliminating the effects of echo...