Dell is going green with its new PC, the Studio Hybrid. The desktops are about the size of a college dictionary, which Dell says is about 80-percent smaller than standard desktops. Other green factors include 70-percent less energy used than standard desktops, 30-percent less packing materials used and those packing materials are 95-percent recyclable.

Dell kicked off its online ad campaign for the Studio Hybrid this week. Print ads are also scheduled to run this month. A spokesperson for Dell says the ads won’t fully center around the energy efficient message but more focus will be on the design.

Should the energy efficiency claims and other green factors be the star of the ads as opposed to the new design? Share your opinion.

From: advertising.about.com

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The Philadelphia 76ers signed free agent guard Kareem Rush on Tuesday to help bolster the team’s 3-point shooting.

Terms of the deal were not released.

The 6-foot-6, 215-pound Rush has averaged 6.8 points, 1.8 rebounds and 1.1 assists in 314 games in five NBA seasons.

Last season with the Indiana Pacers, he averaged 8.3 points, a career-best 2.4 rebounds and 1.3 assists in 21.2 minutes per game and shot 39 percent from 3-point range.

"As we continue to build our team, we’re fortunate that we were able to sign a player as talented as Kareem Rush," 76ers general manager Ed Stefanski said in a statement. "We feel his abilities on both ends of the floor and his range as a 3-point shooter will be assets to us this season."

Rush was the 20th overall pick in the 2002 draft by Toronto before his rights were traded to the Los Angeles Lakers. He also played for the Charlotte Bobcats.

From: rss.cnn.com

ST. PAUL, Minn. Mark Parrish’s homecoming didn’t work out. The Minnesota Wild bought out the final three years of the right winger’s contract on Wednesday, ending Parrish’s frustrating return to his hometown market. Parrish cleared waivers and is now an unrestricted free agent.

Wild general manager Doug Risebrough said the 31-year-old Parrish became a salary cap casualty because the club got too close to the ceiling.

“I had to just look at certain scenarios, including his salary versus his performance,” Risebrough said. “I just felt like this is an opportunity to buy somebody out and let the player move on and the team move on.”

After starring at Bloomington Jefferson High School in the Twin Cities area and then at nearby St. Cloud State University, Parrish spent his first seven years in the NHL as a net-crasher who averaged nearly 25 goals per season with the Florida Panthers, New York Islanders and Los Angeles Kings. He signed a five-year deal with Minnesota worth more than $13 million in the summer of 2006, eager to play in front of friends and family.

But he was bothered by injuries and never fully gained the trust of Wild coach Jacques Lemaire, who made Parrish a healthy scratch several times down the stretch last season. Parrish had 16 goals and 14 assists in 66 games after tallying 19 goals and 20 assists in 2006-07.

Parrish served as team captain three times - the Wild rotate that honor on a monthly basis - but was often criticized by Lemaire and Risebrough for uneven and inconsistent performance.

“I can’t say it didn’t work,” said Risebrough, who said he deserved some of the blame because he negotiated Parrish’s contract. “The unfortunate thing is when you have a big signing like that, people are looking at big production. But the team was successful, and Mark was a part of that. We won a division title and Mark was a part of that.”

The Wild were in need of salary cap space for flexibility during the season, and Parrish became the obvious target. According to the Star Tribune of Minneapolis, which first reported Tuesday that Parrish was placed on waivers, the Wild will save slightly less than $2 million against this year’s cap with the buyout. They are on the hook for two-thirds of the final $8.35 million of Parrish’s contract.

Parrish didn’t immediately return a phone call seeking comment Wednesday.

From: seattletimes.nwsource.com

Jan. 13: Gunmen in Basra kill Fayadh al-Moussawi, a senior commander of al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army militia.

March 12: Gunmen kill Sheik Abid al-Haidari, a senior official in al-Sadr’s office in Basra.

Mid-March: Iraqi security forces arrest Amjad Saadi, a senior official in al-Sadr’s office in Sadr City.

April 11: Gunmen kill Riyadh al-Nouri, the director of al-Sadr’s office in Najaf.

Early May: Iraqi security forces arrest Mohammed al-Safi, suspected to be a top Mahdi Army coordinator in Baghdad.

July 18: Gunmen kill Sheik Safaa al-Lami, senior official in al-Sadr’s office in the New Baghdad district of the capital.

From: us.rd.yahoo.com

Meet the workhorse cousin of the Toyota Prius

Kirkland-based Kenworth Truck, a subsidiary of Paccar, plans to begin full production of its T270 and T370 hybrid trucks in early September.

Like the increasingly popular hybrid cars, these vehicles come with an electric motor that assists the main engine during acceleration and can capture the energy produced from braking, storing it in a battery for later use.

Medium-duty trucks are the backbone of the distribution industry. They are used, mostly in city traffic, to deliver anything from furniture to beer, and about 39,000 are operating just in Washington state, according to Kenworth.

Kenworth chief engineer Mike Dozier said hybrids are ideally suited for such delivery fleets, because stop-and-go driving allows the electric motor to operate and recharge its batteries more frequently.

Hybrid motors can also vastly reduce the fuel consumption of trucks with accessories that rely on the engine for power.

An aerial truck equipped with a lift, such as those used by utilities to maintain power lines, can burn 2 gallons of diesel per hour while the engine idles, spewing pollution and noise, said Steve Van Sickle, assistant equipment supervisor with the King County Department of Transportation.

But the Kenworth hybrid truck the department has been trying for the past six months can power its equipment with the electric motor. What’s more, “it eliminates a lot of noise,” making it good for work in residential areas, Van Sickle said.

Businesses, particularly those with distribution fleets, are feeling the pinch of rising fuel prices

Commercial trucks use 14 billion gallons of gasoline and 23 billion gallons of diesel annually, according to a report by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory. The high cost of transporting goods gets passed on to consumers in the form of more expensive merchandise.

The trucking fleet’s environmental cost is also large. Freight trucks accounted for 19 percent of greenhouse-gas emissions by the U.S. transportation sector, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Light-duty trucks, a category that includes SUVs, accounted for an additional 28 percent.

Mindful of increased environmental concerns among consumers and governments, companies such as big-box retailers are adopting strategies to reduce their carbon footprint, said Paccar Vice President Robert Christensen.

From: seattletimes.nwsource.com