Gadgets 2008

by Nilay Patel, posted Aug 22nd 2008 at 5:34AM
At this point we’ve seen a ton of Dell’s upcoming Inspiron 910 / Mini Inspiron, but until this thing hits the street for real it looks like our pal Mr. Blurrycam has a new favorite target. Here’s the 8.9-inch netbook testing Ubuntu somewhere, with a far less ugly keyboard than last time — maybe next time it’ll sprout some function keys. Two more, including a configuration screen, after the break.

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Filed under: Laptops

If you’d like a limited edition one of a kind watch that will likely cost you a fortune, well then the designer Romain Jerome has one for you.  Actually they specialize in overly expensive watches, however, this one is uniquely expensive.  It’s actually made from rusty old parts pulled directly from the Titanic.  Which means these watches are by no means of a petite nature, they actually are a bit chunky.

They could have easily had an almost steampunk look, but for some reason I don’t really see them fitting into that genre perfectly.  If the watch face had been done a bit differently, it might have easily found its way into that category.  The set had nine different watches and each at an outrageous price.  Likely more due to the origins of the parts than anything else.  Each watch varies a little from the rest, and likely by now they have been snatched up.  If they haven’t though you’ll likely have to jump through a few hoops to get ahold of it.

Source: bornrich

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by Joshua Topolsky, posted Aug 22nd 2008 at 9:19AM
Finally someone has created the perfect lovechild of a laptop and desktop PC. Enter the LLUON A1, a buttery combo that looks as if someone suction-cupped a LCD display to the top of an Eee PC. The system is designed for recreational activities (though likely not hardcore gaming), featuring an Atom N270 CPU, 1GB of RAM, a 160GB hard drive, an 18.4-inch (1680 x 954) display, a handful of ports, and the ubiquitous DVD multi-drive. Right now this is a Korean-only product, and frankly we don’t have a lot of hope that it’s headed anywhere close to our shores in the future, but if you know a good importer — or you’ve got Asian vacation plans — you can probably snap this up pretty soon.

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Filed under: Desktops

Sprint has just lowered their Phone-As-Modem pricing from $50 a month all the way down to $15 a month. Sounds like you are going to see some huge savings, right? Well not so fast, because as you would expect with anything that sounds a little good to be true, there are some conditions that will apply.

To begin with you need to have a Power Vision phone with connection capabilities, which is going to limit your phone choices a bit, but that is not it. In addition to the phone, you also need to be subscribed to another Sprint data plan, such as the Pro Pack that is going for $30 a month. Now instead of the huge savings that you were thinking, you are saving just $5 a month.

Overall its still not a bad deal compared to some of the other carrier plans available, but the whole lowering the price from $50 to $15 seems a little confusing and misleading. The last catch is the same as the regular data plans, which means that the Phone-As-Modem plans are also capped at 5GB of data transfer per month.

Read [RCRWireless]

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Based on previous leaked images we are likely to believe this is the real deal, because after all, isn’t it a rule that these always be blurry and slightly hard to look at. Of course we cannot confirm if these are truly the real deal, but deep down we hope they are.

Based on these images, this model seems a little nicer than the last leaked images, for one it does not seem nearly as shiny and prone to show every little flaw. However the keyboard does seem to be missing a few things, notably the function keys. Keep reading to check out another image of the Inspiron 910, along with another image of the configuration screen…

Via [Engadget]

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Don’t you just hate it when you fall in love with a gadget that’s not available in this country? I’m a big fan of tokidoki, as faithful readers already know, and love my beautiful handbag, jewelry, belt buckle, and other accessories designed by Simone Legno.

But this limited edition tokidoki, PC - exclusive for the Japanese market and which can only be purchased on Fujitsu’s website - is killing me.

Somewhat consoling is the fact that it was created for the “This One’s For The Children of Sichuan” charity auction to benefit children affected by the disastrous earthquake that struck the Sichuan Province of China in May of this year. (An impressive group of artists and vinyl toy companies have come together for the charity auction which will take place online with live auctioneers from Friday, August 21st to Sunday, August 31st.)

We don’t know much about the FMV Loox eco friendly computer, except that it’s beautiful to look at, but if we get specs we’ll pass them on.

Running between the vegetable counters and self-service scales while trying to print out the correct price label for your groceries may soon be a thing of the past. Provided the smart weighing scale graces your local supermarket.

For now, this common shopping irritant of having to remember the number tag for your groceries at the supermarket is out of the lives of some lucky folks in Europe. And that’s attributed to the smart self-service weighing scale, which promises to give these shoppers a unique “weighing experience.”

Developed by researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Information and Data Processing IITB in Karlsruhe, this device can automatically recognize the fruit or vegetable that is placed on it and brings up the most appropriate icons on its touch screen interface for you to print out the price label. How so? The weighing scale is equipped with a supremely intelligent built-in camera that can recognize not only the difference between an apple and a tomato, but say, even different types of tomatoes. Or any other fruit or veggie - even if it is within a cloudy plastic bag! Pretty impressive. The smart scale is currently being tested in supermarkets around Europe.

This is how super-satisfied shoppers are made. And retained.

Via Slashdot.

Tired of all those chargers for all of your gadgets?  Cameras, cell phones, PSPs, laptops, everything has a power cord even if it’s portable.  In a few years that may be a thing of the past (well, maybe more than a few years).  Intel has been researching wireless charging technology and has shown it off for the first time.

Intel’s system uses two metal rings connected by to a power amplifier.  The two rings transmit power to any device close to it.  Sure, it’s not entirely efficient (the numbers seem to say it’s only about 75 percent efficient when transmitting 60 watts two feet), but it given time that could improve.  The Wired article assures that the technology is safe for humans, so that’s a plus.

Imagining the day when all our gadgets could be charged wirelessly, when laptops aren’t bound to the wall when the battery runs out makes me quite happy.  I doubt that day will come very soon, but it’d be nice if it did.

Read [Wired]

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When I’m taking a trip (which looking at my latest credit card bill, might be a rhetorical statement for quite some time), I admit the main factor I consider when picking flights is cost (quickly followed by time of day - no way can I get to an airport before 5AM).

My mom, on the other hand, wants to know everything: how many seats does the plane have, what’s the legroom like in coach, will there be a cafe at the airport that’s open before 5AM (hey, things don’t always go my way…).

Travel obsessives now have all their prayers answered thanks to a new site called Inside Trip, which allows users to compare flights by factors ranging from lost bag rank to seat comfort, giving each trip an overall trip quality rating.

I like to live life on the edge, and find out when I get there (you can’t possibly account for every variable, after all), but for frequent travelers or anyone like my mom who just has to know, this could be a real boon.

Via Geeksugar.

by Darren Murph, posted Aug 21st 2008 at 1:44PMAny halfway dedicated nerd already owns at least one desk fan that’s either USB-powered or features some sort of dual purpose, but if you’re a budding star in the kingdom, this might be the one to get you going. The way-too-loudly-colored Cute Green Desk Cool Fan plugs into any spare USB port, moves a small quantity of air around and doubles as a 4-port USB hub. There’s even an On / Off switch for the fan for those times with stagnancy is preferred. Not too shabby for $14.99 delivered, we say.

[Via Protein OS]

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Filed under: Peripherals