Thanks, Merry Christmas and good luck, now please vote for the coolest.

The Datamancer Aviator Keyboard

If you’re a fan of steampunk styled gadgets, then check out this cool keyboard, the Datamancer Aviator Keyboard.

This stunning looking keyboard comes with a brushed aluminum frame, a black felt face plate, and a bunch or jewel LEDs in blue, red, voilet, green or amber.

The full post can be found on Geeky Gadgets.

Star Wars Milennium Falcon Sled

Let’s face it, the average overly enthusiastic Star Wars fan is
probably more at home in front of his or her favorite trilogy than
they are on the slopes. So what to do when one’s friends head out for
a delightful day on the mountain? Pack in your Milennium Falcon sled
and let the good times roll. Sledding requires almost no physical
coordination beyond that which can be developed via video games.

The full post can be found on The UberReview.

Pong watch

For years we’ve all been telling the time in the same way. Now we have the Pong watch.

The full post can be found on Decide What to Buy.

Social Networking with USB Poke

Set to revolutionise the way social networkers…er, socialise, this keyring-friendly USB device lets you swap contact details instantly. Simply pull out your Poken and ‘high five’ it with your new best friend’s. Clever RF technology then zaps the info between the devices, so next time you log on to your favourite site, your profiles are linked. Genius!

The full post can be found on RGS.

R2D2 USB Hub

Instead of having a plain old box connected to your computer with a bunch of extra USB ports on it, why not have this cool looking USB hub in the shape of everyone’s favourite droid. Plug him into your computer and when you connect a USB device into him, he’ll come to life and bleep/chirp just like in the movies!

The full post can be found on Zath.

Anti-Grav R/C Wall Racing Car

Can an R/C car really impress nowadays? Yes, it
definitely can. The Anti-Grav R/C Wall Racing Car races up walls. No
special effects or camera tricks, just physics: the car generates a
powerful vacuum underneath causing it to cling to any flat surface. Up
up and away!

The full post can be found on Everything below $29.99.

Philips Prestigo Universal Remote Control

Philips Prestigo SRT9320 universal remote control is nothing short of beautiful. At the top end is a 2.8-inch color touchscreen with all your channels, logos and all. On the bottom end is a variety of hard keys that control every function. The SRT9320 is fully programmable without connecting to a PC–it comes with a USB connect for firmware updates–though CNET reports its much easier to use the PC for “multidevice macros”. The Prestigo can control up to 20 different devices so I can see how a computer connection might simplify things here. Available in the first quarter of 2009, Philips Prestigo SRT9320 will set you back $249.

The full post can be found on TV Snob.

The Vibrating Alarm Clock Pillow

The vibrating alarm clock pillow is a gentle means by which to be awoken in the morning. Why get startled by the buzzer of a traditional alarm clock when you can wake up to a soothing vibration. Not only will it save your nerves, it will also allow your partner to sleep undisturbed.

The full post can be found on Coated dot Com.

GAMEROX Gaming Chair For Children By Tim Briggs

This GAMEROX chair aims to deliver health benefits to children stimulating better circulation, movement and exercise and is suitable for 7-12 age groups and can load a maximum weight of 175lbs. The chair is virtually covered by cushions and allows a flexible movement. The sitting position reminds me of horse riding. The coolest thing about this chair is that it stimulates not only correct sitting position but is also good for core stability and muscle training. The base of the chair remains stationary ensuring the safety of the gamer

The full post can be found on Elite Choice.

Noggin Nets: MP3 Enabled Beanies

LimbGear offers you ‘mp3 enabled apparel and accessories’. Those looking for a change when it comes to looking great and still being able to listen to their music would absolutely dig this collection. The latest by LimbGear is an mp3-enable beanie cap that they call a Noggin Net. Just one letter away from being an extremely kissable piece of clothing, the Noggin Net has a slit inside that can hold your mp3 player and space to shove your earphones in.

The full post can be found on Trends Updates.

iMu Vibrating Speaker: Turn anything into a sound system

The iMu vibrating speaker will transform any flat, hard surface into a top notch audio speaker.You can listen to your beats from things like tops of household appliances, cupboards and even car bonnets. It works thanks to a unique US Navy-developed composite called Terfenol-D.

The full post can be found on Gaj-It.

Thanks again to all the sites for their submissions now over to you guys for voting (don’t forget to leave a comment with your reason for a chance to win a $50 Amazon voucher) and tell a friend about this contest to possibly win another $50:

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If you write for a gadget themed blog and wish to be included in next weeks contest check out the CGOTW instructions page.

I have been a noted critic of Nintendo's lackluster DS Lite update, the DSi, but that was before I discovered that the built-in music and sound app comes replete with a virtual parakeet who will intermittently chirp and tweet back your own voice as you idle upon the menu. Now I want one.

Although it must be mentioned that Humbert was not fooled, responding to the video only with a theatrical yawn and then the sudden evacuation of his bowels. On the other hand, this video? Drove him absolutely bazonkers.

(Thanks, Brandon!)

Sprint won't let Nextel iDEN network chirp its last chirp, plans rejuvenation effort originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 31 Oct 2008 08:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Six iPhones. Two high-def Sony camcorders. The Sony X505 laptop.

These are a few things that weigh less than the power brick for the Lenovo ThinkPad W700, the most massive laptop Lenovo's ever made and, outside of the rarified world of ultra-loaded gaming notebooks, possibly the largest and most expensive laptop on the market.

To call the W700 big is an understatement of epic proportions. This over-nine-pound monster is loaded in every way you can imagine and a few you probably can't. Two laptop "firsts" are already making waves. For starters you'll find a stylus secreted in the base of the W700: This is not for use on the LCD — the W700 is not a tablet PC — but for a pint-sized Wacom digitizer that has been added next to the mouse pad. The digitizer works like a drawing tablet, an absolute-positioning system that lets you draw freehand instead of pushing a cursor around with your finger.

Feature #2 is built-in color calibration. A sensor about the size of a fingerprint reader resides above said digitizer, and software is pre-installed to quickly adjust the color settings of the LCD to photo-grade standards. Just start the software, close the lid, and wait for the chirp. Settings are tweaked automatically, and the before vs. after images are striking in the effect the calibration has.

Though groundbreaking, these two features actually don't much impact the price of the W700, adding just $150 to a laptop that costs — wait for it — $4,473. (That's the price tag for our review untit. You can drive the price up higher with pricier components if you wish.) It's all those other specs that add to the price tag: A gorgeous LCD that's by far the brightest 17-inch model we've ever tested. Core 2 Duo CPU running at a blistering 2.8GHz. 4GB of RAM (and 64-bit Vista installed, so you can actually access it all). Dual hard drives (though our unit had relatively small 160GB drives installed). And finally, an Nvidia Quatro FX 3700M graphics card with 1GB of video RAM. All this goodness powers the W700 to record-setting benchmarks, blowing away all comers at general apps (though not quite offering the highest gaming scores we've seen).

The stratospheric price tag ensures the W700 will likely only find a home in the high-test worlds of CAD, 3D imaging, and professional photo editing. The rest of us will simply have to appreciate the thing from afar... and wait for its features to trickle down to cheaper, smaller machines.  —Christopher Null

WIRED Digitizer and color calibrator set a new bar for features in a notebook. Top notch performance all around. Unbeatable screen brightness at this size.

TIRED Seems bigger than it needs to be: Lid is 20 inches diagonally to fit a 17 inch screen. 87 minutes of battery life is 84 more than the W700 will ever spend on and unplugged. DVD playback stuttered and ultimately crashed the system during our tests. Keyboard not up to usual Thinkpad standards. Blarring loud fan.

$4,473 (as tested), thinkpad.com

(Image by Lenovo)

At first I thought this system may have used a camera that watched the movement of an object and sent mouse like coordinates based on the movement. Turns out that after having a look at the patent the NaviSense system uses ultrasonic technology to track your finger. It looks very impressive but I would have to use it to be convinced.

"The iPoint™ is a small motion sensing mouse device which mounts to the keyboard or computer. Alternatively, the device can be integrated within laptops or notebooks. A user typing at the keyboard raises a solitary finger thereby gaining control of the cursor on the display. The cursor moves in accordance with the movement of the user’s finger. A first finger movement acquires navigation control of the cursor, and a second finger movement activates single and double click behavior. An ultrasonic sensor device for short-range detection, comprising: a pulse shaper for producing an ultrasonic chirp signal with an amplitude modulated region and a frequency modulated region; at least one transmit sensor operatively coupled to the pulse shaper for transmitting the ultrasonic chirp signal, the ultrasonic chirp signal intended for reflecting off a finger to produce a reflected chirp signal; at least one receive sensor for receiving the reflected chirp signal; a phase detector for identifying a relative phase of the reflected chirp signal from the frequency modulated region with respect to a frequency modulated region of a previously received reflected signal, and a processor coupled to the phase detector and the receive sensor for identifying a location of the finger from an arrival time of the amplitude modulated region of the reflected chirp signal and a movement of the finger from the relative phase of the frequency modulated region, and providing control to a user interface control in accordance with the location and the movement of the finger."

There's nothing new about pen-based computers and devices that upload handwritten notes to a PC. IOGEAR's Digital Scribe digitizes notes written on plain paper, but the device's usefulness is severely limited by the fact that it needs to be connected to a PC at all times. The LeapFrog FLY Fusion pentop computer does a good job of enticing youngsters to text a little bit less and write a bit more, but it's a bit bulky, requires proprietary paper, and is aimed squarely at kids.

That being said, the latter device is the closest anyone has come to making a pen-based computer useful, practical and fun. It's no surprise, then, that that Fly pen's creator, Jim Marggraff, has brought the pen-based computer to adults with the Livescribe Pulse Smartpen.

Like the FlyFusion, the Pulse records images of everything you write, so long as you write it on the company's proprietary Dot Paper, which allows the infrared camera in the pen's tip to always know where it is on the page. The company promises it will soon allow users to print their own paper from laser and some inkjet printers. In in the meantime, 100-sheet Dot Paper notebooks can be had from Livescribe's web site in four-packs, for $19.95.

The real innovation of the Pulse, though, is that it's also a voice recorder that records audio while recording images of your notes--and links the two together.

After a lecture or interview, all you need to do is tap the pen on a word on the page, and an crisp internal speaker in the pen instantly plays back the audio that was recorded while you were furiously writing. I'll let that sink in for a second, because it's ingenious, and will make the work of students, reporters, investigators--essentially anyone who takes notes and talks to people--significantly easier.

Imagine never again scratching your head at an ambiguous phrase you wrote down in class and wondering what you meant. Imagine not having to search tirelessly through hours of recordings to verify a quote or a vital piece of information. Imagine being able to take fewer notes, and instead being able to actually pay attention, and you're beginning to understand why the Pulse Smartpen is such an impressive product.

Of course, all that potential wouldn't mean much if the hardware and and software interfered with the Pulse's elegant idea. Fortunately, that's not the case. The pen itself is bigger than most, but not large enough to be cumbersome, and it's well balanced enough that you can actually write with it for extended periods without fatigue. A small but bright OLED screen on the side of the pen makes it easy to make sure you're recording audio, to check battery life, and to navigate through different programs (more on that last part later). The whole pen is wrapped in a pleasing charcoal-blue anodized aluminum housing, which helps to make it feel solid.

There's only one button on the pen, which turns it on and off. For everything else, the controls are on the paper. Printed along the bottom of each page, front and back, are a row of labeled command buttons. Tap the Record button, and the pen emits a chirp, letting you know it's recording; if you still aren't sure, a quick glance at the pen's screen displays a counter, and a helpful "REC." Other buttons along the bottom of the page allow you to jump back to previously recorded audio, add bookmarks, change playback speed, and adjust volume.

The PC software makes archiving and searching through what could potentially be hundreds of pages of notes simple. Attach the pen via a well-designed magnetized USB dock, launch the Livescribe Desktop, and your notes and audio are automatically copied onto your computer. You can click on any word, as if you were using the pen in the notebook, and get the same instant playback of that precise moment of audio.

What's more exciting, though, is what happens when you use the search box to find a word in your notes. Now, my handwriting is honestly about the third-worst I've ever seen in my life. It falls somewhere between drunk doctor and scribbles toddlers make the first time they're given a crayon. Yet, so long as my words roughly followed the lines and weren't so big as to take up two rows, the software's optical character recognition got it right every time, instantly jumping to the word in my notes, highlighting it in yellow.

It worked so well that I was left wondering why the program couldn't just turn my handwritten notes into text for me. Hopefully that's something the software will be able to manage sometime in the future. The software also keeps all pages in order, and notebooks show up in separate folders.

Keeping the data on the pen is the simplest solution, however, since it allows you to interact with your notes away from a PC. That's not a problem, since the Pulse comes in 1GB ($150) and 2GB ($200) flavors, allowing for 100 or 200 hours of recording.

The microphone inside the pen is sufficient for most situations, and can be set to "lecture hall, " conference room," or "automatic." In case you're in a particularly noise environment, the Pulse also comes with a pair of ear buds that plug into the back of the pen and record audio in stereo from a microphone in each bud. Using them increases audio clarity quite well, but in many cases, wearing ear buds isn't exactly a polite (or possible) option. Livescribe's included a strap which allows the buds to dangle around your neck, but that solution's still a bit awkward. Thankfully, the pen's built-in mic is usually more than sufficient.

Battery life seems pretty solid. After more than 3 hours taking notes and recording audio, the Pulse's battery meter still read 80 percent, meaning even a full-time college student could get away with docking the pen only on the weekends.

The Pulse comes with two ink refills, and a stylus tip, as well as a stiff fabric case for the pen itself. For the price, it would have been nice if Livescribe had included more than two refills, and I would prefer a cap for the pen, rather than a whole case. The aluminum casing seems rugged enough to endure being jammed into a pocket.

The frustration of the Pulse Smartpen is its as-yet untapped potential. Demo software on the pen allows you to write words in English, and the pen will speak them in any of a handful of languages. But it's still just a demo, not available for purchase yet. In fact, all that's available on Livescribe's Web site, aside from the Pulse itself, are full-sized notebooks and pen tip refills. Livescribe included a nice journal notebook with the package they sent us, but as of this writing, you can't buy it on the Livescribe site. The company expects to have more Dot Paper products available by July. And the ability to allow customers to print their own Dot Paper is still under development.

Livescribe's being smart about third-party software development as well, hoping to create an active community of developers who will eventually be able to sell software for the Pulse on the Livescribe site. But that idea seems to just be getting off the ground, so it isn't likely users will be able to purchase new software anytime soon.

That's frustrating, but fine. The Pulse Smartpen does its main job extremely well, bringing traditional note taking and voice recording together while making both immensely more useful. There's no reason that any student or note-taker shouldn't go out and buy one of these right now. For journalists and investigators, the Pulse Smartpen will pay for itself within a couple months, in time saved alone. Conscientious students won't have to worry about writing down every word, and students who have a tendency to fall asleep in class can rest a little easier knowing that the lecture is being recorded, and can be easily reviewed after their refreshing nap.

The Pulse Smartpen is available now, direct from Livescribe.

For another take (markedly similar, but with a few small digressions) on the Livescribe Pulse, complete with score, check out PC Magazine Editor-in-Chief Lance Ulanoff's review, along with a slideshow of the pen.

Despite strong support for vinyl in recent years, fewer and fewer stores are selling records in the US.  Here in Chicago we're lucky to have a good selection of record stores, and the occasional record fair.  Even if you live in a vinyl-free zone, you might be able to find one of these massive events somewhere near you.  Some of these events are aimed at high-end collectors, but most dealers are smart enough to have plenty of affordable merch for everyone.

April 16th and 17th, The Chicago Independent Radio Project (CHIRP) is holding a giant record fair here in town, and it's much more than just records.  You'll find shirts, 8-tracks, movies, zines, crafters, DJ's, and even live music.  I'm involved with CHIRP in the effort to get the FCC to open more of the FM radio band for local radio stations.  This is the 6th annual "Record Fair & Other Delights", and this year it's a CHIRP fundrasier.  Hundreds of people will be coming from the Midwest and beyond to buy and sell tons of great music.

I've linked the event below.  This is a great way to fill those holes in your vinyl collection, or get one started.  If you're from the Chicago area, I hope that you'll come by the Pulaski Park Fieldhouse this weekend to join in the fun.  You'll also be helping a great cause - keeping independent voices on the free airwaves!

Details about the CHIRP "Record Fair & Other Delights"

Fresh out of the FCC’s lair comes a new pair of QChat-enabled mobiles ready to launch on Sprint: Sanyo’s Pro-200 and Pro-700. Unsurprisingly getting official at CTIA, the pair of Nextel Direct Connect devices can handle all the hot PTT action you could ask for, and while the Pro-200 (shown above) checks in with Bluetooth, messaging capabilities and mobile e-mail, the beefier brother (pictured after the jump) touts a ruggedized shell “certified to military standards for dust, shock and vibration.” Curiously, the duo is only expected to go on sale in “limited markets” this month, with availability popping up elsewhere in due time; those eager to get their chirp on can plan on dropping $49.99 / $69.99 on contract, respectively.

[Thanks, Colton]

Continue reading Sanyo’s Pro-200 and Pro-700 Direct Connect handsets get official

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