Oh! Gizmo

By Luke Anderson

Have you ever been at the store and decided to buy a few bananas, only to find them rotten by the time you finally decide to eat them? Well if that’s the case, you need a better way to store them. I’ve heard of a few different ways to keep them fresh longer, but I doubt that any is better than just leaving them to be picked whenever you’re ready. That’s right, just grow them yourself with a Banana Bonanza kit.

The thought of growing bananas had honestly never crossed my mind. If this sounds like a perfect plan to you, and you don’t mind having a 20-25-foot tall plant growing in your backyard. Also, I’m sure that you’ll need to take into consideration the conditions under which banana plants thrive. If you meet these two requirements, then you’ll be pleased to know that for just $10 you can get started. If bananas aren’t your thing, they also sell a similar kit for peanuts.

[ Lighter Side ] VIA [ RGS ]

By Luke Anderson

I’m nuts about cable management. I’ve spent several years as a network technician, and there’s nothing worse than trying to untangle a mess of cords. Everyone has their various methods for keeping everything nice and neat, though many people just start plugging things in and making sure that it looks good to the average passerby. Of course when it comes time to rearrange things, you’ve got a wonderful ball of cords that requires the assistance of a snake charmer to untangle. Whichever type of person you are, I’m sure that these Flexicords from E-Filliate will appeal to you.

Picture your average cable or cord, then cross that with a pipe cleaner. What you’re left with is a cable that when bent actually keeps its shape. That’s almost exactly what the Flexicords are. They come in a variety of sizes and flavors such as USB, S-Video, HDMI and more. These were just shown off at CES, so we don’t have any additional information on pricing or availability.

VIA [ GearLog ]

By Luke Anderson

With all the planning and preparations for CES, time can really slip away from you. Well fear not fellow readers, I was still hot on the job over at Laptop Experts. I’ve been answering a ton of questions over there lately (10 a day to be exact!), and last week was no different. Here are just a few of the questions that I worked on.

I’ve noticed over the past few weeks that webcams are a big topic, with a good number of people confused about how they work. I had one person inquiring as to whether or not one can be used without an internet connection, while another was curious how to turn on their built-in webcam on a Toshiba laptop. Someone else was having an issue with getting their tilde key working in games. Can one downgrade from Vista to XP? And which is better, a PC or a Mac? Both of these are very good questions, and I did my best to answer them.

Feel free to check out my answers and add to them if you like. Or perhaps you have a burning question about your laptop that’s in need of answering. I’m on there almost every day along with several other experts, so don’t be shy. No question’s too big or too small!

[ Laptop Experts ]

By Evan Ackerman

ShowStoppers Macworld, which was the only selection of exhibitors I had a chance to see since I had to get my ass out to Vegas for CES, was kinda disappointing. There were perhaps 15 exhibitors in a room which felt the size of a small closet, and most of them were selling services of one type or another. We don’t generally like to write about services, mostly because they don’t tend to come with switches or buttons or LEDs or anything. But, there were two things that caught my eye:

Truphone is a VoIP company (i.e. works on the iPod touch) that specializes in cheap international calls. Much like Skype, Truphone users can call each other for free over the internet, and pay a little bit per minute to call regular phone numbers. Truphone bases its rates on your phone number and the number of the phone you’re calling, not your physical location. So, if you’re in Azerbaijan with your US based cellphone and you want to call your friend in the US, Truphone bills you for a US to US call. Downside is, if you’re in Azerbaijan and want to call across the street, it works the other way. What I found entertaining, though, is that Truphone has predefined call rates for Antarctica, which is not only not a country, but I’m not entirely sure that it HAS cell service, much less landlines. But if it does, $2 a minute is probably pretty damn cheap to call there.

One more mildly interesting thing, after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

By Andrew Liszewski

If I had to choose my favorite new gadget shown at CES Unveiled, it would be this Duck Hunter game from Interactive Toy Concepts. It features a free-flying, flapping duck that you try and shoot down with a miniature infrared shotgun. On just a 12-second charge (it connects to the shotgun) the duck will fly for about 30 seconds, and it takes just 3 direct hits to knock it out of the sky. It will hopefully be available sometime this Spring with an SRP of $29.99, and there’s also a 2-player version in the works which allows a second person to actually control the duck’s flight.

But I think what really endeared me to the Duck Hunter game was this guy. Not only was he dressed in fatigues and an orange safety vest, but he was demoing the game every few minutes and driving the surrounding exhibitors crazy. The duck always seemed to take a different flight path each time, and usually ended up crashing in the most awkward of places. If I can annoy people half as much as this guy did with one of these, it would totally be worth it.

By Andrew Liszewski

So Lenovo had their new beast of a laptop on display at CES Unveiled, and I managed to elbow my way through the crowds to spend a bit of time with it. First off, the W700DS is massive, though I have to admit it was a lot lighter than I thought it would be when I picked it up. This isn’t a laptop you’re going to use on a plane or while sitting in a hallway at the Venetian pounding out a story, but if you need a portable photography workstation, it would easily fit the bill. The slide out display is less gimmicky than I thought it would be, but it definitely doesn’t have the color fidelity of the full size one, so you’ll only want to use it for widgets or stuff like Photoshop’s palettes. The integrated Wacom tablet is also a nice addition, though I’d probably find it hard to do any serious brushwork with an area that small.

But the one thing I loved about the W700ds was the built-in screen calibrator. It actually uses the Pantone (Gretamacbeth) Huey Pro software in conjunction with a small calibrator located near the upper right corner of the Wacom tablet. Normally you’d have to attach a calibrator to your screen for the software to properly run its color tests, but with the W700ds you just start the program, close the lid, and 40 seconds later you’ve got yourself a custom color profile. Needless to say, I want one.

By David Ponce

A $130 Bluetooth headset with an extendable boom. There you have it. That’s the Zivio Boom right there.

No, really.

Perhaps this is a little underwhelming considering Joby, the company that makes the Zivio Boom also makes the truly innovative Gorrilapod. Next to that, the Zivio Boom is a bit of a letdown.

Still, to be fair, it does have a couple interesting features. Alleged 10h talk time for one. Or the fact that it comes with a set of interchangeable earpieces and an optional ear loop for a custom fit. I also remember the lady mentioning something about the casing made out of stainless steel and them being the only company that does that, but at that point I was too busy trying to snag a free sample to really pay attention. I do remember her saying that the extendable boom had the advantage of being able to isolate your voice really well. I don’t doubt that for a second; the thing practically sits in your mouth. At least… her mouth.

If you’re in the market for a Bluetooth headset, and you don’t mind looking like you’re about to eat a tiny metal straw that comes out your ear, the Zivio Boom is perfect for you.

Full press release after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »

By Evan Ackerman

If you couldn’t make it to Macworld this year, don’t feel bad… You really didn’t miss that much. There was no 32 gig iPhone, no widescreen iPhone, no iPhone with a keyboard, no iPhone Nano… In fact, there wasn’t really any of those “one more things” that Apple is famous for revealing at the show. In a nutshell, here’s what came out:

New Macbook Pro:

17″ 1900 x 1200 LED backlit display with 700:1 contrast and a $50 matte option
2.66 gHz Core 2 Duo, 4 gigs of ram
Discrete Nvidia GeForce 9600M graphics
320 gig HD, superdrive

It’s 6.6 pounds including an integrated (non-removable) battery that should give you 7-8 hours of juice (for 1000 cycles) depending on how graphics intensive your applications are. Replacing the battery costs $179.

SSD options should be available, but for now the new Macbook Pro is on pre-order in just the base configuration for $2799.

Misc. Software Updates:

iPhoto 09, iMovie 09, and so forth.

DRM Free iTunes:

The good news is that iTunes (all of it) will soon be available in DRM-free higher quality (256 kbps) AAC format. Also good news is that if you have an iPhone, you can purchase and download music over 3G instead of just over WiFi. The medicore/bad news is that Apple is changing the iTunes pricing from a flat $0.99 per song to either $0.69, $0.99, or $1.29 per song, depending on what music labels charge them. Yes, some music will be cheaper, but the music you WANT is more likely to get more expensive. Upgrading your current music to the newer, better, less annoyingly DRM’d “iTunes Plus” version will cost $0.30 per song. Look for all of this stuff to start getting implemented by April 1st, which is kinda a stupid date to start implementing major changes to anything, if you ask me.

Oh, and there was one more thing…

…and it was Tony Bennett. Wheee.

If you’re still craving more Apple, you should seek help and then watch the keynote in full on Apple’s website.

By David Ponce

Or at least everyone who can afford the steep $550 pricetag. That said, despite the eye popping price, the PaceMaker is a fun little toy. It has a 60GB hard drive, and an intuitive user interface that allows just about anyone to liven up a party by becoming a DJ. Or at least a close enough approximation of one. With the PaceMaker, you can learn to mix tracks in less than a minute (two if you’re a grand-mother).

I got a demo of the device, and I really do think I’d be able to pull this off, despite being 6 years old the last time I touched a vinyl disc. The controls are simple to use and laid out in such a way that mixing becomes accessible.

The product hits the shelves in April. The full press release is after the jump.

Read the rest of this entry »