Best New Technology

The trend of nature inspired devices is very popular now. Thus, we have already seen a great deal of concepts that had some natural elements or were made in the form of a fruit or something else. Lately another device of that sort has been designed.

It represents a bamboo inspired stereo sound system. In addition to the fact that the concept looks great it sounds great too. This happens due to the natural acoustics of cylindrical objects. Moreover this device has very impressive characteristics: the opportunity to use Wi-Fi, wireless speakers, integrated LED screen, mp3 player, remote desktop syncing, radio, and CD player. So it would be able to meet the requirements of any technophile.

The whole system consists of 3 main parts: left and right channel wireless speakers, a base station that houses the subwoofer, and a control ring. You can attach all the components and use this gadget as a stand-alone stereo sound system or just connect the speakers together with the control ring. A single charge should be enough for about 12 hours of continuous playing. The control ring located between speakers contains the basic music controls. The main station can also wirelessly sync music with your PC, so you can forget about CDs.

Probably because this device is still a concept it’s hard to find out some disadvantages. Yet as far as the positive features of the gadget are concerned it should be mentioned that there is quite a significant amount of them. But its design and functionality remain the most important ones.

Related:

• 360 Degree Speakers concept
• Waterproof Speakers in Music Showcase
• New “Apple” speakers

Sumvision really has, er, some vision when it comes to MP3 players. This 4GB model comes with a 2.8″ touch screen display (don’t they all try to emulate the iphone these days), all decked out in a stainless steel case and a microSD memory card slot just in case you want to lug around an additional 2GB worth of songs. At £60 a pop, is the Sumvision ICE 1000 worth every penny? You check out the specifications after the jump and decide.

• Screen: 2.8 inch (320 x 240 pixels) TFT panel.
• Capacity: Built-in flash memory, up to 4GB.
• Memory Card Slot: Supports microSD card, up to 2GB.
• Operation buttons: Touch-panel.
• FM Stereo Radio: 20 channel presets manually and automatically.
• Power supply: Built-in Li-polymer rechargeable battery.
• Play time: MP3: More than 10 hours. (Screen off, with earphones)/MP4 or Games: More than 4 hours.
• Speaker: Built-in speaker.
• Weight: 62g.
• Dimensions: 90mm (L) x 55.5mm (W) x 12mm (H).
• Synchronous lyrics. (LRC format).
• Picture browse (JPEG format).
• E-book (TXT format).
• Recording function: Voice recording / FM stereo radio recording (internal).
• Play function: Audio files: Support MP3, WMA, etc. format files.
• Video files: Supports AVI(XviD) format files. ALL files must be converted to MP4 (XviD) format (software included).
• 7 equalizer modes (Normal, surround 3D, rock, pop, classic, bass, jazz)
• 7 play modes (Once, repeat one, folder once, folder repeat, all once, all repeat, introduction)

Source: Nexus404

Posted Feb 18th 2008 10:13AM by Paul Miller
Filed under: Transportation

We’ve heard the marketing babble, and pondered the possibilities of a hands-free drive to work, but do those radar-based collision prevention technologies actually work? The British Motor Insurance Repair Research Centre Thatcham seems to think so. BMIRPCT took a long hard look at Volvo City Safety, Mercedes Distronic Plus and Honda CMBS, and decided the technologies will have a major impact on slow speed accidents — which account for 75% of accidents as it is — and should prevent more than 125,000 injuries a year in Britain alone, according to this research.

[Via gizmag]

Posted Feb 18th 2008 4:42AM by Thomas Ricker

While owners of new hd dvd gear might be miffed at Toshiba’s plans to scrap their HD DVD format, investors are stoked. Toshiba’s shares are up nearly 6% in mid-day Tokyo trading on unusually high volume. A clear sign from investors that it’s time for Toshiba to cut its HD DVD losses and run. Now go ahead Toshiba — investors, consumers, retails, and the content owners all agree that it’s high time to end this format war once and for all. We’re all just waiting for you to make it official.

[Thanks, Karl]

Posted Feb 18th 2008 10:36AM by Paul Miller
Filed under: Digital Cameras

While the advanced processing, glass and sensors of DSLRs has made them a likely candidate for video capture for some time now, a few technical obstacles have stood in the way. All that could be changing, though, with this DSLR “Movie Mode” patent from Japanese inventor Hiroshi Terada uncovered by Photography Bay. The wide-ranging patent addresses trouble spots such as AF focus speed and tolerance, and the auto-cropping DSLRs perform during AF adjustments, but most interesting is the mirror. The patent suggests a mirror that lets through 70% of light, while reflecting the other 30%. Reflected light can be used for continuous AF, while transmitted light is captured on the camera’s primary sensor. This mirror configuration also allows live view while shooting stills. There’s no telling when we’ll start seeing this in cameras, or if any major manufacturers have even licensed it yet — or have developed similar systems — but it does seem clear that DSLR movie shooting is fairly inevitable.

[Via Photography Bay]

Nerf Pocket Howler Screaming Football

The mini version of the popular Vortex Howler. Listen to how it spirals through the air. The World’s farthest flying footballs. Easy to catch with whistling action as it flies. With a proven aerodynamic design, the Vortex Footballs fly incredibly far. Designed for maximum balance and spiral rotation for pinpoint accuracy.Quality construction makes it exceptionally rugged for outdoor play - yet soft enough for easy catches.Colours May Vary  

Technorati Tags: gadgets For Them

Mother always said not to play with your food, but with the Tic Tac Toast, that warning comes across as harder to follow.

Another good reason to play with your food! The Tic Tac Toast stamper combines the fun of tic-tac-toe with the tastiness of toast. Just press this 3 1/2″ x 3 1/2″ plastic stamper into a piece of bread, then put your bread in the toaster. The resulting toast will be branded with a tic-tac-toe grid! When the toasted gameboard is ready, all thats left to do is pick some tasty toppings and play a game.

No prizes for guessing who gets to ear the toast. At least you know both peanut butter and jelly will be more or less evenly spread out. The Tic Tac Toast is going for $2.99 a bite.

Posted Feb 18th 2008 7:04AM by Ryan Block
Filed under: Gaming

So analysts at research firm iSuppli are projecting that the Wii will overtake the 360 as the dominant current-gen console this year, as projected sales would put Nintendo at over 30m units, compared to Microsoft’s expected 26m. The PS3 is also mentioned as having the greatest growth potential if it hits projections of 25.7m total units sold this year, but that seems a little optimistic if you ask us. Sony fans might have the last laugh though, as ultimately iSuppli sees the PS3 as the market leader as we enter the next decade. Hey, who knows, Sony might just catch up and recapture that crown — anything’s possible.

Retro Spacehopper
Welcome to the Space Hopper time machine - a continuum-busting time warp all the way back to the mid 1970s.

See price

Rumor has it that Verizon Wireless is going to begin offering unlimited voice, data and message plans. With some good news that these will become available as early as February 19. The rumored plans are said to have several options to include:

• $100 - Nationwide Unlimited (voice)
• $120 - Nationwide Select Unlimited (voice, SMS, MMS)
• $140 - Nationwide Premium (voice, SMS, MMS, VZNav, VCAST, email)
• $150 - Nationwide Email and Messaging (voice, SMS, MMS, and data)
• $170 - Nationwide Global Email and Messaging (voice, SMS, MMS, and international data)
• $200 - Family plan with two lines, $100 per additional line.

In addition to the wonderful unlimited options these plans are also reported to include no roaming or long distance charges, be available with one or two year agreements, have no contract extensions for current users and include Mobile Web 2.0 portal access. Possibly the best part, assuming these rumors are true is that the 5GB data cap is out.

Via [Engadget]

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