Tag: GADGET

In keeping with our legal requirement to cover every piece junk that plugs into a USB port, we present you with the heated USB mouse pad. With the winter months quickly kicking into gear, those of us with substandard heating in our homes and apartments will be looking for ways to stay toasty while sitting in front of our PCs. Of course, wrapping yourself in blankets and drinking cup after cup of ...

There comes a time in every disposable contact lens' life when it must move along to the big eyeball in the sky; when it's so slime-encrusted and foggy that the only thing it should be seeing is the inside of a trash-bin. If you have a hard time remembering just when it's time to break open a fresh pair, Countact is for you. It's a simple enough product, a contact dish that has a digital timer ...

The reams and reams of spam found with every check of our inboxes here have quashed the surge of emotions we used to experience when that new-mail notifier started blinking. So, we went looking for something to help get our e-mail groove back, and we've found it: the USB Webmail notifier. It's a little box with the iconic envelope design on the front that lights up in green, blue, or red when ...

We've seen a lot of novel ways to wake up those of us reluctant to get out of bed in the morning. We've seen alarm clocks that annoy, soothe, and embarrass you to get moving, but we haven't seen anything that could induce the level of panic that would accompany having to defuse a bomb every morning. The DangerBomb Alarm Clock startles you from your slumber with loud explosion sounds and forces ...

We've spoken before about schools dolling out iPods, iPhones, and generally going high tech. In fact, luring kids in with flashy gadgets is becoming less the exception, and more the rule (Duke, MIT, Abilene Christian University, and Drexel University have all gotten in on the trend). Colleges seem to be encouraged by the potential for innovative education applications and a constant line of ...

It's always fun to look back to see the "cutting edge" of technology from eras past. If you're in London, you'll have to stop by the British Library Business and Intellectual Property Centre, where a collection of Victorian era gadgets has gone on display. Some of the gadgets are terribly unsophisticated precursors to modern must-haves, such as the wrist-watch-styled GPS ancestor with scrolling ...

Which option would you take: Potentially scoring with a beautiful woman or definitely scoring a new iPhone? That's the choice male contestants will make on Playboy TV's new reality show, 'Gadget or the Girl.' The format is similar to many of the other "I really just want to be on TV" dating shows. The contestant meets three presumably attractive girls, eliminates one immediately, goes on a date ...

Best Buy is paving the way for employee-free retail by installing gadget vending machines in airports around the country. Travelers will be able to pick up a host of electronic devices including cell phones, digital cameras, headphones, and various power adapters from the machines for what are sure to be absurd prices. The Best Buy vending machines will be operated and stocked by Zoom Systems, ...

UK electronics purveyor PC World has been showing of its concept of a technology-saturated deck chair that may have many gadget fetishists drooling, but leaves those with more reasonable sensibilities a little perplexed. The chair is made from solar fabric (which we imagine would be uncomfortably warm) for powering MP3 players, laptops, and the like. The top of the chair hides a long range Wi-Fi ...

We know you wish you were a superhero (who doesn't?). Sadly, though, radioactive spiders won't actually give you incredible agility and gamma rays won't turn you into a green monster capable of picking up cars. Like Batman, however, we can whip ourselves into top notch physical shape and carry around a load of gadgets. Despite seeming to forget that 4 comes after 3, not 5, Wired has cobbled ...

We're not sure what's more groan-inducing, the terribly unimaginative name, or the idea of riding around on a pair of 16-pound motorized roller skates. These ridiculous, battery-powered, "transportation devices" will make sure you never have a girlfriend or boyfriend (though if you think these clunkers are cool, you probably didn't have much hope anyway). Availability and price are unknown ...

Everything gets gadget-ed up these days. Not even the low-tech past time of bike riding is safe. Now there are detachable GPS devices from Atech; a handlebar-mountable speaker system with remote for your iPod from iHome; an electric motor for the lazy; and a cell phone app for recording speed, acceleration and distance via an axle-mounted Bluetooth capable sensor. That's a lot of gadgets. ...

We're suckers for ridiculous gadget combos. That's why we couldn't pass up this opportunity to share with you the Party Chain, a combination key chain, LED flash light, universal TV remote, and of course -- bottle opener. Now you can drink, hijack your friend's TV, and help someone look for a dropped contact lens in the dark, all with your $14.95 key chain. Too bad it doesn't also serve as a USB ...

It's raining, it's pouring the old man is . . . surfing the Internet? If he's an old Japanese man, then it's entirely possible. Conceived in the research labs at Japan's Keio University, the prototype Pileus Internet Umbrella is, as it sounds, an umbrella that's connected to the Web. The umbrella's shaft houses a tiny projector that beams Internet content to the canopy's underside via its ...

Every so often a product comes out that wows us with its sheer excess. We see flashy toys and over-the-top gadgets every day, but it takes something really special to stop us in our tracks. This is the LG HDTV Refrigerator. It will be available in the 2nd quarter of the year for $3,999. Look at it: The shiny metal, two-door number has two screens, the larger of which is a 15-inch HDTV, tuner ...