Gadgets Mobile

Back when I used a media PC in my living room, the most frustrating thing that I found was that I had both a keyboard and mouse sitting on my coffee table. Granted, most of the time I simply used my remote, but there were times where I would use my TV as a giant monitor for surfing the net and such, which meant I had a few choices. One, I could use a regular keyboard and mouse, which wasn’t fun. Another was to get an in-air mouse with a smaller keyboard (was a combo) which was better, but still not perfect. I never got around to trying option number three which I think would have been the best, a keyboard with a built-in trackpad.

This little number from Brando is a simple combo device that would likely be welcome in any HTPC environment. The keyboard isn’t full-size, but it more like that of a laptop. The trackpad makes it easy to navigate your screen without the need to keep a mouse on-hand at all times. It is wireless and runs off of four AA batteries. There are separate on/off switches for the keyboard and the trackpad so you can get the most life out of your batteries. You can pick one up for $57, which is close to what you’d pay for a decent wireless keyboard and mouse set.

Source: GeekAlerts

Duck Fadar
Any jokes about us going quackers, will not - we repeat - will not be permitted. Now, here are the fundamental features that make these two deserving of a place at you bath side.

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Posted Mar 9th 2008 1:37PM by Joshua Topolsky
Filed under: Portable AudioWord on the street (and by street, we mean mostly British tabloids) is that Paul McCartney’s deal to sell the Beatles back-catalog is done, and the Greatest Works of Musical Art Ever Recorded will be appearing on the iTunes store “within months.” Of course, we’ve been hearing whispers about this for what seems like a million years, and since both Apple Corps and Apple are delivering “no comment” and “rumor and speculation” responses on the topic, we won’t get too excited. Still, there does seem to be some serious movement on this front, with everyone and their mother saying the lot is to be sold any day now for around $400 million — which is no small sum. We will, of course, keep you abreast of any developments which will lead to you stocking your music players with the Fab Four’s work.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

My wife has a MacBook that I borrow from time to time. Now and then when I’m using it while plugged into the wall I’ll accidentally unplug the MagSafe power adapter. It’s really not a big deal, as it pops back into place rather easily. My wife, however, hates it when she knocks it out. I don’t really understand this obsession with having the plug stay in at all times, but at least I’ve found a simple gadget that will prevent it from happening in the future.

This is one of those things that you know the company that designed it will make a small fortune. It’s a simple piece of plastic that probably costs peanuts to make, yet provides a function that tons of people are going to want. You just plug it into the neighboring USB port, and it keeps your MagSafe adapter in place until you’re really ready to take it out. It’s cheap too, just $11.99.

Source: CrunchGear

Posted Mar 9th 2008 11:38AM by Darren Murph
Filed under: Misc. gadgets
Keeping with the Tangent tradition, the Quattro Mk 2 looks an awful lot like most every other tabletop radio the outfit cranks out. Nevertheless, this particular iteration pays no mind to DAB and focuses its attention on providing access to a smorgasbord of internet radio stations. Aside from featuring both integrated WiFi and an Ethernet port, you’ll also get WPA2 security support, FM tuning capabilities, a backlit LCD, a headphone jack and a auxiliary port for connecting DAPs / PMPs. Word on the street has the walnut and black models selling now for £179.95 ($362), while the glossy red and white versions demand an extra £20 ($40).

[Via Tech Digest]

Vigor Gaming has announced the latest addition to its high-end desktop lineup, Colossus.

The Vigor Gaming Colossus is the most powerful system offered by the company and it can currently support up to eight processing cores, up to 8GB of fully-buffered DDR2 memory clocked at 800MHz, 2 Terabytes of Hard Drive space in RAID-0 configuration, a 1000W power supply and four graphics cards. Colossus is capable of running up to two XHD (2560×1600 resolution) monitors

Based on Skulltrail, Intel’s first Dual Socket Extreme Desktop Platform, the Colossus features full support for two Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9775 quad-core processors. Clocked at 3.2GHz and capable of reaching much higher speeds through Vigor’s complimentary overclocking service, these enterprise-level chips provide industry-leading performance that can handle even the most graphically intense computer games with ease. The Intel D5400XS mainboard that makes Skulltrail possible also incorporates the latest technologies from NVIDIA and AMD that allow for multi-GPU configurations.

Thanks to these powerful graphic cards, the Colossus is capable of running up to two XHD (2560×1600 resolution) monitors with stunning clarity and minimal effect on performance. The Vigor Gaming Colossus can be configured with Windows Vista 64-bit and up to 8GB of fully-buffered DDR2 memory clocked at 800MHz. All of these high-end components are cooled using Vigor’s exclusive Twin-Peaks cooling system, allowing the Colossus to run at full speed indefinitely. The Colossus is designed primarily for use as an extreme gaming desktop, but doubles as a powerful multimedia content platform, making it the perfect solution to blend work and play on a single computer.

A fully-configured Vigor Gaming Colossus PC, including two Western Digital Raptor 150 Hard Drives, two AMD Radeon HD 3870 X2 graphics cards, 8GB of fully-buffered DDR2 800 memory, high-fidelity audio by Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi, and many other high-end components would cost just over $8100.

Dassault Systèmes invites the general public to join Fuchs in this charity race for Sports Without Borders via an Facebook application: virtual runners will be assigned 3D photorealistic avatars generated from 2D portraits and will select virtual running environments from a photo library. Once these steps completed, virtual runners will receive a video of their virtual run.

They can also build support for Sports Without Borders by inviting Facebook friends to participate, which will result in the creation of a solidarity chain linking all friends’ videos in a single virtual relay. Dassault Systèmes will feature the longest and zaniest relays in its Virtual Relay Hall of Fame on the dedicated mini-website, as well as a real-time counter of virtual (and real) kilometers run.

The kilometers run by virtual participants will be added to those run by Fuchs, and Dassault Systèmes will contribute accordingly to Sports Without Borders’ efforts to improve the living conditions of children in Latin American, Africa and Asia with athletic programs. Dassault Systèmes’ partnership with this dynamic NGO will leverage the universal appeal of 3D solutions in order to build awareness and support of Sports Without Borders’ projects internationally.

To follow or participate in the “Virtual Plus Reality Challenge”, please visit: www.3ds.com/VplusR

At last week’s Apple event, Steve Jobs went over the SDK release and how they hope to manage it.  Job’s lightly reviewed reasons Apple would reject an iPhone application; things like privacy concerns, content, or interfering with their business plan.  Somehow, Sun believes they’ll build a Java version for the iPhone.

According to InfoWorld, Java is planning on running the Java Virtual Machine on the iPhone.  However, according to the iphone SDK documentation, the use of plug in architecture isn’t allowed.  It will be interesting to see how Sun works around this.

From InfoWorld:

Sun came to the conclusion it could make a JVM work on the iPhone after taking 24 hours to look at information on Apple’s SDK. Sun saw nothing in the public statements preventing the JVM from being one of the applications enabled on the iPhone, said Klein. Apple released the SDK in conjunction with the beta release if its iPhone 2.0 software; the general release of iPhone 2.0 is scheduled for June.

From the quotes used, attributed to Sun officials and analysts, they seem to forget Apple has complete control over the apps and absolute control over what gets on (unjailbreaked, at least).

Read [InfoWorld] via [Ars Technica]

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Posted Mar 9th 2008 7:08AM by Paul Miller
Filed under: Storage
Samsung promised it was coming in March, and here she blows. The Spinpoint M6 is the first standard-height 500GB 2.5-incher available, at a lean 9.5mm, meaning you can cram it into most existing laptops unlike the 2.5-inch 500 giggers from Fujitsu and Hitachi. Samsung’s using some Perpendicular Magnetic Recording tech to cram everything in, stuffing three 167GB platters into the 5400rpm drive. The M6 goes for $299 and is shipping now. If DVD burning is more your pace, Samsung also just announced an “industry fastest” 22X DVD burner, the SH-S223. The SATA drive can stamp a 4.7GB disc in 12 minutes, and does dual-layer discs at a respectable 16X. No word on price yet for that one.

Pico Z Micro Helicopter

Picco Z Remote Controlled Helicopter The Picco Z is the perfect gift for all kids (big and small)…From Age 6 - 60, This is the kind of toy your dad say’s is stupid but secretly he’s playing with it while your asleep (thats why the batteries are always flat!) This fully operational, crash-resistant Picco Z helicopter is perfect for indoor aerial action and comes ready to fly, with take-off, hover and left/right functions providing enough manoeuvres to make Torvil & Dean dizzy.

 About The Picco Z  The inexpensive Picco Z is remarkably robust, made of tough expanded Polypropylene foam, features a brilliant blue LED strobe light allowing fantastic flights in the dark, and incorporates an auto stability system to make this easy to operate both indoors and outside in calm conditions.  

Picco Z has 2-channels, infrared control allows for left, right, up and down movement Picco Z is small in size which provides agility and speed Picco Z 3 selectable frequencies let you fly up to 3 Picco Z helicopters at once Picco Z Includes  1 Picco Z Remote Controlled Helicopter 1 Picco Z Transmitter 2 x Spare Propellers for the Picco Z Picco Z requires 6 x AA Batteries

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