Weird Jukebox for your iPod or iPhone

If you are the old school type that likes to have new gadgets and need a way to mix old and new, Advance Sound Devices has a strange product that might do just that. The device is called the Retro Tune Mini Jukebox and is basically just what the name describes.

You get a mini jukebox with all the style of the 50’s down to the rotating light column coupled with a dock for your iPod or iPhone. The dock allows you to charge and play your iPhone or iPod while viewing the screen.

Other features of the jukebox include an alarm clock that can wake you to music from your iPod or iPhone and a single disk CD player. The device also includes a remote that allows you to control your iPod or iPhone from across the room.

VIA [ Advance Sound Devices ]

Logitech MX Air Mouse

Explore a new realm of control with you computer. The MX Air Mouse gives you precise laser mouse control just like the other great computer mice but adds another dimension. Once in the air, the Freespace motion sensing capabilities transform your hand gestures and motions into natural responsive cursor controls.
What this means to you: Now […]

Wolverine Photo Storage Device and PMP with Massive 250GB Capacity

by Shane McGlaun

Now that digital SLR cameras can be had with up to 20 megapixel sensors, the size of photos files are getting ever larger. That means that you either need to get more and larger memory cards for your camera, or get something like the Wolverine EPS 250GB Multimedia Storage Player.

This device has a built-in 7-in-1 card reader allows you to move photos from your memory cards to the EPS on the go. The card reader is compatible with CF, SD & SDHC, MMC, MS, MS-Pro, and XD cards. An optional adapter allows the device to read MS-Duo, MS-Duo Pro, miniSD and RS-MMC cards as well. In addition to storing photos you shoot the device also acts as a PMP.

A FM tuner is built-in and video playback is supported in MPEG-1, MPEG-4, WMV9 and Xvid. Music formats supported are MP3, WMA, OGG, WAV, AAC, and CDA. You can also record live radio to the internal hard drive. When combined with the optional cradle you can record directly to the ESP from your TV, DVD, VCR, camcorder or other video source. The 250GB ESP is available now for $649.99.

VIA [ Wolverine ]

Volkswagen Golf GTI W12 Concept

By Andrew Liszewski

I find it pretty funny when I see an ‘affordable’ car that has been completely retrofitted with after-market accessories designed to improve the vehicle’s performance. But I guarantee no one has gone as far as Volkswagen did with one of their own. “The Golf GTI W12 concept has a mid-mounted 6.0 litre twin-turbocharged Bentley engine, rear wheel drive and 642 bhp. That translates into a claimed 202 mph top speed and a 3.7 second 0-62 mph time: and that’s with the engine restricted to just half its full torque output in first gear.” (Quoted from Fifth Gear’s first drive article.)

And while the car is referred to as a ‘concept’ Volkswagen prefers to think of it as a “design study” since the vehicle is fully driveable. (With ‘driveable’ being the understatement of the week.) On the outside of the Golf the only thing that would make someone think there’s something unique about the car is the custom body work which not only looks cool but also provides vital air intakes all over the vehicle which feed the impressive engine.

Of course there are probably a few Golf drivers reading this right now who are a little envious of VW’s special toy. But if you’re willing to fork out the whopping €1,000,000 (or about $1,350,000) for the conversion you too can conduct your own “design study.” Otherwise you’ll have to just be content with reading Fifth Gear’s account of the time they spent with the car.

[ Fifth Gear - Volkswagen Golf GTI W12 ]

High-Tech Toys Recharge While You Play

By Andrew Liszewski

Batteries and the fact that they’ll eventually run out is another harsh lesson most kids learn at a young age. (Unless you’re one of those Amish kids.) So a company called Zen Design Group is launching a line of high-tech toys called ‘SEE Toys’ which have a built-in battery that is recharged as the kids play with them. SEE actually stands for safety, ecology and economy since the toys don’t require the batteries to be constantly replaced and do not rely on an external power source except for a sugar-fueled youngster.

Using kids as a power source is not a new idea, in fact I wrote about something called PlayPumps last year where a specially designed playground is used to pump water into a holding tank while kids are playing on it. So I guess the lesson here is that using kids as a source of energy is OK as long as they’re having fun while doing it. I think that’s the point they missed in all those factories during the turn of the century which resulted in a ban on child labor. If those assembly lines had just been ‘fun’ in some way there wouldn’t have been a problem.

The ‘SEE Toys’ should be available next month on the Zen Design Group’s website and will range in price from $19.99 to $29.99.

[ No batteries required for creative LED toys ] VIA [ Wired - Geekdad ]

Zen Garden Sink Is A Good Idea In Theory

By Andrew Liszewski

In this age of ‘environmental awareness’ inventors and designers are always trying to come up with new ways to better use our natural resources. So here’s an interesting take on the bathroom sink that reuses the water from the basin to feed a plant.

But it’s pretty obvious the sink is more of a design concept than a usable idea because we all know how many chemicals end up being poured into a bathroom sink like toothpaste, mouthwash, shaving cream and soap just to name a few. And while I only took Biology classes up until high-school from what I remember none of those chemicals were used by plants for the purpose of living. Still, I wonder if that long channel could be outfitted with a filter of some sort ensuring that only H20 eventually made it to the plant.

[ Zen Garden Sink ] VIA [ TreeHugger ]

mi VDO FX Digital Video Cam Is Sure To Boost Your YouTube Views

Anyone can post a video of pretty much anything to YouTube but if you’re hoping to rack up the views and number of times your clip gets ‘favorited’ you better make sure your video is something special. So while we’re seeing quite a few digital video cameras specifically designed for making web-ready videos (translation: sub-NTSC quality) I don’t think any of them will be able to compare to the mi VDO FX.

You see besides having the ability to record a soundtrack directly from an iPod or MP3 player while filming and on-the-go editing the mi VDO FX also includes 18 built-in special effects to further jazz up your production. As to what these effects are I have no idea, but given the images on their website I assume we’re talking about black & white, sepia, negative and other real-time filters. So if the video of your dog chasing it’s tail seems to have gone unnoticed on YouTube try shooting it again with the mi VDO FX’s negative filter, I guarantee it will hit the site’s front page in a matter of hours.

As for useful features the mi VDO FX includes 4x digital zoom, has a 1.5-inch color LCD display and uses SD cards with support for up to 2Gb versions.

[ mi VDO FX ] VIA [ Chip Chick ]

Knowhere Cosmos Clock

Like many people I’ve got friends all over the world that I talk to on a regular basis but sometimes I’m afraid to call or message them because I have no idea what time of the day it is where they live. So I could definitely use something like the Knowhere Cosmos Clock which is designed as a quick and easy way to figure out what time it is in different cities all over the world.

The clock face has the 24 hours of the day mapped out around the edge with midnight being at the 12 position and noon being at the 6 position. The hands of the clock each graphically represent 8 major cities around the world through the use of famous landmarks. (Including Paris, New York, San Francisco, Sydney, Shanghai, Tokyo and London.) Each silhouetted landmark points to the current time in the city they represent ensuring you’ll never get someone out of bed again by accidentally calling them at 3 in the morning.

The Knowhere Cosmos Clock is available from Generate for $79.

[ Knowhere Cosmos Clock ] VIA [ Popgadget ]

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