The Power Smart Tower has four of these Green outlets, four normal outlets (in case you have stuff that needs to draw power all the time) and two USB jacks, and will run $80. Its little brother, the Power Smart Wall, is meant to be wall-mounted, and has half the number of outlets and no USB jacks. It'll retail for $30 (this one is pretty tempting to me personally—seems fairly priced and a nice easy way to save some power). Finally, the diminutive laptop charger, helpfully named Laptop Charger, only charges your computer when it actually needs it, and offers an additional plug for a mobile device. That one'll run you $100. All three products are available now from iGo's site. [Krunker via Ubergizmo]

Not only that, the guy behind the hack claims it can be done in 30 minutes on a budget as small as $10. In a nutshell, he just inserted two apple mini usb plugs into the outlets and tucked them back in the wall, but you could soldier the wires to the chargers if you have the skills to go that route. Yeah, you could just keep the chargers plugged in to the regular outlet, which is even easier and seems like less of a fire code violation, but this certainly looks a whole lot better. [Instructables]

Kill-A-Watt's latest version lets you see three stats at once: the current voltage, elapsed time, and cumulative use (which has an unfortunate abbreviation). You also get the programmable functionality, letting you set up unique times for each day of the week and 96 on/off settings per day. It's also a surge protector, which I'm not sure the old one had.

You'll have to pay $70 for this updated version, which still only supports one outlet at once, as opposed to the $10-$20 that you can get the original for. [ThinkGeek]

It's only a prototype at the moment (one of many that have come out lately focused on saving energy), which probably explains why it still looks like a child's toy. Not a good idea when you consider that it sits between the wall outlet and the plug of your gadget. At any rate, PowerZoa transmits details on your power usage to a secure website, where you can use the interface to turn specific devices on or off.

Sooner or later something like this will be widely available, and there will be a cellphone app that would allow me to control everything. And when that happens, I will be all over it. [Powerzoa via DVICE]

Tokyo company HiBot is developing a robot to transfer the dangerous duties of high-voltage wire inspection from meat-based humans metal-based robots, in a move intended not just to decrease the likelihood of flash-frying technicians, but to make the inspection process—vital, now that many countries' electrical infrastructures have components approaching 100 years old—more efficient.

The HiBot Exliner, pictured above and set to deploy in Japan, is the second such robot, and the most ambitious: while the LineScout, pictured at top and currently in trials in Canada, only inspects one line at a time, the Expliner will cover four. And unlike their human counterparts, Exliner and LineScout don't even care if the lines are left active while they're doing their respective things, because they ain't got nothin' to lose, y'know? Also: because they're properly insulated.

UPDATE: For anyone wondering why these robots are necessary (or depending on how you look at it, why they aren't) watch this video, starting at around 2:00. —Thanks, winshape![IEEE via Make]

There's no real info on this thing, but it appears to offer most major plug types by spinning the three segments around. It'd be the perfect thing to put in hotels, where people are continually unable to charge up their razor or laptop. [GadgetLab]

When you need room for just one appliance, the Rozetkus wall socket sits flat against the wall. But when you want to make room for four more items to plug in, the socket pops out, dramatically increasing its surface area.

And while some of you will be eagerly awaiting the pricing/availability of this product, knowing the power draw of my home theater system, I'm holding out for the 3-foot-long, 40-plug XXL edition. [YankoDesign via Engadget]

Yes, coconut-shell charcoal plays a key role in a facility which is estimated to turn into a $10 billion project because for some weird reason the stuff acts like an "environmental sponge" and sucks up helium and hydrogen byproducts like nothing else. Experiments with the Tokamak reactor which is the heart of the ITER facility won't even start until 2018, but I'm already getting concerned about what's going to happen to the world supply of coconuts now. [H+ Magazine via Slashdot]

President Barack Obama announced today a $8-billion federal plant to modernize the United State's power grid. $3.4 billion will come from the government, and the rest will be put up by private companies. In his words:

At this moment, there's something big happening in America when it comes to creating a clean-energy economy. But getting there will take a few more days like this one, and more projects like this one. Here in this region of Florida, this project will reduce demand for electricity by up to 20 percent during the hottest summer days that stress the grid and power plants,. It will provide smart meters to 2.6 million more customers. And most importantly, it will create thousands of jobs - good jobs, by the way, that can't be outsourced; jobs that will last and jobs that pay a decent wage.

In my words: About fucking time. We need to modernize the power grid not only for the jobs, but for the long term survivability of the country's economy. It's the only way to depend less on other countries, and make production more efficient and competitive.

And it's not only about using renewable energies. It's about increasing the efficiency of electricity transport and consumption at homes. That's why $1 billion is going to smart meters and other consumer oriented technology, which will make more than 5 million homes to consume a lot less. Two billion dollars will go to infrastructure to support those meters, and $400 to modernize power lines, with an additional $25 million to push for smarter, more power efficient devices.

Do you think this is a lot of money? It is, especially since it only covers a small part of the grid. But here's what we are getting in return: $20 billion in savings during the next decade, plus increasing the reliability of the grid to avoid power outages that cost $150 billion a year to the US economy.

I can only hope this goes well, and we keep modernizing the rest of the grid as soon as possible. [Miami Herald and Ars Technica]

The structure generates 130 kilowatts of solar power, enough to offset 145,000 lbs of greenhouse gas emissions annually. There are even charging terminals available for electric cars, but only two can be charged at a time. Seems like a pretty smart way to keep drivers comfortable and harvest some spare energy on the side. [Dvice]

How do they do it? With a triple junction compound solar cell that uses three photo absorption layers made from elements like indium and gallium. I'll leave it to the physical chemistry geniuses among you to explain exactly what that means in the comments.

You might have heard of efficiency ratings that climb into the 40% range. Sharp even lists one in their press release. To clarify, those are different tests. Apparently there's a distinction made in efficiency ratings between concentrated and unfocused light. The more you know, right?

Don't expect to be covering your house in these soon, they're meant for use in satellites. [Akihabara via Engadget]

Click on the image to enlarge

Just 496,905 square kilometers. That's really nothing compared to the total world area: Less than the surface of Spain (504,030 square kilometers) covered with solar panels, distributed across deserts and areas with almost 24/7 sun, all year around.

Meanwhile, take a trip pretty much anywhere else in the world and things change:

Looking at an EU dishwasher label...The machine is rated not only on total energy and water consumption, but also on cleaning performance, drying performance, size and noise. At a glance, consumers get a sense of how this dishwasher stacks up against every other dishwasher on the market....The American EnergyGuide label lists the manufacturer-submitted annual kilowatt-hours consumption estimate, compares that to the other manufacturer-submitted estimates, then crunches those numbers with another set of assumptions to project how much money it might cost to operate the machine for a year. It's up to the shopper standing on the dishwasher aisle to figure out whether 100 or 1000 kilowatt-hours per year is a reasonable cost for clean plates.

Basically, the rest of the world gets a free issue of Consumer Reports on the label of every appliance they're about to buy. We're left needing a subscription. [Popular Mechanics]

Reading this retrospective, I'm both surprised and unsurprised at how innovative and well-designed the Dustbuster is. It was rechargeable, wall-mountable, used a high-tech (for the time) design based on a familiar product (the dustpan), had an immediately catchy name and was instantly indispensable for every suburban family in the country. I remember sitting on the carpet and playing with it, which is certainly not something I was likely to do with a damn cleaning product, and the product's name quickly became both a universal noun and verb ("Oh yeah, I Dustbusted the stairs yesterday."). It definitely wasn't the most powerful vacuum cleaner on the market (any modern Dyson would clean its clock) and the filter had a tendency to jam, but for sheer utility, style and "I want that gadget!" appeal, the Dustbuster was and maybe even still is the tops.

The Dustbuster is, I'm comfortable saying, the gadget nerd's cleaning tool. It's portable, battery-powered, cute, and versatile, and has definitely made our lives better. Cleaner, at least. [Popular Mechanics]

Gizmodo '79 is a week-long celebration of gadgets and geekdom 30 years ago, as the analog age gave way to the digital, and most of our favorite toys were just being born.

In theory, a standby PS3 uses about $250 a year when in the off standby position. An Xbox 360 uses a little bit less than that. Both those consoles use a little bit of power to maintain the wireless receiver (and USB charger, if you're charging a controller) while the main power is off. If the Tricklesaver shuts this off when the TV is off, you theoretically won't be able to charge your controllers or turn on your console wirelessly.

The solution is to just turn on your TV before you activate your console. But there's not much you can do about that controller charging. It's also $35, which is kind of steep for something that only has space for one TV and one console. [PR Web via Go nintendo via Oh Gizmo]

Update: Reader Jonathan notes that the PS3 uses only 2 watts in standby, and if you're to calculate that out, that's only about $5 a year. Not quite $250.

Measuring just 2.9 x 0.7 x 5.7 inches, the SNA 95 includes practicalities beyond its 9 bundled tips that are compatible with most major brands of laptops (though it doesn't appear that Macbooks are supported). The Cooler Master system also includes a cable management system, slick cool LED indicators and a USB port for whatever else might need charging.

As of now, the SNA 95 is available for $70 at one retailer. But it should pop up elsewhere soon. [Cooler Master via Crunchgear]

One day someone will put AI on these, add razor blades to each leg, and the whole thing is going to end up badly. [Makezine]

The tech is applied to things like USB ports, which in 3.0, will go from polling (clock based, always checking) devices to being managed via events, so they can sleep whenever not being used. And graphics, when the page isn't changing, can be run out of a frame buffer so the GPU and video RAM can sleep. When I say more sleep, I mean for additional milliseconds or longer. This adds up, over the course of a day when people stop to read or step away from their computers. In the past, the OS controlled the power savings, and that required power to process in turn, so you were using the system's power to manage power, keeping those other components from ever really turning off. By doing power management with more granularity, in hardware and software together, you can switching things on/off fast enough to fit in lots of "naps" and you can also do it with less processing overhead.

I'm excited for this tech to go everywhere where there's a chip.

This setup is deceptively simple. There's an electro-magnetized ring of wire sending 1-watt signal at 7.6-something MHz. From there, a carefully placed and wound coil of wire (yellow) sends the magnetic signal in a direction where another smaller coil (green) specifically tuned to receive the power and send it to a tiny speaker. It reminds me of the way a generator or motor work, somehow. The range was about 3 feet and the music was quiet by audible and worked when I moved the speaker in different directions. Impressive!

The chances of this making its way into mobile gadgets that charge with no cables or pads, ever? We're far off. The range and power are dependent on the size of the coils and the exact way they are wound, so they resonate the magnetic signals just right. Maybe a micro array of these, optimized several generations from now, will do the trick.

Or maybe the Dharma institute already has the answers.