Gizmodo: wall socket

Art Lebedev Takes Wall Sockets 3D

Mark Wilson — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 08:08:43 EST

Your typical wall socket just sits there defeated by life, making no decent effort to prevent the inevitable pwning by a 10-socket surge protector. Art Lebedev's Rozetkus socket, however, transforms from 2D to 3D.

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]

Just a Stylish 'Wall Socket' USB Hub

Mark Wilson — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 10:20:00 EDT

It's not a formal wall socket replacement, but this Elecom U2H-TC410B 4-port USB hub will look sharp (and a bit misleading) when mounted to a desk or table.

In all actuality, it's just a typical 4-port USB hub with a tad more style and a lot of extra space for larger USB devices to plug in. Yes, the hub is a bit expensive at $40, but when a friend electrocutes himself trying to stick a USB dongle into a wall socket because he saw you do it, the price will seem minuscule next his the medical bills and the subsequent lifetime of misery as his bowels no longer have the patience for toilets. [AudioCubes via OhGizmo!]

Velcro Wall Socket is Kinda Useless

Jason Chen — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 13:45:12 EDT

This concept Velcro wall socket seems like it would be a good idea on paper, seeing as it attaches Velcro to both the socket and AC adapters so you can keep them close when not in use. But in practice, the fact that you can keep a plug attached close to the wall, instead of on the floor, does very little to act "as a strong reminder to the user to unplug the plug," which would in turn save power. Unless you're really anal about how high your electric bill is, you're not going to be going around and unplugging your electronics after you use them.

Velcro Wall Socket Conserves Energy [Yanko Design]

Jack PC: The Wall Socket PC

Jason Chen — Thu, 01 Jun 2006 07:30:15 EDT

The UK company Jade Integration is about to release a PC that is small enough to fit inside a standard wall power socket. Not only that, it can be powered solely over ethernet.

Called the Jack PC, the guts of it consists of two layered circuit boards and is powered by only 5 Watts. The face contains a VGA port, 4 USB ports, an audio and a microphone port. The CPU is an AMD RISC processor which is the equivalent of a 1.2GHz x86 processor (think standard Intel or AMD chips).

The main purpose of is to run a thin client to connect to a server so you can do most of the processing off of this device. Also, Internet Explorer 6 is included to access web applications such as your gmail or gcal.

The Jack PC gets its official launch the 14th of June at the IT Works Show. – Jason Chen

UK firm to unveil wall-socket PC [ZDNet]