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We been hearing rumblings about hard drives being put into cellular phones for a while now (we’ve certainly advocated it), but now a company called “Hoya Corp” revealed in a quarterly earnings statement that two major hard drive players – Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and Seagate – are planning on developing 1″ hard drives for…
Japanese firm K Opticom is paving the way for a relatively untouched sense in today’s gadget world – smell. Trial units of the “Kaori Web” system will be placed at K Opticom’s internet cafes in Japan until the end of September. But what is the “Kaori Web,” you ask? See a picture of a flower,…
Toshiba has semi-announced that they will claim the throne of “world’s smallest portable audio player containing a hard drive” in 2005, thanks to their 0.85 inch hard drive announced in January. The iPod mini, freshly released in Japan, currently holds the title. It’s not the size that matters, Toshiba. Wait, yeah it is, sorry. The…
You may have too much money if you would pay $3,000 for a single power cable, or alternatively, you may not be giving enough money to us. If you bought a 1.5m cable, you’d get each centimeter for a around $20. Teac Esoteric, a Japanese company, manufactures the cable — so costly that the provider…
Om Malik points out that he’s lost two iPods in two days to the iPod updater. I just got my 3G 40GB back from the shop and updated with no problems today, but basically, keep a sharp eye — there may be a problem. This is unrelated to the fuzzy playback issues some people have…
Laptop Magazine scoops themselves with their review of the Archos AV420, the $550 portable media player with a 20GB hard drive and the ability to function as a relatively full-featured PVR. They pretty much love it, noting that the 3.5-inch 262k-color screen is very “easy to watch.” Their only complaint is the AV420s inability to…
ThinkGeek is now carrying the Firepod, an in-car cigarette adapter with both a USB and FireWire port for charging your iPod (or anything else that can be charged over FireWire or USB). Looks plenty handy for road warriors with just a couple of devices to charge at a time, and is a relatively good value…
Friday’s Fantasy Future Gadget has a very simple premise: we’ll give you one of the best ideas ever conceived for free. You have to buy us a jet plane when you make a million dollars with it, though. Today’s gadget would sell, like, eight nine eleven millions or thousands millions in a week, guaranteed. The…
Enfora has released a mini-USB version of its Wi-Fi carrying case for the PalmOne Tungsten E. The WP802b model hides a Wi-Fi radio and rechargeable 24-hour battery inside it’s normal looking leather sides. It you’re someone that already uses a portfolio-style case for you Palm, the $170 case is an interesting alternative to getting your…
Motorola has a series of short films shot with their new V710 cameraphone. Gizmodo has taken a bullet for you, watching and digesting the ad-shlock (and mixing metaphors without gloves) to exhume these five core messages: • Hot asian girls can be shallow. • Bears hate your ringtone, as well. • Dogs are awful at…
Motitopia’s Russell Beattie just spent a week with Motorola’s A845, one of the first two phones to support AT&T Wireless’s high-speed 3G wireless service (UMTS/WCDMA), and posted a really interesting article about his experience, somewhere between product review and reflection on the strengths and shortcomings on modern day phone OSes, push email, wireless broadband, and…
We’ve shown you some of these case mods before, but there are some new ones in ExtremeTech’s Crazy Case Mod Contest, like this Art Nouveau-inspired computer that is actually integrated right into a desk, topped off by a back-lit piece of custom stained glass. Read – Crazy Case Mod Contest: Meet the Contenders [Extremetech]
The new Steiner Commander V Binoculars are not night-vision equipment, despite claims that nighttime images are “so brilliant, it’s almost like turning on a spotlight.” Instead, the “Nighthunter” optics deliver a high rate of peak light transmission (96%; a record, they say) that means these military-spec binocs transmit as much available light as possible into…
I sent the intern out for ice, and he decided to go to college. Fortunately, he goofs off in class, too, and found me this really swank in-car cigarette-lighter USB flash drive MP3 adapter thingy. The idea is this: you plug in the MP-308 to your lighter, for power. You plug your USB flash drive…
Let me just go ahead and get this clunker out of the way: the KitchenAid Briva Dishwasher is everything and the kitchen sink. That’s right, I said it. But for real, this thing is awesome. It functions as a regular sink when not in use (or a cutting board if you fold it down), or…
The Bronze medalist in the “Business & Industrial Products” category of the IDEA 2004 awards, the Digital Dirt bike is an all-in-one communications station, driven by a single technician from village to village to deliver news, weather forecasts, school lessons, and needed treatments for common diseases. It’s currently being put to use throughout Andra Pradesh,…
I’m a fan of both the Sidekick and the Treo 600, so when Levi Wallach wrote to tell me about his in-depth comparison article featuring the two keyboarded messenger devices, I immediately did what any sane person would do and read it and then forgot to post about it. Fortunately for you, that was only…
New HP laptops it would seem, the $800 Compaq nx9020, a $1200 nx9020, and a nx9040 with a to-be-announced price. The entire line is aimed at small-business users that need something to perform basic office duties with long battery life, even when using the built-in 802.11b/g Wi-Fi. All models can be equipped with the Celeron…
Gadget Madness brings to our attention a prototype sub-tablet PC called the A5 that is reminiscent of the Sony U50/U70, although not quite as nice looking. While the prototype “runs RISC OS under Windows XP,” for most people the “Windows XP” part is all that is going to matter. An integrated 8.4-inch 800 by 600…
What’s happening in the mobile world this week? Something! I use arrows because they are neat. In coming weeks they might have meaning! ↑ Samsung – About to beat Motorola for the Number Two spot in global phone sales. [Reuters] ↑ Sony Ericsson – Second quarter profits were higher than expected and new phones with…