Hey. Psssst. Are you listening to good music? You should be listening to eeeeevil music. At least some of the time. You know, to maintain a healthy spiritual balance. Ideally, you want to be listening to half good music and half evil music to keep yourself centered. And these are the headphones to do it with, boy howdy. The Angel – Devil earphones don’t have stellar audio quality, to be sure, but they’re awfully cute, aren’t they? And you can remix all your music to have Black Sabbath playing out of the eeeeevil ear, and Miley Cyrus playing out of the angel ear.
Or, wait, do I have that backwards? I think I have that backwards. Well, either way, it’d probably give you a heck of a headache. The Angel – Devil headphones come in 5 color combinations, include the little stand, and cost only $35.
If you’re on your first Nikon DSLR, odds are it’s a Nikon D40, D40x, or D60. They’re solid cameras (I use a D40x myself), but the low light performance is, shall we say, abysmal. Generally, you get good low light performance from using a fast lens, but these entry level DSLRs aren’t equipped to autofocus any lenses except new and expensive ones, meaning that your el cheapo trusty 50mm f/1.4 AF-D won’t get the job done, and the cheapest fast AF-S lens that will work is nearly $500.
Nikon has just released a new lens designed specifically for entry level DX cameras, the AF-S DX 35mm f/1.8 G. It’s not an f/1.4 or an f/1.2 (or an f/0.95), but considering that the kit lens that comes with the D60 is an f/3.5, which is something like four times less sensitive to light (I think), this lens would be a major improvement. The 35mm gets boosted to about 50mm by the 1.5 crop factor of DX sensors, giving you a zoom of about 1x. All in all, a very fast, very solid lens. It focuses to just above 11 inches, weighs 7 ounces, and goes on sale in March for (this is the best part) under $200.
[ The following concerns a paid campaign currently running on the site. ]
February is upon us, and I’m still churning out 6 answers a day over at the Laptop Experts site. It seems that there is never an end to the questions that come in, which definitely keeps me (along with the other Experts) busy. Here’s a taste of what I tackled during this week.
Quick! What time is it in Paris right now? Well if you live anywhere but Paris, you probably had to hunt down an online world time clock, or switch to some widget to figure that out. But with this handsome World Time Clock from Oregon Scientific sitting in front of you, the answer would have been a simple twist away. The clock’s brushed metal dial can be turned to select one of the 12 major cities’ time zones (Paris included) which will then show their current time underneath your local time on the inverted LCD display. The clock will also automatically calculate and take daylight savings into account, and includes a basic alarm with snooze function.
Now the $49.99 that Oregon Scientific usually asks for this clock is kind of ridiculous, but it’s on sale at the moment for a slightly more reasonable $24.99.
Yesterday, we posted an article about LaserPup, a DIY remote controlled dog insane-o-tron with an iPhone interface. The piece of hardware that makes it easy for your iPhone (i.e. web app) to control stuff in the real world is called the ioBridge, and now (inevitably) a guy named Pete has rigged it up to control his fish tank, as you can see in the video above.
The ioBridge is a really nifty little device. You can attach it to just about anything (servos, webcams, electronics, sensors) and then control it over the internet with just about anything. The ioBridge doesn’t just deal with the messiness of converting electronics signals into network signals, but it also handles all of the network compatibility and security back-end. It also includes a code-free widget designer to get the project up and running. Sounds easy, and the possibilities are infinite… And the introductory “beta” price of $88 for the base board means you can probably afford one of these just to experiment with. iPod Touch controlled airsoft target range, anyone?
‘Playing with tradition’ was Richard Hutten’s entry for the Strawberry Fields project, which brought together many different artists who were considered “outsiders to the culture of traditional carpets” to see what unique designs they would come up with. And while there were a lot of original entries, Richard’s design is of particular interest to the geek crowd who still have terrible memories of a time when simply downloading an image to your PC was an excruciating task. Maybe if he designed it as an ASCII rug instead it wouldn’t have taken so long to download?
I’ve always been fascinated by swords, and have thought that it would be cool to be able to walk around with a katana strapped to my back. Of course that’s not something that one can really do, seeing how it’s illegal around these parts. So the next best thing one can do is to carry around something that merely looks like such an armament.
Behold! The Samurai Sword Handle Umbrella! With this awesome tool, you can not only get the look of a samurai sword, but you also have the power to repel water. Sure, you’ll still look funny with it on those sunny days, but the evil ninja rain clouds could be hiding anywhere, just waiting for an opportunity to strike out. Pick one up and defend yourself for just $30
One thing that’s always troubled me about taking a bath is that any way you slice it, you’re actually just sitting in your own filth. You can make yourself feel better about it by adding in some bubbles, but you’re really just covering up the discolored water. The obvious solution is to take a shower before getting in the tub. Of course that’s redundant and just plain silly, so someone has created a better solution.
This funny-looking yellow ball is called the Float Clear Bath Ball. It uses magical powers to attract dirt, oil and residue which it absorbs. I’m honestly not sure just how effective it is, but at least it’s easy to clean. Just toss it in the washing machine, or rinse it out before your next bath. $45 seems a bit pricey, if it actually works well, then it might be worth it. However, there’s no telling how effective it will be.
Related Tags: Portable Audio
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