By Colin Ackerman

We first heard about Sanyo’s Eneloop rechargeable hand warmers early last year, but apparently it’s taken them this long to make it to the states. There’s a new version, too… The original egg-shaped hand warmer gets warm on one side only (102° F in the low setting to 109° F on high, which they call “Turbo”), runs off a rechargeable lithium ion battery, and you get over 3 hours of heat for a 3 hour charge.

The square hand warmer is the new one; it uses AA rechargeable batteries (Eneloops included) and also functions as a battery charger, which is pretty sweet. It warms up on both sides to 102° F on low and 115° F on high, and you’ll get between 1 and 3 hours of warmth for a 4.5 hour charge. So, it’s not as long lasting as the other model, but it’s heating both sides and using swappable batts, which is a major plus in my book.

Best part about these things is the cheap factor: the one-sided warmer with the integrated battery is $35 (in white or pink), and the two-sided warmer that’s also a charger and includes 2 AA Eneloop rechargeable batteries is only $10 more (in silver or, um, ‘hot’ pink). You’ll find them at the online Sanyo store or “select retailers nationwide.”

[ Sanyo Rechargeable Hand Warmers ] VIA [ Gizmag ]

By Chris Scott Barr

When it comes to listening to music in your car, you have a lot of options these days. Satellite radio, AM/FM stations, CDs, and MP3 players can all give you access to your favorite tunes. With the popularity of the iPhone, many people like to utilize it for their in-car listening pleasure. Unfortunately if you’re looking for a truly integrated solution, you’ll find that you have few options.

I personally use a Sony head unit which features an iPod adapter. In order to get it to play nicely with my iPhone, I rely on a special adapter from Scoche which does the trick. It gets the job done, so long as you aren’t searching out specific songs or artists to listen to. The controls are clunky at best and barely functional at worst. Most of the time I have to unplug the iPhone, find the artist or song I was looking for, start a song, then plug it back in. I finally became fed up with it, and have started on a search for a better solution. Apline was kind enough to endulge me by letting us test out their iDA-X305 stereo. Read on for my full review.

Read the rest of this entry »

By Chris Scott Barr

Cuts come in all shapes and sizes, which is why bandages also come in variety packs. Unfortunately it seems that no matter which size you need, that’s the one missing from the medicine cabinet. Wouldn’t it be great if you could determine the length of the bandage, much the same way you do with a piece of tape? Well someone has had that very idea, and thinks it could be very feasible.

The Long and Short Plaster (I had no idea that some people called an adhesive bandage a “plaster”, we just always said Band-Aid) looks very much like a tape dispenser, and works on a similar principal. Obviously, since you’re adding gauze to the strip, there is a little more to it, but not much. What you’re left with is a bandage that is the perfect size for your cut. I could see a good demand for this, if it gets out of the concept stage.

[ Yanko ] VIA [ CrunchGear ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Before you get any clever ideas, don’t think you’re going to be using this Concrete Cloth developed by UK company Concrete Canvas to make yourself a bullet-proof t-shirt, cause it doesn’t work that way. It’s actually a flexible fabric impregnated with a special pre-mixed cement that hardens when it’s hydrated.

So not only does it make creating irregularly shaped items out of concrete a lot easier, like say shelters, ditches, retaining walls, pond linings and chairs, but unlike a regular concrete mix you can’t use too much water, so it’s idiot-proof as well. In fact, the material will even set underwater in addition to being fireproof and chemical resistant. Has polyester finally met its match?

[ Concrete Canvas ] VIA [ Dezeen ]

By Andrew Liszewski

While the new ActiFry from T-fal can cook anything from seafood to risotto to even desserts, its biggest claim to fame is being able to cook up to 2lbs of fresh cut french fries using just a spoonful of oil. Now you might be asking yourself, “how is such a thing possible when my local McEatery uses a tank of oil deep enough to hide a nuclear sub?” Well my first guess would have been stolen alien technology, since I’ve never seen an overweight extra-terrestrial, but it turns out the ActiFry uses a patented stirring paddle and pulse heating system to cook up crispy fries that are considerably better for you. (When using a healthy oil of course.)

Now I still wouldn’t recommend eating french fries every day (4 years of college proved that to be an unhealthy experiment) but the ActiFry seems like a far better alternative to a vat of scalding hot oil sitting on your kitchen counter. $299.99 from Amazon.

[ T-fal ActiFry ] VIA [ GadgetGrid ]