Geek politics affect our lives almost everyday, only most of us are unaware of this. No Flash on iPhone? Geek ego. No stable jailbreak from the Chronic Dev Team? Geek ego once again. Here’s what happened.
P0sixninja, a member of the dev team announced recently that the Greenpois0n jailbreak would be released on 10/10/10 at 10:10 am. When the extremely talented Geoh0t (aka George Hotz) heard there was now an ETA, he decided to work on his own jailbreak, Limera1n, using an entirely different exploit than the one the dev team had planned on using. In less than a day he was somewhat done; sadly he had in his hands but an untested beta version of a jailbreak. Working, sure, and on a greater number of devices than Greenpois0n would have, but possibly unstable and requiring four bug-fixing re-releases as of this writing. And yet, he released before Greenpois0n, upstaging the dev team. The issue? Read the rest of this entry »
We’ve been talking about the HP Envy line of notebooks for quite some time here on OhGizmo. Heck, we even gave one away a while ago. We don’t mind because they’re really decent machines; they’re thin and light and can pack Core i7 quad-core processors. And sure, $50 off might not seem like a huge deal, but when you’re in the market specifically for one of these, every little bit can help.
In this case, we’re talking about an HP Envy 14 14.5-inch laptop with a 1GB ATI Radeon 5650 graphics card. Aside from that you have Beats Audio, 14.5-inch (1600 x 900) HD Radiance display (59% brighter than standard displays), up to 13.75 hours battery life, a backlit keyboard, a slot-loading optical drive built-in, HP TrueVision HD webcam, mini DisplayPort, HDMI, optional WWAN/3G and up to 256GB Solid State drive.
The future is a tricky thing. It’s almost impossible to predict just how it will turn out. Movies try their hand at it, but are rarely anywhere close to be being correct. I’m not just referring to the technology, but to the fashion as well. Take for instance the shoes Marty McFly wears in Back to the Future II. It’s possible that we may actually end up with shoes that lace themselves by 2015. However, I doubt they’ll look quite as hideous as the one pictured above.
What you see is one of the actual shoes worn by Michael J. Fox while filming the movie. That thing is butt-ugly. Ugly or no, it is a piece of movie history, and it (and its mate) can be yours. That’s right, this pair of shoes is going up for auction in the very near future. You’ll need to tap into that nest egg you’ve been saving up though, as the footwear is expected to fetch $12,000-$15,000. Personally, I’ll just wait for a better-looking pair that actually work.
Working in a home office can get a little boring at times, so ThinkGeek has once again come to the rescue with this pair of electronic blinking eyes from Japan that will allow you to anthropomorphize any inanimate object in your home to become your new best friend. They attach to almost anything via suction cups or hooks and the mechanical shutter mechanism stays synced between the two eyes at all times thanks to an IR signal. At three inches in size they’re probably better suited for bringing larger items like filing cabinets or fridges to life, and each eye is powered by 3xAAA batteries. $34.99, sold in a pair of course. No discounts for cyclops fans.
I’m as dependent on my smartphone as the next guy who lives and breathes gadgets, but I still keep a Moleskine in reach at all times for jotting notes and to-do lists. But mostly they do calendar/day planner duty since I’ve yet to successfully migrate to an electronic solution. (Trying as far back as the Handspring Visor.) So I must admit I’m rather enthralled by this Watch Diary designed by Wonjune Song. For the most part it’s just a Moleskine ripoff, except for the handy and stylish analog clock sitting smack dab in the middle that’s visible no matter what page you’re on.
And yes, I’m a firm believer that watches are pretty much obsolete these days except as a fashion accessory, but the Watch Diary manages to cleverly integrate it into each page layout. Instead of seeing your appointments laid out in a list, you actually fill them in around the clock so the red hand ends up reminding you of what you should currently be doing. Order one here in orange, ivory, white or black for $17.99.
Today Friday we’re ending the week with a whoppin $400 off Lenovo’s IdeaPad U160 Core i5 laptop. That’s a 40% reduction.
The U160 weighs a mere 2.9 pounds and is 0.9 inches at its thinnest point. Also features Ambient Light Sensor, Active Protection System and data recovery tools. Features include a Core i5-470UM 1.33GHz processor, 4GB DDR3 ram, 11.6″ Glare LCD, a 500GB Hard Drive and Windows 7.
While they probably won’t sell as well as the Pet Rock did many years ago, these Putty Monsters are yet another ridiculously simple idea that will probably end up making a small fortune. Slime’s popularity has come and gone over the years, mostly directly related to other pop-culture fads like Double Dare or Ghostbusters, but recently we’ve seen it enjoying a bit of a comeback thanks to some clever gimmicks. First it was the Magnetic Thinking Putty from a few months ago, and now it’s these Putty Monsters which are really nothing more than just slime in a can but with added personality thanks to a couple of plastic eyeballs. In fact I’d be tempted to scoff at the ~$16 price tag were it not for that pink monster staring so angrily at me. I’ll take 10!
If you’ve ever tried your hand at playing drums, you’ve no doubt realized two of the biggest issues with doing so. That’s right, a drum kit is loud and takes up a ton of space. If that weren’t enough, they aren’t the easiest instrument to record, and you’ll need a cargo van to haul them. It’s no wonder that guitarists get all the chicks.
The people over at Alesis feel your pain, and have a little something for you. It’s called the DM6 USB Express kit. This is a nice full-sized drumset that’s still small enough to tuck away (or transport) when you’re not using it. It features six pads (upright bass, two toms, hi-hat, cymbal, and a dual-zone snare) and two pedals. Essentially, it’s everything you’re going to need to get started.
The debate over the superiority of soft vs. hardware keyboards isn’t going to be resolved anytime soon, though with the rise of tablet computing and touchscreen devices over the past few years, it’s become more of an issue for those who prefer to bang away on keys. And it’s those types that the Back-Type keyboard, from a French company called AlphaUi, is targeted towards. It’s designed to attach to the back of smaller 5-7 inch tablets providing a set of 24 keys allowing you to physically type while holding the device, without diminishing its portability. The company claims after just a week you’ll be blasting away 250 characters/minute, and from what I can tell since the keys aren’t labeled you can actually configure the layout any way you want.
Now I have my doubts you’ll ever be reaching QWERTY typing speeds with this thing, but I generally like the idea. Now as to when it will actually be available to consumers is unknown. The company was recently accepting requests for beta testers via their website, so I’m assuming that the hardware has already been finalized. Maybe we’ll see them make an appearance at CES in January?
Related Tags: Apple, jailbreaking, Software
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