Recently unveiled at IFA, Dyson’s ball technology, which makes their upright vacuum cleaners easier to steer and navigate around your home, will soon be available on their canister vacuums as well. The first model to feature it, the Dyson DC37, uses a central pivot point working in conjunction with an articulated chassis so it’s easier to get around corners, and harder to get stuck. Like with their upright models, a lot of the DC37′s components are actually hidden inside the ball itself, further illustrating that Dyson is still serious about re-inventing every aspect of the vacuum cleaner.
In fact, the Dyson DC37 will also come with their Musclehead floor cleaning tool which detects differences in air pressure, automatically raising or lowering a set of brushes as it passes over carpeted or hard floors. Available sometime near the end of October for ~$616 to $770 (€439 to €549).
A quick Google image search will return in the neighborhood of about a trillion Star Wars images you can use as desktop wallpaper for your PC. But wallpaper for your actual walls? I’m afraid the options are considerably more limited there. That’s why this Imperial Forces wallpaper, now available from Super7, is so unique. From what I can tell this is the first edition in a collection of different Star Wars themed wall coverings, and features various members of the imperial forces, hand screened and flocked. That’s right, I said flocked.
A half-roll, which is able to cover about 17 square feet, or an area 27-inches by 90-inches in size (translation: very small) is $75. While a roll large enough to properly decorate a room (101 square feet) is $350.
There’s a never ending list of things the iPhone can do, but one thing it certainly can’t is smuggle drinks. In fact, thanks to water sensors and all those electronicy bits inside, it’s a good idea to keep it as far away from any kind of liquids as possible. However, these specially made ‘iPhones’ are a different story. Instead of gyros, wifi, GPS and other components inside, it’s completely empty, with enough space to hold 8 fl. oz. of your beverage of choice. Where you’d normally find the headphone jack is the flask’s opening, which stays sealed with a spring-loaded sliding cover that’s only open when the ‘phone’ is ‘unlocked’ to prevent spillage.
Sadly, the Phone Flasks are just another concept trying to raise funding on just another startup site. In this case, $10,000 at $20 per donation which basically serves as a pre-order for when they eventually go into production. But with only $70 raised and 0 time left, something tells me this product isn’t meant to be.
When we mention monitors, it’s usually Dell that has a deal going. But not today. HP is taking $130 on their 2711x.
Ultra-slim 27-inch HP 2711x 1080p LED-backlit LCD Monitor on sale for $429.99 – $130 off – $30 coupon code: LOGICBUY30 applied during checkout = $269.99 with FREE shipping. That’s the best deal we could find on this LED-backlit LCD Monitor and $10 cheaper than our last mention of this deal.
Sugar and caffeine can’t hold a candle to a shot of adrenaline when it comes to waking you up. Which is why we feel this bomb-shaped alarm clock, which looks like it was ordered directly from the ACME catalog, would be far more effective than the countless number of alarm clocks we’ve brought you in the past. Designed and built by Mike Krumpus from Nootropic Design, when the countdown for the alarm starts you have to snip one of 3 wires to ‘diffuse’ the situation. And every time the countdown begins it’s a different randomly selected wire that does the trick.
Now granted, having to replace the wires every single night before going to bed is probably kind of annoying. And knowing the bomb is actually made from paper towel tubes takes away some of the adrenaline producing fear that would help wake you up in the morning. (Even though the clay version pictured below is certainly convincing.) But if it’s fear and adrenaline you’re after I’d suggest packing one of these in your luggage and convincing airport security it’s just a travel alarm.
Like when most people first hear about the concept behind Booktrack, my knee-jerk reaction was to scoff at what I thought was a ridiculous idea. But having downloaded the app and given it a try, I’m surprised to say I’m not completely in the negative about it. In the same way a moving score can enhance a movie or TV show, the creators of Booktrack, including PayPal founder Peter Thiel, feel that books could also be made more exciting or dramatic with a soundtrack of their own.
And after reading a few pages of The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes – The Adventure of the Speckled Band (that’s a lot of adventure!) I’m intrigued by the idea, though dubious of it catching on. The most obvious question one has when it comes to adding a soundtrack to a book is how you deal with different reading speeds. A dramatic sting really isn’t dramatic if it comes at the wrong time. So when you start reading a story with a Booktrack soundtrack, every once in a while you’re encouraged to double tap on a word so that a moving arrow, which scrolls down the page, stays in sync with where you’re at on the page. It’s a little obtrusive, but over time the app will automatically adjust to match your reading speed, and will time the soundtrack accordingly.
You’re also given control over the individual levels for the soundtrack and sound effects, which helps you adjust them so that they’re not too distracting while you read. And once I had turned them down to more suitable background levels, I was surprised to find that I actually kind of appreciated them. But there are a lot of speed bumps to overcome before this idea catches on. The book I read was 43+ MB in size, which is considerably larger than your average ebook. And from the looks of it, that’s on the small side. And it takes time to add a soundtrack and effects to a title, so don’t expect new releases to be immediately available. Like with most ventures like this it’s going to come down to content available, and so far their library isn’t exactly extensive.
There are truly some ridiculous designs for iPhone-friendly speaker docks out there. So at this point if you’re going to throw your hat into the ring and try to outdo them, you really need to go for broke. Like Jean Michel Jarre has done with his new AeroDreamOne which stands 11 feet tall and includes a built in ladder so that mere mortals are still able to easily dock their iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad on top.
The 870 pound behemoth features 10,000 watts of total power broken down into a 4,000W low-end speaker, a couple of 1,600W mid-range speakers and a couple of 1,400W high-end speakers. Now given the AeroDreamOne is taller than the ceiling height in your average home, you’ve probably already guessed it’s not designed for your average consumer. And you’d be right. With a price tag of ~$560,000 (€399,000) I’m guessing your local Apple Store won’t be keeping them in stock. So not only do I now have to stare disappointingly at the tiny speaker dock I use, I’ve also got Popcorn stuck in my head. Awesome…
I can’t seem to find any information on who created this amazing, gigantic hammock bed. But I do know one thing: it’s awesome. You could polish off an entire box of Ritz crackers on it, Cookie Monster style, and never have to worry about rolling over onto crumbs in the middle of the night. Also, if you happen to build one (it certainly looks like a DIY effort) strategically placed above your kitchen, you could easily just drop dishes into the sink or garbage into the can. In fact, with sufficiently long utensils you could even prepare breakfast without ever getting out of bed. We may be onto something here…
While turn-by-turn voice prompts certainly make navigating with a GPS device easier and safer while driving, they’re still not necessarily the best solution while riding a bike. Not having easy access to the navigation device, or more likely your smartphone, hinders their usability. So a team at the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands has created an interesting alternative.
Instead of a voice telling you to turn here or go there, their Oh Music, Where Art Thou? app adjusts the volume and left/right mix of your music, providing auditory hints of where you should be heading. So when you should be going to the right (not necessarily just a turn) the sound in your headphones would be heavier on the right side. And as you got closer to your destination, the music would get increasingly louder. Kind of like playing hot or cold.
What’s particularly nice about the system is that you don’t need to see your smartphone’s display at any time, and you’re not really limited to a specific predefined route. On the down side though, in order for the compass to accurately detect the position and orientation of your head to adjust the music accordingly, your device pretty much needs to be strapped to your noggin. Hence the special headphones pictured above.
If you’re curious how well it works, and happen to live in Stockholm, you can download a prototype version of the app for your Android smartphone here.
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