Oh! Gizmo

By Luke Anderson

I’ve always been fascinated by the vinyl record. Since I was born in the 80’s, I grew up in the era of the cassette and CD, so those strange black discs were interesting. They somehow played music by having a needle run over them, how strange. Of course I’m older and understand the logic behind how they work, and yet somehow I still find them interesting. This Sound Chaser makes them even cooler.

Essentially what you see are several strips of a record that has been cut up and put back together to form a small track. The little yellow box on wheels contains a needle and speaker which allows it to play music as it follows the track. How cool is that? Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be any plan to release these commercially. It’s probably best, since we really don’t want people to go out and cut up all of their old vinyls.

[ Yuri Suzuki ] VIA [ Dvice ]

By Andrew Liszewski

I know in the past I’ve lamented at some of the Star Wars merchandise that Lucasfilm has approved, but sometimes Star Wars + (insert random item here) just seems like a match made in heaven. And these lightsaber themed replacement styli for the Nintendo DS definitely fall into that latter category. While I’ve already replaced my stock DS stylus with a longer one from my old Handspring Visor, you better believe it’s about to get upgraded again.

The lightsaber styli appear to be officially licensed by both Lucasfilm and Nintendo, and come in either a 3-pack that includes Luke, Obi-Wan and Vader’s lightsabers, or a 2-pack with just Luke and Vader’s sabers that actually light up! Amazon.com claims that both sets will be released on July 31 but you can pre-order them right now. The 3-pack costs $7.99 while the light-up 2-pack costs more than twice that at $16.99.

[ Nintendo DS Star Wars Styli ] VIA [ View From Heaven ]

By Luke Anderson

With rising gas prices, I’m trying to find new and creative ways to save on fuel costs. However, if money is no problem, and you love throwing parties, you have to check out the Party-A-CarGo. Essentially this is a portable party machine that hooks up to the back of your vehichle.

The Party-A-CarGo hooks up to your tow hitch and provide tunes and booze to all of your closest pals, wherever you go. That’s right, the bulk of this is a dedicated kegarator. Of course, just having this thing attached to your vehicle is probably one of the best ways to get yourself pulled over for no good reason. You’d better do a lot of partying, as this thing will set you back a cool $3,000.

[ PartyaCarGo ] VIA [ Dvice ]

By Jonathan Kimak

Have you got a thousand dollar budget for your next party or office meeting? Then you can rent out the 8-lane Scalextric race track. The track is computer controlled and can keep track of statistics like lap times, winners of each race and championship points.

The track measures roughly 19 feet by 9 feet so you’ll definitely need a big room. You also get a real live Race Director, a public address system and head microphone, full race structure and a choice of racing styles.

For an extra $400 you can get the Championship mode which includes race theme music, race flags and cones for decorations and 2 race marshals that will pick up your cars if they fall off the track.

Personally I’d keep the $400 and somehow find the strength to do the arduous task of picking up my own car myself. The only downside to this is that it’s currently only available in the United Kingdom.

[ Event House UK ] VIA [ New Launches ]

By Andrew Liszewski

At first glance you might think that the horse in the above photos is pulling a ridiculously over-designed carriage, but in reality it’s actually a training vehicle designed by Roush Technologies for Turkish-based Kurt Systems who trains race horses and camels. The vehicle provides trainers and veterinarians with a close-up view of the animal while it’s moving and allows them to continually monitor its vital signs at precisely controlled speeds from a walking pace all the way up to 60kph.

The striking and unusual looking machine incorporates a number of innovative and unique vehicle systems, as well as a diesel engine, automatic transmission and a spacious luxury cabin for a crew of three. Weighing in at around 4 tonnes, the vehicle effectively provides a moving enclosure similar to a starting stall, in which the animal can walk, trot or full gallop freely in a controlled environment, whilst being monitored and trained to optimise race performance.

The spacious cabin, which is mounted rearward of the horse, includes a centrally mounted driver’s seat, plus additional seats for a trainer and a veterinary specialist. Onboard systems include 12-volt and 240-volt electrical supplies, to power systems such as computerised heart, blood, oxygen and fitness monitoring. The unit also carries a range of precision hydraulically controlled accessories, such as a silicone saddle to simulate jockey weights.

The training vehicle also features electronically controlled reins which ensure that the horse is being steered in the same direction as the vehicle at all times. Since it was custom built for Kurt Systems I can only assume that the Roush Horse Trainer comes with a pretty high price tag, but given how competitive and lucrative horse racing can be, I have to wonder if they’ve signed Roush to an exclusive deal when it comes to the actual design.

[ Autoblog - ROUSH develops vehicle to increase horse power ]

By Luke Anderson

I can think of few people I know who haven’t seen the Back to the Future movies. If you’re one of those people, then please step away from your computer and go to your nearest store and pick up these movies. For the rest of you, you’ll be happy to know that Nike has finally caved into our demands and will be releasing these Hyperdunks.

It’s not quite 2015 yet, but at last we will have a pair of Nike Hyperdunks similar to those seen in Back to the Future Part II. Granted, they don’t have the cool autolace feature, but there’s still another 7 years to get that working. I will say that I am a bit disappointed, as these only seem to loosely resemble the shoes in the movie. I guess we’ll take what we can get. Look for these to hit stores later this month.

VIA [ Wired ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If you’ve ever dreamed of sticking one of those “My Kid’s A Nobel Prize Winner” bumper stickers to your car, you’re going to need to properly foster their mental development from a young age. So when it’s time to decorate the nursery I’d suggest skipping the stuffed animals and cartoon characters in favor of these plush subatomic particles from The Particle Zoo. They’re all here from the Photon to the Electron to the Neutron, and each one is weighted according to their mass. The Higgs Boson, Top Quark and W Boson are considered the heaviest and are filled with polished gravel, while the massless Bosons are the lightest and are stuffed with polyfil.

You can also get the antiparticle equivalent of various subatomic particles, though you’ll want to make sure you’ll keep them separated from the rest of your collection. You can buy each particle separately for about $9 each, but they’re also available in various theme packs. Or you can just pick up the whole collection at once for about $313.

[ The Particle Zoo ] VIA [ Geekologie ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If you’re in the market for a portable DVD player, I say go big or go home. This laptop-sized Monster Screen portable DVD player features a 12.5 inch LCD display with a half-decent resolution of 800×600. (More than enough for a DVD movie.) And besides DVDs, the Monster can also play VCDs as well as MPEG-4, AVI, DIVX and XVID videos whether they’re burned to a disc or loaded via a USB flash drive or an SD card.

And if you get tired of watching movies the Monster also features a built-in TV tuner for VHF-L, VHF-H and UHF frequencies, as well as a couple of video game controllers designed to be used with its NES emulator. (You’ll need to supply the ROMs.) While it’s claimed that the built-in battery can provide “hours of fun”, with a 12.5 inch LCD display I’d actually be impressed if it made it through a 2 hour movie. You can get it from Chinavision for about $200 if you’re just interested in a single unit.

[ Monster Screen 12.5 Inch Portable DVD Player with Games ] VIA [ Coolest Gadgets ]

By Andrew Liszewski

This morning Nikon officially announced their D700 digital SLR, which you can basically think of as a D3 that’s been crammed into the considerably more compact body of a D300. While that makes the D700 the company’s first compact professional DSLR, there are some trade-offs when you compare it to the D3. While it has the same 12.1 megapixel full frame FX sensor and image processing engine as its bigger brother, it does use a different viewfinder prism that only gives you about 95% coverage. It also has a different shutter that’s only good for 150,000 exposures compared to the D3’s 300,000, and a smaller battery. It’s also lacking an LCD info panel on the back and only features a single compact flash card slot. But on the other hand it does include a built-in pop-up flash, and even a self-cleaning sensor.

The D700 should be available sometime in late July which is of course perfectly timed to get it in the hands of the thousands of photographers who’ll be attending the Olympic games in August. It has an estimated price of $2,999.95 but that’s just for the body. If you decide this is your first SLR camera you’ll need to get yourself a lens as well. And for a full break down of all the D700’s features and specs I suggest checking out the official press release on Nikon’s website.

[ Nikon D700 Press Release ] VIA [ Digital Photography Review ]

By Andrew Liszewski

I don’t own a car, but apparently those numbers posted at the gas station mean that refueling your vehicle has gotten rather expensive these days. So instead of heading out in the family minivan with the kids, why not go the bike route instead? The Zigo is a modular bicycle that allows you to carry a couple of kids in the ChildPod up front, which makes it easier to keep an eye on them while you’re riding. (As opposed to having the child sitting behind you.) When you get to your destination the ChildPod can be removed and transformed into a stroller in about 30 seconds which then allows the Zigo to be used as a standard 2-wheeled bicycle once you attach the front wheel.

At $995 from MyZigo.com it’s not the cheapest bike or stroller on the market, particularly when you consider it’s something your kids will quickly outgrow. But if it helps avoid a trip to the gas station, I guess it could be worthwhile in the long run.

[ Zigo Leader Carrier Bicycle ] VIA [ YoKiddo! ]