If it’s too darn noisy for you to be able to speak in a phone or a hands-free unit, one solution has traditionally been to use bone conduction to isolate your voice. This is what the Jawbone headset does. But sometimes, like when you go skiing, it’s not that comfortable to wear. So Buhel’s Speakgoggle G33 skiing visor has bone conduction technology that lets it pick up your voice from the sound of your friend’s careening-down-the-mountain screams. It pairs with your cellphone through Bluetooth and you can hear through earbuds. It also connects with other G33 visors directly and lets you have intercom functionality up to 500 meters (1,640 feet) apart, so that you can chat it up with up to 6 of your friends while trying not to get killed.
There’s no word on price though the G33 does appear to be available.
We last wrote about Zomm two years ago when they were launching their wireless leash product. At CES this year, the company is releasing a new device called Lifestyle Connect. The idea behind it is to make it easier to stay safe, especially for those of fragile health. The small keychain-like device connects to your Bluetooth enabled phone and gives you one-touch access to a Personal Safety Concierge. This concierge will then assist you with what you need, be it to call your friends, an ambulance or the police. This functionality is also available on the Wireless Leash from two years ago, so the real innovation comes more from the fact that the Lifestyle Connect can also monitor your connected health sensors, like glucose meters, heart-rate sensors and fall detectors, and upload the data to the cloud. It is then available to your trusted friends, health practitioners or first responders in the case of emergency, any of which can be summoned, again, with just one touch.
The Lifestyle Connect is $199 and will ship in April. If you pre-order now, you also get 3 months of concierge service thrown in.
I’d love to know what they were ingesting at the meeting where company iLuv decided they were going to call their new Bluetooth speakers “Mo’Beats”. Funky name aside, these speakers stand out somewhat from the rest for a couple reasons. First their design, very fitting with the overall Apple aesthetic, although we assume they’d work just as fine with any Bluetooth streaming product. That said, the second feature compels you even more to use an iDevice, since that lip is made specifically to dock a Cupertino gadget. Again, you can put anything there, but if you do that, you’ll look as silly as me: I’m rocking Apple keyboards and a barely usable trackpad on a few PCs here in the “office”. I say barely usable because that little bugger’s drivers were made for a Mac and it just acts all kinds of strange on a PC.
Anyway, the Mo’Beats come with a Li-I rechargeable battery and should set you back $100, available soon.
Surviving by yourself in inhospitable conditions is really only fun on TV. There’s only so much of your own pee you can drink, so many camel testicles you can eat and so many carcases you can crawl into before you realize that you really should have packed something like DeLorme’s InReach two-way satellite hookup before leaving for a trek across the Sahara. For $250 and a $10 a month subscription, you can send distress SMSs to pre-designated recipients along with your GPS coordinates, with a delivery confirmation. If you happen to also be carrying an Android phone, you can pair through Bluetooth and actually send and receive messages. There’s an SOS button in case all you’re able to do before passing out is to press a button. Finally, the InReach is rugged, waterproof, shock-resistant and buoyant.
While this is an accident waiting to happen, Chinavision’s “Complete Car Bluetooth Rearview Mirror” certainly has managed to cram everything and the kitchen sink in there. Their replacement mirror features the following: GPS, wireless rear-view parking camera (camera kit included), Bluetooth calling, DVR and yes even a media player. The idea is that in DVR mode it will record what happens inside or out (presumably more than the rearview parking camera can be hooked up to it) while in other modes it can either give you GPS guidance or even play back videos for you. We’re guessing you have to be stopped with parking brake engaged for this particular feature to work, though we’re sure enterprising folk will quickly find a way around that. Everything is displayed on a 4.3 inch, 480 by 272 resolution screen and the internals are powered by a Centrality Atlas 4 Dual-Core 500 MHz processor and 64MB of RAM. Yeah, HD files might be out of the question.
Storage is handled via SD or Micro SD cards, of which two are included (4GB each). It’s $205 for one and prices go down with larger order numbers as this appears to be a wholesaler.
“Yo dawg… we heard you like phones. So we gave your phone a phone.” Yeah. That’s pretty much what’s going on here. See, the Blutooth Handset TK2 connects to your cellphone through Bluetooth and all it does is allow you to speak (and listen, duh). The thing is… you’re supposed to hold it in your hand. Like a phone! So in a way, it’s a smaller phone that you use… to use your phone. It has no other point. It doesn’t free your hands, it does the opposite.
Granted you can pair it with more than your cellphone, so perhaps this can be a tiny VoIP device… Or something. It does feature Bluetooth v2.1, which means you could pair it to your cellphone and something else simultaneously. So maybe you can eke out a use that way. Like if you’re at home and are taking Skype and cellular calls.
This is a great idea. The MyRingGuard is a prototype silicone and plastic ring that sends a distress text message along with your exact GPS location to a pre-determined set of people in case of emergency. They can then decide to either come to you, call 911 for you or walk around their apartment while flailing their arms, in agony over how to best come to your help. Say you’re out running late at night and trip and injure yourself. Or you fear for your safety for whatever reason. Instead of reaching for your phone just press your thumb to your index finger and the ring will communicate through Bluetooth and send out those distress signals. Think of it as a sophisticated panic button.
Currently the MyRingGuard is in the crowdfunding phase, not on your usual Kickstarter but on another social funding site. For $39 you can get a ring, though you’re free to contribute more to attain the stated $30,000 goal. However it appears to only work with Android powered phones at the moment.
It might be an Apple world out there, but Nokia’s still a behemoth in the mobile world. And their accessories often come through with an aesthetic degree of design brilliance that we wish they could display in other areas. Take for instance this Bluetooth headset they’re releasing. It’s called the Luna and is really small, really light and comes in 5 different colors. It looks interesting but more importantly has some killer features. NFC (near field communications) makes pairing with your phone as simple as tapping the two together. If you get a call, press down on it to release it and answer the call. You’re done? Hang up by putting the Luna back on its dock. Or use the button if you don’t feel like doing it that way. Also, it’s able to pair with 2 phones, through Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR. With an impressive 8 hours of talk time and up to 60 hours of standby (unplugged, obviously), getting this $69 device seems like a no-brainer.
Yesterday Jawbone updated their compact ICON Bluetooth headset with ‘HD’ status, reflecting the fact that it now boasts a 10mm speaker driver which is about 25% larger than the regular ICON. A nice improvement indeed, bringing its performance and sound quality more in line with its bigger brother, the ERA. But the more interesting revelation was the company’s new PC accessory affectionately called THE NERD; a plug and play, driverless USB dongle that allows the headset to stream music and sound from a computer, as well as work with VoIP software. The ICON HD can even be connected to your phone and PC at the same time, interrupting your music or movie so that you can still take calls when they come in. Available now for $139.99.
Related Tags: Bluetooth, Sports, winter
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