Oh! Gizmo

By Andrew Liszewski

Cables are so 1920! But for some reason we’ve yet to been able to completely rid ourselves of those tangled burdens. Thankfully there’s devices like the new HDAiR from Altona Technologies that are helping us cut those cords one by one. It’s a wireless USB display adapter that lets you connect a USB-equipped PC or laptop to a Hi-def display or projector via HDMI or VGA. The HDAiR has a usable range of about 30 feet (it doesn’t require a line of site) and over that distance you can push an image with a resolution of 720P or 1440×1200. $199 available now on the Altona website.

[ Altona HDAiR ]

By Evan Ackerman

What with all of the, uh, legally purchased music and movies and games that I download buy, I fill up my hard drives once a year or so. Rather than buying a bunch of external drives, I just buy new bare drives, and swap ‘em out. There are any number of mildly convenient ways (like this, for example) to access a bare drive after you’ve eviscerated it out of your computer, but none of them are as convenient as just having a USB interface on the drive itself.

Now, this particular drive (a 1.8″ drive designed for mobile hardware) doesn’t have any interface besides the native USB, and this is obviously not acceptable for laptop or desktop use. But I don’t see why adding a a standard USB option to most internal drives wouldn’t be possible, and it would make accessing old data much, much easier as well as more robust. Plus, it’s likely that USB as an interface standard is going to be around way longer than PATA/IDE or SATA. This may not matter much right now, but it will in the future, by which time nobody will remember what all of those little tiny pins are supposed to plug into and you’ll just have to forget about recovering your (now vintage) porn stash.

VIA [ Engadget ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Feeling a bit cramped when it comes to screen real estate? The new Matrox M9148 LP PCIe x16 graphics card comes with 4 DisplayPort connections that each support a resolution of up to 2560×1600. So with a simple 2×2 monitor configuration that should give you a combined screen resolution of 5120×3200. Not too shabby. The card also comes with 1GB of memory, a low-profile form factor, a fanless design (translation: giant heatsink) and full support for Vista’s Aero eye candy. While no pricing info has been announced, the M9148 LP PCIe x16 should be available sometime in Q3 of this year.

[ Matrox M9148 LP PCIe x16 ] VIA [ Fareastgizmos.com ]

By Colin Ackerman

Now that wireless routers are cheap and ubiquitous, there’s one way that a router can separate itself from the rest of the pack: features. The D-Link DIR-685 Xtreme N Storage Router takes this concept to the Xtreme (okay, sorry, no more of that) by including a 3.2″ LCD, room for a hard drive, and a whole bunch more. We’ve got a full review for you, after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

By Andrew Liszewski

We originally brought you the Phantom Keystroker back in March of 2008, and at that time it was a rather homebrew-looking device that even my grandmother would find suspicious if she found it attached to the back of a computer. Well ThinkGeek’s now selling the Phantom Keystroker V2, and while the latest model actually looks like a professional product, it’s still far from what I’d consider ‘phantom.’

Like the original, the Keystroker V2 will emulate a keyboard and mouse attached to the victim’s computer, and will periodically make random mouse movements, toggle the caps-lock and throw out random bits of text. The new version’s also got a set of switches on the side allowing you to choose what events will actually plague the PC it’s attached to, as well as how often they occur. Convenient, but once again they make the device look rather suspicious were someone to discover it. $12.99 from ThinkGeek.

[ Phantom Keystroker V2 ] VIA [ bookofjoe ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Sony Japan has just released a compact bluetooth mouse that looks like a perfect complement to the Vaio P ultraportable laptop they introduced earlier in the year. The VGP-BMS10 features an aluminum sliding cover that powers the mouse on and off and also protects the scroll wheel and buttons while it’s stashed in a laptop case. Otherwise it’s not exactly swimming in extra features or functions, though it does have an 800dpi laser and a decent range of about 10 meters. The VGP-BMS10 will be officially available in August for about $67, and it appears to be only Windows compatible, so anyone who’s endeavored to install OS X on their Vaio P is out of luck.

[ Sony Vaio VGP-BMS10 Compact Bluetooth Mouse ] VIA [ Newlaunches ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Last year I wrote about a product called the CarCapsule which was basically a large inflatable bubble made of PVC you could use to protect an expensive sports car. Well a company out of the UK called Carcoon has a similar product, though they also produce a smaller version designed to protect a server when a clean and temperature controlled server room isn’t available.

The Server Shield inflates to about 6 feet tall, and when placed over top of your server (it seems designed to protect a system mounted in a server rack) gravity keeps it mostly airtight while it’s resting on the floor. A set of 4 small ventilators with filters keep air flowing through the Shield, which helps maintain the temperature inside and keep things clean and dry. There’s also a digital temperature readout on the outside indicating the current temperature inside the Server Shield, and special openings that allow quick access to the computer without having to completely remove the cover.

[ Carcoon Server Shield ] VIA [ The Red Ferret Journal ]

By Andrew Liszewski

My desk seems to be plagued by a constant turf war between my mouse, keyboard and Wacom tablet who are constantly battling it out for real estate. But could the Combimouse finally bring peace to my desktop? It takes the idea of the split ergonomic keyboard one step further by allowing the right side to double as a mouse, so in theory you never have to take your fingers off the keys.

When your hands are poised in a standard typing stance the right side operates like a regular keyboard, but when you hold it like you would a mouse, you end up touching a contact switch on the side which automatically changes it to ‘mouse mode’. So not only can it be used to move the cursor, but the I, O, J, K, L and < keys become your mouse buttons. But don't get excited about ordering one just yet. It seems the Combimouse is still in the prototype stages at this point, though successful usability tests have been carried out by Wichita State University, so it just might make it to the market some day.

[ Combimouse ] VIA [ Coolest Gadgets ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If you’re looking for an extremely stripped down way to play media files on a hard drive through your HDTV, this SATA hard drive adapter from Brando is as simple as it’s ever going to get. (Until hard drives themselves get an HDMI connector that is.) It functions like a standard SATA USB adapter, allowing you to connect either a 2.5-inch or 3.5-inch SATA hard drive to your PC via USB, but it doubles as a media player too, letting you connect the drive to your hi-def TV via HDMI, without the need for a computer in-between.

It supports pretty much every type of multimedia file you could ever want to play, from MPEGs to VOBs to the all important Divx files when it comes to video, and MP3s, WAVs and even AC3 when it comes to audio. It also comes with a decent sized remote for controlling playback, a basic composite video breakout AV cable and a universal AC adapter, and you can order one now from Brando for $69.

[ SATA HDD Multi-Media Player Adapter ] VIA [ The Gadgeteer ]