Oh! Gizmo

By Luke Anderson

How often do you look at your power strips? Honestly, I do my best to keep them out of site, as they aren’t really anything special to look at. If you had a cool looking strip, would you want it to be seen by everyone? Well here’s one that does its best to look cool.

Unfortunately I don’t think that they succeeded in their mission to make a power strip that looks cool. It’s supposed to look like some kind of ship, however, I doubt that anyone will notice that detail once you’ve loaded it down with power cords. I think they might want to head back to the drawing board.

[ Giffintermeer ] VIA [ SlipperyBrick ]

By Luke Anderson

While I liked the idea of the Isolé IDP-3050 power strip automatically shutting off my unused gadgets when I’m not around, I’d rather have a little more control over when my I turn off my devices. I think I’d prefer this Energy Saver Bar which lets you turn off all of the outlets with a tap of your foot.

All six outlets are controlled by a foot switch which can be positioned up to 1.5 meters away. Sure, you could just reach down and turn off the little switch located on any power strip, but that takes too much effort. This cool device will set you back around $30, and likely pay for itself in a matter of months.

[ Proidee ] VIA [ Red Ferret ]

By Andrew Liszewski

If you want to reduce how much energy you use, but find you’re just too lazy to flip the switch on a power strip, the Isolé IDP-3050 will take care of that for you. The strip features 8 outlets, but 6 of them are actually controlled by a personal sensor. The sensor uses passive infrared technology to detect if someone’s around, and if no one’s found, it cuts power to those 6 outlets. It seems ideal for someone working at a PC, except that you’ll want to make sure you plug your workstation into one of the 2 non-controlled outlets. Unless you like the idea of it suddenly losing power whenever you get up to use the washroom.

The Isolé IDP-3050 has a user-adjustable time delay of 30 seconds to 30 minutes and is able to detect occupancy in an area up to 300 square feet. The power strip also features surge and noise suppression with a resettable circuit breaker, and it will not operate unless it’s plugged into a grounded, three prong outlet.

You can get it from Watt Stopper for $90. (Cue spit take.)

[ Isolé IDP-3050 Power Strip ] VIA [ Ubergizmo ]

By Andrew Liszewski

The only thing worse than forgetting a power adapter when traveling is not having the right one when you’re in a foreign country. But instead of carrying a bag of assorted adapters which brings us back to the problem of losing them, or trying to make your own with a wire clothes hangar (it would’ve worked eventually) this travel adapter from Kensington combines a collection of different plugs into a single, compact unit.

Like a switchblade, you can slide out the plug you need and use it to power everything from a cellphone to a laptop in more than 150 different countries. It’s suitable for most electronics you might travel with (2.5A; 110V - max 275W; 220V - max 550W) but is not recommended for high-watt devices like hair dryers and irons. Thankfully most hotel rooms already include both those items.

You can buy it directly from Kensington for just $19.99.

[ Kensington Travel Plug Adapter ] VIA [ GadgetGrid ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Belkin’s come up with a simple way to make your everyday surge protector a lot more useful. The Clamp-On is pretty self-explanatory, but in case the name’s gone over your head, it’s basically got a clamping device on the back that allows it to be attached to anything up to 1-1/2 inches thick. The most obvious use is attaching it to the edge of your desk or the back of your entertainment center, but you construction types can also clamp it onto a workbench or saw horse.

It has a generous 10-foot power cord, and uses a set of wheels with rubber ‘grip teeth’ to securely hold onto whatever you attach it to. That way you don’t always have to climb under your desk, or pull your entertainment center out from the wall in order to plug something in. It also comes with a $15,000 connected equipment warranty, which is nice if one day the Clamp-On fails to protect your gear from surges.

You can get the Clamp-On directly from Belkin for $40.99.

[ Clamp-On Surge Protector ]