Q&Q SmileSolar Brings Citizen’s Eco-Drive Tech In A Youthful, Affordable Timepiece

  Take the technology behind Citizen's Eco-Drive watches, cram it inside a hip and colorful case reminiscent of Swatch watches from way back, and slap it with an affordable pricetag.  What you get is the Q&Q SmileSolar, a maintenance-free timepiece that never needs winding or a fresh change of batteries.

  Sure, it brings none of the sophistication of full-fledged Eco-Drive timepieces with their satellite signal reception and premium construction.  It does get the same solar-charging abilty, though, able to replenish its power stores from both natural and ambient lighting sources.

  The Q&Q SmileSolar uses ABS resin for the case and polyurethane resin for the strap (all partly-recycled), so this is no classy timepiece for pairing with your dapper threads.  They do have models that eschew the extra-bright color scheme (like an all-black one), however, so it might still work if you needed a watch and couldn't find the Omega JFK Watch that you wear to make you feel stately and dignified.  Watch details include a 40 x 12.5 mm case, water resistance up to 50 meters, and Miyota Cal.2085 movement.

  Do note, you'll have to give the watch an initial charging during first use (just leaving it by the window while the sun is up should be enough).  After that, it will pretty much just keep ticking unless you end up trapped in a cave with zero light for 120 days (it can run up to 3.5 months on a full charge with no light exposure), at which point, a non-functional watch is probably the least of your problems.

  Available now, the Q&Q SmileSolar retails for $40.

May 29, 2014 Read More +

WebTuner Combines Traditional Pay TV And Internet Video In A Single Media Streamer

  Today's crop of set-top boxes do a great job of bringing internet video to people's living rooms, but requires you to make separate arrangements for traditional pay TV.  In fact, many folks don't even bother with the latter, depending strictly on online sources like Netflix to get their TV entertainment.  But if someone made a box that allowed both internet video and pay TV to co-exist, would you still watch TV the old way?  That's exactly what WebTuner is counting on.

  Unveiled at the 2014 National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) conference this week, it's  a small box that gives users access to both traditional TV channels and their growing online competition from a single device.  Essentially, the device integrates old (live TV, on-demand) and new (all your favorite streaming services) alike, giving them a unified interface from which viewers can access both.

  WebTuner housed its computing hardware inside a small box that plugs directly into a wall outlet, with an HDMI and Ethernet port on the outer end.   To use, simply hook it up with an HDMI cable to the TV and connect it to your home network (either via WiFi or the Ethernet slot) -- done.  It comes with a two-sided remote that has traditional buttons on one side and a QWERTY keyboard on the other.  Like Amazon Fire TV, they're pimping a powerful search experience.  Unlike it, the search will encompass all the content, so a search for a movie title, for instance, will bring up all results it can find, whether it's on Netflix, on Showtime's regular programming, or on-demand with whatever cable provider is hooked into the service.

  While WebTuner is currently showing off their wares at the NAB conference, it's likely to be a long time before they actually hit the consumer market.  Chances are, they'll need to get a number of big media companies on board to make this work, but it's definitely going to be interesting to watch.

May 29, 2014 Read More +

This Mini Mobile Robotic Printer Is Actually Cute And Useful, Can Fit In A Backpack Pouch

  Portable printers have made working on the road a lot more convenient, letting you pull document printouts anytime the need for one arises.   And while the current crop of portable printers work well enough for mobile workers, this Mini Mobile Robotic Printer shrinks it down to an even more manageable size.

  Made by Israel-based Zuta Labs, it's an entirely fresh take on mobile printers.  Instead of a page-wide device that you feed paper into, it's like a mini-Roomba that passes over a sheet of paper laid out on a table.  Rather than clean every surface it  crosses like a robot vacuum would, however, it receives your digital documents over Bluetooth and prints a hardcopy directly on the paper.

  The Mini Mobile Robotic Printer is, basically, a tiny robot armed with a printhead and a set of wheels, allowing it to travel the entire area of the paper going from left to right and top to bottom.  Do note, you have to position it right on the upper left corner of the paper, just like you have to line up the paper properly when using a more conventional portable printer, but that's all the hassle you will need to put up with.  Printing speed is decent, too, with the device able to finish an entire letter-sized sheet in around 40 seconds.  All standard paper sizes are supported.

  Dimensions are 10 cm tall and 11.5 cm in diameter, with a weight of 300g, easily making it the most portable printer in the market.  It comes with a replaceable ink cartridge that can produce up to 1,000 pages before requiring a replacement, so unless you're printing a 100-page manual for a meeting of 20 people in an afternoon, it should last you for a while.  Rechargeable battery is only good for up to one hour of runtime, though.

  A Kickstarter campaign is currently running for the Mini Mobile Robotic Printer.  Pledges to reserve a unit starts at $180.

May 29, 2014 Read More +

Honeywell HPA250B Air Purifier Will Alert You When Allergens Are In The Vicinity

  Any air purifier worth its filter will clear your air of nasty contaminants. The Honeywell HPA250B, however, will not just do that, they'll make you aware of their presence as well, buzzing your phone when it detects the presence of potential allergens at very high levels.

  Granted, that sounds like a feature you probably won't care about. You're just happy to be rid of contaminants, after all -- you don't need to know when they come around. However, wouldn't it be fun to figure out what, exactly, is bringing VOCs into the house?  Like, if the phone buzzes every time your mother in law visits or something. It could become the perfect excuse to keep someone you don't want coming around without warning ("But, honey, she brings germs. Think about the baby"). Genius, right?

  The Honeywell HPA250B pairs with your phone over Bluetooth, allowing the accompanying app to control the device remotely and provide alerts when contaminants make attempts to invade the space. The app can also alert you when the filter needs to be replaced (haha, your puny air purifier still uses filters), so it's quite a useful addition to the setup. As for the purifier itself, it uses a HEPA filter to capture up to 99.97% of microscopic allergens, working its cleaning magic at an area of up to 310 square feet. Since it has an onboard VOC sensor, it can be set to only initiate cleaning when contaminants are detected rather than on scheduled intervals. It features four cleaning levels (germs, allergens, general, turbo) and onboard capacitive controls.

  Available exclusively at Best Buy, the Honeywell HPA250B retails for $269.99.

May 29, 2014 Read More +

SkaterTrainer Turns Skateboards Into Practice Boards Really Helping You Learn New Tricks

  Learning a new skateboard trick entails a lot of trial and error, usually accompanied with a heaping of scrapes and the occasional broken bone.  That's just how it's always been.  But who says it has to be that way going forward?  Definitely not the guys behind SkaterTrainer.

  A tool that makes learning new skate tricks simpler and safer, it attaches to the board's wheels, keeping it from moving before and after performing a trick.  Basically, it lets you practice kickflips, ollies, and other tricks while your board stays in place, so you can develop your muscle memory without having a bodypart crash into the pavement every other time.

  The SkaterTrainer are thick rubber fittings designed to wear over the wheels on your skateboards. When slid onto the wheels, they render them unable to spin, creating a stationary board that can stay in place even while you shake and wiggle on top of the deck.  They, essentially, turn your Corbus skateboard into a functional practice board, making for a cheaper (compared to buying a practice board) yet equally viable alternative  It can fit all standard-sized skateboard wheels.

  Will this turn you into a veritable trick machine with the deck?  Heck, no.  You'll still need to develop your balance while the board is moving, after all (and you can't do tricks on a stationary board to develop that).  When it comes to building muscles memory for seeing quick progress, though, we imagine it's an extremely solid tool.

  Available exclusively from the official website SkaterTrainer retails at $19 for a set of four.

May 29, 2014 Read More +

Google Made A Self-Driving Car From Scratch And It Has No Steering Wheel

  For years, Google has retrofitted existing cars with their self-driving system to test viability of the technology on the road. This time, they're taking the next step: putting together a self-driving vehicle from scratch.

  Unveiled at Re/code by Sergey Brin, the self-driving car prototype is purpose-built for ferrying passengers autonomously. As such, they took out all the parts that people use when they drive, churning out a car that has no steering wheel pedals, mirrors, gauges, and other vehicle staples.  That means, no chance of manual control whatsoever, putting your life completely at the robot car's mercy.

  The car comes with a compact and rounded appearance that's a bit cartoonish, almost like the kind of future car you can imagine seeing in a goofy children's show (if it's raining, make sure to get out of the car carrying a Rainshader Umbrella -- perfect fit). Safety features include blind spot sensors that can detect objects up to distances equivalent to two football fields in all directions, electronically-limited speed (the current version maxes out at 25mph), and backup automated systems that will take over the brakes and steering in case the default setup malfunctions (though we're not sure how this part works).  Inside, it comes with seats to hold two people, a cargo area for belongings, a screen that shows the route, and start/stop buttons.

  According to Google, they're planning to build 100 early versions of the prototype for testing during the summer. The company itself has no plans of selling their own cars, though -- instead, they're likely going to license the technology to existing automakers for use with their own vehicles.

May 28, 2014 Read More +

iStick Is A Thumb Drive For iPhone And iPad

  One of the most annoying thing about iOS devices is the lack of a facility for hooking up extra storage Sometimes, using an SD card or a thumb drive is just way more efficient for transferring files than any of the commercial or private cloud solutions out there. The iStick is a thumb drive that can work with both computers (via USB) and iOS devices (via Lightning), finally creating a simple way to get files to and from Apple's mobile gadgets without going through the hassle of iTunes.

  Created by Hyper, it's an Apple MFi-certified thumb drive that comes with both a USB and Lighting connector. Whether for transferring movies from the PC to an iPad, moving an ebook collection from an iPod Touch to a Mac, or copying the entire photo gallery from your iPhone to your mom's iPhone (hey, mom wants a copy of all your selfies), this should do the trick.

  The iStick has a sliding switch that controls which connector is exposed, so switching from one to the other takes just one flick of a thumb. Combined with the iStick mobile app, you can play media directly from the flash drive (with support for formats not native to iOS), as well open files from a variety of apps (no need to transfer), conduct file management, and even backup files from your iOS device to the thumb drive.

  It comes in a variety of storage capacities, from 8GB to 128GB, with 2.5MBps read speed and 1.9MBps write speed over the Lightning connection. Dimensions are 51.6 x 28.6 x 9.1 mm, with either ABS plastic or aluminum construction for the drive case.

  A Kickstarter campaign is currently running for iStick. Pledges to reserve a unit starts at $79.

May 28, 2014 Read More +