Around The Home
The CoolBoy - a hand-held, portable drinks cooler
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March 30, 2006 Ian Thompson believes that cooling drinks and keeping them cold for hours days or weeks before they are needed is downright wasteful. So the Northumbria University MA Design student came up with‘The Coolboy’ - and says this is how we will be chilling our drinks in 2020. The ‘Coolboy’ concept is a lightweight device, about the size of a cocktail shaker that plugs into the mains and is fitted inside with cooling cells. The tepid drink is poured through the top, and passes across the cells, which then chill the liquid to a perfectly cool temperature. Read More
B&O 80th Anniversary Limited Edition BeoCom 2 cordless telephone
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March 10, 2006 Bang & Olufsen has released a signature series of limited edition BeoCom 2 cordless telephone handsets produced in honor of its 80 years of outstanding design and performance. The Limited Edition BeoCom 2 handsets are unique, as there will only be 600 collector's items produced world wide and exclusively sold in North America. The handsets will introduce a new colour specially developed for this series. In addition, three hundred units will feature unique patterns etched by hand directly onto the surface by Danish designer, Bess Kristoffersen. The handsets will each have its own identity, as each unit will be individually numbered and will showcase its own signature pattern. Read More
iPod Hi-Fi could redefine the Home Stereo System
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March 1, 2006 Apple was once just a niche computer company with a cult following, but the iPod took the Apple religion mainstream. Taking a killer product (the MP3 player) and branding and innovating the interface and form factor so successfully that it has captured close to a quarter of the world market with what would otherwise be a generic product gives the company an aura of marketing invincibility. So when Steve Jobs announced the iPod Hi-Fi yesterday, touting that the all-new, iPod-centric high-fidelity speaker system will “redefine the home stereo system”, we’re a bit reticent to differ. Apple claims the iPod Hi-Fi will deliver “breathtaking acoustic performance and room-filling sound unlike any other speaker system designed for the iPod.” It has an all-in-one design, can run on mains power or batteries, and controlled remotely. It works great, it looks good, it adds portability to a genuine hi-fi system and it shares the iPod coolness factor. Scary yes, and so cool that it might catalyse a return to the days when people carried a boom box the size of a sheep on their shoulder. Read More
Functional redesign of the wall electrical outlet
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February 28, 2006 Don’tya just love a simple and clever solution. One of the legacy items in every home that just never seems to get updated is the electrical wall outlet or power socket or whatever you call it. Designed in the dark ages before low voltage transformers and other humungous devices became commonplace, we’ve seen an elegant solution for a powerboard in the Powersquid but we haven’t seen an elegant solution to overcome this problem for the wall outlet until this revolutionary re-take by 360 Electrical. The concept is simple – the new wall outlets have receptacles that rotate a full 360 degrees in both directions. The receptacles click and hold in 18 different positions, enabling you to find a way to plug in those big fat problem plugs without eclipsing the next outlet. “The idea and patent came from a real world problem. For professional reasons, I was carrying two cell phones and was getting frustrated that I could not charge them simultaneously in the same outlet because of their large plugs,” recalls Kimberly Gerard, 360 Electrical’s president. Read More
Home theatre speakers that dare to be different
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February 27, 2006 If you’re looking for something a bit different in home theatre audio, you’ll certainly find it in the Mirage UNI-Theatre 3-in-1 Home Theatre audio solution. The UNI-Theatre is a self-contained left, right and centre speaker in one ingeniously designed aluminium enclosure intended to blend in with today’s prolific LCD, Plasma and slim-line CTVs. The UNI-Theatre has three independent acoustically isolated chambers, which allow true uncoloured performance. Its 2-way, 3-channel magnetically shielded design will ‘sit’ conveniently under or alongside any wall mounted display such as a Plasma or LCD TV, or alternatively, a glass base enables it to be placed on top or in front of displays or CTVs.
The washing machine that dries and irons too!
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February 16, 2006 If there’s one aspect of daily life that has changed little in the last 50 years it is the washing of clothes. Clothes must be washed, then dried, then ironed, before they can be worn. Each is a separate and distinct process and the three processes consume a fair amount of time and brain space. Now there’s a new machine on the horizon called the WashDryIron – a washing machine that does just what its name suggests - it washes, dries AND irons your clothes in totally separate compartments - meaning no more colour runs, no shrinkage and, most importantly, no more ironing. The creator of the world’s first ‘drum-less’ washing machine, Oliver Blackwell – a University of Plymouth product design graduate – believes it can save an average person around ten days a year in ironing time, which equates roughly with our calculations when we looked at Siemens ironing machine.
The folding cutting board
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February 16, 2006 Living proof that you don’t need a 2GHz processor and fuzzy logic to have a gadget that makes life easier is this folding cutting board from the MomaStore. The outer portions of the cutting board fold upward so you can ensure the food you’ve lovingly chopped all goes into the pan. The polypropylene board is designed such that the integral hinges snap between being locked flat for cutting and locked into a chute for pouring while a patented cross hinge manages the lockout and snap action. Read More
Shadow Trak hides your big screen behind a motorised painting
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February 15, 2006 As sales of plasma and LCD screens continue to skyrocket (up 40% in Q3 2005), innovative ways to cut the clutter in the living room are booming, at least according to Gizmag’s statistics. Each time we run something like Reversica’s big screen concealment solution, or Sonance ‘s invisible' loudspeaker technology or even Onkyo’s combined speakers and television stand they get lots of traffic and lots of referrals (via the “send this article to a friend’ facility at the bottom of each page), which we presume is Partner A telling Partner B they have found an elegant way of combining technology into the living environment. Might we be so bold as to suggest to all those manufacturers of megascreens, that people don’t necessarily want to look at them ALL the time. Anyway, here’s another hide-the-screen solution. The Shadow Trak System hides the screen behind the painting of your choice, so it can be appropriately integrated into any decor. For those who just love motorized systems, Auton’s range of hide-the-screen solutions includes some ripper implementations, with special mention for their hide-the-wine-cellar, hide-the-safe, hide-the-cocktail-cabinet and hide-the-projector solutions. Read More
The X-arm robotic display mounting solution
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February 6, 2006 When assessing the size of a potential market, it’s easy to get it all wrong, even with detailed analysis. Take for example, the Xerox photocopier. Invented by Chester Carlson in 1938, the invention was rejected by more than 20 companies before backers could be found. Some quite prestigious consulting firms advised against investment in the project on the basis that the machines were complex and costly and based on analysis of carbon copy paper sales, the market was simply not valuable enough. The rest, they say, is history and Xerox Corporation is today a US$15.7 billion technology and services enterprise with world leadership in the critical and still emerging document management industry. Think you’d have assessed it differently? Then riddle us this one – does this new X-arm motorized wall mount for flat panel TVs offer a significant advantage and will it be able to capture a sufficiently large niche to prosper? The X-arm allows a viewer to adjust the viewing angle of the TV with a remote control. The market for wall mounting brackets is naturally experiencing massive growth at present due to the popularity of flat panel LCD and plasma TVs. Research estimates on the number that will be sold in the U.S. in the next three years vary between 6 million and 8 million units. What percentage of those would be motorized if they retailed for less than US$2000? Read More
Honda’s new lawnmower with SMART Drive System
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February 5, 2006 Honda Power Equipment is introducing a new lawnmower line and apart from the mandatory higher performance and superior fuel efficiency which consumers expect with every new series, the new HRR line is a better mousetrap because it focuses on the user experience. We’re not sure why lawnmowers seem to have escaped the user-friendly evolution of most other household contraptions, but figure it’s worthwhile lauding Honda for its advancements in the hope the other lawnmower manufacturers will do likewise. Specifically, the new HRR line is equipped with a SMART Drive transmission system and new ErgoActive easy-folding handlebars, which combine to offer what Honda claims to be “an infinitely easier lawnmowing experience.” The heart of the SMART Drive transmission system is a Variable Speed Transmission (VST) which allows the user to easily control the mower's speed simply by resting his or her hands on the ErgoActive handlebars which place the mower's primary controls within easy reach, increasing comfort during operation. Read More
BioKnob fingerprint-activated lock interchangeable with a standard door knob
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February 1, 2006 Here’s a big chance for technophiles to be the first in their apartment building to have a BioKnob – the first doorknob with fingerprint recognition. The BioKnob replaces your existing doorknob, and registered users just brush their fingerprint across the knob to unlock the door. Accordingly, there’s no longer a need to carry keys or hide one under the potplant and for people who have lots of friends, it’ll store up to 100 sets of fingerprints. Now the BioKnob also records the last 1000 accesses with who opened it and the date and time of entry, so you’ll know what time your teenager/spouse came home. Short term visitors can be programmed for the duration of their stay then deleted and entry is also possible by an individually assigned passcode. Read More
Reclaiming all that space in the attic - EZ Attic
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January 29, 2006 Yet more proof that you don’t need an MBA from Harvard and backing from Kleiner Perkins to have a good idea and bring it to market is the EZ Attic, an idea spawned when Illinois resident Mark Dzwonkiewicz was trying to create some usable storage space in his attic one day. The amount of effort and the cost of creating flooring made him believe there had to be a better way and he started work on a solution. Two years later he brought the EZ Attic Storage Flooring mat to market, enabling people to turn wasted attic space into valuable storage. Each matt measures 50 inches by 72 inches, and offers 24 square feet of storage space for US$50.
Godzilla PVR records 4 high definition and 7 standard definition TV shows simultaneously
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January 20, 2006 SnapStream Media develops digital entertainment products that leverage PC technology and there's logically no end to what can be achieved given the rate of development of the multi-splendorous thing that is the PC, but sometimes we just shake our head when it comes to trying to look into what might be possible in the distant future, let alone the near future. SnapStream's Beyond TV DVR software received PC Magazine's Product of the Year Award in December 2004, was referred to as "an idea whose time has come" by the Associated Press and declared "better than TiVo" by Maximum PC. In 2005, the company produced the Hydra PVR which records TEN shows at the same time, bettering the company’s previous top-of-the-range Medusa, which records five shows consecutively. Now it has gone one better again with the creation of the Godzilla PVR. Godzilla is an ultra high end HTPC designed to showcase what can be done with a sick mind and a copy of Beyond TV 4 - it is capable of recording 11 shows, (4 high definition and 7 standard definition), all at the same time. With Beyond TV 4’s HDTV support and with its unlimited tuners, you can create your own monster system. Indeed, if anyone can create one bigger than this, please let us know. Read More
Field Tested: Logitech Updates Their Flagship Harmony Remote Control
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January 19, 2006 If you're like us, you probably have a bunch of home theater gear that comes from a bunch of different vendors, and somewhere between three and fifteen remote controls sitting on your coffee table to control them all. Thankfully, Logitech has a line of programmable remote controls that is intended to solve that problem in style. Jeff Marsh took some time to take a look at the Logitech Harmony 880 Advanced Universal Remote and to talk to them about their upcoming Logitech Harmony 890 Advanced Universal Remote (which adds Z-wave technology from Zensys communications instead of IR). Read More
The AeroPress Coffee Machine: a new concept in an ancient art
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January 16, 2006 There’s always a better way – ALWAYS! Humans have been consuming coffee for 1200 years, the first coffee shops opened 500 years ago and coffee is the world’s second largest traded commodity, behind only oil. More than 1.5 billion cups of coffee are consumed every day with the US market for coffee machines at 20 million a year and growing. You’d think we would have already perfected the best way to produce a cup of coffee from coffee beans, but several years of research by Stanford University mechanical engineering lecturer Alan Adler (the inventor of the Aerobie flying disk which holds the world throwing record of more than a quarter mile) appear to have found a better coffee machine. Independent reviews suggest the new Aerobie AeroPress delivers the smoothest, richest, purest and fastest cup of coffee (under 30 seconds) you’re likely to find and the bonus is that the AeroPress costs just US$30. And while it might look like a French Press because both use immersion and pressure, it works quite differently. Read More
Refrigerator with the lot - Maytag Ice2O
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January 13, 2006 There’s not much more you can expect of a refrigerator than this. It’s Maytag’s newest and top-of-the-range refrigerator, the Ice2O French Door Bottom-Freezer with an external ice and water dispenser. The Ice2O combines the best features of a side-by-side and bottom-freezer refrigerator in one design, along with the largest-available fresh food capacity. Read More
The Kitchen of the Future
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January 12, 2006 You are at the office and decide to invite friends over for dinner that night. What's for dinner? Just pick up the phone and call home. Your kitchen can give you a heads up on what foods you have in the refrigerator and pantry, suggest menus that use some of those foods, and once you've selected the menu, it will supply a grocery list for other items you need to pick up. Use the same call to leave a message for your spouse to put some wine in the refrigerator to chill. Sound impossible? When the brightest minds at the Industrial Design Operation of GE Consumer & Industrial were asked to design the Kitchen of the Future - that is how they imagined it. For a demonstration of GE's Kitchen of the Future, see this WMV movie, and for a video explanation, click here. Read More
Monogram Walk-In Wine Vault
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January 14, 2006 If you’re considering the fit-out for your next luxury home and you’re one of those wine enthusiasts who anxiously awaits each November for the Beaujolais Nouveau to arrive, then feast your eyes on General Electric’s latest - a complete, turnkey walk-in wine vault. The US$35,000 GE Monogram Walk-In Wine Vault combines advanced cooling technology, an electronic inventory-management system, insulation, racking, and lighting - all in one spacious, self-contained unit that can be installed in as little as a day. The Monogram Wine Vault offers the ideal location for storing or displaying wines. Read More
CES 2006: Taking `iPod Docking' to a new level
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January 7, 2006 A visitor from Mars strolling the halls of the CES might be excused for thinking that the Apple iPod represents a far greater proportion of the consumer electronics industry than it really does. It is just an MP3 player, yet it seems that every manufacturer in the game has hedged a bet by having some form of relationship with the iconic iPod. No doubt when we’ve marshaled the Gizmag troops on the CES show floor, we’ll offer a far more comprehensive and strategic overview of iPod-related offerings, but we thought D2Audio's take was worth a mention. D2Audio new family of Geneva Sound Systems are a single cabinet unit which incorporates multiple speakers internally to deliver an incredibly broad audio sweet spot for iPod music players, as well as CDs and radio. Powerful enough for a house party with its full 600 watts of stereo, it has an iPod dock, built-in slot-loading CD, FM radio and supports multiple audio sources. Read More
World's largest plasma display: Panasonic 103-inch 1080p
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January 5, 2006 Panasonic will begin showing a super-large-size prototype 103-inch plasma display panel (PDP) at its booth at the 2006 International CES later today. The 103-inch PDP has 1080p (progressive) HDTV resolution and can deliver more than two million pixels (1,920 x 1,080) of performance – not surprisingly, it’s world’s largest plasma display, edging narrowly ahead of the 102-inch Samsung shown at CES last year. Given Samsung’s penchant for having the largest and mostest of everything, we suspect it won’t take long for the Korean giant to leapfrog back into the lead, but for now the record goes to Japan and Panasonic (and ultimately to Matsushita, Panasonic’s parent company). Read More
Translucent roofing system uses aerogel to allow full spectrum, natural light into living spaces with comfort and energy efficiency
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December 8, 2005 Nanotechnology threatens some radical changes to the way we live – indeed, it threatens to change some of our fundamental belief systems. Anyone with a rudimentary understanding of physics will tell you that putting a clear roof on our dwellings allowing full spectrum, natural light, will result in a disastrously inefficient energy monster. But nanotechnology can offer glass and polycarbonate remarkable new properties as this story illustrates. We’ve written about the world’s lightest substance before (here and here), but now some of aerogel’s other properties are beginning to find commercial application and by filling polycarbonate or glass with nanogel, the clear substances retain their light transmission qualities while delivering outstanding thermal insulation. Read More
The supreme sports sofa – just US$30,000
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December 8, 2005 This looks to be the ultimate environment for the ultimate couch potato. It’s being offered by Domino's Pizza to apparently reflect the desires of pizza-loving sports fanatics, nearly 500 of whom were surveyed about what they wanted in the supreme sports sofa. The Domino's Pizza Man Cave Couch has it all. It serves as a high-end entertainment and food-and-beverage center where everything is within a hairy arm's reach. The couch features two flat screen TVs, a DVD player, an Xbox with three controllers, a refrigerator, an Electric Red MP3 player, an XM Radio with one year of free service, a NEXTEL cellular phone and a NASCAR headset and two Domino's Pizza Heat Wave hot bags to keep your pizzas warm. Read More
For the man with everything - the V8 snowblower
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December 2, 2005 If you’re tired of anaemic, one-lung snowblowers with their slipping drive belts, you might consider Kai Grundt’s V8 snow blower which raises the bar on the traditional snow blower in every respect. With electric start, electric block heater, antifreeze heater and eight cylinders, it has no drive belts to freeze up and you’ll never get bored with the job as the 454 cubic inch big block Chevrolet V8 produces 412 horsepower, 430 foot pounds of torque and can throw snow 50 feet at just 3500 rpm. Nor will you get cold as the machine has been ingeniously designed to route the engine coolant through the handle bars, with the rear mounted, enclosed radiator keeping the operator nice and cosy. Read More
Fireball SE-D1 digital DVD and CD manager offers seamless access to Movie and Music Collections
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November 29, 2005 With a Low US$999 MSRP, the SE-D1 could be one of the missing links towards seamless access to Movie and Music Collections. The FireBall SE-D1 DVD and Music Manager lets users access and manage up to 400 DVDs or CDs through a streamlined interface with an on-screen TV display. Working in conjunction with the Sony DVP-CX777ES DVD/CD changer, the SE-D1 provides users with instant access to all DVD movies or CDs in their collection. Read More
The bedroom environment
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November 28, 2005 You spend a third of your life in bed, give or take a bit – it is the only retreat most of us get from an ever more demanding world. So it makes sense to be comfortable and be able to create an ambience exactly as you might want it. Appropriate music and lighting are the fundamentals, yet few people invest beyond the bare essentials despite the fact they might spend a thousand times more on their automobile, though they ultimately use it far less than the humble bed. Read More
The brain for your intelligent home
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November 24, 2005 With convergence happening at such a rate, it’s sometimes a good idea to buy and plan as far out as possible so you don’t end up wth incompatible or legacy systems. Every self respecting technophile has probably been eyeing up what’s available in home automation, home security and home entertainment systems, but each comes with an array of microprocessor-controlled functions and a network. The aim should be to have one network and the SecureGen HTVR offers the chance to combine all three of those networks with one unit – the brain of your intelligent home. Firstly, it is a fully featured media and control centre for the home. Connect it to your entertainment system to watch television, view videos, play MP3s, or observe video feeds from security and or child monitoring cameras. Integrate the HTVR with a Home Automation System and control your compatible intrusion detection system, air conditioning system, lighting system, and automated appliances from the main unit or wirelessly connected extender devices. It’ll even monitor your intrusion detection system to automatically transmit video to a monitoring centre or predefined location whenever an alarm is triggered.
You can connect up to eight Video Surveillance cameras to the HTVR to record video from your local security and child safety cameras, record and instantly review network (IP) video from anywhere there’s an internet connection, and to save storage space on surveillance footage, it can activate recording upon motion detection. Similarly, using this system, a single camera can be utilized to monitor multiple outdoor play areas. If you’re using Pan/Tilt/Zoom security cameras you can remotely control the cameras or even create presets and tours for the camera to follow.
Add a Wireless Touch Screen Control Panel and you can securely watch videos and listen to MP3s stored on the HTVR or view security or child safety cameras from virtually anywhere in or around the home. It even offers sensor control so you can monitor anything (software included) and record the results on the HTVR which can trigger alarms and activate video recording. So you can record-pause-rewind TV, watch DVDs, upload and view your digital cameras photos in a slideshow, or connect and control lights, appliances, and other home automation systems from any connected television. You might, for example, wish to arm your intruder detection system from your bed, change the temperature of your home from the den, or check to see if you left the lights on remotely from the office. The queue forms on the right … Read More
Home Hydrogen Refueling Technology Advances with the Honda Experimental Home Energy Station III
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November 23, 2005 Further advancing its vision of a gasoline- and emissions-free transportation future, Honda R&D and technology partner Plug Power has unveiled the Home Energy Station III, which provides heat and electricity for the home as well as fuel for a hydrogen-powered fuel cell vehicle. This third generation unit is more compact and efficient than previous Home Energy Station models and follows Honda’s strategy to develop intermediate as well as longer-term alternatives to traditional energy sources like gasoline. Using natural gas as its base energy source, the Home Energy Station III is designed to work in a home-based refueling environment and is able to supply a sufficient amount of hydrogen to power a fuel cell vehicle, such as the Honda FCX, for daily operation while providing electricity for an average-sized household. Read More
Field Tested: Outlaw Audio hits the sweet spot with their 1070 A/V Receiver
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November 22, 2005 Let me just get this out there: we're not audiophiles. There, we said it. When we went looking for the ideal receiver, we were more concerned about video and audio input types than we were sound quality. It's a lucky coincidence that we found Outlaw Audio, and that their clever engineers knew what it was that we actually needed better than we did. They designed a device that delivers audiophile quality, at a consumer audio price, and throws in a helping of digital gear head satisfaction to boot. Their new 1070 A/V Receiver is a wonderful example of designing just what's needed to get the job done correctly, and at US$899 the closest competing product we could find was a Denon unit that costs over 6 times the price. Read More
The first electrical appliance turns 100 years old
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It came after the electric light and before radio, television, microwave ovens, blenders, juicers, computers - indeed, it was the first electrical appliance to populate the home and one of only a handful of devices in history to achieve ubiquity in advanced nations. Interestingly, although it turns 100 years old this year, it can still be found in more than 90% of American homes. The toaster was the first electrical appliance, which also means we are now celebrating 100 years of electrical appliances. Read More
Space-saving oven with an elevator and the door on the bottom
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October 16, 2005 Isn’t it silly that when you see a good design you woinder why people haven’t thought of it before. That was the reaction we had when we first saw the latest oven from Siemens - an oven with a completely new design that’s very easy to operate, remarkably energy efficient and creates space-saving possibilities for kitchen designers. The liftMatic mounts on the wall like a cabinet and is filled from below. With the liftMatic, food is always at eye level. Professionals and hobby cooks no longer have to stoop, and they can reach the cooked food from three sides. With the push of a button, the oven floor moves gently down and then returns to the upper position. If it meets an obstruction in the process, such as a pot or a glass below it, the oven floor automatically stops. Read More
Sony Type X Video Station goes on sale in Japan
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October 15, 2005 Sony is moving ahead in leaps and bounds in its development of the Vaio range of computers in its domestic market. It now has multimedia computers specifically designed for handling music, video production and now home multimedia in an elegant and completely painless way. The diversity of the Vaio range through the Type R, Type H, Type V and Type M ranges is astounding. Last year we previewed the Type X after first writing about it here. In its specced-to-the-max form, the Type X will hold 2 terabytes and record eight simultaneous channels of television for three weeks. The Type X goes on sale in Japan later this month, so a new era of home media capability is coming. With thousands of hours of television to watch, you’ll also need assistance to watch it but the video server enables simultaneous playback in multiple locations. So the kids can watch Sesame Street archives in one room, while the Video Station sends Desperate Housewives wirelessly to the teev in another room and you can watch the baseball or a movie on your laptop via the wireless network.
The intelligent door handle
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October 7, 2005 The diversity of communication and security systems which greet a visitor attempting to enter a doorway these days can be daunting to the visitor and expensive and complex to upgrade and implement for the home owner or building manager. Now Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute have combined and adapted all the cameras, buzzers, keypads, motion detectors, RFID readers and intercoms into a wireless integrated door station and combined it with the door handle which can integrate existing and planned infrastructure at low cost and high convenience. Read More
World's First Active In-Wall Speakers
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September 19, 2005 Last week’s CEDIA Expo 2005 saw some interesting new technologies showcased to the electronic design and installation community, with one of the most interesting being Polk Audio's new active flush-mount loudspeaker systems featuring D2Audio's Intelligent Digital Amplifiers. Polk's rectangular LC265i-IP and round LC80i-IP include D2Audio's MXS amplifier, which actively tri-amplifies and bi-amplifies each driver in Polk's speakers achieving truly remarkable sound quality. D2Audio's Digital Audio Engine drives the sound optimisation through patented technology inside D2Audio's module and custom digital audio processor IC. Read More
Ten million U.S. households will have a networked storage device by 2010
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September 16, 2005 The number of U.S. households with a networked storage device will grow from 300,000 at the end of 2004 to nearly 10 million by 2010, according to Storage and Management for the Connected Home, a new report from Parks Associates. A networked storage device connects to a router and allows shared access among multiple PCs and other networked devices, as defined in the report. The addressable market for these devices includes households with home networks and those with multiple PCs. By 2010, 17% of U.S. households with multiple PCs and one-fourth of those with a home network will have a networked storage device. Read More
The couch for immersive digital living
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September 18, 2005 Like just about everything else on the planet, as the world undergoes its greatest period of change in human history, it makes sense that our furniture should also evolve. With music becoming a vital aspect of movies and games, there is an ever increasing call for total immersion and few environments can offer this - but the Pyramat can. The Pyramat is a cushioned mat with a headrest, built-in speakers, subwoofer and reverberation technology. Moreso, Pyramat is a unique entertainment accessory - a portable foam mat that is comfortable and capable of transmitting the sound from your movie, PC or game console throughout your body. Read More