Electronics

When is a cube not a cube? When it's a Logitech Cube. That is, a mouse and presentation device which, though called a Cube is not a cube. You follow? Here's the thing: when you put it on a desk it behaves like a mouse, but when you pick it up it automatically goes into "Presenter Mode" for navigating PowerPoint presentations like a pro (because without one, PowerPoint is really, really hard). But it's the Cube's in-built gestures (all both of them) that separate it from the herd. Warning: this article contains unavoidable double entendres. Read More

LG will be unveiling the “world's largest 3D Ultra Definition TV” at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January. The 84-inch television has 8 million pixels, giving it four times the resolution clarity (3840 x 2160) of existing Full HD TVs. The television also utilizes LG's “Slim and Narrow Bezel Design,” which the company feels gives viewers “the most convincing 3D viewing experience currently available outside a movie theater.” Read More

Music lovers wanting to listen to digital music files on the move are pretty much spoiled for choice these days, whether keeping things personal with players like the Cowon C2 I reviewed earlier in the month, or sharing with friends using something like the FoxL v2 wireless loudspeaker. If commercial designs don't really appeal, though, there is another route - you could always build your own. Matt Keeter's Fab Boombox is just such a device, designed and built for a final class project and featuring laser-cut, snap-together panels housing stereo speakers (said to be loud in a quiet room and quiet in a noisy room), a custom main control board with an MP3 decoder and a 9V battery power source. Digital music is fed into the player via an SD card slot, with the user controlling playback on a touch-sensitive interface. Read More

We've seen quite a few gadgets made out of gold throughout the years. From a gold-plated USB flash drive to a 24 carat Gold- and Platinum-leafed Aston Martin DB7, gold has long been a symbol of class and a way to add a little flash to what might otherwise be an ordinary gadget. Now we can add computer mice to that long list of fancy gold items, with the new Sphere 2 by Ore Object. The mouse is made of surgical grade stainless steel with either a titanium, gold, or platinum finish. Both stain and dirt resistant, the mouse's surface repels germs, and can be easily sanitized if necessary. Read More

Budding computer hackers/scientists are about to get a welcome gift, albeit a bit late for Christmas 2011. The non-profit Raspberry Pi Foundation (RPF) is nearing the release date of its surprisingly powerful and remarkably affordable Raspberry Pi line of bare-bones machines that have been developed in an effort to broaden kids' access to computers in the UK and abroad. How affordable? The figure above was no typo. Read on to learn just what US$25 will get you when these nifty, fully-assembled, credit-card sized computers go on sale next month (sorry, case, monitor, keyboard and mouse not included ... we did say bare bones). Read More

The Nook Tablet from Barnes and Noble offers meatier specs than Amazon's Kindle Fire for half the price of an iPad, but the selection of apps on offer for the e-reader/tablet hybrid is a bit underwhelming. Fortunately, it takes less than 30 minutes to turn a Nook into a fully-functional Honeycomb tablet with access to the Android Market. Read More

A hard material is impregnated with microcapsules that burst when the material cracks, releasing a stored liquid that hardens on contact with the air, thus repairing the crack ... it’s a system that we’ve recently seen used in a number of applications, including self-healing concrete and polymers. Now, a research team from the University of Illinois is applying it to electronics. They have already created a system that automatically restores conductivity to a cracked circuit in just a fraction of a second. Read More

When is a clock not a clock? When it's a big fat reprogrammable five-character 18-segment display, a bit like the Alpha Clock Five from Evil Mad Science. Its 2.3 inch 18-segment alphanumeric characters are each illuminated by 54 LEDs, providing a bold, bright answer to that most burning of questions: what's the time? Read More

Here's an unlikely recipe for successfully spicing up a winter clothes catalog – make the models lose their clothes, or to be more exact, allow your clients to see what is hiding underneath the bulky winter garments. The X-Ray augmented reality app by clothing retailer Moosejaw does exactly that. It uses your mobile device's camera and some augmented reality trickery to grant you X-ray vision, as you scan both female and male models' bodies in the catalog. All you have to do is position your device over the catalog pages. Read More