Reviews
For professional-looking videos, one of the fundamental rules for the vast majority of shots is to use a tripod. Doing so can be a hassle, however – particularly if you’re running around banging off quick shots for some sort of extreme sports video. With that in mind, New Jersey-based Wild Iron Inc. is introducing a little something known as the Flex Shot. Essentially, it’s a deformable 4 x 4-inch (10 x 10-cm) heavy-duty rubber bag full of a “sand-like material,” with a coated aluminum camera mount on top. I recently had a chance to try out a prototype unit, and I think the idea has a lot of merit. Read More
When you’re facing adversity, what do you do? Do you act out of fear and desperation? Throw everything against the wall and hope something will stick? Or do you use it as an opportunity to refocus, and soar to new heights? HTC chose the latter. The result is the One, probably the boldest Android phone ever made. But is it also the best Android phone ever made? Or even – gasp – the best smartphone ever made? Read on, as we review the HTC One. Read More
When you’re sitting on top of the world, what do you do? Do you pay tribute to what got you there? Or do you use that new freedom to try something different? In the case of Samsung with the Galaxy S4, it leaned more towards the former. Is it too much of the same? Or an improvement on a successful formula? Read on, as we review the Samsung Galaxy S4. Read More
Val Kolton's V-MODA announced a new addition to its stylish range of headphones in October 2012 which, by the time of actual release in mid-December, had managed to attract a good many positive comments from the critics and enthusiasts fortunate enough to get an early listen. The Crossfade M-100s were developed in collaboration with over 200 audiophiles, editors, artists, DJs and Grammy-winning musicians ... and it shows. Gizmag has spent the last few weeks with our ears snuggled up to the 50 mm drivers to find out what all the fuss is about. Read More
In late March, all of the US Home Depot stores began carrying Cree’s new LED light bulbs. While they’re by no means the first such bulbs to offer the same form factor as standard incandescent bulbs, their combination of a relatively low price and visually-pleasing light quality have got some people – and not just publicists working for Cree – saying that they could be what finally brings LED light bulbs into the mainstream. I recently got a chance to try one out for myself, and I definitely liked what I saw. Read More
When Lego kit specialist The Daily Brick made contact to see if we'd like to review its Lego iPad Dock Kit for Retina or iPad mini, bits were champed. This was partially because I don't actually have a Lightning dock for my Retina iPad, and partially because… you know… Lego. But as fun as Lego is, most of the joy is in the building. Is a Lego iPad dock really up to the rigors of daily use? Gizmag built one to find out. Read More
While there are already a number of solar-powered model cars on the market, Toylabs’ new Volta Racer is unique in a couple of ways – you put it together yourself, and it incorporates a flexible polycrystalline silicon solar panel. Although my days of playing with toy cars are behind me (sort of), my days of tinkering with things aren’t, so I decided to check out one of the sun-powered autos for myself. Read More
In a rare and brilliant move, Akihiro Hino (president of Japanese game developer Level-5) somehow convinced Studio Ghibli – Japan's most respected animation studio – to collaborate on a new video game. Even if Studio Ghibli's Oscar-winning director Hayao Miyazaki has been a vocal critic of the medium (nixing the possibility of his films being adapted to game consoles), and was not directly involved with Level-5's Ni no Kuni, it seems some of his magic still managed to rub off on it. Read More
“This is the iPad with Retina Display,” begins the ad. “And this is the new Kindle Fire HD with an 8.9-inch display.” We then see two “stunning HD” screens, with the narrator telling us that we may not be able to tell the difference. Then he drops the bomb: “ ... but your wallet can.” See, the iPad starts at US$500, and this Kindle Fire starts at $270. But is it really the great deal that Amazon says it is? Let’s find out, as we review Amazon’s Kindle Fire HD 8.9” tablet. Read More
BioShock Infinite, the third installment in what is now the BioShock series, sees the return of Ken Levine to the helm. Along with one or two others, Levine is arguably the closest thing the video games industry has to an auteur. With metascores of 96 on both PC and Xbox 360, BioShock is held up as the pinnacle of the current gen, and so it was inevitable, given Levine's return, that expectations for Infinite would be sky high. It's fitting, then, that a city in the sky is the backdrop for the game's snaking narrative. Gizmag took a rocket ship to Columbia to find out if BioShock Infinite could possibly live up to the highest of expectations. Read More
