Gadgets Future

MIT’s Media Lab and Smart Cities Group believes it has come up with a possible solution to the growing problem of finding a parking space in busy urban environments. The solution involves a new concept car that can fold up to just half its size when parked.

The car is being called the “City Car” and can hold two passengers while running on a rechargeable battery. The innovative bit is the way it can be stored when not in use. Unlike standard cars, which require their own parking space, the City Car can fold and stack with other City Cars, like shopping carts stack today. By doing this, they take up much less space (about one-eighth the space) while still being able to recharge ready for their next use.

The researchers aren’t seeing the car as a replacement for our daily vehicles, but more as a solution to transport in built-up areas like city centers. Rather than having your own City Car, they also expect them to be multi-use, with individuals just taking one from the available pile when they need to.

Read more at ITWire.com.

Matthew’s Opinion

It’s interesting that in the U.K. we seem to have loads of money pumped into our public transport systems, yet for the most part they never seem to get any better. People also don’t really enjoy using public transportation that much and prefer their own private space. That’s from my experience anyway.

The idea of having public transportation solutions that allow this private space is an interesting one. If the City Cars were as easy to use as swiping your credit card, unfolding the vehicle, and getting in, then it could take off. I see all sorts of problems with vandalism, however; and what happens in an accident? You wouldn’t have insurance to help pay the repair costs.

It will certainly be a few years before anything like the City Car appears on the streets. Even then, it would be a huge investment for any city to undertake.

Posted Mar 11th 2008 12:46PM by Donald Melanson
Filed under: Misc. gadgets It’s far from the first Minority Report-like interface to make the rounds, but that doesn’t seem to have prevented the massive setup pictured above from drawing a crowd at CeBIT, which one attendee thankfully captured on video. As you can see for yourself after the break, the rig lets you do all the usual moving, flipping and resizing, without the need for pesky gloves or silly headgear. Needless to say, there’s no indication as to where this particular bit of technology is headed next, but it seems safe to assume that it’ll become a fixture of trade shows for years to come.

Posted Mar 11th 2008 8:49AM by Joshua Topolsky
Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video
Remember that Sansa Fuze from yesterday? Well, we’ve gotten some sweet PR on it with a few more details we didn’t hear about yesterday. The device will come in 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB configurations, feature playback of MP3, WAV, Audible, WMA, MPEG-4, and JPEG files, and will be compatible with subscription services like Rhapsody To Go, Napster, and eMusic. As we mentioned in the previous post, the 4GB model will be available in black, red, pink, or blue, while the 2GB version only comes in black, and the 8GB is only available in silver. The models are priced at $79.99, $99.99, and $129.99, and will be available sometime in April.

The Float Away concept by designer Young Hwan Kim concentrates on the bane of mobile computing - the matter of heat. His design involves an extremely simple solution, and you’ll probably smack your forehead with your palm thinking, “Now why didn’t I think of that before?”. All Young did was to elevate the back end by including a lift bar into its design, allowing heat to dissipate into the air while keeping your laptop cool despite running ahead at full speed. As we all know, the cooler electronics run, the more efficient it is and the longer it will be able to last.

LaCie has just launched a new range of external hard drives known as the Desktop Hard Disk. It supports USB 2.0 only and comes in a simplistic black design that makes one remember all those Model Ts from Ford’s factory many, many years ago. You will be able to choose from 250GB, 500GB and a whopping 1TB version for all your additional data storage needs. Just in case you have a job that requires you to travel all the time, the Mobile Disk range is available in 80GB, 120GB, 160GB, 250GB and 320GB capacities, and is small enough to fit into most pockets. The Desktop and Mobile drives retail from €80 upwards, depending on the capacity.

This PC case mod will definitely appeal to just a minority, although that won’t stop a whole bunch of people from ogling who try to supress their hidden, innermost desires to own one. If you have the dough to splash and not the time to build one yourself from scratch, I’m happy to announce that this French Maid Skirt PC Case is up for sale for a ridiculous $499. But hey - whatever it takes to bring your fantasy home, right?

If you cannot get enough of Lego in your life, carrying around thousands of bricks in your pocket is not an ideal option. Play-Nyc decided to put the multi-touch screen of the iphone to good use by creating a “concept” where you to carry millions of Lego bricks in your pocket. This cool little concept named LEGO Touch, uses a cover-flow type interface to scroll through every Lego brick you can imagine and it allows you to build up any Lego model you want by dragging pieces around with your fingers. You can zoom in and out by moving two fingers apart in the same way you would zoom or rotate an image. All bricks on the iPhone are in what Play-Nyc call a “Brick-Bin” and are ready at the touch of the screen.

Please note that this is concept at the moment unfortunately although it does represent what you might see in the coming months.

Other features of LEGO Touch is the ability to email your friends new creations either via email or SMS. For those with a gaming side to them a “build-off” competition is available where you can battle out your Lego building skills with your friends.

The best part of LEGO Touch for the iPhone is that you now no longer need to spend 10 minutes tidying up at the end. Just close out the application and your done I just wish it was an application and not concept right now. No doubt with the Apple SDK launch, this app could be available soon.

Play-nyc Source - markpascua

Guest Post by Matthew of Gadget Venue.

The PCPortal from IOGEAR has just been launched, bringing a hardware-based virtual desktop solution for users to access their computers with just an Internet connection without the hassle of managing and configuring software. The PCPortal device comes with a USB 2.0 Virtual Media Port that allows Windows XP users to connect a USB flash drive, making it function as though it was plugged into the local USB port itself. Features of the PCPortal include :-

• Control or monitor your home or office PC from literally anywhere in the world via a LAN, a WAN, or the Internet
• Hardware-based solution allows BIOS level control for remote troubleshooting
• Remote access via browser makes it very easy to operate
• Authentication and SSL 128bit encryption guarantees security and protection
• USB 2.0 virtual media port allows file transfer between local and remote computer
• Control multiple computers by connecting to a USB KVM switch
• Firmware upgradeable

The IOGEAR PCPortal retails for $499.95 and is readily available.

Radio is becoming an increasingly competitive market. Not only do you have stations competing locally and online, but also you have competing radio services, which include the way you receive your programming. Of course, there is terrestrial radio, which is the most common radio people think of. This is what is offered on FM and AM stations. Then you have satellite radio. As the name implies, your radio signal is beamed from a satellite, giving you an incredible amount of programming, which is accessible wherever you are. There is also Internet radio, which is the best of both terrestrial and satellite radio. It’s accessible wherever you are (with an Internet connection), and it’s free.

Besides having these two things going for it, Internet radio just got even better. CBS Radio and AOL have announced that they are merging their Internet radio networks. Over 150 channels will be offered including music, news, talk, and sports stations. The partnership will also include a new player and additional programming to be launched later this spring. The two companies are also looking to expand their listener base by offering complete support for the Mac as well.

Considering AOL and CBS Radio have two of the largest online radio networks already, this is quite a partnership. There’s no doubt that the companies will be able to take advantage of synergies between the two companies. That means more ad revenue dollars to the bottom line, which is a significant help to AOL as the company continues to transform its business from a paid-subscriber model to an advertising revenue based. It seems that AOL had the users and CBS Radio had the new player and additional content. That’s a good marriage.

Read more from the joint press release.

This MP3 player definitely looks like a cell phone at first glance, but it is actually nothing but an ordinary MP3 player. Dubbed the Blade Runner mp3 player, you get the following hardware specifications in your palm :-

• 1.8″ TFT display
• 2GB of storage space
• Integrated FM radio
• Built-in speaker
• Voice recording capability
• Compatible with MP1/MP2/MP3/WMA/WMV/ASF/WAV formats

It costs $49 to bring this Blade Runner home…the naming convention department could make do with an overhaul.