Gadgets

Imagine waking up, reaching for the tablet on your nightstand, and turning on your coffee maker from bed. You catch a few more winks before it alerts you that your hot java's ready. If Qualcomm's concept Wi-Fi coffee maker ever goes into production, your mornings may never be quite the same.

The coffee maker, however, is just one of many odd and unusual gadgets on display at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.… Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--One of the more jaw-dropping tech demos on view at this year's Mobile World Congress, new touch-screen technology from chipmaker STMicroelectronics lets you control your smartphone or tablet without actually touching the display.

Using it, you can swipe, drag, and prod at your touch-screen device, replacing the fear of fingerprints with the feeling of controlling a spaceship's navigation system.

There's nothing special about the touch screen itself, but rather about the controller chip that manages the panel. Rather than monitoring contact with the screen, the chip observes the electrical field that the tablet's touch screen … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--Track your heart from your wrist with the Mio Alpha, yet another smartwatch launched by Kickstarter and shown off at MWC 2013. For $199 the Alpha is water resistant and built to reliably read the rate of your ticker.

With clean lines and smoothly rounded curves, the Mio Alpha looks and feels both futuristic and sporty. As well it should since the Alpha is essentially a timepiece and fitness gadget for people looking for serious feedback about their workouts.The watch's soft silicone wrist strap is comfortable, too, and it's clear this gizmo was designed to wear … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--Chinese tech manufacturer Huawei normally makes smartphones, but now it wants to take control of your TV with its tiny MediaQ M310.

This black box is a truly minuscule media hub, measuring only 14mm thick. It's so light you could almost forget you were holding it, and it would easily slot behind your TV, out of sight.

Inside is a quad-core processor, the same chip that's powering Huawei's newest flagship phone, the Ascend P2. That should give the M310 enough grunt to chew through graphically testing games or high-definition movies. That chip is backed up by … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--Fear spills and splashes damaging your smartphone no longer. Startup company DryWired believes it has the technology to easily and effectively armor your handset against water and other liquids.

According to the Los Angeles, Calif. based firm, the DryWired technique uses a nano scale monomer material that, when heated forms a gas, then cools to become a water-tight sealant.

A special machine applies the DryWired material to phones and tablets that have been partially disassembled, the idea being that a device's internal components are protected, not only its exterior.

Indeed DryWired claims that after an ordinary phone has … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--Time for a new meaning to "plug and play": the BeeWi Mobot is a power plug that not only controls the gadgets in your home, but also tells you what's going on while you're out, thanks to a SIM card and an iPhone app.

The Mobot is a prototype shown off here at Mobile World Congress by smart toy-builder BeeWi. Plug the Mobot into a power socket, then plug an electrical appliance or gadget into the Mobot, and the Mobot will control that gadget. What makes it more than just a boring old timer plug … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--Announced on Saturday at Mobile World Congress, the Samsung HomeSync is a home theater media hub that aims to inject a little Android OS into your TV via your Galaxy handset. Slated for April, the device can stream videos, games, and other media from your Galaxy phone to your big-screen TV through Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. Think of it as an Apple TV for the Samsung faithful.

Design The Samsung HomeSync is packaged in a minimalistic glossy black box, and it's about the size of three DVD cases stacked on top of one another. When placed on a flat … Read more

As a MacBook Pro Retina user, I can attest that Google's Chromebook Pixel rivals the quality of Apple's Retina display. But the Chromebook falls short in not allowing you to sacrifice some quality in favor of seeing more on your display.

Based on the tech specs floating out there, you might be forgiven in thinking that both the MacBook Retina and the Chromebook Pixel have similar screens. After all, Apple talks about the 13-inch Retina having "spectacular" 2,560x1,600 resolution, while Google cites the Chromebook Pixel having a 2,560x1,700 screen.

Display resolution versus … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--Hot new handsets weren't the only products LG had up its sleeve at MWC. The phone maker also unveiled a new wireless charger, the LG WCP-300.

About the size and shape of your average bar coaster, the WCP-300 is designed to be simple and straight forward. Once connected to a power outlet (or Micro-USB port), just drop your compatible phone onto the WCP-300's disc-shaped charging pad. A small LED on the charger's edge lights up in green when juice is flowing.

Since the LG WCP-300 relies on the Qi wireless charging standard, it supports numerous smartphones … Read more