Gadgets

In Taiwan, gizmos take center stage

Gamers, gear-heads and PC aficionados alike are agog over the latest designs coming out of Computex in Taipei, Taiwan, this week.

More than 1,300 exhibitors are showing their latest wares for more than 120,000 visitors expected to attend the annual event.

With the recent release of dual-core processors such as Intel's Pentium D and AMD's Athlon X2, computer makers are debating new combinations of speed and style to attract the more than 202 million PCs that analysts with Gartner are estimating will ship worldwide in 2005.

One company that's taking advantage right off the bat … Read more

'Smart shoe' to kids: Get off your duff

The day may come when kids don't ask their parents if they can watch more TV--they ask their shoes.

Gillian Swan, a 22-year-old student at London's Brunel University School of Design, has created a children's insole aimed at kick-starting a healthier, more active lifestyle. The product, embedded with sensors and dubbed "Square-eyes," records the number of daily steps taken, then transmits the tally to a base station using a radio signal.

The station, which is connected to the television, calculates the TV time the child has earned and displays it on an LCD screen. Once … Read more

Newfangled TVs from old-fashioned plant

Toshiba and Canon say they will produce surface-conduction electron emission display (SED) TVs out of a refurbished plant once used to produce old-fashioned tube TVs in Himeji. SED TVs and others similar in concept promise to be thinner than LCD TVs or plasmas but provide better picture clarity.

Early units are expected toward the end of next year, but volume production at Himeji won't start until 2007.

Touch screens with a kick

Touchy-feely peripheral maker Immersion introduced a new technology to help put some life into next-generation touch screens.

At the Society for Information Display Symposium in Boston this week, the company introduced its TouchSense technology for flat panel displays. The effect called haptic feedback gives the screen a little give and take when pushed. Haptic technology can be as simple as the feel of a computer keyboard or as sophisticated as those in virtual-reality systems.

As the San Jose, Calif.-based company describes it... "Instead of just feeling the hard, unresponsive touch screen surface, users perceive that buttons depress and … Read more

Speck gives iPod a leg up

Many people choose their iPod case to reveal a little bit of who they are. But Speck Products introduced an iPod case on Thursday that has a personality of its own.

The company's $35 iGuy is a silicone case, similar to other iPod jackets, but it adds bendable arms and legs to the typical design. For now it comes in a version for fourth-generation iPods, though an iPod Mini version is slated for a June arrival

For those who lack creativity, Speck even has a page on its Web site with suggested poses for the iGuy, including sitting down … Read more

iMuffs for the headphone-challenged

Love your iPod but hate getting tangled up with headphone wires? San Francisco start up Wi-Gear is coming out with a Bluetooth adaptor called iMuffs that helps cut the cord.

The wraparound headset uses Bluetooth 1.2 and Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP) to extend an iPod's reach to about 30 feet (10 meters). The stereo headphones also have a three-button controller so you don't have to race back to the iPod to skip to the next song.

And if you have a Bluetooth phone, iMuffs is tweaked to automatically pause the iPod and let you take the … Read more

Dell touts printer deal

Dell debuted a thermal printer on Wednesday as part of its strategy to bolster its arsenal of non-PC products.

Even though the company entered the desktop printer business a few years ago, Dell initially relied on Epson point-of-sale printer products, which it continues to sell. Now Dell is hoping its Thermal Receipt Printer T200 will oust its competition at the checkout counter.

The dual-color standalone box connects through serial, USB or powered USB ports. Retailing at $299, the printer is also available as part of a bundle that Dell is pitching to retailers. The bundle now includes the T200, a … Read more

A keyboard for geeks only

So you think you're a good typist? Consider trying the new keyboard designed by programmer Daniel Guermeur. If you're alarmed by the fact that none of the keys are labeled, you may be closer to the hunt-and-peck category than to what Guermeur's Web site says is the ideal customer for the device: the "uber geek."

"If you are an elite programmer who can write sophisticated code under tight deadlines," the site says, "someone who makes impossible projects possible, or a silver Web surfer your colleagues turn to when they need IT advice: … Read more

Stop your iPod from snarling

Where there are iPod earbud wires, there are likely to be tangles. And where there are tangles, there's an inventor imagining yet another iPod accessory.

Enter the iDiddy, a "wearable and tangle-free" iPod add-on that integrates the MP3 player's earbuds into a synthetic leather "iLanyard" attached to a calfskin case. The adjustable lanyard, which encases the earbud wires, is worn around the neck; when not in use, each earbud slides into a clip on the lanyard to prevent snarls.

The iDiddy, in development and user testing for more than five months, according to press … Read more