On many occasions I’ve wanted a projector for my cell phone. My most common need is for sharing photos stored on my phone to my folks, who’s sight isn’t that great. Texas Instruments is putting on a full court press to get projectors bundled in with cell phones by year’s end. Putting aside my trivial needs for a phone projector you take this product into the business world and all sorts of applications pop up.
It will be interesting to see how small these units are, what kind of power they will draw from either you cell phone or power plug and what kind of clarity will be displayed. TI did mention DLP technology for some models which would resolve any concerns for clarity and quality. TI also mentioned by year 2010 the cell phone projector business could be as popular as camera phones.
Source [including image] GearFuse.
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With “going green” such a big trend right now you might find yourself wanting to put a little green in your workspace – and no, I don’t mean that green. The following is a video USB tutorial on taking some supplies from around your office or home, LED lights and some USB power to create your very own USB LED Greenhouse.
Video is 3 minutes.
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Hmm, that title came out a little weird. Anyway, Vladimir released updated versions of his USB wood drives to include some odd shapes that include, what looks like to me, a mushroom, tree stump, wooden tooth and a fluted casing.
Wooden Jewelery is offering these for $20 [1GB] and $30 [2GB]. The wood drives come with a leather lanyard and a quality case. The line is called MEMORE and there is a full selection available with larger shapes and sizes to choose from.
So what else do you get for the $20 or $30? Well, for starters you get a very unique wood USB drive perfect to start any conversation. Not only does your USB drive hold valuable data, but the wood case is valuable too. To prove that point you can explain [depending on what you get] that a Bog Oak drive has been created from wood that is carbon dated back 1,300 years. Or Yew Root drives have been carbon dated back 600 years.
A quote from the creator:
…I prefer to work in wood because it is a living material…
-Vladimir Levestam
On the heels of announcing the EVGA USB to VGA or DVI adapter comes USB Fever with their power house trifecta USB to VGA, DVI and HDMI adapter. I believe it’s the first USB video adapter with these three options.
So with the news of USB Fevers multi-display adapter we can revisit the idea of boosting your video space. For me, this product is of special interest as I’m currently running a 19″ wide screen off my laptop dock station. Unfortunately the laptop doesn’t have enough video processing to push two monitors. The USB Fever multi-display USB adapter solves this problem.
It appears EVGA has an edge on higher end resolution, but the USB Fever will still get you a max 1400×1050 resolution. This is ideal for 19″ wide screens. The VGA, DVI and HDMI video adapter can string up to 6 monitors together and will work through powered USB hubs. I would venture to say this solution isn’t ideal for hi-end graphics applications like 3D modeling or gaming, but would be a good product for use of viewing spreadsheets, email, word processing, web surfing, blogging, Photoshop and TV.
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EVGA is lowering the bar for USB to VGA adapters and that’s a good thing. Traditionally you would pay upwards of $200 dollars for a USB to VGA adapter but now the UV12 and UV16 adapter from EVGA are under $80!
The UV Plus family take an existing USB port and convert that bus into a VGA/DVI adapter for additional monitors. This is ideal for those will lower video processing power (laptops) who want two or three widescreen monitors.
I spoke with Jeff, a pre-sales rep at EVGA and he did caution me against using the UV Plus family for hard core video applications such as
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Microsoft developed a USB stick to pluck evidence out of computers at crime scenes. The USB device is called COFEE (Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor) and has the power to blast through security settings to get the good stuff…and quick.
The COFEE USB devices is ideal for on-site investigation where law-enforcement needs to extract data quickly and accurately. The Microsoft COFEE contains 150 commands which dramatically cuts down time to gather digital evidence. It can decrypt passwords and analyze a computer’s
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I’m not sure about the rest of the world, but Texas Hold’em in the US is a very popular past time right now. In fact, I got 2nd place last night in my neighborhood poker tournament. Well, Dane-Memory is a fan too. Dane-Electronic made 1GB and 2GB USB poker chips.
The size is official but I’m wondering if the chip has that clay feel to it? The USB poker chip splits in half when being used. Top half is the cap and the bottom half has the USB connection and memory. Red is 1GB and blue is 2GB.
For the Texas Hold’em enthusiast you might want to pick up several of these USB poker chips, as now you can go “all in” using your personal financial records as liquid cash.
USB poker chip product page.
Source:Â UberGizmo.
**Mike [Dane-Elec Irvina CA – send me a comment if you’ve seen/used this chip before]
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Joe from USB Geek sent me an email about his new USB washing machine alarm clock, I thought we hit the mother-load. We didn’t. But lets stop and think for a minute, could we – one day - have a USB washing machine? It’s possible if the USB 3.0 spec really boosts the power over the bus to 12v. Until then, the USB washing machine can only be an alarm clock.
The USB washing machine plays four crappy alarm clock sounds along with an hourly chime and LED signal. Perfect for late night slumber.
In case you have a military friend you can set the hours for 12 or 24 and power the gadget via USB or two double A batteries.
At just $20 you can please any gadget lover who’s a germaphobic and likes to sleep in.
Visit the USBGeek web page and get a sample of the alarm clock sounds. Music to the ears [not].
USB washing machine alarm clock product page.
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WiHood is a relatively new service which is the world’s first “virtual laptop” that protects children online [ anywhere & at all times] with the WiHood’s USB bracelet.
The concept is ideal and it appears the user interface, setup and configuration is just as simple. This is what WiHood is: A USB bracelet which auto-launches a virtual desktop when connected to any computer. The virtual desktop runs off the WiHood servers which monitor and update website, programs, virus etc 24/7 for a completely kid friendly computer system.
From personal experience, my kids have trashed my computer – by mistake of course – but it still took time and skill to restore my PC. The WiHood USB bracelet eliminates this risk because a virtual desktop is all your child can use. The other issue I have with my kids using “the parent’s PC” is constant maintenance to monitor website, filters and content. With WiHood, that daunting task is automatically taken care of.
“WiHood protects children, saves parents from purchasing a new PC, and kids love that they have their own “virtual laptop” which stores their pictures, music, homework, etc. and can be worn on their wrist!”
The USB bracelet uses the internal storage to save files, folders, pictures, music etc…but those files are only accessed through the virtual desktop which runs off the WiHood servers. This means your kids will enjoy all the performance of a PC with the security of a remote server running the underlining PC desktop.
The WiHood is free to try and costs $49 for 6 months service or $100 per year. Stack that cost up against purchase of a dedicated PC for the kids and the WiHood is the clear choice.
Still interested. Maybe some more information? Check out the WiHood FAQ page. Or their WiHood Virtual Laptop home page.
WiHood was founded in August 2007 and has been honored to be awarded funding from Innovation Norway, a division of the Norwegian government providing capital to the most innovative companies in Norway.
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With over 5,300 Diggs, I figure this would be a good article to report about on how to make a sawed-off USB key. Nothing about this project is too technical, but the idea is clever enough it’s gained a lot of attention.
The sawed off UFD is a mod of using a slim Kingmax USB drive, USB cable and some glue + knife for a very cool looking storage device.
The intro line to this tutorial from the main page is:
“Holy crap– somebody just went and TORE MY FREAKING USB CABLE IN HALF while it was still attached to my laptop!!!
No– wait– sorry. That’s just my USB drive. My bad. Never mind.”
Which I think is pretty funny.
So besides getting a slim Kingmax USB drive (here is a 4GB for $15), you will need the following:Â USB cable, X-acto knife, glue, pliers, small screwdriver and some mad cutting skills.
First thing you will want to do is cut open the female end of the USB cable so you can insert the memory for storage. It’s fairly straight forward in the process. Some additional pictures are available
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OWC is giving you GB hungry data hoggers some extra storage space. Their new 500GB Mercury portable hard drive is their largest [portable] edition yet. It’s got Firewire and USB connectivity to support any gear you’re dealing with. A couple concerns I have are a) it’s a 5400 RPM hard drive, which is standard for portable hard drives – but I like 7200 RPM, and since the Mercury is b) bus powered, the 7200 RPM wont see the light of day. As I’ve mentioned before, if you are looking for serious use off your USB hard drive, don’t deal with bus powered devices.
So given those two knocks, it’s still super slim for a half Terabyte of data storage, and at just $359 it’s doable, but I’ve seen plenty of options out there.
Nothing posted on OWC’s site for purchase, but check their homepage and use the search function.
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Iomega is shifting it’s focus to the consumers with more disposable income, the gamers. Well at least in theory. The Iomega Media Xporter is a portable 160GB hard drive designed to seamlessly integrate with cross-platform applications to PlayStation 3 consoles and Xbox 360 console.
With the gaming console become more of a home entertainment center, it’s Iomega’s goal to provide the tools to enjoy photo’s, video, music and games without hassle. The Media Xporter allows users to experience all the above without a PC. Once more, the photo’s and video will look stunning on a hi-def TV since the PlayStation and Xbox support HDMI as well as HDTV connectivity.
I don’t know about you, but a family function or get together would be a lot more fun sharing photo’s on a sweet flat screen then huttled up over a computer monitor. The Media Xporter makes this a simple and easy process.
The 160GB Iomega Media Xporter drive is power via USB 2.0 and will retail for $120. Although I do have some concerns about a bus powered USB hard drive.
Source: Coolest-Gadgets. Media Xporter product page.
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WiHood is a relatively new service which is the world’s first “virtual laptop” that protects children online [ anywhere & at all times] with the WiHood’s USB bracelet.
The concept is ideal and it appears the user interface, setup and configuration is just as simple. This is what WiHood is: A USB bracelet which auto-launches a virtual desktop when connected to any computer. The virtual desktop runs off the WiHood servers which monitor and update website, programs, virus etc 24/7 for a completely kid friendly computer system.
