4 Port USB Hub – Soccer Theme

Matt Laboff June 7, 2010 USB Fever

The 2010 World Cup of Football starts this Friday.Â To support the once every four year event, grab yourself a USB football themed 4 port hub from USB Fever. For me, we start off with our hardest game which is England verse USA on Saturday.Â Friday should also be packed with excitement with Russia verse Mexico. To get the football USB hub, jump to USBFever’s website.Â It’ll only cost you $12 + a little bit in shipping.

Football 4 port USB hub product page. Continue Reading

Home Brew USB Lego Printer

Matt Laboff June 2, 2010 USB Hacks

At one time in most guy’s life, they are nuts for lego’s. It’s usually the 4-8 year range, but for some it continues on. Here is a great example of how this guy never let go of the dream. “Squirrelfantasy” created a felt-tip pen printer out of Legos, motors, a USB print driver and a pile of creativity. The “Lego Felt-Tip 110” was designed and coded from scratch. Unlike your typical ink-jet printer, when the ink goes dry or begins to fade, just replace with a new felt-tip pen. Granted it’s only one color, but we all print blank anyway. Not the most accurate printer, but an extremely accurate Lego printer. Check out the video. Very entertaining.

Source: PCWorld. Continue Reading

USB Cuff Links For A Spy

Matt Laboff May 27, 2010 Hand Crafted USB, Useless Novelty

James Bond could use a gadget like the USB cuff links.Â How else could you slurp GBs of data from a secure area then waltz out without anyone knowing.Â Ok granted that’s a poor example of how you could use the USB cuff links, but it makes you wonder, they would be kinda cool. Designer Ravi Ratan is looking to up your geek look with the expensive $195 links and with storage to 4GBs no less.Â For those seriously considering this, also consider the possibility for engraving of up to eight letters.

USB cuff links

Source:Â UberGizmo. Continue Reading

Underwater Video Recorder With Spot Light

Matt Laboff May 25, 2010 USB Fever, Video

Now this is a great USB gadget which you could have a ton of fun with, especially with summer coming up.Â USBFever released a new underwater video camera which is compact in size and good with resolution.

usb underwater

The underwater video recorder is small enough it can strap to your wrist or versatile enough to mount on your bike helmet, skateboard bottom, mountain bike, you name it! The video recorder includes a powerful LED spot light to increase visibility under water or ideal for low light situations [cruising through the brush or forest on your mountain bike].

USB video recorder

If you can blow the $190 then it would be a great gift for the kids to use while at the pool all summer. Here are the bullet points worth considering: Continue Reading

USB Port Cleaner – Is It Needed?

Matt Laboff May 20, 2010 Brando USB

Brando announced a $17 USB port cleaner gadget.Â At first glance it’s a great idea and well needed in many situations.Â How many times has your flash drive been stuffed into your pocket, dropped on the ground or left in the glove box?Â In each of those situations it’s very likely junk or debris could have made it into the USB contacts.

USB cleaner

The USB cleaner appears to be an alcohol based solution on the pad where by it cleans the metal contacts of the USB port.Â Honestly, if you feel the need you can grab a alcohol swab and a pop-sickle stick and accomplish the same thing.Â Although it wouldn’t be nearly as cool.

USB cleaner gadget

If you feel the need, Brando is selling the USB cleaner for $17 plus some shipping. Continue Reading

Nexcopy SuperSpeed 3.0 USB Duplicator – Shipping Soon

Matt Laboff May 13, 2010 USB 3.0, USB Duplicator

2025 Update: Nexcopy Enhances USB 3.0 Duplicator with Higher Capacity Drives and Advanced Drive Manager Software

Nexcopy, a leader in USB duplication technology, has been shipping its USB 3.0 SuperSpeed Duplicator for over 15 years. The 16-port USB 3.0 Duplicator remains one of the most reliable solutions for high-speed USB flash drive and hard drive duplication. With peak transfer speeds of 65MB/s per device and up to 72MB/s with multiple drives connected, the duplicator can efficiently handle demanding data loads. For USB 3.0 hard drives, transfer rates reach a consistent 95MB/s, regardless of whether a single device or eight devices are connected.

USB 3.0 SuperSpeed Duplicator

Since its initial release, Nexcopy has expanded its USB 3.0 flash drive lineup, now offering capacities up to 256GB with optional custom branding. These high-capacity drives are ideal for industries requiring large data sets, secure distribution, and reliable performance.

The USB 3.0 Duplicator is powered by Nexcopy’s proprietary Drive Manager software, which receives regular updates to enhance speed, improve user experience, and add new functionality. Drive Manager updates are always free and require no license fees. For professional applications, the PRO version of Drive Manager enables advanced features such as:

USB write protection (hardware-based read-only mode)
Configuring USB drives as USB CD-ROM devices
Partitioning flash drives at the controller level
Editing USB device serial numbers

USB 3.0 flash drive

Nexcopy continues to focus on providing enterprise-grade duplication solutions with ongoing software innovation and long-term product support.

Source: EverythingUSB.

USB Hack: Nexus One Turns Into Full Blown Portable Workstation

Matt Laboff June 5, 2010 Networking, Software, USB Hacks, USB News, Video

The love for Linux is that with a bit of tweaking you can do just about anything. Case in point: Sven Killig took the Nexus One, loaded up some code to control the USB host controller and is now running a full work station. Now this sounds awesome. Sven can run a digital camera off his phone, stream video from a USB stick to his screen or even run a printer off the USB port. Check out the screen-shot of his work station…

USB Hack Nexus One

So if you’re like me, this project would be in the advanced level of Instructables for DIY mods, but thanks to Sven’s recording skills, we have a video to tell us how. The best part of all this? Heâ€™s got the whole thing demonstrated for you on video, but not only that, you can hit up the down-loadable binaries from his website. And while he tried all of this on Android 2.2, which means its the only version of Android itâ€™s been successfully tested on (at the moment), Sven believes that it will work on Android 2.1, too.

Source: SlashGear.com. Continue Reading

USB Powered Monitor By Samsung

Matt Laboff June 1, 2010 Video

GetUSB has reported on monitors which connect via USB, but now Samsung has fine tuned this product to include connection AND power to be exclusively through USB.Â The Korean electronics giant made this possible by including two USB connections to the host so that one transmits data and some power and the 2nd USB connection is designated to power only.Â We’ve seen this before in USB hard drives, so it’s nothing new.

USB powered monitor

In addition, Samsung says that this was made possible by improving the transmittance of the panel and the luminance efficiency of the back-light used in the monitor, which ultimately reduced the power consumption to as low as 6.3-watts. The new USB monitor by Samsung has a shorter life span than a traditional monitor [30,000 verse 50,000] but hey, it’s just growing pains and, as with everything, expect it to get better. Source:Â TechnaBob. Continue Reading

Off Topic: Time Lapse of Gulf Oil Spill – It Makes You Sick

Matt Laboff May 27, 2010 Off Topic

Here is a time lapse of the British Petroleum oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which started April 20th, just days before Earth Day. The music makes things a bit dramatic, but you’ll get the point. What a horrible disaster and with effects we will see for years. Hats off to NASA for providing us the technology to view an event like this from an entirely different perspective. It’s important to see this imagery to understand the impact we make on the Earth. Granted, we are a spec of time in the Earth’s life span, but making matters worse for ourselves isn’t very beneficial. Lets hope something good comes out of this horrible disaster, like it being the catalyst to really sink our teeth into new energy methods and technologies.

Source: Gizmodo. Continue Reading

USB Not Working – Try This

Matt Laboff May 21, 2010 USB Tutorials

Do you have USB ports on your computer but for some reason the devices connected are not working? Or maybe your USB ports stop working after a long period of time? Don’t worry, the USB not working is [most likely] related to your computer configuration, not the ports malfunctioning. If our hunch is right, the fix is easy.Â This is what we recommend checking if USB devices are not working on your computer. Lets check to see if the USB hubs and ports are set to power save when idle.Â What this setting controls is the ability for a USB port to sleep if not used.Â The sleep mode of the port is an effort to help your computer save energy going to connected devices that are not in use. To check the USB power setting lets do the following: Go to > START > CONTROL PANEL > SYSTEM. From here go to the Hardware Tab and click the Device Manager. Next, scroll down to the section labeled Universal Serial Bus controllers and expand it out.Â Right click on the USB Hub listing and select properties.

USB not working

In the properties box, go to the power setting tab and look for the following.

USB not working

Once you’ve configured this correctly [uncheck] there is a good chance your USB devices will begin working [consistently] again. Continue Reading

USB Bottle Opener

Matt Laboff May 18, 2010 Brando USB

Nothing too fantastic about this flash drive except the convergence of different needs.Â Ideally suited for those who frequent pubs while cruising on the wi-fi, this USB bottle opener is a perfect key chain accessory.

USB bottle opener

Available in 1, 2, 4 and 8GB sizes.Â Laser etching is an option I would think given the sleek aluminum body.Â USB bottle opener by Brando [out]. Continue Reading

Do You Really Need 64GB USB Drives?

Matt Laboff May 12, 2010 GetUSB Dealz, Kingston

I can honestly say, today, no I don’t.Â But that doesn’t mean you don’t.Â Today we found the Kingston 64GB drive on sale for $147.Â That’s about $72 off the regular price.

The company line: Kingston’s new DataTravelerÂ® 200 USB Flash drive is ideal for storing and transferring digital images and presentations and transporting all kinds of data. With capacities up to 128GB, the DataTraveler 200 features password protection via Password Traveler software, which allows you to create and access a password-protected, secure area of the drive called a “Privacy Zone.” DataTraveler 200 is ideal for those who need significant storage capacity and data protection in a sleek, durable design. With a capless design and enhanced with Windows ReadyBoostâ„¢,** the DataTraveler 200 is perfect for home or business. DataTraveler 200 is backed by legendary KingstonÂ® reliability plus a five-year warranty and 24/7 tech support. Grab the GetUSB Dealz now. Continue Reading