Internet Appliances


Posted by flung in Chumby24 Oct 2008 10:40 am

chumby Chumby announced today that they will be holding a charity auction on eBay for Chumby media players personalized by celebrities such as Hayden Panettiere, Kim Kardashian, Jerri Manthey, Meredith Salenger, Carlos Alazraqui, Isabel Lucas, and bands Blind Melon and Duke Spirit. Fans of the Chumby and of these celebrities can begin bidding on the media players starting at 12pm PST today and for 10 days until 12pm PST on Monday November 3rd. Proceeds from the auction will go to the celebrities’ charities of choice which include The Whaleman Foundation and Dream Foundation.

Chumby will also be auctioning off eBay exclusive blue chumby bundles starting at 12:30pm PST. These bundles are available for the first time to the public and come with a large soft navy blue chumby tee and all 5 sets of chumby collectible charms. 30 bundles will be auctioned off on eBay.

Updated on Friday 10/24 with links to the auctions.

[Check it out]

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Posted by flung in Gadgets and Internet Appliances15 Oct 2008 08:10 pm

SmartGlobe

If you think a globe is just a globe then you haven’t seen the new Oregon Scientific SmartGlobe. This globe provides interactive lessons in English and Spanish to individuals of all age groups and also happens to be updateable via the Internet. The globe provides quizzes and activities for topics such as countries, capitals, major cities, populations, languages, history, current events, etc. There’s even a Smart Pen which can be programmed for age-appropriate content. Again – the best part is the downloadable content which keeps the globe updated on a weekly basis. Other features include:

  • Free 1 yr content downloads after the initial registration
  • Flags from around the world with corresponding national anthems
  • U.S. map included for detailed activities
  • Speakers located in pen and base
  • Supports headphones

You can purchase the SmartGlobe at the Oregon Scientific website for $129.95. Now if only someone could make a globe that redraws itself should countries change names or change borders..

[Check it out via New Launches]

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Posted by flung in Gadgets and Internet Appliances10 Oct 2008 11:28 pm

flatshare

This is the “Flatshare” modular fridge designed by University of Applied Arts of Vienna, Austria design student, Stefen Buchberger. Perfect for homes with multiple roommates, the Flatshare fridge is made up of a single base station and up to four stackable modules. Each module provides a person with their own personal space in the fridge and can be customized with unique colors and add-ons. There’s even a handle on the side of the module for easy transport. With the Flatshare fridge design, Buchberger won first place in the Electrolux Design Lab 2008 competition.

The goal for this year’s Electrolux competition was as follows: “The 2008 Electrolux Design Lab … challenged undergraduate and graduate industrial design students to create home appliances for the Internet generation 2-3 years from now. Entries were to address food storage, cooking, and/or washing.”

The other top eight winners to the sixth edition of the Electrolux Design Lab competition were as follows:

Second place went to the iBasket by Guopeng Liang from Tongji University, Shanghai, China.

Third place went to Coox by Antoine Lebrun from L’Ecole de Design Nantes Atlantique.

The other six finalists were:

Sook, a social networking recipe generator with electronic tongue, by Adam Brodowski, Savannah College of Art and Design, USA.

E-bag, a kinetic energy-powered cooler bag, by Apore Puspoki, Moholy-Nagy University of Arts and Design, Budapest, Hungary.

Stratosphere, a sanitizing clothes rack/valet, by Atilla Safrani, Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest, Hungary.

Vesta, a foldaway cooktop with RFID scanner, by Matthias Pinkert, HTW Dresden (FH) University of Applied Sciences, Germany.

Drawer Kitchen, a desk-drawer hotplate and fridge, by Nojae Park, Chiba University, Japan.

Scan Toaster, a USB toaster that prints news, weather and snapshots onto slices of toast, by Sung Bae Chang, Sejong University, South Korea.

The prize for first place? € 5000 and a six-month internship at one of Electrolux’s global design centers.

[Check it out]

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Posted by flung in Gadgets and Internet Appliances and Webcams05 Oct 2008 11:06 pm

rovio

WowWee’s website for their new Rovio Mobile Webcam device is now up and running. If you’re not familiar with the Rovio (like myself), it’s best described as a Wi-Fi enabled webcam on wheels. As the website declares, the Rovio “lets you see, speak, and hear from anywhere in the world… as if you were right there in the room.”

The premise is certainly exciting - heck I’d consider getting this roving webcam simply to watch and monitor my dog while I’m at work!  The specs are as follows:

  • rovio 2 Rechargeable NiMH battery pack
  • Charging dock with built-in TrueTrack beacon
  • 3x wheel motors
  • 3x omnidirectional wheels
  • 1 camera motor
  • 1 VGA CMOS sensor
  • LED illumination
  • 1 speaker
  • 1 built-in microphone
  • USB connectivity
  • Wi-Fi connectivity

Now according to SlashGear, the initial Rovio stock is sold out so if you’re thinking about getting this device for the holiday season, you better get your order in now. You can purchase the Rovio in North America at the following retailers:

rovio_1

[Check it out via SlashGear]

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Posted by flung in ARCHOS and Digital Audio Players and Internet Appliances and MP3 player and Portable Media Players and Portable Video19 Aug 2008 02:28 pm

archos 5

Archos introduced three new connected devices today as part of their new “Internet Media Tablets” product lineup - the Archos 5, the Archos 7, and the Archos 5g. These players offer many of the same features found in previous Archos models except now, there’s a large touchscreen display and even 3G connectivity on the Archos 5g model. The focus of these devices is clearly on the Internet - following the trend that Apple established with the iPhone and iPod touch. The Archos 5 is the company’s flagship product featuring a 5 inch display and a wealth of features. The Archos 5g adds 3.5G HSDPA support and the Archos 7 increases the display size to 7 inches while keeping the same resolution.

On the application front, the new Archos Internet Media Tablets support features such as:

  • Web browsing via a free Opera browser
  • Email application
  • Web TV and Web Radio
  • Widgets
  • Video playback
  • Music playback
  • Photo playback
  • Games
  • Content streaming from a PC
  • TV recording

Powering these new Archos players is the new ARM Cortex superscalar processor. These in fact are the first devices out there to use the new Cortex processor.

archos 7

Some of the common specs include:

  • 800 x 480 resolution display
  • Video playback support for MPEG-4, WMV, MPEG-2 (optional on the Archos 7), H.264 (optional on the Archos 7), and M-JPEG. HD MPEG-4 and WMV support optional
  • Audio playback support for MP3, WMA, Protected WMA, WMA pro 5.1, WAV, AAC, and AAC+
  • Photo playback support for JPEG, BMP, PNG, GIF
  • Built-in PDF viewer
  • Supports optional DVR station
  • Supports POP3 and IMAP email accounts
  • Wi-Fi support
  • 3.5 mm mini-jack
  • Built-in speaker and leg stand
  • Lithium Polymer battery

The Archos 5 will be available in three storage configurations - a 60GB ($349.99), 120GB ($399.99), and a 250GB ($449.99) model while the Archos 7 will be available in a 160GB ($449.99) and 320GB ($549.99) model. The Archos 3G which comes with a SIM card slot and supports 3.5G connectivity will only be available in a 30GB model ($549.99).

[Check it out via PC Mag]

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Posted by flung in Chumby and Gadgets and HP27 May 2008 08:21 am

Hope all of you had a wonderful Memorial Day Weekend. I sure had a nice relaxing time at home this weekend (these 3 day weekends are awesome but go by way too quickly if you ask me). Couple of notable things from this weekend:

  • Watched Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and well.. it was OK. It wasn’t amazing and it wasn’t horrible.. but it was just OK. Now granted, I had lower expectations already going into the flick but somehow, the magic was gone in my opinion. I suppose it had something to do with the fact that I grew up with Indiana Jones (and with Star Wars etc), and now, it’s just not quite the same anymore (especially in light of how good Iron Man is). Oh well - here’s hoping we end the Indiana Jones movies for good… And please.. let’s not see Shia as a potential Harrison Ford replacement down the road.
  • Continued to play with the Chumby over the weekend and it’s just a blast. I’m looking into how hard (or easy) it is to create a widget for the Chumby right now but overall - it’s a very cool (and cute) device. Can I recommend it for everyone out there? I want to say yes but at around $180, I’m not sure yet that I can. I only wish I had many more widgets to put on the darn thing! Stay tuned for a full review
  • Finally, I took advantage of the Memorial Day sales this weekend and finally picked up an HP MediaSmart EX470 Windows Home Server box. I’ve been talking about picking one up for months now but finally got around to doing so yesterday. I also purchased a 1 TB drive to increase the default 500GB of space on the EX470. So far so good. I’ve been busy copying all of my files and multimedia content to the EX470 (it’s a lot of data) and also installing the Windows Home Server Connector software on my client Windows PC. My main work desktop was successfully backed up last night while I slept. Love it - that’s how backup should work - easily, quickly, and quickly.  Stay tuned for a review of this bad boy shortly too!
  • I have a lot of other products to talk about over the next few weeks also. I’ve got a new HP Slimline box to review (it’s acting as our main Windows Media Center box now - it replaced the Apple box I had created a few months back), a new HP Pavilion notebook to review, and a couple of other odds and ends to talk about.

Have a wonderful week everyone!

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Posted by flung in Chumby and Gadgets24 May 2008 04:44 pm

A Chumby has been sighted.

Yes.. a Chumby is here at Krunker.com and I’m absolutely loving it. I’ve created a virtual Chumby so you can see the widgets I’m viewing on my Chumby right now.

 

Stay tuned for a review of the Chumby - in the meantime, here are some early pics of the Chumby. Enjoy!

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Find out more about the Chumby by visiting http://www.chumby.com

[Check it out]

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Posted by flung in Internet Appliances and Nokia10 Feb 2008 05:30 pm

n810 CNET (via CNN.com) has published a review of the Nokia N810 Internet Tablet here on CNN’s website. The N810 has several notable improvements over the N800 including an integrated full QWERTY keyboard, an integrated GPS, and a more robust Web browser and user interface. Amazingly, the N810 actually has a smaller footprint than the N800 even though it now includes a slide out keyboard. Some of the interesting specs and features of the Nokia N810 include the following:

  • TI OMAP 2420 processor running at 400MHz
  • 4.1 inch QVGA touch screen display (800 x 480 resolution)
  • Web cam
  • Bluetooth and Wi-Fi support
  • Email, Mozilla based browser with Adobe Flash support
  • Support for wide variety of multimedia formats

The verdict from CNET?

Nokia’s sleek new Internet Tablet worth a look

I owned an N800 for a few months and found it to be an interesting device to have around the home (or on the go). There’s no doubt that the screens on these Nokia Internet Tablet’s are incredibly beautiful.. but beyond a little web-surfing and email checking, it’s hard to justify spending this much money for a device that really at the end of the day needs to be near a Wi-Fi hotspot or at least paired with an Internet connected mobile phone. Truth is - the iPhone is a far better deal than the N800 or the N810 although no where near as open a platform. Offering an integrated GPS IS a nice improvement though.. but is it enough to justify the $480 MSRP? Not sure.

[Check it out]

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Posted by flung in Internet and Internet Appliances and Sony18 Dec 2007 03:12 am

sonymylo2-fcclg

The FCC’s coughed up another upcoming mobile device. This time it looks to be the Sony Mylo 2 Communicator device. While largely similar to the original Mylo, the new Mylo 2 appears to now come with a digital camera in the back as well as support for 802.11g wireless networks. Other features include a macro mode switch and an integrated flash for dark environments. It looks like the next Mylo will still now support a mobile phone network unfortunately.

[Check it out via MobileMag]

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Posted by flung in Internet Appliances and Nokia20 Nov 2007 03:10 am

nokia 810

nokia 810-1

For those of you wanting a closer look at the new Nokia N810 Internet Tablet, head on over to AVING USA here. They have several close up shots of the device which was demonstrated by Nokia at the DigitalFocus@newyork event. In case you’re not familiar with the N810, here are the specifications:

  • 4.13 inch WVGA display (800 x 480 resolution) with up to 65K colors
  • TI OMAP 2420 processor running at 400MHz
  • 128MB DDR RAM and 256MB Flash memory
  • Up to 2GB internal memory
  • Support for miniSD and microSD (SDHC compatible)
  • 10 hour battery life for music playback
  • 5 days battery life for always online time
  • 14 days for standby time
  • Smooth slide with integrated QWERTY keyboard
  • Integrated GPS receiver
  • Stereo speakers and sensitive microphone
  • Integrated desk stand
  • Integrated VGA web camera
  • HW key to lock touch screen and keys
  • Ambient light sensor
  • WLAN support
  • Bluetooth 2.0 support
  • 3.5 mm stereo headphone plug
  • Maemo Linux Based OS 2008
  • Mozilla based Browser, Media Player, Internet Messaging, Video Calling, Map, RSS reader Image viewer, Utilities

The N810 is going for around $450 to $480 on the net right now.

[Check it out]

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