GadgetReview

Several months back, we introduced you to the Philips Tapster headphones.  But there’s some bad news here for everyone who was looking forward to them–there’s now pretty much no way they’ll hit store shelves.

The folks out at Crave on Cnet’s Asian subsidiary believe they know why, too–they don’t work.

It’s a strange theme these days, gadgets that don’t work, but the beat goes on (or rather doesn’t) from these headphones.  They were supposed to be a major innovation in playback and volume controls, which are supposedly controlled by tapping and swiping the ear modules.  Under normal circumstances, this would dislodge them from the ear, but with these, they didn’t dislodge.  Something of an accomplishment there, but the problem was, the purported tap-and-swipe system of volume and playback control never materialized.

So a little bit of vaporware for you, folks…and that’s always at least a little sad.

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Oh Japan…have I told you lately that I love you?

You’ve given me some of the coolest, strangest, and most downright preposterous topics to write about of all time.  And today, you’ve given me a topic that’s ALL THREE.  You’ve given me a topic that proves conclusively that you’re going insane and yet you’re also brilliant.

You’ve given me the Tele Scouter, a headset-mounted translation device.

Yes, it’s actually called the Scouter.  For those of you now about to quote Dragon Ball Z, indeed, his power level is over nine thousand.

Anyway, the Tele Scouter uses an imaging device to project images directly onto your retina, and the images in question are fields of text, generated by voice recognition and translation programs that literally show you what someone else is saying, in your language, before your very eyes.

And it’s not just translation, either–there’s talk these can be used in sales pitches to get instant access to customers’ shopping records via face recognition technology.  Now, I don’t know what the long term ramifications are of getting all that light shined directly onto your retina, but the thought of an instant translator IS pretty cool.  The price is pretty salty, as you might expect–about eighty three thousand dollars for a set of thirty, plus the cost of any custom software to go with it.

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In an interesting move, now retailer Orange is getting into the cash for old gadgets game with its Recycle and Reward program. While they don’t have the awesome automated kiosks of other vendors, Orange will give you a quote and a check within a week when you take whatever it is you’d like to get rid of–old mobile phones, laptops, and music players (bigger stuff that the automated kiosks can’t handle) and offers up cash for them.

It IS somewhat limited–no bringing in your old furnace, water heater or what have you; it’s pretty much exclusively a consumer electronics setup–but hey, free cash for stuff you weren’t using anyway?  That’s no small treat.

Also, Orange is also launching its Copy and Keep program, where they’ll charge you a whopping twelve bucks or so to transfer all your media, addresses and contacts from your old mobile phone to your new one.  Pretty useful if you’ve forgotten how or just plain old can’t be bothered.

So if you’re needing a new phone, and want to get rid of the old one, then it’s a great time to think Orange.

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If the prospect of spending north of $200 on a GPS add on (aka TomTom) for your iPhone or iPod touch has you little shaken fear not, for there is a semi-reasonable solution.  Arriving in stores  later this month is the Dual Electronics XGPS300 GPS Cradle for the iPod Touch.

For $179.99 it not only adds GPS to your iPod Touch but includes NavAtlas’ turn-by-turn navigation app, a rechargeable battery, speaker, audio out, mini USB port and windshield cradle.  The app itself is free and available at the iTunes app store.  But before all you cheap skates rush off to download it, note that the application works exclusively with Dual Electronics’ cradle.

Or you could just hope and pray that Google releases their free nav app to the iPhone and some how Apple approves it.

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Ok, I’ll be honest, best I can suss out from the press release is that Thrusmaster’s T-Freestyle NW gaming board is a piece of wood with rubber bumpers that works in concert with the Wii Balance Board to produce a RIDE like experience for current and soon to be released Wii snowboarding and skateboarding games.  And I don’t know what Rolling Motion Board technology is, but whatever ‘koolaid’ Thrustmaster’s marketing team is cooking up I want a sip of it.

It’s crafted of genuine maple and launches this holiday season (end of November) for $29.99.

Continue reading: Thrustmaster Intros Budget Friendly RIDE Experience

‘Stacks’ have long existed in Apple’s Mac OS, but what about the iPhone?  They are now thanks to ‘Stacks’, a piece of software that you can add to your iPhone, that is assuming it’s Jailbroken (aka hacked).

Much like Mac’s OS you can add multiple applications (in Mac OS X you can view multiple files in a folder, at a glance, from your dock) to your iPhone or iPod Touch’s dock instead of just four.  Tap on a ’stack’ and a playing card like display of applications are laid out before you.  If you’ve added too many applications to the ’stack’ it transforms the window to a grid like layout similar to your iPhone’s default screen.

Wired notes that there are a few draw backs to the current interation, such as the lack of icon badges (unread email), visual notifications and a few other minor hiccups.  Problems aside, I think it’s a great idea, though it might defeat the purpose of having four dedicated buttons to choose from.

If you’ve got a Jailbroken iPhone or iPod Touch you can grab ‘Stacks’ now, you’ll just need to make a $1 donation to the developer.

Video after the ‘leap’

Continue reading: Stacks Software Adds Mac OS X Stacks To The iPhone

Based on a patent filing, it looks like Apple is ready to enhance and elaborate on their wireless syncing system, MobileMe.

While it’s still not clear to which devices this would apply to – the application references everything from an Apple TV to an Apple computer – it’s relatively evident that Apple is looking to get us away from syncing our iPhones (and perhaps soon to be other wireless products) via USB cord.

Ultimately, this would make our lives more simple as we’d be able to have access to all our work files as well as our music and videos without performing the arduous syncing process.  The service would probably be a subscription based program and connect all our Mac products to the ‘cloud’, negating the need for not only syncing but at home storage, such as Apple’s Timemachine.

One huge probable caveat, though, would be the inability to hack said wireless products, such as we’ve seen with Jailbroken iPhones, since it’s probably fair to assume that Apple could just push an update to the device.  Then again, you could just opt to not subscribe to the service.

Then again, this system could be much more locally based – after all the name is ‘Grab & Go’ – such as an at home wireless network, but that seems so unlike Apple, given their desire for grandeur and all.

[via Appleinsider]

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You could buy Audioengine’s wireless speaker dongle system, but if you’re looking for the complete package for just under $200 Klipsch now has you covered.  The ProMedia 2.1 Wireless iPod/Computer Speaker includes 2 satellite speakers, a powered subwoofer and a 2.4Ghz USB dongle to wirelessly transmit your computer’s audio up to 30 feet to the aforementioned speakers.

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Super Talent Technology is set to release their first USB 3.0 flash drive, the SuperSpeed USB 3.0 RAIDDrive.  It will be completely backwards compatible with USB 2.0, but with a USB 3.0 port it can deliver transfer speeds up to 200MB/sec.  When it launches this December – price unknown – it will be available in 3 capacities: 32GB, 64GB and 128GB.

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Now instead of using a glass to hear what is transpiring beyond that closed door, which provides little to no enhancement, you’ll be able to hear all the nefarious details in crystal clear sound thanks to the Next Room Eavesdropping Device.

For all and intense purposes it’s like a stethoscope and a powered mic simply enhances the audio on the other side of the door.  A set of earbuds deliver the audio to your ears and a built-in rechargeable battery (via USB) should provide endless hours of snooping.

I’m particularly fond of Chinagrabber’s advisement: This product is being sold as an investigative tools for law enforcement or licensed investigators.

[via Thanks, Darren]

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