gadget news

Sure, your iPhone may play games, tell you where to eat, and surf the Internet, but can it tell you what you did the other day and how to do it better? Enter the Polaris phone, a new system designed by the giant mobile phone company KDDI and Japan's Flower Robotics.

[ Read Full Story ]

Although Nikon was the first to market with HD capture for its DSLRs, Canon has arguably pushed things further forward with the full-frame, 1080p-capable 5D Mark II and sub-$1,000 Rebel T1i. The brand new 7D is the next step--enhancing the movie mode with video geeks' most wanted features, while at the same time integrating features from their top-end 1Ds Mark III family, giving would-be photo pros plenty to covet.

Is this the camera that finally puts the semi-pro digital camcorder firmly in its grave?

[ Read Full Story ]

Neuroscientists have developed a fingerless glove that automatically translates hand motions into text by way of electrode sensors. Michael Linderman and his colleagues published the results of the first phase of their research project in last Wednesday's PLoS ONE. In this phase, six volunteers, using a digital pen, wrote the numerals 0 to 9 fifty times while wearing the prototype glove, which recorded the electrical activity of eight muscles in their hand and forearms.

[ Read Full Story ]

What happens when a mobile phone company makes a netbook? You get a "mini-laptop" that's connected to the brink. (The epically failed Palm Foleo notwithstanding, of course.)

Nokia's Booklet 3G has (duh) 3G HSPA connectivity, a SIM card slot, and WiFi. Its super-thin 0.8-inch-thick, aluminum-encased body houses an Intel Atom processor, an HDMI-out port, and an SD card reader.

[ Read Full Story ]

At $3,500, this little beauty may not find its way onto my kitchen counter any time soon, but I have to admit it's tempting. Fill it with batter, close the lid, and the ChefStack shoots out perfectly formed pancakes at a rate of 200 per hour.

[ Read Full Story ]

The best chocolate comes from Europe. Go on, try and argue with me. Now, look at the new non-U.S. Black Label Series LG Chocolate BL40 and try and argue with me again. Can't do it, can you? Thought so. Shielded in tempered glass, the premium phone has a 4-inch, 800-by-345-pixel LCD widescreen. Its 21:9 aspect ratio is wide enough to display full 70mm movies across the entire screen. Yum.

[ Read Full Story ]

For a point-and-shoot, Panasonic’s new 12-megapixel Lumix DMC-ZR1’s zoom defies its size. Thanks to a first-in-class 0.1-inch aspherical lens, the shooter packs 8X optical zoom (35mm equivalent of 25-200mm) in a svelte, 1.02-inch-thick, 4.8-ounce frame. Aspherical lenses have always bested their perfectly rounded cousins in size, so it’s about time day-to-day shooters lost some weight, too.

[ Read Full Story ]

Leander over at Cult of Mac has been busy doing some iPod sleuthing, and stumbled upon plenty of Chinese-made cases for the forthcoming iPod updates. What did he find? Cameras!

[ Read Full Story ]