Gadgets

Don't tell Brock Walker that Herman Miller's Aeron is the perfect office chair. He just made it better. Walker is behind PostureFit, a wing-shaped pad that's an option on the Aeron. Placed at the base of your spine, it enables your pelvis to maintain its forward tilt, correcting any swayback tendencies.

Available next month for $90.

www.hermanmiller.com

Creative Labs' MuVo is an excellent little MP3 player, but it's its versatility that we love most. Just shuck the battery case and you'll see it's also a USB-based storage stick, like the Agate Q or Sony Microvault. That means your computer views it like a floppy disk or hard drive, so no software is required to upload tunes (or PowerPoint presentations, for that matter). You just drag and drop the files.


Price: $129


www.creativelabs.com

Most people pack up the summer house come fall, but designer Michael Jantzen foresees a time when they'll pack it away instead. Jantzen's concept Hide Away house, made predominantly of fabric, folds up for storage. Yet it features all the comforts of home, including hot water, electricity, a bathroom, and heat. During the off-season, hard shells store the water-gathering devices, solar panels, sewage treatment tanks, and other off-the-grid necessities, as well as the fabric walls and ceilings. Everything fits into the back of a pickup truck.

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We're sorry, but due to circumstances beyond our control, we've had to postpone the PopSci Battle Bot naming event until further notice.


Please check back at www.popsci.com/battlebot for further updates.


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The Room


Movie soundtracks are made for rectangular spaces, and a 10-to-7 side-to-front ratio is ideal. The perfect room would also have a ceiling that's higher than its width but shorter than its length. At the very least, avoid a perfect cube (sound waves might cancel each other).


Seating


For a conventional TV, set up your seating area at a distance of 2-1/2 times screen size. For an HDTV, it's twice screen size.


Speakers

We didn't lose to Marshall Faulk. We were losing, sure, but the final gun never sounded. Our man, Assistant Editor Michael Moyer, called a punt instead of a two-point conversion after a TD with 10 seconds left in the 4th. The software, an alpha version of EA Sports' ultrarealistic Madden 2003 NFL Football, couldn't make heads or tails of the Ray Rhodes-like call, so it locked up. Game over. Faulk wins 21-16, but with an asterisk.

Who hasn't been romanced by an inkjet's impressive dpi (4,800 by 1,200) or speed (17 pages per minute!) specs? Unfortunately, this is a formula for disappointing prints. The most important (though not sole) consideration these days is actually drop size-not something printer makers play up on the packaging. Here's what to look for when purchasing your next photo printer, along with a measure of importance.

Here we go again: In June, Darius Leszczynski of Finland's Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority found that an hour of cellphone exposure shrinks cultured human cells. The resulting gaps between the cells, the study suggests, could allow toxins to enter the brain. As quickly as several scientists dismissed the study—saying the shrinkage was probably caused simply by heat—Gro Harlem Brundtland, General-Director of the World Health Organization, issued a warning to parents to limit cellphone use in children.

Gone are the days when a hammer was a hammer and a drill just made holes. Today's tools are more versatile than ever, from sanders that drill to drills that find studs. And they don't merely get the job done; they do it better, more quickly, and more safely. Cordless tools are getting lighter and more powerful, thanks to new battery technologies. It's enough to inspire you to replace everything you own, so here are 11 high-tech tools you'll want for your new toolbox.
-Charles Wardell
1. Skil 14.4-volt Cordless Drill Driver

Be honest: Even you don't want to watch your home videos (raw footage is just not compelling). The good news: Home video-editing software is getting more powerful and easier to use, and the latest digital camcorders (don't even consider analog) are designed to transform you into a production company of one. Here's what to buy.


—Steve Morgenstern



1. YOUR GOAL: ENTER A FILM FESTIVAL

Talk about a split personality: Xentex Technologies' Flip-Pad Voyager has one huge 20-inch display that splits to serve two masters. Just rotate the right half 180 degrees, attach a keyboard and mouse, and you and a friend can separately surf the Web, read e-mail, or work on a project—or you can play a game head-to-head. If you're computing solo, the two halves complement each other with, say, a Web page on one side and a document on the other. At 12 pounds, it takes the two-laptops-in-one theme too far, but it double-folds into a diminutive 14- by 10- by 3-inch package.

Don't know your Schweineschnitzel (steak) from your Schweinemagen (pig's stomach)? IBM's menu and street-sign translator may prevent a culinary catastrophe. The prototype is a PDA with a clip-on camera. Pictures are sent wirelessly to an IBM server, characters identified, and text sent back. Not the best way to read Molire, but it does translate the basics with few errors. The device could be available in two years.

How's this for instant gratification: Snap the perfect shot with Hewlett-Packard's 4-megapixel HP 812 ($499) or Kodak's 2-megapixel EasyShare CX4230 ($299) camera, then immediately decide—via a preprogrammed address book—who you want to e-mail it to. The next time you dock with your PC, the pics are automatically sent. You can mark photos for automatic printing as well.


www.hp.com and www.kodak.com

Throw away your stirrers and say hello to the first paint container upgrade in decades. Dutch Boy's plastic Twist & Pour Paint Delivery System, otherwise known as a paint can, has a twist-off lid, internal pouring spout, and mug handle. Need to remix? Just close, shake, and pour. Initially available for gallon cans of latex-based paints; quarts will soon
follow.


www.dutchboy.com

The size of a briefcase and weighing in at more than 10 pounds, Toshiba's Satellite 1955 didn't engender much interest at first glance. But then Masa Okumura, Toshiba's director of product marketing, casually removed the keyboard from the base-and explained that it'll work as far as 3 feet away. There have been laptop prototypes over the years that turn into full-feature desktops, but this is the first that actually delivers.