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.

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?

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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!

Keeping count of repetitions in any sporting endeavor is surprisingly challenging, be it push-ups, wind sprints, or golf shots. Trying to keep count with water between your ears leaves many swimmers pruning in the wet stuff longer than necessary. The brand new Pool-Mate watch is the first automatic lap counter, promising to help the swimming world count to ten.

Summertime, a cocktail party, stiff drinks -- what's missing? If you're a futuristic type, then the clear answer is: the newest butlerbot.

Though it may not be much comfort as you use it on the usual round of chores, inside the new Dyson DC31 vacuum cleaner is a motor that's ten times faster than a jet engine, and much quieter. At 104,000 rpm, the DC31's digital switched reluctance motor actually spins faster than any motor on earth.

Earlier in the week, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen announced that a mobile implementation of the full Flash Player 10 would be making its way onto several smartphones by October. In addition to Android, other mobile operating systems, including Windows Mobile, Palm's WebOS, and Symbian have signed on. Missing from that list, to absolutely no one's surprise, is the iPhone.

I'm still waiting for the technology that finally does away with my need to sleep. But since I do need my nightly dose (I've tried going without, and it's ugly), I'd like to make sure I'm doing it as efficiently as possible. A new device called the Zeo promises to help stamp out bad sleep and wasted time in bed, by bringing deep analysis of sleep patterns, formerly the province of professional sleep laboratories, into the home.

HP is hoping there’re a lot of people out there with mass printing needs but without regular Internet access. Their new PhotoSmart Premium printer has a Wi-Fi-enabled touchscreen on the front that allows a user to print directly from the Internet. The idea is that the printer would be a quick way of printing out online directions, pictures, movie tickets, and so forth, without the need of a computer.

Now that I've had a day or two to digest the rapidfire assault of product updates that was the Apple WWDC 2009 keynote, I must admit I'm less than thrilled with what went down. Sure, I may have drooled on my keyboard just a bit as I followed live blog coverage of the pep rally. But now that the Apple Kool-Aid has finally worn off and I've returned to my normal crotchety self, I can't help but feel disappointed--perhaps even a little incensed--by this most recent Steve-free Apple hoedown.