Posted Feb 3rd 2008 5:58PM by Joshua TopolskyFiled under: Laptops We’re not sure that you’d want to do it, but it’s nice to know that you can do it. If you’re really sick of the native OS that came with your Eee — or you’re trying to feel out what a Cloudbook would be like if you could buy one — you can now install Everex’s Google-centric gOS onto your system with little-to-no effort, simply by following this ten point breakdown. You’ll need an external optical drive, a wired internet connection, and probably an hour or so, but once all is said and done, you can break free of Xandros and roll deep with the Ubuntu-based gOS. How the software performs on the miniscule laptop we couldn’t say, but at least now you (Read the full post about ‘Install gOS on the ASUS Eee’…)

Hmm. Unless you want Child Protective Services knocking on your door, don’t hang a picture of your kids sleeping on these Livingstones floor cushions in your office. Few will believe that these realistic-looking stones are actually made of 100% virgin wool and are filled with hypoallergenic polysilicone fiber. They come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors and are available directly from smarindesign, where you can also obtain a price list. If you can keep CPS at bay until then, the Livingstones should be delivered within about four weeks of placing your order. Via GEARFUSE. (Read the full post about ‘Livingstones rock cushions’…)

Posted Feb 3rd 2008 1:55PM by Darren MurphFiled under: Digital Cameras We already witnessed the overseas announcement of JVC’s palm-friendly GR-D850, but now it looks as if the firm is making it official here in the US of A along with a slightly (and we stress “slightly”) more advanced sibling. The GR-D870 High-Band Digital Video Camera features the same 1/6-inch 680k pixel CCD, 35x optical zoom, 2.7-inch LCD monitor, DV in / out and 3D Noise Reducer, but steps it up ever so slightly by tossing in a SD / MMC card slot for snapping digital stills (up to 640 x 480) while recording footage to miniDV. (Read the full post about ‘JVC intros GR-D870 miniDV camcorder with 35x zoom’…)

Popcorn Maker An old fashioned popcorn brought back from the dead, reverse engineered shrunk down to a fraction of its original dimensions so it sits handily on your kitchen worktop See price Tags: pvp, gprs, speakers, lcd (Read the full post about ‘Popcorn Maker’…)

Posted Feb 3rd 2008 11:52AM by Joshua TopolskyFiled under: Laptops During the recent Greener Gadgets Conference in New York, former OLPC CTO (and XO challenger) Mary Lou Jepsen discussed the real-world difficulties with using the kid-friendly laptops, including the creation of an XO “hospital” used to repair broken computers. Apparently, in the crowded conditions of schools in places like Nigeria, the little green laptops have a tendency to be jostled around and even knocked on the floor from time to time. As there’s typically no repair shops nearby, the kids have learned to fix the systems themselves, setting up a “laptop hospital” where they can repair what’s broken using simple tools and cheap replacement parts. (Read the full post about ‘5-year-olds repair OLPC laptops at Nigerian “hospital”’…)

What kind of chair do you sit in? I’ve got a pretty decent chair that I’ve had for around five years. It’s nothing fancy, just a black high-back computer chair. If you like to sit in something that differs from the norm, and happen to be an aviation enthusiast, this B-52 Stratofortress Ejector Seat Chair should be right up your alley. This rather eccentric-looking chair is modeled quite accurately to the ejector seats found in B-52 bombers. I’m going to guess that when you pull on the straps, the seat will still remain firmly planted on the ground. I’m going to venture a guess that only the most dedicated of aviation enthusiasts will want to pick one of these up. (Read the full post about ‘B-52 Ejector seat won’t launch you from your cubicle’…)

Battery Lamp You can have this for ?14.95 Tags: digital, consumer technology, players, video games (Read the full post about ‘Battery Lamp’…)

Posted Feb 3rd 2008 9:53AM by Darren MurphFiled under: Robots C’mon, be honest — the unofficial cutoff age for playing with Legos sans kids is sometime way before puberty, but thanks to a new development from Carnegie Mellon University, we adults may soon be able to unashamedly indulge in those desires once more. Posey, hailed as a “hands-on way of interacting with computers,” features a plethora of snap-together, sensor-laden parts that can communicate with PCs through ZigBee. When a user attaches a leg to a body, for instance, an on-screen representation immediately mimics the movement, providing hours of fun and some real promise for future applications. (Read the full post about ‘Posey makes playing with snap-together blocks okay for adults’…)

Posted Feb 3rd 2008 7:41AM by Darren MurphFiled under: Misc. Gadgets Unfortunately, Dr. Chunlei Guo of the University of Rochester hasn’t yet figured out how to turn scrap metals into gold, but he, along with Dr. Anatoliy Y. Vorobyev, has discovered how to colorize a variety of metals. By utilizing a “femtosecond laser processing technique,” the duo has crafted a method for turning even aluminum into aluminum with an impeccable gold finish. Furthermore, they’ve also been successful in turning tungsten dark blue, leaving reason to believe that nearly any metal could be altered to appear as a different color. Ah, just imagine what these folks could do with your MacBook Pro.[Via The New York Times (Read the full post about ‘Researchers devise method for colorizing metals, alchemists swoon’…)

Apparently the Casio EX-F1 is a camera with no shutter, according to TechOn. Casio plans to release the EX-F1 March. The EX-F1 offers a continuous shooting speed of 60 fps (frames per second) (each frame is 6 Mpixels) and to shoot full HD (1080/60i) H.264 movies, and much more. [Source] Tags: AAC, sat-nav, digital, cool gear (Read the full post about ‘Casio EX-F1: The Camera With No Shutter’…)