Gadgets Base

Yes, you are reading this headline correctly. Someone actually invented a washing machine that works in conjunction with a toilet.

Yeah, I know it sounds pretty gross, but listen to what the WashUP actually does. The washing machine is stationed above the toilet in order to recycle the washer water into the toilet.

The concept is based on a simple premise: why use fresh water to go to the bathroom in? The WashUP puts in soapy water from the washing machine that would have otherwise have gone down the drain and puts it to good use. Now you can go in part-clean, part dirty water and send it, well, down the drain.

The washer is also built high so you don’t need to crouch down to put your clothes in. Now that’s something that is an improvement. The only thing that doesn’t seem to be well thought out on this WashUP is where do you dry your clothes? I mean, if the washer is now in the bathroom above the toilet, where is the dryer going to go, in the shower?

I would think that would be an obvious flow in the logic, but I guess the concept designer didn’t see it that way. I also wonder if planet Earth is at the point where we need to recycle our water that much.

Source

I suppose that the military has been looking for more remotely piloted aircrafts since the MQ-1 Predator, and it appears they have been going to colleges for their next one. They have given the University of Michigan a $10 million dollar grant to come up with a “six-inch robotic spy plane modeled after a bat”.

I don’t know if the picture to the left here is their prototype, but you have to admit that it certainly looks neat. Not only is the COM-BAT (it’s official name?) designed for reconnaissance, but the military wants it to “gathers data from sights, sounds and smells in urban combat zones and transmit information back to a soldier in real time”.

This means no more going into enemy territory as blind as a bat. Okay, that was a bad joke, but it was too hard to resist. However, if you had an infrared lens in that COM-BAT, you could send a whole fleet of these things in, and the people you’re spying on may be none the wiser.

Believe it or not, this COM-BAT is planned to have energy scavenging potential, so it could be powered by wind and solar energy. That means it could stay in the air indefinitely, provided it has enough wind and sun. Other planned features are miniature microphones, as well as detectors for picking up nuclear radiation and poisonous gases.

Well, if this project doesn’t work, then maybe Batman would be interested in it. Just one of those coming at the Joker could be enough to make even him frown.

Source

The red colored Zune 80 has made a re-appearance and it’s not even Valentines day, you remember the holiday that we see tons and tons of red device announcements. With just one small catch, the red model of the Zune 80 will not be offered in all the same locations as the regular Zune models and can just be purchased at Zune Originals. Keeping with the standard pricing, the red Zune 80 will retail for $249, you can also choose to have it customized for an a few extra bucks. No word on if this is going to be a permanent offering or just for a limited time.

Product [Zune Originals] Via [Zune-Online]

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There’s a good chance that if you have a laptop, there’s an empty PC Card slot just waiting to be used. Sure, you could always add some extra USB ports or a 3G card, but if you don’t need anything that fancy, why not do something simple with it like turn it into a secret stash?

This tiny Stash Card will let you keep a few very small items stored away in your laptop. Perhaps a spare key, or a few bucks. I wouldn’t stick anything of value in it, as it can be swiped just as easily as your laptop. For $8 you can’t really go wrong.

Source: CrunchGear

We had seen the first leaked image of the Motorola Z9 way back in July 2007 only to have it finally turn up on the FCC earlier this month, now we have all the details and its safe to say they are official, they were leaked courtesy of a Motorola product sheet.

The Motorola Z9 will be a media-centric slider style phone with dedicated music keys that will appear when the music player is launched or the phone is set to music mode. The Z9 has support for GSM 850/19001800/1900, WCDMA 1900/850 and 3.6 Mbps HSDPA. It will feature a 2.4-inch QVGA display, have A-GPS support, a 2-megapixel camera with flash and 8x zoom, Opera 8 browser and 45MB of internal memory with up to 8GB of additional storage with the microSD card slot.

Now it just comes down to when Motorola will release the Z9 and how much it will retail for. In addition to the scan of the ‘official’ product sheet (which you can see below) you can also check out some other goodies from Motorola by visiting their site: http://uaprof.motorola.com/

Via [Just Another mobile phone Blog] Image Via [gizmos.es]

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How many gadgets do you know actually cram in as many as 5 features in a single device? Well here’s the 5-in-1 Gagdet Pen to prove it so, featuring a pen, a mini torch, a laser pointer for your presentations, a stylus for those touch screen devices and even a bank note checker to see if anyone returns you fake $1 bills. After all, you can’t be that much of a high flyer considering the 5-in-1 Gagdet Pen retails for a mere $11, so looking out for counterfeit Benjamins is pretty much a far-fetched idea.

Product Page

Posted Mar 20th 2008 11:14AM by Darren Murph
Filed under: Desktops
Granted, the Nova P22 is probably small enough for the vast majority of folks, but if you weren’t feeling the aforementioned machine for whatever reason, here’s another option. The NOVA LITE Mini 2L measures in at 9.09- x 7.24- x 2.00-inches and weighs just a few raisins more than the X300 (3.3-pounds for those taking notes). Apparently, this box was designed to simply “meet everyday computing needs” while keeping noise to a minimum, and ASUS has three lovely flavors for you to choose from. Packed within, you’ll find up to 2GB of DDR2 RAM, an 80GB / 160GB hard drive, a DVD burner, Ethernet, WiFi (on select models), built-in speakers, four USB 2.0 ports, DVI / VGA and audio in / out connectors. No word on a price, release date or any of that pertinent information, unfortunately.

Posted Mar 20th 2008 6:28AM by Darren Murph
Filed under: cellphones
We’ve handled handsets with unorthodox keypads before, but there’s quite a bit more about this here device that’s off-kilter than just a unique method of input. Discovered in the always unpredictable database of the FCC, the Mobicom-built mobile plays on the 850 / 1900 GSM bands and features a built-in mp3 player, file manager, speakerphone and accelerometer — you know, for accessing icons by simply tilting the phone. The most astounding inclusion, however, isn’t the integrated NFC technology that allows users to make payments on the go, but rather the unmistakable logo of a financial services company. Sitting front and center. On a cellphone. Something tells us this thing better print greenbacks if it hopes to seriously lure any suits away from their precious BlackBerrys.

[Via PhoneScoop]

Wow, that’s a nice chunk of change. Included in the list of big names bidding for some of the spectrum that comes up for grabs once broadcasters give it up as they go digital, are Google, AT&T and Verizon. In case you forgot about this, last year Google influenced (in a good way) the auction rules convincing the FCC that winners of the spectrum open up their networks to a wider range of equipment, apps and in particular, standards.

Posted Mar 20th 2008 7:55AM by Chris Ziegler
Filed under: Handhelds, Wireless
It’s not every day that we hear about a Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard device that lacks any cellular hardware whatsoever, so when we do, it’s sort of like winning the lottery except way less exciting and profitable. Enter the first volley of devices to support Motorola’s new Total Enterprise Access & Mobility initiative — TEAM, conveniently — which represent just the very front end of a whole infrastructure solution for business campuses looking to replace their desk phones with something just a little more mobile and modern. Eventually, TEAM will support true VoIP-cellular handoff, but in its initial form, it’ll be WiFi only, making these first handsets very unique indeed. We don’t have the complete picture on specs here, but they’ll support push-to-talk, text messaging, and as we mentioned, they’ll be loaded with the very latest and greatest that Windows Mobile have to offer when they launch later this year.

[Via PC World]