Nanodots are fun all by themselves. I love playing with these. It’s almost relaxing. It’s hard to believe that they have figured out yet another way to make them fun with a new product that makes it more fun to build with Nanodots. The Nanopad with FeWeave technology is a nice pad to use when you are building with Nanodots that also let’s you play a game with your Nanodots. Available in 16 inch for $19.99 and 26 inch for…
Oh, this is so totally cool! Think Geek is now offering the first of 52 “Geek of the Week” trading cards! The cards are broken into sets of eight — I guess because doing sets of seven didn’t look symmetrical enough(?), but anyway! Seriously! How can you resist Veronica Belmont dressed as a warrior princess? In 2010, illustrator Len Peralta set upon a challenge: interview 52 members of the geek-elite, and use that newfound familiarity to create likenesses of them….
Arctic has developed into a company who primarily made cooling solutions for computers to a company who releases high quality products of everything from speakers and keyboards to now hobby items. I have reviewed many items from Arctic and have yet to find something that was not high quality while staying affordable. Their newest line of RC toys. As you can see in a post here, the first offerings were all service related vehicles. They are now announcing a new…
Despite being a gear geek, I still want my kids to have activities for inside that are not on a television or video game system. In their life, most of what they know come either of those ways. We do play with Lego toys, slot car tracks and board games, but those get old to the boys. What we need is something unique that seems magic. Enter GlowCrazy which happens to be both unique and does seem like magic. The…
Over at Milo.com’s Daily Bark, they are featuring a subjective list of the ‘best gifts ever’! It is interesting because it is focused on someone who would have been born in 1980, therefore turning 30 this year. The infograph looks back at what the hot gifts would have been for boys and girls over time. Personally I am too old and my kids are too young to have wanted the kid-centric stuff, but the later stuff … well, who said…
Show me a person who could watch the Pixar movie Wall-E without getting a little bit misty, and I’ll show you a person with a heart of stone. The premise was that Earth, long inhabited by wasteful humans was eventually rendered unusable, and there was a mass exodus to a fleet of spaceships provided for by the Buy N Large corporation, which the company that had sold the products which helped contribute to all of the waste on Earth in…
Solar power has been a promise since I was my son’s age. In the future. we were all supposed to have roofs covered in solar cells and not having to use ugly power lines to power our lives. We were barely able to get to the point of powering calculators. Fast forward 20 years and while there have been advances, we still don’t drive solar cars and we still have to have power lines run to our homes. Thankfully, there…
Magnetic spheres must be really becoming popular. There are at least three brands of them out on the market with Buckyballs, Neocube and Nanodots. I was received a set of Nanodots to play with. Nanodots look a lot like ball bearings. However, each of the 236 balls are very magnetic. I actually took one dot and had it hold up a piece of paper on the metal side of my cubical; they are that strong. Because of this, you do…
Back when I was my son’s age, I was a science nut. I loved learning all about our universe, electronics, magnetism and the world we live in. My favorite catalog from then was Edmund Scientifics. They had and still have science products and lots of toys similar to what Nano Magnetics Inc are announcing today in the form of Nanodots. Nanodots are little tiny magnetic spheres that you can build things out of. It’s also been suggested when you stock…
Just what’s needed to brighten up a dreary cubicle and provide entertainment when your warden supervisor isn’t looking — Zibits, a new series of miniature remote controlled robots that are about 2″ tall, move in “several directions including a full 360º rotation”, and that are equipped with “robotic lights and sounds”. Zibits will show up at Toys ‘R Us in mid-March for less than $10. Zibits Miniature Robots
I have a confession to make. I like penguins. Part of this is I am a Linux user and Tux, the Linux mascot, is a penguin. The other part is they are so darn cute. That’s why I decided to take a look when Arimaz offered to send a sample of MyDeskFriend AKA Pingo. Part Tamagotchi, part Facebook app, part Tux Droid and all cute. That about sums up this tiny robot that fits in your hand. MyDeskFriend comes with…
I have often wanted to buy one of those Ambient Devices Judie blogged about a few weeks ago. I’ve also wanted a Nabaztag as well, since they are cute and can do some really cool stuff like play mp3 files or provide e-mail alerts. I don’t want either anymore, thanks to kysoh.com who sent me a Tuxdroid that is not only very cute, but is also based on open source software.
When I got this airplane in the mail, I was shocked that this little tiny thing can actually fly. I am happy to say that this little airplane not only flew, but flew very well even outside where I tested it. Let’s go over all the pieces of this plane. The plane itself is constructed mainly of a carbon fiber wire for it’s fuselage and durobatic foam for it’s wings, horizontal and vertical stabilizers. It doesn’t sound like much, but…
Next year the Rubix Cube turns 30, so the fact that I was working part-time in a retail department store to support school / books / music / games / friends/ etc when it came out means a couple of things. First it means that there is a certain nostalgia attached to the Cube. OK, so it also says I’m old! Anyway, when I had the opportunity to try out the SphereXYZ, a challenging puzzle that invokes the spirit of…
When I was a child, I absolutely loved stuffed animals; I had such a massive collection residing on my bed that they threatened to push me off should I stretch out or roll over in the middle of the night. One of my fondest wishes at that time was that some of my favorite stuffed animals could be more life-like and animated. Granted, this was in the 70s, and the closest things we had to robotic toys back then were…
A couple of months back, I asked my LEGO friends Beetle and Maynard with their girlfriends Sunshine and Faith to check out the new Fingertip Mini Cube Speaker that Thomas at USB Fever sent from overseas. (see the review: Make Some Music) Sunshine: “We were looking for an upgrade to a dual speaker setup. It was then that Judie from GearDiary told us about the Stereo Mini Portable Sound Box from USB Fever. That Judie girl ROCKS, because it as…
When I was a kid, my parents bought me my first robot. Except this was in the early 70s, so it wasn’t a real robot – it was a fuzzy effigy, a mechanized kitten thing. The kitten was tethered by co-joined wires to a long battery box which also served as a remote control. It could walk forward…stop…walk forward…stop; it might have even meowed, too – but I honestly don’t remember. Anyway you get the idea; the kitten wasn’t very…
Good things do come in small packages. I asked my LEGO friends Beetle and Maynard with their girlfriends Sunshine and Faith to check out the new Fingertip Mini Cube Speaker that Thomas at USB Fever sent from overseas. Beetle: “As sound technicians for the Best Little LEGO Band from Nashville, we got frustrated with the round speakers that came with our Apple Shuffle.” Sunshine: “Then Kerry and Judie from GearDiary told us about these speakers from USB Fever.” Maynard: “It…
At the same time that Gear Diary was approached to review the Johnny Lightning Battle Wheels, we were also invited to review the V_Bot. What is the V_Bot? Well, here is a clipping from the email describing it: “V_Bot, the new high-tech hero, transforms from a sleek street vehicle into a giant robot loaded with action moves. This revolutionary RC toy captures kids’ imaginations with a giant robot that they can control, transform and drive. V_Bot even has a plug-in…
Sometimes, I need to have white noise playing in the background in order to be able to concentrate. This can take the form of music (CD, MP3’s etc), radio (Internet or other), or the TV. Sometimes, the simple sound of the air circulating in the room that I’m in can be deafening, and just too loud. I need to fill the air with something other than, well… the air. Recently here in Chicago, we had a very bad rainstorm come…
The call of duty beckons yet again, to review another RC aircraft. But, this time it is not another helicopter, it is an airplane. Specifically, it is the Silverlit Palm–Z Mini RC Indoor Airplane, available from Hobbytron.com. To date I have test flown the Hornet 3 Mini RC Helicopter and the RC AH-64 Apache RTF 4 CH Electric Helicopter, both also available from HobbyTron.com. With my RC helicopter flying experience would I be able to take on flying an airplane?…
