Posts tagged “gadgets”

Finally, know how much battery is left on a Canon digital camera!

This is something I’ve been wanting ever since I first got a digital camera. There is now open source “firmware” for Canon digital cameras that will instantly provide an actual battery meter! I don’t know how many times I’ve been using my camera (Canon SD630), knowing that the battery must be running low but having no idea how close to empty it was until the dreaded, blinking red battery icon shows up.

This is but one of many additions available with this method that is akin to, but not actually, a firmware update. Actually, you just put a couple files on your SD card and it takes care of the rest, all with no risk of damaging your camera! If it isn’t what you want, you just take out the card and the camera boots normally. It truly is a revelation. I haven’t tried it myself yet, but I can’t wait to get home to the camera to give it a shot!

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Ten years in, music industry begins to get it

I wasn’t the first to the checkout lane with an mp3 player. I am a music hoarder and therefore loved the idea, but when they broke on the scene I was a poor college student and there simply wasn’t enough money in the beer fund to buy the pricey gadgets that let you put 200 (!) songs on one CD. Then graduation day came and a generous Aunt and Uncle later, I was rocking the Rio Volt SP100. I was in hog heaven.

I hit the eurail that summer, Volt in hand, and there were near fisticuffs with my traveling companions over this player that today can be had at Walmart for $20. Why? Well, on the train, there isn’t a lot to do (at least not in 2001). Music can get you through a lot of boring and confining moments on overnight hauls. But the macro concept there was the fact that you got to take your music with you.

Portable music libraries entered the consumers mind with the walkman in the 80’s, but it wasn’t until the mp3 player that your music fit in your pocket. There wasn’t a bulky shoebox of tapes or Case Logic book of CD’s that had to be toted along with your gadget. Your gadget now WAS your music! Most excellent.

We’ve recently celebrated the 10th anniversary of the mp3 player and I am seven years removed from my Rio delight. I am happy to report that the music industry might finally have figured out how to interact with consumers on the digital playing field.

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Amazed or horrified? I think both.

Boston Dynamics' Big Dog

I was transfixed while watching this creation that sprung (literally) from Boston Dynamics with DARPA funding. It reminds me of both the Imperial Walkers on Hoth and a deer running around with its head cut off. Dubbed the “Big Dog“, it will surely haunt my dreams. Definitely worth a look.

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