Tag: gadgets

Ice Orb Levitating Speaker

I’ve got a slightly delayed birthday present today, from a good friend of mine.  Ice Orb levitating speaker is a Bluetooth speaker with a twist.  It comes with a base, which, when switched on, makes the speaker levitate over it.  It just hangs in the air, no strings attached.  Or a USB cable attached, if you want to charge it.  Coupled with a few blue LEDs, it makes quite an impression.  The future is here, ladies and gentlemen.  We live in the world of science fiction.

Here’s the video of this thing in action:

International Electrotechnical Commission : World Plugs

International Electrotechnical Commission has a very handy (especially before travelling to a foreign country) list of different plugs (a total of 14 at the time of this writing), mapped to countries of the world.  So if you don’t have one of these:

adaptor

make sure you check the list of adapters & converters worth buying before you fly out.  And while on the topic of this great variety, IEC also explains why there are so many and if this annoyance will ever be sold:

The IEC issued its International Standard for a universal plug in the 1970s; so far it has been adopted by Brazil and South Africa. It is unlikely that there will be a run on the standard in the near future. Literally hundreds of millions of plugs and sockets have been installed and who would convince a country to invest now in changing its whole infrastructure?

Most likely the future will lie with solutions such as the USB plug or possibly a multi-plug that can accommodate many different plugs, or even new technologies such as LVDC (low voltage direct current) or wireless charging mechanisms.

Nexus 10 is here

After what must have been the fastest delivery in the history of online shopping, my brand new shiny Google Nexus 10 has arrived. It’s black in color, packing 32 gigs of storage, very fast, and with a beautiful screen.

The wait is finally over.

So far I have only managed to update it to the Android 4.4.2, install and configure all the apps I use, download and watch an episode of the Vikings, and login to every single social network.  It is too early to say much yet, but so far I’m loving it. Colors, performance and the battery life seem to be perfect.Â