The Geek Wish List: Day Three

  • Mercedes Benx S-Class 2007

No doubt this is a high-performance car with luxury status which would attract the interest of the most mainstream petrolhead. But it’s also got some features with particular geek appeal.

The big one is an automated braking and control system. When you’re on the open road you set your desired speed and, well, that’s it. The car uses radar sensors to detect the speed and distance of the car ahead, then speeds up or slows down as necessary to maintain a safe distance. It’s said to work well, though it can be disarming and drivers find it difficult to avoid the natural implication to hit the brakes manually. Unlike previous incarnations of the technology this system can slow the car right down to a complete halt, meaning it’s even suited to congested city driving.

There’s also a night vision camera which displays an image on a screen mounted behind the steering wheel so that you can spot otherwise hidden upcoming obstacles:

And there’s even built in massaging on the seats, controlled via the dashboard:

(Pics courtesy of Mercedes via Wired.com)

  • Digital thermometer frying pan

Baking is simple: you switch the oven to a precise temperature, and if you aren’t convinced the dial settings are right, you can use an oven thermometer. But when it comes to frying pans, it’s tough to get much more accurate than “do I dare prod it with my fingertips?”

Well, that was the case until somebody came up with the idea of building a digital thermometer into a pan and having the temperature displayed on the handle:

So once you do figure out exactly the right temperature to get your bacon and eggs just so, now you can be assured that next time you fry you can get exactly the same level of heat… to a degree of accuracy which only a geek could appreciate.

For more details: http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/kitchen/a7a9/



Wednesday Geeky Pics: Bugs!

Let’s go old school geeky for a moment.  Did you have a bug collection when you were a kid?  I did, briefly for a class project, but then decided that I’d rather see them alive and flying around than pinned to a board. Of course, who needs a board when you’ve got a camera? With all of the beautiful things in nature to photograph, these guys are sometimes overlooked… but the pictures below are definitely worth checking out. And just think, these buggy models might still be alive and well!

A friendly face. – mhodge (CC)

bugs7

Continue reading ›

Making filthy water drinkable through nano-filtration

It’s not a secret, we all know that a good part of the world has problems with its drinking water sources, bringing death and sickness every day upon third-world countries. Sure, humanitarian organizations try to help these countries, but doing so is expensive. So when looking at the situation, Engineer Michael Pritchard thought he needed to do something about this mess, and invented the lifesaver bottle, which, using a non-chemical nano-filtration membrane, can make the most revolting water drinkable in seconds.



Top 5 Places to get Free Science Fiction Online

By Casey Lynn
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

One of the things that I love about science fiction and fantasy is that the genre is one where short fiction is still alive and kicking. Not only are the “big four” magazines still in print – Analog Science Fiction & Fact, Asimov’s Science Fiction, Fantasy and Science Fiction, and Realms of Fantasy (which recently rose from the ashes with a new publisher) – but there are countless small-press zines, many of which are ezines available for free online. And not only is this great news for short story writers, but also for science fiction readers. As an avid writer/reader myself, here are some of my favorite places to get free science fiction online (and I should note that there are many more).

Continue reading ›

The Geek Wish List: Day Two

  • WiFi detector shirt

With a list price of $29.99, this could spell an end to walking round city centers surreptitiously opening up your laptop and checking for WiFi signals before you commit to placing your latte order.

The shirt glows to show both the presence of a WiFi signal and its strength. It’s powered by three AAA batteries in a built-in pocket. And if you don’t want to perpetuate geek stereotypes, you’ll be pleased to know the detector and display are removable to allow easy washing of the shirt.

For more details: http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts-apparel/interactive/991e/

  • Millennium Falcon Mac Mini

The crew at MacMod do exactly what the name says: modify Apple products for improved performance, overcoming proprietary restrictions, or simply amusing themselves. This falls strictly into the latter category.

It turns out the innards of a Mac Mini and a Millennium Falcon toy fit together remarkably well – and let’s face it, it’s a marriage made in cool white plastic heaven. The only major piece of drilling needed was a hold for a USB slot which helped the ship serve as an iPod shuffle dock:

Another modification using a rubber washer “found in a junk drawer in the garage” was enough to install a webcam in the main flight deck:

And after around four hours tinkering, the crew wound up with a fully functioning media center Mac:

For more details: http://www.macmod.com/external-mods/mac-mini/371-millenium-falcon-mac-mini

The Geek Wish List: Day One

Over the next week we’ll be bringing you ten of the most desirable geek possessions. Some are as cheap as a few bucks, some cost tens of thousands of dollars, and some are one-offs which aren’t for sale. But every one of them should have you thinking “I want one of those!”

  • Gyroscopic pool table

As anyone who’s played in a run-down bar with a ramshackle bar will know, a pool table needs to be flat. Really flat. A variation as minute as thousandths of an inch across a table’s surface can cause problems. When you’re on a boat, that type of slope is almost inevitable in anything but the calmest of waters.

This table uses a gyroscope to automatically adjust the table to remain level, no matter how the boat sways:

If you can’t afford one of these tables or if you don’t have your own ship, you can play on them if you are ever lucky enough to take a cruise with Royal Caribbean which has them on several of its liners.

  • Cray CX1

At a starting price of $25,000 this is the world’s most expensive desktop computer. That’s largely because it’s a true super-computer with the ability to run 16 processors. At full capacity it can run 512 GB of RAM (that’s GB, not MB) and store 4,000 GB of data.

The main selling point is its small size: 31 x 44 x 90 cm, and weighing 62kg. That may sound heavy, but the first Cray supercomputer weighed 5.5 tons.

As you might imagine, this isn’t designed for your average home user (though 512GB might even be enough to run Vista). It’s primarily for researchers who need to process huge amounts of data but don’t have the space for larger machines. The first machine sold to UCLA for use in a neurological imaging lab.