Archive for February 13th, 2009

The Gadget: The Wham-O Snowball Blaster is an arm mounted slingshot/cannon thingy for snowballs. It has a mold on top for making three perfectly spherical. UPDATE: Slow motion video added.

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The Price: $30

The Skinny: The molds don’t work well with thin snow, but I bet wetter stuff is amazing. The range on the slingshot is about 30 feet, and fairly powerful and accurate as it can be considering a snowball will almost always arc. You have to aim up and lob the shot, which is kind of contrary to the gun-like form of the weapon. The rubber bands flex well even in cold weather.

The bottom line is that if you’re facing off against any one with a half way decent arm, the average firepower on this piece is no match for a quick pack and toss from a human appendage. Nice try, though. Don’t I look mean cradling such an armament?

[HammacherSchlemmer]

Snowmodo is our snow sport winter meet up at Lake Tahoe, with prizes, discounts, tons of fun snow activities, a party and GADGETS. If you can make it (and people are coming from TEXAS) please RSVP. I’ll let you wear my hat (below).

In order to transform this table from pub to coffee-sized all one needs to do is give it a push down until it clicks into place. Push it down again and the table raises up.

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The fact that the Push-Up could effectively do the work of two separate tables makes it practical given the trend towards designing for smaller spaces. Plus it kind of looks like a metallic spider—and let me tell you—the creepy look is in. [Chris Murphy Furniture via Likecool]

What woman wants 400gbp/s in her slot? What. The. Hell. [Thanks Ponies!]

Have a romantic evening planned for tomorrow? You do? That’s good…that’s good. Just remember, there is a dark, scary side to love. The following gadgets are a sign that you might be in danger.

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[Image via Gabe Evans NYT]

When LinkedIn user interface designer Bryan Haggerty decided to propose to his girlfriend, he wanted to do something more than the old romantic candlelight/beach thing. Instead, he wanted the iPhone to do the heavy lifting.

So he designed the Romantech iPhone app to lead his girlfriend around San Francisco, spurred on by video clues to find the next spot to sync via GPS. Eventually the process spelled out a <3 on the map—and if that expression of love weren’t enough, Haggerty was waiting in the last location to propose in person. Meh, it was thoughtful and everything, but a text message would have gotten things done quicker. [Wired]

Granted, it’s a 720p Magnavox, but the $200 barrier is great one to see fall at a major, big-box retailer. You can grab it starting this weekend at Target.

You may laugh while pointing to your 50″ plasma, but I know a lot of people for whom a 19-inch HDTV would be the perfect bedroom complement, especially here in NYC, land of the hovel.

Also, maybe we were hallucinating, but my girlfriend and I thought we saw another sub-$200 19-incher pop up in Best Buy’s ad a few Sundays ago. Both BB and Walmart have been floating around the low $200s for a while, but has anybody seen any more 19-inch HD sets for under two Franklins? Drop some links in the comments if so.

Have you ever seen how close photographers and spectators get to the action at rally car events? This guy is lucky that his head didn’t go flying with his DSLR.

[Break via Jalopnik]

Jonathan Berg’s Wall-E computer is so cute, I just want to pick him up and squeeze him. But that would probably upset the delicate mechanisms inside.

This is a plexiglass custom case built to look like Wall-e. He features Intel’s Atom 330 processor on a mini- ITX board. He has bluetooth, wireless-N, a 250GB hard drive, web cam in his left eye, 7 inch touch screen, logitech usb speakers as his arms, an itech laser keyboard, and a bluetooth microphone for use with speech recognition.

Thanks, Jonathan!

[Google via Lifehacker]

My ideal refuge is the ball pit from Chuck E. Cheese. But since I’m too tall to partake, I’ll have to settle for the slightly less colorful but equally round Globus Scriptorium desk and chair.

Stored as a white polyurethane sphere, the Globus Scriptorium splits into hemispheres when in use—one for your rump, one for your laptop. A futurist design punctuated by luxuries like a 180 degrees of swivel and leather upholstery, the Globus Scriptorium can be yours for $7,000.

I’d be tempted if it weren’t for the ugly integrated base plate that ruins the design’s curvy appeal. Well, that, and the whole paying $7,000 thing. [Hammacher Schlemmer via Nerd Approved]