Hasta La Gadget!

Artist's rendition of the PSP Go!

(Credit: 1UP)

For the past couple months we’ve been covering the ongoing rumors that Sony is prepping a new PSP. Well, more details are emerging, with gaming site 1UP reporting that Sony will trot out its new UMD-less PSP at E3

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“Hi, My name is Theo Watson, and this is a little app I made this morning,” says the author of Spinning Vinyl. “Right after smoking out.” he doesn’t add, despite the rather stoned sound to his voice.

Spinning Vinyl, seen above, takes a music track and plays it back and forth against the needle, back and forth back and forth, depending on how fast you spin your iPhone. It uses the accelerometers to determine the rate of rotation.

And yes, it appears that Theo did write this in just one morning. Sadly unavailable in the iTunes Store, but we’re publishing this in the hope of stirring Theo from his soporific stupor for long enough to submit it to Apple.

Product page [Fffff.at via Make]

There’s a small but growing breed of handheld espresso machines, of which the Twist is the latest. They all have a similar concept — using pressure to pump pre-heated water through the grounds. The pre-heated water is key, as the lack of a boiler is what makes these gadgets so small.

When you first look at the Twist, and read its name, you will probably make the same assumtion I did — that you somehow twist it to wring the coffee out. Instead, it works much like the Handpresso we’ve seen before, only instead of using a hand-pump to build up the bars, there is a standard gas canister like you’d use in a soda siphon.

If the photos are anything to go by, this works extremely well — the crema on the espresso is thick (although a little dark, which might point to too fine a ground). Because the pressure comes from a known source, the psi remains constant over the shot (135 psi or 9 bar).

These handheld machines are certainly interesting. They make a better cup than the standard stovetop mocha, but are also a pain to use and make just one cup at a time. The biggest failing, though, is the external water source. By the time you have poured it into the cold device, enough degrees have been knocked from the liquid to render the coffee anything but hot. If it were somehow possible to have a chamber for cold water, so you could place the whole handle on the heat to both boil the water and heat the device, these things might finally be both good and convenient enough to use. $130, pre-order.

Product page [MyPressi via Uncrate]

See Also:

• Handpresso Wild: Portable Espresso Maker
• Presso: Manual Drive Espresso Maker
• Review: Delonghi Magnifica Is a Magnanimous Mud Maker

You can’t tell me someone didn’t think of glowing red eyes. Or even glowing white eyes. Just glowing eyes in general is cooler than a glowing red body…under ultraviolet light.

The Associated Press is reporting that South Korean scientists have cloned four dogs with the “power” to …

Complicity mechanism; residual ladder; spatial corrections. These are some of the products and categories on the Worst Website in the World™ promoting the design company Ludens. Tucked somewhere deep inside the Flash monstrosity, you’ll find the Mexican Army Shelf, a modular wall unit as awesome as its name suggests.

Appearing as a simple block of wood when spied from afar, the shelf unit folds out like the offspring of the Swiss Army knife and the crappy pencil boxes we were forced to make in school (mine never closed properly, but the varnish, even when well dried, provided solvent-highs for months after).

We think of it as a utility belt for the wall, with special compartments for keys, coins, clothes and, well, anything else small enough to slide in. It looks far beyond my woodworking skills, though, and is as yet unavailable to buy. Ikea needs to make this, and fast.

Product page [Ludens, but don’t even bother trying to find the product, via the Design Blog]