Hasta La Gadget!

Don’t call it a smart watch. The Casio GB line appeared in 2011 with little fanfare – it was up against devices like the Pebble in the public imagination and so an underpowered smartwatch was of little interest. However, Casio has updated their Bluetooth line with the GB-6900B And GB-X6900B, improved versions of their iconic G-Shock watches that allow you to control your phone from your watch and, more important, control your watch from your phone.

For example, you can do the standard remote control actions on the watch including turning phone audio up and down and seeing snippets of text messages and emails. However, the new Casio Engine 2 movement also allows you to set watch features via an interface on the phone including alarms, stopwatch activation, and the like. Most interesting are the phone sensing features that allows you to find your phone if it is near the watch and to tap the watch to turn off an incoming call.

ABlogTowatch has a full rundown of features and notes that many of these are things you might actually use. While it doesn’t sense your heartbeat, blood pressure, and pants size it does do a few important things well and, more important, connects to your phone via low power Bluetooth profile 4.0. This makes it easier to justify connecting the watch to your phone simply because the battery will wear slower than traditional Bluetooth devices.

Again, the G-Shock isn’t for everybody. However, if you’re looking to geek out you could do worse for $200. The watches should be available here in a few months.

Newcomers like Pebble might be the current darlings when it comes to connected watches, but it doesn’t mean that established players are standing still. Back at CES, Casio showed a G-Shock watch with Bluetooth (GB-5600A) capable of receiving calls and text-message notifications (with sound and vibration), plus automatic time updates from an iPhone. Today the company announced a pair of G-Shock watches (GB-6900B / GB-X6900B) with Bluetooth 4.0 LE that extend the existing functionality to select Android handsets. In addition, both watches feature music remote control (via AVRCP, presumably) and the ability to set alarms and timers from Casio’s companion smartphone app. Battery life is a pretty impressive two years (with 12 hours of Bluetooth use per day) on a single CR2032 battery. The GB-6900B and GB-X6900B will be released in Japan on September 21st for 18,000 yen (roughly $187) and 20,000 yen (roughly $208) respectively. All that’s needed now is a retro-looking Databank or calculator watch with Bluetooth, right, Casio?

Filed under: Cellphones, Wearables, Mobile

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Via: Far East Gizmos

Source: Casio

With the smartphone hordes banging at their gates, compact camera manufacturers are being forced to up their game. As such, Casio’s just launched a 16-megapixel, 18X zoom EX-ZR800 Exilim engine-equipped model with features like continuous shooting, “night shot” ISO 25,600 sensitivity, HDR and five axis stabilization. Unlike with the Olympus SH-50, however, the latter feature works on stills only and not video to correct translational and rotational camera shake. You’ll also get 1080p / 30fps H.264 video, a 25-450mm zoom range, f/3.5-7.0 aperture, time-lapse, 5fps burst speed, selective blur and “triple shot” exposure, which saves an image before you even press the shutter. The EX-ZR800 will arrive in Japan in red, white or black on August 23rd for 40,000 yen (about $410). There’s no indication of a western arrival, but if we had to guess we’d expect it to trickle over to Europe and the US shortly afterwards. In the meantime, check the (translated) source for more.

Filed under: Cameras

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Source: Casio Japan (translated)

Casio is going to release 2 G-Shock watches made as G-shock brand’s 30th anniversary limited edition watch on August 9. Both models are colored in black and gorgeous gold. Each model has 5,000 watches available.

GW-M5630D
Price: ¥34,650
Size: 46.7×43.2×12.7mm
Weight: About 52g
Power source: Tough solar (Solar charging system)

DW-6930D
Price: ¥25,200
Size: 53.2×50.0×16.3mm
Weight: About 67g
Power source:　CR2016　(Battery life: 2 years)

Casio is going to release New EXILIM series digital camera “EX-TR15″ in a limited quantity – 3,000 cameras ONLY.

“EX-TR15″ is definitely for someone who cares a lot to look beautiful in photos and likes to take a photo of yourself.

It added new “skin-whitening” mode to the existing make-up function so that you can brighten up your face and give your skin a glow. Also, to make it easier to take a self-shot, the camera frame includes a shutter-release button.

“EX-TR15″ has “EXILIM Engine HS Ver.3″ with mixture of high-speed image processing technology and high-speed shooting technology built-in. The display screen features 3.0 inch TFT color LCD (921,600 dots).

Size: 128.9×61.6×14.9mm
Weight: 149g
Lens: F2.8 lens, Focal length: 3.8mm
Effective pixels: 12.1 mega pixels
Image sensor: 1/2.3inch CMOS image sensor, 12.76 mega pixels