Hasta La Gadget!

We’ve talked about Flash Rods flash drives that look like toy cars several times over the years. My favorite continues to be the Back to the Future DeLorean. The company has offered several other versions of its vehicular flash drives over the years and they’ve all had USB storage of one sort or another stuffed inside. The company has just announced its new mid-size Flash Rod line.

Like all of the drives in the Flash Rods family, these are storage products with a storage device crammed inside of a toy car. The biggest difference in the new mid-size range from the company and some of the other products offered is that the storage hardware itself uses USB 3.0 connectivity.

All of the other drives from the company have used USB 2.0. Moving to USB 3.0 storage devices means that transferring files to and from the Flash Rods will be faster than ever before.

The drives are compatible with both Windows and Mac computers. You can choose from several different card types including a Shelby Cobra, a 67 Mustang, and several others. The 32 GB version sells for $110(USD), while the 64 GB version costs $130. They’re available now over at Flash Rods.

[via EverythingUSB]

Do you frequently need to transfer or back up data from USB drives? Are you a spy? Well if you’re not one, what kind of job requires you to do that? Whatever it is you do, StarTech has a gadget that could serve you well. It can copy data from a USB drive and transfer it to up to two other USB drives simultaneously. And it can do that on its own, there’s no need to hook it up to a computer.

The Flash Drive Duplicator and Eraser can copy just the data stored in a USB drive or it can make a clone of the entire drive. The second feature is useful if you’re copying up a bootable back-up drive or a disk image. As its name implies, the device can also erase data from up to two USB drives at the same time using either a quick erase method or a slower, but more secure way that supposedly follows a standard set by the US Department of Defense. I feel ashamed that I don’t have any data that merits that kind of sophisticated death.

Aside from transferring data to a flash drive, you can also use the device to transfer data to a hard drive, a solid state drive and other storage devices like memory cards as long as you have the proper USB enclosure or reader for your storage device. What I don’t know is if you can use those storage media as a source drive. You can order one from Amazon for about $171 (USD). Head to StarTech’s website for more information.

[via Electronista via Xataka]

Comic book geeks are perhaps the single greatest consumer of themed flash drives. If you’re a fan of Iron Man and are looking forward to the third movie in the franchise hitting theaters this summer, it may be time to you to start stocking up on some collectible flash drives. Three Iron Man 3 flash drives are coming out just in time for the blockbuster flick to arrive.

I happen to think the coolest of the three is Iron Man’s Repulsor hand. When the flash drive is plugged into the USB port, the light in the center of the hand that Iron Man uses as a weapon glows blue. Another cool drive in the trio looks like Tony Stark’s Arc Reactor, complete with a little animated light show when plugged in:

The third branded flash drive looks like the red, white and blue Iron Patriot head. All of the flash drives have retractable USB ports and are available with 8 GB or 16 GB of storage. While I haven’t found them in the U.S. yet, you can pre-order the Arc Reactor and the Repulsor Hand over at Australia’s Mighty Ape now.

[via EverythingUSB]

If you’re ever in Las Vegas, New York, Beverly Hills, or Yountville, California you must stop by Bouchon Bakery and buy a batch of their French Macarons. They’re the tastiest damned thing you’ll ever eat. So when I saw that they were making flash drives that looked like these delectable pastries, I started drooling.

Yes, I know that I cannot eat a flash drive, but it doesn’t make these brightly-colored pucks look any less appetizing. PQI’s Macaron USB Flash Drives look just like my favorite tasty treat, so I’m not sure that I could resist trying to take a byte out of my flash memory. While you definitely won’t want to dip these in your afternoon tea, they are water-resistant, dust-resistant and shock-resistant, so they might hold up to my stomach acids for at least 10 seconds before disintegrating.

No word on where you can buy these yet, but I suppose that’s a good thing, as I wouldn’t want to end up in the ER getting my stomach pumped anyhow.

[via Far East Gizmos]

A week ago, we learned about the Mycestro, a pointing device that, despite its unusual form, only has a humble goal: to replace your mouse. The Ego! Smartmouse on the other hand is quite the opposite. It looks like a traditional mouse, but it is much more than that. The question is, do we need a mouse that’s this smart?

Made by Laura Sapiens, the Ego! – no, no, no signore, it’s Ego! Put some life into it! – is a Bluetooth mouse that can be used both on a flat surface as well as on air. You can also use the Ego! to control your HTPC or other Bluetooth media players. It can also be used as a wireless flash drive. It can also be used to as a gesture-based gaming controller. It can also remember and automatically input your passwords for you. It can also vibrate to alert you of an appointment or a new email. If Old Spice were to design a mouse, they’d probably come up with an Ego! Except the Old Spice mouse would have a six-pack.

In order to perform all those tasks, the Ego! runs on Linux, has a 400MHz ARM9 CPU, a flash memory capacity of either 2GB or 4GB, a VGA camera, a touch sensor (in place of a scroll wheel), an accelerometer, a gyroscope, a compass, a vibration motor and an optical mouse sensor. It’s got nothing on my mouse though! My Logitizzech M305,000 is covered in luxurious duct tape and has a special right-click button – 60% of the time, it works every time.

Here’s another look at the non-mouse features of this mouse:

Laura Sapiens is currently raising funds for the Ego! Smartmouse on Kickstarter. Pledge at least £70 (~$106 USD) to get one.

But back to my original question: how many people need a mouse this smart? The gestures for managing windows for example – is that actually faster than just using the mouse the normal way? How often do you need to move a file and yourself as well to another workstation? Will the VGA camera be good for anything else other than that gimmicky pairing method?

I’m not saying the Ego! is a bad mouse. I’m just not that convinced that it should exist. Partly because it’s making my mouse feel bad.

[via Laura Sapiens via Digital Trends]