Hasta La Gadget!

If Sketchers is looking for something new to put in their ShapeUps, they might want to try out a GPS device, like the SmartShoe. Nominated for the Most Innovative Location Device Award at the Locations & Beyond Summit, GTX Corp., maker of the SmartShoe, develop mini GPS-tracking and cellular location-transmitting technology platforms for a number of consumer products. 

The GPS SmartShoe is marketed on GTX’s site as a device that can be used to help keep track of people with Alzheimer’s. The idea was born in 2002 in response to the Elizabeth Smart dissapearance case in Salt Lake City, Utah.  

This is the fourth year of the Location & Beyond Summit, which will be taking place at the St. Regis Hotel in San Fransisco on October 4. According to the summit’s site, the Most Innovative Location Device category is “open to entries that can clearly demonstrate new ways their application has changed or have had a major effect upon people and markets using unique location capabilities.”

Overall, it looks like a fairly interesting device, but the only way it could be successful is if GPX targets more people than those who have parents with Alzheimer’s. Maybe they should market towards the over-controlling parent crowd who can spy on their children by getting them to wear the shoes.  

The finalists have been announced for the annual James Dyson Award, which honors the best inventions coming from the next generation of engineers. It’s kind of like that movie Revenge of the Nerds, but it has a £10,000 prize.

The Copenhagen Wheel is of the cooler finalists. Despite its name, it was created by a team at MIT’s SENSEable City Lab, which aims to use technology to foster modern, sustainable cities. The awards will be announced in early October, but as biker, geek, city-dweller, and American, I’m pulling for The Copenhagen Wheel.

The Wheel does a few different cool things. First, the Wheel is a sleek accessory that instantly turns a boring conventional bike into a hybrid electric power bike from the year 3000! The tech works much like a standard hybrid car does, by storing energy from breaking and pedaling which bicyclists can later use to climb hilly terrains with a built-in engine. 

Second, the Wheel does can sync with your smart phone to link in social media network built around biking. The Wheel includes location and environmental sensors that can be used to plot bike routes, achieve exercise goals, or share data with other linked-in bikers (traffic, pollution, road conditions, etc.)

The Copenhagen Wheel is a clean green technology that could end up bringing a lot more
urban-dwelling bikers into the fold. The Wheel is currently in production by Ducati Energia of Italy and will be available next year for $600 per wheel.

Video describing the whole shebang after the jump.

Features are important, but accessories are uber-important when smartphone shopping. Samsung Galaxy X owners: the accessories are here.

The desktop and vehicle dock (shown above) mounts the phone for easy viewing and access. With the phone in the desktop dock, you can watch videos, listen to music, and use it as a speakerphone for conference calls. The vehicle dock mounts to either the windshield or the dashboard to display GPS instructions, latest traffic alerts, and location-based information. Internet search is available using Google Search by voice. The dock also contains a microUSB connection to keep the Galaxy X charged.

There is also a DNLA compliant TV adapter that will allow the smartphone to stream directly to your HDTV. Supporting a wide range of video, music and image formats, the adapter supports resolutions up to 1280×720 and a frame rate of 30fps. It also has a microSDHC slot and WiFi (b/g/n) with WEP encryption,

All this is nice, but what smartphone owners love are their bumpers and protective products. Samsung will offer protective cases in a variety of colors, patterns, and fabrics. Screen protectors include anti-scratch, mirror, and privacy screens.

An extended battery, a carrying case, and extra charger (for your office or keep in your bag) are also available.

The desk dock is priced at $39.99 and the battery charger is $49.99.The screens and gel cases are $29.99. Everything is available through Samsung online.

The bottom has fallen out of the GPS car-navigation market, which might explain why we’re seeing some innovative handheld options from Magellan. Last week it introduced the iPhone ToughCase, to protect your phone and enhance your GPS reception. Now it’s presenting three new models in its eXplorist line of outdoor handheld GPS devices. The eXplorist 510, 610, and 710 are meant for navigating outdoor destinations, capturing geotagged photos, and sharing your experiences online when you get home.

Each device offers a 3-inch color touch screen, a 3.2 megapixal camera, and a mic and speaker for voice notes. The 710 ($549.99) is meant for either the trail or the road, as it includes maps for both hiking and driving. The 610 lists for $449.99 and the 510 for $349.99. They’ll be available in the fourth quarter of 2010.

A new nuvi is coming down the highway, and it means business. Navigational business. It’s the Garmin nuvi 1695, a connected GPS device that offers Bluetooth and GSM, much like the 1690 before it. In fact, it’s not entirely clear what makes this different from the last year’s 1690, but GPSTracklog speculates this will offer Garmin’s traffic trends feature also found in the 3700, augmented by real-time updates from every other 1695 user similarly stuck in traffic. Seems like a good guess to us, but we’re of course more curious about how much the thing will cost — $500 for the 1690 when it was new was a bit of a bitter pill to swallow.

Garmin connected nuvi 1695 takes an immediate left turn out of FCC HQ originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 07 Jul 2010 08:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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