Hasta La Gadget!

While it’s always fun to buy things, it’s not always fun that you have to deplete your funds to make it so. These new wallets serve as a not-so-subtle reminder to think about how you’re spending your precious cash every time you open them up.

Each of the Sonic Wallets offer a variety of unique sound effects to accompany the imagery on its outside. For instance, the Edvard Munch-inspired “The Scream” wallet lets out a horrible variety of blood-curdling screams whenever you open it to take out your cash or credit cards:

There are a total of eight designs available, including an American flag, baseball, Buddha, drum machine, Jesus, Moolah the Cow, and my personal favorite, the Shakespearean insult wallet:

Though I’m not sure if the wallet is tossing barbs like “You are a tedious fool” and “Out of my sight, though dost infect my eyes!” at the snot-nosed punk cashier or at the owner of the wallet.

Each wallet is made from durable Dupont Tyvek, and sells for $19.95(USD). Check out all of the different designs and sounds over at Gadgets & Gear.

Sure, these could get annoying after a while, but maybe that’ll teach you to spend less money – or the battery will eventually die (after a few thousand uses.)

Taking a page from the ninja playbook, researchers at the CSIRO Autonomous Systems Laboratory in Brisbane, Australia have developed a robot that’s able to listen for noises and use the distraction to mask the sound of its own movements as it creeps up on a target. More »

Personally, I prefer speakers that are heard and not seen, but if you’re from the opposite school of thought – and you have deep pockets – you might want some of these ginormous glass speakers for your media room.

Let’s get this out of the way first – Perfect8′s Point MKII Evolution Speaker System retails for $115,000(USD). Yep, that’s a condo or a small house in some cities. But at PERFECT8 technologies, it buys you a pair of speakers and subwoofers.

The Point MKII Evolution speaker system comes packaged in a a thick glass enclosure, carefully engineered to eliminate any rattle or unwanted noise. Highs are powered by a air-motion transformer with powerful neodymium magnets, while the midrange is provided by a pair of 7″ Mg-Cones, and the low range is powered by a pair of long-stroke 10″ subwoofers with 22 pound magnets, located in the base of the cabinet. Frequency response for the system is rated at 16Hz to 26KHz, with a THD of less than 0.2% at 96dB SPL. Maximum long-term power output for the speakers is 200 watts, with a peak handling capacity of 1000 watts.

While I have no doubt that these sound incredible, if you just like them because they’re transparent, then you might want to just go for People People’s Transparent Speaker, which you can get for as little as $360(USD) – and you can still put your kids through college.

[via Home Crux via Design You Trust]

I just bought myself a bunch of those cool Philips Hue wireless lightbulbs, so I can now see the appeal of adding colored lights to a room to set the mood. But if you’re looking for more of a disco feeling rather than just solid colors, you might want to check out this new Bluetooth speaker coming from dreamGEAR.

While it borrows its name from a dated old iPod nano dock, the upcoming i.Sound Glow Sound Bluetooth Speaker is a horse of several different colors. For starters, it’s a wireless audio speaker that works with smartphones, tablets and MP3 players. It can be connected via Bluetooth or a 3.5mm audio jack and music plays through its pair of full-range speakers. But what really sets it apart are the six glowing LED orbs on its face which can be set to automatically change color to go with your tunes. You’ll also be able to set the orbs to cycle through pre-programmed color patterns if you’d prefer.

Pricing and a release date for the i.Sound Glow Sound Bluetooth Speaker haven’t been announced yet, but dreamGEAR will likely be showing it at CES from January 8 to 11, 2013.

There are plenty of Bluetooth speakers available these days, and here’s another one you might want to check out if you still haven’t found one you like. This latest one was designed in France, and is called the Lowdi.

The minimally-styled Lowdi is a Bluetooth 4.0 mobile speaker, with 3 watts of power. It can produce sound up to 80 dB measured at 0.5m, which isn’t bad. You can recharge the device via USB and its autonomy is 8 hours. Like other speakers, the 3.5mm input allows you to plug in other audio sources which don’t support Bluetooth. The Lowdi also has a mic so it can receive phone calls as well. Another nice touch is the rubber bumper around the exterior of the case, which resists scratches.

The Lowdi Bluetooth speaker sells for for €99 (~$132 USD), including a carrying pouch, USB charging cable and 3.5mm audio cable.

[via Geek & Hype]