Hasta La Gadget!

For the last couple of weeks, I’ve had the privilege of having my hands on one of the coolest looking Bluetooth speakers ever made, the Marshall Stanmore. But just because this speaker looks like a Marshall amp, does it sound good too? Well, the answer is a resounding “yes.”

For starters, the Stanmore just looks awesome, aping its bigger brethren, the iconic Marshall amplifiers used by musicians around the world. That in and of itself makes the Stanmore a speaker you want to show off – a real conversation piece. But ultimately, a speaker’s worth is judged by its sound, and the Stanmore doesn’t disappoint.

Inside of the substantial 11 pound enclosure are a pair of 3/4″ dome tweeters and a 5-1/4″ woofer, which are driven by 80 watts of amplification. This combination produces more than enough volume to fill a large room. In fact, I placed the Stanmore in the middle of my first floor – about a 1000 sq. ft. space – and I was able to enjoy my tunes throughout the entire floor.

I threw a wide variety of musical genres at the Stanmore, from electronic to jazz to classical to rap, and it handled them all with aplomb. With volume cranked to a 100%, there’s no perceptible distortion, though it’s unlikely you’ll need to drive the Stanmore at such ear-splitting levels. Thankfully, the speaker also produces clean, well-separated sound at low volume levels too. I was also very pleasantly surprised at the width of the soundstage that came out of its 13.7-inch-wide enclosure. A bass port on the rear helps keep the low end tight and thumpy, but never overbearing. For extended low end boom, you can place the rear of the speaker against a wall.

In addition to offering up tremendous sound, the Stanmore includes some features seldom found on Bluetooth speakers, including bass and treble controls, and multiple auxiliary inputs. In addition to RCA and 3.5mm analog inputs, you get a digital optical input as well, which makes the Stanmore a possible choice for living room use with media players and cable boxes. Keep in mind that the optical input only works when the output is set to PCM stereo.

The only I did encounter was the speaker’s relatively limited Bluetooth range. When using my iPhone 5 as a source, Bluetooth signals started to drop out around 20 feet from the speaker. This isn’t dramatically worse than other Bluetooth speakers I’ve used, but it’s not the best either. That said, if you leave your smartphone sitting near the speaker, it’s brilliant, but don’t expect to walk far away with your audio source in your pocket. I’d love it if Marshall had included Wi-Fi/AirPlay capability, but alas they didn’t.

Overall, the Marshall Stanmore rocks. It pushes out an impressive amount of crystal clear sound from a small enclosure that will fit neatly onto your bookshelf or table. Priced at $400(USD), it’s not a low-end speaker by any means, but you get what you pay for.

Laptops get thinner and lighter every year, but their power adapters are mostly still big and heavy. FINsix claims its Dart laptop charger is up to four times smaller and up to six times lighter compared to ordinary chargers.

Dart uses what FINsix calls Very High Frequency technology to provide up to 65W of power. You can read more about it on FINsix’ technical report (pdf), though the word “technical” isn’t there for nothing. Note that 65W won’t be enough for all laptops – for example, Retina MacBook Pros use an 85W power adapter – but that will do for hundreds of other models. You can check this compatibility list (pdf) to see if your laptop will work with Dart. Dart also has a 2.1A USB charging port, so it can also replace your mobile device power adapter.

Plug a tiny browser to Kickstarter to support Dart. Pledge at least $89 (USD) to get a Dart that works with hundreds of Windows laptops. The MacBook-compatible Dart is at a higher reward tier – $148. FINsix says that they have to buy Apple’s power adapters to get parts for the Macbook-compatible Dart, hence the significant added cost for that model.

[via Engadget]

NASA has announced that it is set to send the OPALS – or Optical Payload for Lasercomm Science – device to the ISS. What that means is that NASA is sending a laser up to the ISS that can be used to send messages including HD video back to the Earth with more bandwidth and speed than conventional methods. This is a big deal since the amount of data being sent back to Earth is growing constantly.

The OPALS device will be able to send data, including video, to Earth in the form of laser transmissions and is likened to upgrading from dial-up to cable at your home. The conventional method used to send data back from the ISS has about 200 to 400 Kbps of bandwidth. The lasercom device will be able to provide up to 50 Mbps of speed.

NASA says that in the future a similar deep space laser device will be able to support transmissions from Mars at up to 1 Gbps. The laser will head to the ISS this week aboard the SpaceX Dragon resupply cargo ship – assuming that the rocket overcomes its current launch delay.

There are plenty of wireless boombox solutions out there, but not all of them deliver great sound. I’ve heard some pretty lame sounds coming of the more affordable speakers, but if you’re looking for a wireless solution for your home, you might want to check out these new speakers from Microlab.

The Microlab FC60BT speakers offer Bluetooth/NFC connectivity and have a subwoofer, as well as two stereo satellite speakers, which sit on clear stands instead of box enclosures, which the company claims will reduce harmonic distortions. The system provides a total of 105 Watts of power and comes with an RF remote control, which works from any place in your room.

The FC60BT doesn’t come cheap though, as it’s retail price is $449(USD). The system will ship starting this May.

When I was growing up, one of my favorite toys was the good old Lite Brite. I’m guessing that it was an indication that I would later find myself hopelessly addicted to pixel art. Now, technologists are working on tiny robots which can create Lite Brite style art all on their own.

Created by Disney Research and the Autonomous Systems Lab, ETH Zurich, PixelBots are round, palm-sized robots which have a LEDs inside of them, and a drive mechanism on their bottoms. An overhead camera tracks the positions of each robot and a computer controls each robot remotely. They’re designed to be able to swarm together to create rudimentary images composed of dots.

Currently, the robots can replicate images drawn on a tablet, and the can also change between images using gesture controls. They can also automatically recover their position if a user picks one up and moves it out of place.

One other neat thing is that their wheels are actually magnetic, so they could not only be used on tabletops, but they could stick to whiteboards too. While I’m not sure there are too many practical application for PixelBots, they sure look like fun, and I’d certainly love to have a fleet of them at my command.

You can read more about how PixelBots work in the research paper Image and Animation Display with Multiple Mobile Robots.