Hasta La Gadget!

Mad Catz’s Airdrives sit outside your canal and let ambient sound in

This next sentence is going to drive some of you crazy: bike friendly headphones. But before you scroll past the rest of this post and start writing angry comments about road safety and how listening to music means cyclists deserve to die (whilst forgetting that you regularly balance a hot cup of Starbucks on your paunch while texting and driving), read a little longer.

The Airdrives are from Mad Catz, and they don’t block your ears at all. Unlike earbuds or over-ear designs, the Airdrives sit on that little cartilaginous nodule at the front of your ear-hole. The speaker is held there by the cord, which hooks over your ear and cinches tight. This also helps keep them in place, which is essential when doing sporting activities.

Because the sound is sent in from the outside, it’s no different from listening to the radio in your car. You can still hear ambient sounds, and identify the direction they come from. The design also combats listening fatigue, letting your ear shape and process the sound from the ‘buds as it would any other external sound.

I’m interested to try these out. Too-loud music will of course still be too loud, and drivers will still hate you for wearing them, but for podcasts they may just be ideal. The Airdrives also have inline controls and will answer your compatible phone. This last is probably a terrible idea, though. It’s one thing distracting yourself with a phone-call when you’re in a two-ton cage and can only kill others. When you’re on a bike, you can only kill yourself.

Still want to write a nasty comment? Go ahead. Just don’t say I deserve to die because I don’t use the same environmentally destructive form of transport as you do. From $15. Pictured model $50.

Airdrives product page [Mad Catz via London Cyclist]

Airdrives on Amazon [Amazon]

See Also:

• Budfits Keep Earbuds Where You Want Them
• Headphone Hat For Stealth Listening
• Awareness App Pipes Outside Sounds to Your Headphones
• Tunebug Turns Your Bike Helmet into a Speaker
• Bike Speakers Rock Your Commute
• Wireless Bike Speaker Beams Tunes From iPod To Handlebars
• Podio Bike Speakers Turn Cycling into “Enjoyable Melodious Tour …

Normincies’ laptop bag looks great, and packs some clever features

I’m sorry. I’m about to write about yet another bag, but you’ll love this one. I promise. Not only is it hot-looking, it has some very clever design details. Also, it’s from Finland, which somehow makes it seem even better.

The laptop bag comes from a company named Normincies, and is available in either nylon or Alcantara, a suede-like artificial fabric, and comes sized for 15 or 13 inch laptops. All models have plenty of pockets and storage inside, but its what’s on the outside that makes these bags so different. They have a fat aluminum strip running around the outside, and the bag is strung inside this handle, offering rigidity and protection.

That’s neat enough, but take a look at how the shoulder-strap joins the bag. Those odd-looking slots and holes at either side are in fact anchor points for the strap, a strip of webbing which terminates in two metal torpedoes that hook into these holes.

The only problem is the same one you get with almost any laptop bag: weight. At 4.6 to 5.1 pounds (depending on size) these bags may weight more than the computer you’re putting into them.

Normincies aluminum laptop bags [Normincies]

See Also:

• Classic Finnish Casserole Still Amazing today
• Helsinki Hovercraft Runs On The Sun From Start to Finnish …
• Finnish population structure won't persist much longer
• Laptop Bag Transforms into Desk and Chair

Speck’s CandyShell Card protects your iPhone and stores your credit cards

The iPhone 5 may or may not have a near-field communication chip with which to make cashless payments, but why wait to find out anyway? You can add cashless payments to your iPhone 4 today, with Speck’s new CandyShell Card case. It has no high-tech electronics — just a slot which will carry your credit cards.

The hard case covers everything except the screen, and round back there is a rubberized slot which can hold up to three cards. These slide in through an opening in one edge, and at the other side there is a cut-out that lets you push cards out with your thumb.

It’s simple, and it lets you leave your wallet at home. It will also let you sample that feeling of terrified helplessness you get when you lose not just your phone, but all of your money and ID too. Get used to it. If NFC payments take off, losing you phone will be a whole lot more inconvenient than just losing the ability to make calls. $40.

CandyShell Card for iPhone [Speck. Thanks, Edith!]

See Also:

• Apple Adding NFC Contact-Less Payment to iPhone 5, Consultants …
• Will the iPhone Become Your iWallet?
• Visa Case Turns iPhone into Credit Card
• Swipe Credit Cards With Your iPhone

The Tarsier case magnifies the iPhone’s high-res screen up to almost six-inches

Nulogia’s Tarsier 2.0 screen is — at first glance — a rather inelegant hack for the iPhone. But on closer inspection (pun intended) it could be a very useful accessory, especially for those with poor eyesight.

The Tarsier is descibed by its maker, Stergios Stergiou, as “yet another bumper for the iPhone 4 but with an interesting twist.” That twist is a flat lens which is held above the iPhone’s screen by four 3-D printed legs. Thus suspended, the screen is magnified to appear almost six inches on the diagonal, making it almost as large as the screen of Samsung’s Galaxy Tab. Stergios calls it a “a pocketable Kindle but with a higher resolution and in color,” which strikes me as a great description.

You’re not going to want to keep this attached all the time, of course, but for extended reading it would be ideal. But keep the iPhone in the supplied bumper case and toss the lens and stand into a bag and you have a very portable — and readable — ebook setup.

The Tarsier 2.0 is available now from the Shapeways store, and will cost you a reasonable $25, or $4 less than Apple’s non-lens bumper case.

Tarsier 2.0 for iPhone 4 [Shapeways. Thanks, Stergios!]

See Also:

• Large-Screen Kindle Won't Mean Squat if Apple Tablet Arrives …
• IPad
• Magnetic Lenses Snap-on to Your Cellphone
• 3D Lenticular Greetings Cards: Great Idea, Terrible Taste

From left to right, the women’s Hex strap comes in very dark pink, light pink, dark pink and pink

Pop quiz: What’s the difference between a man’s and a woman’s watch? If your answer involves styling differences, or watch-faces designed to easier fit the typically smaller female wrist, then don’t even bother opening your mouth to tell us.

The difference is that a girl’s watch has a thin strap, and it’s pink.

That’s the difference according to Hex, at least, which has fulfilled an imaginary demand for a women’s version of its iPod Nano-holding wrist-strap. Available in pink, dark pink (purple), light pink (white) and really-dark-pink (black), the all-pink silicone lineup has the exact same size pop-in pop-out square case to hold the tiny touch-screen iPod as does the bigger man-size strap.

Have any of you tried to use a Nano as a watch? I have, and it’s terrible. Like those old 1970s LED digital watches, it requires that you press a button to read the time, defeating the point of having a glanceable clock on your wrist. The wrist-mounted position is fantastic if you you use it as an iPod, though. Just remember to thread the headphone cable up your sleeve or it will annoy the hell out of you.

The rubber Hex strap-on comes in pink (did I mention that?) and costs a rather humorous $30. Available now.

Hex strap product page [Shop Hex. Thanks, Valerie!]

See Also:

• HEX iPod Nano Watch-Band with Nike+ Cut-Out
• Inevitable Strap Turns iPod Nano into a Watch
• How to Turn the iPod Nano Into a Wristwatch
• Griffin iPod Nano Strap is a Colorful 80s Throwback