Hasta La Gadget!

The XShot is yet another iPhone tripod-mount, but it is also one you might actually take with you. A hard shell case covers the sides and back of the phone, and can be left in place if you’re the case-toting type. In fact, apart from a chubby little growth on the lower left side, there’s not much to distinguish the XShot from any other case.

But there’s a trick! The tripod screw is contained in a separate widget, and this clips into either the bottom or the side of the case when needed, hence that unsightly hump.

It’s actually a great idea, and would pair up nicely with a small Gorillapod – it’s kind of silly to carry a full-sized tripod just for your phone after all. And if you don’t have a Gorillapod, you can use the included flexible tripod that comes included with the XShot. And then you should do buy a Gorillapod.

The XShot will be available later this month, for a reasonable $25.

XShot product page [XShot. Thanks, Alex!]

See Also:

• Fong iPhone 4 Tripod Adapter as Ugly as it is Practical
• The Glif iPhone 4 Tripod Mount Does Much Much More
• At Last, An iPhone Tripod Adapter
• Gorillacam, A Tripod Application for iPhone
• XShot: A Rather Painful-Looking iPhone Tripod Case

Somehow, Griffin has managed to take a laundry-list of dork-tastic follies and combine them into a single product that actually looks quite good. It’s called the Slap, and it turns your iPod Nano into a watch.

The Slap is a version of those old slap bracelets that are still used to make reflective cuffs for cyclists. Inside is a strip of memory-metal that you can straighten out, but that instantly circles your arm and grips it when you slap it against your wrist.

This strip is encased in brightly-colored silicone, recalling the poor fashion choices we made in the 1980s.

Finally, it copies the already unoriginal idea of turning the clock-faced Nano into a wristwatch.

And I can’t help but love it. Until you try wearing the new Nano on your wrist, don’t laugh. It’s a surprisingly practical place to put it, even if snaking the headphone cable up your sleeve out through your collar is a little fiddly. I have carried the Nano this way, both on my existing watch-strap and (nerd-alert) on a Honl Speed Strap Velcroed around my arm.

Griffin’s Slap has a semi-enclosed capsule for the iPod, with a single hole for the headphones to enter. The volume and sleep/wake buttons are covered, but have raised nodules over them to help you click through. The touch-screen is of course always exposed.

The Slap will be available soon, and comes in a double-rainbow of eye-searingly bright colors. For the boring Henry Fords out there, it also comes in black. $25.

Slap product page [Griffin]

See Also:

• Nano watch – Wired News
• Inevitable Strap Turns iPod Nano into a Watch
• How to Turn the iPod Nano Into a Wristwatch
• Watches

After a long teaser campaign which I managed to steadfastly ignore, Marshall (yes, that Marshall) has announced two self-hyped pairs of headphones. Named the Major and Minor, they come as over-the-head cans and in-ear buds. Both look very nice.

And that’s no accident. Given that the product pages for both sets of headphones begin their slideshows with several pictures of the packaging, and then linger on the details (the same vinyls used in the famous amps is used for the headband, for example), it’s clear that these headphones are all about branding.

The Majors look a lot like the retro-tastic Panasonic RP-HTX7s, only squarer and blacker. They fold up into themselves for easy off-head transport, and come with a one-meter (just over three-feet) extension cord. And, of course, they come in a nice box.

The Minors are equally lovely to look at, with gold accents and a nice, tough-looking corded cable, and they also come with an inline remote and mic for use with phones. They also have an “air-click” gimmick on the buds, an extra piece of plastic (you choose the right size) which apparently locks the ‘buds into your ears.

As for price, the Majors are $100, the Minors $60 (and already sold-out). Whether these live up to the reputation of the legendary guitar amps, or whether they’re just a cynical brand cash-in along the lines of the Commodore PC or some horrible $50,000 ostrich-skin and diamond Leica will be revealed only by testing. If all you care about is looks, and are happy to take a chance on sound, then these are a pretty cheap fashion accessory.

Marshall Major and Minor product page [Marshall Headphones]

See Also:

• Awareness App Pipes Outside Sounds to Your Headphones
• Koss Celebrates With PortaPro 25th Anniversary Edition Headphones …
• Home-Made Coconut Headphones

We love a good concept design, but there’s a thin line between inventing something useful and veering off into a crazy fantasy-land of what-ifs. This admittedly cool file-transfer tool is firmly in the second category, and clearly the designers took not a second of their time to figure out how it might actually work.

The device is the iDrop, a stylus which you use like a pipette. Touch the end to text, an image or even an app on your tablet’s screen and then press the end of the pen to “suck” the information into the pen. Once stored, it shows up – magically, it would seem – as an icon in a column of other stored snippets, just as if it were liquid.

To paste the file back again, you just reverse the process. The fanciful CAD mockups even show a pool of liquid atop the tablet’s screen, possibly the most ridiculous part of all.

I don’t mean to belittle the idea: Apart from the fact that it uses an old-school stylus, it seems to very useful. But there is no hint as to the effort needed to implement the idea, the programming, the method of transfer, the, well, everything. It reminds me of the “designs” me and my friends used to draw in school when we were little kids: cars that turned into helicopters, plans for underground road systems, and more. I always thought, later, that these were mere childish fantasies. It turns out that they were something more. They were “concept designs”.

iDrop Information, Simple! [Yanko]

See Also:

• Who Wants a Stylus? Apple Is Thinking About It
• Designers Unearth Apple Tablet Prototypes — From 1983
• Gallery: Tablet Computing From 1888 to 2010

I promise I’ll stop writing about iPad keyboard cases soon, but today’s second installment comes from ThinkGeek, in the form of a luxurious leather folio case, packed with little chiclets to help you type.

Unlike the ZAGGmate profiled earlier today, the ThinkGeek case is designed to continuously swaddle the iPad, not to be removed. It holds the tablet by its edges, covering the bezel with a leather rectangle whilst still allowing access to all the buttons and ports.

But that’s not why you’re here. The keyboard part of the case is hidden under a flap which doubles as a wrist-rest when unfolded, and the connection is, as ever, via Bluetooth (li-ion battery life 90-hours ). All the media keys are here, including the ones the Apple Bluetooth keyboard doesn’t have: home and slideshow. Ever since putting iOS 4.2 on my iPad, I have been worrying about all those extra double-clicks I’m racking up on the home-button. Putting this on the keyboard is smart: when you’re typing, you’re also likely to be doing a lot of app-switching.

When not tapping away, you can use the case like any other folio-case, folding the keyboard-containing front-cover around the back, or just letting everything close up and stick shut with the magnetic clip.

For a circuitry-toting, leather folio, the ThinkGeek case is pretty cheap, at just $60. Available now.

IPad Bluetooth Keyboard Case [ThinkGeek. Thanks, Jessica!]

See Also:

• ClamCase Turns iPad into Laptop
• Leather Case Turns iPad into Netbook
• IPhone Case Adds Vestigial QWERTY-Slider Keyboard
• Protective Keyboard Case Joined By Trackpad Cover