Hasta La Gadget!

This is the Miniguru, from Guru Board, and it’s the smartest keyboard we have seen in years. We’re stuck with the keyboard, probably forever, so the Guru Board folks have stripped it to its basics and tried to make it faster and easier to use.

The premise is that you keep your hands in one place, with your fingers always on the home row. To this end, the number pad has been removed, and a nipple has been added just like you’d find on a Thinkpad notebook keyboard, so you can mouse around without a mouse or trackpad. Even the cursor arrows have disappeared, moved to be easier to use.

The Miniguru works like this: two “swirl” keys, on either side of the spacebar, change the mode of the entire keyboard. Pressing one with your thumb, for instance, flips the keys into a navigation mode where the i,j,k and l keys work as cursors, with other oft-used functions close to hand. To free up these thumb-keys, the alt keys have been shifted next to the swirls (in the same place as they are on a Mac keyboard) and the ctrl key has been shifted to replace the useless, almost universally hated Caps Lock key.

If you’re thinking that you’ll need to learn a new way of typing, you’re right. Mac users especially will have a lot of muscle memory baked into the Command key shortcuts they use every day. To this end, Miniguru has a clever approach to reprogramming the keyboard layout. Any changes made using the configuration software (and you can change pretty much everything) are saved to the keyboard’s own firmware. This means that whatever computer you plug it into, it will act just as you set it to.

This keyboard-for-life philosophy continues to the construction. When it is available (in the last quarter of this year), it’ll have proper mechanical keys. The keycaps will come in a choice of “clicky, tactile or linear” responses. You can also customize the colors of the caps, the tray and the nipple, along with a choice of vertical or horizontal “return” key.

How much will it be? We don’t know. The price will be announced when the product is ready to ship. As someone who already has too many keyboards at home, I can’t wait.

Miniguru Product page [Guru Board via the Giz]

See Also:

• Just My Type: Hands-On With the Das Keyboard III
• A Tale Of Two Keyboards: Apple Extended Keyboard II Vs IBM Model M …

Quirky is the company that designs gadgets by committee, only the committee consists of everyone on the internet. It specializes in simple, neat and usually stylish solutions to small problems, like the iPod Nano kick-stand or the iPhone Beamer case with a built-in LED lamp. Now Quirky has turned its community-sourced focus on another tech annoyance: USB cables.

If you own a computer (and I’m guessing you do, unless you have a generous friend who prints Gadget Lab out for you daily), then you are fully aware of the problem of USB cables. They tangle and twist, knotting together into a serpentine convolution of wire and plastic. Worse, you never know which is which, and you end up tracing the wire back from the peripheral you want before you can plug it in.

Cable Caps fixes both these problems with characteristic elegance, although without the usual Quirky style. Annoying (”cute”) characters anthropomorphize the usual devices like printers, cameras and, erm, eggs. You slip in the corresponding cable to allow easy identification, and the trailing “tail” of the caricature is a rubber band that can secure a bundled wire.

Like all Quirky products, there is a minimum number of orders required before the production lines are fired up. You can pre-order them for $8 per set of three.

Cable Caps [Quirky. Thanks, Tiffany!]

See Also:

• Kickster Adds Stand, Handle and Case to iPod Nano
• Beamer Makes a Case for Flash on the iPhone
• Cute Fold-Up Tripod is Also Rather Tacky
• Powercurl Cord-Winder Makes Magsafe Heatsafe

LAS VEGAS –Remember Fitibt, the cute fitness tracker for adults that logs your every move? Now seniors have their own version of the device. Wellcore is a monitoring system that offers automatic fall detection, a web site where you can input data to track your activity and rest patterns and send text alerts.

But it is not being pitched as just another fitness tracker. Instead Wellcore executives are playing up the device’s emergency alert system. Wellcore has motion detection and pattern recognition so if the wearer stumbles or falls, it can automatically send an emergency service, a caregiver or a family member an alert.

“Traditional personal response systems require users to push a button to activate it,” says Vijay Nadkarni, CEO of Wellcore. “They have also been marketed in a way that makes it embarrassing for many to buy it. We are combining the idea of fitness and an emergency response system.”

Monitoring your lifestyle through data and data analysis is becoming increasingly popular. New devices such as the Fitbit and the DirectLife from Philips are trying to automate self-tracking. Wellcore tap into that idea but adds a feature that should get the attention of seniors.

The Wellcore system, designed by Hartmut Esslinger, founder of industrial design firm, Frog Design, has two parts. It has a base unit that acts as a charger and a clip that can be hooked on to your belt or pants. The waterproof hardware costs $200 (every additional belt clip costs $100) and the emergency monitoring service will set you back by $50 a month. The system will be available for pre-orders starting February 18 through the company’s website.

Wellcore also includes features such as an automatic reminder sent through the device’s base unit asking to be worn. If the sensor is left unworn for an extended period of time, an email message is sent to a designated caregiver or family member, so it’s a good way to remind mom or dad to use it.

The password-protected online dashboard measures the numbers of steps taken everyday and charts patterns from the data offering activity graphs that indicate if its average or above average for the user. Users can also check their daily, monthly, or 90 day progress.

While the other fitness trackers can do more, they also aren’t designed for senior users. Wellcore attempts to bring the same idea to an older group by throwing in a few services that will sweeten the idea for them.

See Also:

• Review: Fitbit Fitness and Sleep Tracker
• Entrepreneurs Find Gold in Gadget Startups
• Know Thyself: Tracking Every Facet of Life, from Sleep to Mood

Photo: Wellcore system

This USB hub has 24 ports. Who could possibly use such a thing? I regularly have to re-jig my USB setup to fit in everything I use (not to mention the gear I test) and I can’t ever see myself needing almost a quarter-century of sockets.

We suppose it could be good for those who need to write a whole lot of thumb-drives at once, although there are purpose built devices for that which don’t make your peripherals radiate from the center like some demented electronic sunburst. The Super USB 24-Port Hub will set you back $70, and comes (of course) with a power adapter.

I have another concern about having so may gadgets hooked up to just one port on your computer. Unlike FireWire, USB communication is controlled by your computer and not the peripheral itself. Wouldn’t having 24 gizmos running concurrently drain the resources of even a powerful modern machine?

Super USB 24-Port Hub [USB Fever]

Pedal Brain is a kind of Nike+ for cyclists, an iPhone accessory and application that, despite looking quite excellent, could possibly nickel and dime itself out of existence.

Pedal brain comes in three parts: a handlebar-mounted iPhone (or iPod Touch) case (called the Pedal Brain Synapse), an iPhone application and a web-app. The case (plastic initially, with a carbon-fiber version to follow) communicates with your bike monitoring devices using the ANT+ wireless protocol, a standard utilized by power-meters, heart-rate monitors and speed and cadence sensors. This is the first deviation from the successful Nike+ model, which comes with its own sensor.

This requirement for expensive accessories might explain the price of the unit, which will go for between $130 and $200, and more for the carbon fiber case. This is in addition to a (undecided) monthly fee you’ll have to pay if you want to keep your data for more than a week. It’s true that amateur cyclists like to waste money on their hobby, especially on training kit they don’t need, so this could be a hit. And let’s face it, nobody will buy the plastic version. Anyone who has a power-meter will already be a carbon freak.

The app pulls together all of the information available and collates it into pretty graphs, which are shared in real-time with the web (iPhone-only) as they are recorded. An interesting twist is the coaching function, which lets cycling trainers submit coaching plans to which riders can subscribe. The prices of these are determined by the coach, and Pedal Brain adds $4-a-month on top.

The whole kit-n-caboodle should be available in March, ready for wussy, winter-shy cyclists.

Pedal Brain site [Pedal Brain via the Giz]

See Also:

• Knog Nerd
• Hands-On With the Sigma Wireless Bike Computer
• Five iPhone Apps That Replace Bike Hardware
• Cerevellum Bike Computer Concept