May 26, 2015 at 20:49Gadgets for geeks: an electric drive for a skateboard and a computer with a matchbox
There are things that define an era. Beacons of time.
This is not always something truly epochal or ingenious - no, often these are completely ordinary things, but - things without which the appearance of a decade would be completely different.
What will we recall over the years, looking back at the mid-2010s?
1. Glasses of augmented reality
After the failure of Google Glass, which allows one glimpse into the new, bright and convenient world of augmented reality, after many years of PR company Oculus Rift and similar devices that theoretically give new opportunities to immerse yourself in virtuality, but never left the stage promotion, both topics seem already rather orderly and uninteresting. Only at first glance.
There is a class of devices that combines the positive aspects of both of these ideas: a high-quality stereoscopic picture of VR helmets and the integration of Google Glass with the real world. But, not without their negative traits - batteries, for example, do not live in such things for a long time.
Such a device should be compact, have some energy autonomy and allow the user to see the surrounding space, and not just the transmitted image.
Drawing a parallel with the world of fiction, such a thing resembles an intelligent interface in a suit of Tony Stark or a helmet of a space paratrooper, where navigation, reference information and other useful things were projected directly onto the visor. It would be nice to get something similar in a civilian and more compact version.
A striking example of such a device is EPSON Moverio BT-200.
Now such a device is burdened with a “tail” of a wire connected to the battery and control unit, and a heavy price of 55,000 rubles.
You can be sure that after a while the convenience of such gadgets will increase and the price will drop. How soon is hard to say now.
The release of more analogues by different manufacturers should solve this problem.
2. CHIP
The world's first computer for $ 9, according to its creators, a promising invention with kickstarter.com
With the dimensions of a matchbox, this tiny computer has a speed of one gigahertz, half a gigabyte of RAM and 4 gig of flash memory, can connect to any equipment via Wi-Fi and Bluetooth and connect to any monitor with a wire.
It might not seem that its capacities are impressive, but considering its compactness and cheapness, it becomes clear that this is a very interesting device: watching videos, working with documents, surfing the Internet and the ability to integrate the Chip into other devices is what makes it interesting for anyone amateur engineer.
In addition to the gadget itself, on the kickstarter, you can buy “clothes” for it - Pocket CHIP - a case with a battery, a color screen and a keyboard that resembles a qwerty-phone form factor. The thing is nice, but not necessary - the device is self-sufficient as it is.
3. SWITCHEROO
Everything is simple here. SWITCHEROO is a compact device, comparable in size to an SD card, which is mounted in any electrical appliance and allows you to control it from your smartphone to iOs or Android using a special application via Bluetooth.
Cars, doors, household appliances, etc. - imagine the prospects.
4. Makey Makey Go
Makey Makey Go is a fun toy and an incentive for creative inclinations. This is a keychain made in the form of a standard flash drive, having a USB connector on one side and two contacts on the other - for connecting wires to crocodile terminals with anything.
The device allows you to connect any object to the computer and use it as a sensor, switch, manipulator, shutter button for the camera and so on.
5. PhoneDrone - turn your smartphone into a quadrocopter
PhoneDrone allows you to make a full drone from an Android smartphone or iPhone, able to follow the owner and take pictures in flight.
A special shockproof case with a damper and four carrier motors will launch your phone to heaven. The mirror provided by the design will allow you to shoot not only what is directly below the device, but also what is in front.
Applications written for Android and iOs make it possible to control the device from the second smartphone in real time, watching it with “eyes”, program the flight in advance or pair the gadget to the host via Bluetooth.
6. Telepresence Robot - Feel like Sheldon Cooper.
Various manufacturers are now creating and promoting avatar robots that can be sent somewhere in their place. Such an assembly will transmit a picture and sound to your home computer or a special terminal, and to people around it can demonstrate your presence - with your voice and image on the built-in screen.
Usually, such gadgets are also equipped with a chassis for independent movement, which greatly simplifies their delivery to the desired location.
7. nexpaq - the first modular case for a smartphone.
This is not really a case. Rather, this is not a case at all. This is a smartphone extension platform. This device allows you to connect an additional capacious battery to your phone, or a better camera than the one available in the device itself, or more powerful speakers, or additional communication modules, or more memory, temperature sensors, a laser pointer ...
Or anything else that will be created in the framework of the project. Now 12 different modules are available.
8. MyoWare - 4th Generation Wearable Muscle Sensor Platform
This is a muscle contraction signal reader suitable for controlling prostheses, robots, exoskeletons and anything you want to connect to.
This is one of the few kickstarter projects that causes not just lively interest, but a sincere desire to invest - with every pre-ordered product, the fund for helping children who need a bionic prosthesis also grows.
Although, objectively, this is far from the most advanced thing, even on kickstarter, not to mention special laboratories and medical firms.
9. 3D printers for printing clothes
Electroloom - a promising development of a group of comrades from San Francisco. According to the proposed concept, inside the printer there is a special template that repeats the finished product in shape, and spraying a mixture of synthetics and cotton will form fibers of the material from which the desired garment is formed.
This project is close to implementation.
Unlike the conceptual brainchild of designer Joshua Harris, he proposed creating an apparatus that not only prints a variety of clothes, but also recycles old ones. Such textile 3D printers, as the author himself suggests, can enter the household life of most families no earlier than 2050.
10. Mellow - an electric drive for any skateboard.
Mellow can be easily installed on any skate or longboard, weighs only two and a half kilograms with the battery, provides speeds of up to forty kilometers per hour at a distance of up to fifteen kilometers and does not interfere with riding in the usual manner when the battery is empty - the engines built into the wheels do not give any additional friction.
This technical novelty is fully charged in two hours. It is controlled by a cute wireless remote control with a safety strap with a magnetic lock. Protected from water and dust.
The Mellow installed on the board can be seen only if you are specifically looking for it, because the gadget is compact and invisible on the underside of the board.
If you live close to your place of work, a skateboard with such a device can serve as an environmentally friendly alternative to public transport.
Of course, this is not the entire list of current gadgets, but only 10 of those that seemed interesting to us. Kickstarter's paths are inscrutable - today a computer with a matchbox, and tomorrow with a needle head. Let's see what the future geek future is preparing for us ...
This is not always something truly epochal or ingenious - no, often these are completely ordinary things, but - things without which the appearance of a decade would be completely different.
What will we recall over the years, looking back at the mid-2010s?
1. Glasses of augmented reality
After the failure of Google Glass, which allows one glimpse into the new, bright and convenient world of augmented reality, after many years of PR company Oculus Rift and similar devices that theoretically give new opportunities to immerse yourself in virtuality, but never left the stage promotion, both topics seem already rather orderly and uninteresting. Only at first glance.
There is a class of devices that combines the positive aspects of both of these ideas: a high-quality stereoscopic picture of VR helmets and the integration of Google Glass with the real world. But, not without their negative traits - batteries, for example, do not live in such things for a long time.
Such a device should be compact, have some energy autonomy and allow the user to see the surrounding space, and not just the transmitted image.
Drawing a parallel with the world of fiction, such a thing resembles an intelligent interface in a suit of Tony Stark or a helmet of a space paratrooper, where navigation, reference information and other useful things were projected directly onto the visor. It would be nice to get something similar in a civilian and more compact version.
A striking example of such a device is EPSON Moverio BT-200.
Now such a device is burdened with a “tail” of a wire connected to the battery and control unit, and a heavy price of 55,000 rubles.
You can be sure that after a while the convenience of such gadgets will increase and the price will drop. How soon is hard to say now.
The release of more analogues by different manufacturers should solve this problem.
2. CHIP
The world's first computer for $ 9, according to its creators, a promising invention with kickstarter.com
With the dimensions of a matchbox, this tiny computer has a speed of one gigahertz, half a gigabyte of RAM and 4 gig of flash memory, can connect to any equipment via Wi-Fi and Bluetooth and connect to any monitor with a wire.
It might not seem that its capacities are impressive, but considering its compactness and cheapness, it becomes clear that this is a very interesting device: watching videos, working with documents, surfing the Internet and the ability to integrate the Chip into other devices is what makes it interesting for anyone amateur engineer.
In addition to the gadget itself, on the kickstarter, you can buy “clothes” for it - Pocket CHIP - a case with a battery, a color screen and a keyboard that resembles a qwerty-phone form factor. The thing is nice, but not necessary - the device is self-sufficient as it is.
3. SWITCHEROO
Everything is simple here. SWITCHEROO is a compact device, comparable in size to an SD card, which is mounted in any electrical appliance and allows you to control it from your smartphone to iOs or Android using a special application via Bluetooth.
Cars, doors, household appliances, etc. - imagine the prospects.
4. Makey Makey Go
Makey Makey Go is a fun toy and an incentive for creative inclinations. This is a keychain made in the form of a standard flash drive, having a USB connector on one side and two contacts on the other - for connecting wires to crocodile terminals with anything.
The device allows you to connect any object to the computer and use it as a sensor, switch, manipulator, shutter button for the camera and so on.
5. PhoneDrone - turn your smartphone into a quadrocopter
PhoneDrone allows you to make a full drone from an Android smartphone or iPhone, able to follow the owner and take pictures in flight.
A special shockproof case with a damper and four carrier motors will launch your phone to heaven. The mirror provided by the design will allow you to shoot not only what is directly below the device, but also what is in front.
Applications written for Android and iOs make it possible to control the device from the second smartphone in real time, watching it with “eyes”, program the flight in advance or pair the gadget to the host via Bluetooth.
6. Telepresence Robot - Feel like Sheldon Cooper.
Various manufacturers are now creating and promoting avatar robots that can be sent somewhere in their place. Such an assembly will transmit a picture and sound to your home computer or a special terminal, and to people around it can demonstrate your presence - with your voice and image on the built-in screen.
Usually, such gadgets are also equipped with a chassis for independent movement, which greatly simplifies their delivery to the desired location.
7. nexpaq - the first modular case for a smartphone.
This is not really a case. Rather, this is not a case at all. This is a smartphone extension platform. This device allows you to connect an additional capacious battery to your phone, or a better camera than the one available in the device itself, or more powerful speakers, or additional communication modules, or more memory, temperature sensors, a laser pointer ...
Or anything else that will be created in the framework of the project. Now 12 different modules are available.
8. MyoWare - 4th Generation Wearable Muscle Sensor Platform
This is a muscle contraction signal reader suitable for controlling prostheses, robots, exoskeletons and anything you want to connect to.
This is one of the few kickstarter projects that causes not just lively interest, but a sincere desire to invest - with every pre-ordered product, the fund for helping children who need a bionic prosthesis also grows.
Although, objectively, this is far from the most advanced thing, even on kickstarter, not to mention special laboratories and medical firms.
9. 3D printers for printing clothes
Electroloom - a promising development of a group of comrades from San Francisco. According to the proposed concept, inside the printer there is a special template that repeats the finished product in shape, and spraying a mixture of synthetics and cotton will form fibers of the material from which the desired garment is formed.
This project is close to implementation.
Unlike the conceptual brainchild of designer Joshua Harris, he proposed creating an apparatus that not only prints a variety of clothes, but also recycles old ones. Such textile 3D printers, as the author himself suggests, can enter the household life of most families no earlier than 2050.
10. Mellow - an electric drive for any skateboard.
Mellow can be easily installed on any skate or longboard, weighs only two and a half kilograms with the battery, provides speeds of up to forty kilometers per hour at a distance of up to fifteen kilometers and does not interfere with riding in the usual manner when the battery is empty - the engines built into the wheels do not give any additional friction.
This technical novelty is fully charged in two hours. It is controlled by a cute wireless remote control with a safety strap with a magnetic lock. Protected from water and dust.
The Mellow installed on the board can be seen only if you are specifically looking for it, because the gadget is compact and invisible on the underside of the board.
If you live close to your place of work, a skateboard with such a device can serve as an environmentally friendly alternative to public transport.
Of course, this is not the entire list of current gadgets, but only 10 of those that seemed interesting to us. Kickstarter's paths are inscrutable - today a computer with a matchbox, and tomorrow with a needle head. Let's see what the future geek future is preparing for us ...