Finding the right earbuds can seem as daunting as finding the best match for your next car or pet. After all, you plan to spend a lot of time together and you want to be comfortable with each other.
These buds have all the features that are important to me, starting with clean, crisp sound. In addition to music, I listen to a lot of spoken audio from podcasts and audiobooks and with my hearing level, the middle registers are especially important. I want to hear dialogue and lyrics and not be overwhelmed with heavy bass lines and the iLive buds are right on the money.
I also appreciate that the buds come with a well-designed charging case. When I’m not using them, the buds get their fuel topped off while they’re nestled safely in the case.
But perhaps the most welcome feature for me is Automatic Noise Cancellation. I want my everyday buds to filter out a good bit of traffic sounds when I’m walking my dog and tone down the hum from my weed trimmer and other tools when I’m working in my yard.
I think noise cancelling is a big challenge for any earbuds and I don’t expect them to deliver the filter power of expensive over-the-ear headphones.
But I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the quality of the active noise cancellation I get with the iLive buds. My ears say it’s comparable to the noise cancellation I’ve experienced with buds that cost more than twice as much as these.
The iLive buds were easy to set up and put to work. When fully charged and removed from the charging case, they automatically created a link to each other and went into pairing mode. After a few seconds, the model number popped up as a new Bluetooth partner option on my iPhone.
The short stalk on each bud has a flat surface with a touch-sensitive area at the top. Hold your fingers on that spot for 5 seconds to turn each bud on or off. A 3-second press cycles the bud between normal, transparent and active noise cancellation modes. A friendly voice will announce each stop.
Taps also launch other functions. For example, a single tap will play or pause music or answer or end a phone call. A double on the right bud will skip a track while triple taps adjust the volume.
The buds are also said to be sweat proof for those of us who exercise to that level (me, not so much) and they let you deliver voice commands to personal assistants on Apple or Google devices.
The Truly Wireless Noise Cancelling Earbuds also come with a pretty nice price tag: $69.99 on the iLive website. That’s about half of what some of the big-name brands charge for their buds with the same features.
Health monitoring and tracking devices keep getting smaller and more affordable, A good example is the Movano Ring which made its debut at this year’s International CES.
Moving already makes a ring that collects data on your sleep, heart rate, heart rate variability, and body temperature. A new version will also monitor for health problems such as hypertension, an issue for nearly half of all adults in the US.
The company has applied for FDA clearance. If successful it would become a certified medical device. The ring is expected to arrive in the second half of 2022.
I have two adult children who both thumb their noses at Apple products in general and the Apple Watch in particular. They are all in with Android phones and Android watches.
One big reason why they favor Android is Andros give them much more control over their devices than the other guys. They especially like to personalize their watch faces.
That’s why I told them about Live The Times. It’s a development house that offers more than 30 faces for watches that run Wear OS. And a lot of them are pretty slick.
The Courser face caught my attention. It offers multiple complications such as moving bezels and an analog and digital stopwatch. , and custom complications. The bezels rotate and work with the analog hands to add functionality.
The Executive Gold Earth shows some serious style and the Cyber Red Tech tells time down to the second, for someone who wants to make every second on this planet count.
The most popular face in the collection is the Flames watch face. It has a detailed fire animation and complications such as weather updates and heart rate sensor support.
Live The Times faces support a variety of Android watches including models mad by LG, Asus and Fossil along with fashion brands such as Michael Kors, Louis Vuitton, Kate Spade and Emporio Armani. To see the full collection, visit the Live The Times website and companion store on Google Play.
As the idea of a wearable camera continues to gain traction, the PogoCam is poised to jump to the head of the pack.
The device that I first saw at this year’s CES trade show has a lot going for it. Unlike Google’s Glass, the PogoCam doesn’t require its own frame and lenses and can be attached to the user’s own glasses.
And, probably more important to its potential success, the PogoCam is far more affordable: $149 compared to the $1,500 price tag on Glass when it was released a couple of years ago. And, as the prices indicate, the PogoCam is not in the same class as the Glass.
My experience wearing and testing the PogoCam over the past few weeks has been uneven at best. The PogoCam started strong by easily attaching to the right bow of my glasses using a small magnetic strip.
The camera has two buttons, one for shooting still images, the other for video. Its internal memory can hold 100 photos or a half-dozen 30-second videos.
The camera pairs with an iOS or Android mobile app, but the files don’t move directly between the camera and the phone. To make the transfers, you have to detach the camera and plug it into the PogoCam “smart case.” The case makes a Bluetooth link to your phone for transferring still photos. Moving videos requires a USB connection to a computer.
While I was able to capture several still shots and a couple of videos with the PogoCam, none were very good. They certainly didn’t match the colorful sample images featured on the PogoTec website.
I suspect my blurred images were largely due to way the camera is triggered. Try pinching the bow on your glasses frame without moving the frame and you’ll know what I mean. Maybe James Bond (or his tech wizard Q) could hold their spy cams perfectly still, but not me.
I think the PogoCam has a bright future, but early adopters should prepare to master complicated connections and commit to lots of practice.
For more details about the PogoCam, visit the PogoTec website.
Now that our daughter is old enough to have her own family, she’s delighted to tell us about all the tricks she played on us when she was a teenager.
We would drop her off at the local shopping mall where she said she would spend the evening with her friends. But in fact, they slipped out the back door where boys were waiting to take them to some unknown house party.
I’m betting that her daughters will all have the Lotus by Seam as one of their required fashion accessories.
Developed by Seam Technic, the Lotus is a small wearable device that lets parents and friends keep track of loved ones by recording and transmitting a variety of environmental information including GPS location , photos and audio.
At home, her mother could use a mobile app to see what she sees and hear what she hears. And if any difficulties would arise, she could make a hands-free phone call while sharing her location.
The Seam system lets users record audio and still images captured from two button-style recorders, one facing to the front, the other with a rear view.
Users can share the data and images privately with up to five friends our guardians. Or, they can have the system trigger a call to an emergency phone number while still capturing GPS location data. The data logs are stored in the cloud for up to three months while the service is in its launch stage.
As a parent, I was especially attracted by the safety element of the Seam system. But Seam founder and CEO Drew Henson said he created the system primarily to help his family members feel more connected to him while he was away from home traveling the world. “It’s a seamless way to feel connected, social and safe,” he said.
The Lotus by Seam is scheduled to launch a funding campaign on Kickstarter on Nov. 1. The Lotus recording devices are expected to see for $119 but early supporters will be able to reserve them on Kickstarter for up to 40% less.
In this age when children can be bullied at school or snatched by strangers, parents are using high-tech tracking devices and emergency alerts to help protect their loved ones.
Now there’s a new wearable invention called Bow2tie that disguises an audible alert inside a fashion accessory shaped like a bowtie.
The can be worn as a bow tie for boys or a hair clip for girls. When pressed, it emits a high-volume sound that works as a distress signal and call for help. According to Bow2Tie’s developers, the alert is loud enough to attract attention but not too loud to cause hearing damage.
The developers plan to launch a crowdfunding campaign to raise money to produce the device in different styles and colors.
The alarm will be housed in a durable casing with a rotational clip and powered by a small but long-lasting battery.
In addition to wearing the device as a neck tie, Bow2Tie models can also be worn as a pendant or bracelet.
For more details and to sign up for email updates, visit the Bow2Tie website and Facebook page or follow @Bow2Tie_USA on Twitter. And check out the video below to see the device in action.
Those voices in my head? They’re not signals from space or instructions from the CIA. More likely, it’s probably my wife calling with dinner plans, the folks on the Freakonomics podcast, or a song from my James McMurtry playlist.
And although the sound arrives over a Bluetooth channel, it’s not coming through headphones, it's piped into my ears through hearing aids.
Yes, I’m one of the estimated 30 million Americans who have some level of hearing loss. I blame mine on years of loud rock ’n roll concerts.
Wearing hearing aids make headphones problematic: there's no room for earbuds and over-the-ear pads can cause feedback and muffle nearby sounds, some of them potentially dangerous. Why, I often wondered, haven’t the brainiacs in the electronics industry come up with a way to build Bluetooth technology into hearing aids?
That marriage finally took place a couple of years ago. Now there are several medical-grade hearing aids that that can be controlled and customized from a mobile app and deliver streaming audio. For the past two months, I’ve worn a pair of Halo 2 hearing aids provided by Starkey Hearing Technologies, a Minnesota company with a 50-year history of making hearing aids. In 2014, Starkey launched a Made for iPhone hearing aid with a mobile app and streaming capability.
Earlier this month at CES, I checked out offerings from two other hearing aid makers: ReSound and Oticon. ReSound shares an ownership umbrella with Jabra headphones and Oticon was a pioneer in using digital processors in hearing aids.
Unlike the Bluetooth hearing boosters that are sold through retail outlets, the Starkey, ReSound and Oticon aids are meant to be provided by an audiologist, a licensed dispenser or a doctor. When I got the Halo 2 aids, they came with professional assistance that included a hearing check and specific tuning for my personal hearing profile.
But once the devices were in place, I could use a Starkey app called TruLink to control the devices. The app will raise or lower volume levels or cycle through default settings for different listening environments such as a restaurant, a car or for music.
Custom settings can also be created and stored as Memories for additional situations. For example, I might want a very wide and sensitive setting for a quiet walk in the woods, or one that focuses on the voice that is closest to me. That’s helpful at a party or public event.
A few days ago, I used the app to focus on the speaker at the a business conference. He was standing at a podium about 30 feet away at the front of the room. I heard an immediate improvement. Another way to tune in to a speaker or a conversation is to turn the iPhone into a remote microphone. At a group dinner at a noisy restaurant, I put my phone closer to my wife, who was sitting two seats away. That trick worked pretty well, though I wasn’t thrilled about putting my phone out of reach.
The sound amplification I get with the Halo 2 is as good and often better than my experience with the digital hearing aids that I bought a few years ago. I’ve had fewer situations where I’m unsure of the direction a sound is coming from or straining to adequately hear a someone who speaks softly.
Starkey says their aids incorporate technology that tackle both of those issues. It automatically compresses frequencies that are not usually generated with speech, and it says the Halo 2 aids communicate better with each other, which helps the wearer more easily identify the direction a sound is coming from.
The Bluetooth streaming has been an added bonus. My iPhone 7 paired smoothly with the hearing aids using the Accessibility option for hearing devices. Now Hearing Aids appears as a listening option when I get a phone call, play music, watch a video or listen to an audio book or podcast. I’ve had a few complaints from callers who said they couldn’t hear me very well when I’m talking through the hearing aids, but most people couldn’t tell any difference.
One feature on my Bluetooth headphones that I sometimes miss is the ability to accept an incoming call by pressing a button on one of the ear pads. The Halo hearing aids don’t have a similar button, but they do cooperate nicely with the Apple Watch, so I can accept a call by tapping my wrist.
The TruLink app has an extension for the watch, but its feature list is pretty short. I can cycle through the Memories settings or adjust the hearing aid volume, but only if the companion app on the phone is open.
ReSound LiNX2
ReSound and Oticon have also linked their smart hearing aids to mobile apps and other accessory devices. The ReSound Smart app is available for both Apple and Android devices and the iOS version works with the Apple Watch.
The app contains default settings for different environments, including restaurants or outdoors, and it allows users to create and store custom settings. It will also help users find misplaced hearing aids.
Other ReSound accessories include two wireless microphones. One is a clip-on mic that you would give to a family member, teacher or anyone you want to hear clearly. The other is a multi-directional mic that you might place on a table to tune in a group of people. ReSound also makes a streaming box that can be connected to a TV set or music source.
Like the other hearing aid apps, Oticon’s ON app for Apple devices will control volume levels and switch settings for its Opn model hearing aids. It also helps find lost hearing aids and it offers some controls through the Apple Watch.
Oticon Opn
But Oticon dives a bit deeper into the Internet of Things, the networks that that link everything from light switches to kitchen appliances. Oticon says its Opn model is the first hearing aid that will also interact with smart home devices such doorbells, thermostats and security systems.
The Opn hearing aid supports connections made through an Internet service called IFTTT (If This Then That) where users create simple scripts to send orders to smart devices.
For example if an event occurs (someone rings the doorbell or a smoke detector goes off), that triggers a response (a verbal message to your hearing aids or a text alert to a caregiver).
The IFTTT option is one more step toward a good example of how modern hearing aids are evolving well beyond the tiny amplifiers that our grandparents wore. Today they are miniature computers that keep us plugged into the digital world around us.
In our family, we call our daughter the Weather Girl. She has so many weather apps on her phone she could be doing reports for the local TV stations. If I ever need to know the dew point or when the moon will rise, she's the go-to gal.
But my daily weather information needs are not very complicated. I like to know the current temperature and the predicted conditions for later in the day and what I should expect for the rest of the week. On my Android phone, the aptly-named Little Weather App fills that need nicely.
When I open the app, I see my location and current temperature displayed in a nicely-drawn streetscape graphic that changes with weather. The little town is a lot like life: Sometimes you get a big yellow sun, sometimes you get dark clouds and raindrops.
The scene can also be used as a face for an Android Watch, adding the current temperature and conditions to the time and date.
As you scroll down the display on a phone or tablet, the app offers more details, including the “feels like” temperature, humidity level, air pressure, wind speed and direction and the precipitation chances.
A chart shows readings from the past 24 hours for temperature, windspeed and precipitation, depending on which button you press.
I usually bypass that stuff and go directly to the hourly forecast. I want to know how much I will sweat if I plan to play tennis at 2 p.m. or whether the predicted rain will hold off until after my evening dog walk.
The Little Weather App shows predicted temps for each hour and a graphic to indicate if it I should expect rain or just cloudy skies. The weekly forecast is displayed in similar fashion with the predicted high and low temperature and conditions.
The app uses data from Forecast.io, which aggregates data from more than a dozen sources, NOAA’s forecasts in the US and METAR forecasts used by pilots around the world.
The Little Weather App is a free app, so you can expect to see a small add on most pages. It’s available for Android devices in the Google Play Store.
The app’s developer, John Carpenter, has a portfolio of his other Android projects on his 2Lines Software website and you can follow him @johncarpenter on Twitter.
I don’t know anyone who still wears Google Glass but I know plenty of people me included - who would happily wear the Compass.
Officially launching today, the Compass is a tiny digital camera that weighs about one ounce and is just slightly larger than the Apple Watch screen. In other words, it’s small and unobtrusive enough to slip into a pocket or clip to your clothes.
The camera records up to two hours of 1080p HD videos when you press a button on its face. The video can be stored on a microSD card and in a cloud-based repository that comes with the camera. It also has a microUSB port and Wi-Fi connectivity.
The camera's developers, Drift Innovations, have also created a companion mobile app called Drift Life that can be downloaded for free for iOS or Android devices. The app enables shot set-up, remote control recording, live streaming of events, and playback and sharing directly from those devices.
Why would people wear the Compass? How about to capture the great stories your friends tell and the funny stuff your kids say. You might live stream a concert or a speech and maybe feel a little safer sketchy neighborhood or in a stranger's car. If you’ve seen what people do with Periscope, you know there are hundreds of other answers.
To get a closer look at the Compass, check out the Drift Innovation website which sells the Compass for $129.99. Also, check out the video below and follow Drift Innovation on Twitter and Instagram.
The PowearIN2 jacket has a long list of special features for plugged-in people, but here’s the one that immediately got my attention: a channel in the sleeve where you can thread a charging cable to your mobile phone. That goes along with an underarm pocket designed specifically for power banks and another pocket for wireless charging.
“With the rise of mobile technology, two things have become incredibly important: pockets and power,” says Powerin, the people who created the jacket. “After all, we need somewhere to keep all of our cool gadgets, and none of those gadgets are much use when the batteries die.”
The PowearIN2 jacket is designed using a modular concept so owners can incorporate the element that suit their needs and their gear.
It has storage and charging options for tablets, headphones, smart watches and other battery-powered gear with a hub that will charge up to five devices at once.
Other features include a face guard for blocking the wind and a eye hood for snoozing in the airport waiting area. There are also compartments for earbuds, keys, pens and passports.
Power is currently raising money to put the jacket into production with a funding campaign on Kickstarter. The jacket will have a retail price of $229 when it is launched in the fall but early backers can reserve one for at little as $109.
For a closer look at the jacket, visit the campaign page and check out the video below.
Millions of people are getting introduced to virtual reality video through inexpensive cardboard viewers. Google sells them for a few dollars and a few weeks ago, the New York Times gave one away with it’s Sunday edition.
The viewers are made to hold a mobile phone that plays videos shot with a special array of cameras that capture a 360-degree image. They’re great for giving you a taste of immersive video, but you’ll soon be looking for a better and sturdier device to deliver a higher level experience. The headset sold by Corxx is just that kind of device.
The Corxx VR1 Virtual Reality Glasses are made with solid plastic and include cushioned goggles and an elastic strap that fits comfortably around any human head. With the cardboard viewers, you have to hold the viewer in place throughout the video or 3D game. With the VR glasses, your hands remain unencumbered.
The headset holds any phone with a screen between 4 and 6 inches, including the iPhone 5, 5S, 6 and 6S. The phone slips into place behind a door with a magnetic latch. A pair of convex lenses give you a full view of the video display and pair of knobs lets you adjust the focus to suit your specific vision.
I installed the NYTVR app to watch some of the immersive videos made available by the New York Times and the experience with much better than watching with the free viewer. Other VR content is available on YouTube and with games available in the iTunes App Store and the Google Play Store.
The VR1 headset is available from Corxx for $53.99.
My wife and I like to tease our adult children about the cute and funny things they said when they were little. When they deny our stories, I would love to be able to replay a recording to settle the issue.
I’ll be able to do that with our grandchildren if I’m using Kapture, a wearable audio device that records, stores and shares 60 seconds of sound. That might be a baby’s first words, a dinner toast or an uncle telling a joke.
Kapture is a wrist band with microphone that is always listening to the sounds around you. When you hear something that you want to keep, you tap the device twice and it uses Bluetooth to send the previous minute of audio to to your smartphone.
Using the Kapture app, you can edit and enhance the saved sound clip and share it with friends. Once a sound bite is recorded and saved, Kapture continues recording in an endless loop, ready to capture the next segment.
In addition to recording children and family members, Kapture could also be used in a work environment when you want to capture a boss’s instructions in their own words or the main details in a conversation.
The Kapture wristband costs $129 and comes with six different colored bands and gold or chrome grills. It works with both Android and iOS devices.
For more details, check out the video below, visit the Kapture website and follow news and updates @kaptureaudio on Twitter.
Years ago, when I finally resolved to stop smoking cigarettes, I used an approach called gradual reduction. The ideas is, I would smoke fewer cigarettes each day until I reached zero. It’s an technique that is often recommended by health professionals.
In my case, my attitude was good, but my performance was imperfect. I failed to keep a log or notebook, so I never knew for sure how much I had smoked yesterday or what my target should be for today. It’s a problem that can trip up many would-be quitters who have good intentions but lack the tools to make their plan work.
This is where SmokeBeat comes in. It's an app that works with a wearable monitoring device to monitor and record a smoker’s habits and help them keep track toward their smoke-free goal. The app was developed byTel Aviv-based Somatix, a company that focuses on collecting data to help individuals and organizations track and measure the efficiency of incentives.
The app uses the gyroscope and accelerometer that are built into smart watches and other wearable devices to identify the hand-to-mouth movements that signal smoking. Once the smartphone and wristband are paired, the app starts recording and measuring smoking activities.
The app acts like a personal smoking coach. It delivers a pop-up alert when it believes you are smoking. It tells you how many cigarettes you’ve smoked today, yesterday or this week. After you set a personal target - say three cigarettes per day - it lets you know if you’re on track or if you’ve blown past your goal.
It also lets you know how much money you’re spent (i.e. wasted) on smokes and how much you’ve save as you reduce your habit. The high cost of smoking has proven to be a good motivating factor for quitters.
Because I haven’t smoked cigarettes in many years, I recruited a family member to test drive the SmokeBeat system. Michael’s not a heavy smoker, but he might have several cigarettes on an average day and use his electronic vapor pipe in the evening.
Michael also has an Android smartphone and watch. The SmokeBeat app is currently available only for Androids (I'm told and iOS version will be released soon) but it works with a variety of wearable devices, including Apple and Taizen watches.
SmokeBeat’s constant reminders that he’s a smoker was both welcome and annoying. It reinforced his determination to quit or cut down, but it was a little like having his mother looking over his shoulder.
He also appreciated the app’s clean and clear presentation of the data that it collects. It helped him analyze his smoking patterns and illuminated what he already suspected: that smoking consumes more time and money than he would like.
Michael noted that the app and increased the battery usage on his watch and it registered a number of false positives telling him he was smoking when he wasn’t. Nevertheless, he said he believes SmokeBeat would be a very helpful tool in his effort to quit the nicotine habit.
When I heard about Chemion, I was reminded of NASCAR and how the cars and drivers are adorned with advertising logos and messages. The drivers should also be wearing Chemion LED glasses.
Cohesion glasses are a new entry in the growing field of wearable technology. In this case, it’s eyewear that can display messages, images and animation. Think of it as a temporary tattoo for your face.
Fuinot, the company that developed the glasses, created the name as a combination of “chemistry” and “on.” The glasses are designed to share “the chemistry of your heart with the world. They are created for those who are brave enough to show their emotions and personality in a fun, non-invasive way.”
The words and images are controlled through an Android or iOS app on the owner’s mobile device. Users can create different messages, images and animation, or display an equalizer image synchronized with the music music they are listening to.
Chemion smart glasses are are priced at $99 and can be ordered on Amazon. More photos and details are available on the Chemion website.
Over the years, I’ve collected more than a dozen backpacks but I’m not fond of any of them. They’re too small, too cheaply made or they have the wrong pockets. I think I need the Tactical City Pack.
The Tactical City Pack has features that I haven’t seen on other packs. For example, it uses the MOLLE (Modular Lightweight Load-carrying Equipment) system that lets you attach modular pouches and accessories to fit your needs. It's the same system used by many of the armed forces that are part of NATO.
You can rig your pack one way for carrying a computer and an umbrella for treks to the office and another way for a weekend in the back country. The pack also has multiple zippered compartments, easy-access side panels and padded neoprene back panel.
Seoul-based Eshena produces a number of pouches and bags for use in the MOLLE system. The company recently launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise $25,000 to produce the Tactical City Pack. Backers who pledge $89 or more will be in line to receive one of the packs when they ship next spring.
People with hand injuries are sometimes fitted with an exoskeleton, a robotic hand that helps patients grasp and release objects and assists with their rehabilitation.
In most cases those gloves are made of hard materials that don’t easily conform to the human hand.
Now scientists working in Singapore have devised a new robotic glove that uses soft materials and pneumatic actuators that can make adjustments based on the dimensions of the fingers.
The invention is called the ExoGlove and it was developed in the Evolution Innovation Laboratory at the National University of Singapore by Dr. Raye Yeow and Mr. Yap Hongkai.
The target customers for the ExoGlove are patients who have hand impairments due to neurodegenerative diseases such as ALS and Parkinson’s disease, muscular dystrophy, and stroke or traumatic brain injuries. Those impairments require physical or occupational hand rehabilitation.
My Weimaraners run to greet me when I walk through the front door and I’ve always assumed that their wagging tails mean they’re happy to see me. It turns out that while wags are a signal of happiness, there could be much more to their story.
The people at DogStar are working on a gadget that will record and decode the language behind the the wags, which they say is the social interface in the dog world. Today DogStar launched a fundraising campaign on Indiegogo where they hope to raise $100,000 to develop TailTalk, the world’s first dog emotion sensor.
TailTalk is a flexible band that fits around a dog’s tail. Like the fitness wristbands that humans wear, TailTalk uses a gyroscope, accelerometer and Bluetooth technology to transmit motion data to a companion app on an iOS or Android device.
The app charts the dog’s emotional events and helps pet owners better understand what makes their dogs happy and what contributes to negative emotions like fear or anxiety.
“We feel that pet parents are wonderful,” DogStar co-founder Yannis Tsampalis told Yahoo News. “But if they had more data, they can probably make better decisions and create a stronger bond between them and their dog.”
Backers who contribute $99 to the Indiegogo campaign will be first in line to get the device when it ships in May of 2016.
You can get a closer look at TailTalk in the video below. More details are also available on the DogStar website and @DogStarLife on Twitter.
While snorkeling at one of the underwater reef parks in the Bahamas, it was frustrating to see beautiful coral formations 15 or 20 feet below the surface but not have enough flipper power to get a closer look.
What I needed was a an underwater jet pack like the one developed by by S.C.P Marine Innovation in the UK. The x2 Sport is a wearable propulsion system that lets swimmers move faster and dive deeper than what they can do using simple muscle power.
The idea is to into a swimmer into Aquaman with a power pack strapped to your back and a pair of thrusters strapped to your wrists. Just point your arms in the direction you want to go and squeeze the trigger in a handheld throttle. The jet pack lets you cruise at speeds up to 6 mph with 60 minutes of power.
The x2 developers have launched an Indiegogo campaign hoping to raise $35,000 to get the product into full production. Donors who pledge $2,000 will be in line to first 20 jet packs when they ship next summer.
Among the many things I do with my Apple Watch is check the weather and read news and text alerts. Jason Nichols thinks the watch could also save my life or the life of a loved one.
Nichols is developing an app called WristSOS. With the app installed, watch wearers will be able to send an instant distress signal to family members. Nichols envisions the app being used by children, elderly people or anyone who is in a situation that causes them to be concerned about their safety.
Nichols has launched a fundraising campaign on Indiegogo where he hopes to raise $7,500 to get the Apple Watch app built and posted in Apple’s App Store. Any money collected beyond the goal will be used to work on an Android version.
Contribution levels start at $1. Nichols has reserved a custom Apple Watch for up to five people who donate $1,500. The estimated delivery date is December, 2015.
For more details, visit the WatchSOS page on Indiegogo.
As soon as my Apple Watch arrived, I discovered two things: First, the watch battery requires a lot of charging. Mine can’t go two days without refueling. And second, I would need some sort of charging stand.
The watch comes with a charging cable, a USB cord with a quarter-sized disk on one end that makes a magnetic connection to the underside of the watch.
Yes, you can charge the watch by simply pairing it with the cable, but that’s an unimaginative solution that leaves your desk or nightstand looking cluttered. I tried one of the cheap charging stands sold on eBay, and it wasn't much better. I was disappointed by its flimsy materials.
A $400 watch deserves better treatment, like a charging stand that is both functional and stylish. That why I like the iGear Apple Watch charging stand that has become the overnight home for my watch.
iGear makes the stands using solid brushed aluminum or polished cherry wood. The base weighs about one pound, so the stand won’t easily tip over or get nudged aside.
There’s a soft pad on its underside to prevent prevent scratches and the base is finished with a nice beveled edge.
The watch’s charging disk nestles into a circular slot at the top of an angled arm. The cable slips into a channel that runs down down the arm and through base. That design keeps cable clutter to a minimum.
The angle of the charging stand arm makes the watch face easily visible, so I use it as a clock on my night stand. When I touch the watch, I get an instant view of the time, date, outside temperature and my next appointment. I can also answer incoming calls.
The iGear stand not only looks great, it extends the versatility of the Apple Watch and well worth its $24.99 price. The stands are available in a silver, gold or wood finish at the iGear HQ website and on Amazon.
I started reporting on gadgets and gear when Atari ruled electronic games and computers used floppy disks. My weekly column ran in the The Louisville Courier-Journal and online at USAToday.com and ABC News.com. I was a regular at tech trade shows including COMDEX, CES and the CEDIA show for home theater. Follow @GizmoEditor on Twitter and on Facebook. Contact me at ricman@iglou.comI also create short videos for vendors to use on Amazon and YouTube. Click here to see a portfolio of my recent videos.
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Need a video to promote your app or product? Check out my gig at Fiverr.com and browse my video portfolio here.
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