Remember the Laserdisc? Let DEVO Help!

Alice In Wonderland (On the iPad)

I really want an iPad and this video/commercial for Alice In Wonderland makes me want it even more but I will wait, at least, until the first couple of price reductions and the inevitable release of 'clones' by Apple's competitors. The clones will either drive the price down to a more comfortable level or provide some more viable alternatives (in that they won't be locked down by Apple's somewhat draconian system).

Mythbusters 1100 Barrel Paintgun Paints the Mona Lisa

Portable Multi Video Game System Emulator

Do any of you, my faithful readers, have a device like this? I keep seeing them pop up on Engadget and places like that and I am almost ready to flip the proverbial switch and order one for myself. For about $87 you get this portable device which will emulate almost any 32 bit (or older) video games system on it's 320x240 screen and it will play videos and MP3s. It also includes 4 GB of internal RAM and a mini-sd card slot for increased storage.

Gaming Console Modes:
- NES (Nintendo Entertainment System - 8bit)
- SNES (Super Nintendo Entertainment System - 16bit)
- Sega Genesis (Sega Mega-Drive - 16-bit)
- GBA (Nintendo Game Boy Advance)
- Neo-Geo (SNK Neo-Geo)
- CPS1 and CPS2 (CAPCOM, arcade game systems, 1st and 2nd edition)

Wow! (?)

Link ($87.31 at Chinavision)

The Blue Ball Machine

It doesn't really do anything and the music is kind of lame but it if you like Rube Goldberg type inventions you will appreciate this.


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Idiotic Uses For Your Unused USB Ports

Why be content with useful things (mice, keyboards, memory sticks, external hard drives, etc.) when you can have a dog that humps your USB port? Or how about some USB aroma sticks?

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The Return of the TV Antenna

Today's post is a bit off-topic but necessary. With HDTV you can get excellent quality broadcasts using a pair of rabbit ears in many places. For some of the fringe areas you will need something a little better. You can go to your local electronics retailer and drop $80 on an HDTV antenna but I have not been very impressed with the two that I have which are, essentially, just amplified rabbit ears. This antenna looks like a pretty simple design and it claims to work pretty well. You may be able to put it in your attic if you don't have a lot of metal in your home's construction.

Even if you do get your local channels via cable or satellite you may want to pursue using an antenna and getting the channels yourself. Most providers are compressing the signals to fit more channels in the same amount of bandwidth, giving you a lower quality picture.

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Cartrivision - a Home Video Format From 1972

Retro Thing has a nice post about the first (?) home video format - Cartrivision. From 1972, this was the precursor to the VCR but it was expensive. Being that I was five years old in 1972 I certainly probably wouldn't remember any of these systems - and they seem to have went out of business rather quickly as expected given the rather exorbitant price-tag - but do any of you readers remember this system?

Link

Labguy has a nice page dedicated to this machine as well.

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