I’ve Been Thunderstruck

I love gadgets as much as many of you do. And most of the ones we get exposed to are pretty cool. But I came across one today that surpasses anything I’ve seen in a long time : The R2D2 Digital Audio and Video Projector by Nikko.

This product pretty much defies description, so I invite you over to their web site to watch the video. But, to pique your interest, here’s a short list of the features:

• Project any digital media up to 260 inches onto walls or ceilings
• Play DVDs and CDs with built-in player
• Connect external devices like iPods, memory cards and USB flashdrives
• Built in 20W speaker system
• Wireless FM out
• Format support : DVD-video, DVD/R/RW, VCD, SCVD, Audio CD, CD-R/RW, WMA, MP3, MP4, DivX 3.0, JPEG
• A seriously cool Millennium Falcon remote!

And all this can be yours for only $2900US!

Your house has more computer power in it than the average laptop! According to an article by Patrick Di Justo in the May 2007 issue of Wired, the modern house has about 31,700 MIPS while the average laptop has about 6,300 MIPS. In case you’re wondering a MIPS are millions of instructions per second, which is a measure of a processors speed. Here’s how it breaks down:

• Typical Laptop : 6,300 MIPS
• Modern House : 31,670 MIPS
• Living Room : 26,750 MIPS
• Xbox : 21,000
• Cable Box : 2,000
• Hi-def DVD : 2,000
• TiVo : 1,000
• Television : 600
• Home Stereo : 150
• Home Office : 2,600 MIPS
• Broadband Router : 800
• Wireless Router : 800
• Smartphone : 500
• Inkjet Printer : 350
• Digital Camera : 150
• Garage : 1,690 MIPS
• Car : 1,300
• Roomba : 80
• Clothes Dryer : 60
• Clothes Washer : 60
• Vacuum : 60
• Heating/Air Conditioning : 60
• Home Security : 60
• LawnBott Lawn Mower : 10
• Kitchen : 420 MIPS
• Refrigerator : 60
• Dishwasher : 60
• Microwave : 60
• Stove : 60
• Toaster : 60
• Blender : 60
• Coffeemaker : 60
• Bedroom and Bathroom : 210 MIPS
• iPod : 200
• Electric Toothbrush : 10

I would have thought that my digital camera had more MIPS than a home stereo, but them I’m also surprised that an Xbox has more MIPS than a laptop. Guess you need a lot of processing power to play Halo 3!

I was thinking today about my Garmin 76CSx, and got to thinking about whether GPS receivers (often called GPSr), are more gadgets than real pieces of technology? As GPSr’s become more and more prevalent in the marketplace, they will mature to a point where we can do things wirelessly, accessing the Internet and getting data we need on the fly. Sooner or later something like the iGPS will debut, and we’ll have more GPS functionality in the palm of our hands than we ever thought possible before. At that point, is the GPSr just a cool gadget, or an honest-to-goodness piece of technology? I think my GPSr, in all it’s basic glory, is an amazing piece of technology that stands on it’s own with the basic functionality : showing me where I am on the earth. If you think about it, being able to know almost exactly where you are on the earth at any given time is pretty amazing. Couple that with something like Geocaching, and you get very cool technology helping you engage in a very interesting sport. It just blows my mind how cool it all is!

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