Monday 6 November 2017

TRE Talk Radio Europe 'gadget guru' technology for November 2017

Here's the technology I was talking about in my November 2017 'gadget guru' chat on TRE Talk Radio Europe this afternoon:

Nuviz
This is a 'head-up' display that’s designed to fit to a motorbike helmet, bringing fighter pilot technology to the road. You get GPS maps, a camera for recording your journey, a hands-free headset connection and the opportunity to listen to music. Nuviz is designed to stick to the bottom right-hand side of a motorbike helmet, offering a transparent screen that sits in front of the rider’s right eye and a controller that fits to the bike handlebars. From what I’ve seen, the Nuviz is a serious piece of kit for any motorcyclist who does a lot of riding in unfamiliar territory. UK price is £615.

Bowers and Wilkins PX headphones
Bowers and Wilkins started making loudspeakers back in the 1960s – that’s still what they’re best known for – and only expanded into headphones less than ten years ago. The PX is the company's first pair of wireless headphones with built-in active noise-cancellation. Inside the earpiece is a 40mm driver angled to send the music straight into your ears. They connect via Bluetooth, with buttons on the right-hand earpiece for volume control and playing or pausing - and can even stop your music automatically when you take them off. Expect to pay around £329.


Moto Smart Speaker with Amazon Alexa 
This loudspeaker is designed to attach to any of Motorola's Moto Z phones. It fastens on magnetically, which is rather neat, and gives you a pair of stereo speakers delivering 8 watts of music power. Inside is the same kind of technology as one of Amazon’s Echo loudspeakers, including a connection to the Amazon Alexa virtual assistant. It’ll listen out for instructions through its four microphones and will answer the same questions you might ask an Amazon Echo device. Except, of course, because it’s attached to your phone, you don’t need to be at home to do any of this. And because it’s attached to your phone, the phone screen can also show you answers whilst Alexa talks to you. Pricing is $149/£99.

USB fridge 
A few years ago, accessories powered by the USB socket on your laptop or desktop computer were all the rage. I thought this trend had gone away but it seems I was wrong, because I’ve spotted a USB fridge. How on earth do you get enough power out of a USB socket to power a fridge? Part of the answer is the size of the thing: it’s literally only capable of holding a single 330ml can of drink. It’ll cool to around 8 Celsius after five minutes, which isn’t as cold as a proper fridge but is perfectly acceptable, I’d say. Especially for £14.99.

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