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This device will literally tell you how much you stink
There's so much bad technology in the world that Japan even has a beautiful word for pointless gadgets: "chindogu." There's another splendid Japanese term, one that companies are apparently holding training sessions on how to combat: "sumeru harasumento," or in English, "smell harassment." To help keep offensively stinky people in check, Tanita is releasing a gizmo that figures out how bad your body odor is.
Tanita's BC-1000 Body Composition Monitor wirelessly sends embarrassing weight details
Remember all those ANT+ wireless peripherals that were supposed to come flooding out after the introduction of Garmin's FR60 Fitness Watch? We suppose said flood has to start somewhere, and this is it. Tanita's BC-1000 Body Composition Monitor is hardly more than a sophisticated scale, designed to hold humans for just moments at a time while collecting measurements on muscle mass, overall physique, daily caloric intake, metabolic age, bone mass and visceral fat. From there, the unit can either send those details wireless to the aforesaid watch, or it can beam them to any PC with an appropriate dongle. The device is slated to ship this summer for $279.99 with a USB stick or $399.99 with an FR60 watch.
Tanita works out the Ironman segmental body composition monitor
Getting the low-down on your body fat percentages can involve a scale, calipers, calculator, spreadsheet, and lots of math. Enter the Tanita Ironman Segmental and Full Body Composition monitor. This torture device comes with retractable hand-grip electrodes that measure each body quadrant's water, muscle mass, bone mass, BMR, visceral fat, metabolic age, and physique rating. Engadget Fitness Club (EFC) public service note: keep in mind that electrodes of this sort can be a bit inaccurate based on your water weight. Most fitness experts consider calipers to be the most accurate way to get body composition data even though they're a bear to use. That said, this could be a great long-term monitoring tool if the $299 price tag doesn't scare you off and Wii Fit just isn't doing it for you.[Via ChipChick]
Tanita's body fat measurer doesn't require you to get up
Tanita's been known to mesh gadgetry with health before, but its latest creation really goes beyond the call. This body fat measuring system apparently enables patients to remain firmly glued to the bed / sofa / etc. rather than actually, you know, getting up and moving, when checking out just how out of shape they are. Truth be told, the device was designed to allow "bedridden or physically-handicapped people" to check up on their BMI without having to be uncomfortably repositioned, but it's still a device the lazy could love. Click on to the read link for lots more pictures -- if you can muster the will power, that is.[Via TokyoMango]
Communication-enabled exercise equipment in the works
While we've seen a number of individuals turning to Nintendo's Wii to shed a few pounds, the next wave of exercise equipment seems to be filtering in. Just weeks after seeing Motivatrix's MX9 Workout Master, five companies have come together in an effort to "develop a communications protocol to establish a connection between home healthcare devices from different manufacturers so that they can exchange information with one another." Mitsubishi, Citizen, Sharp, Tanita, and Hitachi have jointly designed the standard as part of a Japanese healthcare project, which will be "used when interconnecting healthcare equipment such as blood pressure meters, weight scales, and blood glucose meters with home gateway devices." Notably, the protocol can applied to both wired and wireless configurations, and if all goes as planned, it should be rolled out en masse to manufacturers in the Spring of 2008.[Via DigitalWorldTokyo]
Tanita releases scale with USB drive
It is no secret that Americans, on a whole, suffer from an obesity problem. The path to recovery, however, involves a bit more than just keeping track of one's weight: factors like body mass index, and "muscular quanitative score" are just as important, and have to be accounted for in measuring health. The Inner scan BC-500 by Tanita, is a step in the right direction for those combating weight problems. It allows up to four people to log a month's worth of their data onto a provided USB flash drive, which can then be analyzed with included software, or printed out for your doctor. Being able to keep track of your health information can prove to everyone that the DDR workout is working.[Via Far East Gizmos]
