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The best computer and mobile accessories to give as gifts
Perhaps the person on your list is already quite happy with their laptop or mobile device (slash, you're not up to buying them a new one). There are plenty of accessories that make for affordable, and dare we say, practical gifts. Included in our holiday gift guide are two styles of keyboards, a high-end mouse, a battery pack, selfie and battery cases, a 400GB (!) microSDXC card, Bluetooth trackers and a wireless charging pad -- useful for, say, a new iPhone owner.
Tile Pro helps you find your stuff from 200 feet away
We've held up the Tile as the best Bluetooth-connected fob to keep track of your stuff since its second, refined version launched in 2015, and more recent versions have gotten better and smaller. The latest additions to the lineup released today, Tile Pro, respond from 200 feet away, twice as far as older models -- and both new gadgets are waterproof, too.
Tile unveils a smaller take on its original bluetooth tracker
In the three years since it first introduced its Bluetooth trackers, Tile has accepted that less can be more and worked to reduce the profile of its location-aware squares. Less than two months ago, we saw the launch of the Tile Slim -- a thin tracker designed for use in wallets, purses and laptops -- but that wasn't all that Tile has been working on. Today, it's taken the wraps off the Mate, a smaller take on the Original that comes with the all-important loop.
Tile's slimmest Bluetooth tracker won't bulk up your wallet
Tile, which raised over a million dollars on Kickstarter over three years ago, is a popular Bluetooth tracker that helps you find your missing stuff. Aside from Bluetooth, it also uses a crowd-finding feature where other Tile app users can ping you the whereabouts of a Tile that's out of Bluetooth range. There was an update last year to Tile 2.0, which has a louder alarm plus it'll help find your phone as well. The problem with the existing Tile, however, is that it's a little chunky. That's why Tile has now introduced the Tile Slim, a much thinner version of the tracker that'll fit more comfortably in tight spots like wallets and passport holders. But that's not all. Tile has also announced a new initiative that just might bring Tile's location-finding smarts to anything and everything.
Land Rover puts Tile's stuff-finding Bluetooth tech in an SUV
Tile's Bluetooth-connected trackers are made to keep you from misplacing all kinds of stuff -- keys, bags, phones, laptops, whatever. Now Land Rover is building the tech into a vehicle that makes it pretty much impossible to leave your important items behind. In the 2017 Discovery Sport Tile will be a part of its InControl apps setup, ready to alert the driver if tagged items aren't in the car. Maybe you've never shown up to the airport one bag short, but for the rest of us, it's one way to avoid an awkward situation.
The stuff-finding Tile now helps you find your phone
Placing a location-tracking Tile on your stuff has become a good way to keep you from pulling up all the couch cushions in your house when you misplace your car keys. Today, Tile has introduced a new white Bluetooth-enabled white square that'll keep helping you find your stuff, but also your phone with the Tile app. With the updated app and Tile if happen to lose your phone, you can double-press the "e" on the Tile and if the app is running in the background, the phone will start playing a little tune. The app can also be used to locate another phone. So when someone loses an iPhone, their Android-owning friends can help out instead of just shrugging because they can't load Find My iPhone.
Faif is a turn-based tile combat game rooted in gambling
Faif, an interesting puzzle game with RPG and gambling elements, was created by developer Beavl in 12 hours as part of the latest Ludum Dare game jam. The theme for this Ludum Dare was "you only get one." The premise of Faif is simple: You take on an AI opponent in turn-based combat. Each of you chooses five tiles from the grid and the game randomly chooses one of them for you. Land on a heart and your health increases, land on a skull and you take a hit. Swords increase your attack power and gems can be used in the store to buy goods. You can play a beta build of Faif in your browser right now, free of charge – we suggest doing that because the game is a lot of fun. An iOS port is in the works, while an early access version is half-off ($.99) on Android right now. Developer Beavl says it will upload improved versions of the game "almost every week" in the run-up to the full release.
Tile: Crowdfunding a community driven device to keep track of your stuff
We all lose our stuff. It's part of life; you accidentally leave your favorite jacket at a restaurant, your wallet falls out of your pocket into a shrub, or somebody decides that they like your bike more than the fixer they're riding. A new company, Tile, has plans for a unique way to figure out where your stuff is at all times and they're looking for just US$20,000 in crowdsourced funding to start production. Tile's self-named product is a tiny Bluetooth LE device that you attach to or embed in something that you don't want to lose. Clip one to a bike, stick one in the pocket of your jacket or your wallet, and even put one on the dog's collar. A US$25 Tile has battery life for one year, at which time you'll need to replace it and recycle the old one for reuse. Now here's the big news: with most "find your stuff" type apps and devices, you're limited by the range of Bluetooth (maybe 100 feet at the best). That means that unless you know where the heck you lost your stuff, you're out of luck finding it. How Tile plans to expand the range to ... well, everywhere ... is to make sure that a lot of other people are using the devices and the accompanying Tile app. %Gallery-191807% Let's say that you drop your wallet into the aforementioned shrub. When you get home and suddenly realize that it's missing, you launch the app which tells you the last place where it "saw" the Tile. If that's not enough information to help you dig your wallet out of that shrub, the next level is that you'll "mark" the Tile as missing, which puts all other Tile apps on alert to look for your wallet. If anyone else running the Tile app happens to get anywhere near your wallet hiding in the shrub, an alert is sent through their iPhone to the app running on your device. The guy who just walked by your wallet has no clue that he just helped to find it for you. What will make this work for everybody is if a lot of Tiles are sold and many people decide to run the app. That's a big "if," but the idea is compelling and the cost a handful of Tiles -- maybe $100 a year -- is much less than replacing some of your more cherished belongings if you lose them. Early bird pricing is available today only for $15 per Tile, after which the price goes up to $19 for the remainder of the campaign (through July 29). When the product goes live in the winter of 2013/2014, the price will be $25. Check out the video below to get a better idea of how Tile works, and then decide if you want in on the ground floor on this very innovative way of keeping track of your stuff.
KDDI announces Android-based Infobar A01 smartphone with glanceable iida UI
There's been a few smartphones exclusive to Japan as of late that we'd like to see available over here, but perhaps none more so than KDDI's just-announced Infobar A01, which is set to hit the country in July. It runs Android 2.3, but you wouldn't know it from the interface: a completely custom UI designed by Yugo Nakamura that follows some similar glanceable design principles to Windows Phone 7, or what KDDI describes as a "single band of information." The phone is no slouch hardware-wise either -- it boasts a 3.7-inch qHD display (that's about 300 ppi), an 8 megapixel camera, a 1Seg TV tuner, and dual-mode GSM / CDMA connectivity (no word on the processor, unfortunately). As you can see, it also has some tile-like buttons -- a common theme with previous Infobar phones -- and it's available in your choice of four different color schemes, no less, along with some optional silicone and leather cases designed to match the phone (by the phone's designer, Naoto Fukasawa, incidentally). Hit up the gallery below for a closer look, and head on past the break for a pair of videos showing the interface in action. %Gallery-123820%
Omnimo: desktop Windows given fashion makeover with Phone 7 Series flair
Can't wait for Windows Phone 7 Series, but can't hack the emulator, either? Don't lose hope, Windows junkies -- you can still bring some semblance of WP7S order into your life with this Metro UI-inspired desktop HUD. Based on the open-source desktop customization platform Rainmeter, the "Omnimo UI" will overlay your desktop with a minimalist, tiled interface not unlike the one you've been drooling over for weeks, with live hooks into many useful services (including Gmail, iTunes, Steam, Twitter and SpeedFan) as well as the usual widgets and a host of program shortcuts. The best news of all? It's available now for all versions of Windows since XP, completely free of charge; simply follow the source links or flit over to Lifehacker, where good folks will teach you how it's done.
Roof tiles change color based on the temperature, your house's mood
Okay, sure, ideally your entire roof would be comprised of solar tiles that would meet your entire house's energy demands and would also water your lawn and clean your gutters while they were up there. But, despite pledges of "affordability" something tells us it'll be awhile before your roof starts juicing your gadgets. This solution from MIT looks a little more practical -- and affordable. They're simply tiles that change color based on the temperature, Hypercolor style. In the cold they turn jet black, absorbing the sun's warmth and channeling that into the house. In heat they turn white, reflecting that same light and cutting down on cooling bills. Simple and smart. The MIT team calls the tech Thermeleon, and while early prototypes do change color as designed, it remains to be seen how durable the tech will be, and a leaky roof is no good regardless of how efficient. Asphalt shingles reign supreme for yet another year.
NEC's biggest pro LCD yet: 82-inch LCD8205
Adding to its line of professional displays, NEC is bringing the LCD8205 to 2008 Digital Signage Expo East. We've seen bigger in the consumer space, but when you've just got to have 4x4 tile support for a max 328-inch (diagonal) display, refreshingly realistic 5,000:1 claimed contrast ratio and 1920x1080 resolution, there's not much better. At $54,999 each, it's unlikely we'll find one under the tree when it releases in December but catching a peek (and fogging up a display window or two) is slightly more attainable goal.[Via CE Pro]
Microsoft spinoff ZenZui's "Zooming User Interface"
Borne of Microsoft Research, newly-announced ZenZui is coming out of stealth mode at CTIA this week to introduce what we think is a fairly novel approach to mobile content browsing -- a concept ZenZui calls the "Zooming User Interface" (hence the "Zui" part of the name). The concept sorta has to be seen to be fully appreciated (we intend to do a full hands-on from the show floor here before too long), but essentially, ZenZui uses an array of extremely easy to browse content "tiles" that can be zoomed in and out using numeric keypad presses. The tiles themselves -- which can be anything from news, to traffic, to mini-games, to whatever -- are developed with an open API, encouraging developers large and small to get involved. They can be sent and received in a "viral" fashion from other ZenZui users, and since everyone's getting paid based on the ad revenue their tiles generate, it's a pretty happy ecosystem (theoretically, anyway). Since it's coming outta Redmond, Windows Mobile is obviously the initial target, though other platforms are in the works. Expect a beta later this year with availability directly from ZenZui and its content partners.
