Toys

Ambient devices have been popping up all over the place these days. There is the Ambient Orb, Ambient Umbrella, Ambient Dashboard, and now we have the Nabaztag/Tag Wireless WiFi Rabbit. Yes, you read that correctly, a WiFi rabbit. And a cute one at that. My good friends at Think Geek were kind enough to send me a Nabaztag/Tag for review.

I’m not a kid anymore, but I still enjoy playing with
construction toys on occasion. I guess it has something to do with the fact that
I always wanted a LEGO set when I was child,
but never was fortunate enough to receive any. The closest that I got to LEGO
was Tinkertoys,
Lincoln Logs and my
Dad’s old Erector set.
They were all fun to play with, but they weren’t LEGO. Today I’m going to tell
you about ENGINO construction toys. These
award winning toys are from Cyprus, and bear a resemblance to LEGO. Are they
better than the world famous toy, or just a knock off? Let’s see…

Do you remember my review of the highly popular PicooZ RC Helicopter? The PicooZ is a really small radio controlled indoor flying toy with a price tag of less than $40. I had a lot of fun with that review, so I decided to go completely nuts and try out the $300 Carbon Butterfly indoor RC airplane from Plantraco.

If you are like me, and victim to the snooze button, then you
should definitely get your hands on a Clocky!
If you haven’t heard
of him, he’s the alarm clock that jumps from your night-stand and
runs around your room, making funny/cute sounds along the way, as
if desperate to get you up. Kind of like a pet. Because you don’t
know where he’ll be, you have to search for him to turn him off and
viola! you wake up in the process.

Every year, there are a handful of toys that end up on the holiday gift wish lists of kids all over the country. I can remember 5 years ago when it was the Bit Char-G / Microsizer tiny remote controlled cars. Even my Dad stood in line at Radio Shack to get one (for himself!). This year one of the popular toys is again a remote controlled device. But this time it is not a car… it’s a tiny helicopter called the PicooZ.

Remember my iFish review? I’m amazed that the video in that particular review continues to be one of the most viewed videos on this site. If you are a fan of novelty toys like the iFish, you should enjoy this review of Sega Toys latest offering: the idog mini. My friends at AudioCubes.com recently sent me the Blue version of this plastic dog.

A short time ago my wife Meredyth, a more sedate guest contributor, showed me these two devices from Brando USB, and asked me if I’d like to do a review on them. As a serious fan of non-serious office toys, I was delighted. “What do I have to do?” I asked. “Play with them a lot, then do some writing,” she replied. Never being one to turn down a chance to do something extremely silly, I accepted the offer, brought them into my lab, and got down to the important business of having fun.

One of my favorite computer games that I had on my Commodore 64 was called Little Computer People by Activision. Think of it as The SIMs, but just with one person and really really simple. Back in the day it was a lot of fun to just watch the little person walking around his house doing all sorts of activities. That game was on the market about 20 years ago. These days you don’t need a computer to have your own little computer person on your desk. You just need a cube.

I’ve recently had to give several presentations using MS PowerPoint and Keynote. Although nothing replaces preparation and knowledge in a successful presentation, a good gadget can go a long way to give your lecture professional polish.

Just how geeky are you? Do you happen to have a laser pointer in your gadget bag or drawer? Ok, give yourself 5 geek points. Do you use this pointer for tasks other than pointing out mundane details during presentations at your day job? Give yourself 5 more geek points. Do you pester your cat by shining the laser on the floor beside it, to get him to chase the tiny point of light like some type of alien rodent? Ok, no points for that, because that’s just mean ;o) Can your laser beam its dot up to 38 miles and burn holes in black trash bags? I didn’t think so… I win!

When I was a kid, I remember my Dad having this large Yellow Celestron telescope. He was very proud of that telescope and had a special foot locker that he kept it in. The thing was that I think he only actually used the scope maybe once or twice. It was difficult to find a place where lights from houses and street lamps would not ruin his star gazing attempts. One of the times that he did go out, it was in the middle of Winter. So he came back home late at night about half frozen. Hmmmm… fun. NOT! That’s why I had to think of him, when Brando asked if I was interested in reviewing the Sega Toys HomeStar planetarium.

Last week I reviewed the iFish and this week I’m taking a look at another silly, but fun little gadget from Brando’s toy shop. This time around it is the Potan Poton from Tomy. I was told that the name refers to the sound that water makes when it drips. While that reference won’t be

And now for a review of a product that is both wacky and different. The iFish from Sega Toys, the same people that brought us the iDog. I wasn’t too sure what I would have to say about this combination speaker and robot pet thingy when Brando asked if I would review it, but I

I first saw one of these things on display at the local fair. They were asking $50 to $150 for sets like this, and I thought they were REALLY cool, but not $That$ cool. So I decided look them up on Ebay later that day and took some pics with my camera phone (I’d never

The Firewheel folks in the land down under asked Julie if she would like to review their 10 shot fully automatic rubber band machine gun. Since she is female and a grown up, she was not really interested. When Julie asked me if I would like to review this product, I asked my fifteen-year-old son

Okay, I know that this may be bordering on the “Too Much Information” threshold, but I’ll confess that when I was a kid, I loved magnets. Not many things would make me happier than coming across an old speaker that I could dismantle to remove its magnet disk. Ball bearings were the other thing that