Gadget Dose

Is it too soon to have your little kids send out instant messages to you on their very own Black Berry? This latest hand held device is built to do just that….or at least just copy the adult version. It resembles pretty much what mommy and daddy’s very own sets are like, with the right QWERTY keyboads and all the enhancements. The only thing different is the cutesy colors…and no it isn’t wireless capable (should we be alarmed if it was?) and it doesn’t also have a SIM Card function.

The Baby Blackberry is actually called the Text and Learn tool and toy built  for toddlers and young kids from KRESTA. It will teach pre-schoolers to identify letters, spell out simple words or their names, and focus on basic computer skills….which should be good because you know, kids start becoming technical younger and younger these days, right? It’s the way of the times. Other learning activities to this gadget include shape identification and letter matching as well as navigating on a proper QWERTY handset keyboard.

When little kids want to mimic their parents using their Black Berry, they can actually do it with their very own handheld set now thus risk losing the data from mom or dad’s phone! I wonder if this one has cutesy sounds that appeal to younger children.

The Text and Learn Kresta will hit the stands in the summer and will be priced at $25.00.

This gadget was recently unveiled at a UK Toy Fair.

With this little R/C car you can drive your way to eavesdropping and get the audio broadcasted right to your ears.

Ideal snooper robot that comes fully assembled and is fully remote controlled. Capable of entering a room undetected it will listen in on conversations then transmit them to up 150 feet away to the listening receiver.

As long as you don’t drive in front of the people your trying to listen to

Around $80 you can find it and other interesting robotics HERE

How cool is this? Got a young one that does not like to take a bath? Put this bad boy in the water and you will have a hard time getting ‘em out.

Both the duck and the remote are waterproof so no worries about breaking anything. On a full charge you get 15 whole minutes of duck driving goodness. (Any more and your young on would be coming out of the water looking like a wrinkled prune.)

About $30.00 Product Page

What says festive more than a tiny Santa flying a helicopter around your Christmas Tree?

This R/C chopper sports features similar to the pico copter and some others, The remote control is a super wide IR controller with the charger built in. Simply plug the copter into the charger when it needs a recharge.

Santa also has a flashing blue LED for night flying excursions. The copter is designed for indoor flying mostly, but will operate outside provided theres no breeze.

It also comes with spare parts just in case you go and drive Santa into a wall.

Heres the full spec.

# Product Features Rechargeable Mini RC Flying Santa Claus
# Built-in Li-Poly rechargeable batteries pack The Flying Santa can be recharged!
# Super Wide Infrared Remote Controller with Rechargeable Unit
# Super Light Size (only about 170mm from end-to-end)
# Super Light Weight (the Flying Santa is only about 10g)
# Easy to operate & control
# Miniature design for indoor flying
# Auto Stabel & Prescision Speed Control for steady lifting-up
# Tri-Band Technology
# FLASHING of the BLUE LED Lightwhile flying
# Rudder Trimmer
# Spare Tail Propeller, Cross Screwdriver, Instruction Manual - English
# Functions: decoration, collectable, home and office fun
# HxWxD(approx.): 40mm x 70mm x 170mm (Helicopter)

On sale for $ 25.00 over at Toys.Brando.com.hk

A super fun gadget from ThinkGeek - heres the scoop…

these precision ChoroQ Qsteer Mini R/C Racers imported from japan. Amazingly we were able to zoom these mini cars all over our desk with nary a fender bender.

They also have a turbo button for an extra boost of speed - Choose from cute versions of the Nissan 350Z or the Mazda RX-8. Remotes operate on different frequencies so you can race each other.

for $14.99 its a great deal! Product Page

Rapidly climbing Amazons list of must have toys for the season is the Eye Clops….

* Bionic Eye hand-held device magnifies 200 times normal size on any TV screen
* Creates hours of play and exploration for the entire family
* Built-in LED lights illuminate any object
* Plugs into A/V jacks on any TV
* Includes observation dish and tube for exploring objects and liquids

Its a 200X magnifier for the kids! - If it werent to odd looking Id want one for myself…. course I suppose you could hack it into something more techhie.

But back to the kids - you can plug this into the front panel of most any tv than has video in and magnify stuff to your hearts content. Its also got a dish for liquids - just in case someone might want to magnify um, cereal in milk for example.

This ones a winner - at $40.94 its priced for the holidays.

Product page

Another possible Christmas idea here - this little nicely priced beauty comes from Discovery.

Its remote controlled - and apparently the remotes are neatly sculptured little dragons. The dragon walks on command, his eyes light up in red. Tell me when you were a kid you didn’t go nuts for sparkly or light up eyes!

With fire breathing effects and of course it sports a big ‘ol dragon growl. You can also turn its head and make it roar. What dragon would be complete without the roar?

Touted as its last feature are its moving dorsal fins.

Just about any kid would love this - I dunno, maybe its more of a boys toy. I could imagine walking this thing into any lego / block city and having it reap terror amongst the lego people.

Yeah, Im still mostly a kid.

You can find this dragon at Amazon for the entirely reasonable price of $39.95

Attempting to combine exercise, video games, and learning - this neat gadget from Fisher Price is an interesting crossover platform. Thinking ahead to Christmas, you might want to look into this for the little tyke on your list.

Smart Cycle plugs right into your TV, ready to take kids on learning adventures.. As they pedal, favorite character friends guide them through learning discoveries, games, and even exciting races. Bring the arcade experience home, with multiple levels of play for different ages and stages.

I don’t know how much of an arcade experience this is - but lets face it, once the little guy gets to ride up and down a mountain on this thing you probably wont be able to peel him/her off.

Another nifty feature is the included joystick - so when the little one gets all tired from driving all over the place they can use the joystick for a bit.

You can also go into race mode for that sheer joy of speed… and I wonder if little Jonny wont be so tired he just might take his nap on time?

It comes with a number of games which plug into a cartridge slot on the side and presumably more are on the way. Sounds like a great gift to me - heck, I wouldn’t mind a grown up version of this.

Originally priced at $100.00 its currently on sale at Amazon for only $89.19 - so get the savings while they last!

Billed as everything from a robotic desk lamp to a room guard - this snakelike remote controlled invention from the folks at Wowwee is an oddity. It not only acts as a r/c toy but it is capable of autonomous movement. Packing an IR radar sensor - light intensity sensor - speakers and boat loads of animated led’s. I;m not sure if its more disco ball or pseudo snake.

It can “see” as far as tracking and following light - so you could whip out that old laser pointer and have it follow the dot. The animated led’s have multiple patterns and sequences that change depending on the things “mood”.

While we’re at it did we mention its also an alarm clock? And you can attach an mp3 player to it and it becomes a speaker. Its also a dessert topping and a floor wax.

ok Im kidding about the floor wax

Supposedly it has mount points so if you set it up to patrol your room - not only will it track and follow intruders - you could mount soft projectile launchers to it and it will shoot the intruder.

Tell me thats not the best way to keep the dogs out of the kitchen eh?
With the remote you can also program up to 40 movements for some motion direction fun.

So what do we have here? I dunno exactly, its a bunch of unrelated technologies tied together in a weird but fascinating toy. I’m certainly interested in its hunt and shoot mode. I’m sure cats everywhere are not looking forward to this thing though.

Pretty fair price at $99.99 - Certainly would make a great Christmas gift ( yeah, I know its already time to start thinking of that )

You can get one from the manufacturers site HERE

One of my favorite places to go and gaze upon goofy gadgets ( Toys.brando.com.hk ) has just picked up ssomething I’ve been watching since it came out in Japan some time ago. Back then it wasn’t available for shipment in the states. Now everyone can enjoy this desktop space killer.

Its a small aquarium complete with fish (not real ones) that swim around the tank. Its powered by the USB connector on a 4 foot cord. You can also switch the light on via computer control too (blue led). As if this weren’t enough to get you to give away valuable desktop real estate - theres more!

With the enclosed software you can also feed and “play” with your fish - Feed / Medical / Play / Turn Light on /off. You fill it up with real water and a motor generates a real current.

Now thats probably enough for the goofy desktop toy enthusiast, but I’d actually take it a step further… You could hack the thing and put in real fish! - yeah sure - get that top off and put in a freshwater goldfish - or crayfish - or a small blue shrimp. All those do great in cold freshwater tanks. Here are the specs….

# Swimming fish with hinged tails and life-like motion
# Blue LED nightlight and water current
# Able to feed and play with your fish by using the interactive menu
# Plug and play
# No batteries required
# Compatible with Windows 2000/XP
# 4 feet USB cable
# Size: 11.2×11.2×8.8cm
# Weight: 343g

Youll need a usb port - and surprisingly 200 megs of hard drive space for the software …

A you can’t turn this down kinda deal at $23.00 HERE

And while your at it - you might as well hook up the scrolling usb message board to brag about your new fish tank.

Happy Friday!

Tiny Tag lets you turn your home into a laser tag arena. Though the small, black Tiny Tag “laser” is just 2-inches long, it packs enough power to shoot 50 feet. You must try to shoot your opponent, while avoiding your opponent’s shots.

Each time you are hit, a green light flashes and you hear a voice say something like “Bummer.” Each additional hit advances the green light. But be careful! If you get seven hits against you, your device will say -”Loser!”

Mind you for the price of $14.99 you get two - so you can easily afford to outfit the family for those long winter weekends of house hunting

You can find them HERE

I was gonna save this for the Friday fun gadget feature but I couldn’t wait - its just too cool.

Before shooting each suction cup-tipped, foam dart, you load a cap into each one. When the dart sticks to your target, the cap explodes with a load crack. Sometimes you can even see a spark.

Check out this video of it in action

You can get one at ThinkGeek for a mere $14.99!

With an astounding 792 pieces - this animated Lego creation will keep any kid busy for hours - the spine glows in the dark, its remote controlled and roars! - Woot!

Buy one at Lego for $90.00

How cool is this ? The game comes with a motion sensitive football, pad and main unit -

It plugs directly into a television and translates players’ running movements to control game play, allowing two players to compete against each other or play on the same team. Players stand on the control pad and step on left and right direction indicators to avoid tacklers and collect power-ups such as invincibility, earthquake, speed, and more. The football-shaped game paddle controls play selection, executes hand-offs for running plays, and allows you to throw passes.

Sounds like a heap of good fun - it does require 6 AA batteries - so if you have those to spare your all set. You can find it HERE for $59.95

What flies, floats, and hovers ? The Hydro Fly from Megatech!

Speed, incredible acceleration, and unbelievable maneuverability and the Hydro-Fly has got it - on land, on water and in the air - all wrapped up in one wild, ready-to-run R/C vehicle. Assembled and ready to run with radio, battery and charger include Wild maneuvers and fantasic vertical-climb capabilities 3 channel radio system.

Not too bad - any kid or kid-like adult would love one of these - just don’t let the batteries run out in the middle of a pond

You can find it on sale for $83.99 HERE