Digital Winter 2008

I just realised I haven’t blogged for ages, mainly due to the fact that my feet haven’t touched the ground in the last week and a bit.

So what follows is a very, very brief digest of what I’ve been up to, one post at a time:

DIGITAL WINTER 2008 TECH EVENT

This is basically where a bunch of companies have stalls which show you their latest gadgets, and sometimes their flagship products as well.  Siemens showed their new concept solar-powered dect phone too.

Sandisk's new Sansa Fuse at the top, and its mini cousin, bottom

There was so much food and cake available, but I’d stuffed myself with sushi on the way there, annoyingly.  Secretly I was dying for a nice cup of tea and a chocolate biscuit – but this was no time for confectionery or patisserie, it was time for some serious gadget-hunting.

The technology was suitably diverse, so here are a few highlights of the event.  Have a look at Sandisk’s Sansa Fuse (at the top) which has 4GB inbuilt memory, and a slot for a micro SD card for future expansion. 

… and the red ones have a great Ferrari-style paint job, which doesn’t have any bearing on the performance of the product, but looks nice.

 

           Next up…

Power Traveller's Solar Gorilla Laptop Charger

…a look at the Solar Gorilla from PowerTraveller, a gigantic solar panel which you can use alongside their battery to charge up your laptop – you can also use a mains adaptor with the battery if you’re stuck in the dark, and get about 6 hours’ worth of laptop life from a full charge.  The MacBook Pro is there for scale.

In fact, I have the miniature one of these, the powermonkey which I use for charging my mobile – although the larger product on display is probably better suited for use in remote areas that catch a lot of sun, i.e. anywhere except London.

 

                                  And Finally….

Veho 200x USB Microscope with 2p coin on screen

…the USB microscope from Veho, one of the more amusing products on display.  You can see on the screen a 2p coin magnified 200 times from the coin underneath the microscope.  Yes, *of course* I stuck my fingers underneath, you can see the ridges and everything. 

For one secret and hideous moment I wondered whether this would be a useful beauty accessory for facial excavation and then decided against pointing the device at a particularly good spot on my cheek in public, what with wanting to look like a serious technology journalist and all, although I can’t resist adding that you’re either a squeezer or a leaver in this particular field.

So Digital Winter was quite fun.  If you want to see these pics a few minutes after I’ve taken them, then please feel free to subscribe to my Flickr Stream, where I’ll upload them from my N95.  I promise not to upload any pictures from the microscope.