Popular Gadgets

These are the 15 most popular gadgets from the past week, based on how many people looked at their pages.

The Remote Control Night Vision Spy Car

I can't tell you how many times I've thought "What if I could mount a video-camera on the front of an RC car and drive it around while seeing what the camera sees". Ok, I'll tell you - quite a few, because I'm an RC junkie.

This remote control car not only lets you see what the car sees, it does it with a night-vision camera that sends images wirelessly to a remote headset with an eyepiece and LCD, allowing you to see what the car sees in the dark! Kids will absolutely love this. If they can ever pry it away from dad, that is.

Aero-Garden Kit

This is the perfect gift for cooks or gardeners or yourself, no green thumb required. It's a counter-top herb garden, with the perfect balance of organic nutrients, oxygen, lighting and automation technology. No messy soil is needed. It comes complete with everything including seed pods and nutrients.

Maytag SkyBox Personal Beverage Vendor

"Ka-Thunk." Want to hear that satisfying vending-machine sound when grabbing a cold beverage? This customizable personal beverage vendor from Maytag holds 66 12-ounce cans or 33 12-ounce bottles. Child lock-out lets you lock some sections while leaving others accessible. To add some personal style, the front and side panels of the SkyBox can be customized with NFL, college, NASCAR, and other sports and beverage logos. It operates without coins or dollar bills. And just think about how much room you can free up in your refrigerator.

The World's Smallest Indoor Remote Control Helicopter

Last year I bought myself an indoor RC helicopter, and I thought it was the coolest thing ever. Now I wish I had this one instead. It's the smallest, most stable, and lightest remote control helicopter available. It has two contra-rotating coaxial rotors that use gyroscopic inertia to keep the copter balanced and two micro-motors that spin the rotors at varying speeds, resulting in precise and effortless movement up to a range of 50'. Did I mention how small it is?

Philips DECT Digital Baby Monitor

Having suffered through two kids worth of basic, no-frills baby monitors, I now greatly appreciate the features that Philips have built into their new DECT digital baby monitors. DECT stands for Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunication, and it's basically the same technology built into high-quality digital cordless phones. Unlike the older-style baby monitors I had to use before, this one has zero interference from nearby monitors or other devices in or around the home. It's also a totally private connection -- the neighbors can no longer listen in.

Recently featured in Time Magazine, the Philips DECT Baby Monitor features a two-way intercom so you can communicate with your child directly from the handset, an integrated thermometer reads ambient room temperature and displays it on the handset and base, 5 different lullabies are controllable from the handset, a nighlight is controllable from the handset, and rechargeable batteries with up to 12 hours operation between charges.

Also included are a belt clip, neck cord, zippered travel bag, and a lifetime guarantee.

CEIVA Digital Photo Frame

CEIVA offers the world's only connected digital photo frames. With a digital photo frame, you can display photos from your digital camera as if they were regular photos, except that the frame can bring your pictures to life in a full-color slideshow.

CEIVA frames can receive photos through the internet (no computer required) directly from friends and family anywhere in the world. New photos can also be sent directly to the frame from camera phones.

CEIVA Digital Photo Frames are on sale now with a number of special offers to choose from.

Digital Picture Frame

Why stare at the same photo all the time? This 8" digital picture frame has 64 MB of built-in memory allowing you to store up to 100 6-megapixel photos. It can be positioned in six different ways for optimum landscape and portrait viewing, and is wall-mountable. Built-in speakers can play music while it plays a slideshow of your photos (remote included). New photos can be loaded via USB 1.0 or 2.0, or via various digital camera flash memory card formats.

Handheld GPS, MP3, Translator, Converter, and Audio Book Player

Does it shine your shoes? No, but this amazing wireless device combines a GPS, MP3 player, audio book player, picture viewer, world clock, currency and measurement converters and a calculator in a device that fits in the palm of your hand and weighs less than 6 oz. Don't leave home without it.

Voice-Activated R2-D2 Droid from Star Wars

How would you like your own little R2-D2 droid chasing you through the hallways of your battle-cruiser... er, I mean house?

This motorized replica responds to more than 40 voice commands, and plays games like tag using an infra-red sensor to find people.

R2-D2 has lights, a swiveling dome top, and sounds that mimic the real thing.

Shure E500PTH - The Ultimate Sound Isolating Earphones

While these may the most expensive earphones ever, except perhaps for those with gold plating and diamond studs, the Shure E500PTH Sound Isolating Earphones are pretty much the earphones to drool over.

Sound quality is, no argument, the best in the market.

I normally hate ear bud style headphones, but the comfort of these can't be beat. They feel like nothing is there.

And one of the nicest features - push to hear. Most noise-isolating earphones do just that, isolate the outside noise so that all you hear is your music. And then when someone talks to you, or you actually want to hear something outside, you have to pull them off. The Shures have a switch that causes them to reverse the sound isolation, so that you hear what's outside and not what's playing.

They include a carrying case, and the "push-to-hear" switch can be removed for increased portability. You can't go wrong with these, as long as you can afford the steep price.

The Tumbling Vacuum Marinator

Why wait to marinate?

Winner of Popular Science Magazine's Best of What's New Award in Home Technology, this marinator creates a vacuum inside the barrel that causes the food's fibers to stretch and become porous, while paddles inside of the rotating barrel flip and coat the food with marinade.

Unlike conventional techniques that only flavor the surface and require 24 hours of marinating for thick cuts of meat, the automated marinator infuses restaurant-quality flavor and succulence into a 5-lb. brisket in less than 20 minutes, while using half the amount of marinade required for pan or bag soaking.

Northern Lights LED Sphere

With shifting and undulating lights reminiscent of the Aurora Borealis, this illuminated sculpture simulates the atmospheric phenomenon using powerful blue, white, and green LEDs projected through a fragmented diffuser against the light-bending curve of a silvered, borasilic glass globe.

Got that? Me neither. All you need to know is: it looks way cool, and has absolutely no other purpose.

Lego Mindstorms NXT Robotic Building System

This all-new Lego Mindstorms pack has a new NXT Intelligent Brick with a 32-bit microprocessor and more memory. The kit features 3 servo motors with built-in rotation sensors for precise control, and over 500 Lego Technic elements. The computer software features intuitive drag-and-drop programming.

Casio Atomic Time Watch

I've seen so many watches lately that record and display all sorts of data that I'd forgotten what a watch is really for: to tell you the time. But how do you make sure your watch has the right time? With Casio's atomic time watch, you don't need to worry about it.

The watch receives radio signals from five atomic clocks across the world, thus ensuring that your watch will tell you the correct time for the next 30 million years. Other features include the usual multiple alarms (4), timer, stopwatch, and solar power!

Closet Organizing Trouser Rack

Taking up only an 18-inch width in your closet, this pant rack keeps twenty pairs of slacks neatly hung and readily accessible. It easily mounts to a closet wall or door and has a 10-gauge steel support bracket to hold 20 solid birch wood dowels that let you hang trousers flush against the wall, then swing them out individually, up to 180 degrees, for easy selection. Can also hold ties. (Just dare them to look in your closet.)