Anker 25W 5V - 5-Port Wall Charger

WHAT IS IT:  5-port dedicated smartphone/tablet power charger

NEW, FUTURE or RETRO:  new and hot

PREVIEW or REVIEW:  review

HOW GOOD IT IS:  One of the things Anker excels at, as a young new company, is thinking outside of the box and seeing solutions where no one else has even seen the challenges yet.

Case in point, this 5 port device charger. I have a place in my house that I have designated my “charging area”.  It is a section of countertop that is relatively unused, with an outlet that is rarely used, and in a convenient place to grab whatever is charging and dash out the door in the morning.  Even with such ideal conditions I usually end up not charging more than 2 devices at a time.   But it seems every day I am acquiring more and more things that need to be regularly charged.  Let’s count:  smartphone (every night); tablet (every night); pocket camera (several times a week); Bluetooth headset (several times a week); stereo Bluetooth headphones (several times a week); Bluetooth speakerphone (several times a week); and more.  And that’s only me, and does not include other members of the household.  Each of these devices charges optimally with certain currant parameters, so it is usually safest to use the OEM power-brick that came with the device.  That ends up with a rat’s nest of cables and transformers and always forgetting what fits what.

Sharp Talking Time

WHAT IS IT:  First ELSI quartz talking time clock (1979)

NEW, FUTURE or RETRO:  Retro

PREVIEW or REVIEW:  Review

 

HOW GOOD IS IT:
 

When the Sharp CT 660E “Talking Time” was introduced in 1979 it represented a technological breakthrough.  It was based on the first use of LSI (large scale integration) construction as opposed to the usual method at that time of mounting discrete components to a printed circuit board.  That made it an amazingly sophisticated product in the consumer marketplace at that time.  While there had been electro-mechanical “talking” devices previously this was the first talking clock to synthesize an actual human voice.  Talking products had a short-lived popularity in the 1980’s (who can forget your car insisting that “your door is a jar”) and then for the most part faded away.

Samsung S9C 55” OLED TV

WHAT IS IT:  Organic self-emitting pixel display TV with curved screen.

NEW, FUTURE or RETRO:  Brand new

PREVIEW or REVIEW:  Preview

HOW GOOD IS IT:  This product is just coming to market and has not been tested yet by Tech Toy Playground (there are no other reviews yet posted to Samsung's website).  From initial indications this will be THE television to knock the socks off your friends and neighbors.  From the first glance everyone will know it is different owing to the curved screen like you find in the fancier movie theaters.  Curved screens are possible with OLED displays (remember the predictions of roll-up TV's?) and the technology has been in development for many years.  The first OLED commercially sold was the Sony XEL-1 back in late 2007 which had an 11" screen and sold for about $2500.  They only made about 1000 of them.  Larger sizes were predicted but manufacturer's were hampered with major challenges when they tried to crank out larger sizes.

D-Link Wireless Pan and Tilt Day/Night Network Surveillance Camera

WHAT IS IT:  a simple video camera that you can view from virtually anywhere on your smartphone, tablet, laptop or computer that includes the ability to pan & tilt, zoom, listen to room sounds, take live snapshots and see the area whether it be daylight or night

NEW, FUTURE or RETRO: new

PREVIEW or REVIEW: review

HOW GOOD IS IT: This little camera is an amazing value for the price. While many camera-based home security systems are designed to give you information after the fact, this camera will alert your smartphone if there is unusual motion activity or sounds and let you see it live, while panning, tilting and zooming to get the "best view" before you snap photos and call authorities.

Logitech Harmony Ultimate all-in-one remote

WHAT IS IT: Universal programmable home entertainment system remote control with smartphone app option
NEW, FUTURE or RETRO: new and hot

PREVIEW or REVIEW: review

HOW GOOD IS IT: The Harmony Ultimate does so much, in so many ways, the way I use it versus the way you use it versus the way your neighbor uses it can be, and probably are, worlds apart. Logitech's product description certainly lets you know that it is designed to operate several devices (in other words, replace several remote controls) and also that it can be programmed to set up sequences of events, like turn TV on, set to proper input, turn amplifier on and set to proper input and turn off unused devices. The combinations are endless and no matter what, some won't always work as expected. I've owned previous similar remotes from Logitech and other companies and I'll attest to the Ultimate being the most user-friendly and versatile of them all.

Anker Bluetooth 4.0 wireless earbuds

WHAT IS IT:  Bluetooth stereo earbuds with talk capability

NEW, FUTURE or RETRO:  new and hot

PREVIEW or REVIEW:  review

HOW GOOD IT IS:  In my estimation this is a breakthrough product category and one of those things that is a “must have”.  Why you may ask, since there are headphones, earphones, ear buds and other listening devices of nearly every size, shape, price and function.

From the Tech Toy Wizard

This site isn’t a technology forum, in fact you will rarely encounter a technical term here.  It’s about the FUN of technology … past, present and future.

The past because great ideas spring from humble beginnings.  Some of our most fun tech toys of today were amazing inventions in their day and whether you remember them with nostalgia or are curious to know more about them Tech Toy Playground reports on them, puts them in perspective and lets you know how they influenced today’s technology, and even posts product reviews on them.

There are a lot of places to get details and even reviews on what’s hot in today’s tech marketplace.  We give you that and more, including how a product fits into the overall scheme of things that affect your life and what kind of influence it will have on future technology development.

The future of course is anybody’s guess and Tech Toy Playground is great at guessing.  Who knows, the next coolest gadget on Earth might be something that you first heard about right here.