Christmas 3.0 — A digital dreamland of gadgety gifts for

0 Comments | Deseret News (Salt Lake City), Nov 28, 2004 | by Brice Wallace Deseret Morning News

You might think you have a dilemma. You think, "Whoa, how hard is it to buy a gift for a gadget-loving someone who already has everything?"

After all, they're hip-deep in camcorders, personal video players, digital cameras, scanners, printers and cell phones that do everything but shoot off fireworks. You wonder what's left.

Well, at least a few things. I mean, how often have you seen this person consulting a talking dictionary, technologically eavesdropping on bird calls, scanning magazines or taking photos with a little stick, watching The Big Game piped into their sunglasses, charging their cell phone with their jacket or having a robot clean their carpets?

Yeah. That's what I thought.

For people who get a charge out of wearing innovative clothing, SCOTTeVEST Inc. and Global Solar Energy have just the thing. The companies have combined forces on a solar-powered jacket that will carry, connect and charge up portable electronic devices.

SCOTTeVEST already offered clothing with hidden pockets and connection wires -- 42 pockets in a jacket and 28 in a vest -- and its Solar SeV ($425, www.scottevest.com) features solar panels, removable sleeves and more than 30 hidden pockets.

The panels are flexible thin-film photovoltaic material that convert sunlight into power to charge a hidden battery packet that's about the size of a deck of cards. The battery can charge any device that's usually powered with a USB charger.

Forecast for clouds? No problem. The SCOTTeVEST says direct sunlight is not needed. The typical charge in direct light can take two to three hours, although the battery is designed to power devices quickly after the panels are exposed to sunlight. The panels can be removed or used separately from the jacket.

You know how your mom also chastised you for sitting too close to the TV? She'd throw a hissy fit about the Eyetop DVD ($600, www.eyetop.net) from French company Ingineo.

Eyetop DVD looks like blue sunglasses but incorporates a color LCD screen in the lower center part of a lens. Just a quick glance lets a video fan enjoy that new "Seinfeld" DVD, with earbuds providing the sound, as a belt-worn control unit pumps out the signals.

The company calls it the "world's first personal, portable, private video entertainment system" and a perfect way to watch a DVD without disturbing other people -- unless, of course, they're already disturbed by someone watching a show in their goggles.

But DVDs aren't the only option. The video eyewear can be used with camcorders, video games, laptops or VCRs. They even let a user sneak a peek at Kodak photo CD images. The DVD player, meanwhile, can connect to a regular TV, too.

Watch TV in bed. Watch instant replays via a portable TV at the ballpark, dark or daylight. Just don't drive with it playing. Skiing's probably a bad idea, too.

Want to get somebody a mini-piano but dread the thought of hearing nonstop, nonsensical plunking for weeks? Radio Shack is among the companies with a keyboard that has light-up keys to cue the player to the proper pitch.

The MIDI Light Up Keyboard, with 61 full-size keys, costs $199.99 (www.radioshack.com). It comes with a batch of songs to learn, with keys lighting the way to harmony. A headphone jack also can cut down the noise factor.

If you really want to escape the noise, head outdoors and listen to nature. The Brunton Nature Ear II ($279, www.brunton.com) can help. It's designed to amplify up to 48 decibels the frequencies common to bird songs.

And while you're out, show your fellow birders your favorite pictures, suspended from your neck. Really. Nokia "image lockets," called Medallion I and Medallion II, sport holders to display up to eight personal still images.

Color images are uploaded from a compatible mobile phone via infrared or from a computer and are displayed in 96-by-96-pixel squares. The medallions ($299.99 each, www.nokiausa.com) also contain a backlit timepiece available at the touch of a button. The Medallion I is designed for necks, but the Medallion II's strap allows it to make like a bracelet.

Radio Shack has an ultra-small camera for people looking to inconspicuously squeeze off a few quick shots. The Camex 3-in-1 Digital Pen Camera ($15.99, www.radioshack.com) is a small digital camera attached to the end of a pen. Photos can be downloaded onto a computer.

The camera shoots pictures or video clips or can be used as a Webcam, with the aperture, white balance and lighting controlled automatically. Its 2-megabyte memory can hold up to 152 images, although higher-resolution formats can cut the amount down to 19 pictures. It is compatible with Windows 98, 2000 and XP.

From a pen that's a camera to a pen-sized scanner: The battery- operated Planon DocuPen scanner ($199.99, www.docupen.com) is the size and shape of a pen but can scan and store up to 100 pages into its 2-megabyte memory. An 8.5-by-11-inch document can be scanned in as little as four seconds, and a little red light will blink if you scan too quickly.

Data can be transferred to a PC, and included PaperPort software allows the user to merge images, put them in e-mails or convert a scanned printed-text image into editable text.