Nest Thermostat
The Nest Thermostat is a lovely piece of work that brings thermostat technology forward and away from the dull, boring and antiquated units from Honeywell and the like that do no more than frustrate the average home owner. Nest brings Android and iOS apps, it learns your behaviour and above all – cuts your costs.
That’s the theory anyway. Sometimes it can be difficult to extrapolate the beautiful design from the actual functionality and true cost savings. On the other hand, any theormostat that gives me the ability to manage the temperature in my home via remote means is most definitely a step forward. Add in the obvious beauty of the unit, and it’s ability to ‘learn’ – and all in all – you’ve got a winning product.
Nest has just signed an exclusive partnership with Lowes – and looks to retail for about $249 per unit.
$249
Check it out here, at Lowes.com
Samsung Galaxy S III
While MorningLemon.com HQ are iPhone 4S users, it’s not as though we’re beholden to the device or company that makes it. Far from it, we’ll gladly use whatever is the best device for our specific needs.
The times are-a-changin’ when it comes to Android devices. Finally, Google has recognized that for Android to gain any sort of strong foothold as a brand, there must be some sort of standard interface and functionality rather than allowing manufacturers de facto control over the look and feel of the device. We’ve seen numerous enhancements in Ice Cream Sandwich that enable a level of stylistic control and device similarity that Google wasn’t able to promise earlier. Volume is the name of the game, and this is where Android will succeed – for that to happen, you have to take control and homologate the visual design of the core OS and take it away from the manufacturers, who will always lean towards gimmicky and poor design if they feel it’ll earn them a few extra points on their quarterly results.
When it comes to the Galaxy S III – you get everything you want, and more. With new and enhanced features like Smart Stay, Direct Call, Social tag, S Voice, S Beam and a 4.8 HD Super AMOLED display – you can be certain that, for right now, this is the best phone on the market.
$Depends
Check it out at Samsung.com
The Chemical Brothers: Don’t Think
I’ve long been a fan of the Brothers, and while Further and We Are the Night were good, not great, this – this here – this is great. This is the Chemical Brothers at their best, live, loud and with visuals.
Check out the movie site here.
£16.99
Grab the blu-ray or DVD here (ffs, get the blu-ray)
Or, if you’re Stateside;
$26.99
The Chemical Brothers: Don’t Think [Blu-ray/CD] from Amazon.com
BIEGERT and FUNK QlockTwo W Watch with Words
Speaking of watches, how about one for those of us that struggle with the abstract notion of quickly reading and deciphering two different sets of hands set against a circular structure of well placed numbers? Now, I will readily admit, I’m actually quite good at it now, but as a younger man it actually filled me with a subset of angst when asked the time while I was clearly wearing a watch. I would worry that the asker was somehow dissatisfied with the speed of my response, indicating that I was, well, slow. No more! No more, I say! All you have to do now, my angst ridden watch wearers, is read. You can do that, can’t you?
QLOCKTWO W, case in natural brushed stainless steel or black, 35 x 35 x 7mm, black leather or natural rubber strap, calendar day and second display, LED technology. Available from autumn 2012.
$TBD – coming this autumn.
Check it out at qlocktwo.com
Logitech UE Air Speaker
We’ve all seen speaker systems designed for small spaces and personal use. There is literally hundreds of them on the market from at least a hundred different manufacturers.
I use one in my kitchen, but there’s something my kitchen system is missing, and it’s going to feature prominently more and more often in the future – AIRPLAY. Apple’s Airplay technology allows you to instantly stream your songs from your laptop, iPhone, iPod, iPad and other licensed devices to Airplay certified devices like the Logitech UE Speaker.
Here’s how it works; while in your Music app you’ll notice an icon on your device that looks like the one in the product image, a rectangle with a triangle intersecting it. Pressing this icon will bring up a list of Airplay enabled devices in the vicinity. So let’s say you want to play music on your UE Speaker and you’d like to listen to playlist from your iPhone.
Go to your Music app, click the Airplay icon, select your Logitech UE device and click play – viola – you are now listening to music on your UE speaker, in completely high fidelity, there is no loss of sound quality while the data is transferred from your phone to the speaker via your wifi network.
Sounds great, right? Yeah, I want one too. Airplay is going to very quickly become a common standard for even the most layman of folk. You have been warned.
$399
Get your UE Speaker from Logitech.com
Tallgrass 8-bit Pale Ale
Tallgrass Beers puts the party in LAN-party with 8-bit beer. If you’re going to throw a shindig, make it interesting – give people something to talk about or try for the first time. Why not a themed craft-brew for you and your fraggin’ friends? Oh better yet, what better way to enjoy a lonely retro-gaming session than getting completely sloshed with a beer that understands you?
Here, have a beer. Relax. Let’s beat Super Mario together.
More info here from Tallgrassbeer.com
$8.50 4-pack
Available to order via France44.com
Archer Season 1 and Season 2 Blu-Ray
Quite simply, the best show on television right now. Season 3 is rip-roaring it’s way through space right now, or rather, “the danger zone”. Catch up with ISIS mates Sterling, Lana, Malory, Cyril, Cheryl, Pam, Dr. Krieger, Ray and Woodhouse right from the very beginning.
Egotistical, self-serving, insensitive, callous, lacking empathy – that’s Sterling Archer. He’s also ISIS’ most dangerous agent, more so for his unpredictability than anything based on pure skill. And it’s a pleasure to watch it all unfold.
Raised by his valet, Woodhouse, Sterling Archer is Malory Archer’s son. Malory runs ISIS, the International Secret Intelligence Service. Lana is the amazonian beauty who teams with Archer on most missions. Pam and Cheryl are office staff who tend to get involved far more often than they should. Dr Krieger is, well, difficult to fully explain – think crazed maniac and brilliant scientist rolled in to one. Cyril is the ISIS accountant and Ray fills in the need for the gay-agent.
Be sure to catch all the literary and other references from Archer too, they’re hilarious. It’s probably what makes the character so endearing, he’s truly an idiot-savant.
Check out the book of Archer we featured earlier this year, here.
Archer: The Complete Season One [Blu-ray] from Amazon.com
Archer: The Complete Season Two [Blu-ray] from Amazon.com
Follow the man himself on twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/codenameduchess
Lana: Okay, that was a fluke.
Sterling: Yeah, a fluke of nature. Because I happen to have perfect situational awareness, Lana. Which cannot be taught, by the way. Like a poet’s … mind for … to make the perfect words.
The Hunger Games Trilogy
With the first instalment of the movie trilogy on it’s way to theatres, I decided to give the Hunger Games Trilogy a go. It’s interesting to me how, without question, the most pertinent and voracious readers and writers both live and breath within a much younger demographic.
Generally, books without pictures were for old people. There’s been something of a renaissance since the likes of J.K. Rowling and Stephanie Meyer made books cool for tweens. When I was younger, the height of literary genius were the choose-your-own-adventure books. Boy, have times changed, and what an exceptional triumph it’s been for publishers.
The Hunger Games, I think, tops them all – as it lends itself to both sexes, and a slightly older audience than the Harry Potter books. Very much enjoyed, very much recommended.
$30
The Hunger Games Trilogy Boxed Set from Amazon.com
Ferrari F12 Berlinetta
So you and Jeremy Clarkson thought V12′s were done did you? Oh no my friend, not at all. The marque that made powerful V12′s their standard has done it again and delivered on a promise to offer the world a pure driving experience. The cockpit has been sanitized of unnecessary clutter, the gauges and dials and knobs scaled back to only the essentials. Yes, indeed – 740+ horsepower from a fire breathing V12 that doesn’t redline until 8500rpm and sounds like nothing you’ve ever heard before. The Ferrari that understands what enthusiasts want.
The sound in particular sets this car apart. It’s funny to say, as most Ferrari’s, lets be honest, sound fantastic – but there’s something eloquent, something exotic and sensual about the noise this V12 makes. Truly exceptional. It sounds like a level of engineering that shouldn’t be available to the common man.
$TBD
Check it out at the F12 Berlinetta Micro-site, f12berlinetta.com
Pre-Launch, Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa put the Berlinetta through it’s paces at Fiorano, Ferrari’s private test track.
And then, the launch video…
Playstation Vita
PS3 capable gaming on the go? Yes, please. Dual analog sticks? Yes, please. Rear touch panel? Yes, please. Quad core, OLED display, 3G, WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, touch screen and motion sensors – YES PLEASE!! Hyper-expensive memory card that’s required if you really want to enjoy the thing? I am disappoint, Sony.
That’s ok, I’ll overlook it this time considering all the other improvements you’ve made over past failures. Game changer? Almost. They’ve taken the Apple approach of giving consumers what they want, but just couldn’t keep it up when it came to the memory card, that’s when old-Sony reared it’s ugly head. Unfortunate, but something we can move beyond.
Multi-touch 5-inch organic light emitting display (OLED) as the front display Multi-touch pad on the rear of the device Dual analog sticks Two digital cameras (front and rear) Software titles on small, Vita-specific flash memory-based cards Three motion sensors, gyroscope, accelerometer and electronic compass Advanced and fast Wi-Fi connectivity Free PlayStation Network access, including trophy support and new Vita features “LiveArea” and “Near” Vita can play PSP titles, minis, PS one classics, video and comics from the PlayStation Store
Technical Specifications
CPU – ARM Cortex-A9 core (4 core) GPU – SGX543MP4+ External Dimensions – Approx. 182.0 x 18.6 x 83.5mm (width x height x depth) (tentative, excludes largest projection) Touch Screen – 5-inches (16:9), 960 x 544, Approx. 16 million colors, OLED Multi touch screen (capacitive type) Rear Touch Pad – Multi-touch pad (capacitive type) Cameras – Front camera, rear camera Game Media/Storage – New Vita-specific dedicated flash-based game medium; dual slots, one for the new game medium, the other is for storage media to be utilized for personal content and download content Sound Built-in stereo speakers Built-in microphone Sensors – Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer), three-axis electronic compass Location Built-in GPs Wi-Fi location service support Keys / Switches PS button Power button Directional buttons (Up/Down/Right/Left) Action buttons (Triangle, Circle, Cross, Square) Shoulder buttons (Right/Left) Right stick, Left stick START button, SELECT button Volume buttons (+/-) Wireless communications IEEE 802.11b/g/n (n = 1×1) (Wi-Fi) (Infrastructure mode/Ad-hoc mode) Bluetooth 2.1+EDR (A2DP/AVRCP/HSP) Battery – Internal/embedded (not removable) * Connectivity subject to Wi-Fi availability coverage limitations. ** 3G functionality and coverage requires purchase and activation of an additional AT&T data plan. Connectivity subject to 3G coverage limitations.
Product Description
Sony’s PlayStation Vita, previously codenamed “Next Generation Portable”, is the successor to the PlayStation Portable hardware series. Vita retains the familiar general form of the PlayStation Portable hardware series while dramatically improving on virtually every aspect of its use with powerful and exciting new features including: dual touch pads at the front and rear, dual cameras at the front and rear, dual analog sticks, a 5-inch OLED screen, six-axis motion sensors and a three-axis electronic compass and exceptional built-in connectivity via Wi-Fi. Taken together this makes for a handheld gaming device that truly signals the entry of handhelds into the world of Next-Gen gaming.
$249.99
PlayStation Vita – WiFi from Amazon.com
Zeal Optics Zeal Z3 GPS Goggle
The most advanced goggles on the planet. The Zeal Optics Z3 GPS goggles have built in GPS and HUD within the goggles themselves to provide you with vital information such as speed, altitude, run count and certain analytics on how hard you’ve been shredding. Awesome.
The mountain takes on a whole new perspective with the most advanced optics and GPS technology of The Z3 GPS Goggle. The lenses offer proprietary One-Lens™ technology that incorporates a polarized filter that not only cuts 99.9% of glare from the sun and slopes to reduce eye fatigue, but also automatically adjusts to varying light levels, going from a light yellow tint in low light, to a dark rose/brown tint in brighter light. The Zeal Blend™ lens tint enhances contrast and slope definition comes alive, making your skiing adventure remarkable.
$470
Zeal Optics Zeal Z3 Gps Goggle from Amazon.com
2013 Audi A3
I’ve mentioned this before, but more and more I’m beginning to be drawn to smaller vehicles. I just don’t see the point to these massive boats, specifically for cars, SUVs, trucks, minivans and their ilk I can certainly understand – but for cars? No, they don’t need to be Camero sized anymore. It’s not necessary. What exactly is it you’re doing in your massive car that you require that type of size?
So here comes the brand new 2013 Audi A3, which unfortunately doesn’t look like it’ll be coming stateside. What a shame, when will we learn.
$TBD
Check it out here at RoadandTrack.com
The All New 2012 VW Beetle.
Looking decidedly less, well, lame than it’s previous iteration the all new VW Beetle seems to have a bit more in common with it’s Porsche and Audi stablemates than it does the generally boxy-with-curves VW, and more power to them! The base model will start at less than $19,000, the all new Diesel TDI was just announced at the Chicago Autoshow – and the VW team has a live blog up for you to keep track of all the latest news on the new Beetle.
I’m not entirely sure what’s happened to me lately, but I’ve found myself drawn more to cars like this and the Toyota iQ than, say, any retro-themed car. I think that’s where the issue is, I’m completely and utterly finished with retro-styling on cars. The Dodge Challenger finalized the vision, it can be done no better – stop trying. I like to see progress. I like to see the latest technology pushed to tough price points and tight margins. Not old, over-priced tech being sold on the basis on a name or symbol. Like porn, basically.
$19,000 base
Check out the 2012 VW Beetle blog
The SuperBowl YouTube Commercial was pretty awesome too.
Shinkansen 0 Series Bullet Train Model
The 0 Series is the oldest of the “bullet” trains native to Japan, and were the first trains to grace the new high speed rail tracks in 1964. Yes, you read that correctly, Japan has had high speed rail since 1964. We’re still “discussing” it. With air travel the way it is, who in sweet-f wouldn’t want to travel by high speed rail?
Celebrate the history of high speed rail’s earliest trains with the Shinkansen 0 Series Bullet Train Model
$1116
Available from the Japan Trend Shop
Stussy Eye Gear Spring 2012 Collection
After a period of semi-obscurity Stussy is stronger than ever as a business. The company has strong fundamentals and believes in a design first philosophy, allowing them to flirt with us stylistically. The Spring 2012 Collection is no slouch. There is not standout here for me, aside perhaps from the Lester set, otherwise the collection as a whole is very strong as each individual piece can stand on it’s own as a quality piece of eye gear.
These fresh frames are a remix of some classic shapes along with modern versions of Stussy shades from the past. All frames are hand-built using some of the best materials available. The plastic frames are constructed from sheets of high quality cellulose acetate, a material that gives the frames a nice weight and buttery feel along with some rich color options. The metal frames are made from a three metal blend which makes them nice and burly but still maintains a lighter weight and smooth finish. All Stussy sunglasses are fitted with high optical clarity CR-39 lenses which offer 100% UVA/UVB protection, shatter resistance and a light weight. Check ‘em out and bust your own groove!!!
$Varies
Check it out at Stussy.com
