Play Conveyor never meant to win beauty contests, as he stared at the lump on his desk—an ordinary wired mouse—and decided the whole industry had been lying to him. Every curve, every rubber grip, every “vertical” or “ambidextrous” label still left his wrist aching after three hours of editing. So he cracked the thing open, kept the guts, and threw the shell away.
SpaceX just flung the doors open on the Starship HLS lunar lander and the view that greeted us is just stunning. Four astronauts are sitting in a circle of chairs, with their backs to the curved wall, which is as wide as a city bus. The sunlight streaming in is making the metal ribs underfoot look like polished silver. Above them, a massive 30-foot-high dome looms large – big enough to park a house in. With NASA breathing down their neck and demanding the schedule get cut down by months, SpaceX made the decision to rip out the seats, shelves and half the cargo racks.
Unitree, a robot manufacturer based in Hangzhou, released a new video yesterday showing a person clad in black straps and sensors standing on a gym mat. Just across town, a G1 robot is in the exact identical attitude. At first appearance, there is no discernible difference between a human punch and a robot punch. They refer to this setup as an Embodied Avatar.
Most Star Wars fans have probably held various lightsabers over the yaers, whether they be the plastic toys that hum like dying bees, or the $300 aluminum tubes that light up like airport runways. None of those ever seem to just vanish into thin air… until now. HeroTech’s third generation of retractable lightsabers – or should we just call this one the “Impossible” – has finally cracked the code on something that every prop maker, Disney Imagineer and crafty inventor has been trying to pull off for decades: to make one that lives inside a perfectly accurate Graflex hilt, snaps out to full length quick as a wink, glows like a star and then without warning sucks itself back in with a mechanical whirl.
Photo credit: BricksAndCanvas
On October 31, a Category 4 typhoon known as Kalmaegi devastated Cebu. By sunrise, the entire neighborhood was submerged in a murky brown slurry that smelled like a mix of diesel fumes and raw sewage. That neighborhood was home to a person who posts on Reddit under the username “bricksandcanvas”; he’d lost his house, his furniture, and, most importantly, almost his life. But three days later, he was able to dig out his iPhone 17 Pro Max from the dirt, and it was still functional.
When you first open the box, you’ll notice how light it is. Amazon managed to trim more than 30 grams off the old model. That means the new Fire HD 10, priced at $69.99 (down from $139.99), will slide comfortably into a backpack pocket without dragging the zipper down on you. Hold it in one hand for an hour and your wrist won’t be bothered.
Photo credit: HiPeR Lab
Jerry Tang walked into UC Berkeley’s HiPeR Lab with a small shoebox-sized container in his hands. Inside was a compact quadcopter drone called DUAWLFIN, which was super light – lighter than a bag of oranges – and could move at a pretty good clip – faster than someone who’s taking a brisk walk. Four propellers, four motors, and four wheels – basically just the essentials. Tang flipped a switch on his laptop and DUAWLFIN took off, hovering for a second before dropping straight down in a bit of a free fall. The propellers just kept spinning though, and the wheels suddenly kicked in, taking over.
Craft Studio has just launched the OmniOne Pocket PC, a handheld computer that runs full Windows 11 on a chip more commonly found in super-cheap laptops. Slide it out of your coat pocket and you’ve got a real desktop ready to go for email, spreadsheets, or those Zoom calls you just can’t seem get out of.
Ploopy has just launched the smallest trackball mouse device you’ll actually use. The Nano 2 retains the original’s palm-sized design, but adds one button that feels like a secret handshake with your cursor. Roll the 38mm ball with your thumb, and the pointer will travel exactly where you desire. Holding the button causes pages to scroll as smoothly as a wheel. When you release, you’re back in control of your aim. There are no unnecessary clicks or clutter—only one switch that you program yourself.
