After the Xbox 360 and PS3 came out with their own motion-sensing tech, the poor Nintendo Wii has been moved to the gaming background because, well, console gaming in standard definition just doesn’t sound that cool anymore. A modder named Angel OD at the Bit-Tech forums, for some reason, wondered why no one ever slapped on a water-cooling kit on a Wii before, and started to work on a project to do just that. We believe no one has done it since it doesn’t seem to run hot enough to need one (at least ours doesn’t) which makes the exercise a bit unnecessary, but we’re not going to argue about the awesomeness of the finished product.
You saw the new iPad 2, thought the new Smart Cover accessory was pretty cool, but ultimately decided to stick with your old iPad until Apple manages to fit a Retina Display into a tablet. Problem is, you still think the whole Smart Cover thing is awesome, learned that it all worked with magnets embedded into the iPad 2 itself, and wished that there was some way to fit that thing onto your old iPad. Apparently, it’s possible, thanks to the magic of magnets. Specifically, block magnets that you can buy online. And super glue. It won’t magically give your old iPad the neat auto-sleep-and-wake feature, but at least you get a reasonably affordable folding screen protector that folds into a neat stand. Video after the break.
If you own a WP7 phone, then you’re probably aware that you can’t just install any app on it without going through the Marketplace first. It’s the law of the smartphone land, but like jailbreaking on iOS devices and rooting on Androids, the Windows Phone community, Microsoft enthusiasts have developed a way for you to unlock (that’s “jailbreak” in WP7 parlance) your WP7 phone. A new unlocker app called ChevronWP7 has been released, allowing you to sideload unnaproved apps that you might want to test without going through the Marketplace.
We’re aware that we may never see a white iPhone 4 on sale in Apple stores, and we know that demand for such a rare jewel can run pretty high. What did we do about it? Nothing, really. We just learned to live with our stock black iPhone 4s. What we didn’t know was that selling DIY kits that converts your ordinary black iPhone 4 into a rare, official-looking one can be a gold mine. A 17 year-old New Yorker found a way to do it, and he’s reportedly earned around $130,000 in six months from doing what we never thought of.
If you don’t mind the possibility of messing up or losing a couple of perfectly fine gadgets, here’s how you get your kid interested in science. A father from Brooklyn and his son wanted to send an HD camera into space and film the “blackness beyond our earth.” So how’d they do it? They built an enclosure out of a takeout box, tied it to a weather balloon, set the camera to record, and used an iPhone 4’s GPS to retrieve it. Needless to say, the backyard launch was a success: After reaching a height of about 19 miles above the earth, the balloons burst, the cushioned cam and iPhone fell back to earth with help from a parachute (it fell around 30 miles outside New York), and we get to watch more than six minutes of awesome footage. Video after the break.
