Awesome Tech

Techmoan shows off another strange bit of 1980s tech. The Magic Message was a cassette tape player attached to a remote transducer and designed to play audio descriptions of products when a salesperson wasn’t available. It had suction cups and was designed to be installed inside of a window.

With locations in Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia, the Museum of Soviet Arcade Machines is filled with vintage arcade machines that date back to the Soviet era. Incredibly, the machines have all been restored and are playable. Baklykov. Live takes us on a tour of the museum, its machines, and other artifacts.

We’re not too sure how we feel about a fuzzy keyboard, but this is the Internet, so somebody out there needs to try every idea at least once. Makers Evan and Katelyn took an ordinary computer keyboard and gave it a tactile feel with the same kind of velvet flocking they put in jewelry boxes. Last-minute Valentine’s gift, anyone?

Performing artist Amy Inspiral shows off some sweet hula hoop moves, enhanced by a hypnotic light show courtesy of her Moodhoops FutureHoop Pro. The high-tech hula hoop has embedded RGB LEDs and can display animated patterns animations using a persistence-of-vision effect.

Keymacs makes high-end keyboards. In this video, they show how LEGO bricks and polyurethane can be used to create a double-shot keycap. They then use a CNC router to engrave the details and refine the shape of the mold, then make an additional set of molds to produce the contrasting letter embedded in each key.

These neat desktop gadgets add a splash of color and light anywhere you have sound. Each of these light bars creates a colorful light show using 32 LEDs and a built-in microphone and can be set to 18 different color schemes. Grab a 2-pack in The Awesomer Shop for just $35.

Snagit lets you easily capture the images and video from your Mac or PC screen and annotate them to help share ideas, create tutorials, and provide feedback. It can capture your entire desktop, a window, or region, as well as video from your webcam and microphone. Save 36% off the regular price in The Awesomer Shop.

Videos and film images aren’t moving at all. They’re just a collection of back-to-back frames that our brains stitch together to create the illusion of movement. Joe Hanson of the PBS series Be Smart takes a deep dive into the way that our eyes and minds process images and how motion picture devices work.

Laser cutters are useful tools to have in a workshop, but they take up a lot of space. Rendyr’s Optic Laser Cutter folds up small when not in use, and its detachable cutting mat means you can cut on top of objects like tabletops for a virtually limitless work area. It has dual laser diodes totaling 15-watts and a built-in filtration system.

The x1 bitLighter provides a different kind of light source for photographers and videographers. It’s shaped like a handheld flashlight and outputs a clean, bright light in 3000K to 5000K color temperatures with a 93+ CRI, and up to 2700 lumen output. Its adjustable width beam has no hot spots and won’t flicker. Includes a tripod clamp.

Earpods usually come in standard black or white, but the people who wear them come in a medley of flesh tones. Go Air Tones True Wireless Earbuds are the first to recognize the skin we’re in by developing earbuds in an affordable range of seven neutral colors to blend in harmony with the wearer.

While it’s not nearly as slim as the original KeySmart key organizer, the KeySmart MAX makes up for that with features. It has a built-in Tile Bluetooth tracker and a loud tone to help you find lost keys, a bright flashlight with a rechargeable battery, a multitool blade, and holds up to 14 keys.

LeafCutter Labs’ add-on controller has four programmable macro keys and a 360º encoder knob, making it a great input device for creative apps or for controlling media. It comes in a powder-coated steel case with a 32mm aluminum knob. Choose from case lit or key lit versions.

An unnamed artist from China shows off a unique handmade phone case that’s so steampunk that its gears actually turn. It might not be the most practical design, but it sure looks awesome. We found a similar case you can actually purchase over on Etsy, or you could just glue some gears on your own and call it a day.

The 2024 Silverado EV is a bumper-to-bumper reimagining of Chevy’s best-selling truck, and this 664 hp stallion is no longer a gas-guzzler. The 4-door, 4-wheel-drive all-electric RST First Edition uses a DC fast-charging system to “fuel” up for a 400-mile range, and to carry or tow up to 10,000 pounds.

If you search around on Amazon, you can find some pretty big portable power banks. But Handy Geng needs more milliamp hours of power, so he got to building this enormous power pack that has batteries totaling 27,000,000 mAh (or 27,000 amp-hours) of power output. And yes, it’s still portable, kinda.