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Top Twelve Dream Gifts of 2005

December 13th, 2005

Dream Gifts 2005

This list features the top twelve dream gifts for this holiday season, ranging from gigantic monitor displays to seven foot tall robots; all costing a pretty penny. Enjoy!

12

The Oculas

The Oculas

Need to get away from it all? The Oculas is the answer. The Oculas has built in 5.1 Surround Sound with integrated PC, Mac, Xbox and PS2 on 23” flat screen TV. They claim it has “many levels of sensory impact” objects to interact inside with technology inside the enclosed sphere. OK, it is a box with a TV and game consoles… But it’s freaking awesome!

$43,166

11

Voodoo u:709 Notebook

Voodoo Notebook

Voodoo ENVY u:709: Featuring the AMD Athlon FX and Dual Core desktop processors from AMD. This makes it the worlds fastest notebook, period - nothing touches it. Voodoo is by far one of the most expensive and well built computer hardware companies. You can choose from different tattoo styles and colors. Overpriced? Yeah.

$4,200

10

Samsung 82-Inch LCD TV

Samsungs 82 inch Plasma

Samsung showed off the world’s largest LCD TV this year, an 82-inch monster that currently ranks as the world’s largest (and totally blows away the previous title holder, a 65-inch LCD TV from Sharp), at least until LG or whoever decides to spend a few hundred million in R&D to top them with an 85-inch or 100-inch LCD TV. Won’t go into production for another 10 months, which is probably for the best since you’re going to probably need at least a year and half of scrimping and saving to even have a shot at affording this bad boy. Korean ladies not included.

$60,000+

9

Phase One 39-Megapixel Digital Camera

Phase One 39-Megapixel Digital Camera

Phase One has started to begin shipping the highest quality digital camera back ever. The P45 is the world’s only digital camera back with a 39-Megapixel sensor, allowing you to capture images that are sharper and more detailed than ever before.

It is the latest release of Phase One’s revolutionary P-series digital camera backs. Promising unsurpassed image quality, the P45 is the ultimate in medium and large format digital photography equipment.

With the release of the P45, Phase One once again rises above its competition and stands alone in fulfilling the aspirations of professional photographers. Commercial photographers in the advertising and marketing fields can achieve incredible speed and efficiency through the P45’s capture rate of 35fpm and write speed of up to 20MB/s. Whether shooting for giant billboards or high-end fashion magazines, the P45’s 117MB per file size capabilities should provide industry-leading image quality.

Using Phase One’s Capture One software with the P45 enables professional commercial photographers to capture, adjust, prepare for print and archive high-quality images. This increased workflow efficiency and image quality should significantly decrease the amount of time spent in post-production, enabling studios to take on more clients and ultimately increasing studio profits, claims the company.

Expensive

8

Env Mike

Env Bike

I think it would be pretty cool to own the world’s first fuel cell motorcycle. It doesn’t drive very fast and it’s slightly homely but it emits water only and runs very quietly.

The detachable Intelligent Energy Core is the heart of the env.

The Core is a 1kW fuel cell generator which provides power on demand and is hybridized with a battery pack to provide 6kW peak load to enhance performance under acceleration. It also incorporates hydrogen storage as well as the necessary feed and flow mechanisms.

The fuel cell is a Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM)

A fuel cell is an electrochemical device which produces elextricity, water and heat directly from hydrogen and oxygen. The water by-product can be evaporated, drained or even drunk.

The design of the Core emphasises its standalone capability, giving this radical fuel-cell its due as a beautiful, valuable and useful energy resource.

$6,000

7

Diamond iPod Nano Case

Diamond iPod Nano Case

Can you say BLING?! Sure, the case probably weighs more than the Nano itself, thereby defeating the purpose of its lighter-than-light charm but if you need your new Nano all blinged-up this is the case. It has 586 diamonds (a total of 10.36 carats) set in white gold. The case will be shown at the International Gem and Jewelry Show in Chicago this weekend and in Virginia next weekend. It would be a cuter if it at least had a chain or a clip.

$12,495

6

Continuum Caliburn Turntable

Continuum Caliburn Turntable

The Continuum Caliburn debuted at CES 2005 last January, and is now being distributed in the States. Three people already own the system, so we now know that three audiophiles love vinyl enough to drop $38,000 on a record player. Don’t get me wrong, I love vinyl’s rawness and depth, but my turntable plays just fine. The Caliburn sports a $12k tonearm, and the platter is suspended via a vacuum to keep it turning smoothly.

The Continuum Audio Caliburn turntable and Cobra tonearm were marvels of engineering excellence. Novel shape optimization technology was used as a design platform. This software-based system throws the rule book out the window and calculates the theoretically ideal shape for any given application (as you can see the arm is different from anything you’ve seen). It’s a very interesting design concept that has never been used before in audio.

$38,000

5

Friendly Vac by Friendly Robotics

Friendly Vac

The Friendly Vac from Friendly Robotics is a robotic vacuum cleaner like the Roomba, but with a much higher price tag. The autonomous vacuum is equipped with multi-dimensional proximity sensors and stair sensors to avoid walls, obstacles, and tragic stair accidents, can tell the difference between hard floors and carpet, and has three cleaning modes including a spot clean mode for trouble areas. The Friendly Vac’s achilles heel may be its size: Unlike the diminutive Roomba, it’s 13 inches tall, which will prevent it from getting under some short-legged furniture.

$1,599

4

Voodoo Gold Omen PC

Voodoo Gold Omen PC

Ooo shiny. We are self-admitted suckers for gold so the news of this 24 karat gold plated luxury PC immediately caught our eye. The limited edition Voodoo OMEN 24K will feature technologies such as liquid cooling and silent operation, the AMD Athlon 64 FX-57, NVIDIA SLI technology, a limited edition ASUS motherboard, and Corsair Micro memory which are tweaked for higher performance.

$8,000

3


Seven-Foot Robby The Robot

Seven-Foot Robby The Robot

The ultimate gift for your film buff friends or a big dust collector? Personally I don’t want a robot unless it can mow my lawn, clean my house or fix me a dry martini up with two olives but if you are into the the robot as prop thing you can pick up a life-size, fully animatronic remote-controlled version of Robby, the robot from the 1956 film Forbidden Planet.

The seven-foot tall robot is made from the same molds used to create the original costume and is pre-programmed to deliver his lines from the movie. He also comes with a remote control that lets you adjust the volume, track selection, and start and stop functions. He can also be hooked up to a home theater system and you can project your voice through his sound system with a wireless microphone.

$49,999

2

Elumens VisualStation 160-degree monitor

Elumens VisualStation 160-degree monitor

Yeah, we all know this was on the former Screen Savers a few years ago, but it just has to be on the list. The VisualStation is an enormous dish-shaped monitor from Elumens. It uses an LCD projector and an expensive-looking lens to project the picture on its nearly five-foot screen. The projector is housed under a surface that you can put your keyboard and mouse on.

$20,000

1

9X Media Multi-Screen X-Desk

9X Media Multi-Screen X-Desk

Mommy… All I want for Christmas is a 15 x 4 40″ LCD monitor display setup.
Now this is just pure insanity.

All 9X Media multi-screen X-Desk systems are expandable and customizable. Providing the ultimate in personalization, they include multiple and varied screen size combinations ranging from 19″ SlimLine LCDs to 40″ SlimLine LCDs integrated into this elegant structure.

The X-Desk can scale from 2 to 32 screens in 1000’s of configurations, and can incorporate multiple screen types and sizes including 5:4 and 16:9 aspect ratios.

The largest supported setup (15 40″ SlimLine HD-LCDs across x 4 40″ SlimLine HD-LCDs high), a total of 60 Monitors cost merely:

$772,452

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Technology

  1. chrisp
    December 13th, 2005 at 21:26 | #1

    I WANT THEM ALLLLLL

  2. December 14th, 2005 at 16:08 | #2

    That Voodoo laptop would be nice but I think the price is a bit too much.

  3. Francois
    December 14th, 2005 at 16:33 | #3

    I will take one of each…

  4. Jacob
    December 14th, 2005 at 17:20 | #4

    I WANT EVERYTHING TO, TOTAL BILL: 2,135,822
    i think i could afford it, after 20 years or so(if i dont spend anything.)

  5. Brian
    December 14th, 2005 at 17:36 | #5

    All I can say is: Holy Crap!!
    I’d like one Robby the Robot and one of those 82″ plasma TVs would be nice. Please put the souped up PC in the corner. I really don’t need it to be gold plated though, that is so gouche. I just want the innards in a standard case with plenty of cooling.

  6. Josh
    December 14th, 2005 at 19:18 | #6

    I would love to be one of the first owners of the fuel cell motorcycle.

  7. renegade334
    December 14th, 2005 at 19:50 | #7

    Hehe, i was thinking the laptop was a good price….. then i realised it was american dollars…… DUH!

  8. December 14th, 2005 at 19:53 | #8

    I love that bowl shaped monitor!

  9. December 14th, 2005 at 21:56 | #9

    got it! got it! need it! got it! got it! need it!
    i used to have that one.
    OOoooooOOOOooo!!!!!!! writes check for $772,452

    i am sooo dreaming

  10. Nina-Thao
    December 15th, 2005 at 10:06 | #10

    I’ve been REAL good this year… so I should receive most of them. Any gift would do actually (the more expensive, the bettere re-sale profit though), thank you Santa….

  11. December 15th, 2005 at 13:05 | #11

    Do they ship to barbados? Let me sign the dotten line. :)

  12. SpongeBebop
    December 15th, 2005 at 16:14 | #12

    I’ll pay fifty dollars for one!

  13. tech goddess
    December 15th, 2005 at 17:02 | #13

    OMG - Do ya think they would accept post-dated checks? How about first born children. I soooo want that freakin awesome Oculas…

  14. Lucas Ourinhos
    December 15th, 2005 at 22:35 | #14

    alguem me da de presente ???

  15. December 16th, 2005 at 05:12 | #15

    there goes a second mortgage on my house ánd a divorce , but dang I will be having fun.

  16. Danilo Lima
    December 16th, 2005 at 07:08 | #16

    Who can to re-sell each one after use?

  17. December 16th, 2005 at 12:16 | #17

    nice!

  18. JS
    December 16th, 2005 at 13:38 | #18

    24 screens - and about as many programs - running all at once on the same computer? Of course! What’s that smell? Oh, it’s my CPU, melting. No, the other smell? Oh, that’s my brain getting fried. As I am typing this comment with my rand hand, I am also watching TV, listening to the radio, playing flight simulator with my left hand, reading Da Vinci Code, winning a game of online poker, and cooking dinner. If you’re going to get me less than 32 screens, don’t bother.

  19. BH
    December 16th, 2005 at 13:41 | #19

    The laptop looks like it would overheat in 20 minutes and shutdown. Pretty neat though.

  20. 日本人
    December 17th, 2005 at 06:30 | #20

    I cannot buy it….. expensive…..(´_ゝ`)

  21. Danny
    December 19th, 2005 at 00:36 | #21

    Well All Of These WOuld Be Nice If My Price Range Was ANywere Near Them…

  22. T1mbo
    December 19th, 2005 at 13:01 | #22

    Include the Korean ladies and MAYBE….

  23. December 20th, 2005 at 22:25 | #23

    Wow, that 160-degree monitor would be amazing. As much as I use the computer now, if I had one of those, I’d probably never move again. I’d have to get a minifridge for the office so I wouldn’t starve.

  24. Alex
    December 27th, 2005 at 15:00 | #24

    We have one of those 160 degree monitors at my uni and I was using it the other day. Unfortunately, as everything in computing is designed for a square display when using normal applications (and games) you have to either cut the corners of the screen off or not use it full screen. The image also distorts when it curves at the edges. This really distracts from the experience.

    There are some movies that have been designed specifically for it, such as the ones you can see above and these do offer a great experience. But you can’t simply plug in half life 2 and play i’m afraid, it just looks odd.

  25. Shaqwave
    December 28th, 2005 at 00:03 | #25

    Bill Gates can afford all that

  26. dexter
    December 28th, 2005 at 19:24 | #26

    dream on!!! hahah

  1. December 15th, 2005 at 02:16 | #1
  2. December 15th, 2005 at 11:48 | #2
  3. December 15th, 2005 at 12:04 | #3
  4. December 15th, 2005 at 12:43 | #4
  5. December 16th, 2005 at 10:53 | #5
  6. December 16th, 2005 at 11:09 | #6
  7. December 16th, 2005 at 14:49 | #7
  8. December 17th, 2005 at 15:30 | #8
  9. December 18th, 2005 at 19:10 | #9
  10. December 19th, 2005 at 15:56 | #10
  11. January 15th, 2006 at 00:54 | #11
  12. September 8th, 2006 at 06:02 | #12