Keeping an eye on stylish
gear and technology.

As long as there’s portable devices and people with excessive amounts of money there’ll be blinged out models of just about everything, Goldstriker International - a company that encases pretty much anything in gold - now offers two unlocked 8GB iPhone models sporting .999 hardened 24 carat gold encasings.

Either get the full one for £699.95 (about 1,500 USD) or save a couple of bucks by getting the part gold model for £499.95 (about 1,000 USD).

Goldstriker International: Apple iPhone struck in 24ct Gold (£499.95 - £699.95)

Citizen:Citizen’s ccPhone is a limited edition of modified 8GB iPhones. Instead of a shiny metal back plate these ship with a jet black and matte surface along with matching artwork, video and music. They’re serious about the limited part though, there’s only 50 units available so you better hurry up if you want one.

I guess it’s no surprise that standing out from the crowd will hurt your wallet a bit though. Expect to pay about $2200 for one of these.

ccPhone: Limited Edition Black iPhone (€1500, about 2,165 USD)
Citizen:Citizen Official Site

Evolve is a truly wireless iPod sound system from Griffin Technology. Each speaker cube is equipped with a Lithium-Ion battery pack capable of 10 hours of playback. When the juice runs out you place the speaker on its charging station and just wait for it to fill up again. Easy as that.

The speakers has an effective range of 150 feet and besides the regular iPod dock the base unit sports composite and s-video out as well as in- and outgoing female RCA connectors for non-iPod devices.

GriffinTechnology.com: Evolve iPod Speakers ($299.99)

Xtreme Mac’s MicroMemo turns any iPod Classic+2nd/3rd gen Nano or Video into a portable audio recorder. Just plug in the detachable microphone and hit a button to record audio content directly to your iPod.

The main focus is on voice memos (meetings, interviews, random deep thoughts etc) but it seems to work well with other sources as well since you can hook up anything you like using the 3.5mm jack.

The recording time is displayed on the iPod screen in real-time and it’s available in both white and black.

XtremeMac.com: MicroMemo for iPod Classic / 3rd gen Nano / Video ($59.95)
XtremeMac.com: MicroMemo for 2nd gen iPod Nano ($59.95)

(Via Prylfeber)

A large display on a device you wear in your pocket and annoying scratches. It’s more a question of when the two will meet up than if. Here’s Belkin iPhone ClearScreen Overlay. A really simple (and transparent) way to protect your iPhone from at least some of the hazards of everyday use.

Belkin.com: iPhone ClearScreen Overlay ($12.99)

If you put in a pre-order now you’ll get your hands on Apple’s new Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard on October 26th. Besides now being completely 64-bit (with full 32-bit compatibility) it features all kinds of goodies:

• The Dock is now more 3D-looking and features Stacks to get rid of desktop clutter
• The Finder is updated with support for stuff like Cover Flow and you can use boolean logic (AND, OR etc) as well as quick date ranges to quickly find the files you need
• Quick Look lets you preview all kinds of documents in full-size before opening them
• Time Machine is the new backup system, besides keeping regular backups it lets you “step back in time” and revert to older versions of your files.
• Multiple virtual desktops on a single screen with Spaces

Apple Store: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard ($139.00)
Amazon: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard ($109.00)

Got a pair of excellent headphones you can’t use with your iPhone because of its recessed (or “special”, as some put it) headphone jack? No worries. Griffin’s iPhone Headphone Adapter is designed to fit the jesus phone perfectly and then work as a regular 3.5mm adapter.

GriffinTechnology.com: Headphone Adapter ($9.99)

Gizmodo’s Brian Lam has written an article on why he doesn’t recommend buying the jesusphone iPhone anymore, and it’s really worth reading. And I ask the same question as Red Ferret, what would the public reaction to crippled and bricked iPhones have been if it was Microsoft who stood behind it instead of Apple?

“With this, I’m going to have to move our recommendation from “Wait” to “Don’t hold your breath.” I’m done with this handset until third-party apps come back. Argh, I didn’t want to have to write this, but this is what’s on my mind.”

Gizmodo: iPhone Revisited (Verdict: Don’t buy)

The guys over at Computer Choppers are about to finish their first custom MacBook Pro encased in uber-shiny 24 karat gold (with a golden, engraved keyboard) and lets us know that they’ll make one for anyone willing to pay about $1200-$1500 (depending on MacBook size) and wait 2-4 weeks.

Computer-choppers.com

Continue reading for a shot of the golden keyboard.

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Okay, here’s Brand Incubator Ltd’s iStones (Wabi and Sabi), two iPod docks weighing in at about 2.5 kg each. While fighting the urge to write that they rock I’ll just stick to mentioning that they both sport USB 2.0 and audio/video outputs instead.

Brand-Incubator.com: iStones iPod Docks