The iDAPT modular charging unit saves you a wiry mess

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I’m filing this one under ‘gadgets I actually want’. I see a lot of gadgets every day and, if I’m honest, I’m not actually that bothered about owning most personally. The iDAPT, on the other hand, is definitely on that list. It’s a little box that sits on your desk and lets you plug stuff in standing up, and it’ll charge them. No more wires, chargers, or lost gadgets to contend with.

Sure, it’s not perfect – there’s no Zune adapter, and pink isn’t exactly my colour (it’s available in other colours too, thank god) but it’ll charge almost everything you can think of – BlackBerry, Nokia, iPod, PSP and TomTom, among others. The full list is on the manufacturer’s website. It’s available now, and set you back just £35. Bargainous.

Amazon (via ShinyShiny)

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FireWire gets a speed boost, but USB will catch up in time

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FireWire versus USB isn’t exactly the most exciting of format wars — we are talking about data cables, after all. Most people use one or the other for connecting all manner of digital paraphernalia to their PC (and more often than not, USB 2.0) but probably don’t give the underlying technology much of a though.

FireWire, pioneered by the likes of Apple and Sony, has had a bit of a rough ride. It appeared almost ubiquitously on Apple computers and Sony camcorders, and would have been familiar to early adopters of the iPod, but has since fallen from favour somewhat, with Apple downgrading many of their FireWire ports from the faster 800Mbps to slower 400Mbps standard…