Personally I love all things robot. When I saw this little guy, I knew that my life was not yet complete somehow. He has a great, ultra-cute design and would definitely add some coolness to your computer area as well as making the life of a blog writer a little less lonely. I think he and I could be good friends.

He has 350k pixels, which means his maximum resolution is 640×480. The LED eyes actually illuminate at night, plus he has a microphone so you can speak to others while video-conferencing. The mic is an essential element here, after all I will be telling people how cool my little robot buddy is. So what if they get creeped out. It’s just me and my BFF robot.

Today hField technologies announced the release of a new version of their Wi-Fire long range USB Wi-Fi adapter that is now compatible with Windows Vista. The Wi-Fire adapter works with any 802.11 b/g and provides a high gain directional antenna so you can pick up Wi-Fi signals from a lot further away than most adapters and often get faster transfer speeds.

According to hField, the adapter can pick up Wi-Fi signals from as far as 1,000 feet away, which is about 3 times the distance most other standard adapters. The device is fairly small measuring only 3×4 inches and can stand alone or be mounted on the top of your notebook. It can also be folded up to store easily in your notebook case.

Take a look at this Visuals analog USB gauge used to monitor the power supply unit on your computer. The gauge has a dial and looks like something you’d find in an automotive shop but can be a very handy tool for anyone building and/or overclocking their computer.

The Visuals USB gauge has three buttons, one of which needs to be pressed in order to see one of three monitoring parameters. The gauge will monitor the wattage, temperature and fan speed of your power supply and is as simple as plugging it into your USB port. Unfortunately you can’t use it to monitor just any power supply unit, though. The analog gauge is only compatible with GIGAYBTE’s ODIN GT series of power supplies. The gauges retail for a little over $60, that is if you can find one.

If you’re like many people that spend any amount of time online, you’ve probably had concerns or problems with probably the most common issues people have with surfing the net lately; security. For many, more and more interactions and transactions are taking place online, and everywhere you go you have to enter a user ID and a password. You can’t complain since security for the most part is a good thing, but it’s hard to remember the login credentials for every site you go to, and with all of the online identity theft scams going on these days many people are leery of entering their financial information online at all.

GuardID has a product called the ID Vault which we recently had the opportunity to review that goes a long way to help thwart online scams and gives you a single point to store login information. As a software engineer that has been developing hosted applications for years I’ve always trusted my own ability to identify phishing scams and unsecured sites, and I had never used a product like this before as I’ve always been hesitant to put all my information into one point of access. Although I still feel I do a good job of watching out for scams on my own I do have to admit that after spending some time with ID Vault product I’ve changed my tune and am pretty impressed with the secure environment this product creates.

We’re often surprised here at the ‘Brick by the different types of things that companies come up with which are powered by a USB connection. Most do seem to make a lot of sense though; people are spending more and more time at their computers and most of these devices don’t require a lot of juice to power them. This far infrared heating pad is a good example, offering the benefits of infrared heat through the convenience of a USB connection.

This funny little USB peripheral called the Availabot is designed to work in conjunction with the instant messenger on your computer. It stands on a little marshmallow looking stand that connects via USB to your computer and gives you a physical representation of the availability of your friends on your IM application, laying flaccid when the contact is gone, and quickly standing upright when the contact is available.

The idea is pretty interesting (and funny) and the Availabots are completely customizable in the profile they store and in how they look. You can use as many of them at a time as you would like to dedicate a USB port for. The puppets currently work with iChat on Mac OS X 10.4 but the company has plans to extend them to other IM programs on the Mac and eventually Windows.

Here’s another convenient solution for hooking up your bare external hard drives to your computer without having to buy and enclosure or open up your case. It’s not quite as slick as the Stage Rack we saw a week ago but it takes up less room and costs a little less, too.

The small adapter is called the USB to eSATA adapter from Brando and will connect your SATA or eSATA drive to your computer through the little USB 2.0 compliant adapter giving up to the max 480Mbps transfer rates. The adapter runs $15 by itself and $25 with the appropriate power supply for your country and makes the drive plug & play giving you instant access to its contents, and of course a warm whirling bare drive sitting on your desk.

We all love music. Some of us so much so that we hold on to old media long after it’s time has passed. Take that box of old cassettes you have stashed in the closet, for example. You know who you are. Problem is, tapes degrade over time. Eventually, you either have to buy it anew on more recent media, or convert it somehow.

Enter the plusdeckEX. It mates with your PC via USB and the result is beautiful digital music. A 7.1 channel built-in sound card converts the analog signal from the cassette tape into a digital file format like MP3. It’s just that easy.

Do you have a green thumb? Or are you a homicidal gardener? It won’t matter anymore, thanks to Brando’s USB greenhouse. You will never have to feel bad again as you watch plants grow before your eyes.

Combining nature with technology, Brando’s greenhouse has a USB-powered (And egg shaped) case that uses a growth light to stimulate plants. Since it is a mostly hands-off process, you’ll soon forget about your previous plant track record. The device will monitor moisture and remind you when you need to water your thriving plant friend. Comes with software, Marigold seeds, and artificial soil.

As far as USB gadgets go the iSharpener USB pencil sharpener could be considered one of the more practical ones. It actually has a practical use although I can’t remember the last time that I actually wrote anything with a pencil. The device of course is powered by your computers USB connection but if you’re all your ports happen to be occupied at the time your lead breaks it can be backed up by 4 AA batteries.

The iSharpener seems simple enough and personally I think it should have been called the iSharpen, but they did add a nice little “spin” to the device. Instead of just a boring old grinding noise while watching wooden shavings fall into the plastic bin, the makers added 3 colorful LED lights inside the light up when you’re sharpening! How’s that for adding excitement to your day?

Take a look at this. The picture pretty much says it all but I’ll explain some anyway. This is the SATA HDD Stage Rack which is compatible with PC and Mac and connects through USB 2.0 to your computer. By simply plugging in your hard drive like it was some old-school Atari game the drive shows up on your computer. It supports 3.5″ and 2.5″ drives and does require an external power connection to spin the drive in addition to the USB cable.

I have a drawer full of hard drives from different upgrades where occasionally I need to access. Opening your PC is a real pain and putting it in an enclosure isn’t a whole lot better. Up until now I, like a lot of people, have been using a SATA to USB adapter cable which works pretty slick but doesn’t hold a candle to how cool this hard drive dock looks.

Gone are the days of having your USB devices tethered within the standard 5 meter limit of a USB cable. The Gefen USB 400FO USB extender kit uses fiber optics with full USB 2.0 standard compatibility to stretch the reach of not just one but four USB connections up to 1,650 feet or 500 meters.

The kit comes with two externally powered boxes, the send unit (USB 400FOS) and the receive unit (USB 400FOR). Your computer connects up to four USB cables to the sender unit which sends the signal as far as 500 meters to the receiver unit where it gets converted back to a USB connection to power your RC Car or Missile Launcher from almost a third of a mile away.

It looks like that USB Mini Fridge we saw earlier this year, not unlike Spiderman, has had it’s suit changed from red to black and has come up with some advanced powers. Now this little fridge that snugly fits a single 12 ounce can will not only cool it down, but can also heat it up.

The USB Mini Fridge and Heater appears to carry the same shape and always-on blue LED lighting, but now with the flick of the inline switch on the cord can heat up its contents by by 34°F or cool it down by 28°F. The little refrigerator/heater can achieve these temp changes in a matter of 5 minutes and is powered by a standard USB connection to just about any computer.

What if the idea of bringing HD television to your computer was as easy as plugging in a USB drive? That’s the idea behind the new Pinnacle PCTV HD Ultimate Stick, priced at around $130.

The Pinnacle PCTV HD Ultimate Stick takes the form of a USB drive which plugs into a computer’s USB 2.0 port. It is described as providing “plug-and-watch TV viewing on a PC without any installation”. The stick delivers HDTV broadcasts via ATSC and can also support analog (NTSC) TV signals. It is also hardware-ready for ClearQAM (unencrypted digital cable) reception.

How would you like to be able to use select USB devices a good distance away from your computer? That’s the idea behind the new Gefen Wireless USB Extender, priced at around $400.

The Gefen Wireless USB Extender makes use of a sender/receiver system to wirelessly transmit USB 2.0 signals up to 100 feet away. Gefen says it’s an ideal solution for those in particular who don’t want to run USB cables around the area. It requires no installation of USB drivers and can reportedly deliver data at speeds up to 54 Mbps.