Companies are starting to get more into environmental packaging. The latest is Dell. Dell gets just a little greener by adding bamboo in its product packaging portfolio. And they are the first in the PC industry to do it.

It applies to all Dell Inspiron Mini 10 and Mini 10v netbooks shipped from today onward. Bamboo is used as product cushions cradling the Mini within an outer box that is made from 25% post-consumer materials. Starting early next year, Dell hopes to expand their use of bamboo packaging to a wider range of it’s products.

Panasonic has unveiled their latest iPod docks from their D-Dock series. Dubbed the Panasonic SC-HC4 and HC3, these slim iPod docking stations pack in a digital amplifier delivering 20Watts × 2 channels output, an AM/ FM tuner, CD player and a SD card slot.

The speakers are made from high quality Bamboo fiber to make them lightweight and capable of delivering deep sound. The Panasonic SC-HC4 will be available in silver, pink and black for 40,000 Yen (or $450) and the Panasonic SC-HC3 will be available in silver for 35,000 Yen (or $400).

SimpleTech wants to please tree-huggers everywhere while stealing Panda food for their latest, the [re]Drive, a 500GB external hard drive that’s ensconced in recyclable aluminum, and “renewable, naturally grown bamboo.” Poor pandas. What will they eat if we keep using their food in tech?

Interestingly the aluminum and bamboo enclosure acts like a heat sink, so much so that there’s no need for an internal fan, which saves power. But somewhere, a panda cries out in hunger.

Salk Sound’s latest speakers, look like they belong in some weird sci-fi flick. They are definitely different. They are dubbed the HT 4 to outdo the current HT 3 line. These babies weigh 155 lbs and stand about 42″ high. Supposedly they can deliver “a very accurate recreation of what you would hear in a concert hall or other live venue.”

They are made of trans-laminated bamboo, but there is a cheaper Medium Density Fiberboard version in the works too.

With this USB flash drive it’s like you have sawed a Panda in half everytime you go to use it. Ling-Ling here will go on a bamboo diet and eat your data instead. A portion of the proceeds (5%) goes to the WWF to save real pandas, with a minimum annual donation of $25,000. And you love Pandas right?

It’s available in 2GB, 8GB, and 16GB sizes. It’s a nice change of pace that they opted to saw him in half rather than decapitate him. For once.

Two creatures love bamboo a whole lot. Pandas and eco-loving hippies. I make fun, but both creatures are smart, because bamboo grows super fast so chopping it down to be used in electronic devices, or to eat, is a good idea. Micro Innovations is the latest company to feature accessories made with a bamboo shell.

Those accessories include speakers, a card reader, a webcam, USB hub, keyboard and a mouse. Hopefully the guts of these devices are a little greener as well, not just the casing. These should be available in an electronics store near you around April or May.

Isn’t it ironic that some of the most beautiful turntables have shown up long after the days of vinyl? If only we had had such beauty back in the days of records. Germany based company, Montegiro, has a new high-end audio system in the form of the new Legno turntable.

It uses bamboo as well as high-grade steel to produce beautiful music from your old vinyl collection. The company decided to use a bamboo chassis because of the wood’s stabilizing and resonance-damping properties. There are also four adjustable and high-grade steel feet with rubber O-rings. The Montegiro’s Legno luxury wooden turntable is now available for a mind-blowing $13,240.

If you’re looking for an environmentally-friendly laptop that will match your wood floors, the ASUS U6V-B1-Bamboo laptop is for you. It’s actually fairly nice looking and this 12.1-inch ultraportable laptop is now available for pre-order on Amazon.com. It features a Moso bamboo cover and a palm rest that is “artisan grade,” ooo la la.

Even the touch pad has bamboo fiber patterns on it, making it feel as though you’re scrolling and pointing on a real bamboo surface. Specs include a 2.53GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T9400 processor, a 320GB hard drive, a NVIDIA GeForce 9300M GS 256MB graphics card and more. The display is LED backlit and features a 1280 x 800 resolution. An optical drive is included as well as Windows Vista Business. Go ahead and pre-order it on Amazon now for $1,999.

We got a chance recently to check out a robot of the cute and cuddly variety, as opposed to the kind that will take your face off. The sickeningly cuddly and cute WowWee Alive Panda Cub. While it doesn’t go so far as to chew bamboo in your livingroom and call itself Ling-Ling, it’s an impressive huggable robot for the kid or the grown up in your life. The final verdict? Kids love it because of it’s interactivity and realism. Hit the link and head over to our robot site for the full review.

Is it just me or would anyone be a little weirded out by these shower companion things? One looks like a pink female body which isn’t too bad, but the next one in line is kinda bowing down like he’s gonna finish you off. The strange blue blob starfish thing makes me want to get out of the shower real quick and so does the Panda. I would just like to shower in peace thank you.

The panels are created by an Italian company called Colacril and they will add a splash of…something to your decor. Maybe fear or paranoia. I don’t see much showertime fun here. The last thing I need while taking a shower is some Panda staring at me as if my man parts are bamboo. I’m old fashioned that way.

Wood classes up almost any gadget. Even simple USB drives. But when you give the Wii a woodgrain makeover, the result is simply awesome. It’s as if the the old Atari woodgrain consoles merged with the Wii. Much better then boring Wii white. For now it’s just a concept design by Joe D, which is a shame. Nintendo would sell a ton of product.

Joe’s concept apparently has a layer of woodgrain veneer on the Wii-Mote, Nunchuk, even the Classic Controller and Nyko Perfect Shot. That’s sweet enough, but he also gave the controllers get some bright white backlit buttons and black paint to bring out the wood. Once you see design like this it’s hard to come back to reality and pick up your white wiimote.

Many gadget makers are looking for unique ways to stand out while providing eco-friendly alternatives to plastic gadgets. As far as USB drives go, this one manages to be both environmentally friendly and able to stand out from the crowd. As a bonus it will hold your data.

The NAND based flash drive will be available in 128MB, 256MB, 512MB, 1GB, 2GB and 4GB sizes. The high speed USB 2.0 memory stick resides inside a hardened bamboo shell that can last forever. It comes with a bamboo slide box, so you’ll always know where it’s at. Plus it looks really stylish sitting on your desk.

Everything seems to be going environmentally friendly today. You can get shirts made from recycled coke bottles at Wal-Mart if you want. Automakers are also spending billions to bring electric vehicles and alternative fuel vehicles to our roads. Even our computers are going green with hard drives that need less power.

Fabrik has announced what it claims to be the world’s most eco-friendly external hard drive today. The drive is called the SimpleTech [re]drive and it is said to be the world’s most energy-efficient, resource conscious external storage and backup drive. The drive uses Turbo USB 2.0 to connect to your PC, promising 25% more transfer speed than USB 2.0 alone.

I don’t know about you, but some iPod accessories just rub me the wrong way, are just plain annoying, not mention overpriced. Example: These iPod T-Shirts. They come in a variety of designs to appeal to both males and females of the species, but that really doesn’t help. I have no desire to part with my money at all.

Would you want to wear this? They just attached earbuds and a pocket to hold the device. They did go out of their way to be environmentally friendly though, since the shirts are made from cotton and bamboo. The $70 price tag is just too much for a crappy shirt.

Asus ditched their plans for all-bamboo laptops, much to the delight of bamboo chewing Pandas everywhere. Instead they’ve revealed the U6, which is only bamboo trimmed for that we’re still green statement. I have to say, the look works.

If laptops evolved from the old wood-grain atari console, this is what they would look like. You’ll pay for all that elegance, as it will cost you around $2000. Apparently, plans for the all-bamboo Asus EcoBook were scrapped when heat management became an issue. Good thing too, because otherwise we wouldn’t have this looker.