Hitachi isn’t a name you hear as often in the consumer electronics realm as Sony or Samsung. Despite that, Hitachi makes some fantastic home theater and AV products. I own one of their plasma TVs and it is by far the best set I have tested. Hitachi is branching into the professional market with its latest AV projector.

The projector is called the CP-X10000 and offers a whopping 7,500 lumens of brightness and a contrast ratio of 2500:1. The projector offers ultra-wide range lens shift and a 10-bit full digital video processor along with a 10,000-hour filter.

There’s few things better than owning a piece of technology or gadget that keeps on giving, and TiVo is turning out to be one of those devices with it’s latest beta release of a mobile website to control your TiVo box. This adds to the devices core ability to act as a DVR, and the company has also recently introduced features to order pizza, stream Netflix content and watch YouTube videos.

TiVo says the new mobile site at m.tivo.com will allow users, subscribers or not, to browse television listings and search for shows. The online app will also will recommend other television shows based on what you are viewing. The site is available to anyone that has access to the internet through a mobile browser, and no installation on the mobile device is necessary.

Intel and Micron’s joint venture in NAND flash technology, IM Flash Technologies, has announced mass production of 34nm, 32 gigabit multi-level cell NAND Flash device. This move puts the company in the lead of Flash technology ahead of the likes of Samsung and Toshiba with the only monolithic 32 Gb NAND chip that fits into a standard 48-lead thin small-outline package (TSOP).

The companies stated in the announcement that the development of the technology process is going along well and is actually ahead of schedule with the ability to provide companies to create greater capacities of NAND Flash memory for devices like cameras, phones, media players and computers at a lower production cost than what is currently available.

The Mario Kart Pullback toys were cool, so was the giant r/c Mario Kart racer, but this set of Mini Mario Kart rc cars from Brando gets it right. Each car is rechargeable and about the size of the iPod shuffle. Each comes with a 6-direction IR controller and shell and banana accessories. That’s what I’m talking about. You need accessories to really play Mario Kart outside of the Wii. They are available in Mario, Luigi, Koopa and Yoshi. Available for $24 each. Finally you can have real life Mario races.

You might expect the second Android cellphone to come from Motorola or Nokia, but according to John Biggs over at Crunchgear, it’s the Zzzphone, a full-QWERTY keyboard Chinese slider which apparently runs the Android operating system. It’s tauted as the world’s first unlocked quad-band mobile featuring the Google Android Operating System.

It seems to do everything you could ever want it to do as well. It works everywhere in the world and can be built and personalized per your custom requirements with GPS, Wi-Fi, even your choice of seven colors for cases, and 15 other options. Up to 32GB of memory, they are also claiming to be the world’s first phone with snap on modular accessories, like a full QWERTY keyboard, mini boom box, projector and more. Damn. John says that he has ordered one and it should be arriving in ten days. It’s only $119.

Nanotechnology strikes again, making technology seem like magic. Chemists from the University of Zurich have developed a new fabric that never gets wet. Never. Not even when completely submerged in water for two months. Nope. Not wet yet. The fabric is made of polyester fibers that are covered in a layer of 40-nanometer-wide silicone nanofilaments.

The nanofilaments are spiky and this causes the water to sit in a sphere above the fabric, while a permanent pocket of air is protected below. Think self-cleaning clothing, or truly spill resistant furniture. Another plus is that it reduces drag in water by 20%. So Michael Phelps better get himself a new swimsuit or be beaten by it.

One of the most frightening things I ever say was a teen girl driving through my neighborhood, on the wrong side of the road, sending a text message. It’s not only a problem with teens, according to a study lots of adults drive and send or read email as well.

The study was commissioned by IMS Inc and found that the main reason adults cite for reading and sending email while driving is pressure to keep up with personal life without making the boss mad for doing it at work. The catch is that reading or sending email while driving is dangerous.

The iPod is so popular that there is a huge amount of accessories and gear to go along with them. Typically, accessories revolve around speakers, earphones, FM transmitters and the like. Sometimes we see a few more exotic accessories like voice recorders.

Today a new iPod accessory was announced that takes the strange gadget cake called the iBreath iPod Breathalyzer. A fold out breath tube lets users blow into the device to see the blood alcohol level and decide if they have had too many drinks to drive.

You may or may not have a place in your car to place a gadget charger conveniently. That’s where this charger, shaped like a coffee cup, comes in handy. Chances are you have a cup holder, so just plug it into your cigarette lighter and sit in your cup holder. It converts the DC power from your vehicle into two 120-volt AC outlets and a USB port.

You’ll always have a spot available to charge up. Fits in any standard cup holder. This great solution is only $29.99. Hopefully you have two cupholders so you can still have your coffee too.

Creative is sick of living up to it’s name apparently, so why not make a swell barnyard MP3 player. Like the Zen Moo for instance. The Creative Zen Moo is in the shape of a cow’s face. They were so un-Creative that they didn’t even think to make you pull on the udders to milk some music out. This player looks like it’s pretty much a Zen Stone, including a tiny OLED display, 2B of internal memory, 20 hour playback time and an integrated FM tuner. The Creative Zen Moo was specially designed to pay a tribute to the year of the cow in the Chinese zodiac calendar for 2009.

Wireless iPod docks are not new, but the trend kind of died out leaving us with many tethered versions. Marantz has one of their own to offer with the IS301, a Lucullan wireless iPod dock that transmits both audio and video and includes a receiver with ports for your home theater. Almost every dock-connecting iPod will work and it also features Bluetooth 2.1 for BT-enabled devices. It should hit Japan in January for about $277. Hopefully the US soon after.

I am familiar with the company ZAGG. It makes some interesting products like the InvisibleSHIELD film that is laser cut to exactly fit gadgets of all sorts form Mac notebooks and the iPhone to various Blackberry devices. In fact, I use their film to protect the screen and body of my iPhone and it works great.

ZAGG has announced a new line of products called ZAGGaudio and the first product from the line is the Z.buds earphones. The earphones retail for $79.99 and feature a microphone built-in to allow users to place and receive phone calls.

This is one hell of a bike/Guitar Hero mashup. Who knows how long it took these GH geeks to set the whole thing up. All I know is that this dude and his friends had wayyy too much time on their score-marked hands. It’s just further proof, as if we needed any, that rock nerds go freakin crazy for GH, while the rest of us are doing stuff like, I don’t know, kissin girls. Okay, I admit it rocked just a tad. They get points for a crazy ride. It just leaves ya feeling like, “What the hell did I just watch?”.

Most kids these days own a mobile phone and Samsung wants a piece of that action. The Toby or S3030 is targeting pre-teens and young adults. Tobi features unique GUI themes with animated characters, such as Monster theme, Snowman theme and Ocean World theme. The backside cover is changeable with a see-through protective sleeve, so a photo can be placed there. The phone will be available in six colors, Sweet Pink, Loyal Blue, Apple Green, Bright Orange, Oasis Blue and Snow Silver.

The safety features in the phone include SOS Call, SOS Message and Fake Call, allowing access to family members and friends in emergencies. Samsung’s Tobi is made from recyclable and biodegradable bio-plastic and has non-toxic paints and non-allergic materials. Even the earphone is made eco-friendly without any polyvinyl chloride. It will be available in Italy and UK this month and then other European countries, CIS, and China later this year.

Lately Dell has gone a little artist crazy with new colors and art for many of their models, so it’s not very shocking to see the Inspiron Mini 9 and 12 get into the action. There are five patterns by artist Tristan Eaton, with the same stuff you are familiar with under the hood. These painted Minis will run you an extra $50 over the base price of the regular models, $349 for the Mini 9 and $549 for the Mini 12. I’m sure you can’t contain your excitement.