How many times have you been out and about and said to yourself, I really wish I knew how much that model of car is going for? If this happens to you often, then check this out. If you’re living in Sweden, price comparison site Bilpriser.se has just rolled out a new iPhone app that lets you shoot a photo of a car’s license plate and retrieve it’s specs and compare prices for that vehicle.

Apparently it just checks out the government registration database to locate the car’s make and model, then checks the information against their own database so that the right information will be sent to the right users. There are over 9,000 models and 80,000 different versions so you should get the right information most of the time.

At this year’s CES, Mattel showed off their new Hot Wheels offers, which are pretty cool. They have embedded the toy cars with a miniature camera. This allows you to see your crazy driving of the 1:64 car first hand.

Pretty cool when going through loops and courses, not to mention crashes. It’s called the Hot Wheels Video Racer and is sure to be a hit with kids everywhere when it hits the market.

I really like cars and have been a big fan of Top Gear for years. The only thing that bothers me about the UK version of Top Gear is that they often hate on American cars and are known to get the facts of some cars completely wrong.

Long ago, there was rumored to be a version of Top Gear in the works for the US market with Adam Corolla. That program was cancelled before it even aired.

You could buy your kid a whole bunch of Hot Wheels cars and track sets, only to step on them late at night and break your leg… Or you could simplify things and buy this inexpensive kit that lets you turn just about anything into a track.

Sound awesome? It is. No, it really isn’t. The “My First Autobahn” Tape Kit doesn’t actually keep your cars’ wheels on the track, but it’s still a cool way to make roads wherever you want. The tape won’t damage floors, and can be easily removed from most surfaces.

Not so long ago one of the chain restaurants had these kids meals that came with paper cars that you have to punch out and fold to build. The things weren’t that easy to put together so I can only imagine how hard building this 1:1 full-size replica of a race car was for the geeks at Epson.

The car is a replica of the Acura/Honda NSX Super GT race car and is built from cardboard and paper. There isn’t a piece of metal in the entire papercraft sculpture, even the frame is cardboard.

Ford has teams of researchers and engineers that have the sole purpose of developing new safety systems for Ford vehicles. One of the new systems that researchers at Ford are working on is the Automatic Braking Intersection Collision Avoidance System.

The system uses a series of wireless radio sensors around the vehicle. When the sensors detect another vehicle and determine that a side impact is imminent, the brakes for both vehicles are automatically applied.

I am sure that we have all forgot to put gas in our car at one time or another and gone out to go somewhere and realized we didn’t have enough gas. That is easy enough to fix in a gas powered car, you just go the station and fill up.

If you are driving an EV and realize you forgot to plug it in, you are out of luck. I know if I had a car that needed to be plugged in each night I would forget to do that eventually. A company called Evatran has announced a cool new proximity charger for EVs.

Last week I spent a couple days with Ford in Dearborn, Michigan checking out the new MyFord Touch and Sync system that will debut first in the 2011 Edge SUV. This very cool system allows the driver to customize the view on the instrument panel to suit whatever their focus is.

The MyFord Touch system on the 2011 Edge has a large analog tach in the center of the cluster with two smaller 4.2-inch LCD screen on each side. Using the dual D-pad controller located on each side of the steering wheel you can move through all manner of gauges and information related to the entertainment, navigation, and climate controls of the vehicle. The system also has a larger 8-inch touchscreen in the dash that shows navigation and other items.

Today is a special day. It’s the first day that turn-by-turn capable GM vehicles as old as 2006 can search for destinations using Google Maps and have those destinations sent directly to their vehicles. Proof that some of us are living in a future slightly ahead of the rest of us. Those with GM vehicles.

The OnStar eNav feature is now fully functional and totally Googled. Hopefully other factory navigation systems start doing this very soon.

Mario Kart is now in 3D, as in these are real life rc Mario Karts that you can race. The action isn’t limited to the screen anymore thanks to Takara Tomy of Japan, offering real life RC Mario Karts. The controller actually contains items that you can throw at other players including the usual green shell, red shell and banana peel.

If you throw a banana, an IR light will show up on your rear so that whoever hits it will crash off course just like in the video game. Sounds like a lot of fun.

Rolls Royce. The name is all about luxury, elegance and an expensive price tag. So normal radio simply will not do in their automobiles. That’s why they’ve gone and made HD radio standard on all of the vehicles they offer. Well, let’s be honest, it’s the least they can do at those prices.

The move makes Rolls-Royce one of just two car manufacturers to offer HD radio standard. The other is Volvo. Audi and Mercedes-Benz will be playing follow the in 2011, when they offer HD radio themselves.

Pimping your ride with new shocks, struts, and a more powerful engine is all well and good, but if it can’t get by on looks alone what’s the point? These art cars are real lookers. These mini Coopers put the geek on the street my brotha.

Who wouldn’t love a Pac-man and Space Invaders themed car? These beauties were designed by Matt W. Moore, who clearly has a love of retro arcade games. This Pac-Man version is the best. Click through to see the Space Invaders car, which also rocks my geek socks.

Beer fueling cars? Cars now competing for beer that you should be guzzling? Yep. And your car won’t get a beer gut or wake up next to Quasimodo the next morning. Don’t sweat it though, we’re talking leftovers. Sierra Nevada has purchased a MicroFueler, which produces ethanol from water, sugar and yeast. As you probably know from Beer 101, yeast is a major byproduct of beer fermentation. So they can now make fuel out of beer leftovers.

It’s a great Earth friendly way to recycle waste. And it’s nice to see a company being responsible and doing something good. Plus their cars get to drink beer. How cool is that? Your job doesn’t put beer in your car.

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.

Many a kid has played with their slot car race track and watched as their racer zipped through the curves and straightaways only to be dislodged and careen off the track. It never gets old even as we age. It’s just that when you grow up, you need a bigger track. And in this case 8 whole lanes of fun.

This thing is no joke either. It’s not some cheap plastic toy. Instead it’s quality made, going so far as to prevent power-supply faults and even car-derailing bumps, which leaves you free to enjoy the race. All you have to do is clear the necessary real estate and invite a bunch of friends over. It beats playing this slot car game.