JVC was feeling nostalgic, so it has upgraded that most classic of urban audio fixtures, the boombox. Make no mistake, this ain’t your grandaddy’s boombox. This is a boombox for the 21st century. How do I know this? Because it boasts an iPod dock and touchscreen of course.

Even the way that you wake the device from standby mode is futuristic. You wake it up from standby mode by waving a hand in front of the system, which illuminates all of the controls and the LED display. That’s not all, there’s a bunch of gestures and motions you can apply to the touchscreen to do stuff like control the sound.

Apple rumors seem to circulate constantly and each time an event has Apple launching new products, like MacWorld, the rumor mill works overtime. A new rumor started over at TechCrunch says that Apple may have large format iPod touch in the works.

According to sources cited by TechCrunch, some of whom claim to have held this device, the large format touch would have a screen of 7 or even 9-inches. That is netbook screen size territory and Apple is said to be talking to Asian OEMs about producing the device.

Here’s another clone out of China. The HB 778 dual SIM card phone looks a lot like a phone we know. Yep. The Touch Diamond or Touch Pro. It sports a 2.8-inch touch screen and of course, dual slider design that slides up for the numeric keypad and side slide for gaming keys instead of a QWERTY keyboard. You’ll get a TV function, FM radio, 2.8-inch Touch screen, touch keypad with vibrator, 1.0-megapixel camera, Bluetooth, dual SIM slot, and microSD slot. It even comes preloaded with classic games like Super Mario. The very familiar HB 778 will cost you $151.

The HTC Touch Diamond just got a new color, and it will be available in white. That’s right. The most boring device color known to man. The eternal white limbo that the Wii is damned to walk the Earth wearing. The new color will be available on store shelves this October, but other than the color change, everything beneath the hood is the same. Will it remain white or is the quality such that it will turn yellow after a few years? I have no idea, but I’m sure most of you want neither white nor yellow. Colorware to the rescue!

We’ve all been there. You need to pet your chicken even though your chicken is miles away. How do you do it? Maybe it’s sick of being fondled and that’s probably why the chicken crossed the road in the first place. It got sick of your harassment. Thankfully a group from the National University of Singapore’s Mixed Reality Lab have developed a way to pet your chicken through the internet. No chicken will be safe!

The idea was inspired by acts of pets and animal abuse through lack of welfare. This system enables humans to provide care for pets even though they are physically not together. The system enables a human to remotely touch her pet which is kept at home while she is away (in her office), and at the same time monitor the movement of the pet. This is realized by using a doll, which resembles the real pet located remotely, sitting on a mechanical positioning table. The pet owner interacts with the real pet by touching the doll.

There have been a ton of rumors about the new redesigned iPods. But wait, there’s more. MacRumors and Ars Technica are both saying that we’ll be seeing the new iPods on September 9th. No specific details, but new nanos are a part of it, along with a rumored subscription service and maybe even a new iPod touch at a new lower price. We’ll see.

We’ve all heard about Microsoft’s Surface touchscreen table, but now the company seems to have been inspired by the Sensisphere. Check out Microsoft’s new Surface Sphere, a giant orb planetoid whose surface is a multitouch screen.

As the video shows, you can display movies and even play one freaky game of pong. Imagine all of the uses this thing could have. Like a 360 degree security cam viewer, teaching about planets by displaying every detail, displaying robot faces and so much more. All of these things we Sci-Fi geeks dreamed about as kids are coming true.

ZTC released the ZT598, a dual input phone with the touch display hiding behind the number pad, which flips open. Another strange but interesting feature are the 7 LEDs on both sides, which blink along with your music, attracting you like shiny bright consumer bait.

The ZT598 features a 2.8-inch display, 0.3-megapixel camera, Bluetooth, FM radio, dual SIM slots, microSD slot and integrated music player and is available for $134. It also has a very moving message on it’s face, “Enjoy your life”. Maybe I don’t want to enjoy my life. Maybe, just maybe, I was enjoying my life, but don’t like to be told what to do. Maybe I only enjoy Life cereal. What’s it to ya?

This concept phone by Takumi Yoshida, looks wavier than a water bed bearing a Sumo wrestler. That’s because it’s made for the blind and the nearly blind, with lighted sides that help convey different alert messages and curvy tactile keys that make it distinguishable for the visually impaired.

It would also be good for those users who want to feel as if they have squeezed their phone into a different shape, causing it to bulge. Great idea for the sight-impaired as there aren’t many phones they can use easily.

Looking somewhat like a urinal cake, the Memory Mouse doesn’t look like it would be very comfortable to hold. And looking like a urinal cake, why would you want to? The interesting thing about this concept device is that it has 4GB or 8GB of built-in memory and a touch scroll wheel.

So, it would make up for it’s lack of style by freeing up an additional USB port for other devices, but it isn’t wireless. The touch scroll wheel might be a good idea, but I’m not convinced. The notches on a standard scroll wheel are important, especially in gaming. But really, using this device as it is above, would be like playing Air-Hockey without the Hockey.