You've heard about using Bluetooth in mobile phones, headsets, and PDAs. Now it's also helping to give racecar drivers a competitive edge. The first driver to take advantage of this technology is 20-year-old Daniel Herrington, who signed with the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) this March for the 2006 Star Mazda series.

Herrington uses a Bluetooth helmet that lets him hear his team more clearly and efficiently. It also helps keep him safe, Herrington told us: "When it does become a safety feature is in the case of a fire, when you must get out of the car quickly," which the lack of wires lets him do.

Herrington's team plans on integrating Bluetooth technology elsewhere in his car--to read essential data, for example, without using cables. The car has 30 to 35 sensors throughout, which measure engine temperature, tire pressure, air-fuel rations, wheel speed, and other factors. "These are things that can change during the lap" Herrington said. "With Bluetooth, we can pull that data off the car faster."

Bluetooth sensors might also be used to send data from the driver himself. Monitoring heart rate, breathing, and other physiological stats could be quite useful in a race. For instance, "If [a driver's] heart rate spikes up," Herrington said, "the crew can call in and calm them down."

The Bluetooth technology Herrington is using was developed by Torc Technologies's team of professors and students from Virginia Tech, who are still fine-tuning it. Among devices they're working on is a voice-activated mic, which would let Herrington talk to his crew without taking his hands off the wheel.

I've always been pretty impressed with Vtech's cordless phones–right down to their features, quality, and design. Except for that one time in college when my mom bought me the VTech 9111 900MHz Cordless Phone in red. It was the hippest phone to have in the years 1999-2000. Many of my friends owned one in orange or blue. And I think I remember the phone popping up in popular TV shows, such as Dawson's Creek. Anyway, after a couple of days, I realized that my ringer wasn't working. People would call and I would have no idea they were calling. I was really disappointed, and I had to opt for an AT&T cordless phone instead.

Well, Vtech has come a long way since then, announcing today the availability of three new phone systems: the mi6879, the ia5874 and the V Mix gz2335. All three models include 17 polyphonic musical ring tones which can be assigned to phone contacts, are headset compatible (2.5 mm), and have a backlit keypad and display.

Specifically, the VTech mi6879 digital 5.8 GHz cordless phone ($99.95) features:

-Full-color LCD screen
-Digital answering device
-Dual caller ID/call waiting – stores last 50 calls
-Handset and base speakerphones
-Expandable up to four handsets using only one phone jack
-Intercom, transfer and conference calls between handsets
-15 minutes of recording time

The VTech ia5874 5.8 GHz cordless phone and digital answering system ($69.95) features:

-Holds up to 20 names and numbers in each handset
-Dual caller ID/call waiting – stores last 45 calls
-Comes with three handsets

The VTech V Mix gz2335 2.4 GHz cordless phone (pictured here, $24.95) features:
-Colored face plates (red, silver, and blue)
-Dual caller ID/call waiting – stores last 30 calls
-Holds up to 10 names and numbers in each handset
-Flashing visual ringer (see the phone ring when ringer is turned off)
-Voicemail waiting indicator

All models are available at vtechphones.com and major retailers, such as Best Buy, Circuit City, and Office Depot.

Plasmas and LCDs may get all the headlines, but there is a lot of life left in RPTVs as well. Robert Heron, PC Magazine's HDTV analyst, just finished testing the HP Pavilion md5880n and was pretty impressed. (And he isn't the only one.) You can read his full review for all the details, but two things jump out at me. First, full 1080p support positions it perfectly for HD content. Second, $3,500 is a great price for a 58-inch display. Of course at 118 pounds, this isn''t a set you are going to want to hang on you wall. Still, for the money this is a tough HDTV to beat.

The md5880n uses TI's DLP technology to remarkably powerful effect.  If the next generation of LCoS RPTVs continues to improve on the high-mark set by the md5880n, RPTVs could be around for a very long time.

Thanks to intern Errol Pierre-Louis for this review!

Franklin Electronic Publishers, known for its plentitude of handheld reference devices, is gearing up to offer new help for language learners. The first iteration is for Spanish speakers who are learning English: English in Your Pocket contains a variety of books and dictionaries, and you can look up words or phases in Spanish and English, then hear them pronounced by pressing the audio button.

The gizmo has guides that coach you through the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) and the U.S. Naturalization process.  It includes a USB cable to communicate with your PC along with a MMC/SD card slot to use if you want to download content form the Web; you can also carry along music or audiobooks to listen to when class is over.

I could definitely see how this gadget could come in handy for someone learning English as a second language. It's easy to use, and lets you record your voice and compare it with the device's voice, to help you get the pronunciation down. But unfortunately, it is light and fragile, and reminded me of one of those clunky basic calculators I used in grade school. The keys are unresponsive at times, forcing you to jam buttons repeatedly before it does what you want. And the instruction manual even anticipates keyboard failure: It tells you to poke a reset button with a bent paper clip to fix it.

In short, the information, dictionaries, guides, and audio would be useful for learning English, but the quality of the device isn't worth anywhere near its $249.95 price tag.  Otherwise, this would be a great gift for a Spanish-speaking friend or relative looking to learn English.

Today, my hardworking colleagues over at ExtremeTech have given their traditional no-detail-left-unexamined treatment to an extreme mouse: the Logitech G3 Laser. Logitech works hard at making its peripherals rock, and it seems this little guy is no exception. It tracks extremely quickly (2000 dpi), great for gamers and graphics people. It's a bit smaller than similar mice--good for some, not for others--and has an ambidextrous design.

My favorite passage from the review (by Jeremy Atkinson): "Whereas an Eskimo can look at a cold white ball and give it multiple names, a experienced and picky mouse user can look at a seemingly average looking mouse and find a half-dozen things that he may or may not like about it." So true!

Click over to ExtemeTech and find out if the G3 is the mouse for you. 

The world is crazy for Superman, and why wouldn't we be? He's an alien from Krypton who fights evil. He represents truth, justice, and the American way. Oh wait, in the new film Superman Returns, that famous motto has been changed to "Truth, Justice and...all that stuff." Why? Because the screenwriters of the film believe he's not an American hero; he's a hero of the world.

Either way, we've seen just about any tech-related product you could imagine adorned with the Superman logo: iPod cases, desktop themes, and case mods. Now you can watch free episodes of The Adventures of Superman, Superboy, Superman Cartoons, Lois & Clark, and the online premiere of "Look, Up in the Sky," a story about Superman narrated by Kevin Spacey, on AOL's In2TV.

The Superman Channel is available now through the end of July on In2TV.

Is it too soon for a robot museum? Considering that the concept first came about in 1920 (that's when Karel Capek invented the word "robot" for his play, "RUR: Rossums's International Robots"), and that actual working robots have been with us since the early 1950s, maybe the time is just about right. According to the Japanese blog Pink Tentacle, the world's first robot museum is set to open this October in Nagoya's Sakae district.

"Housed in a refurbished building that used to serve as an imported car showroom, the 2,600 square meter museum will center around an exhibition area entitled 'Robothink,' where everything from toy robots to industrial robots will be showcased in exhibits covering topics from robot history to the latest in robot technology. Some of the robots that enjoyed the limelight of the 2005 Aichi Expo, held just outside Nagoya, will be prominently featured. The museum will also include a shopping area offering robot-related goods, as well as a cafe restaurant set in a near-future style environment where robots coexist peacefully with humans."

If the latter entails hoisting a few cups of sake with Bender, I'm there!

I read about this excellent device on Gizmag, one of my favorite Other gadget sites: The Skystream 3.7, from Windenergy, is a viable appliance "designed specifically for the grid-connected residential market" that can significantly reduce home energy costs by harnassing the power of wind. You plug it in, and it supplements your home electricity supply at a fraction of the cost of traditional sources. Though the device itself costs $8,000 to $10,000 to buy and install, it can pay for itself in 5 to 12 years, or even less if you qualify for governmental rebates (or if you live in a really breezy area). Let's just hope whoever killed the electric car doesn't get wind of this (sorry, couldn't help myself).

To read more about this and see better pix, check out the Gizmag story.