Power Strip Archive

  • “Green Tap”: NEC develops energy-saving power strip

    “Green Tap”: NEC develops energy-saving power strip

    Posted on November 12, 2009 | No Comments
    NEC subsidiary NEC System Technologies has developed a power strip [JP] with a built-in processor, sensor (the device pictured on the right) and remote control that can cut power consumption by as much as 15% and more. The company says the so-called Green Tap, which sports four outlets, can be used by both offices and private homes.

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  • Charge4All folding power strip

    Charge4All folding power strip

    Posted on October 8, 2009 | No Comments
    Ok road warriors, here's one for you. This is a little gadget I wish I'd had back in the day when I used to travel constantly for work. It's essentially a power strip, with adapters for multiple electronic devices, that zips up into a folding case. Seems quite obvious really, but a cool device none the less.

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  • Review: TrickleStar TV/PC

    Review: TrickleStar TV/PC

    Posted on August 28, 2009 | No Comments
    While it is well known that I once did a burlesque show under the name TrickleStar in Weimar Germany, many of you don't know that TrickleStar is also a system for shutting down idling hardware next to your TV or PC. I'm here to tell you, my kleine Kuchen, that it's really great. Think about your own sad situation: you have a computer or TV that you turn off. The constellation of devices that orbit these central devices remain on or in a standby state. The TrickleStars solve that problem by turning everything off when the main items are off.

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  • The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention Part 6

    The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention Part 6

    Posted on July 28, 2009 | No Comments
    Hello, my name is Christopher Hawker. I am a professional inventor, specializing in innovative consumer products. My company is called Trident Design, LLC. I have developed many products in numerous industries and have over 20 products on the market. My most famous invention is the PowerSquid, a cephalopod-inspired power strip with outlets situated at the end of short cords, thereby eliminating the problem of losing outlets to bulky transformer plugs. John Biggs, editor-in-chief of this blog, has asked me to write the story of the birth of the PowerSquid and its development and journey to market. This is the Song of the PowerSquid. This is part 6 of a 6 part series. Read them all here. Part 6: Philips Enters the Picture In the summer of 2006, I got a call from the president of Power Sentry to tell me that they were being bought by Philips, the Netherlands-based consumer electronics giant. My initial instinct was that this would be a mixed bag. They were just too large. He reassured that it would be great for the PowerSquid, with the awesome brand and marketing power of this giant, worldwide corporation suddenly behind our product. What really ended up happening was that the huge corporation barley noticed that it sold PowerSquid, since it had thousands and thousands of other products. The lack of focus quickly became evident as the relationship began to unfold. Most notably in their responsiveness to our needs as Flexity, which usually amounted to, “bad news delivered late.” Nevertheless, we continued to push Flexity. Philips agreed to let us distribute their other power products to our customers, so we became a distributor of the original non-surge PowerSquid, as well as their lower-end (UL Listed) surge protectors. We successfully sold the Calamari into Dell’s and Apple’s online stores, which were two of our major targets all along. Unfortunately, they both sequestered them to the last page of their surge protector sections. We had no “pay-to-play” money to get higher placement. With no special attention drawn to them and backwoods positioning, neither venue proved as successful as our own site.

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  • The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention Part 5

    The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention Part 5

    Posted on July 27, 2009 | No Comments
    Hello, my name is Christopher Hawker. I am a professional inventor, specializing in innovative consumer products. My company is called Trident Design, LLC. I have developed many products in numerous industries and have over 20 products on the market. My most famous invention is the PowerSquid, a cephalopod-inspired power strip with outlets situated at [...]

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  • The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention Part 4

    The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention Part 4

    Posted on July 26, 2009 | No Comments
    Hello, my name is Christopher Hawker. I am a professional inventor, specializing in innovative consumer products. My company is called Trident Design, LLC. I have developed many products in numerous industries and have over 20 products on the market. My most famous invention is the PowerSquid, a cephalopod-inspired power strip with outlets situated at [...]

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  • The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention, Part 3

    The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention, Part 3

    Posted on July 25, 2009 | No Comments
    Hello, my name is Christopher Hawker. I am a professional inventor, specializing in innovative consumer products. My company is called Trident Design, LLC. I have developed many products in numerous industries and have over 20 products on the market. My most famous invention is the PowerSquid, a cephalopod-inspired power strip with outlets situated at [...]

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  • The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention, Part 2

    The Song of the PowerSquid: The Inside Story of the Life of an Invention, Part 2

    Posted on July 24, 2009 | No Comments
    Hello, my name is Christopher Hawker. I am a professional inventor, specializing in innovative consumer products. My company is called Trident Design, LLC. I have developed many products in numerous industries and have over 20 products on the market. My most famous invention is the PowerSquid, a cephalopod-inspired power strip with outlets situated at [...]

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  • TV TrickleSaver helps eliminate energy vampires

    TV TrickleSaver helps eliminate energy vampires

    Posted on July 9, 2009 | No Comments
    Now that I’ve hooked up my PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, debug Xbox 360, THX Makos, Verizon FiOS HD DVR, Slingbox Pro HD, Wii and an HDMI splitter to my ginormous 50-inch Panasonic G10 (plasma), I’m looking for ways to keep that electricity bill down. Enter the TV TrickleSaver and its built-in current sensing circuitry that knows when your TV is on or off. When the boob tube is on all the accessories attached to it come to life and when it’s off they go into a deep coma. Simply plug the TV into the master power cord and everything else through a power strip into the slave and you’re good to go.

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  • MyDeskFriend: Creepy Facebook connected Penguin robot

    MyDeskFriend: Creepy Facebook connected Penguin robot

    Posted on June 29, 2009 | No Comments
    Here we have a robotic penguin named MyDeskFriend from Arimaz. MDF is an interactive robot that connects to your Facebook account and is akin to the Tamagotchi, but the level of interactivity goes beyond yourself and infiltrates your entire Facebook friend list.

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