This cool retro-practical iPhone case from thumbsUp! resurrects the fad of the years gone by when cassettes dominated the world of music. Its era-accurate cassette casing is fun enough to begin with; the cassette shell for your phone can be flipped around and brilliantly makes a kickstand for viewing photos and videos.

This uber realistic iPhone cassette case is for HK$160/US$20 from sites like PerpetualKid.com. The downside? It isn’t compatible with the iPhone 4.

Back in the Eighties we all wished we had K.I.T.T. the talking car from the TV series Knight Rider.

So should it be any surprise that some of our digital gadgets can talk now? Plantronics HK recently launched a new hi-tech Bluetooth headset that will tell you “Whatz Up” with the new M100i which is so clever that it will tell you when its low on power, if it’s on mute and how much talk time is left.

On hand to help launch the new headset was local rap celebrity MC Jin who received a special one of a kind edition of the M100i, and to show his appreciation the rapper freestyled the virtues of the new headset. While we gazed into the eyes of  the beauty above…it was magic we tell you.

M100i Bluetooth Headset is the latest ultra-slim lightweight hands free device from Plantronics that features advanced technology to deliver clear and natural audio. The M100i combines dual-microphones, wind-noise reduction and Digital Signal Processing (DSP) technology for an enhanced communication

It includes convenient status voice alerts for remaining talk-time, low-battery, mute and connection status. iPhone users can monitor headset battery levels with an on-screen battery meter. In addition, the M100i automatically adjusts sound levels while moving in and out of noisy environments, so users are always hands-free and able to focus on the task in front of them.

Other features include:

• Multipoint technology pairs one headset to two Bluetooth devices.
• Battery that provides up to six hours of talk-time and 10 days of stand-by life.
• At only 9 grams, the Plantronics M100i is lightweight and comfortable for extended wearing.
• Soft gel ear tips, in three different sizes, together with an optional ear loop provide multiple wearing options for a perfect fit.

Availability & Suggested Retail Price

The Plantronics M100i is currently available from all major retail stores at a suggested retail price of HK$698.

Make your vid calls in Full HD 1080p to your favourite loved one or friend with Logitech’s new range of webcams. Introducing four new webcams from the inexpensive entry level C270 to the high end C910, Logitech hopes that there’s a webcam just right for you.

The C270, C310, C510 and C910 each comes with these general features:

Logitech Fluid Crystal Technology: Each new Logitech HD webcam features Logitech Fluid Crystal technology, ensuring that each video call and recording offers crystal clear images with smooth, fluid motion and rich, true-to-life colors, even in the real world.

One-Click Upload to Facebook and YouTube: With the new Logitech HD webcam, it’s a snap to record and upload HD videos to Facebook or YouTube. The included Magix photo and video editing software will help you polish the rough edges before your video goes viral.

Compatible with All Major Video-Calling Clients: The Logitech HD Pro Webcam C910 is Skype-certified and will work with the major video-calling clients, including Skype, Yahoo! Messenger, Windows Live Messenger and Gmail Voice and Video Chat.

Logitech Vid HD: Vid is free and sets up automatically when you plug in your Logitech webcam. When you’re ready to make a video call, just type in your friend’s email address to connect – no screen names, no extra accounts to create, and no third party software to download. Whether you’re using a PC or a Mac computer, an external webcam or an embedded one, Vid HD works.

Breaking the HD video-calling barrier, Logitech Vid HD delivers HD video calling to more people. Not only is Vid HD the free, fast and easy way to a make an HD video call, Vid HD makes HD video calling possible on computers with a dual-core processor, which is standard on most PCs sold today.

Logitech Vid HD is included with purchase of the webcam and is also available for free download at www.logitech.com/vid

Key Features of Logitech Vid HD

• HD 720p video calling lets you see your friends and family in crystal-clear high definition.
• Set up your webcam and you’re ready to make an HD video call, thanks to the Logitech Vid HD software that is automatically set up with your Logitech HD webcam.
• Adding a friend is as easy as typing in their e-mail address – no need for screen names.
• One-click-to-call feature puts all your contacts within easy reach.
• Free for everyone using any webcam.
• Bandwidth and System Requirements
• High-speed Internet connections of at least 1 Mbps upload download speeds
• Windows XP, Microsoft Vista, or Windows 7
• 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
• Any HD-enabled webcam, however it works best with Logitech HD webcams

NOTE: The person you’re calling needs to have a setup with the same requirements to send you an HD quality video call

Logitech HD Pro Webcam C910

The Logitech HD Pro Webcam C910 is HD in every way. Record breathtaking widescreen Full HD 1080p videos or make a video call in HD 720p on Logitech Vid HD, or any service that supports HD video calling. Lifelike stereo audio will make certain that everyone hears the real you. Capture rich, 10-megapixel snapshots (software enhanced). The C910 also features crystal-clear stereo audio with two mics – one on either side of the webcam lens. At 25 millimeters deep, the exceptionally thin C910 webcam adds a modern minimalist touch to your laptop or desktop computer setup.

Key Features

• Full 1080p HD lets you capture videos in breathtaking detail.
• One-click upload to Facebook, YouTube makes it easier than ever to record and share videos.
• HD 720p video calling means better quality video calls with an image that is sharper and smoother than standard definition calls.
• Stereo audio with two mics helps ensure that everyone hears the real you.
• 10-megapixel photos (software enhanced) enables you take brilliant high-resolution photos.
• Logitech Fluid Crystal technology ensures that each video call or recording offers crystal-clear images with smooth, fluid motion and rich, true-to-life colors, even in the real world.

Suggested retail price:  HK$769

Logitech HD Pro Webcam C510

If you prefer a webcam that can go wherever you go, the portable Logitech HD Webcam C510 — with its fold-and-go design — makes it easy to take your webcam with you. So whether you want to make an HD 720p video call at home, at the hotel, or at the office, the C510 webcam will fold up and fit in your pocket for easy transport. Plus, the 360-degree full-rotation allows you to swivel the webcam around and include more people on your video calls and recordings.

Key Features

• HD 720p video calls on Logitech Vid HD, or any service that supports HD video calling.
• One-click upload to Facebook, YouTube makes it easier than ever to record and share videos.
• Fold-and-go design lets you take your webcam with you wherever you go.
• 360-degree full-rotation gives it swivel for calling and recording at any angle.
• 8-megapixel photos (software enhanced) for high-resolution photos capturing.
• Logitech Fluid Crystal technology ensures that each video call or recording offers crystal-clear images with smooth, fluid motion and rich, true-to-life colors, even in the real world.

Suggested retail price:  HK$299

Logitech HD Pro Webcam C310

The Logitech HD Webcam C310 lets you enjoy HD 720p video calls on Logitech Vid HD or any service that supports HD video calling. You can share 5-megapixel photos (software enhanced) with your family and friends. With Logitech Fluid Crystal technology enhances your video calls and recordings with the best-possible image and motion, even when light is low.

Key Features

• HD 720p video calls on Logitech Vid HD, or any service that supports HD video calling.
• One-click upload to Facebook, YouTube makes it easier than ever to record and share videos.
• 5-megapixel photos (software enhanced) for photos capturing and sharing.
• Logitech Fluid Crystal technology ensures that each video call or recording offers crystal-clear images with smooth, fluid motion and rich, true-to-life colors, even in real world conditions.
• Logitech Video Effects gives your video calls an extra dose of fun with hundreds of avatars, masks, and Fun Filters to choose your mood.

Suggested retail price: HK$249

Logitech HD Pro Webcam C270

The Logitech HD Pro Webcam C270 brings HD video calling and capturing to the masses. The C270 has built-in software that enhances quality with 3 megapixel photos and Fluid Crystal technology, which gives you the best-possible video experience – even in low light and background noise – so you can focus on what matters.

Key Features

• HD 720p video calls on Logitech Vid HD, or any service that supports HD video calling.
• One-click upload to Facebook, YouTube makes it easier than ever to record and share videos.
• 3-megapixel photos (software enhanced) for high-resolution photos capturing.
• Logitech Fluid Crystal technology ensures that each video call or recording offers crystal-clear images with smooth, fluid motion and rich, true-to-life colors, even in real world conditions.
• Logitech Video Effects gives your video calls an extra dose of fun avatars, masks, and Fun Filters.

Suggested retail price: HK$189

This product is typical Apple.

Nobody asked for the trackpad that’s used for your Macbook to be put on the desktop but Apple thought you did and so almost out of thin air comes the Apple Magic Trackpad.

We took it for a 7-day test drive and while couldn’t throw away our Magic Mouse 100%, as we got more comfortable with the Magic Trackpad the more we saw ourselves reaching for it first before the mouse. But if you had a choice of a mouse or a trackpad on your MacBook we’re pretty sure everyone would choose mouse – just because its more sensitive and faster to get to where you want to go when you’re working.

Its a slim and small piece of brushed metal – the whole thing is one giant mouse button. And with Apple’s cool 2-finger, 3-finger and 4-finger swipes and pinching it will be hard for you to use any other laptop trackpad again. We’ve seen people -ourselves included – get frustrated when using a PC laptop without these gestures. So if you switch frequenty from a Macbook to an iMac – the Magic Trackpad may be an easy way for you to transition between the two.

From Apple:

The new Magic Trackpad is the first Multi-Touch trackpad designed to work with your Mac desktop computer. It uses the same Multi-Touch technology you love on the MacBook Pro. And it supports a full set of gestures, giving you a whole new way to control and interact with what’s on your screen. Swiping through pages online feels just like flipping through pages in a book or magazine. And inertial scrolling makes moving up and down a page more natural than ever. Magic Trackpad connects to your Mac via Bluetooth wireless technology. Use it in place of a mouse or in conjunction with one.

When simply surfing on your desktop or if you have a Mac Mini or your Macbook hooked up to your big HD TV in your living room – then the Magic Trackpad comes into better and more convenient play than ever before.

So if you are a someone who needs to pinpoint stuff on your Mac, then stick with the mouse, if you want an easy way to surf around and lean back – the Trackpad is for you. We’re going to head out an buy one ourselves now because that kind of relaxing surfing is sometimes what you need than waving a mouse around all the time.

Its currently HK$518 and available at the Apple.com/hk store, but we’d try getting it from an Apple reseller like Studio A first, because of the iPhone 4 backlog they are having with their delivery service.

The iPhone 4 camera is pretty amazing, but wouldn’t it be even more amazing with a few lenses? And that goes the same for your Blackberry and Android camera phones as well.

PhotoJoJo has come out with 3 magnetic lenses that easily attach to your smartphone camera and give you 3 new ways to snap pictures with a wide angle, fisheye and macro view.

The bundle of 3 lenses costs HK$320 (US$40) or you can buy just the Wide/Angle and Fisheye separately. And they ship to Hong Kong.

From the PhotoJojo site:

Our high-clarity glass cell phone lenses are like pro lenses for your camera-phone, giving you crisp and clear shots every time.

These two small yet powerful and finely constructed lenses, one fisheye and one combo wide-angle/macro, attach to your cell phone transforming your standard flat phone photos into wide and up-close wonders.

They work with any camera phone and attaching them is easy breezy! A detachable magnetic ring sticks to your cell, providing a sturdy, shake-free hold between the lens and your phone.

Go with the combo wide-angle/macro lens for capturing sweet crowd shots at concerts or that awesome ally-way mural. When the same lens is set as a macro, you can really get in there to shoot a super-close-up detail! Meanwhile, the fisheye creates fun-tastic curved edges with its 180 degree angle whilst making everyone look like they live in a plastic bubble!

Facebook camera-phone album, get ready for pics like you’ve never seen before.

Don’t believe us? Have a look at the gallery on their site and for what you normally spend on magazines with Chrissie Chau on the cover you can start making your Facebook photos look a little bit better.

In one of the trickiest press releases we’ve seen in awhile, Leader Radio Technology, an importer of iDevice accessories in Hong Kong sent out an email that reads “iPhone 4: We’re Ready” – maybe its just the optimist in us but we were hoping to be ready for something more – like the iPhone 4 itself, not just the case to put it in.

We like their campaign for sure at www.weareready.hk – but it does seem strange that a company selling iPhone accessories would have a website that was all in Flash. Maybe they missed Steve’s memo?

So what’s coming over that you’ve seen us post about already? It seems, everything:

LRT  announced 7 new iPhone 4 accessory lines that you will need to have, if we ever see the iPhone 4 in Hong Kong.

The 3 things we liked the best are the HK$800 Vapor cases by ElementCase:

We bet this thing will never drop a signal and can even take a bullet for you with its carbon fibre material. Take that Bruce Wayne!

This slim battery/case from Dexim for HK$448:

and this iHome iA5 App Enhanced Alarm Clock Speaker System HK$798:

The rest are:

• iHome iP49 Flagship Portable Stereo Rechargeable Alarm Clock FM Radio HK$1,198
• iHome iP90 Dual Alarm Clock Radio HK$898
• POWERMAT Home & Office Mat* / Portable Mat* HK$998
• POWERMAT Apple Dock 接收器 HK$298
• dexim P-filp Foldable Solar Power (DCA223) HK$498
• dexim BluePack S5 (DCA121) HK$398
• SwitchEasy NUDE For iPhone 4 HK$168
• SwitchEasy TRIG For iPad HK$328
• SwitchEasy Reptile For iPad HK$328
• jaybird SB2 Sportsband Bluetooth Headphone HK$798
• jaybird iSport Bluetooth Adapter HK$298
• cyfi Wireless Sports Speaker for iPhone/iPod HK$798

All these devices will be out later this month and in August as the demand for these products around the world weigh heavily on their stock levels.

And we swear we did not ask these models to pose with the products in this way – and yes that “band” on their heads is a bluetooth iPhone headset – but the less said about them the better:

We hope to get a few to play with and let you know how they are – which ones are you most interested in learning more about?

With all these music apps coming out, tapping your fingers on an iPhone can get pretty tiring – as well as making you look kind of stupid.

What you need is: The Fingerist from Evenno. It’s an accessory that plays like a normal electric guitar, but with the iPhone’s touchscreen instead of strings: making it a whole lot geekier cooler, even famous guitar player Ritchie Blackmore could only dream of having one of these when recording “Smoke on the Water.”

Don’t believe us? Check out the video below.

It has a built-in line-out so you can plug your iPhone into a guitar amplifier. It can also be used as an audio speaker, powered by 3 AA batteries, when you simply want to play music louder, required for those larger live performances. Priced at US$150/HK$1200, The Fingerist is compatible with both the 3G and 3GS iPhone. It won’t help you build your actual guitar chops or maintain your calluses but c’mon, you know you want one even if you only use it once!

Ladies and gentlemen, we present to you the Ritchie Blackmore of 2010:

and if you can’t get the hang of playing with it, you can always do this….

Altec Lansing’s Octiv Mini iPod dock is designed to give clear, high-quality sound output and actually looks cool while doing it. It breaks the design mold with a very angular shape as it measures just four inches wide and about five inches deep, saving a lot of counter space.

The Octiv Mini also comes with Altec’s own Alarm Rock app which lets you fall asleep and wake up to your favorite tunes, functioning as a “full-featured digital alarm clock”. Altec’s Octiv Mini will be available in July for US$60/HK$480.

Got an iMac? Then you should definitely consider buying this Mini DisplayPort Converter for 27”iMac from Belkin. This adapter takes an HDMI input at up to 1080p and squeezes it into a Mini DisplayPort connector at 720p for display, letting you enjoy graphics from your Sony PS3 or Xbox 360 on your lovely iMac. Audio signal is also split for stereo-out and it’s HDCP-compliant.

This device will require you to fork out US$150/HK$1170, which is an awful lot for a converter box with a single input. But in Hong Kong apartments it makes a world of sense if you want to keep all your toys together in your study and for you alone to play with! Bwa-hahahaha!

Ahem, yes well, there you have it. More info here.

Are you still pushing those color bars on your video game guitar? ‘Simon’ is so 1980′s – its time to get ready to rock…for real this time!

The YouRock MIDI Electric Guitar could be the missing link between getting kids to transition from game god to rock god. From a real instrument to a Rock Band/Guitar Hero controller, the YouRock guitar is a full-fledged MIDI controller that contains 25 guitars, 50 synths, 25 tracks, and 50 drum tracks all in one package.

With the built-in sounds, a headphone jack, and MIDI all housed inside the guitar, you’re always ready to rock, no matter where you go. The YouRock is an excellent choice for gamer-musicians, electronic guitarists, and college students for a price that won’t break the bank. It costs US$199/HK$1600 and never goes out of tune.