thanko

I always applaud innovations in the art of laziness, and the gadget elves at Thanko are masters at it.

Take Gorone de Megane, the latest eyewear to come out of Thanko's Tokyo workshop.

As the name suggests, these "napping glasses" let you read a book, watch TV, or use your smartphone while remaining completely horizontal in bed or on the couch.

Prisms in the specs reflect light into your peepers, leaving you perfectly positioned to nod off into a blissful snooze. … Read more

Halloween's over and done with, the cold November rain is here, and the mercury is dipping. But the gadget ninjas at Tokyo's Thanko do not rest.

They've been preparing for winter, when millions of Japanese face less-than-cozy conditions at home and in the office. Central heating doesn't really exist in Japan, so people use everything from kerosene heaters to blankets to keep warm.

Add to that Thanko's USB Heated Futon Mouse pad.

This cute twist on traditional futon floor bedding, which is, of course, very different from the Western concept of a couch futon, comes in three parts: a mouse-pad mattress, a heated quilt, and a wrist pillow. … Read more

Speaking of how hot it may get in Tokyo this summer, what with power shortages and the natural humidity, leave it to the gadget elves at Thanko to come up with this baby.

Stick a fan in an umbrella and what do you get? You get Fanbrella, that's what.

It seems too simple and intuitive not to have been invented before (and of course, it has).

There's a folding mini fan attached to the shaft of the umbrella, activated by a button in the handle. A thin mesh around the fan will prevent accidental haircuts. … Read more

Japanese gizmo company Thanko is dishing out its latest spy gadget, the Waterproof Video Camera Spy Watch HD.

Although this device has the annotation HD behind its model name, the gizmo can record only 640x480-pixel videos. Maybe the firm was referring to the image resolution, which measures 1,600x1,200 pixels.

Weighing less than a quarter of a pound, this watch has a USB 1.1 port for charging the internal battery, which delivers approximately 90 minutes of video operation. There is also 4GB of onboard memory for users to store videos and pictures. The watch is rated IPX8, which … Read more

Japanese peripheral maker Thanko is known for making some useful products such as the Stowaway keyboard replica, but the company is also infamous for developing novelty items like the vibrating bracelet that buzzes when you receive a call on your cell phone. The company's latest innovation, unfortunately, falls into the latter class.

Sporting an aluminum frame with a tripod socket at the bottom, the Desktop PC mount can be attached to any tripod and used to secure a notebook, thus acting like a podium for the budget-conscious. There are two elastic bands and a ledge to secure your laptop … Read more

The Think Outside Stowaway was a product from about 10 years back. This foldable keyboard was designed for PDAs, in the old days when Palm ruled the electronic organizer world. It was an amazing bit of equipment--a full-size ThinkPad-esque keyboard that folded to a quarter of its footprint when not in use. I remember watching with envy whenever someone whipped it out in school to take notes.

Imagine my surprise when I saw an article on Gizmag about an identical product made by Japanese peripheral maker Thanko. There's no mention of the brand "Stowaway" in the article, … Read more

Missing calls? Maybe the ringtone or vibration on your phone doesn't cut it. Well, the gadget-mongers at Japan's Thanko have a new bracelet that not only vibrates when someone's calling--it displays their number.

The Bluetooth Bracelet is an improvement on the BluAlert Vibrating Bluetooth Wristband. The slender LCD panel displays the time, serving as a watch, as well as the caller's number when you get a call.

It sits right on your wrist, so you'll feel the vibration through your skin and bones if your phone is in your briefcase or pocket. It's more … Read more

Break out that old cardigan and turn it into an intelligence-gathering machine with Thanko's latest spycam.

The Tokyo gadget maker gets sneaky with its Button-style Videocamera 2. From the outside, it looks like an innocuous button, but it's secretly recording sound, images, and video of whatever's in front of you.

The device is just under 3 inches long and 1 inch thick, weighing 20 grams (less than an ounce). The lithium ion battery can power the button for about 50 minutes on a full charge, which takes two hours.

It's not discrete enough to conceal under … Read more

The Japanese gadget wizards at Thanko have created a USB soldering iron so you can melt lead on the go.

The USB Soldering Iron can heat up to 390 Fahrenheit if powered through one USB port; with two ports, it gets to 570 F. Wire it to a 9V battery it it will burn at nearly 930 F.

Thanko seems to have a policy of trying to convert every tool known to man to USB, from dental microscopes to electric razors to e-cigarettes. They also have a yen for plain old wacky stuff, like these cat-ear headphones.

They seem to … Read more