Tired of nosy roommates, bosses, coworkers and curious passers-by gawping at your laptop screen as they walk by? Why not wrap yourself (and your laptop) up in a weird giant tube sock for some privacy?

Instructables user Bekathwia invented the hilarious knitted Laptop Compubody Sock for just this purpose. It’s a fabric tube that covers your head while letting you see the your laptop screen. There are even hand-holes so that you can continue to type comfortably while sucking up all of the privacy in the room.

Will the Laptop Compubody Sock get people to leave you alone while you’re surfing/working? Probably, but only because they’ll assume you’re a little off kilter thanks to the sweater tube protecting you and your computer from any human interaction.

The post Bizarre Knit Head Sock is a Cozy Bit of Portable Laptop Privacy first appeared on Gajitz.

This motorized laptop, a student design project by Tobias Toft, is pure fun with no pretension. The laptop lid raises and lowers on a motor following a number of novel interactions from the user, none of which are the typical lifting or lowering motion we’re used to using.

By tapping, swiping, snapping or knocking, the laptop gets the message that it should open or close its lid. The interaction methods used in these actions allow users to connect with their machines in a fun but not overly silly way.

Although the motorized laptop doesn’t seem to have a great deal of real-world usefulness, it does take care of one particularly annoying aspect of using a laptop. It uses its webcam and microphone to sense the user’s position and then automatically adjusts the screen to the optimum viewing angle.

The post Open Sesame! Gesture-Controlled Motorized Laptop Lid first appeared on Gajitz.

Sometimes, it’s the simple and quirky ideas that seem to make the biggest waves. The DrawTop is a nifty idea that mashes up high-tech and low-tech to come up with a product that is really unique and wonderfully creative. Dreamed up by Ryan Mitchell as a project for a product development class, the DrawTop took on a life of its own. After Mitchell graduated and was no longer producing DrawTop, the orders kept pouring in – so she decided to turn it into a business.

The premise is deceptively simple: a vinyl sticker adheres to the lid of your laptop to turn the surface into a reusable whiteboard. Although you may wonder why someone with a laptop would simultaneously need to use a whiteboard, that question is easily answered when you think of all the times you’ve been trying to explain something and only drawing a diagram will do the trick.

The DrawTop comes with a set of markers, an eraser cloth, and a set of Velcro dots for sticking your markers to things – all for $12. According to the company, the vinyl adhesive doesn’t leave a residue and, if you should decide you can live with a plain old laptop again one day, the DrawTop should peel right off with no damage.

The post Backwards Tech? Turning a Laptop Into a Whiteboard first appeared on Gajitz.

In just a few years, portable computers have changed so much that they hardly resemble the large, clunky machines of just 15 years ago. But technology never stands still, and this conceptual design from Niels Van Hoof may in fact be the next step in notebook evolution.

The small notebook is called Feno, and it is a surprisingly graceful little device. It utilizes a flexible OLED display to allow the screen to fold around the keyboard. The result is a far smaller folded size than has ever been possible before.

The truly wonderful part of this design, though, is the pop-out mouse that eliminates the traditional touch pad on most netbooks. The wireless mouse cuts down on the size of the keyboard component and eliminates the headaches that come with trying to type on a small keyboard without activating the touch pad.

The designer doesn’t indicate the side of the Feno, but judging from the pictures and the size of a standard CD (4.75″ diameter), it looks like it would be around 5 inches X 12 inches when folded, making it small enough to slip into your backpack or purse easily. This incredible concept gives a bright new vision for the future of portable devices.

The post Into the Fold: Amazing Origami-Like OLED Computer first appeared on Gajitz.

One of the most fiddly, hard-to-resolve problems about working on a laptop is finding a suitable workstation when you’re away from home. But why have a portable computer unless you’re going to take it out into the world with you? This concept would let laptop owners take their work and a totally portable workstation on the go with minimal amounts of fussiness and no hunting for a free table.

The Openaire laptop case/workstation combines a laptop case, a legless chair and a desk into an easy-carry package. Designed by Beau and Nick Trincia, the Openaire lets the modern nomad work anywhere. The legless chair keeps your jeans from getting wet or dirty while the small desk elevates your laptop and keeps it cool as you work.

The case is multi-layered, with the chair nesting on the outside of the case, so you can choose whether you want to take the whole setup with you or just the carrying case/work desk. Sure, using this work station in the park might earn you a few double-takes and maybe a giggle or two, but it sure beats sitting on the cold, hard ground – or even worse, working inside all day every day.

The post Transforming Laptop Case Lets You Take it All With You first appeared on Gajitz.