There are plenty of fitness gadgets out there as well as apps that turn any smartphone into a fitness gadget.  The Striiv fitness pedometer offers the unique ability to determine what your activity is.  Using TruMotion technology based on an accelerometer and gyroscope, the Striiv figures out whether you’re jogging, climbing stairs, dancing or doing some other type of exercise. 

As you move around doing your everyday activities, Striiv keeps track and uses your motion to award you points which can be used for charity donations at no cost to you.  You can also play games that are powered by your movement.

Striiv retails for $99 on the official Striiv website.

A Japanese company named REAL-f has come up with the technology to create what they call 3DPFs (“3 Dimension Photo Forms”). The process begins with a series of face photos taken from various angles. A composite image is created and imprinted on vinyl chloride resin that has been stretched over a mold. According to REAL-f, even details like the iris of the eye are accurately replicated.

Find out more about these amazing masks in this TechCrunch article.

Doctors and chiropractors report increasing numbers of people complaining of neck strain, shoulder pain and headaches that can be traced to hunching over mobile gadgets. Many are warning that bending over a small screen to text, watch videos and play games could cause a lifetime worth of debilitating pain. Dean L. Fishman, a chiropractor in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, has renamed his practice the Text Neck Institute because the majority of his patients were visiting him with the same complaint.

Americans send more than 100 billion text message each month, so the text neck problem is bound to increase. To find out what you can due to avoid the consequences of too much texting, read this article on MSNBC.

Now that Amazon has announced the Kindle Fire, the inevitable questions about how it stacks up against the iPad are being raised. The Fire costs about $300 less, but has these disadvantages compared to the iPad:

• Smaller screen (7 inches compared to the iPad’s 10 inches)
• No camera or microphone
• No creative or business apps
• Limited onboard memory

The bottom line is that you want a tablet to watch movies or read books and find the iPad to be too expensive and too large to be truly portable, the Kindle Fire could be you’re best bet. If you want to edit photos, manage a spreadsheet or perform some other functional task, the iPad is probably the better choice.

Read more analysis of the iPad vs. Kindle Fire question on the MSNBC GadgetBox blog.

Windows 8, which will features a new interface called Metro, is due for release in late 2012. It will offer a new Windows paradigm for running, switching and working inside apps. Apps are represented as tiles rather than icons. When an app is running, it occupies the full screen with no menu buttons showing until you right-click your mouse (or swipe your finger on a touchscreen device). Many tech experts are predicting that Windows 8 will be an excellent OS for non-Apple tablets.

Read more details about Windows 8 in this Fast Company article. You can also see it a demo from the BUILD conference in this YouTube video.

Did you know that some gadgets and appliances continue to draw power even when turned off? This waste of energy is sometimes referred to as “vampire power.” Now there are devices that help you monitor and control this energy drain. One of these is ThinkEco’s Modlet, a wall plug that continuously monitors the energy usage of any device plugged into it.

Using an interface installed on your computer, you can shut off devices connect via Modlet or set a schedule for turning them off and on. Modlet communicates with the computer through a wireless connect or USB dongle.

ThinkEco claims that the Modlet can reduce overall energy usage by a household by 6 to 10 percent. It retails for about $45. You can find out more about Modlet on the official ThinkEco website.

The IFA Consumer Electronics Show in Berlin has just wrapped up (that’s show icon Miss IFA pictured above). This year, visitors to the huge expo had the chance to see a variety of iPad competitors, state-of-the-art television sets (some with 3D displays and touchpens), smartphones, kitchen appliances and hundreds of other useful and not-so-useful gadgets and gizmos.

Check out a summary of some of the best gadgets on the Huffington Post website.  You can also find out more on the official IFA website.

If you love a good hack that improves your productivity, then you’ll want to try this do-it-yourself WiFi booster.  According to Discovery.com, this boost can increase signal strength by 2 to 4 bars.  Best of all, the main piece of equipment you’ll need is an empty beer can.  After washing out the can, you cut it open and attach it to your WiFi router.  For complete instructions (with pictures) visit Discovery.com.

As personal gadgets proliferate, the demand for gadget covers also grows.  Some of the world’s top designers have recognized the market for gadget covers that make a statement and have introduced their own lines of signature covers for tablet, e-readers and smartphones.  Marc Jacobs, Jonathan Adler, Gucci and Burberry are just a few of the designers and high-end accessory companies that are now selling “tech clutches.”

The potential market for unique gadget covers is huge, with millions of personal gadgets finding their way into the hands of consumers each year.  Like other accessories, designer gadget covers are viewed by many as an extension of their personal style. 

The Jonathan Adler iPad case shown here has the same retro appeal as many of his home furnishings.  Read more about the new trend for designer gadget covers in this Florida Today article.

After months of anticipation in the U.S., Spotify is finally here. This website from Sweden which is already popular in Europe is a free music service that lets you stream from a library of 15 million songs. You can also integrate your own tracks into the Spotify environment and then use a drag and drop interface to create custom playlists. With one click, share songs and playlists with friends who have registered for Spotify. You can also access Spotify from your mobile phone for music on the go.

Spotify is free for the next six months, after which there will a cap on the number of listening hours per month, so try it out now. Find out more on the Spotify website.