I have trouble sleeping. To remedy that, I’m willing to try almost anything, including wearing a glowing hat to bed. The Sleep Shepherd hat holds two speakers sewn into each earflap and a sensor that rests against your forehead. The idea is that the sensor monitors your brain waves and the speakers play tones that …

“How interesting could a lamp made from an old tractor headlight be?” That’s the first question that came to mind when I heard from Andrew Chivote, inventor of the Lampster, a lamp now halfway through an extremely successful campaign on Kickstarter. Then I saw the Lampster and it was love (I guess you could even say love at first light …

When E.T. uttered the phrase “phone home” in the 1982 movie, he was talking about calling for a ride back to his home planet. But he could have just as easily been speaking about the link between the places we live and smartphones. Since that time, our phones and our houses have gotten ever more closely entwined, and now you …

When you look at the website for the Phantom 3 drone made by DJI, you learn all about its fancy flight controls, 4K camera and other high-tech features. What you don’t learn is that the drone can make quick work of that dreaded fall task — leaf cleanup. For that clever use of the drone, you have to turn to …

If I ever get too lazy to roll my own dice, it’s truly time to put me out to pasture. That’s what I thought when I was first approached about reviewing a prototype pair of “Boogie Dice,” six-sided cubes now on Kickstarter that roll themselves in response to noise. Then I got the dice and started playing around with them. …

Enlarge ImageIf it gets made, this drone system will be the one to watch. FlyBi If its Indiegogo campaign is successful, the FlyBi drone could be the most fun, most user-friendly unmanned aerial vehicle out there. That’s because it’s got a few key features missing from other drones currently on the market. For starters, there are the goggles. Unlike other …

When architecture graduate students Anna Stork and Andrea Sreshta put their minds to developing a product that could help post-earthquake relief efforts in Haiti, they started thinking about light, which is often in short supply in disaster areas. The result was LuminAid, a solar-powered inflatable lantern that is simply brilliant. When folded down, the rubbery plastic TPU lantern is about …

Enlarge ImageThe B.R.O. Ball is a speaker that can take a real beating. Invincible Audio Usually, you have to use some caution when you see someone touting a new product on Kickstarter or Indiegogo as “the world’s first.” But in the case of the B.R.O. Ball, I’m inclined to believe the claim that it is, indeed, the world’s first Bluetooth …

We spend a lot of time here on CNET’s Crave blog talking about cool gadgets trying to raise cash on crowdfunding platforms like Indiegogo and Kickstarter. Sometimes those campaigns work out, but sometimes they fizzle out and the promise of the Next Big Thing never materializes. I’m glad to say the Aquabot is one product that did see the light …

Ever since Marty McFly zipped around the silver screen on a hoverboard in 1989’s “Back to the Future II,” people have been fascinated by the idea of riding on a plank that levitates its user a few inches off the ground. Earlier this summer, carmaker Lexus announced that it had invented a hoverboard, and indeed it had. The only catch …