Innovation
Rupert Goodwins' Diary
Friday 02/03/2001The world's stupidest gadget came in for review today. The job it does might just be considered useful, but the way it does it beggars belief.
Friday
02/03/2001 The world's stupidest gadget came in for review today. The job it does might just be considered useful, but the way it does it beggars belief. It is a PRESSIT Cdestroyer CD shredder -- for when you've just got to get rid of those state secrets you've had burned into a CD ROM. Or your girlfriend/boyfriend's CD collection, after they'd dumped you for a long-haired musician. How do you shred CDs? The Cdestroyer has two circular sheets of sandpaper, one in a sort of ash-tray like bowl and the other on a disk with a handle. Place CD in bowl, put disk on top, rotate handle. Within a mere five minutes of hard wrist action, your CD has been turned into a very scratched CD. But doesn't this generate lots of aluminium and polycarbonate dust? I hear you cry. Yes, it does. Lots and lots. But the accompanying documentation addresses the health and safety aspect of this: "don't breath it in or allow it to come into contact with eyes". Presumably, this means you operate the thing in a glove box. And when you've had enough and remove the remains of your CD, you'll notice that quite a lot of the surface remains unscratched, especially the bits in the centre and around the edges. All said, this is quite the most gormless device I've seen... but if anyone can think of an alternative use for it, do let me know. The lucky winner gets their very own PRESSIT Cdestroyer, complete with a faint sprinkling of RedHat Linux...
02/03/2001 The world's stupidest gadget came in for review today. The job it does might just be considered useful, but the way it does it beggars belief. It is a PRESSIT Cdestroyer CD shredder -- for when you've just got to get rid of those state secrets you've had burned into a CD ROM. Or your girlfriend/boyfriend's CD collection, after they'd dumped you for a long-haired musician. How do you shred CDs? The Cdestroyer has two circular sheets of sandpaper, one in a sort of ash-tray like bowl and the other on a disk with a handle. Place CD in bowl, put disk on top, rotate handle. Within a mere five minutes of hard wrist action, your CD has been turned into a very scratched CD. But doesn't this generate lots of aluminium and polycarbonate dust? I hear you cry. Yes, it does. Lots and lots. But the accompanying documentation addresses the health and safety aspect of this: "don't breath it in or allow it to come into contact with eyes". Presumably, this means you operate the thing in a glove box. And when you've had enough and remove the remains of your CD, you'll notice that quite a lot of the surface remains unscratched, especially the bits in the centre and around the edges. All said, this is quite the most gormless device I've seen... but if anyone can think of an alternative use for it, do let me know. The lucky winner gets their very own PRESSIT Cdestroyer, complete with a faint sprinkling of RedHat Linux...