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Most audiophiles know the value of noise canceling headphones, which shut out large portions of the background sounds leaving the headphone wearer to experience the purity of their music.

Airplane travelers who have used noise canceling headphones know of their benefits too. The loud drone of the airplane engines is one of the major factors leading to flight stress and jet lag. Noise canceling headphones (even without playing any tunes through them) shut out most of the harmful aircraft noises thus helping travelers land at their destination feeling more relaxed and awake.

But what most of those people don’t know is that the best noise canceling headphones are not made by Bose, contrary to what their marketing campaign would have you believe. The Bose Quiet Comfort 3 are very good headphones. An even better pair of noise canceling headphones is. . .

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The holiday season is upon us. And so is the need to find cool gifts. Here’s a roundup of some of the presents that the friends and family of Spot Cool Stuff will be finding under their trees shortly. If are one of those friends and family then please don’t read any further. Otherwise, check out our gift recommendations for the photographers and music lovers in your life, as well as for those who (seemingly) already have everything.

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It is impossible for a lightweight, battery-powered portable speaker system to produce the same sound quality that a larger, high end plug-into-the-wall unit does. The laws of physics are too stacked against small, power-efficient speakers for that. But the On Tour portable speaker system from JBL comes remarkably close to breaking these laws. Newton himself would be amazed at the big sound that comes out of these little speakers. We are guessing that he’d also appreciate the On Tour’s design that includes a sliding cover and optional top clamp that can hold a portable game system (Newton being the sort of guy who surely would have had a Sony PSP).

What’s most remarkable about the On Tour system, though, is its low cost. At the current Amazon sale price of $50~60 there is absolutely no other speaker system that provides as much quality for as little money.

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No, we didn’t mis-categorize this post. Onions and all sports drinks containing electrolytes (such as Gatorade) are indeed iPod accessories.

And yes, we mean a real, actual, everyday onion. This isn’t some sort of clever reference to the humor magazine The Onion.

To charge an iPod with said onion and sports drink you needn’t be MacGyver or have any special power cord or special equipment. The normal USB cord that comes with the iPod will work fine. A typical onion and a cup of sports drink will get you around 15 to 20 minutes of power.

For specific instructions check out the video after the jump (and try to ignore its creepy music):

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For playing an iPod through a car stereo system (that doesn’t come with its own iPod adapter) no one makes better products than Griffin. For car stereos with an AUX port there’s the Griffin TuneFlex Aux. For cars without an AUX-port there’s the Griffin RoadTrip.
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You have an iPod. Your friend has an iPod with a killer song, a funny video or a cool photo you don’t have. It seems like it should be easy to transfer media from your friend’s iPod to yours. And with a miShare it is.

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Fans of The Family Guy would be forgiven for an initial impression that the Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin Loudspeaker’s profile is similar to that of Stewie’s head. The Zeppelin’s elongated football shape gives this speaker system a striking silhouette. But the design doesn’t only look dramatic, it is a main reason why it SOUNDS dramatic. The shape of the Zeppelin causes its sound waves to evenly disperse over an area wide enough to fill a large room. The design is so innovative that the Bowers & Wilkins Zeppelin was awarded a prestigious gold medal at the 2008 IDEA awards for it. (The Flip Mino camcorder was also among the three gold winners).

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Normally Spot Cool Stuff avoids conceptual or soon-to-be-released products. We review products we can get our hands on. But the (totally theoretical!) iRing was too cool for us not to mention. The idea of designer Victor Soto is to have a ring that could control an iPod via Bluetooth. Small buttons on the bottom of the ring would provide the play, pause and next/previous track functionality. The ring’s outer band would rotate to control the volume. And a small clasp would lock the controls in place. We don’t know if such a ring is technically possible. We just know we want one. [via Yanko Design]

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