A couple of months ago, a video did the rounds of a brand new piece of workout equipment that promised to eradicate bingo wings and have people queuing up for a ticket to the gun show.

I watched the promotional video. About five times. What can be so interesting about a glorified dumbell, I hear you cry?

Check out the video to see why it’s worth several (highly amusing) watches.

In the meantime, the people behind the Shakeweight sent one over for me to try.

The Shakeweight is basically a large dumbbell with ‘vibration features’ which means the ends vibrates as you ‘shake’ it. It comes with a DVD that shows you how to tone your arms in six minutes a day.

It’s easy enough to use. Simply hold it in two hands and shake it towards and away from you. There are various other exercises you can do too, all of which works different parts of your arms.

The big question: Does it work?

I’d love to say it’s a complete gimmick. But you can feel the burn as you use it, so I’ve no doubt that it would help you tone it up. The vibrating motion has much the same effect as power plating, putting extra pressure on your muscles.

But spending six minutes a day solidly shaking a dumbbell is boring. Exercise regimes need to have variety in order to be motivating and interesting, and that’s something this program lacks.

Advantages

• Battery-free
• Simple to use
• Compact

Disadvantages

Lack of variety in exercises

You feel like a prat using it

Conclusion

If you don’t mind looking a little foolish and prefer a regular exercise routine rather than a varied one, this might be worth a try as the results are good. For the fickle and vain (e.g. me) it doesn’t have quite the same appeal as power plating.

Buy it from the ShakeWeight site for £29.99 or from Amazon for £9.81

A little while ago, we did a piece on gorgeous looking fridges. The featured white goods really were aesthetically pleasing, but I think I’ve found just the thing to really ramp up the dork factor.

iPhone app magnets.

That’s right, you can replicate the interface of your mobile onto the open space of your refrigerator.

Sure, it might get a little confusing when you return home after several Long Island iced teas intent on sharing your wittiest comments/drunk nonsense on Facebook, only to discover that repeatedly jabbing the Safari magnet doesn’t actually work

But let’s be honest, that’s not such a bad thing.

Fancy grabbing them for your kitchen? They’re from IWOOT for £9.99

(They’ll go perfectly with your iPhone bedding)

I’ve been using the Electrolux Intensity for many years now (here’s a video of me talking about it back in 2007), and the simple fact is, it doesn’t matter how great its suction is, how splendidly small it can be folded and how smart it looks, it’s heavy, it can’t do stairs, corners or cobwebs, and the bag is so tiny it can barely muster enough puff for an entire room.

And before Electrolux, there was a hovercraft vacuum, a robot vacuum and all manner of other hoovers that all sucked me in (so to speak) with their nifty sounding cleaning stratagems. Usually, they captivated me long enough to give them a good review, too.

Which is why it’s time for me to come clean, admit I’m a sucker, dust down my critical faculties and wash off the dirty feeling I’ve got from all those bad puns. This time around, I’m a cynical housekeeper finding fault wherever I can.

The Dyson City Wool + Wood comes in three different sizes. I tested the very smallest one, which is so compact you can sit it on a piece of A4 paper (should you ever feel the need).

The design itself is smart enough. I’m not a huge fan of the Dyson look, but you’ve got to admit that they’re unmistakeable. Just to nitpick, I’d really like to be able to fold the hose down even more: it’s all very well having a cleaner with a tiny footprint, but if it’s as tall as all other cleaners, it still needs the same size cupboard.

I may not be keen on the Dyson look, but the usability of the design is second to none. Everything has an appropriate button, lever or clasp and nothing is wasted. There are no bags with this cleaner, and no disposable filters either: you simply take out the filters and give them a wash regularly (register your Dyson on the website and you’ll get an email reminding you when it’s time to clean them again).

You’d think with a frame that small, the tiny City would struggle to muster the energy to do a decent clean up job. In fact, the little sucker is so powerful it jumps off the floor when you switch it on, reminding you not to underestimate its ability to drag dirt out of your carpet.

I’ve been using this vacuum for a month or so now, and I’m totally smitten. The City cleans impeccably, is expertly put together and it’s a doddle to empty and maintain. You don’t really need one of the bigger models — there’s something quite nice about emptying your Dyson regularly rather than leaving it all in the machine gathering… dust. But if you really would rather have a larger model, the City comes in medium and large too.

Gains points for

• Great design, including a compact cylinder and a clip-on accessories holder.
• Excellent cleaning. Powerful suction and — as the name suggests — suitable for both hard and carpeted floors.
• No waste. Everything can be removed and cleaned, so there’s nothing to throw away. You do need to wash the filter regularly, however, or you’ll notice the drop in quality.

Loses points for

It’s a matter of taste, but coloured plastic doesn’t really do it for me.

It’s thin and skinny, not short and fat. Fine if you have a tall cupboard for storage, but no good if you want to stash it somewhere smaller.

Dyson City Available for around £200 from:

Amazon

Ebay

Argos

Back in the days of double denim and the SNES, there was only one way to get your fizzy caffeine kick, the SodaStream.

Kitchens across the country were dominated by this huge white machine and all of its accessories and flavour bottles. Inevitably, the sheer size of the machine led to it being relegated to the attic (not to mention the dubious quality of its dandelion and burdock).

The retro drinksmaker has undergone a revamp in the last few months, and it’s now smaller and sleeker.

Does this new look give the product more longitivity?

First impressions of the aesthetic looks of the new SodaStream are positive.  Available in black, red and grey (pictured) the new model is slim enough to slide in next to your toaster without much trouble.

To set it up, you pop the gas cylinder in the base, fill one of the bottles with water, insert into the SodaStream and pump the top button until it buzzes. Then simple pour in your chosen flavour and your drink is ready!

The starter pack comes with a dozen or so sample flavours, including the basics like Lemonade and Cola, and various sugar free options like Cranberry and Raspberry and Tonic water.  The flavours have definitely improved from the 90s  (gone are the days of Rola Cola) and they’ve even got an energy drink and a selection of fruit flavoured sparkling waters this time.

So, on to the pros and cons of making your own fizzy drinks:

Wins points for:

• Eco-friendly. The bottles of flavourings last a lot longer than buying one ready-made bottle. On average, a 500ml bottle will make up to 12 litres of soft drinks.
• Cheap. Long term, it’s much cheaper to make your drinks on a SodaStream then to constantly buy bottles of drinks.

Loses points for:

Washing up. As you’re re-using the bottles, it’s a little more washing up. Also, the bottles aren’t machine washable, which can be a bit of a pain.

Screwing in the bottles. It’s a bit fiddly trying to fit the bottle into the gas dispenser bit.

The price.  I tried the black Genesis model, which was £59.99 (from the SodaStream store, £69.99 for the red version). Not cheap, but it’s worth bearing in mind the long term savings. Style queens might prefer the Penguin version (£149.99)

Conclusion

It’s early days, but I haven’t had the almighty urge to hide it away from view yet. Since receiving the Soda Stream, I’ve used it on a daily basis to create drinks, so it’s doing its job!

SodaStream from Argos

SodaStream online store

Diets suck.

Cutting out all the good stuff, eating salad and counting calories is a seriously boring way to spend your time. But for many of us, it’s essential to keep an eye on our food, to ensure we don’t end up shopping in the tent section of Argos.

One way of doing that is by altering the way we cook our food. Which is where the Tefal Actifry (£131.50) comes in. This alternative electric fryer cooks your chips with a tiny amount of oil, rather than submerging them in it.

I recently got a chance to try the ActiFry out. Here’s how it went.

The ActiFry is really simple to use. Simply pop your peeled and sliced potatoes into the tub of the ActiFry, pour a tablespoon of oil over the chips using the mini measuring spoon and close the lid.

The top of the AcriFry has a LCD display where you can choose the amount of time you want the chips to be cooked for, and hit start. 45 minutes later, you’ve got tasty and crispy chips.

This fryer isn’t limited to chips either. You can cook meat, fish, rice and stir-fried vegetables. The accompanying cookbook gives an assortment of ideas.

Here’s my verdict:

Wins points for

• Ease of use: The time consuming bit is the peeling and slicing of the potatoes
• Lack of odour: Unlike its full-fat brothers, the ActiFry has an odourless filter to stop your kitchen smelling like a fish and chip shop.
• Dishwasher safe: Most of the bits can be bunged in the dishwasher, although there is very little to clean up thanks to the lack of oil.

Loses points for

• Time it takes to cook: It takes 40-45 minutes to cook enough chips for a family of four.
• Noise: When it’s cooking, it has quite a loud humming sound. Not great if you have thin walls and irritable neighbours.

Conclusion

I’m a convert! I genuinely loved this product, and the chips went down really well with my picky family. A friend of mine uses her ActiFry regularly to create Cajun wedges,  and I’d like to try a few more adventurous meals with it. Especially if I can use it to cook a variety of foods in a healthy way.

Who actually uses cordless home phones these days, aside from the elderly and the technophobic?

Mobile phones may have replaced much of the need for a home phone, but this home basic still has its benefits. For a start, the battery tends to last longer, you don’t need to worry about lost signal, and (as the BT advert rightly points out) you’re more likely to focus on the conversation at home then in the pub.

Models like the iDect C51 Twin Digital Cordless Telephone on the right (£64.99 from Amazon) combine style with functionality.  The portable handset offers the advantages of a mobile phone, with a sleek design and a comfortable curve to the base.

Need a landline update? Here are a few more options.

MagicBox Toque DECT with Answering Machine

MagicBox has some really lovely designs, and several of them mirror the contemporary black designs of the iDect.

The MagicBox Toque DECT with Answering Machine (£59.99, Cordless-phones) has been designed specifically with home décor in mind, rather than the practicality of an office. Glossy and minimalistic, it wouldn’t look out of place in the pages of a lifestyle magazine

The charging system is  similar to that of the Powermat, where you simply plop it into the dish, and it recharges.

Siemens Gigaset SL565 Bluetooth® Cordless Phone

This phone (£68.08, cordless-phones) might not have the high-tech appearance of the previous two cordless phones, but it makes up for it in features.

The bluetooth element allows you to go hands-free at home, and you can also send and receive SMS messages. It uses up 60% less energy then most other cordless phones, which should appeal to the eco-friendly amongst us.

Philips DECT ID937

Emerging Terminator-style from the compact gloss base, the Philips ID937 has a surprisingly soft touch for such a solid looking phone.

Highlights of this handset include a sim-card copying facility and XHD sound. Plus the price (£34.99 from Amazon) isn’t too shabby either.

There is a thin line, between being a normal run-of-the-mill dork, and becoming The Uber-Dork.

Buying this iPhone bedding set on the right would shove you right over that line.

The set is from Swedish website Ellos, and is aimed at the teen and ‘tween’ market. Displaying the standard iPhone icons and a mini iPhone for the pillow, you can see why this particular line of bedding has sold out until March.

Perhaps the next step is for them to expand into the double duvet market, emblazoned with the Apple iPad?

Until this very moment, I had no idea how much I wanted to watch my breakfast develop from plain old bread to tasty toast.

Previously, I simply popped my chosen bread into a boring old toaster, and waited until it popped up.

The Magimax Vision Toaster changes all that.

The toaster maintains the high standards of Magimix with its stainless steel cooking products, whilst updating it with a glass wall so you can watch your morning meal cook.

A toaster that looks good and lets you keep an eye on your toast before it burns? A winning product all round!

You can buy the Magimix Vision Toaster from John Lewis for £160.

Decorating nurseries for a new baby always seems like a pointless pastime. By the time your child is old enough to notice the décor, he or she is going to have developed toddler-based design tastes and you’re going to be painting everything Power Puff pink or something equally unpleasant.

So, if you’re planning a new room for your newborn, you might as well decorate it how you’d secretly like your own  to be if you weren’t busy pretending to be a proper grown up.

These retro robot light switches would definitely be included in my dream room – though I’m not sure they’d match those Mario decals we featured a while back, which I also want.

These ones are available from Robot Candy on Etsy. Alternatively, Boutique to You sells a fine selection of very silly lightswitches, including one in the shape of a cat.

The dark days are upon us and Mother Nature has left us all to manage our misery as best we can. Being an enterprising species, we’ve concocted various different alcoholic beverages to drink at various different winter festivals (Christmas, New Year, Midwinter, Twelfth Night, the office Christmas Party). But if the booze can’t shake your Seasonal Affective Disorder, you could always try sitting yourself in front of a sun lamp for half an hour to see if that helps.

There are now loads of lamps to choose from, and many of them also work as “sunrise alarms” which wake you up each morning with a false dawn in the hope of leaving you feeling less like hiding under your pillow until the winter passes.

Here’s a round-up of some of the best SAD lamps and sunrise clocks.

Oregon Scientific I-Wake-up Sunrise Clock

I’ve been using the Oregon Scientific SAD Lamp by my bed for a few weeks now and I’m really rather liking it. SAD lamps often seem to suffer from a touch of the uglies, which seems a mite unnecessary considering how often lights are used to create beauty in a home. The Oregon model isn’t the prettiest available, but the simple design (it’s basically a light box with a digital bedside clock on the bottom) means it’s not hugely offensive either.

Gains points for

• I love the way it works as a nightlight, with the lamp coming on at the same brightness level you left it at. It’s made feeding my daughter at night a calmly lit affair.
• Big digital clocks aren’t to everyone’s taste, but I’m -10 in both eyes and I can see the time at night on this… if I get close enough.
• Ease of use. This clock keeps it simple, with just a few buttons on the front and the programming buttons hidden away on the side.

Loses points for

Lamp could be easier to switch on. A minor niggle, but in the middle of the night, finding the right button isn’t always easy and I’ve accidentally activated the alarm a few times now. I’d like a big button on the top to hit instead.

The Nature Sounds for the alarm are crickets, and three variations of water running or hitting shore. The sound of water trickling is not the sound I want to wake up to. Beds + trickling water = dreams about weeing the bed.

£99.99 from Oregon Scientific

Naf Naf Sunrise lamp and alarm clock

This slimline creation won’t be to everyone’s taste. I thought it was pretty attractive considering the very low price tag (for a SAD light), but others have baulked at its hourglass shape. Like the Oregon model, it’s all plastic, and it certainly feels a bit cheaper in comparison with the others. But if you want a simple sunrise wake up alarm and you don’t mind the more unusual design, I think it’s a good option.

Gains points for

• Cheap price tag. So many sunrise alarms are scarily expensive that it’s nice to have one for belt-tighteners.
• Six different calming noises to wake you up.

Loses points for

The grey plastic. What is it with sunrise lamps and grey plastic?

Centre of gravity. I kept knocking it over.

£59.95 from Gizoo

Lumie Elite Bodyclock

I’ve had the entry level Lumie Bodyclock Sunray 100 for a few years but this model is the more stylish, sophisticated top-of-the-range Elite 300 model. The dome is made of glass instead of plastic, for starters, giving it a feeling of quality that the others lack.

It also comes with a number of extra features, including a choice of wake up calls and some spoken word relaxation sessions. The inclusion of an SD card reader means you can plug in your own music if the dawn chorus doesn’t appeal.

Gains points for

• Seven day alarm setting means you can tailor your daily wake up calls to suit your needs
• A better quality build than you usually get – though it comes at a price
• Easy to use and with enough features to suit most gadget fanatics.

Loses points for

For that price a digital radio would have been a welcome inclusion

You actually need to read the instruction booklet for this lamp or you’ll find yourself sitting in the dark when you switch the lamp on only to find it slowly dimming to nothing after half an hour.

£146.95 from Lumie

Philips goLITE BLU

I bought my sister a Philips SAD lamp for Christmas a few years ago and it perked her right up (though I’m not sure either of us are truly convinced that light therapy is any better than a placebo). This lamp, however, promises something slightly different thanks to the colour of the light.

Instead of bathing you in a glow of white light, the goLITE serves up a halo of “blu sky” light that will apparently stimulate your body clock, making you feel more lively.

It’s a lot more compact than the lights you normally get for SAD and because it’s rechargeable, you’re not tied to any particular spot when you’re undergoing your therapy. Apparently, it’s also effective for treating jet lag too.

This one is a tricky one for me to review because I’m currently waking every 2-3 hours in the night to feed a 3-week-old baby, so I’m unlikely to ever feel truly lively. However, Amazon reviewers seem to love it, and I’ve certainly noticed that it helps to make me feel less lethargic during my usual winter afternoon slump.

Gains points for

• Portability and compact design
• Fixing up your circadian rhythm so you can go about your business with a spring in your step.

Loses points for

Design. is it too much to ask for a nice-looking light box?

Time limits. It’s fair enough to request you only switch this on for 15 minutes to heal the gloom, but it does inhibit the usefulness of this as a light source. This lamp is strictly for medicinal purposes.

£141 from Amazon

Lifemax Light Pod SAD Light Therapy Lamp

This is the budget option for those who are depressed about the dark and also depressed about their bank balance. Handy for popping by your computer when you’re working, this little lamp won’t take up too much desk space.

It’s not going to win any design awards, however, and it’s fairly functional when it comes to looks and build quality. That said, you can pay a lot more for lamps that aren’t much better looking or better built. Like the Philips model, you’re not supposed to use this constantly or you’ll mess up your circadian rhythms and you won’t be able to sleep at night.

At least, that’s what they say, but my sister uses hers as a light in the living room and hasn’t suffered any of the consequences so far.

Gains points for

• Being an affordable SAD light
• Size and efficiency. It’s small, compact and simple to use.

Loses points for

The small size does limit its therapeutic abilities, but it’s still a great starter option

It’s not ugly, but it’s not pretty either.

£59.95 from www.co-opXest.com