Chumby Guts are available for $US139 and include everything you need to construct a Frankenstein’s monster version of the gadget. [Maker Shed]

The Price

$US100 for a limited time, $US120 afterwards. Includes international power adaptors and AC charger, but battery is sold separately. Starts shipping November 25 to the US and some countries in Europe.

The Verdict

It’s the same questionably essential yet unquestionably adorable Chumby, with a new case and a lower (and very tempting) price. I have no idea what its makers meant the original beanbag Classic (newly renamed) to be used for, but the One is more than a little reminiscent of old-school clock radios. And if you look at it as simply a badass clock radio, rather than an amorphous connected widget device, you really appreciate it. Imagine waking up to Pandora, then rolling over and checking your email and Twitter before hitting snooze for another 10 minutes of sleep. Awesome, right? But what exactly has changed from the Chumby Classic?

Instead of the touchscreen-in-a-beanbag look, it’s now rocking a smooth white plastic casing with a big honking volume knob on the side and a 3.5-inch resistive touchscreen. I really like the design: It’s playful and chunky and thoroughly charming. Some may be bummed that the One loses the beanbag look, which is kind of a signature of the line, but I don’t think it’ll make that much difference. The Classic (beanbag) Chumby required a power cable so it’s not like you could toss it around, and luckily the new design is still distinctive and fun — and if you really want the beanbag, it’s not going anywhere. The One is simply joining the Classic, not replacing it.

The Chumby One does lose a few features found in the Chumby Classic — it only has one USB port compared to the Classic’s two, and the formerly stereo 2W dual-speaker set is now mono speaker with the same wattage. The speaker is noticeably more distorted and muddier, and it could use definitely use improvement, although it’s not horrible and is fine at lower volumes.

But the Chumby One also gains 2GB memory (the Classic has 64MB), a li-ion battery (in addition to AC) and a faster processor. I didn’t notice much improvement in speed, but it’s not like it really needs a whole lot of muscle to display weather and news headlines. The Chumby One’s screen also seems sharper than the Classic’s, and the overall package is shorter and narrower, although thicker. Chumby’s selection of widgets, by the way, is quite good, with a huge selection of clocks, social networking services, news, RSS feeds, games and other fun little time wasters.

I’m conflicted about the Chumby One. On the one hand, it’s totally unnecessary — it can’t really do anything a modern smartphone with a dock can’t do better, and at $US100 it’s sort of expensive for an alarm clock. On the other hand, I’m undeniably taken with this thing. It does a good job delivering the time, weather, news and RSS feeds, running Pandora and waking me up, and it looks adorable while doing it. If you’re comfortable dropping $US100 on a little plastic cube of widgets for your bedside table, go for it.

Awesome retro design with clean and simple UI

Runs widgets admirably

Substantial price cut, but not quite impulse-purchase territory

Doesn’t do anything your smartphone can’t

While the CPU has been bumped up from 350MHz to 454MHz, the 3.5-inch (320×240) touchscreen remains the same. There are about 1500 Chumby widgets for all sorts of things, like Google Calendar and Facebook.

Though there’s no official word, it’s believed the Chumby One will arrive next month for about $US100. I kind of dig the retro alarm-clock look, and the lower price could sweeten the deal. [Gadgeteer]

No word on new features; even though our own Matt really liked the original Chumby, he didn’t see much of a niche for it to fill. But the design has kind of an iriver neo-retro thing going on with the cubic design and big dial, and we’ve always had a soft spot for the little guy. We’ll update more as we get new information. [Ryan Block]

The company has told Forbes that “several ‘powered by Chumby’ gadgets” will launch in the coming months. They have struck partnerships with Sony, Samsung, Broadcom and others.

The first product to launch will be a digital photo frame and will be followed by TVs, Blu-Ray players, clocks and radios. Chumby, you really don’t think Yahoo’s platform is good enough, huh? [Forbes]

The differences between the two models aren’t that major: The 2009 model has a variety of colours, a more responsive touchscreen (although I’m happy with the 2008 unit), screen brightness controls (a welcome addition) and automatic reboot after power outages. I’m not sure if that’s worth $150 or not, but either way, having a Chumby is like having a robot baby, and you can’t put a price on a robot baby, can you?

[Chumby]

That, and the Linux OS’s hackability. If it’s still just as hackable, having the engine embedded in TVs and Blu-ray players might actually actually produce a race of super Blu-ray players that play Quake, eat babies, connects to MySpace and actually competes with the Yahoo! widget engine we saw in a bunch of TVs at CES. [CrunchGear]

Now, just to begin, this clever bit of Chumby hacking doesn’t turn the device into a direct line to the president. Let that idea expire right here and now; you will not be discussing our nation’s nuclear launch codes with a frantic President Obama via a Chumby phone anytime soon (it is Linux, though, so who knows what someone will cook up eventually).

What it does do is allow you to experiment with this incredibly hackable device and have a fun little weekend project that will make your home office or work cubicle that much cooler. The DIY project doesn’t dial out—yet—but it will play tunes though the handset thanks to clever speaker placement. The “Future Improvements” planned for this project, made possible by the manufacturer-endorsed hacking that’s possible with the platform, are also pretty cool.

Lastly, when Obama isn’t saving the free world with his Chumby, he can unwind with Quake; feed his fish; or even give his infamous iPod a break with some relaxing Pandora internet radio tunes. He doesn’t have anything else planned for when he takes office next week, right? [MAKE — Thanks, Mike!]

The details on the “My Chumby’s Fish” design are pretty thin, but it appears that sensors monitor conditions inside the tank and report details back to you. Because it’s Chumby heart utilises a wireless connection, other fish lovers with this device can interact with your fish and feed it remotely via your own personal goldfish network. By “interact” I mean that the fish can see each other via webcam, you can talk to it via a microphone and use “shake and tap movements” to simulate vibration and air bubbles. Yeah, this is a bit over the top for something you will probably flush down in the toilet in a week—but then again, most design concepts are out there to begin with. [Yanko]

To get the Gizmodo AU widget on your Chumby, log onto Chumby.com and select the Australia category in the Manage widgets tab. And while you’re there, you should probably add all the other Allure Media sites as well, from Babble to Kotaku and Lifehacker to Defamer – they’re all pretty much guaranteed to keep you entertained throughout the day while you should be working, and that can’t be a bad thing.

[Chumby on Giz]