I’m about to spend $10,000 in the next 4 minutes buying the craziest transparent tech on the internet. And I’m going to use it to build the most decked out, practically invisible desk setup on the planet, right here to try to answer a very simple question. Transparent tech used to be everywhere in the ’90s. It suddenly disappeared and it’s only now started to make a massive comeback. So, I want to find out, is this stuff actually good or is it just an overhyped gimmick that’s clearly fueled by nostalgia? Transparent Gadget 2025. This is basically a complete modern reimagining of the original Transparent Game Boy. Like 15 years of gaming, childhood is coming back to me. I’m buying this. I remember the transparent PS2 controller back in the day. And it’s crazy seeing how much controllers have evolved since then. Xbox is keeping the dream alive. Such a sick name as well. The Ghost Cipher Special Edition. Okay. There’s a transparent Nintendo Switch controller, too. And it’s actually got LEDs planted onto the circuit board. I wonder if you’ll be able to see the mechanisms of the joysticks and the buttons through the controller. Okay, so while I was playing, I got to eat. Transparent kitchen tech. Why did this come up with zero relevant results? This is the first time Google’s just been like, “You want me?” Oh my god. Oh my god, the price. So, this is by the company Bugatti, and they’ve made a cooker called The Noun, which cooks food between two sheets of glass. And this isn’t just like a visual thing. It’s a completely different way of cooking food, which they’re saying is
healthier and more precise. Oh, you qualify for free shipping. Well, thank you very much. Ooh, clear ice maker. So, the device itself, not transparent. What it produces is 100% transparency. It sounds like a whole load of rubbish. Like, ice is clear. The fact that you can see this person’s hand clearly through the glass, that really emphasizes the difference between this and a normal ice cube. I got sidetracked by my appetite. If we’re trying to build a full transparent setup, what are the key pieces? Transparent keyboard. Oh, now we’re talking. The cool killer CK68. Why stop at 68? Daddy, chill. It’s very weird, but I’m also intrigued by the whole presentation of it. Wait, are they plugging the wire into the suitcase? That I’ve never seen before. And we are done. The Q9 is creamy. Why is it creamy? Is it just me or does this also just look insanely ugly? I feel like this is one of the risks of transparent tech. You’re exposing what’s inside and it may not always look good. Transparentness. Oh yeah, this is more
I like it. And I like that. Look at this tiny little battery indicator there. That’s a functional benefit of the thing being transparent. Oh, there’s another one here. But this one actually has keyboard keys instead of your mouse buttons. Okay, let me just split screen this using the fancy Opera browser, our sponsor. Um, yeah, let’s just buy both. Oh, yeah. Wait, Lenovo made a transparent laptop so that you can sit in a coffee shop and every single other person knows exactly what you’re getting up to. That’s actually got to be the single worst product to try and make transparent. Let’s try this. Arya AI. What are the coolest categories of transparent products I could buy? Ah, earbuds. That’s a shout. Transparent earphones. Why are there actually tons? This is giving me an idea, though. We should do an earphone battle. The Nothing Ear. These are the best earphones that this company currently makes. So, got the Beats by Dre, which take a slightly different approach with everything being translucent. It’s kind of cool that they’ve even applied that to the ear tips. Oh, then Sony, the WFC710NS. How does a company that got it so right with PlayStations get it so wrong with audio? I really like this transparent audio stuff. Let’s go into speakers. So, I have in the past bought one of the small speakers from this transparent company. I think it’s time to buy the flagship, the $1,200 sound system. There’s actually some very interesting stuff here that I think we need to revisit in some other videos. And now, a transparent turntable,and it’s another $1,300. Do you know what this stuff makes me think, though? You know, when you see ultra luxury pricing like this, can you get it cheaper? Let’s say we hopped onto AliExpress. There’s quite a lot of stuff here, which really feels like we have transparent speakers at home. Wait a second. Retrotransparent subwoofer, hi-fi speaker. I clicked the black speaker. $281. This is less than a quarter of the price of the other one. So, we got to buy both and compare them.
All right, let’s create a new tab island because we are desperately going to need some battery to power this stuff. Charge 170. I need some charge. Oh, should we say charge? Yeah, charge. Would you like some charge? It’s the Ice Mag 2, which is a power bank with active fan cooling. Yeah, I think we’ll take one of those. Ooh, they’ve got a charge of 300. The next gen power beast is coming soon. Okay, they know how to get my details. Excuse me. The Liberty wireless charger has 16 overlapping charging coils so that you can put your devices anywhere on this pad and not need to put them in a specific spot to charge. This was Apple’s exact idea with Air Power until they tried making it over the course of a few years until eventually deciding it was practically impossible. So either this company just has a lower bar for what they consider an acceptably working product or they’ve done what Apple couldn’t do, which is a pretty big deal. So that feels like all the key pillars of our setup. Is there anything now that’s just random and crazy? I’ll tell you what isn’t crazy. The state of my
browser tabs right now. This is a sponsor, but I’m not exaggerating when I say that. When I used to buy products like this, it was a mess. I’d get completely lost. Whereas now with the Opera browser, I have like 50 tabs open and you just can’t tell. Link below to download it for free. The Polaroid Sun Camera. So, this isn’t even a product that you can normally buy. This is an engineer’s model used to show you how the Polaroid works. I feel like this will only be available for a small window of time, and I should buy it right now.
This is like the digital 2025 counterpart. Someone’s made a pack of transparent playing cards. I feel like we have to buy this just to try and understand why someone would make this. Yeah, now’s a good time. We’re back. It’s been 3 weeks and it’s time to test some tech. So, the best products are going to make it onto this transparent setup, which should become something that’s never been done before. And as usual, the very best product will earn its place in the Mr. Who’s the Boss Hall of Fame. So, let’s
go from cheapest to most expensive, which means we start with the two computer mice. So, the first one is the keyboard keys mouse at $10. And then we got the almost fully transparent mouse at $17. Well, definitely cooler in person than those website listings. Got to say, this is exciting. The idea of proper keyboard mechanical switches every single time you press your mouse buttons. Oh no. It’s just a normal mouse click, which means it looks stupid and it is stupid. I’m going to give each product a
transparency score based on how well I think it uses its transparency. into this gets a solid six. It is completely clear and the lighting is surprisingly cool. But apart from these battery lights, you can’t see most of the inner workings cuz of all this plastic in front of it. Watch this. It’s actually a lot better. Look at this. You can see the microchips on the circuit board, plus the entire clicking mechanism. It’s quieter, but more sophisticated than the other one. 7 out of 10. It’s basically
like a more interesting looking version of the Apple Magic Mouse with an actually usable charging port location. Apple, what did you do? So, a weird keyboard mouse can go into this shelf here. And this feels like a pretty great first addition to our setup. Okay, jumping ahead a little cuz I think this will take some time to work. The Claris Ice Cube Maker. This is the only one where the device itself isn’t transparent, but what it produces is claiming to be the highest tier of transparent. Cuz if you really think About it, the vast majority of ice cubes that you see are actually pretty cloudy. And that happens when you use water that has lots of impurities in it. you cool the water too quickly or you freeze the water from multiple directions. And it’s the latter problem that this machine addresses. It freezes the water in layers from the bottom up, which is what allows gases to rise to the top instead of pushing those gases and impurities into the middle of the cube, which is what happens in a traditional omnidirectional ice cube tray. Those are some chunky ice cubes, then a whole bottle doesn’t even make four. So, we topped it up. All right, off we go. It says chilling 0 hours 0 minutes, which means it’s counting upwards. Why would I need to know how long my ice has been cooking? So, I guess we’ll just see when it’s ready. Then, when that’s done, we can add the ice cube to this little cocktail over here, which is definitely not water. And now, while we wait for that water to freeze, let’s try and wrap our heads around why someone actually made the Aqua playing cards. Even the packaging is transparent, and they look Oh my god. So, they’re made with plastic card stock and actually embossed with transparent ink with this ultra smooth finish to make them easy to shuffle and fan and do all those crazy card things that I used to think one day would be how I would find my girlfriend. You can tell they’ve got a little more flex than a normal set of cards. They’re quite pliable. I do have one trick. Okay, so the card is there.
Now the card is gone. Wait, I can’t see. Can you actually see the card? I’m really struggling here. Like, this isn’t going to work for any card game where you need to hide what cards you have. It’s barely going to work for games where you need to see your own cards. They are waterproof, so I guess they’re like drinking game proof, but then you have too many drinks and you’re not going to be able to tell a nine from a five. Maybe you could say that these were just meant to be a display item, but then when you actually put them all together, which is what you do if you were displaying them, you can’t see through the deck. Anyway, this is actually ironically like a 2 out of 10 transparency. Not to mention that it’s yellowing a little, so it just looks bad to be honest. Honestly, I feel destined for the clearance section. Enough of playing cards. I think it’s time for some proper gaming now. So, how do these controllers shape up? First is the Afterglow Nintendo Switch controller, which is worth $50. And then the Xbox Series controller, Ghost Cipher Edition, which is 80. Woah, that looks premium. I want a bit of a roller coaster of emotions right now. I mean, the Switch controller is freaking sick. I mean, apart from this little black back plate here, you can see everything. You can see the actuator beneath the joysticks. You got a little bit of battery on show over here. You can see the rumble vibration modules and even the fact that they’ve covered them with a little bit of foam, which I guess is there to reduce the rattling that they make on the inside.
And the soldering is just pristine. Oh yeah, check this out. When have you ever seen a controller be able to do this? Oh my god, a child inside me is screaming. This is so cool. I sound like a child, too. The best part of this is that these LEDs also have a functional benefit. They’ll flash red when the controller is on low battery, and they will go green when the controller is fully charged. Put all of that together, and I think we are at a 9.5 out of 10 transparency rating. Okay,transparent gaming session on a transparent TV. The TV looks like a floating hologram. So, does this controller make me a better gamer? It’s actually really enjoyable to play with. A little bit on the sticky side because it is glossy plastic, but really like these high triggers. They’re almost like bat ears, but it means your fingers rest quite naturally higher up on the controller. It’s got extra controls at the back with these paddles which are configured to a taunt. Point being not just a pretty face actually also a good value controller. So that’s the Switch controller, but this Xbox controller is actually at the same time a very good example of the downside of transparency because this is a controller where you can’t see nearly as much. You know, it’s got this inner silvery shell that’s covering most of the components. The finish itself is much more translucent than it is transparent. I’d only give this a transparency score of like 4 out of 10. But then, does that less transparency actually make it the more practical controller? It’s going to get less sticky.
It’s zero maintenance. There’s no fingerprints. It doesn’t feel like it’s going to pick up scratches over time. So, kind of. Yeah, like there’s definitely an audience for this, but me personally, I am just too attached to this afterlow controller and the fact that it’s literally cheaper than Nintendo’s own. Xbox, you are unfortunately getting relegated. So, what’s the best power bank? I ended up slightly splurging on this charge website, I guess, because transparency is kind of their thing. So, first up, their $70 MagSafe 10,000 mAh power bank, which looks pretty cool, I’d say. It’s really sick to be able to see the enclosure of the USB port. You got this cooling fan, some copper coils, presumably for extra heat conduction. Oh, this is smart. There’s a phone stand baked in. Does that also mean you can flick it sideways to use standby? Yes, it does. Okay, to be completely transparent with you, I think this is a good attempt at this kind of product, but I’m just not sold on the idea of this product. Both from a transparency perspective, you know, because most of the thing is battery, you’re not really seeing a lot with the whole thing being clear. I’d go four out of 10 transparency. The main thing is just efficiency. This is a 10,000 mAh cell. The thing is massive. Like that’s practically tripling the thickness of my phone. But even though 10,000 mAh sounds like it should be able to charge my iPhone’s 4,685 mAh battery 2 and a bit times over, the reality is quite different. Like trying to wirelessly charge like
This wastes so much energy that you will most likely end up with 0.9 to one charge of this iPhone out of it. To me, wireless charging feels like an acceptable compromise when you’re at home with access to unlimited mains electricity. But for a travel power bank where you have very limited capacity and you need to make the most of that capacity, it just feels to me like it makes no sense. But then we have the current flagship battery, the Shek 170, which is 24,000 mAh and triangular. Apparently, the prism shape is inspired
by Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon cover. I’m not so sure about that. Feels like they wanted to make a triangle and then came up with the justification. Well, you can absolutely see a lot more here. Somewhat let down by this battery area which is frosted instead of clear. What are they trying to hide? Ooh, software looks a little bit calculator-like, especially for something that’s so futuristic in all other aspects. But what is really cool about this is that the display is actually planted onto the circuit board.
It’s just another one of the components like everything else you see here. So, it makes you feel like this has to be transparent to work the way that it does. But then we can go next gen with the Sharky 300. This thing is a proper monstrosity. Like, one of the first things the site says is literally overkill power. Have we ever seen a RGB LED strip on a power bank before? So, this has the same 24,000 mAh capacity as the other one, but the extremity comes in how fast it can release that power. because this battery bank has 300 W of max output. I’ve yet to see anything close to that high for a power bank like this that can slip in a backpack. And what that means is you could charge not one but two 140 W 16-in MacBook Pros at the same time at max speed. Also, thanks to this DC output port over here, things that a normal power bank couldn’t, like power tools, like a monitor, like a Wi-Fi router. And it’s if you’re going to do those kinds of things that something like this becomes more worth it. Ooh, does look like they fixed the display though. This is actually like the nicest display I’ve ever seen on a power bank. And while technically it’s kind of more blocked off than the other one in terms of transparency. I do rate the fact that you can see the batteries clearly. I think for me the special thing about transparent tech is the ability to look at the key components while they’re in their natural place. It’s kind of like the benefit of seeing animals in a safari versus a zoo. as a strange example. And so for a power bank, battery is like the
key working component, which means I think this has earned a place on our esteemed transparent setup. And now the time has come for the earphone battle. Starting with the Sony WFC710NS, which are $120. And yeah, definitely not the most polished unboxing experience. Feels like this needed a couple more rounds of refinement. at $150. Then the Nothing Ear buds. And this isn’t any kind of special edition. This design is just kind of what Nothing does. And then finally, the Beats Studio Buds Plus. These are $170. And I’m very curious to compare these to the others. Because historically companies like Sony have had this reputation of cult following, enthusiast grade audio, Beats are kind of the opposite with more of a reputation of overpriced tech designed for the mainstream. Talking transparency, I actually think the Beats win this by a landslide. You could even say it beats them, or you could not. I do wish it wasn’t frosted, but even then, you can see everything. See the battery in here? You can see the earbuds through the case.
You can see all the magnets and the housing for those magnets. 7 out of 10. And I have to say, I’m a little surprised. You know how Apple owns Beats? And Apple is almost famous for how they don’t like to show how their things work. They just want you to know that they work. For a company like that to make a transparent product like this, which really just reminds you that it’s not magic. It’s just a bunch of components on a circuit board. I didn’t see it coming. Anyway, the nothing’s I’d probably give a six to. You can’t really see anything in the case, which is a bit of a bummer. Then I do think the earbuds themselves pull off the transparency really well. You can feel the effort that’s gone into specifically building the internals to look good while transparent as opposed to the Beats which feel a bit more like they were intended to be a non-transparent product but just have a transparent variant. Then the Sony’s I would say have the weakest transparency effect. I think the blue color takes a lot of the impact away from the
transparency. It’s a little surprising that the cabling inside also looks a bit disorganized. But which one sounds the best?Uh, they sound basically the same. There are micro differences. Yes. Like nothing’s lean a little bit more on bass than the other two. But that means then that Sony’s reputation for audio is deserved.
