The concept of using wearables to help track and monitor your fitness better is not something new. In fact in 2014, fitness wearables are going mainstream. We can finally see a lot of these smart wearables available for commercial use. They help you track your workout, your calorie count, heart rate, sleep patterns, step count and other aspects of your health you want to keep watch on.

Here are 20 of the latest wearable gadgets you could probably buy in 2014. Note that most of these wearables were shown off during CES 2014 and has yet to get their confirmed released-by date or prices. But one thing is for sure, with such a wide range of selections to choose from, the competition is definitely heating up.

Recommended Reading: 10 Cool Fitness Gadgets For Health Junkies

Wellograph

Wellograph is a watch, a fitness tracker and heart rate monitor, rolled in one. Its larger screen allows you to view graphs of your daily and weekly activities, steps, fitness and heart rate. You can pair it with your smartphone over Bluetooth to view even more detailed stats. Its battery can last for 2 weeks if you use all its onboard sensors, or 3 months if you’re using it exclusively as a watch. [$330]

Polar V800

The Polar V800 is a cross between a smartwatch and a health tracker. You can track calories burnt and steps taken, monitor your heart rate, GPS and sports profiles. You can tell the smartwatch what sports you are doing so it can better "understand" your training and even give you tips on your recovery time. It’s also waterproof, so you can take it for a swim. [$450]

Atlas

Atlas is a feature-filled fitness tracker that works with many kinds of activities, sports, workouts in the gym, including swimming. Once you start doing a specific movement or sport, it’ll try to detect to see if it recognizes what you’re doing. If it cannot recognize the movement, you can "teach" it so you can track the amount of repetitions you do for each workout while tracking your heart rate at the exact moment. [$285]

Garmin Vivofit

The Garmin Vivofit is for the city fitness junkie who want to track steps taken, calories burned, hours slept and overall fitness progress. It also tracks heart rates, is water-resistant and lets you sync the collected data to your smartphone. It comes with a 1-year battery life and tracks fitness levels 24 hours a day. [$129]

LG Lifeband Touch

The Lifeband Touch features a bright OLED screen that is visible even when you’re outdoors, and it’s touch sensitive for easier navigation. You’ll be able to see your fitness activities, calories burned, speed, and other measurements taken through its 3-axis accelerometer and altimeter sensors. You can also pair it with a heart rate monitor or smartphone to view notifications and control music. [$179]

Movea G-Series

Movea, a company responsible for motion-tracking software and firmware of consumer electronic products is behind the G-Series. On top of tracking steps taken, calories, sleep, distance and speed with the addition of knowing what posture you’re currently at, it also tracks your cadence (revolutions per minute) while cycling or running. [TBA]

Sony SmartBand

The Sony Smartband is a holder for Sony’s Core, a sensor that tracks your daily activity. However, the Core doesn’t have to be worn on the wrist; it can also be inserted into a shoe (in the future). You won’t be able to view any information through the core as it doesn’t have a screen, but you can access the data collected by pairing it to your smartphone via Bluetooth. [TBA]

Archos Activity Tracker

Like other activity trackers, the Archos activity tracker has a small screen to let you view your steps and calories burnt and can be paired up with a smartphone. But you can also compete with friends to see who has the largest step count of the day. Archos also plans to introduce more connected gadgets like a blood-pressure monitor and smart weighing scale. [TBA]

Razer Nabu

Razer Nabu is a wristband which gives you smartphone notifications and band-to-band communication. It lets you track fitness goals, sleep time and running distances (thanks to the built-in GPS feature). It recognizes gestures like finger snaps, a flick of the wrist, handshakes and high-fives which you can use to do things like dismiss notifications. [$49 (Developer)]

Mio LINK

The Mio LINK is more of an advanced heart rate tracker. Users wear the LINK while running, biking, swimming or any other vigorous sport and they’ll be able to track their heart rate through the LED indicators. Information of your heart rate and activity duration can be viewed when synced to a smartphone over Bluetooth. [$99]

iFit Active

iFit started out as a fitness tracking app but has now ventured into making their own fitness tracker called the iFit Active. The Active would come with a mode-switching feature, depending on where you are: at home sleeping, braving traffic to get to work or doing your morning gym routine. These modes change automatically to allow 24-hour tracking without any hiccup. [$129]

Jaybird Reign

The fully waterproof Reign can track your performance through activities like running, biking, swimming and walking. It has band sensor where you can place a finger, and it can tell you if your body is optimized for a workout or if it’s too tired. Instead of a screen it has 12 LED lights to show you the time or how far you are from your fitness goal. More info of your fitness levels can be viewed when it is paired with your smartphone. [$199]

LG HRM Earphone

LG is taking the basic Heart Rate Monitor (HRM) to the next level by combining it with earphones. The earphones will play music off your smartphone connected over Bluetooth. You can then clip the HRM device on your shirt to allow it to track distance, calories, and steps taken, with its 3-axis accelerometer. It’ll also work together with LG’s Lifeband Touch for more accurate readings. [$179]

Intel Smart Earbuds

Intel has created earbuds that have sensors inside the earpiece which can measure your heart rate. It works with an app, on which you can set a target heart rate. The device can then select the music track that suits the pace you’re working out at. The earbuds are powered by the smartphone earphone jack you plug it into. [TBA]

Epson Pulsense Watch / Band

Epson’s line of wearables is available in two forms: Pulsense Watch and Pulsense Band. The former monitors your activities while the other records it. Pulsense monitors your heart rate, activity level, calorie burns and sleep patterns. Pair it with your smartphone for a better breakdown of info collected. [$129 (band); $199 (watch)]

Spree Headband

Spree is currently the only consumer fitness tracker that can tell you in detail the temperature your body is operating at. To do this, the device has to be worn on the forehead. Spree can track your heart rate, movement and the distance you have covered through the app. [$299]

Netatmo JUNE

The fashionable Netatmo JUNE measures your daily sun exposure rates and will advise you to wear a hat or apply sunscreen lotion when necessary. It measures the sun’s intensity in real time. The information can be viewed when paired with a smartphone. [$99]

PUSH

PUSH is catered more to gym goers who want that extra edge and lots of information to better their performance. Not only does it track the repetitions and sets for each specific workout, it’ll tell you your force, power, balance, speed, explosive strength, load and tempo. Serious gym-goers will appreciate how this device can better sort out their performances and progress over time. [TBA]

Notch

Notch is a wearable that can be worn on different parts of the body (e.g. wrist or ankle), in multiples, to provide a better, more overall body tracking system. Everything is synced over Bluetooth and can be viewed from its smartphone app. It’s a great tool for sports enthusiasts who want to gain an advantage over the competition. [TBA]

Lumo Lift

Lumo Lift is a posture-correcting device that you can wear on your chest. It reminds you to sit straight by generating small vibrations. It can also track how often you are sitting in the proper posture in a day. It also tracks steps and calories burnt. To view the data collected, just pair it with a smartphone. [$59-$79]

It’s a new year and if you are looking to reload or completely redesign your business cards and have yet to do so, you’re in luck. Together with PrintKEG.com, we are giving away 1000 business cards to lucky hongkiat.com readers.

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Note that the prize does not include shipping or card design but if you need help with the latter, you can opt for their custom design, or check out our resources and tutorials, or get ideas (and free templates) from our awesome business card showcases.

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So you are planning a special date for Valentine's and want to declare your love to your better half. Just don’t make the mistake of forgetting the festive decorations that can make this an amazingly unforgettable experience.

When it comes to decor, it’s more than just splashing red all around, or turning everything heart-shaped. There are many ways to turn things super classy, super trendy and super sweet. Whether they are balloon hearts, wall fixtures, decor for the dining table or the bedroom, there are plenty of decor ideas to put the atmosphere into the right gear.

Best of all, for some of these items, you can get the how-to-make-this tutorial at the site. Just remember to click on the links to get the tutorials or get a closer look at the setup. Be ready to impress!

Recommended Reading: In The Mood For Love: 50 Wallpapers For Valentine’s Day

Free Valentine Printable and Heart Candy Jar by The 36th Avenue

DIY VALENTINE POM POM DECOR by Molly

Message in a Bottle by Sweet Scarlet

Crayon Heart Valentines by WhipperBerry

Homemade Valentine’s Decor by Shannanigans Blog

Valentine's Day Subway Art by The Tomkat Studio

Valentine Bunting by Laura Beth

Valentine's Day Decor: Sweet Valentine's Day Wreath by Making Home Base

Tree Branch Decor by MagazinaOnline

HEART STRING ART DECOR by emmy-ray

Valentine Mantel by Remodelando la Casa

Valentine’s Day Decor by Anna Saccone

Simple DIY Valentines Day Door Decor by Serendipity Refined

Romantic Home Decor by Snowy Bliss

Charming Bedroom Decoration For Valentine’s Day

Burlap Valentine Heart Pillow by Thistlewood Farm

Valentine's Fortune Cookies by Jenny Raulli

DIY Love Letters by My Sister’s Suitcase

DIY Valentine's Day Burlap Gift Bags by The Casual Craftlete

Valentine Party Pouches & Eat Your Heart Out Printables by Shaken Together

Windows 8 users may find it difficult to look for the shut down button. For reasons unknown, Windows 8 users need to go through 3 steps to locate the option to shut down. In the Windows 8.1 update, you can right click on the start menu and choose Shut Down.

However if you are working on touchscreen devices, you might prefer enabling a (cooler) slide to shut down UI on your Windows 8.1. It also works on desktop and we’ll show you how to set it up in this quick tip.

Recommended Reading: 20 Useful Microsoft Windows 8.1 Tips & Tricks

The Slide to Shutdown UI

The Slide To Shutdown UI is an executable file found in the Windows > System 32 folder. If you double click on the SlideToShutDown.exe file you will see your lock screen rolled down half way through the screen from the top. From here, if you want to shut down your Windows, just slide downwards (but let’s not do that just yet).

There are a few ways we can access this Slide to Shut down option quickly: Quick Search, Pin to Start or Taskbar and if you are on desktop, by setting a keyboard shortcut.

1. Quick Search For SlideToShutdown

Because of a more powerful Search function on Windows 8, you can press your Windows key to bring out the Metro UI then type slidetoshutdown.exe and press Enter to run it.

2. Pin To Start or Taskbar

You can also pin the SlideToShutDown.exe file to the Start or Taskbar. Right-click on the file and choose pin to Start or Taskbar, and the file will show up in your Metro Launcher or at the bottom of your desktop screen where the taskbar is. To shut down just run the file, the slide to shut down.

3. Create Shortcut On Desktop

Alternatively you can also create a shortcut to the file and place the shortcut on the desktop.

Right-click on the SlideToShutDown.exe file then choose Send to > Desktop (create shortcut). On the desktop, right-click on the SlideToShutDown shortcut and choose properties.

In the properties window, look under the Shortcut tab for the "Shortcut key:" field. Give this shut down shortcut a keyboard shortcut combination, for example Ctrl + Alt + Shift + S, and you’re done. To next time you want to slide to shutdown just press this key combo.