In the future everyone will wear identical white lycra jumpsuits and eat three course dinner pills. Well they will according to old episodes of Outer Limits. They will also do away with old-style clocks and tell the time by glancing at a few flashing dots. It's true, because we've seen the future of time-telling in the ultra-sleek shape of the Designer Binary Clock.

This ingenious timepiece dispenses with traditional dials and digits, displaying the time instead in binary format. Confused? Don't worry, that's the idea because the Designer Binary Clock has been created to flummox all but the science-savvy sophisticate (ie: you after a little practice).

Basically you work out the time by adding the illuminated lights in each column (the bottom light in each column is worth 1, the second light up is worth 2, the third up is worth 4 and the fourth up is worth 8) or across each row (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32). It's easy after a some practise. Sort of.


Okay, the truth is it's a bit more tricky than all that big hand/little hand business but who cares about that when you've got a truly unique clock that looks like it's been swiped off the Starship Enterprise? What's more, with the light patterns changing every second, it's really rather mesmerizing. And with three brightness levels and 12/24 hour options, you'll be clock-watching for all the right reasons.


Once you get your head around telling the time binary style you can impress guests with your incredible Hawking-like ability to make sense of a few glowing LEDs. And if you can't you can still gaze in awe at this extremely elegant curio and ponder your failure to grasp basic mathematics.

Here's how you tell the time (in Binary and BCD mode):



As well as its befuddling beauty, the Designer Binary Clock will also help keep the old grey matter in trim. Doing a little mental arithmetic every time you glance at the clock is good for the brain, especially if you've battered yours with beer and allsorts. Now if you'll excuse us, it's eleventy past fifteen so we're off to iron our jumpsuits.