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On a scale of one to 10 on the scale of really annoying things, not being able to find your keys when you're already late has to be right up there with breaking down on a stormy night in the middle of the Yorkshire Moors or England losing their talismanic player to injury just before a major international football competition.

But what do any of us actually do about it? Nothing. Nada. Squat. In fact even those who are organised usually just leave their in regular 'safe' place – hanging on a hook in the hall maybe, or on a surface near the door – a great system until your local neighbourhood thief works out that a poking a long stick with a magnet on the end through your letter box gains him unfettered access to a household of precious belongings.

Well here's a chance to put locksmiths all over the country in fear for their livelihoods and move opportunist thieves on to the next street. It's an electronic key locator – but with a difference.

Once, the height of lost item locator technology was 'clap/whistle and it beeps'. The Loc8tor Plus is altogether more sophisticated. It comes in two parts: locator tags which you attach to your keys (or anything else important that you're in the habit of misplacing) and the locator handset.

The tags have a flashing LED built in and emit high pitched pips when you activate them. The handset is used just like a pocket metal detector to activate tags and track down your lost items. The closer you get to your precious things, the faster the handset bleeps. It also has a graphical display that shows how close you're getting, and keeps working until you're an inch away. It uses an RF (radio frequency) technology to perform its magic.

And now for the really clever stuff. Each tag can be given a name and registered separately with the handset (up to 24 per handset) so you can search for specific things – keys, wallet, cat and so on. It'll work up to a maximum of 600 feet in open space, which I found to be easily enough to cover all the nooks and crannies in my Victorian terrace and in addition to its standard locator mode has a couple of useful extra features too.

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