This week I had the opportunity to spend a day at the Texas Motor Speedway test driving 2009 GM Collection. There were so many gorgeous and impressive vehicles present, I would be hard pressed to say which was my favorite; but of course I had one…
How often these days do you see 4×3-aspect LCD monitors for sale? I’d be willing to bet it’s not often. Widescreen has simply dominated the PC market, from laptops to desktops, which a lot of people thinking is a wonderful thing. It makes laptops smaller, it’s better for watching movies and it lets you put documents side-by-side. But the downside to this is considerably less vertical room, and if you think about it that’s where you often need it. How often have to been to a website that is almost twice as wide as it is tall? Or written a…
The Treo Pro really needs to be a success for Palm. The company that was once a team of innovators has obviously been talking to the green movement, since for ages they seem to have just been recycling. The Treo 750 was good, but flawed when put up against the competition. For a kick off there was still no WiFi, despite the move by other manufacturers to make it a regular feature in their high-end phones. GPS was notably absent too, and the design was all too similar to the Treo 650, which came out in 2004. Its chubby dimensions…
It never fails that when I pack my gear, there are always small items which will sift to the bottom of my bag’s cavernous pockets. This doesn’t even take into account all of the times when I have needed a particular something, and no matter how neatly I thought I had it packed, I couldn’t find it when it was time. Well, no more. Tom Bihn makes a variety of Organizer Pouches, and I think that it would be safe to assume that there is something for everyone. Let’s take a look… Cordura Organizer Pouches
I am a GPS nut, and I have been since I won my first one, a Garmin GPS-12 at the Dayton Hamvention as a door prize. That Garmin had no maps in it, but fortunately it’s almost unheard of to not have included maps on a GPS unit these days. So what makes the Nextar I4-BC special? Let’s find out.
Despite the uncertain state of fuel prices and overall economy, there are still a few who place “fun” above “sensible” when making a new car purchase. We recently got to test a pair of German imports aimed at that extreme side of the “fun” factor: a BMW M3 sedan and Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG sedan.
The Sierra Sound iN Studio 5.0 speakers are one of many iPod speakers available on the market today. I recently spent some time with them and I have to say I like them a lot, but there are some oddities. Read on to see what they are…
I am a real lover of good music. I was a radio DJ in college, and through that, I developed an admiration for good music and talented musicians…regardless of the genre. When I heard that Bowers & Wilkins, the makers of some extremely nice iPod speakers (watch for my review of their speakers coming soon) had begun a new kind of music club, I knew I would have to check it out. And boy am I glad I did. The B&W Music Club is unlike any music club I have seen. Many of you are probably thinking, as I did,…
The MacBook Air is a beautiful piece of electronics. It is sleek, stylish and… well, just plain cool. But while its aluminum construction is certainly more durable than, say, the current (and soon to be phased out) version of the MacBook, without too much difficulty the Air can get pretty banged up and scuffed. Within a short period of time “beautiful” can become “beat up”. And that is a problem on a device like the MBA. On the one hand you want to protect it while on the other, while on the other you don’t want to lose the sleek…
UPDATED WITH REVIEWS: Special Wednesday Walkaround: Two new models coming from American Suzuki – the all-new 2009 Equator pickup and the refreshed 2009 Grand Vitara. Suzuki hosted this press launch in the Texas Hill Country at the historic Knibbe Ranch. Click on image for video.
When I was a child, I absolutely loved stuffed animals; I had such a massive collection residing on my bed that they threatened to push me off should I stretch out or roll over in the middle of the night. One of my fondest wishes at that time was that some of my favorite stuffed animals could be more life-like and animated. Granted, this was in the 70s, and the closest things we had to robotic toys back then were those obnoxious stuffed dogs that came with a wired battery pack so that they could walk a few steps, bark,…
[Note from Judie: This is Drew’s follow-up to his original letter about his first week with the Vertu Ascent Ti. If you haven’t already read that, then you might want to check it out.] I had an opportunity to take a bit of a deeper dive with the Ascent Ti this weekend and tried out some of these other features: 1. Fortress (the over the air backup utility) 2. The camera 3. The music player 4. Software upgrade process One of the big selling features is the ability to back up your personal information to the Fortress, a military shelter…
(Why) I Hate to Date (Online) is a new publication from MaryAnna Donovan which outlines her 5 years of online dating. I thought it might be fun to look at this book since Judie had just finished writing a series about online dating in July. In the book MaryAnna provides commentary about a few of the men she met as well as the online dating sites themselves. The book summarizes the online dating experience very accurately and provides excellent points about the world of online dating. If you’re thinking of online dating – could you benefit from the book?
When I bought my laptop a few years ago, I proudly brought it home, tore open the box, and set it up on my desk. I was so excited to give it a try. With a crack of my knuckles, I sat in the chair and reached for the keyboard, which sat flat on my desk. I had to slouch a bit and sloop my shoulders inward in order to reach. I then craned my neck to view the screen, which was below my eye level and slightly askew. While this setup did result in many fantastic articles and reviews,…
Every mom carries around a basic toolbox, whether it be stowed in her diaper bag or purse. The child’s age will dictate what gear must be carried, whether it’s bottles, binkies and rattles, or tissues, snack money and aspirin. The cleverly named company, Mommy Toolbox, has created a line of products meant to make mom’s (and dad’s) lives easier; their first product is the Carabean, a lead-free rubbery paint coated aluminum clip that can function as a much needed third or fourth hand. Packaged in pairs, I was sent a set in black licorice; they are also available in buttercup…
Prior to using the Balanzza digital luggage scale I had an awkward way of weighing my luggage before leaving on a trip. In order to meet airline weight limits (typically 50 pounds) I’d try to position my fat suitcase on the bathroom scale. This was an imperfect method because it was nearly impossible to read the weight without shifting the suitcase around on the scale which in turn produced inaccurate readings. When I found the Balanzza luggage scale I had to give it a try to see whether it was a better method than the old bathroom scale.
I received an email offer about two weeks ago from SmithMicro. They advertise a software product called TuneRanger which promises to “Sync, manage and protect all of your iTunes libraries …with the click of a button”. I have my main iTunes library on an iMac and would like to synchronize all of the iTunes music over to my MacBook Pro so that I’d have an identical copy including playlists and any ratings that I’d created for my songs. SmithMicro was offering over 30% savings if I bought within 10 days of the mailing – which seemed too good to be…
There has been a host of activity (and anxiety) over at Jaguar during the past year. A new “entry level” model was introduced, replacing a pair of, shall we say, leftover Fords.
I have a large DVD collection. I am not yet all that excited about investing in Blu-ray where I get to pay twice as much for each new title. Although many HD televisions perform certain image upconvert functions (to improve the way standard TV and DVD images appear on the higher-resolution HD display), they don’t necessarily perform that function very well. Enter the Oppo DV-981HD DVD Player. The 981HD was introduced a while back with some state of the art features for the time at a moderate price. I recently got the opportunity to work with this player and put…
I am very fortunate to have such a wonderful working relationship with the folks over at E-TEN, now officially a part of the Acer family! I received a wonderful surprise the other day. E-TEN (now Acer, now that the merger between the two has completed) sent me the V900 WM Pro 6.1 mobile device!
Digital cameras seem to be everywhere these days, and I am pretty sure you are all familiar with the basic premises of composing a photo on them. Set subjects in place, aim camera, scream “everyone smile!” point, and shoot as everyone smiles or says cheese, or whatever other instruction you gave them. Pretty simple. Simple, that is, if you are not trying to take pictures of children. My six year old and three year old are a mile a minute. They rarely sit still, let alone, smile on command. And even if one does listen, it is almost impossible for…