Misc Gear

Boogie Board Introduces 2 New LCD eWriter Models at CES

You know about the Boogie Board, right? It’s basically an LCD notepad that can be reused as many times as you need. It’s great for leaving a note for your husband, wife, or the kids, or maybe jotting down a phone number at the office. I know I go through tons of little notepads that I keep next to my phone in my office just taking little notes. This saves all that paper, plus, all your friends or coworkers would be totally jealous of you. What’s really cool is that these babies use zero power. Zero. They use Reflex No…

Events, Travel

What’s Coming with Us to CES, the 2013 Edition

Every year we make the trek to Las Vegas, and every year we try to strike the perfect balance between the gear that we’ll need and a few extra things that will make our lives easier; the trick is to not forget anything vital or to too seriously overpack. Sometimes we get it right, and sometimes we fail miserably. Here’s what’s coming along this time … Judie: I’ve been going to CES since 2002, and you would think that by now I’d have a perfect kit prepared … but technology keeps changing, and so does my gear. I think I…

News & Features

Wilson Electronics’ New Sleek 4G Signal Booster Will Keep Your Connection Solid

If you are on the road a lot, then you know all about what it’s like to have your cellular signal act in a less than reliable manner. Watching your 4G/LTE signal drop down to zilch, then slide over to EDGE, 3G and then ultimately climb back to 4G — depending upon where you area, even though the areas are shown to have 4G coverage — is just part of using a mobile phone these days. . The same thing can happen when you are in a car, truck, boat, or any other moving vehicle. One way to combat this…

News & Features

Mobile Fun Samsung Galaxy S III Extended Battery Kit

If you have a smartphone other than one of the Droid Maxx devices, chances are you wish it had better battery life. And as they get more and more powerful we do more and more – so any gains in power efficiency are lost by greater usage! There are battery cases available that fully cover your device and change the appearance and certain enhance the size and weight. But what MobileFun is offering is a replacement battery that adds nearly 50% to your battery capacity (from 2100mAh to 3000mAh) yet only increases the thickness by attaching directly as a replacement…

Crowdfunding, Gear Bits

Whooz? Are a Huge Hit at My House

On Christmas morning, as packages from under the tree were divided into piles and then opened, I got what would turn out to be one of my biggest Christmas surprises: the best gift was something I had stuck into the girls’ new Jon Hart bags, almost as an afterthought — Whooz iPhone and iPad Character Sets! Kev’s youngest daughter stopped everything to start installing a set on her iPad charger, and Kev’s oldest daughter was right there with her. Let me back up for just a moment. Everyone in my house has an iPhone or an iPad (or both), and…

Gear Bits, How to Do It Yourself!

Raspberry Pi Hacked to Allow Siri to Open Your Garage Door

What a world we live in – We now have computers that fit in our pockets, gorgeous televisions that are 1″ thick, and a dude who skydived from the edge of space. Continuing along that vein, now you can program your credit card sized computer, otherwise known as the Raspberry Pi, to open your garage door for you using Siri’s voice commands on your iPhone. Seriously. RaspberryPi.org forum user “DarkTherapy” was able to code his Raspberry Pi saying he used “SiriProxy running on the Raspberry Pi, along with wiring Pi to access the Pi’s GPIO pins and turn a relay…

Reviews, Yum Log

Baker’s Math Kitchen Scale – KD8000 – Unleash Your Inner Alton Brown Again

I’ve often said (including here on Gear Diary, I think), that in the kitchen you’re either an Alton or a Mario. “Altons” refer to Alton Brown, the Mr. Wizard of the Food Network who combines science and math with recipes to teach you how to cook and why precision is important. I’m an Alton. “Marios” are more like Mario Batali, cooks who throw in a dash of this and a sprinkle of that and never measure anything. My girlfriend is a Mario. Well, maybe she’s more of a Maria… These two archetypes can work well together in a kitchen, as…

Gear Bits

Set Top Boxes, a Gear Chat

Over the years writing for Gear Diary, we often have chats behind the scenes about all sorts of issues. Some are private and will never see the light of day, but many times what is said ends up in a long string of comments that would make a great post. This one all started by a gift I received from a friend — a brand new Roku 2 XS — which I love a lot. I posted in our back channel about it, and off we went. Joel: Received a Roku 2 XS from a friend of mine. Best thing ever. First…

Editorials

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly Regarding FedEx Smartpost and UPS Surepost

If you have ever bought something on the internet that didn’t ship solely via USPS, then using either FedEx Smartpost or UPS Surepost was likely an option; they are both shipping options that use the United States Postal Service for the final leg. In other words, UPS or FedEx will deliver the packages to your local Post Office, and the Postal Service will handle the actual delivery. The concept sounds good, but in practice it can be anything but. The Good For the e-tailers, it’s a really good deal. They setup the contract with UPS or FedEx, and they get…

Gear Bits, Outdoors

Caching in on Fun

Has anyone ever told you to go take a hike? Have you considered actually doing it? Do you enjoy scavenger hunts? If you answered yes to these questions, then geocaching is for you! Geocaching is a scavenger hunt appropriate for adults or anyone who can follow a GPS. The basic premise is that somewhere out in the woods, someone hid a treasure chest (or geocache), and in that chest is a collection of random goods including anything ranging from a heart necklace to a plastic stegosaurus. The GPS coordinates will help you get to the area, and then it’s your…

Reviews

Kanex DoubleUp Dual USB Charger Review

Two years ago, I left for CES carrying my iPhone and a Samsung Galaxy Tab. I thought I was packing efficiently because instead of bringing each device’s USB wall charger, I brought a single wall charger that had dual USB ports. So of course it was on that trip, when I needed my gear the most, that I found out that just because a charger plugs into the wall and has two USB ports, it won’t necessarily be powerful enough to charge even one of your devices — especially when one of them is a tablet. To add insult to…

Reviews

Just Mobile HeadStand Review

So you’ve got a pair of big, beautiful, great sounding headphones like the SMS STREET by 50 DJ over-the-ear headphones I reviewed last month. Sure, you could store them in the included football-shaped case,heretofore referred to as the “fbcase”, but that quickly becomes pain if you use them on a regular basis. I mean, do you really want to have to unzip the “fbcase”, remove the headphones and attach the cord each and every time you want to listen to music without disturbing the other people in the house? And that doesn’t take into account having to disconnect the cord,…

Gear Bits

Best Buy Tech Service Gone Awry; a GM’s Customer Service Saves the Day

I came home a few weeks ago to find my almost four year old Gateway desktop rig powered completely off. I tried turning it back on, only to find out that it had decided that it didn’t want to at all. That could only mean the power supply, since it had been on and working just fine a few hours before. Annoying yes, but fortunately, not insurmountable. It took me a couple of weeks to scrounge up the dough for the new power supply, since I wanted to get it directly from Gateway; I figured that I could probably follow…

Reviews

Belkin Charge + Sync Dock with Audio Port for iPhone 5 Review

Belkin was quick from the gate in offering accessories for the iPhone 5. As you know, the iPhone 5 didn’t just get a longer screen, but it also got a new dock connector and a relocated 3.5 mm headphone jack. As a result, accessories designed to work with the dock connector of the iPhone in its earlier iterations no longer functioned unless you added an adapter. Belkin quickly released a number of cables, and now they have released a dock for the iPhone 5 and the iPod touch. The company was kind enough to send one for review, so let’s…

Crowdfunding

Home Aquaponics Kit: A Self-Cleaning Fish Tank that Grows Food

Project Title: Home Aquaponics Kit: Self-Cleaning Fish Tank That Grows Food Status: Funded, with only 37 hours left (at this posting) Closing Date for Funding: 1:59am CST December 15, 3012 URL of the Project: Home Aquaponics Kit From the Creatives: Grow fresh produce right in the comfort of your own home – beans, basil, thyme, baby greens, oregano, mint, parsley, spinach and so many other delicious foods! • So what’s happening inside? The fish, they poo and they pee, and all that waste-water gets broken down by beneficial bacteria into nutrients • The waste-water from the fish is then pumped up…

Editorials

Rapidly Advancing Smartphone Technology Makes It Hard to Go Back

Early this year I got the Motorola Droid 4 for Verizon (on release day no less), and I joined the 4G/LTE revolution. At first it was underwhelming since the 4G coverage in our area was ‘spotty’ at best, and non-existent for the most part. But within a couple of months, Verizon had added a new 4G zone to our area and expanded coverage in the existing zone. It was awesome! So for the next few months I enjoyed fast data speeds — and the zippy performance — of the Droid 4. It was apparent that the phone itself thrived on…

Gear Bits

Chicago Tribune Looks Back at Amazing Gadgets That Are Now Common

Can you remember your first call on a touch-tone phone, your first fax or VCR, when your family got cable, or when you first saw one of those tiny battery-powered TV sets? I can remember all of those things and more – and today the Chicago Tribune is looking back at 25 ‘futuristic’ gadgets that are now commonplace. The lead image is of a picture phone, taken 40 years ago when it was part of a display of future technology at the Museum of Science and Industry. Earl Dell Jr., 4, was excited about the experience of using one of…

Gear Bits

IBM’s Watson Is Tech You Should Know About

If you’ve ever worried about having your job replaced by a machine, I’ve got some distressing news for you. IBM, a US tech and consulting firm, has produced a powerful artificial intelligence system as their latest creation. Known for their innovations in the world of technology, IBM has already invented a slew of modern conveniences, including the ATM, hard disk drive, and Universal Product Code (UPC). Their most recent development, an AI supercomputer nicknamed Watson, is capable of replicating a high-functioning human’s ability to understand data and provide answers to questions. The machine is allegedly able to access 90 servers…

Gear Bits

Google’s Project Glass is Tech You Should Know About

What does ‘Augmented Reality‘ mean to you? It’s been a huge buzzword in certain tech circles this year, but what’s the big deal? If you’re like me, the negative associations are endless. You remember laser tag. You remember watching those awful 3D films with the red/blue lenses when you were little. Maybe you even remember Nintendo’s Virtual Boy console from back in the day. In any case, you’d be hard pressed to find an example of augmented reality that wasn’t a gimmick. Which leads us to Google’s latest project, the incredible Google Glass. Project Glass is one of the company’s…

Reviews

Oberon Design Large Smartphone Sleeve Review

It wasn’t so long ago that I reviewed the Oberon Design cellphone sleeve, and while that case was perfect for the iPhone and other similarly sized mobile devices, it isn’t quite big enough for all of the larger-screened mobile devices that are now so popular. I’ve got the new Nokia Lumia 920, which has a 4.5″ screen and measures 5.13″ tall x 2.79″ wide x 0.42″ thick; it is simply too large for the original sleeve. Luckily, I was soon to receive the new Oberon Design Large Smartphone Sleeve. This larger sleeve measures 6.25″ tall x 4″ wide; these measurements…

Reviews

ZAGGsparq 6000 Portable Power Station Review

CES 2013 is coming up fast, which means we are already thinking about the gear that will help us best cover the show. This year I expect Judie’s and my iPad minis will play a big role. I’ll also be using my Canon T3i to grab better photos and video than I have previously. And Carly, Carly will be getting her first taste of the gadget-craziness that is the Consumer Electronics Show. Each year Judie and I have talked through what gear would best help us keep our gadgets charged and, each year, we have found ourselves running on vapors…

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