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Coffee Machines have always been popular with Gadgetspeak readers and none more so than those produced by Nescafe Krups. However it’s been quite a few years since I could get my hands on one and they certainly have changed a lot.
This unit is designed for the small home and is quite small in its worktop width, it is 16.5cm wide 32cm deep and 18cm tall when shut and 31cm tall when open and ready to use. This small size means that the water container is also quite small and it can take no more than two pints of water.
Often finding suitable small gifts for members of the opposite sex is not easy, I mean friends but not those especially close to you. However if they use an iPhone I might have some suggestions that are also affordable options for Christmas gifts.
This is described as external memory for iPhone but I see it also works with the iPad. However not only is it storage but once connected to your ‘i’ device it will download an App that even for people like me – a confirmed Android user – can understand. The App allows very simple transfer of files – music, pictures and videos – from the iPhone to the iBridge and also the reverse.
Is it a notebook? Is it a tablet? No it is both.
Hot on the heels of its BravoWin 2-in-1 notebook, Venturer has released the BravoWin S 10KR product. This device is classified as a 2-in-1 mini notebook. The 2-in-1 reference in the product’s title refers to the ability of the BravoWin S to split into separate screen and keyboard elements with the separated screen adopting the role of a tablet.
Not everyone wants or needs the largest SmartPhone so this slightly smaller offering from Samsung may fit their needs. It seems that the mobile phone teams to follow are Samsung or iPhone as far as the vast quantity of publicity created.
Adding to its range of smartphone handsets, Huawei has released the Mate 9.
Featuring a 5.9-inch full high density touch screen, this Mate 9 has a high-precision unibody, aluminium metal frame that has been finished with a soft sandblasted texture. With dimensions of 156.9 x 78.9 x 7.9mm (H x W x D) and weighing 196g (including the non-replaceable 4,000 mAh battery), the Mate 9 is available in a choice of colours including Space Grey, Moonlight Silver, Mocha Brown and Black plus the Champagne Gold of my review model.
The Gizmos are back with a new set of nonograms to test your puzzles solving skill.
This is the top of the range electric shaver from Braun. In September I attended a presentation which included a section by satellite from Los Angeles and as this was quite early in the morning in the UK it must have been the middle of the night there.
SyncroSonic Technology is what Braun have developed in their shaver but before I cover that a few more thoughts from Dr Michael Breus in Los Angeles who has a very interesting book The Power Of When which tells you how and what to do when having told the assembled journalists about the best way to start the day I asked about the end of the day and he said Blue Light was bad when trying to promote sleep he suggested red light but I am sure he was not suggesting a visit to a house of ill repute an
Do children spend too much time using a mobile device? Amazon believes it has a solution for this problem with a tablet and software managed by parents.
In an apparent effort to integrate, and influence, every aspect of home life, Amazon has developed a version of its Fire tablet specifically for the younger members of the family. This Amazon offering combines a standard 7-inch Fire tablet with a removable child-proof bumper frame in either blue or pink plus a one-year subscription to appropriate content that has been graded for specific age groups. This product goes by the title of Fire Kids Edition.
A long weekend in Glasgow in late November was not high on my list of places to visit, nothing against Glasgow or Scotland but the week previously it had been -10 degrees in Glasgow so armed with my long johns I ventured north of the border.
Let’s get the weather out of the way it was cold but not below freezing, it was dry with no rain or snow, some free time Saturday afternoon saw a visit to a Distillery not far from Glasgow, and while I do not drink alcohol I found the tour interesting and when we were returning to Glasgow after the visit there was the most amazing sunset. The nine notebooks come from four ranges Swift, Spin Convert, Detachable Switch and Cloud Book Aspire One 11.
This product has been around in one form or another since the CD-ROM first started to appear in PC’s. Other companies have come and gone but Nero has only undergone a name change and of course it now does so much more than oversee the burning of media.
Rip & Burn was possibly why people first purchased Nero, certainly I still use the Burning ROM feature at least weekly, Nero Express, Nero Disc to Device and Nero Cover Designer completes the Red section of the Home Screen all under the Rip & Burn entry. A Turquoise Blue column has Nero Media Home and Nero Media Browser under the Manage & Play entry.
This is a Bluetooth Speaker sold by a company from the Isle of White. To confuse everyone the company making the product is Lexon who as far as I know is French, so what has this turquoise blue unit got to offer listening wise.
The Lexon Tykho Booster measures 24x8x7cm, weighs 705grams and is covered in rubber so should be water resistant to a point where a shower of rain should be OK. This does not mean it should be left outside as it is not designed to be water proof.
A visit to a central London location, just off Oxford Street, introduced me to a new handset from Wileyfox.
This Toshiba unit should be available in sizes up to 8TB by the time you read this. I was sent the 6TB offering as the 8TB has been delayed from the initial launce briefing earlier this year 34 floors up the Shard near the supposedly soon to be finished London Bridge station.
While the Shard is meant to look unfinished I doubt six years ago when they started changing London Bridge station that anyone who suffers it daily thought their ordeal would still be going on.
Offering to add VDSL / ADSL Internet connectivity to your router-based LAN set up is a NETGEAR modem.
Supplied in undistinguished packaging made up of a rather plain cardboard box, the DM200 is a Broadband high speed DSL modem from NETGEAR. This product acts as the link up connection device between the vast virtual world, known as the Internet, and your router and / or computer. The DM200 product offers the user VDSL / ADSL Internet access.
With this next game its title gives you a clear indication of what is in store for you when firing it up. The Ultimate Hidden Object Game, also known as the Original Clutter Game, presents the player with a plethora of action involving searching for objects found in cluttered scenes with a smattering of puzzle bonus game play.
This is described as a telescope for both sun and moon observation. However as most will know you should NEVER look directly at the sun so this telescope tracks things via your SmartPhone attached to the side of the telescope.
A couple of times a year I get the chance to tell you about special offers being run by ALDI and as always these tend to last only a few days they in fact often sell out sooner than that. I have permission to tell you a day or so in advance so you get the chance to get there on the first day. If that is not possible then you can purchase from them online in advance of the store sale day but be warned online stock often sells out before the day.
Netgear’s Nighthawk X4 dual band AC2200 extender can be used to deliver high throughput as either a WiFi range extender or as an access point to deliver WiFi to a remote area when it is connected to the router via an Ethernet cable.
The X4 operates on both both 2.4 and 5G bands and employs MU-MIMO (Multiple User, Multiple Input, Multiple Output) technology which is claimed to be able to provide a aggregate throughput of 2,200Mbps. This, understandably, will only apply when used in conjunction with a MU-MIMO router. White in colour it has ventilation holes on every surface with the exception of the front. It is 16cm tall and 8.5cm wide and has the 13A plug at the lowest point on its rear surface.
While the various in-car navigation devices that I have checked out tend to give you a choice of voices, whether of the male or female gender, the current trinity of Siri, Cortana and Alexa from Apple, Microsoft and Amazon do not offer the user such a choice. All three of these disembodied voices are of the female variety as they provide the requested information.
Recently I have had the opportunity to interrogate and request assistance from Alexa, the vocal conduit providing feedback from devices such as Amazon Echo and Echo Dot. In my case, the designated device was the smaller Echo Dot housing Alexa and her ability to respond to the user’s spoken commands. Available in a choice of black or white, the Amazon Echo Dot is a small circular platform device with dimensions of 84mm diameter and 31mm height.
The title on the box says Vintage Suitcase Turntable. Which to me anyway makes the suitcase sound vintage, in fact nor is the turntable although until a few years ago when vinyl came back into fashion it would definitely be retro.
This is one of Aldi’s bargain buys that are always on sale until they sell out which could be a week or even much less, often their online stock sells out prior to the on sale day in their stores, so if you want one don’t think about it for too long. The suitcase itself is brown and covered with a leather effect wipe clean plastic.
Both items from a company called tech21, first a case for an iPhone 7 and also for the same device something that Apple devices certainly seem to need a screen protector and this is called Impact Shield Self Heal 4.7 inches.
Protection made intelligent is how tech21 label this case. It makes three claims on the front of the box 3metre 3-layer drop protection, ultra-thin & lightweight and limited lifetime warranty let’s delve deeper into those claims. The case itself stretches over the back and sides of the iPhone and just enough over the front of the unit to hold it in place.
Providing you with your own personal, portable library is the task of a new eReader from Kobo.
While most of the competition has faded away, for various reasons, as they attempted to battle the might of the Amazon Kindle machine, Kobo continues to fight the good fight. Based in Toronto, Rakuten Kobo is one of the world’s faster growing eReading services with an offering of five million eBooks and magazines accessed by its various eBook readers. A recent addition to the company’s family of eBook readers is the Kobo Aura One device.
There is often a long interval between requesting an item and it arriving, this is certainly the case here with this well constructed USB external drive. The manufacturer G Drive calls this a mobile USB drive that works on both MAC and Windows.
It is 12.5x8x1.7cm, the length increases by 4cm with the supplied 60cm USB3 cable attached. It weighs 170grams. The stated transfer rate is ‘up to 136MB/s’ according to their website. It is available in 1TB in Black or Grey, 2TB in Black or 3TB in Black as I received. The prices given on their site in dollars are $69, $119 or $179. It is a 5400RPM class drive speed.
The Kensington USB 3.0 hub model UA3000E provides three USB 3.0 ports as well as a Gigabit Ethernet connection and so could be a useful add on to a netbook or laptop which lacks necessary ports.
The UA3000E is a small unit which is compatible with both Windows and Macs. It will take up very little room in a laptop bag and will provide much useful connectivity. It is black in colour, weighs just 68g, is 105mm x 45 x 25mm in size and has heavily chamfered edges which give the impression that it is smaller than it actually is. The three USB 3.0 ports are along one side and, at one end, is the Gigabit Ethernet. At the other end is the 10cm long USB 3.0 cable to connect to the laptop.
You do not want to annoy a god, such as Ares, who can send down all manner of threats against you.
When a god falls in love with a mortal, even a mortal who is a royal princess, you know that the situation is bound to cause trouble. This was the scenario covered in the Match-3 game of The Trials of Olympus. In that title Angelo, a god expelled from Olympus, builds a magnificent city and wins the heart of the Princess Amara.
Having recently covered a couple of Notebook/Tablet offerings this item from ASUS is different in that the keyboard is detachable so without it it’s a true Windows Tablet and with it then you have a small touch enabled Notebook
The viewable screen is 21.6x13.8cm which gives the notional diagonal imperial measurement of 10.1inches; the default screen resolution is 1280x800 there is a webcam in the centre of the top of the 2cm strip above the screen. It is 1089 grams in weigh made up of 506 grams for the detachable keyboard and 583grams for the screen unit. It feels a little back heavy but it is not unstable, the screen has a positive fit into the back of the keyboard unit at around 100 degrees.
A computer mouse is just a computer mouse that has been designed to slide around a mouse mat as it controls the movement of your desktop cursor or so you might expect. But the reality can be somewhat different. A computer mouse can come in a variety of sizes, colours schemes, connectivity options and enhanced functionality. Standing apart from many brands of rodents is the Air Mouse® Voice device developed by Gyration, part of the SMK-Link Electronics Inc.
Forming part of Gyration’s family of “gyroscopic” input devices, including the Air Mouse GO Plus, Air Mouse Elite and Air Mouse Mobile, this Air Mouse Voice adds a voice-enabled presentation remote control and motion sensitivity to high-precision desktop mouse control. Slightly longer, and perhaps not as tall as my usual device, the Air Mouse Voice has dimensions of 115 x 60 x 28mm (L x W x H).
This is a multi-connection easy to use and to setup 24inch flat panel. It is literally open the box clip the connection between the base and back into the back of the panel and then clip the base into that, plug in the leads and you are done, two minutes at most.
This BenQ GW2455H LED monitor measures 57x34x1.6cm; the stand is oval at 24x19cm and raises the panel by 10cm from your desk. The viewable screen is 52x29.5cm which gives the notional diagonal imperial measurement of 23.6inches. There is a line of connections mid-way up the back on an overhang, to the left of the support arm, VGA, Digital and HDMI and to the right the three pin kettle style power input.
Lava Lamps were all the rage about two generations ago, this is a very similar thing in that there is a coloured liquid in the container and towards the base what looks like a layer of sparkly stuff which slowly turns into small craters and then it starts to rise.
The lamp itself can either come in chrome or brass finish mine was the former and the container has very dark blue liquid. Assembly requires an Allen Key (provided) and the container fits into the chrome skeleton and the one fitting holds the skeleton to the container. Just be careful when assembling that the top fits inside the bottom or the two will not be joined. A short 50cm electrical lead is hard wired into the base of the lamp. This then joins the main 1.
It is time for an old favourite to make its annual upgrade appearance.
Over the years WinZip has developed from a basic compression / decompression utility, which was my first introduction to the product, into a file management / sharing / encryption application while retaining its original functionality. The latest edition of this software is now up to version 21 with Standard, Pro and Enterprise packages being available. This review is based on my experiences with the Pro version of the product which has been launched with a price point of £42.
The Doro 8030 is an easy to use smart phone tailored to meet the needs of those mature people who form the company’s traditional market but now feel that they are ready to migrate to a smart phone.
This is essentially a 4G smart phone with a 4.5 inch screen running on Android 5.1 However, Doro recognises that while technology and performance are important, ease of use and having the features needed by those whose sight and hearing are not of the best in addition to being able to call for assistance in case of an emergency are vital.
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