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After my last review of a SanDisk unit this came initially as a disappointment, in fact more than a disappointment. I was sent a replacement unit and that had the same problem, so once solved I have put it through a thorough and rigorous set of tests to see that it did not occur again.
This is a MP3, Video, Photo, FM Radio and Voice Recorder. It measures 4.5x75x.5cm and weights just 30 grams. It comes with 2GB of internal memory but it can also accept a micro SD card. The left side is where the Micro SD card can be inserted and beside this is where the pinhole microphone is. The right side has slider for on/off, however if you are the energetic type slide it the other way to engage the hold control. The base has the proprietary USB connection and a 3.5mm earbud socket.
An ideal gift for a man or in the alternative pink colour equally ideal for a lady. The items in this kit perform a range of vital tasks and can all be powered from a USB port. Yes another great gift idea from those clever people in Hong Kong.
A total of five items all in a single box. The first is a the actual light unit is 7cm long. It comes on a circular base 5cm across and the articulated arm is 16cm long, the actual light consists of three LED’s spaced 1cm apart. One side of the base has a USB plug and the other has a simple push on/off switch. It could do with an extension cable as most USB sockets are slightly inset and even though it is on the outside I could not get it to fit without one.
A small bluetooth headset that provides good quality sound and good noise reduction, all at at good price.
The MotoPure H12 from Motorola measures 41 x 18 x 12mm and weighs in at 12g putting roughly in the middle of the pack compared with . It also happens to be exactly the same size abd weight as the Motorola H680 that fared well in my - no coincidence I'm sure! The H12 is well provided with both a small charging cradle and a protective hard case that can also be used as a charge point.
While colour does give documents eye-catching appeal and helps emphasize points of importance; not all documents require this feature.
In many cases a well laid out document in black and white is all that is required to get a message across to interested parties. As a result monochrome printers, especially of the laser variety, have an important role to play in the creation of certain types of documents. The Canon i-SENSYS LBP3360 falls into this category. Designed more to give a feeling of solidity rather than an overall stylish appearance, the LBP3360 is a boxed-shaped unit.
The Gemini 33 is an attractive bedroom radio/alarm system, but it wouldn't be out of place anywhere in the home.
First of all the most striking aspect of the Gemini 33 is the clock face. For those of you that miss a traditional 'clock' to tell you the time you'll love this product - although of course without the need to wind up a clockwork mechanism. In fact all you have to do is switch on and the time is automatically extracted from the radio signal. As soon as the time is established the hands start to turn - which does look very impressive.
Rice is something thats lots of people struggle to cook well. So maybe a device designed for the job is something that can help you get rice as good as your local Chinese or Indian restaurant or take-away.
To me I was brought up with potatoes at every main meal. Rice happened occasionally as did pasta but only when out and it seemed strange. I still love potatoes in all forms but rice and pasta have their place. However cooking rice well is not always easy. The unit is not quite a cube as it is 23cm wide, 24cm deep and 22cm tall. The latter figure does not include the circular container that all the cooking is done in and that protrudes by a couple of centimetres from the top.
A high definition projector aimed at gamers, but that is equally at home
providing a taste of the cinema in your own home.
Optoma have developed a range of projectors based on DLP® technology developed by Texas Instruments way back in 1987. The technology provides a number of advantages over more traditional LCD projectors including better light intensity and closer pixels. The result is stunning. The GameTime GT3000 package contains everything you need to play your games or video on the large screen.
One example of SODs law is that the phone will ring when you are busy in another room. One solution to this problem could be to have an extension unit.
I must confess that until very recently I had never heard of Doro and I suspect that many others would be in the same situation. So it is perhaps appropriate that I take a few moments to explain a little about the company. Doro is a Swedish consumer electronics company with over 30 years experience in the field of telephony. The company develops, markets and sells a wide range of products in more than 30 countries worldwide.
Described as a "finger-twirling, light-whirling, head-spinning, mind-popping game...easy to master but endlessly challenging" this next product has single and group action.
Those over a certain age must remember the Rubik Cube; after all over 350 million units have been sold since its introduction in the 1980s, well now we have a follow up product entitled the Revo. At first glance this cube shaped device with coloured sides could easily be mistaken for a slightly larger, shimmering version of the original Rubik Cube.
This is the only product I have so far received from my visit to CEDIA in June this year. Of course some promises always fail to materialise but this year is worse than normal. However this product took my eye as I walked past their stand.
I am no style guru but it certainly looks stylish to me and most people who have seen it have commented on it. 44cm across a maximum of 18cm wide and 25cm tall to the top of the large chromed handle that sweeps in a semi circle from one side to the other. It is a maximum of 7cm above the unit in the centre. The sides are only 3cm across and I suppose it is like half a large rugby ball. It weights 4.5kilos.
The addition of video to the iPod range is great for when you're on your travels. Despite the
excellent quality screens on the iPod it's still nice to watch on a larger screen. Of course most
video content is still available on DVD - not iPod.
The iLuv i1155 is a great concept. Accepting that however good the Internet delivery may in future become for video distribution you'll still have a large collection of valuable DVDs. As much as you'd love to rip those onto your computer - and hence to your iPod - the big media companies don't want you to do that. They would rather you pay again.
Accidents can happen, so can deliberate attacks on your computer systems integrity. So why not make sure your data has been backed up
As I have mentioned in the past, backing up your hard drive, even in the days when MBs and not GBs were the norm, could well involve long drawn out sessions with a propensity to raise frustration levels to great heights. Nowadays you do not have that excuse for putting off the task of backing up your valuable data. There are numerous products available that will carry out an automated backup on a user-defined schedule. One such product is Drive Backup 9.0 from Paragon.
Light-weight radio-controlled flying toys have been available for a couple of Christmases now. This year we
look at a clever helicopter design that has the advantage of entertaining two children at the same time.
Flight has always held a fascination for many children so it's no surprise that inexpensive radio controlled flying toys have been somewhat of a hit over the last few years. Traditionally an expensive pastime, the miniaturisation of electronics, motors and lightweight construction materials has enabled this new generation of device. There have been problems though.
I first saw a pre production unit of this tiny printer at the start of the year, I got a working unit around a month or so ago, here just in time for the Christmas party season is my review.
It is very small and runs in a built in rechargeable battery so you can happily print with no mains power around. It is 12x7x2.2cm and weights 220grams. It will fit easily in a bag or at a push in a pocket. The special coated paper comes in packs of ten or thirty. The sheets are 7.5x5cm. Images can be printed direct from a camera or phone using Bluetooth or by direct connection using Pict Bridge.
Here we have two neat little phones for first timers. Easy to use and tiny enough to fit small pockets, Alcatel offers good value Pay as You Go phones which would make ideal first mobiles for your kids.
Two new little phones for little ones from Alcatel this Christmas. The Alcatel OT-V212 Zebra is a neat little starter phone with funky design for younger kids. This phone has the usual calling and messaging functions. It's additional features include alarm, calculator, clock, choice of language for messages and a personal dictionary. There are just two games - Russian and Bricks. There's a radio but no MP3 player.
Sometime ago I reviewed a card reader that I believe claimed to be 27 types, this to me seemed far more than I knew of. Here I am looking at two devices from Brando and one of these claims 80 while the other has 56 and another plus.
I have long transferred data by a four slot card reader and up till now it has always done what I needed. However when the ‘mini’ this and the ‘micro’ that come along they need an adapter so that they adapt to their full size cousins before they can fit in the reader. Here with six slots that is almost solved. It is 10x4.5x1.
This is a neat speaker system for your Apple iPod that also incorporates a good FM radio and can also take input from an external source.
Mains powered and measuring approximately 225 x 165 x 100mm (WxHxD) and sporting a black grill with brushed aluminum trim the HouseParty 4 is a general purpose sound-system for iPod. The product is packaged with five iPod adaptors covering most iPods right up to the latest iPod Nano, Touch and the 3G iPhone. Also in the box is a short 3.5mm jack lead for connecting to other audio source, a small remote control, manual and power supply.
While 3G handsets, such as the iPhone and Blackberry, tend to have high price tags, there is a company that believes it is possible to offer a range of internet-based features via 3G on a more economic basis.
As part of the Hutchison Whampoa Limited family, 3 (the company responsible for launching the UK’s first 3G network offering national coverage for calls and text) has a habit of selecting slightly unusual locations when launching its various products.
Blurb is self publishing book service accessible from the website www.blurb.com . The twist is not only can you produce photobooks for yourself, you can also self publish and sell them from the website at a profit!!
Unlike other photo publishing services I have reviewed, Blurb specialises in books and not all the other photo services. From the website you can download software to turn your own photos into very special books which will make great presents for friends and family. The books are true coffee table style and the end product is good enough to sell to the general public.
This looks like a conventional radio of a few years ago, what would have been called a room portable. The only thing that tells you it is something more is that it has a display rather than a dial. It can be mains or battery operated.
The Roberts Stream 202 measures 29x15x10cm and weights (without batteries) 1480grams. It takes six ‘D’ cells should you want to go that route. Unlike a lot of DAB/Internet offerings this is stereo. There are a pair of 7cm speakers clearly visible through the thin front grey mesh. The sides have a large black stripe and the middle 18cm of the handle is also black everything else is grey.
Ricoh has quite a history in camera design and development dating back over fifty years. The latest
GX200 camera continues their tradition of robust quality.
My own history with Ricoh dates back around thirty years when the first 'real' camera I was allowed to use was my fathers compact 35mm range-finder camera. I was allowed to take it away on a school trip! The results even in my inexperienced hands were good. That experience led to my 18th birthday present of a Ricoh KR10 SLR camera. Over 25 years later I still have that camera along with a couple of Pentax K-mount lenses.
Whats in a number? It all depends on what the number is related to in the current circumstances.
According to popular legend, when the number belongs to a bus, you will have just missed it with several more only due to appear after a lengthy interval. If the number concerns your salary then it is never large enough to satisfy your hoped for standard of living. With phone models it can indicate a multitude of features such as those found on the Nokia N78. This particular handset is a 3G Smartphone that adopts the candy bar style.
Small enough to fit in a pocket, a new product from Gear4 comes with the promise of enhancing your audio listening experience.
The Blackbox Micro is an audio system consisting of a single speaker that lives up o its name in most respects. For a start it is box-shaped and is almost completely black in colour. Admittedly one face of the box does feature a reddish orange pad but as that is on the side which rests of whatever surface is being used, it does not spoil the illusion. I was going to say that you do not really notice it but, in fact, you do – more on that aspect a little later.
This is the big brother to the recently reviewed Geneva M (18/07/08), there is an even larger unit (to big for my place) the XL full details on their site. So what does this large unit have to offer?
It is 44x35x28cm mine was black but they also do white and red. It weights just over 17 kilos. Like it’s smaller brother it is a rather good iPod playing device, that just for good measure can play CD’s – of various types – has an FM radio and an ‘Aux’ input to play anything that can connect via a 3.5mm jack plug. Unlike the ‘M’ it has a built in iPod dock and this does have four buttons but they are to control any item attached to the 3.
Routers, and often wireless ones, are increasingly being used for broadband access and often enable more than one PC to access the internet. Consequently, it is only a relatively small step to add a network printer which can be shared by all users on the network. The Brother HL-2170W, weighing just a few pounds and having a footprint of less than 15 inches square, is ideally suited for moving around the house or small office.
In the past the majority of network laser printers have been both too heavy and too expensive as they were intended for heavy-duty office use. Everything has changed with the introduction of products such as the HL-2170W, which is the most versatile of Brother's HL-2100 series of compact mono laser printers. Providing both wired and wireless network connections as well as USB it offers a range of facilities that will fit the needs of many users who have more than one computer.
Dipping into the Sandberg product portfolio produces a device for copying files from one computer to another.
Transferring files from one computer to another used to be a time consuming and user intensive operation as floppy disks were filled with data that could then be copied to the second system. Nowadays with wireless networks dominating the home environment, the task is far simpler and quicker. However not everybody has a network or maybe the transfer operation involves copying to a new computer before it is integrated into a network.
Also called the 'GlowTime', the CRD-51 is a neat little bed-side clock radio that's
available in black, white or pink and offers a very flexible alarm system.
I've been provided with the 'pink' version for this review, a fact that was not lost on my daughter, who promptly disappeared with it to her room where it remained for a good few days until I could rescue it and put it through its paces. This is a particularly attractive product (not only my opinion - my daughter helpfully agreed!) measuring 166 x 60 x 150mm (WxHxD) and weighing around 450g.
Three small methods of moving data via the USB port. The first nicknamed the Jelly Bean from Dane-Elec the second and third from Hong Kong courtesy of Brando the people that send anything anywhere in the word for $3 P&P.
I understand blue is now an acceptable colour (Smarties wise) as it now does not have harmful colourings if the TV ads are anything to go by. This is a small rubberised 2GB memory stick. It is 4cm long less than 2cm wide and only .5cm thick. It could look something like a sweet so do not leave it near a child.
A great little dustbuster vacuum cleaner for your car which runs off the car battery and has a pivot nozzle to reach awkward places.
The Black & Decker Pivot Auto car vacuum cleaner is a very handy little gadget. It is so much easier to use than taking your regular home vacuum cleaner out complete with extension lead! And the suction is good for such a small unit which runs off your car battery. The Pivot Auto has a car lighter jack, so all you have to do is plug it into the car and away you go. The Pivot name refers to the nozzle which pivots from the base to various different positions.
This is the last of the items I saw at Marks & Spencers Christmas in July event. This unlike some of the previous items I have reviewed has a real purpose. With all the talk of black outs a radio driven by a alternator certainly has a place.
Slightly blocky in shape and unusual in layout for a DAB/FM radio and add the hand crank on the rear it is unusual. It is 20x12x8cm and weights1060grams. Remember the extra weight of the built in Ni-MH battery and the alternator. The face has a single 8cm round speaker housing, eight silvered well labelled buttons, a grey volume knob and a double tuning knob the outer one for FM and the inner one for DAB.
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