New Home Gadgets

Back when I used a media PC in my living room, the most frustrating thing that I found was that I had both a keyboard and mouse sitting on my coffee table. Granted, most of the time I simply used my remote, but there were times where I would use my TV as a giant monitor for surfing the net and such, which meant I had a few choices. One, I could use a regular keyboard and mouse, which wasn’t fun. Another was to get an in-air mouse with a smaller keyboard (was a combo) which was better, but still not perfect. I never got around to trying option number three which I think would have been the best, a keyboard with a built-in trackpad. (Read the full post about ‘Wireless keyboard features built-in trackpad’…)

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The social networking sites numbers for the US are in and the year to year comparisons are pretty telling.  MySpace is down 1% while FaceBook is up 77%.  The biggest movement is by some new comers, namely Fubar.com who grew by, get this, 3272217%.  Fubar is billed as “the first online bar and happy hour,” with free well drinks all night long.  OK, I made up that last bit. All but two on this top 20 list had positive year over year gains confirming the general feeling that social networking is far from done.  Newcomers like myyearbook and linkdin saw triple digit growth proving these smaller, segmented markets have lots of growth potential. (Read the full post about ‘MySpace loses ground, Fubar.com gets hot?’…)

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Posted Mar 9th 2008 2:08PM by Joshua TopolskyFiled under: Gaming Remember that Xbox 360 price cut we mentioned a few days ago? Well it appears that the Financial Times Germany is reporting that this Monday, Microsoft will trim the fat from the Arcade and Pro consoles, shaving €80 and €50 off the price tag, respectively. Of course, right now this is still unconfirmed by the boys in Redmond (or in any other official location), though the buzz in the community does seem to suggest that these cuts are coming. Hopefully if these become a reality, the company will break something off for folks on these shores as well — we need all the help we can get right now.Update: See that photo above? (Read the full post about ‘Euro Xbox 360 price cuts landing Monday says paper’…)

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Posted Mar 9th 2008 1:37PM by Joshua TopolskyFiled under: Portable AudioWord on the street (and by street, we mean mostly British tabloids) is that Paul McCartney’s deal to sell the Beatles back-catalog is done, and the Greatest Works of Musical Art Ever Recorded will be appearing on the iTunes store “within months.” Of course, we’ve been hearing whispers about this for what seems like a million years, and since both Apple Corps and Apple are delivering “no comment” and “rumor and speculation” responses on the topic, we won’t get too excited. Still, there does seem to be some serious movement on this front, with everyone and their mother saying the lot is to be sold any day now for around $400 million — which is no small sum. (Read the full post about ‘Beatles’ catalog coming online at long last?’…)

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At last week’s Apple event, Steve Jobs went over the SDK release and how they hope to manage it.  Job’s lightly reviewed reasons Apple would reject an iphone application; things like privacy concerns, content, or interfering with their business plan.  Somehow, Sun believes they’ll build a Java version for the iPhone. According to InfoWorld, Java is planning on running the Java Virtual Machine on the iPhone.  However, according to the iPhone SDK documentation, the use of plug in architecture isn’t allowed.  It will be interesting to see how Sun works around this. From InfoWorld: Sun came to the conclusion it could make a JVM work on the iPhone after taking 24 hours to look at information on Apple’s SDK. (Read the full post about ‘Sun:iPhone to get Java | Apple: no way’…)

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Maybe you were just surfing around for your next career or were up to something more sinful, when your boss decides to show up behind your back, literally. Instead of painstakingly trying to revive a decent screen on your PC, and in the process look like a silly baboon, you can now make a swift and smart move using the USB Smart Privacy Mouse and convince him that you were really being a sincere employee. The USB Smart Privacy Mouse, as you must have already guessed, is for the wily amongst us. It has a “secret” button that can be configured to conceal any (and all) programs that you would consider private and instead bring up “decent” programs in times of need. (Read the full post about ‘Protect your surfing secrets with the USB Smart Privacy Mouse’…)

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Posted Mar 9th 2008 10:06AM by Darren MurphFiled under: Portable Audio, Portable Video No sense in forcing someone to stick with the tried and true MP3 / WMA regimen when formats such as OGG, APE, FLAC and AAC are out there, right? Apparently, the folks at Teclast are nodding their heads in agreement, as the firm’s latest PMP handles all of the aforementioned files alongside WAV, AVI, RM and RMVB. Additionally, the 7.9-millimeter thick PlayFX-compatible unit features a 2.4-inch QVGA (320 x 240) resolution display, 2GB / 4GB / 8GB of capacity, a built-in FM tuner / recorder and a text viewer. (Read the full post about ‘Teclast’s M25 PMP has love for lots of formats’…)

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Posted Mar 9th 2008 7:08AM by Paul MillerFiled under: Storage Samsung promised it was coming in March, and here she blows. The Spinpoint M6 is the first standard-height 500GB 2.5-incher available, at a lean 9.5mm, meaning you can cram it into most existing laptops unlike the 2.5-inch 500 giggers from Fujitsu and Hitachi. Samsung’s using some Perpendicular Magnetic Recording tech to cram everything in, stuffing three 167GB platters into the 5400rpm drive. The M6 goes for $299 and is shipping now. If DVD burning is more your pace, Samsung also just announced an “industry fastest” 22X DVD burner, the SH-S223. The SATA drive can stamp a 4.7GB disc in 12 minutes, and does dual-layer discs at a respectable 16X. (Read the full post about ‘Samsung’s 500GB 2.5-inch drive arrives, alongside 22X DVD burner’…)

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Picco Z Remote Controlled Helicopter The Picco Z is the perfect gift for all kids (big and small)…From Age 6 - 60, This is the kind of toy your dad say’s is stupid but secretly he’s playing with it while your asleep (thats why the batteries are always flat!) This fully operational, crash-resistant Picco Z helicopter is perfect for indoor aerial action and comes ready to fly, with take-off, hover and left/right functions providing enough manoeuvres to make Torvil & Dean dizzy.

 About The Picco Z  The inexpensive Picco Z is remarkably robust, made of tough expanded Polypropylene foam, features a brilliant blue LED strobe light allowing fantastic flights in the dark, and incorporates an auto stability system to make this easy to operate both indoors and outside in calm conditions.

(Read the full post about ‘Pico Z Micro Helicopter’…)

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Lavalamp Phone Charm You can have this for ?5.95 (Read the full post about ‘Lavalamp Phone Charm’…)

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