My HPTouchSmart PC Review shows you how you can buy the PC of tomorrow – today!
You’re probably going to catch some ads on TV about this in the coming weeks (as I did today), but the HP TouchSmart PC is just all over the place now. It’s so sleek and cool, and when you see it you just can’t help want one. What am I talking about?
This post is part of our Tech Reviews series!
Just watch the video, and then you’ll know what I’m talking about…
Here’s yet another video of an office worker gone nuts, but this is better than the guy swiping his computer monitor and keyboard off the desk. This guy flat out throws monitors across the room, he tears down cube walls, and he even appears to take a sledgehammer to the copy machine. It goes on and on for what appears to be a very long time, I don’t understand why everyone didn’t just run out of the office. The security video is dated 5/23/2008 which was a Friday – maybe he got fired or something, I don’t know – you be the judge!
Here’s something you may not have seen – it’s the “Eye-Fi Wireless SD Card”. Most of us have SD cards lying around because that’s what we store all our precious pictures on in our digital cameras. How many times have you taken pictures, and then waited days (or weeks, or months) before uploading them to your PC or laptop? I can’t count the number of times that I have gotten out the camera and realized that it was full of pictures from a month back. Even worse, that meant fewer pictures I could take – because I couldn’t delete anything off the card yet.
This post of part of The Smorgasbord Tech Reviews series!
Enter the “Eye-Fi”. Inside this flash memory card are some tiny electronics that will astound you. This SD memory card can connect to your WiFi network, without cables, or cradles – or anything! It can automatically upload all your pics to any PC on your network OR even upload them to Flickr, Fotki, Shutterfly, Webshots, Photobucket, Kodak Gallery, Sharpcast, Wal-mart, Snapfish, Phanfare, Picase Web Albums, TypePad, VOX, Smugmug, or Facebook! It can even resize photos before submission if you wish! What an unbelievably handy gadget to have!
This could possibly be one of the coolest gift ideas for just about anyone! Imagine giving this to Mom or Grandma – or anyone that hates having to get the cable or usb adapter out just to transfer the pictures every time!
Eye-Fi Wireless 2GB Secure Digital Memory Card SD
Price: $99.99
Photos should not be trapped in your camera. Set them free effortlessly and wirelessly. The Eye-Fi Card is a wireless SD memory card for your digital camera. It stores pictures like a standard SD memory card, but also uses your home Wi-Fi network to automatically transfer images from inside your camera to your PC or Mac and to your favorite photo or social networking website for sharing or printing. No cables, no cradles, no fuss.
You might be able to find a really good new or used eye-fi in one of these auctions as well:
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A short while ago I reviewed the Asus Eee PC, which is an incredible sub-compact laptop that runs on Linux and you can buy brand new for only $300-$500. Some say it was inspired by the OLPC or One Laptop Per Child initiative. In a way the things that have derailed and plagued the OLPC front are now starting to creep into the computer industry as a whole – and it’s not really surprising.
This post of part of The Smorgasbord Tech Reviews series!
Let me explain…in my basement I have a 6 or 7 year old Gateway box. When I got it (used) it had 128MB of RAM and a 20GB HDD. The processor I think is Pentium III, maybe 500-600Mhz?? I upgraded the Ram to 256MB and installed Redhat Linux. Over the years it has had many different versions of Linux, but for the last 3 years or so it’s been Ubuntu. Now that box has 512MB of Ram, a 100GB and 120GB hard drive, and a 128MB graphics card and an LCD dispay. It’s funny, the only thing I never upgraded was the USB 1.1 to 2.0. This box works great as an Internet / email workhorse. I can get any web work done on it, edit graphics, manage digital pics, or mp3′s. I converted video on this box for many years (and still can). My whole point here is that you don’t need a lot of horsepower or the latest hardware to have a solid affordable working home computer for many years (anymore). I know tons of geeks that recycle hardware and do the exact same thing.
Now that technology has evolved a bit, the same “sect” of geeks that recycle hardware wouldn’t mind using that same tech on a portable device they could take with them. There are lots of linux laptops now available, but many geeks have been installing linux on their windows laptops for years. It was inevitable that the Asus Eee Linux PC would be a hit in the geek community. Asus got a taste of success and predicted 2 million Asus Eee PC’s sold this year, and you can just hear somebody in marketing say “if we sold that many Linux Eee’s, just imagine how many we could sell if it had Windows on it!”.
Well, that time has come, and now Asus has come forward to release versions (4G and 12G) Windows XP Home installed. A lot of geeks are pissed off and screaming “sellout”, but Asus isn’t exactly a non-profit company. If the oil companies can make windfall profits the year of the largest hurricane in U.S. history – is it any surprise Asus released a windows version of the Eee PC? I think not.
So now that anyone can enjoy the sub-compact genius of the Eee PC – how well does Windows run on it? It comes with Windows XP, 12GB of storage, 900Mhz Celeron CPU, and 1GB of DDR memory. It has a new 8.9 inch display which can run at 1,024 x 600 pixels, which makes it much closer to a standard (non-wide) desktop. It even supports multi-gesture inputs, like the iPod touch and iPhone, something (that currently) no other PC made today can claim. You don’t get Skype and Open Office installed, but you certainly can install them yourself easily.
Some reviews say the Windows version of the Asus Eee PC aren’t as good as Linux, mainly because the storage is only 12GB instead of 20. The storage had to be sacrificed to pay for the Windows license. The speakers may suck, but they do on the Linux version too. At least the screen is increased to a decent (and still compact) size, and the camera is now a respectable 1.3 megapixels. It’s all give and take I guess.
I had read a lot of reviews on Amazon and eBay where some had purchased the Linux version of the Eee PC and just couldn’t do it. They had all kinds of problems, and probably no “geek” to turn to for help. So they either tried to return them or sell them on eBay. The Windows version is for the masses, and will make it much easier to just “plug and play” devices. Although “most things” work in Linux, there are still of lot of printers, cameras, and other devices that either don’t work, or take a bit of “tweaking” to get running. Let’s face it, none of us may ever drop anything off to the “Geek Squad” to be fixed, but there’s a reason they have customers.
My original Asus Eee (Linux) PC Review.
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[nms:asus Eee 4G XP,4,0,0,smorgas.asus.eee]
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Can Holographic Storage, a technology 20 years in the making, be the future BluRay killer?
Robin Harris wrote an article on his blog the other day about holographic storage shipping next month. The technology was in the works for decades before becoming a reality. Every now and then I read about something and go “wow – that’s the future!”. I remember when I was a kid in the 80′s and my day telling me about computer storage and memory doubling nearly every six months. He also told me “someday you’ll be able to carry your 30 albums or your entire record collection on a small postage stamp sized chip in your pocket.” It seemed like something out of the movies back then, and yet my 4GB SD Flash card for my digital camera can hold about 1,000 songs which I guess is about 75-80 CD’s (and it’s about the size of a postage stamp).
We’ve all seen a holograph in a sci-fi movie. A holograph is a projected image that, if you moved around it, would actually have perspective form different angles. A holograph is a true “3D image”. So, how do you turn a holograph into storage? Technically a holograph IS storage, because it stores information about the image to be projected. A hologram uses 2 laser beams. A reference and illumination beam create an interference pattern on photo sensitive media. Shine a laser on that reference pattern and get an image in 3D – simple as that. Robin Harris brings up to good points in that article, the first being that a small fraction of the reference data can reconstruct the entire 3D images (you just can’t move as far around it). This means that unlike a CD or DVD, if the photo sensitive media is scratched it doesn’t (completely) destroy the data. Imagine data that can “reconstruct itself” from the remaining bits. His other point was that the amount of storage is just about limitless. By changing the reference point and illumination of the beams different holographs can be produced – so hundreds (or more) could be stored in the exact same space on the media.
Oh – did I mention the fact that photographic media has a lifespan of over 100 years, so holographic storage has the longest lifespan of any media to date. The company that created this holographic storage technology is “InPhase” and the first units will be shipped for $18,000 next month. One disk costs $180 and stores 300GB.
Why do we care? For the same reason that both CD and DVD players were thousands when they first came out. This is the future of technology. Movie studios with long term storage needs will gladly pay $18,000 for this device, but as the prices drop I think that this kind of technology will be something that consumers need. You can buy a half-terabyte drive at your local Wal-Mart now for $100. I think it’s great to be able to back up all of our digital pictures and music on an external drive for our home network. But as time goes on I will need multiple ones, and eventually some will fail – and eventually I’ll lose some really cherished memories. I think that’s why a lot of people I know print out so many digital pictures on photo paper – they know that if somehow the digital copy is lost, the printed version should last a lifetime. If InPhase eventually created a consumer version holographic storage drive, wouldn’t you buy one? I mean come on, you could store you family digital photos knowing that the media would be good up to 100 years. I know of no other storage technology other than printed photos themselves that could give you that kind of piece of mind.
Think about the industry uses this could bring. Movie theaters could ship out their blockbusters to the theaters on these disks knowing the quality wouldn’t diminish no matter how many times they were rented out. Web hosts could practically offer “uncorruptable backups”. You may not know this, but your local cable company usually has movies “downloaded” on their local server for the video “on demand” services you can watch. With holographic storage they could store tens of thousands of movies for you to watch, and not just hundreds. Unbelievable amounts of data could be stored in black boxes of planes, trains, and automobiles. You could possibly take your entire entertainment system from your living room to your car on one disk. Entire textbooks could begin to be stored on disk cartridges to be read in standard readers and books in schools and universities would not only be cheaper, but the quality of the content would never diminish (just the hardware readers to view them).
So that’s why I think holographic storage is a future BluRay killer. How many years will that be? I don’t know. It took 20 years for holographic storage to become a real piece of hardware you could buy. I don’t think that it will be 20 more years before what I envision comes true, but it’s certainly possible within the next 5-10. But you never know, something might just come along that’s even better than this!
I’ve found a secret cache of cool computer gadgets I’ll be posting over the next few months. For the first installment I want to highlight something really cool that I wish I had about a thousand times. This is an “IDE to USB Converter Cable”, and you can take an internal hard drive, hook it up, and plug it in your USB port just like it was a flash drive. This isn’t a SATA converter cable (but they have those too), but I have to say I still have a half dozen old ATA IDE hard drives lying around from 6GB to 200GB. If I have to transfer buku files from my laptop to my pc – this is exactly what I need! External hard drive full? Flash drive too small? This converter cable will save your butt! If you get fired from your job and need to get some files off your PC at work, just slip this cable and an old hard drive in your briefcase or bag and you’re good to go!
This post of part of The Smorgasbord Tech Reviews series!
Now you can access or test an internal ATA/ATAPI (IDE) drive without the hassle of connecting it to a motherboard. Just attach the Easy IDE converter and you’ll have fast USB 2.0 access to hard drives, CD burners, DVD drives and more. Great for technicians. Includes 3-foot USB cable, AC adapter and 40- to 44-pin adapter for 2.5 drives. The IDE to USB converter would make a great gift for any geek on Father’s day, Christmas, birthday, or any time! You don’t have to be a computer tech to get use out of this thing, I think that we all have some used hard drives sitting around somewhere that we could easily temporarily use for data transfers with this cable.
You might even find a great deal on a “IDE to USB converter Cable” on eBay right now:
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USB 2.0 to IDE SATA ATA ATAPI 2.5" 3.5" HD HDD Converter Cable Adapter w/Power | |
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SATA/PATA/IDE Drive to USB 2.0 Adapter Converter Cable Accessory Hard Drive New | |
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USB 3.0 and 2.0 to SATA IDE Hard Drive Adapter Converter Cable | |
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Affordable Home Security can be yours with an IP Camera. It’s cheap peace of mind, a cool gadget, and easy to install diy home tech!
This post of part of The Smorgasbord Tech Reviews series!
Every now and then I see something and get a thought like – “Why don’t I have one of those…” or “that is so worth the money…”. It’s funny because as a kid I used to thumb through the cool new techie gadgets in popular science that were still years away and only in reach of those with a 6-figure salary. Now I see stuff online, or in a gadget magazine or tech catalog and I say “it’s about time they made that…” – and the prices aren’ t bad either!
Today my realization was that you can get an affordable IP camera! What is an IP camera you ask? It’s a camera that you can hookup to your network at your home or business and get live motion video. This would mainly used for surveillance as a security cam, but the “IP” in “IP camera” means you can access it via the Internet. You connect it to your network either wired or wireless (depending on the camera).
Intellinet Network Ip Camera, 550710
First I want to talk to you about the Intellinet IP Camera. It cost about $300 which is a bit high for an IP Camera, but it’s because of what it can do. This particular IP Camera has an embedded Linux operating system, flash memory, will email you “on-event”, and can stream (or upload via ftp) live motion video to a web site or PC. Once you set this up with a static IP – you can watch live motion video just by typing in the IP address in a web browser – no software of any kind required! Read the specs on that to find out the video quality, size of the flash memory, etc. I didn’t get much out of that page itself, so I moved on to other models…
Wireless G Network Security IP Camera Webcam AIC250W
This model of IP Security Webcam is Wireless! It’s VGA quality and you can view it over the web too, but the cool thing about this one is the fact that you can view up to 16 of these suckers at once (on one screen). Now that’s what I call affordable in-home security since each one is under $100!
Sony SNC-M3W Pan/Tilt IP Wireless Network Camera w/Audio
Sony has a nice Wireless Network IP Camera that looks pretty durable. You’ll pay a bit more for this one, but #1 it’s “Sony” and #2 it’s the first IP camera I’ve seen that captures audio. In addition to that – this Sony IP camera does pan and tilt (the first one’s don’t do that either). To use all of the features (like pan and zoom) you’ll need to install the Sony software to get everything to work.
SMC 802.11G Wireless IP Camera Pan
The SMC Wireless IP Camera does all the Sony model does, including record video and audio in MPEG 4. You can of course control the camera from a remote location (which does pan and zoom) and it also has motion detection. This Wireless IP Cam seems to be a good bet since it’s priced about $160 less than the Sony (currently).
Pan & Tilt IP Network Camera IR Night Vision, Video, Audio, Color, digital Zoom
This IP Network Camera is unique because in addition to the pan and tilt features, it has a color pictures, digital zoom, audio capture – but wait…..(drum roll) – it has NIGHT VISION!
Honestly – IP Camera’s have so many features that you have to figure out what you want to get out of it, and how much you want to spend. You might not need Pan and Tilt, so you might be able to get away with as $100 bargain IP camera. Then again, one that can be chained with many others in a multi-view display or the night vision could be what you need. In any event – do you homework before you buy. I should probably remind you that you can find a ton of great IP camera deals in auctions, check some ending soonest below!
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I’ve been on the lookout lately for some out of the ordinary gadgets and the wireless USB hub really caught my eye. Why? Well, USB gadgets and hardware are great, but sometimes you don’t have enough ports and there’s a zillion wires – but the thing that really is hard is when you have lots of devices and a laptop. We have a laptop in the living room, and it’s kind of the “community” lap top. Granted I use it most of the time, but everyone uses it every day. We have like four PC’s in the house, but there’s something about being able to get online when you’re watching TV that’s just so convenient. Anyway – I’ve been thinking about getting some external hard drives and setting up both a backup system and some mass storage for the laptop. Storage is cheap – a terabyte or two would be nice. But the laptop is in the living room, and the last thing we need is to have 3 or 4 hard drives in the corner or on a shelf or endtable.
This post of part of The Smorgasbord Tech Reviews series!
I saw a picture of this wireless usb hub and it hit me like a light bulb – that’s it! That’s exactly what I need! I could hook up 3 or 4 external drives in the closet, hook them up to this thing and then just put one usb stick in my laptop and be connected to all the drives! I just love cool gadgets and devices that solve quirky problems – and this is one of them. This would also be really cool for a scenario where you had a regular tower PC, and a USB printer and some external drives where you had a need to have them across the room (or in the next room) and you just couldn’t get cables long enough. Maybe all you really wanted to do was put a printer in a common area or room so everyone could use it. Problem fixed again!
Looks like both Iogear and Belkin make wireless USB hubs that have both the hub and the wireless usb dongle to connect. They mostly sell for around $150. But D-link makes one that you might like better – and it’s around $100. What makes the D-link different is that you can connect to it through the wireless card of your computer without needing the usb dongle. You can buy an additional usb dongle if you need one – but the distinct advantage I really see about the D-link is that you can connect from multiple computers! With the USB dongle version you can only connect from the computer with the dongle. Either way – you can get a good deal on one new, but you might be able to find a good deal on one used on eBay as well. I’m going to give you all the options I can find, and hopefully you get a great deal!
Do you have experience with a wireless USB hub you own, or were you thinking about getting one? Comment now!
With all of the portable hard drives, flash memory cards and sticks, and cell phones with internal memory it’s possible to carry all kinds of digital files anywhere you want. You may use a flash memory stick to carry documents to and from the office or school. Hard drives are so darn cheap, and they are not only getting smaller, but flash drives are increasing to 16GB and 32GB sizes at very affordable prices.
Have you ever thought about what would happen if you lost one of your portable storage devices? What if it was stolen? It could be as bad or worse than if you lost your laptop! I saw an ad in a gadget magazine for a secure digital hard drive by Aegis with a biometric fingerprint reader in the top of the drive. The have a cheaper version with 128 bit encryption only, and another version with 128 bit encryption and biometric fingerprint reader. If you value your data – both are a pittance compared to what you could lose if you data were in the wrong hands.
APRICORN Aegis Bio 80GB 2.5″ 128-bit AES Hardware encrypted External HDD – Retail
The Register has this article about USB Cables that back the movie industry that caught my eye. I had forgotten that one of Windows Vista big selling points (ack!) was that it could “lock things down” at the hardware level. In other words, a video card could determine if you were watching pirated video or a purchased DVD and disallow viewing of the pirated one. It gave geeks and Linux fans one more reason to decry Windows, and Microsoft one more reason to be friendly with the big guns of the entertainment industry.
According to The Register article, the USB Implementer’s Forum is developing a USB cable that will not carry Hi-Def video unless it has the proper DRM. This proprietary technology was developed to control HDMI and DVI interfaces – just the ones I previously talked about that Vista can lock out. This is a new twist – being able to limit it through the actual cable!! So you worry about this big brother type of garbage and then you realize (like the article pointed out) – all a hacker has to do is mimic the encryption of the wire, OR make the device(s) believe that the cable is legitimate (when it’s not). There are ways around everything. Remember when you had cassette tapes in days of old, and you broke off the top tabs so your favorite mix tape couldn’t be recorded over? Then one day when you were hard up you just put a piece of scotch tape on top – and recorded right over that stuff.
Sometimes I get worried that I should be buying a lot of stuff up. I was paranoid like this both last year and the year before. I thought I should buy up a bunch of digital tv’s, and dvd players – stockpile some electronics that would very soon be littered with all kinds of “DRM” limiting my abilities to use them. There are all kinds of items at the “superstore” that won’t let you, for instance, copy a DVD to a DVD burner, or watch DVD’s from a different region. But there are tons of DRM and region free devices for sale online as well. There are lots of devices that you can get shipped directly to your house the entertainment doesn’t want you to know about.
A DRM’d cable just reminds that I want devices that do MORE and not LESS. If you’re a geek – you (like me) are probably more interested in a entertainment or media center device. Read my article about the HDD Player, you’ll be glad you did!
If you want to let us know about some cool DRM free gadgets – comment now!
