Gadgets Base

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - computers are complicated, even for folks like me who are in the business. With that in mind, Best Buy has discovered another way to mint money - charging folks a small premium to remove the bloatware that the major computer makers install on their computers.

While some of the software can be considered useful or helpful, what I’ve found is that I rarely use it, and so much of it runs as an always-on service that uses some amount of additional hardware resources. It all adds up.

Users typically hate this stuff (at least once they discover it), and vendors are coming around to discover this. Take for example, Sony who already charges folks a premium to ship their Vaio laptops without the ‘extra-ware’.

BTW, if you would rather do it yourself and save some $, just do a search for something along the lines of ‘remove bloatware‘ - you’ll find dozens of articles and forum posts on how to do so. Throw your vendor name into the search for more pinpointed results.

Posted in Computers, Networking & Internet

Now here’s a pillow that looks really soft and yet is able to lift your moody self out of the doldrums thanks to a built-in LED. Perfect for folks who want to catch up on their reading before they hit the sack, as the glow is bright enough to illuminate the pages of your tome. Good thing it comes with an On/Off switch as well, allowing you to conserve the batteries in the long run. This reminds me of the LED Heart-shaped Pillow, save for a different form factor. The LED Paw-shaped pillow retails for $25.

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I have no doubt that many of our readers who are in their 30s and 40s have already moved on to the world of MP3s and other “file-based” entertainment formats, doing away with the old vanguard of physical media such as cassettes and CDs. What happens then, you ask, to your collection of old (but beloved) CDs that are currently sitting in a box up at the attic? Instead of letting it collect dust and having grandkids query you about the days where media wasn’t stored on holographic discs, why not sell off your old or unwanted CDs for some cash? After all, times are pretty lean at this moment, so any method where you are able to make some additional dosh would be most welcome, especially where things you don’t want any more are concerned. This new online service is known as Musicmagpie.co.uk, and they will pay anywhere from 25p up to £3 for each CD.

I would presume that the trade-in value will have a lot to do with the rarity of a disc as well as the condition it is shipped to them, so it always pays to take good care of your stuff as you never know when it might turn into some sort of sought after collectible overnight. This is a free-to-use trade in service, and in case you were wondering whether anyone is foolish enough to throw away perfectly OK CDs, statistics show that over £21 million in old CDs are thrown away in the UK every year. Now that you see the big picture, things will start to get interesting. All you need to do is head on to Musicmagpie.co.uk, click the ‘Get cash for your old CDs’ button and fill in the barcode number found on each CD that you want to sell. The website will then reference that number with its database, offering you a certain amount of cash. It is capable of purchasing up to 250 CDs per transaction.

I guess it is high time I start to rummage through my junk…

Source: BIOS

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It has been a while since we covered anything that Raon has made, but I felt it was necessary to mention what may be the first dual-core ultra mobile PC to hit the market with the Raon Digital Everun Note. 

This is one UMPC (Ultra-Mobile Personal Computer) that has some cool specs, including a 7-inch, 1024 x 600 display with DX9 graphics.  It has a PCle mini-port, and, of course, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g. 

As for what’s on the inside, it has an AMD Turion X2 dual-core CPU, 1 GB of RAM, and a 12GB SSD or up to 80GB hard drive.  As you can see, the Raon Digital Everun Note bears a strong resemblance to a certain UMPC from Asus that rhymes with “free”.  It measures about 7.87 x 4.65 x 1.08-inches, and weighs about 1.65-pounds.

The Raon Digital Everun Note is set to retail for $879, however an availability date has not yet been announced.

Read [UMPC Portal] Via [ubergizmo]

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Geeksugar has posted a review of a new email-only device called The Peek, which will be available at Target for $99 this fall.

At first I wasn’t sure I was interested in a gadget that only handles email: smart phones offer much more, and the latest laptops are so little you can stash one in all but the smallest of purses. Plus, the Peek’s keys seem kinda petite…

IFA 2008 is certainly an event to participate if you’re in Europe with a penchant for the latest and greatest in consumer electronics. Penandfree has taken that opportunity to release a new next-generation wireless electronic input pen known as ‘Duo’, enabling users to write both letters and figure on a display of a non-tablet monitor (up to 22″ in size, although I’m not too sure why the size limitation is there). Penandfree claims that their solution is 10 times more affordable than a standard tablet monitor, so it will be interesting to see which organizations will pick up such technology when it is available in Korea at the end of this month.

Source: AVing

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With all of the excitement yesterday coming from the new Google Chrome browser its important to remember that we already have some good browsers on the market, namely Firefox.

With progress being made on version 3, Mozilla has announced that the latest beta (Beta 1) for Firefox 3.1 will be delayed by a few weeks. According to the developers website, the code freeze was pushed back from September 9 to September 30. Mike Shaver, the interim head of engineering for Mozilla stated that “the delay was necessary so developers would be able to incorporate feedback on the earlier alpha editions.”

With the code freeze being pushed back it looks like we will not see a public beta for Firefox 3.1 until sometime in October, of course Mozilla has not announced any specific date. Shaver also went on to state that Firefox 3.1 will have a Beta 2, and they currently are shooting for an October 28 code freeze to make that date. They are also hoping to have the final release out sometime in late this year or early 2009.

Firefox 3.1 is expected to include some additions and enhancements that were not included in the 3.0 release. One of those features will be “TraceMonkey,” which is a new JavaScript interpreter that according to Mozilla “dramatically boosts JavaScript performance.”

Via [Macworld]

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While I was attending the Penny Arcade Expo (PAX) last week, a certain salesman came in the Press Room with a most unusual product called the BaliYo. The best description that I can give of the BaliYo is that it is a pen that thinks it’s a butterfly knife.

Perhaps you never had a guy like this in your high school, but I remember this one tough guy who would carry a butterfly knife just so he could do fancy tricks of flicking the blade open and close. I guess he wanted to do something cool to pass the time, and a yo-yo was just way too geeky.

The BaliYo is meant to be a similar toy rather than a pen, because it really isn’t the best thing to write with. The two stray ends don’t stay up, so gripping it isn’t really feasible for writing. However, the designers took the time to put a Fisher Space Pen refill, which can “write underwater, in freezing cold, boiling heat, at any angle, even upside down”.

So, the purpose of this pen is to look cool. I can think of a perfect scene for it for a movie. Some of you may remember in Top Gun when Maverick (Tom Cruise) is playing with his pen in a classroom, and flipping it from knuckle to knuckle, and Iceman (Val Kilmer) does the same trick, only faster, in order to show him up. Can you imagine if Tom Cruise took out a BaliYo and starting doing some tricks? Iceman would have been iced!

This pen sure does cost a lot as it has an MSRP of $39.95, but it is on sale at the BaliYo site for $34.95. It comes in a variety of color combinations, and here’s a YouTube video if you want to see it in action.

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I don’t usually write up cases, purely because although they’re cool gadgets are always cooler.  They just happen to be the thing that keeps your gadgets warm and safe.  Typically the most exciting thing to happen to a laptop case is to have color added to it or space invaders slapped on.  However, this Napbook actually does have an interesting twist to it.  The top flap on the laptop case is well padded, giving you a nice fluffy spot to lay your head for a quick nap.  If you like to camp out for launch dates of games or gadgets and want your laptop along for entertainment, you could easily use this as a pillow.

It would also mean your laptop is safely stowed away under your head and less likely to turn up missing.  This is a design by Hafsteinn Juliusson, a designer from Iceland.  Since it is a design, there really isn’t any word on how to get one.  However, for those with crafty skills, it seems to be a simple enough DIY project.  Plus that way you can pick the colors or the amount of padding you’d like added.  Although the look of this design does border on goofy, the practical uses for it make it a bit more appealing.

Source: CraziestGadgets

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The FCC is only interested in whether a device deserves to be released or not, so they aren’t too big on keeping secrets. The latest “victim” of the FCC would be the Asus Eee PC S101, Unfortunately, juicy details that we geeks want (processor speed, hard drive capacity, screen size, the works) are unavailable from the FCC at this point in time, save for photos. This will be a high end Eee PC so do expect to fork out a figure that is way past the $500 mark. Many people lay claim to features the S101 will carry including a 10″ display, an Intel Atom processor, and a choice between a 32GB/64GB SSD, but all those remain to be confirmed as at press time.

Source: Liliputing

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