Category Archives: Hardware

invisibleSHIELD on iPod touch

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Now supporting over 3000 different gadgets and laptops, the invisibleSHIELD is the way to protect your gadget(s) without adding any bulk.

So I recently had my iPod touch replaced because of a faulty display. I kept the concealed from hands until my invisibleSHIELD would arrive. But I could stand it any longer and I discover a bright pixel. So I replace that one as well, and it happens to be on the same day the invisibleshield arrives. So here goes the install. It came with a cloth, a $5 off squeegee, and a moist pad of application solution. And the invisibleSHIELD of course. But that pad is not a good way of things. What happened to that all-perfect spray bottle? It did not get enough on to the invisibleSHIELD so you could
Not slide it around to align it on the device. Also, we had to take it off and on so many times that some dirt would get under the invisibleSHIELD and you wouldn’t realize it until you had put it on. And it didn’t fit right! I had to go at it with a pocket knife to trim it down so it wasn’t o er any buttons or ports. Let me say, that this was a horrible install. So difficult! The easy install aspect gets a -**. Disasterous.

But the protection you get in return Almost makes up for that. The invisibleSHIELD was originally used by the military to protect blades on helicopters from scratches. This is the same material, just cut down to fit your device. Look at the below video to show what it offers.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5mPCC1hHUk&hl=en&fs=1&]

As you can see, scratches aren’t an option! This will stop scratches. It also adds some extra grip, but it still slides in and out of my pocket really easily. It doesn’t spin, but I didn’t buy my iPod touch to spin it.

Overall, I give it ***

Three stars. The install is -2 stars, and the protection is 5 stars.

invisibleSHIELD homepage
iPod touch invisibleSHIELD

Plantronics Discovery 925 Headset

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Well, I have actually never had a headset before, but I do say, I like this one. I remember my first phone- old and clunky, as expected for a first phone. But for a first headset, this is recent, comparable, and most importantly stylish. Let’s start with the obvious. It looks like a Tony non-functioning piece of plastic, and I would never guess it was a headset. Just the general shape of it looks so elegant. The headset is available in many different colors, but I have the black one which is shown in the picture above.

I must say that the quality is great, for a headset with the range it has. The input is great (other people say), and I must say that it is just plain great.
It has the standard setup and configuration for all other headsets, with a passkey of 0000.
So, why would you want to get this headset? Let’s count down the reasons.
3. It’s SOO much sleeker and MORE AWESOME (awesomer?) than those round ones with that thing that flips out, or than the ones that go over your ear.
2. Super easy bluetooth setup (in fact, I now use it with Skype on my Mac. Sorry PC users!), default config for most all phones.
1. Great battery life–kinda hard to believe when the battery is probably a tiny bit bigger than a hearing aid battery. But this has a feature that many bluetooth headsets don’t include: A charger in the case. The case is nice and leather, and has a plastic fitting inside that is molded to the shape of the headset. But inside the part that fits the bigger part is the same plug that is used to charge it. It’s a little hard to explain, but pictures can explain anything.

As you can tell, there is a mini USB port on the side, which when you plug it into the case the plug inside the case is inserted into. The big plastic thing hat fills the space where the headset doesn’t is actually a battery that charges the headset. On the bottom of the case is another mini-USB port that you can plug in the headset’s charger to. You can also charge the headset directly. But this provides a full charge that i almost guaranteed to last through the busy businessman or businesswoman’s day.

So in the end,

Pros: Sleek, wireless, good battery life
Cons: Umm…Not made by Apple?

***** Outstanding!!!




LG env2

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I must say, the last phone I had was definitely not the nicest one in the world. and It was SO not the nicest one in the world that I barely used it. Now, all of that has changed. I now have a very nice phone, which is running on verizon. Now, as you can see it’s not an iPhone. And I have a very good reason for that – AT&T. When it comes out for verizon I will have it about instantly. But the phone I got is still a nice phone, when it comes to verizon. As you can see by the title it is the env2. Flip, with an internal and an external display. Full QWERTY keyboard, as well as a keypad on the front. Black, with a funky USB slot (not something I appreciate). The env2 is definitely a cool, affordable phone. I have just pretty much explained it. But something I didn’t mention was the camera. The camera is 2.0 mega pixels, and unlike the original env, is flat with the surface so it now lays flat on a table or hard surface. Also, compared to the original env the env2 is a little bit more square (shorter and wider). Sadly, I don’t have a micro SD card inserted, but of course it does still have some internal memory (I have no idea how much). The speakerphone is average quality, but when using the phone normally (no speakerphone), the quality is great. I can very clearly hear someone talking from across the country. I don’t have a headset, so I wouldn’t know if it changes the sound before it goes through the headset port. Also, the charging ports are completely different. I don’t even know if the charging port on the original env is even a USB port. It is pretty much just a hyped up and prettier env. Below are some visual comparisons from the original env, which happens to be my sister which she has dropped many times, and it still works. Sadly I hear the env2 is not quite as durable (I wonder if they did that on purpose to get more purchases).

Wacom Bamboo

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Yup, another product review. I am almost out of freeware, and I have been resorting to web apps. Therefore, there may be blogging less frequently. But to keep it this way (weekly), please click some of the ads in the sidebar. Every click counts!
The Bamboo ($80) is definitely the best 1 week in advance of purchase thing I’ve ever bought. Basically, wacom makes pen displays and tablets. the Bamboo is a Pen Tablet. While at a friend’s house, I tried out their older version of the intuous. I was amazed at what accuracy and speed you could achieve. Of course it was a little hard when I first picked it up, because it is a little different from a mouse. The bamboo has a square surface. If I hover 3-5 mm over the surface of the active area (the inner square) with the pen in the exact middle, the pointer will go straight to the middle of the display. Basically, while hovering, the position of the tablet is the same as the position on the display. to click, just touch the pen tip to the surface of the tablet. Do this twice in a row quickly and you have just double-clicked. The bamboo is pretty much just a faster way to navigate, draw, touch-up photos and even hand-write notes.
Let’s take a look at the pen.
As you can see, then pan has 2 programmable side switches. By default, hover over the tablet (3-5 mm) and push the top button to right click. hold the bottom button while moving the mouse from bottom to top of a document/webpage/anything window. Basically, it is a pan/scroll. Personally, I have found that it’s a lot easier to have the bottom button to be right click and the top button scroll/pan. Other than that, there really is nothing much to it.
Let’s take a closer look at the tablet.
The inner and lighter square is called the active area. This is where the pen is responsive. But over all that you see these buttons called ExpressKeys™. You can assign these to do pretty much anything from forward/back to open an application/do a keystroke. The inner circle is a touch sensitive ring. you can have this zoom in or scroll. It is not the nicest piece of touch sensitivity I have ever used (the iPod touch is!) though. But being a 2 monitor person, I ned a way of switching between them. To do this I have to go into system preferences and select which monitor I want–Monitor 1, Monitor 2, or I can even have it go across both monitors if I want. But If I was on my extended monitor (Monitor 2) there would be no way for me to access the system preferences to change back to monitor 1. So I only had 1 thing left to do: The ExpressKeys™. If I could use the left arrow to go to the left monitor, right arrow to go to the right monitor, and the FN1 do span across both, it old be perfect. But how? There is no setting for those keys to do that. So I used something I’ve never used before: Automator. Id never used it, but it was actually really easy. To do monitor 1, I just hit record, open system preferences from the dock, go to Pen Tablet, go to details, monitor 1, close, then go into the menu and hit quit Then I stop the Automator logger. I can then save it as an application, which I then programmed the right ExpressKey to do that.
Overall, for the price tag of $80, i’ll give this one a 6 out of 5. AMAZING! The things I can do with it are amazing.
Check out what I’ve done in photoshop with it so far!:
Wave Of Emotion

Waterfall of life

Sea of creativity

Psychedelic

Flocks Of Love

Flashback

Explosion

Cruise of life

Braindump

Flip Mino Review

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R278PtBb3BA&hl=en&fs=1&]

I recently got myself a Flip Mino. And I must say, it’s pretty good stuff for a budget camcorder. Try turning it on. Press the small on button on the side. Flip. Nice Name, eh? Now it shows you time left to record, battery life, and the video preview. Want to record something? Just press that big red button. When you are done recording, press the big red button again. Would you like to see what you just recorded? Press the Play/Pause button. You are now watching the most recent video you took. Would you like to turn up or down the volume on the playback? Use the + and – buttons. To fast forward through a video, just press the > or the buttons to navigate through them. Hey, I don’t like this video. Just press the trash button. You can also zoom in/out while in a video: just press the + or – buttons while recording. The buttons light up (except for the red one) when you can use them. For example, when you are recording you aren’t going to use the play/pause, trash, or left and right buttons, but you are going to use the + and – buttons. All of the buttons except for the + and – buttons are illuminated. When you are browsing through videos, you aren’t going to use the + and – buttons, but you are going to use the Play/Pause, delete and left and right buttons. For this reason, All of the buttons but the + and – buttons are illuminated. While in the middle of playback, all of the buttons are illuminated. You can trash it, play/pause it, use the + and – buttons to change volume, and hold the buttons to fast forward/rewind through. I do not have the HD version, but I am completely happy without it. I get 640X480, which is better than any video quality I have ever gotten in my life. I even had them print a custom image onto it. This can be done for no extra charge! It has to be a VERY big image, or the online software says it’s not high enough resolution to make a good print. Here is a picture of mine.
At one point, you are probably going to want to get the videos from the flip to your computer. In the box, there is no installation CD. No cable. And no port on the thing. But sometime, you are going to have to figure out why they call it a flip. They call it a flip because of how you plug it in. Pull a little switchy thingy and a USB digi “flips” out of the top. you can them plug that straight into your machine, buy one of their cables online (extra cost) and plug it into that, or even using any old USB Extension cord works. If you have a little station for all of your gadgets to plug in, I recommend just getting a usb extension cord (they come in handy for LOTS of situations other than this, too). After plugging it in, you will see a USB drive appear either in My Computer or on the desktop (depending on your operating system). Open it and you will see Flip for Mac and a Flip for Windows. These both require a driver to be installed (3ivx er something), but that’s no biggie. The application will run straight off of the drive. In the application, you can download the video files and save them. But I have never used that much, because on the first launch it said would you like to upgrade to FlipShare, and of course, being me, I LOVE updates. Now, Flipshare then deletes the other applications from the flip and replaces it with Start flipshare. It will only do this to the application compatible with your system. The other one (in my case the .exe file) turns to Setup_Flipshare.exe. FlipShare installs on your hard drive and opens each time you plug in the flip. FlipShare the application itself is actually pretty nice. It has a very newish feel, and allows you to do a lot with your video. Save them , make a movie of them, and even upload them straight to AOL video, myspace™ and YouTube™ all without even having to open an internet browser. You can take a snapshot of a certain place in a video. you can export the video. You can email a video. You can even make a video greeting card with it. FlipShare is pretty cool. But if you don’t want to deal with any software and just want the files, easy. Open up the drive, and there will be a folder called DCIM. Go down as many folders as you can and you will be greeted with a bunch of .AVI videos, waiting for you to manually copy them off. If you just want the videos and nothing else, here you go.
Now when it comes to charging and battery life, it’s pretty cool. The battery is like the one in iPods, sealed in and not replaceable. But to charge it, just plug it in to your computer. Recharging a completely dead battery can take up to 3 hours, but that doesn’t usually happen. Usually it take 1.5 to 2.5 hours for it to charge. You know if it is charging by looking at the USB digi. There is a small bright light, that blinks while charging. It stops blinking when it is done charging. The battery life is around 2 hours, not bad at all for how much it can do.
In the end, I give this a 5 Star rating. The sensitivity of the buttons is almost as good as the touchscreen sensitivity of the iPhone. Easy to use, and just like they say–video recording is now as easy and cheap as taking a photo.
Easy cheap video recording and sharing–The Flip Mino

Another reason why Apple rules….

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Ah, another day. Standard. I have my iPod touch in my lunchbox, even though we are not aloud to have any electronics at school at all. my lunch is a peach cup, a sunny-D, and a PBJ. Standard. I also have some cheese curls for a snack. Well, it is all normal, when I go to have snack. I eat my cheese curls, Drink some Sunny-D, and put it all away, covering up my iPod touch. Then, 45 mins later, it is lunch. UHOH. I open my lunch box, and what do I see? Sunny-D leaked out of the bottle. ALOT OF IT. so much, that my iPod touch is almost submerged in Sunny-D. So, Secretly from rules, I go off sprinting to the bathroom, and there I take it out and #1- turn it on, make sure it still works. it does, but the contrast is all white, and it is pretty insensitive to touch. So I go off cleaning everything I can, wiping it off with paper towels, and in the end I decide; this is never going to be okay unless I get a sympathetic understanding and knowledgeable adult to help me with my problem…. Ryan to the rescue! ryan is %100 the best teacher known to man, and he is everything I stated before: sympathetic, understanding, and knowledgeable. so he helps me with cleaning it off with rubbing alcohol and putting it upright on the heater vent, and it slowly starts to recover… But when I get picked up I route straight for the apple store, so they can check it out because it is still failing. I bring it in, get an appointment 10 mins after we arrive, and talk to a guy I know there from a previous problem

( I know about everyone at this retail store!). my words: my ipod had a little accident involving liquid… and before I can say anything else he takes it and uses a special tool that was like what doctors use to look in your ears and looks in the bottom ports. Apparently, there are liquid submersion sensors inside that turn pink when submerged. Now they would have been pink if Ryan hadn’t put them over the heater, which I think disabled them. But of course I didn’t tell them that, because right after they give me the news about the Liquid Submersion Sensors not going off, he says they will replace it for free. So, here I go, with a brand spanking new iPod touch for free, replacing the old one, too bad I couldn’t keep the old one I would have dissected it and put it on the will next to the old iPod mini! Look at the picture below of the new one before I take it out of it’s packaging. too bad they don’t give it to me in the box.