This was an amazing year for gadgetry as a ton of stuff that’s been in the pipeline forever has finally made it to retail, and a bunch of stuff that’s been around for a while made its way to the Garside family house.
Top 5 Drool worthy gadgets:
Eye-Fi memory cards
Imagine not having to connect your camera to your computer (or plug your card into your computer), this little guy wirelessly does the transfer for you. Unfortunately it’s only available in SD which means no good for our Digital Rebel XT.
HP Media Smart Home Server
When I see this I simply drool. Ugggghhhh, so gorgeous. So awesome. So available in Canada. A home server acts as a centralized storage device, an automated backup tool, a centralized media repository, and loads more. We live in the digital age, and everything we do in our house is dependant upon our network. This little guy will keep our stuff in order and keep all of our data safe and backed up invisibly.
Microsoft Zune
Imagine a device that had upgradeable firmware, which allowed for wireless syncing, and which had an easy to use interface…AND well made client software that isn’t buggy and doesn’t look like a glorified spreadsheet.
Yeah, imagine that it was Microsoft that beat Apple to the punch.
Ouch.
The store isn’t available in Canada yet, and relies on Microsoft’s points scheme (which irritates me), but this looks like it could be an iPod killer.
While I don’t relish buying my periphreals again…since Apple makes me do it anyway, I may as well.
Amazon Kindle
Again, not available in Canada…but imagine buying books for a third the price, reading them all on one, easy to use and easy to read device, and being able to buy a new book from anywhere (on the dock of your cottage retreat, in the airport, deep in the heart of the woods while camping). This is the future of ecommerce, and why I’m a little nervous of the future of All New Comics. This thing beats the pants off of the iPhone hands down.
HTC TyTN II
I wanted to put the iPhone here, but it’s not available in Canada, and it’s so crippled out the door that you have to haxor all over it to make it useful. The HTC TyTN II does all of the cool productivity things that the iPhone does, only better with built in GPS, WiFi, Bluetooth, a full keyboard and more.
Top 5 Gadgets we bought this year:
Guitar Hero II
The beast that created the addiction. Rhythm guitar games are horribly addictive. Good songs, and a difficulty ramp that rewards progress with new songs.
Harmony 880 Remote
I LOVED our old Harmony remote, but when it died it was time to upgrade. With a built in Lithium Ion battery, colour LCD screen, and the same programmability that made the last Harmony our favourite device in the house, this one’s even better.
Dell Inspiron 6400
My All New Comics work is long and repetitive, with me often just copying and pasting seemingly forever…but having a laptop means I can copy and paste ad nasueum while watching TV! I do so love this little box. It’s 15″, has 2 GB of RAM and 160GB of storage. Paired up with one of my 300GB portable drives I’ve got more space than I’ll ever need (so long as I try to keep the Laptop to just the essential stuff, no long term archival of stuff, that’s what the PC is for).
Canon Digital Rebel XT
Our pictures were always OK, not great, but OK. We had a lot of shots of Kaylin looking away, and blurry shots, but this bad boy has improved our photos 100 fold. Instant on, no shutter lag, and incredible clear pictures. It’s spectacular.
Rock Band
As awesome as Guitar Hero is…Rock Band is more so. We can play it together, you get to explore your inner rock god, and the song selection is incredible.