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Gadgets Archive

iPod Shuffle

ipod shuffle Early last week I went shopping and one of the items I planned on buying was a USB flash drive. I use a Windows laptop at work and I have an iBook at home and there are times that I need to move files from one machine to the other. I would either FTP the files to my web site or wait until the weekend when both machines were at home, but I thought that a USB flash drive would be an easier, more efficient and just more convenient solution.

Call it fate, serendipity, luck or just plain coincidence, but when I went shopping a big storm hit and I decided to cancel the trip in order to avoid the heavy rain. The next day Apple announced the iPod Shuffle at Macworld.

Continue reading iPod Shuffle…

iBook Update

I thought I would post a follow-up to my post about my new iBook. It has now become my main computer at home - usurping my aging Dell laptop - and I use it for everything from just browsing the web to developing my web site and Firefox extensions.

I was the victim of Apple upgrading the specs on the iBook, although not the only one, with both Dunstan Orchard and Richard Rutter getting caught out this time and Dan Cederholm mentioning this previously. Despite this I’m still extremely happy with my purchase.

Continue reading iBook Update…

Switcher

ibook This week I made the switch from PC to Mac. No this isn’t a belated April Fool’s - I am now the proud owner of a brand new iBook. Now admittedly I do still own a PC and I had already started the move towards Apple when I bought an iPod, but this is still a major change for me.

I decided to switch for a number of reasons:

  1. I wanted a new laptop that was truly portable. My Dell Latitude laptop has been a trusty companion for many a year now, but is beginning to show it’s age: the battery doesn’t hold it’s charge properly, some of the keys work only sporadically and it’s not the speediest of machines.
  2. I wanted to try out OS X. I had long admired an operating system that could combine “the power of UNIX with the simplicity and elegance of the Macintosh”.
  3. I wanted to be able to test on a Mac the web sites and Firefox customizations that I develop.

Continue reading Switcher…

Robot Olympics

robolympicsToday I went to ROBOlympics: “the first ever event to bring robot competitions and competitors together from around the world at a single place”. All the events were held at the Herbst Pavilion in Fort Mason and included sumo wrestling, fire fighting, soccer and more. I took a few photos of the robots and outside along Marina Green. It was a lot of fun and certainly a different way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Update: I’m now linked to from Boing Boing which was recently voted weblog of the year.

RSS vs Atom

rss on yahoo Dave pointed out that Yahoo! now supports RSS. I have set up a chrispederick.com feed on My Yahoo! and it works great. I have also added Atom support to this blog now that it is supported by both Blogger and Yahoo!. Let’s hope that the controversy of RSS vs Atom resolves itself soon.

Gadgets

I bought myself some new gadgets recently. Firstly, after my sister gave me the first season of The Office on English DVD, I had to go out and get myself a new DVD player. I bought this JVC model from Zone Free DVD. The service was very good and the DVD player is excellent, so I can now play DVDs from any region. My other purchase was a robotic vacuum cleaner called a Roomba. You place it in the middle of the room, turn it on and walk away - when it’s finished it will beep and turn itself off. It works very well and I hope to have some videos of it in action up soon.

New Toy of the Day

Although I use Trillian Pro as my main instant messenger, I have recently been looking at an open source alternative called Miranda. I am very impressed and will be interested to see how it progresses with a new roadmap.

New Toy of the Day

Dave sent me an article about a new motion controlled cellphone.

New Toy of the Day

Check out this new handheld printer. It is hand operated by sweeping it across any type of print media and the printout will then start to appear right behind the sweeps.

New Toy of the Day

The new Archos handheld entertainment center looks very cool. Not sure when it will be released, but I may be tempted to pick one up.

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