Every year on March 17, we honor Saint Patrick (circa 385–461), one of the patron saints of Ireland. Whether or not you choose to celebrate the holiday by wearing green, eating Irish foods, imbibing Irish drink (usually Guinness), or attending parades, we wish you a safe a happy holiday.
Everyone wants to be Irish on St. Patrick’s Day… even computer operating systems. So as you raise your glass to St. Patrick this year, try to pretend your beer was a computer operating system. It might go a little like this…
Macintosh Beer
Considered by many to be a “light” beer. All the cans look identical. When you take one from the fridge, it opens itself. The ingredients list is not on the can. If you call to ask about the ingredients, you are told that “you don’t need to know.” A notice on the side reminds you to drag your empties to the trashcan.
DOS Beer
Requires you to use your own can opener, and that you read the directions carefully before opening the can. The can is divided into eight compartments of 2oz each, which have to be accessed separately. A lot of people keep drinking it after it was discontinued.
Windows 3.1 Beer
Was the world’s most popular beer in the mid-1990s. Looked a lot like Mac Beer’s. Requires that you already own a DOS Beer. Claims that it allows you to drink several DOS Beers simultaneously, but in reality you can only drink a few of them, very slowly, especially slowly if you are drinking the Windows Beer at the same time. Sometimes, for no apparent reason, a can of Windows Beer will explode when you open it.
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BlueLounge introduced their SpaceStation docking station and USB hub. It’s the clever idea you’ve always had but never done anything about. BlueLounge put all your storage ideas to a true, marketable package, the SpaceSation.
Really a fancy design of a cover with a USB hub tucked inside, the SpaceStation does clean up your desktop quit nicely.
“Hovering just 5mm above the desk, cords are free to enter or exit the hub at any point – on the side to connect a scanner, the front for an iPod, the back for a laptop or camera. An internal 4-port USB hub will keep all peripherals connected. One USB plug exits the station right where needed to connect a laptop. Just tip the front of the SpaceStation up to access the hub and cords.”
The SpaceStation surface is a rubber pad so your iPhone and other gadgets have a soft, non-skid surface to rest. The SpaceStation also provides air circulation to
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Fantom Drives are well known for high performance and high capacity storage abilities. Just recently Fantom introduced their G-Force series to include both eSATA and USB connectivity. The eSATA port is designed for maximum throughput (wait till USB 3.0 though) and USB 2.0 for universal compatibility. Keep in mind, my previous post about the SATA to USB adapter for chump change.
“The G-Force Megadisk eSATA+USB RAID features flexible and user configurable RAID operation modes or RAID 0 (disk striping) for maximum speed RAID 1 (Disk Mirroring) for maximum fault tolerance JBOD (Direct Mapping) for maximum flexibility or Spanning for simple large volume support at bus speeds of 300MB/Sec.”
The G-Force Fantom series includes NTI Shadow software for real-time continuous backup in addition to scheduled backup capabilities. What I like about the NTI software is the included ability to backup any attached storage devices like U3 flash drives. The NTI software includes support for Windows and Mac.
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Have you stumbled across your laptop power cord while it was lying on the floor, jerking your computer off the desk? I have, and although no damage was done to my laptop, it did loosen my power connector inside the computer. If you are one of those unlucky ones who did some damage, chances are you spent between $100 and $200 for getting the power connector fixed. Ouch.
Bob from JerkStopper, introduced me to a nifty little gadget that will save you time and money – a laptop power cord safety latch. It’s a simple plastic Cable Retention Device with a dummy USB connector which docks on your laptop. The rear of JerkStopper is where you thread the power cord and lock it into place.
The JerkStopper has three dummy configurations: USB, RJ45 and RJ11. For $9.99 you can purchase a set of three which is a wise investment for any laptop user.
Bob has a good product here, and ideally I would like to see the dummy USB port as a working interface extension port, but the logistics of creating a quality JerkStopper and live USB access seems difficult.
Here are some warning signs you might need a laptop power cord safety latch or JerkStopper:
The power LED and/or battery charge LED flicker when you wiggle the power cord and/or the AC adapter tip on the back or your laptop.
Laptop suffers from spontaneous and/or instantaneous power-downs for no apparent reason.
Laptop only runs when you keep the power cord and plug in a certain direction.. Movement of the AC power adapter plug causes power “glitches” or outages.
Strange “clicking” noises coming from the area near the power plug. Laptop switches from AC power to battery power intermittently.
Laptop refuses to start or charge a properly inserted battery. Laptop appears to be “dead†when you plug AC adapter.
Laptop suddenly shuts off without any warning. Sparks come out of the back of your laptop.
Laptop will not charge the battery and/or Laptop only runs on battery power
Gadgets and the size of those gadgets have always been inversely proportionate. We want the bigger and better technology features with a smaller physical size. Here I bring you a classic example: the USB digital voice recorder.
At the size of [about] a credit card – 6.5mm – this digital voice recorder can record up to 69 hours of audio. The USB digital voice recorder is a 1GB storage device with a flip-out USB connector and flush mounted controls for recording, pause, play, rewind etc.
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Here’s one for the select few, yet equally as interesting for those digital SLR fans. The 35mm slide and film negative scanner is your one-stop workstation for turning those old negatives into digital masterpieces.
The slide and negative converter will scan your old photo’s up to 1,829 DPI and easily convert them to jpeg. With USB connection the digital slide converter will quickly and easily build your family photo album into a digital copy. The slide scanner also comes with drives to work directly with Photoshop to remove pesty
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Technology convergence can be fun, useful and sometimes awkward and with the underwater scuba mask sporting USB connectivity combines all three.
Using a 5 mega pixel camera, Liquid Image has created an underwater camera built right into your scuba mask. Not a bad idea at all. Especially at a $99 price tag. Never before has it been this in expensive for vacationers to get a snorkel mask and camera for that Bahamas’ trip.
Running off AAA batteries, your pictures are saved to a built in 16MB of memory (not enough) or microSD card. After your afternoon swimming with the fish, download everything via USB.
The USB snorkel mask includes a shutter release button and cross hairs on the tempered glass for sharp shooting. A little storage compartment for, I would think, fish food and a LCD status display screen. Other features include video mode and hi or low res mega pixel settings.
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Well 2008 is here. Happy New Year! If you happen to be at home checking out the 2008 Rose Bowl parade then download this free audio tour. It’s a detailed description of all the floats, how they where built and by whom. Just click on the picture below and you will be redirected to Amazon for a free MP3 download of the 2008 Tournament of Roses Parade.
Transcend has built a great name for themselves with the Jetflash UFD product line. It’s been tested as one of the fastest drives on the market, simple designs which are small and compact.
The new Transcend Jetflash V33 is no exception. At just 60 x 16 x 8 mm in size and 7g of weight the 1 through 8GB size would hardly let you know they are there.
As with all Jetflash UFDs you have the option of downloading the Jetflash Elite software package for personal UFD management. The software suite includes:
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Olinari doesn’t work with silver spoons, but rather silver dog tags. These plush sterling silver dog tags hold your K9 info in a Sony Micro Vault USB drive. The hand made pieces are anything short of cheap. Now it’s just a matter of wanting to place a $350 dog tag around the puppies head to only be drug through the mud, sh!t and food bowl.
But don’t let my sarcasm stop you short of checking out these beauties…I understand the love an owner has for their dog. And albeit these USB dog tags mean you’ll probably get the dog back, but not the tag, shouldn’t stop you from putting return-to-owner on USB.
Oh – and if you wanna to forget the DOG reference altogether – just use this as a high-end lanyard for personal [human] use . There are 7 models to chose and a selection of
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We started out with a USB a$$ blower a while back, now we have the USB optiwind mouse, the ideal Palmar Hyperhidrosis USB gadget. With over 28 CFM airflow those sweaty palms will never be wet again.
The USB optiwind mouse has a little more RPM than the USB seat blower we reported a while back (1500 rpm).
For the tech palmer hyperhidrosis type consider the 800 dpi, 25dBA noise level spec and MTFG of 20,000 POH.
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It’s called a USB rechargeable clip torch but I’m not sold on the term torch…sound like something needs to go up in flames. Rather, the rechargeable clip light uses a USB port on the back-end for juicing up during down time.
The convenient and portable LED light comes with a couple different clips so attachment can be made virtually anywhere. At just $14 the rechargeable light also affordable for just about anyone. The LED light portion and USB connect portion do rotate a full 180 so it’s fairly easy to get optimal positioning…as with this book clip light illustration.
The recharge part is done in about 3 hours however no specs where given on how long the USB clip light stays…well…lit.
Here is the USB rechargeable clip torch product page. Keep in mind
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Every year on March 17, we honor Saint Patrick (circa 385–461), one of the patron saints of Ireland. Whether or not you choose to celebrate the holiday by wearing green, eating Irish foods, imbibing Irish drink (usually Guinness), or attending parades, we wish you a safe a happy holiday.
Everyone wants to be Irish on St. Patrick’s Day… even computer operating systems. So as you raise your glass to St. Patrick this year, try to pretend your beer was a computer operating system. It might go a little like this…
Macintosh Beer
Considered by many to be a “light” beer. All the cans look identical. When you take one from the fridge, it opens itself. The ingredients list is not on the can. If you call to ask about the ingredients, you are told that “you don’t need to know.” A notice on the side reminds you to drag your empties to the trashcan.
DOS Beer
Requires you to use your own can opener, and that you read the directions carefully before opening the can. The can is divided into eight compartments of 2oz each, which have to be accessed separately. A lot of people keep drinking it after it was discontinued.
Windows 3.1 Beer
Was the world’s most popular beer in the mid-1990s. Looked a lot like Mac Beer’s. Requires that you already own a DOS Beer. Claims that it allows you to drink several DOS Beers simultaneously, but in reality you can only drink a few of them, very slowly, especially slowly if you are drinking the Windows Beer at the same time. Sometimes, for no apparent reason, a can of Windows Beer will explode when you open it.
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