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Newstips Electronic Editorial Bulletin Issue # 2009-08c
Maybe the last time homework isn't late & other news
Is an apocalypse an appropriate holiday gift?
Welcome Bethesda Softworks, most recently known for its Fallout 3
console & PC game & its add-ons (Broken Steel, Mothership Zeta,
The Pitt, Point Lookout & Operation: Anchorage), all of which
we've reviewed here. Imagine that an atomic war in the 1950s
devastated everything so that all that remains is a wasteland
with no government, no infrastructure & lots of human & mutated
enemies; it's a video gamer's heaven. The news for you is a
special edition coming together for the holidays; Pete or Kate
can get you more info. Contact: Pete Hines, Bethesda Softworks
(Rockville, MD) 301-354-4274 phines@bethsoft.com
http://BethSoft.com Agency: Kate Isenberg 323-551-6971
kate@gr8danepr.com
Intel at retail - the speed of light, speedier tight
The next wave of Intel products arriving at retail are based on
their new 34nm process, packing more memory & processing per
square inch than ever before because everything is smaller &
packed tighter. The smaller the path between elements, the less
time it takes (at any given speed, including the speed of light
at which electricity travels) to get from one point to the next,
so the faster devices can operate. Conquering nanospace isn't
just about speed; Intel engineers also addressed power
consumption & heat generation. We find it just a little amazing
that this level of tech in Intel processors & solid state drives
has become a commodity retail offering that any consumer can hit
a store & buy. Contact: Todd Garrigues, Intel Americas Inc.
(Santa Clara, CA) 301-497-8997 todd.c.garrigues@intel.com
http://Intel.com
Tiffen & school supplies
For college kids studying cinema/television or photography,
Tiffen filters & tripods & maybe even a Steadicam could be
requisites for back-to-school shopping. Any college kid, in fact,
may want to consider a tripod for the inevitable photos or videos
they take for classwork or after hours. In high school or in many
cases middle school, it may also make sense to look into a camera
bag as a smart way to protect any personal camera for damage. Of
course, with so many photos ending up in an iPod Touch or iPhone,
there's always room for Tiffen's least expensive offerings, the
amazing Photo fx & Cool fx (available in the App Store). If you
need details or reviewables, you need Hilary. Contact: Hilary
Araujo, Tiffen Company (Hauppauge, NY) 631-273-2500x1216
haraujo@tiffen.com http:/.tiffen.com
Special Report: Are monitors (category) fading?
One of the earliest signs of recovery we saw in the Consumer
Electronics category came as HDTV sets with smaller but
respectably sized screens appeared at $100-500 price points. We
also noted that 1080 HD sets tended to (not all did) offer a
smidge better resolution than their twin units, sans tuner, in
the PC monitor market, which tended to offer only 1050 lines.
Most TV sets (as most monitors) offer multiple inputs; for most
users who are not making any use of the tuner (because they
receive via cable box or satellite, not over the air through an
antenna), TV sets & monitors are easily interchangeable
(especially for all the monitors with speakers). There is some
overlap & some non-overlap among brands; for example, Samsung
offers both, JVC offers only TV sets & ViewSonic is mostly
monitors. Interestingly, the new products from Westinghouse
include only TV sets, no monitors. What we believe we're seeing
is the monitor category beginning to melt into the somewhat
higher-volume TV category; in other words, before long, the thing
you connect to your computer is likely to have been designed,
built & sold as a TV set. We've been on the flip side of that for
years, thanks to umpteen generations of WinTV products that let
us watch TV on our PCs; these days, one of our 2 desktop monitors
has an HD cable box plugged into one of its inputs. The business
case is obvious: building fewer SKUs for more applications means
stronger sell-through & fewer returns. So what compelling reason
is there to keep the categories separate? We can't come up with
one either.
Special Report Bonus Review: Epson All-In-One Stylus NX415
As we gathered info on back-to-school options in these hard
economic times, we were delighted to learn that Epson has a
printer/scanner at a $60 street price (thanks to a $40 promo
discount in stores). They call it an "All-In-One" unit (we put
their name for the type in quotes because different people have
different interpretations of "all"; for us, it implies fax
functions, which aren't in this unit, but then, what student do
you know who ever deals in faxes?) The Epson "All-In-One" Stylus
NX415 is fairly compact with a glass platen scanner bed under its
top lid, a camera memory card slot up front & a color display
about the size of those on many cameras or cell phones. It uses
Epson pigment-based inks, which are superior to the usual
dye-based inks in terms of smearing, water damage, color fidelity
& richness & fading. Epson continues to emphasize printers in the
role of photo printers, though we hardly ever see that happening
in a student population, so features like auto photo correction
(including red-eye removal), direct memory card photo printing,
cropping, etc. The 3 things that you (on behalf of your student)
would expect this unit to do are to print, to scan & to copy
(which is just printing what you scan, after all). It does those
things well. It's not the quietest ink jet ever, so a student
trying to catch a few minutes of sleep while printing a major
paper after an all-nighter may find this a little louder than the
noise in the hall but a little softer than the roommate's
snoring. The printer connects via USB & comes with software for
both Windows & Mac. It's also worth noting that the paper guides
all slide & fold closed, so it can pack away for the summer
without having flaps that catch & break on the way to or from
storage. Bottom line: As a back-to-school choice, the printing,
scanning & copying features of the Epson "All-In-One" Stylus
NX415 in concert with the quality of the Epson pigment-based inks
combine to make it a more functional & more versatile tool for
the student & at $60, a good value for the student's underwriter
(you).
Special Report Bonus Review 2: Fruit 2day
We recognize that the need to snack is among the many
distractions that can be detrimental to personal productivity, so
we checked out the background of Hero Fruit 2day & had them send
us samples of their 4 varieties for more personal testing. The
flavors are (nominally) cherry-grape, strawberry-orange,
mango-peach & strawberry-banana; each has the juices of several
other fruits also in the mix. Each is a drink you can chew, with
chunks of real fruit (the marquee pair) in a puree of real fruit
juices. Since those fruits have natural sugars (21gm in each
6.75oz/200ml bottle, all from fruit, none added), there's a
little energy boost. Nutritionally, the label claims you're
getting the USDA equivalent of 2 servings of fruit (something
many of us often shortchange). There's a gram of fiber to help
you feel full, which helps defer the distractions of hunger
pangs, 100 calories, very little sodium, a lot of vitamin C (120%
of the recommended daily value) plus small amounts of vitamin A,
calcium & iron. All of that just means you can make one of these
your morning or afternoon fruit break without feeling
nutritionally guilt-ridden; feeling guilty is natural, alas, when
you're immersed in the indulgence of the flavor & texture of
these chunky little drinks. You may also find the price a little
indulgent at just short of two bucks per bottle (hint: there's a
dollar-off coupon on a 2-pack at their Web site). So why would
you buy a bottle of this instead of a couple pieces of fruit? The
best reason is probably shelf life; you can keep this
refrigerated for a lot longer than you can keep fresh fruit from
rotting. Bottom line: the trade-off of its indulgent taste & long
shelf-life versus a somewhat indulgent price suggest Hero
Fruit2day purées as an appropriate & fun occasional alternative
to having fresh fruit on hand when distracting snack pangs make
it harder to get your work done.
Special Report Bonus Review 3: Livespeakr
We were thinking about this for back-to-school: Livespeakr is an
amplified speaker pair intended primarily but not exclusively for
Apple I-Gear, thanks to a standard stereo mini-plug. Its internal
battery (with a claimed 16-hour runtime) recharges through a USB
connection (cord included, as is a USB wall wart AC adapter) &
play while charging. A clever design slides the speakers into a
compact storage mode, a small-footprint mode for most listening
or a wider separation that it calls a "movie enjoyment" mode. The
base also has a slide-out, flip-out "kickstand" that helps raise
the speakers to a couple of inches above the desktop & angle them
toward the listener. The only electrical control is a power
switch; you use the connected audio source to adjust the volume.
The reproduction is satisfactory, but hardly audiophile grade;
it's about as good as most standard table radios or OEM car
radios. Also, its $85 sticker price seems a little steep for
this, but that's a buyer's call, not ours. Bottom line:
Livespeakr does a decent job of playing handheld device audio out
loud & in stereo with decent quality.
Special Report Bonus Review 4: V-Moda Vibe II headset
When inviting back-to-school product pitches, we said yes to the
V-Moda Vibe II headset for a number of reasons. One is that while
it's an intra-aural (goes in the ear, like earbuds) device, it
comes with "sport clip" ear hooks, which we hoped would be an
alternative to the safety concerns of sound-isolating
transducers. We were wrong. These significantly reduce your
ability to hear real-world sounds & we consider them unsafe to
wear when traveling; that said, we can understand that isolation
to be a favorable characteristic when studying. There is a great
deal of detail in the sound reproduction but considerable bass
boost; while they don't offer the kind of transparency that an
audiophile seeks, kids may enjoy listening through these. This is
a headset, not just headphones; a mike is in one pod about 6"
down the right earbud cord & a call control button in a second
pod, more pendant-like, where the earbud cords Y-connect en route
to the standard 4-conductor 3.5mm plug. The fabric-covered cords,
stainless steel alloy driver housings & Italian-designed carry
case are part of a deliberate mystique that wants to place this
$120 product as a style, lifestyle & art offering. The investment
in package design is obvious; it at once glamorizes the product &
makes it close to impossible to remove, with an overindulgent use
of wasted cardboard & plastics. We find the audio performance
reminiscent of several of the better $60-80 devices we've
reviewed, but we completely understand that the look & panache of
this may well be part of the benefit that users within its target
market seek to own. Bottom line: The V-Moda Vibe II stereo
headset with mike is a fashion-forward choice for delivering very
trendy noise-isolated audio reproduction while also supporting
hands-free cell phone usage.
Special Report Bonus Review 5: Keygaroo
As a back-to-school thing, girls may like this more than guys;
it's also nice as a stocking stuffer. Keygaroo is a broad family
of big key rings with leather pouches or pockets or ID holders
attached in the kinds of colors & finishes that shout "put me in
your purse" (even for those kids who use a backpack as a purse).
We like them as a place to keep earbuds, for example, from
turning into a uselessly tangled wreck; it's just as easy to
imagine these holding cosmetics, cash or snacks. The key ring is
on a spring; pull it from its dock to expose an opening in the
loop that makes it easy to add or remove keys. Bottom line:
Stylish, clever & fundamentally useful Keygaroo key keepers with
attached leather storage pockets, pouches or cases offer an
attractive antidote to losing loose items.
Available: Productivity & Back-To-School Products (PDF)
As Marty does his on-air product show & tell rounds, he preps a
PDF for the station Web sites; if you'd like the productivity &
back-to-school PDFs, just ask.
Let's all do a fake Comdex
Comdex was always the week before Thanksgiving & the whole
computer industry showed up, with or without booths, to showcase
their latest/greatest stuff. We can do the same without leaving
our desks. All it takes is a bunch of us putting out editorial
calls (ProfNet: widen your doors) & running our coverage at about
the same time - say, the week of November 16. We won't get the
giant party lists or huge swag bags, but at the same time, we
won't gain 15 pounds or use up all our mad money. Contact: Martin
Winston, Newstips (Novelty, OH) 440-338-8400; marty@Newstips.com
http://Newstips.com
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Newstips Bulletin [Novelty, OH] +1.440.338.8400 http://Newstips.com
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