digital

Canon Launches New EOS Rebel

1 Comment / Cameras and Photo, Gizmo of the Day / By /

Canon Rebel EOS T2iThe Canon EOS Rebel T2i is seen as the ‘flagship’ of Canon’s entry-level digital SLRs (so it’s the best of the worst, right?). While the camera is relatively similar to the previous EOS Rebel, a lot of the features have improved slightly to produce a more feature-packed high-specification camera all round.

The resolution on this camera is an impressive 18 megapixels and the screen is as large as you’d expect on a camera of this quality – it is also easy to use; a bonus compared to some of its competitors! The resolution of the camera means that photos produced are 6 foot by 4 foot in actual size, should you ever wish to print them out at 100% (stock up on those ink cartridges). …

Canon Launches New EOS RebelRead More »

Nikon Coolpix S1000pj – digital camera with a built-in projector

3 Comments / Cameras and Photo, Gizmo of the Day / By /

Nikon has a new take on point-and-shoot digital cameras: it’s one with a built-in projector. Yes, that means you don’t need to upload your pictures to a large-screen monitor or plug into a TV. Just point your camera at the nearest wall and share with everyone.

The Nikon Coolpix S1000pj is the world’s first such digital camera. It is a 12.1 Megapixel camera with a 5x wide-angle Zoom-NIKKOR glass lens, a 5-way VR image stabilization system and a 2.7″ LCD screen.

And the projector? It can project 10″ to 6’6″ away, with VGA-equivalent resolution to produce images up from 5″ to 40″ large. Not too shabby. Battery life is about an hour, which is not too long to start boring everyone. Amazon has a nice video of this camera in action.

The S1000pj is a bit pricey, but that usually comes with being 1st to the table. But to be fair, it has a slew of features that are usually found in more advanced point-and-shoots.

Buy now!
More info from the manufacturer
Price: $429.99
(Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting)

VHS2DVD Wizard – Converts VHS to DVD

17 Comments / Audio/Video, Home Theater, Gizmo of the Day / By /

VHS2DVD Wizard

VHS2DVD Wizard is another competitor in the VHS to DVD conversion market. It presents a simple and tidy way to transfer your VHS video tapes to DVDs. Sure it might not have the same features as some of the other competitors (round up) but it does it cheaper and perhaps with less hassle.

Plug in the 2 video cables to connect your PC via USB to your VHS player, install the software and simply hit play on your VCR. The software will capture it as it is playing and allow you to edit unwanted sections out at the end (such as ads) before finally burning it to DVD, or simply saving it on your computer for future viewings. The price ($50) is very similar to that of Honestech’s VHS to DVD Deluxe (which we’ve tested and reviewed in depth), but keep in mind that the Honestech product doesn’t care whether its VCR or any other analog source (audio and/or video) as long as it has RCA output jacks.

Buy now!

Price: $49.99
(Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting)

The “Electronic” Ruler – redefining stationary

Gizmo of the Day, Miscellaneous / By /

Electronic Ruler

I’m sure no one’s thought of this idea before – turning an ‘analog’ ruler into a digital one – but Shay Shafranek has done exactly that. Taking a circuit board, he placed a set of LED digits under a thing strip of wood-like material and added a reset button and little touch-sensitive buttons on the side to detect where the pencil is. The beauty of this is that it can do everything a normal ruler can do, except better of course! Drawing lines of exact length are instantly more accurate with a digital scale, the ruler can help scale drawing by setting it into scale mode (1 unit on the ruler = x units on item) and measuring long distances are easier as the ruler will add up each individual distance when it’s moved!

I think I’d be happy to pay a crazy amount for a ruler like this, but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be for sale at the moment. In the mean time, there’s a really good presentation of what the ruler can do over at ShayShafranek.com.

GfG’s Article Recap for Week Ending June 19, 2009

Computers, Gizmo of the Day, Home Automation, Networking & Internet, Portable, Software / By /

Have Zune begun to copy Apple’s stylish music players with the upcoming Zune HD? We’ve got your weekly fill of format wars – this time focused on home automation and could we really be that much closer to wearable remote controls?

Father’s days coming up and, being such a caring bunch, we came up with a a really great idea! Another idea may be to get him an analog to digital converter so that he can preserve those old video and music sitting in the attic.

Are you aniPhone/iPod Touch user and also a networking maniac? Take a look at Zensify.

The week was capped off by the ever-so-geeky Mac vs. PC poster and a look at the current progress of holographic optics – manufacturer SBG has a very cool prototype of a full-color, heads-up wearable display.

Products Using GPS To Tag Digital Photos

6 Comments / Cameras and Photo, GPS / By /

GPS is becoming more and more popular in high(ish)-end phones so that SatNav can be used on the move and for a good laugh on Google Earth. But a growing use of GPS is seriously cool (and useful!) – digital cameras with GPS capabilities which allow you to tag your photos onto a map, so you can see exactly where you took them. Let’s look at the current contenders.
…

Products Using GPS To Tag Digital PhotosRead More »

Legacy Locker ensures your digital assets are passed onto your beneficiaries when you die

Gizmo of the Day, Miscellaneous, Networking & Internet / By /

One of GfG’s friends, Jeremy Toeman (of LIVEdigitally fame) has co-founded what we feel is an indispensable service for anyone that ‘lives’ online in any sense of the word. It’s called Legacy Locker (LL) and is essentially a secure store for your online assets, things such as passwords, account info, & documents. More importantly, it provides a mechanism for securely and safely conveying this information to your beneficiary if you pass away.

It works relatively simply: you sign up for an account, and start adding what are known as assets (an example would be the username and password to your e-mail account). You assign a beneficiary to each asset you have, and you can change those whenever you’d like. If you pass away, one of 2 persons that you assigned must contact LL to inform them. LL performs verification using humans, so you need not worry about ‘computer error’ or inadequate checks. LL then securely passes on your digital assets to your name beneficiaries.
…

Legacy Locker ensures your digital assets are passed onto your beneficiaries when you dieRead More »

Sony Webbie HD Camera

Cameras and Photo, Gizmo of the Day, Portable / By /

A fun camcorder/camera for fun times. Sony’s Webbie HD weighs in at 7 ounces and is pocket-sized allowing you to record all your crazy life moments.

The camcorder records 8.5 hours of HD MP4 video which plays nicely with YouTube. The Webbie can also take and store thousands of photos using a built-in 5MP camera. Of course the number of photos and length of video depend on the size of the memory stick. So, since this is a Sony product, what memory stick do you think the Webbie uses? I hope you guessed a Memory Stick PRO Duo… 8.5 hours of video or thousands of photos are based on 16GB memory card.

So record your next adventure with impeccable detail as the Webbie can film in high-def (1440×1080/30p, 1280×720/30p) or standard definition (640×480/30p)… all for under $200! That’s right, the Sony Webbie is listed at $199.

Congress extends Digital TV switchover to June 12 2009

Audio/Video, Home Theater / By /

Now that both the US House and Senate have voted in favor of similar bills to extend the DTV cutover by 4 months, it’s just a matter of the President signing off on it (and he’s in favor of it).

The argument in favor of extending the deadline goes something along the lines of TV stations and consumers not being ready. Guess what? Come June 12, they’re not all going to be ready either.

Pull off the bandaid already. It’s gonna hurt now, or in 4 months or in 12 months. But if the frequency spectrum being used for analog TV isn’t freed up, then it can’t be used for newer, better wireless technologies. Sometimes leadership involves pulling some of your population dragging and screaming forward with you. Don’t worry, when they get there, most of the reluctants will grudgingly change their mind.

In case you don’t know about the Digital TV Transition, there’s a .gov website covering the subject.

Analog to Digital Converters – Round Up

Audio/Video, Home Theater, Books, Music and Movies, Cameras and Photo, Computers, Gizmo of the Day, Recommended, Software / By /

Slide and Negative to Digital Converter

Here we have a furious round up of some of the many analog to digital converters we’ve featured over the years to persuade you to digitize your precious analog collections of audio cassettes, vinyl records, photographs, slides/negatives and VHS tapes. Let’s go!

Audio Cassettes

With CDs looking like they’re being overtaken by new performance discs and music simply being downloaded and stored on computers, it’s amazing that some people still have audio cassettes – we’ve said our goodbyes, now it’s your turn. The Ion Tape2PC USB Cassette Deck lets you do that by sticking your tape into the slot and transferring it to your computer in MP3 format. Audacity and EZ Tape software suites are included to make make everything run smoothly and is compatible with PC and Mac.

Buy now! – $125

Slides, negatives, photographs, vinyl records and VHS tape still to come. Read on.

…

Analog to Digital Converters – Round UpRead More »

Scroll to Top