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It’s all about Mobility – Ultra-Light Notebooks, Mini-Bluetooth Ear Piece, Mobile Transcription, TV on the Go!
In this issue, we deal with new gadgets and new services, leading off with the new ultra-light HP Mini. It’s a fully functional Windows computer at 2.6#. Fast on the heels of the HP Mini is the new Asus Eee PC 900 at 2.1#. It’s quite comparable to the HP mini and also costs about $500 for Linux models. We’ll compare the two – head to head – next issue. The release of the Ultra-cool update of the Jawbone Bluetooth is simply amazing. It’s so small and light you can barely feel it. Love the Gold version for people with blond hair!
The two online services which allow you to speak into your cell phone and/or text a message to their website and get it transcribed and emailed to you are phenomenal. I lean toward Reqall for quality of transcription. Hulu is a super fun place to watch TV shows and movies. It’s better than Blockbuster, Netflix, Comcast and AT&T. Why? Because it’s free! Last tip of the issue, type into www.google.com the word “Olympics” and you’ll get a medal count from each country.
As of the publishing of this ezine, here’s the Olympic “Top 3” medal winners in the Summer 2008 Olympic Games in Progress (after 4 days of competition).
Go to Clyde's Blog and see the countries mapped out and the rest of the Olympic schedule – hour/hour.
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HP Mini - Super cool travel notebook - Under $500
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HP Mini - Super cool travel notebook - Under $500
The
HP Mini Notebook is a super light (2.6#) small screened notebook for folks on the run. It has everything one could need except a DVD/CD drive, but this should be okay for most folks. It has lots of ports for adding USB devices and a Broadband card from your favorite wireless carrier. It comes pre-configured with either Linux, Windows XP, or Windows Vista. What distinguishes it from other ultraportable notebooks - is the solid construction and the awesome, almost full (90%), keyboard. Heres' a detailed presentation worth watching: A Nerd's Video Presentation
I haven't found one I could "touch and feel" yet, but I'm hoping to get an eval unit. If you have any contacts at HP - send 'em my way!
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Partner Spotlight - Online Backup
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You have insurance for your car, your residence, and your health - why not have some for your computer? I know, I know. It's such a pain in the asparagus to backup your data. It's not sexy, it's not fun, and it's sure not easy. Wait - it IS easy! Imagine losing all your business information from your notebook by having it stolen. What if someone comes into your office, steals your server, all the backup tapes, the backup drive and all the workstations. What now? How 'bout you awake to a fire and you have to get out of the house - now! Are you going to unplug your desktop computer in your haste? Probably not. The best way, in my mind, is to backup online. Click on any of the links in this email to take you directly to a service that - for less than a movie ticket - will backup your hard drive's data, photos, videos, and music. If you only have a small amount of data, it's free. The data is heavily encrypted and uses the same security they use at banks. As long as you keep your user name and password away from prying eyes, your data is safe. It's saved many of my clients data in some bad situations!! Did you know the average life span of a hard drive is only 3-5 years? I'm talking Windows PC and Mac users. BTW, this service runs on both the Windows (2000, XP and Vista) and Mac OSX (10.4 and above) platforms. Mozy for Mac is officially released. Check out the rest of my Partners on my site.
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| Jawbone 2.0 - Slimmer/Cooler Bluetooth Headset |
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Jawbone 2.0 - 50% slimmer and cooler
So, I've been using the Jawbone 2.0, the slimmer, cooler, sleeker version of the original Jawbone for about 2 weeks now. I have to say, I like it a lot better than the original in that it just sticks in my ear without a wrap around ear piece. If actually feels like a light ear plug. I barely know it's there.
Here are a few links from fellow bloggers on the topic:
Comparing both the old and the new Jawbone
Being a vegan, I'm not so happy about the leather straps, but the metal ones seemed to corrode. All in all a great product
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Partner Spotlight - DVD Backups
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 There are several ways to make backup copies of your DVDs, but I feel this company makes it super easy. You just install the 2 programs (for Windows Users only), reboot your machine, and start backing up those precious DVDs before you or your child ruins them. After your youngster destroys that copy of Dora the Explorer or High School Musical 254, you can make another copy.
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| You Say It, It comes back to you as Text |
Speak It - It's Magic - Text It/Email It
Don't you hate it when you're driving or in line for the groceries/movies and you just don't have the time to jot a note which you'll later want to recall? Well, this is one thing you can cross off your list, as both of these services convert your spoken text to text messages/emails. They have a lot in common - they're both free, they both allow you to add "friends" (so you can verbally send text messages/emails to folks), you can set appointments, you can text yourself.
Allows for date/time of reminders. Sends a summary via email of all Jott's you made the prior day. You get ones you sent and received - both text and links to their website to listen to voice.
These are all the links you can use for your Jott service. For instance you can say, "Amazon ipod shuffle" and you'll instantly get pricing via text message. Makes it great when you're out shopping, eh? There's a very extensive list, beyond this, of site you can link to Jott.
Instead of links to the website, you get the actual audio files emailed to you. I've been testing both services - and so far, I'm finding the voice recognition on this service, a bit more precise the Jott. With Reqall - you can access your photos set up in Picasa web albums.
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ITM Rumors
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New Site – Blackberries (the iPhone Killer), Dell’s new Mini Notebook, Mac OS X 10.6, Timex Thumb Watch
Hey everyone, I'm proud to announce my new site - ITM Rumors. It's a hybrid of a Blog and a regular web page.
It talks about the new Mac OSX 10.6 (code-named Snow Leopard), the Blackberry Thunder (the first true iPod competitor) , the Blackberry Bold, Eudora 8.0 (yeah!), Google Connect & Open Office.
Give it a whirl at www.ITMRumors.com
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Cut the Cable & Satellite – watch TV on computer – for Free
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Hulu.com - Cut the Cable - Watch TV/Movies Free
Hulu is a great place to hang out and watch TV and Movies "for free." Of course, this does come with a couple of "gotchas." First, you have to sit through a commercial at the beginning (only 5 seconds, though) and sprinkled throughout - commercials just "pop up" during movies ant TV shows. The scariest commercial yet was for "Outback Steakhouse." You only get 10-15 seconds of commercials at a time. You can share, email, pop-out and watch High Res, and Full screen. You can even embed a video for your website by picking just the clip you want.
There are 60 movies on the site, including "40 y/o virgin," "Ice Age," "Thank you for not Smoking," "Lost in Translation," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," and many others. I'm sure they'll add tons more over time.
The biggest news of all - Hulu added John Colbert and The Daily Show a few weeks ago.
Major score! The Simpsons, Tiger Woods, Arrested Development, The Office, Family Guy, American Dad and Saturday Night Live are among the many fun full TV show and TV clips.
All in all, I'd rather watch Netflix movies and TV series without commercials, but this is great for spontaneous mood if Netflix doesn't have it - especially the Colbert & Daly shows.
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Be In The Moment - it's the only moment of the moment.
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