The holiday season is approaching, my last exam before the Thanksgiving break is tomorrow. As an authoritative figure in getting the most return for your dollar I am asking readers "What items do you want for Christmas!" I will use my superior art of bargain hunting to find a deal for you. If you have an amazing deal that is not posted, please leave a comment and I'll update the post.
Post will also include product recommendations. These are my opinions, I do not hold anything responsible. The product I recommend are items I would personally buy.
Updates 11/07/1008
Phones:
If you are renewing a new cellphone contract sign up with AT&T and get a XBox 360 + some randome cellphone for free. (Recommendtion on the deal, but not the individual phones)
Now a list of laptop computers:
Compaq 15.4in, 2GB, 160GB, $298, Black Friday only item.
(I do not recommend this laptop for school, unless your dirty poor. However this is usable for moms and dads, assuming your parents are not a video game addict, or use it for CAD and graphics)
Lenovo lineup. visite lenovo.com>>(under solutions for) Government & education>>Higher education>>under scroll options Student select Student & Alumni (click "Go")>>Notesbooks.
With this you can get a student discount of 5% and when you check out use the code USXTHANKSGIVING for an additional 10% off.
(I recommend the entire ThinkPad product line, don't buy IdeaPads unless you think they are pretty and would boost your self esteem.)
Hard drives:
For external HD you can purchase an internal HD and put an enclosure on it, making it a external or you can buy one prebuilt.
Enclosures: Search newegg.com, make you match sata to sata or ide to ide.
Cameras:
DSLR vs Point and Shoot: In ample light conditions, point and shoot camera can produce similar results as a DSLR. However, DSRL will have far better performance under low light conditions, such as in doors. DSLRs have minimal shutter lag (the time between when you press the shutter button to the time when the picture is actually recorded), usually bellow 0.5 seconds. Point and shoot camera will be well above one second. If you don't like missing shot or take a lot of action photos you would want an DSLR. DSLRs also allow manual control, enable you to creat special effects. You can also change lenses, allowing you to shoot far and near with the same camera body. The down side is that DSLRs are very expensive, ranging from 500-8000 dollars without the lens. Cheap lens will cost around $150-600 and more professional lens will range from $1000-10000.
Canon SD1100, awsome quality for your money. It lacks a wide angle zoom, depend on your usage, this might or might not be a problem
Nikon D40, entry level DSLR
Canon Xti, entry level DSLR
I'm keeping an eye on these cameras as Black Friday approches and the ads are released
TVs:
Buy a major brand television (Sony, Samsung, Panasonic, etc) unless your dirt poor. In that case you can have my old CRTs. If you need explaintation for the difference of DLP, LCD projection, LCD, Plasma, laser, OLED, etc, etc, etc please post a comment and I'll explain.
If you live in England you can now purchase a Dodge Avenger and get one for free... no kidding
More to come...
A neat gadget for those of us who spend a little too much time on our laptops...(me? guilty as charged)
by
zexi
on Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Windows users rejoice! SlifeLabs is finally sharing the love with their windows version of Slife, a productivity manager.
Their website description:
"Designed around a set of intuitive visualizations, Slife 2.0 helps you stay on top of your activities and productivity automatically. Create activity groups, set goals and discover how you spend your time."
I for one have been looking for a desktop productivity manager for quite some time, and although I'm not sure if this'll fulfill exactly what I've been looking for, it definitely looks cool and worth trying over the next couple of days.
Check it out here and see for yourself!
Hello, hello, and welcome to me nerd-ing off. If techy stuff turns you on, get ready to be seriously aroused.
There's a ton of really useful stuff out there. I'm writing this post very selfishly because some of the coolest programs aren't useful unless your friends also use them. There's some others I want to touch briefly on too, but let's start with things I want YOU to start using.
Group Software
Called RTM for short, this is an online to-do list. Stay with me for a sec, I know what you're thinking: "oh a to-do list, gosh Terry, could you be any more boring?"
2) Twitter.
Get with the inventor and king of microblogging. Each entry is 140 characters or less, limiting people to short and witty details of their lives. You can log on and view the twitters of your friends while adding some of your own, or you can twitter right from your cell phone! Not you, Joey, because you can't send text messages, but everyone else can. There's RSS feeds if you're into that kind of stuff.
There's not much more I can explain, but I suggest you go to www.twitter.com and click on the red "Watch a Video!" button.
Jooce is a program that allows you to place and share files online. There's much more to it than just that, though! Click here to read more of my silly, excited, software writing.
ChaCha actually isn't a website (*gasp) or software (double *gasp!). Actually, it's a question answering service. Try it: text any question from your cellphone to 242242 (chacha) or call 1-800-2-chacha and ask your question. Usually, answers come back within 2 or 3 minutes! Ask anything: restaurant suggestion, directions, movies, ANYTHING. Do you know why? Because there's a REAL HUMAN BEING answering the questions! Click here to read more!
5) Then there's the "of course" ones: Skype, Google Calendar, ooVoo (skype with audio and/or video conferencing), googleTalk. I don't even need to tell you guys about those, you already know that they're awesome. Unless you don't, in which case an update is soon to come!
6) Reddit.com -Suggested by HotLikeAToaster
Other Baller Programs
1) Mint
Mint is a free and easy way to track your finances. According to their website, it's been approved by mcafee and verisign for military grade security. Newspapers like the WSL are raving about it. I, myself, think it's pretty cool.
Alright, you know the drill by now, Click here to read more!
2) CCleaner
This one is VITAL. CCleaner, which stands for Crap Cleaner, is a program that will remove junk from your windows machine. Don't you know? Windows (especially Vista) accumulates junk over time...almost like the operating system is decaying. To keep your computer healthy, you need to clean out the junk.
The first time I used CCleaner, it deleted more than 8 GIGS of crap! That's right, 8 GIGS back to me! Since then, I run it periodically to recover 1 or 2 GB each time. That screenshot is me running CCleaner today to get a screenshot of it in action. But I had used it yesterday too. That means that my machine picked up 65 MBs of garbage in one day.
With an accumulation rate like that, how can you afford not to download this FREE utility?
The first time I used CCleaner, it deleted more than 8 GIGS of crap! That's right, 8 GIGS back to me! Since then, I run it periodically to recover 1 or 2 GB each time. That screenshot is me running CCleaner today to get a screenshot of it in action. But I had used it yesterday too. That means that my machine picked up 65 MBs of garbage in one day.
With an accumulation rate like that, how can you afford not to download this FREE utility?
3) Foxit Reader
Foxit Reader is great. You know that huge mammoth-snail program you use called Adobe Reader to open up PDF files? Yeah, fuck that. Click here for your epiphany.
Whew, that's it for now, guys. I'm actually missing a lot of really cool programs and websites. Spoffee, Jing, Pageonce, Woot, Reddit, launchy, Revo Uninstaller, Audacity, Google Chrome, Fit Brains, Display Fusion...you can look those up. Or if you enjoyed reading this, I wouldn't mind finishing up some time. Alright, have fun kiddos.
-T.Tao
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