Sometimes you need a phone that just does the basics. Just calling and possibly texting. You also want the phone to be easy and, if possible, you would like the service plan to be very understandable and affordable.  The Jitterbug J and Jitterbug’s service may be just what you are looking for.  I was sent a 30 day loan of a Jitterbug J in red with the American Heart Association Go Red for Women’s heart health logo’s emblazoned on the box.  Jitterbug has donated $500,000 dollars for Go Red for Women, which is definitely a worthy cause.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

(image courtesy CFO Daily News) Friday afternoon The Consumerist reported on a comment made by Michael Cader on a publishing industry site. Essentially, he said that if you can afford an ebook reader, you can afford higher ebook prices. Needless to say, many of us at Gear Diary vehemently disagreed. Each of us had our own take on the publishing industry, high prices, and our general frustration with publisher’s attitudes towards ebooks.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

One of the most popular games to hit the iTunes App Store was “Brothers in Arms”.  The “Call of Duty” like game which places the player in the middle of World War 2 is still one of Gameloft‘s most successful titles for the iPhone OS. The much anticipated sequel to the game, Brother In Arms 2:  Global Front, just hit the App Store today. I quickly downloaded the game and recorded this brief video walk though of the first few minutes. Unlike the first version which actually showed the player’s body while playing the sequel is a more traditional first person shooter where you see only your… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Weighing in at just 3.4 pounds the HP ENVY is a sleek ultra-portable with style and power. Our GearSponsor has found a sweet deal on one that makes it  today’s GearDeal! The HP ENVY has a Core 2 Duo processor running at 1.6GHz. The base model ships with 3GB DDR3, a 250GB Hard Drive and a 512MB Mobility Radeon HD 4330 graphics card. It has Wireless-N with Bluetooth, a 4-Cell Battery, and a VGA low-light webcam. It looks great and has all the power you need on the go. It lists for $1699.00 but a recent price drop and a $250 off Coupon bring the price all the… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

One of the main reasons I do not use a scanner much is that they are big and cumbersome.  Most are part of a printer all-in-one package and are confined to a desktop somewhere in a home.  I do not do much home desktop work.  Most all computing for me is done on the run with a laptop.  These scanners all come with special software to scan a document and picture that usually is not always the best to use.  Once scanned, the image is tucked away and must be dug up to use with another application. Announced at Macworld Expo, the Doxie erases all of these scanning issues.  Doxie is an ultra-portable scanning solution that is integrated with your favorite cloud and desktop applications.  Read the entire press release after the break.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Welcome back to the GearGames weekly video game release feature here at Gear Diary! Some pretty cool stuff this week, including the high profile release of the PS3 exclusive Heavy Rain, made by the same team that brought us the solid adventure game Indigo Prophesy a few years back. Heavy Rain has been highlighted as an example of the ‘uncanny valley’, the point where virtual characters look so real that the most subtle differences from actual behavior make them grotesque. As a game, it has gotten solid reviews so far – reviewers have had the game for several weeks and while I haven’t heard anything revolutionary, it sounds like a great game. The XBOX360 finally gets the port of Risen (my PC review is here), and it appears that the time spent polishing it might have helped based on differences from the earlier European X360 release. Continue reading on Gear Diary …

There are plenty of cases out there for the iPhone which bill themselves as being made from “carbon fiber.”  Few however are the real deal, and most are made from imitation plastic.  Such is not the case with the Innopocket CF Formula Series case for the iPhone 3G and 3Gs. The case, which comes in two color variations (Diamond Black & Exquisite Black) is made from 100% REAL carbon fiber. Race fans and car enthusiasts will appreciate the Formula series for its “dream car” material while others will simply enjoy the beauty of the carbon fiber pattern and smooth texture it offers. Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Teleread noticed this weekend that there’s been an increased amount of chatter on the Barnes and Noble forums regarding their ebook pricing. It looks as though B&N has very suddenly jacked up their prices on a number of books, causing some serious pricing disparity with their competitors. What kind of disparity? Well, I threw together the chart above to highlight a few examples. These books are being highlighted only because they were mentioned on the B&N forums, and it was easier than random spot checks. The most egregious, by far, is Stephen King’s “Salem’s Lot”. Amazon is charging $7.19, Kobo is charging $20, and Barnes… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I used a mac exclusively for many years, until I picked up my Toshiba netbook last summer. It was my first experience using a non-work issued PC since college, and while I knew to install a few free anti-virus and spyware utilities, I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about security. Since then, I’ve started using my netbook far more than I expected; as a result, when Gear Diary was offered the chance to review PC Tools Spyware Doctor and Antivirus software, I jumped at the chance to test it out and see if there was something more I should be doing to protect my computer.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I’m not a big fan of winter.  Certainly it’s cold, but what gets to me more is getting up in the dark and coming home in the dark.  By the time I get home, I’m usually spent.  In the spring, summer and fall I would enjoy daily walks with our Boston Terrier, Sophie.   In the winter, though, it’s been tough keeping up the walks — and it’s not just me.  Sophie isn’t having any of it.  Go out there?  It’s cold.  It’s dark.  I’ll just cuddle up right on the couch, thank you. I was looking for something that might give Sophie a chance to play inside when the weather’s not cooperative. We’ve got a basket full of dog toys, but Sophie will just lay and chew them.  Not much activity there.  Then I remembered Judie’s review of the Frolicat BOLT, an automatic laser light toy that’s geared for….cats.   Is it something a dog owner could also use? Could this toy get some spark back into Sophie’s evening playtime?  Let’s take a look at the Frolicat BOLT and Sophie in action. Without further adieu, let’s take a look at a video of Sophie versus ‘The Red Bug’ in action… Continue reading [...]

The first high-quality leather device cases that I used came from Sena Cases. At the time I was impressed by the quality of the leather, the impressive construction that included double or even triple stitched seams, and the overall design of the cases. The company took an approach that ensured cases would be stylish enough to be attractive yet conservative enough to be used anywhere and at any time. Most importantly, they did a great job of protecting whichever device I was looking to use with one of their cases. All this remains true. I was and am a big fan of the company’s products. Recently Sena was kind enough to let me get a look at one of their newest cases for the iPhone, the Corsa pouch. I’ve never used this style of protection with my iPhone so I was curious to see whether or not I would prefer it to the thin shells I tend to use these days. Let’s take a look. Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Larry’s back from a week at Disney, and that can only mean one thing… it’s time for Larry and Dan to catch up over Skype and put together Gear Chat Episode 3. This time out we chat about…. privacy issues, Apple and Google’s on-going spat, iPhone App picks and more… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

(image courtesy Tulsa Time PR) This week I became a little bit fed up with the lack of Android love from the major ebook stores. The best we’ve got so far is eReader, which is a weak implementation of a slowly fading store, and Shortcovers, which is so bad it is practically an abomination against literature. Where is an updated Kobo app? Why hasn’t Barnes and Noble ported over to Android? And of course, where is Amazon and the Kindle in all of this?… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

These days, you can do practically anything remotely that you can do face to face (or almost–I delivered my valentines to my Sami in person).  Even so, I was a wee bit surprised to find that you can now use your iPhone to search for a new house. Yup, it’s a stone-cold fact; the folks at Visionary Apps LLC (www.visionaryapps.com) have created what they call a “Complete Realty Suite,” three iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad apps that allow you to search for homes for sale, for rent, and foreclosures.  Now, I personally find the “foreclosures” part kinda ghoulish, but as Judie points out, in this kind of economy, you need all the help you can get, right? The Complete Realty Suite will be released next Tuesday by Visionary Apps.  In the market?  Maybe you should check it out.  After all, they’re my favorite price:  free.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I probably wear t-shirts more than any other piece of clothing I own.  It’s what I’m most comfortable in and it allows me to wear a wide variety of colors and designs.  T-shirts go with anything too and that makes planning my wardrobe all that much easier. Darktide Tees makes historic and gothich inspired t-shirts for both men and women.  The t-shirts are some of the best quality shirts I’ve come across.  They use a special digital transfer process to place images on ring-spun cotton shirts.  This results in a multi-colored, high quality image that both looks and feels amazing. Some of their designs boarder on the sick and twisted, but guess what?  I like that!  And they have such an extensive catalog of images from which to choose from you’ll even find some more conservative ones too. The company was kind enough to send me some of their shirts to test drive. Click on through to check out my video review and then click here to head on over to the Darktide Tees web site to browse their entire collection. Continue reading on Gear Diary …