The HP Pavilion dm1z is an 11.6″ ultraportable laptop whose LED display can handle LED 720p video. It features an AMD Neo Mobile processor, weighs less than 3 1/4 pounds and is just 19.8 mm thick. Its keyboard is 92% full sized keyboard and it comes with Wireless-N, a webcam, a 5-in-1 card reader, 3 USB 2.0 ports, HDMI output, up to 10 hours battery life. The notebook has a starting MSRP of $549.99 but our Gear Sponsor has found a deal that will take $100 off instantly plus another $25 off using the coupon that can be found on LogicBUY. That brings the price down to $424.99 and it will even ship for… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

For many people, digital music stopped being a revolution – or even something to debate – a long time ago. Apple’s iTunes is the largest music retailer, and more and more sites seek a piece of the ever-growing digital music pie. But not THIS guy: Prince, in an interview with the UK paper the Daily Mirror said: “The internet’s completely over,” Prince told the paper. “I don’t see why I should give my new music to iTunes or anyone else. They won’t pay me an advance for it and then they get angry when they can’t get it.” Ah … Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Image provided by Wicked Lasers I love Wicked Lasers because they make some of the coolest lasers known to man.  Well, their new laser, the S3 Spyder Arctic, looks a little too much like the design of the lightsaber if you ask Lucasfilms, so they decided they needed to send Wicked Lasers a nice little cease and desist letter. According to the letter, they think that the Arctic series laser was designed to resemble the hilt of a lightsaber. Lucasfilms is also concerned because the laser is dangerous. Nevermind that if someone was actually able to make a lightsaber they would actually be able to cut people in half! What would have… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Oh Borders. I don’t want to wish failure on any entity, especially a company that taught me a great deal, but sadly, the Borders eBook strategy is going to fail. Spectacularly. I just don’t see how they’ll overcome the Amazon/B&N/Apple juggernauts with such scattered, messy, and honestly lackluster set of offerings. Head over to Borders’ site, and check out their ebook readers page. Be sure to look at their ebook comparison chart. In case Borders caught on to how bad it is and has removed it, here’s a screenshot: Hint to Borders-If your “comparison chart” illustrates how much better spec’d your competitors devices are to yours… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Tired of your iPod speakers looking like speakers? Want something that looks a bit different but still delivers great sound? If so the iPom might be just the thing you are looking for. The iPom is- a floral themed speaker solution boasts a apple-shaped subwoofer with two removable flower speakers. It plays music from USB drives, SD cards, and any other sound source with a 3.5mm output. The specs of the iPom include… • 2.1 Stereo Speaker System • Plays music from USB Memory stick or SD card or any other music device that has a 3.5mm output, such as iPods • Humanized Touch Volume Control and music control • Adjustable Bass • 3 Continue reading on Gear Diary …

We are all feeling the financial pinch!    Blue Plate Special is a weekly review of bargain apps for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Nothing over $.99. My little brother, Sam and I spent many hours playing board games when we were kids as I am sure many of you also did.  It seemed that we played a lot of Battleship while traveling in the back seat of the car.  My guess is that playing battleship meant there was two boards that kept us apart.  The game is simple to play, yet has stood the test of time as… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

This is my shed… This is my shed’s lock… This is me forgetting the lock’s combination for the 700th time… There has to be a better way… and thanks to Wordlock there is. Wordlock offers a variety of different combination locks that include padlocks, bike locks, luggage locks and more. What makes Wordlocks locks different is that they don’t use hard to remember number combinations to secure your… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

When it comes to protection for my gadgets, I spare no expense and tend to get a little OCD about it. It’s pretty common here on GearDiary to see reviews and postings about cases, screen protectors and bags for our gear. When Mezzi contacted us about reviewing an aluminum laptop case I was pretty excited. If I’m not using one of my many soft cases to transport my laptop then I’m using my Pelican hard plastic case to for maximum protection. The Pelican case is big and bulky, so I was excited to get my hands on a Mezzi LUXslim Black Aluminum laptop case. I had a week long business trip to really put the case through… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

The Lenovo IdeaCentre K305 is a Quad-core Tower PC powered by an AMD Phenom II X4 and running at 2.6GHz. It features 6GB DDR3 RAM, a 640GB 7200RPM Hard Drive, a DVD+/-RW Optical Drive and Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit OS. At $899 it is a good deal. When you mix in the stackable coupons our Gear Sponsor has located ($200 off plus $220 off) the price comes down to just $479. It will even include FREE shipping. That means that with this Gear Deal you can get a quad-core tower for under $500. For details and ordering visit LogicBUY. Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I am a do-it-yourselfer (although not always a good one!) and also a gadget freak, so anytime the two can be brought together I am a happy man.  There are many times when a room or area needs to be measured quickly for reference and nobody is around to hold the end of a tape measure, or the area is simply too difficult to reach — like a ceiling.  In these situations, the Ultrasonic Distance Measurer from EFO is the perfect solution. This handy little gadget allows the user to quickly and accurately measure from 2 to 60… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Image Courtesy TheLastMiles.com Recently I wrote a rather large article full of ‘quickie reviews’ for recent Jazz music releases – and the response I have gotten has been amazing! I have heard from musicians, jazz lovers, general music fans and folks who simply wanted to express appreciation that I was supporting the ‘indie’ movement even thought they had no interest in the music. Even as that article was published, I had a couple of new releases I was listening to, a couple new recordings that were about to release … and a couple that should have been in the article but slipped through the cracks. I was also fortunate enough to be contacted… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Image courtesy Birthday Shoes It isn’t just ebook scammers you have to watch for on the internet! If you’ve been paying attention to Judie and Larry’s Couch to 5k Series, you may have caught that Judie runs in Vibram Five Finger Sprints. Recently I picked up a pair of Vibram Five Finger KSO’s at my local EMS, and I think Larry has a pair too…so we’re clearly big fans of toe-shoes here at Gear Diary. Now, if you’ve looked into ordering VFF’s recently, you may have noticed many sizes and styles are backordered. Vibram has had a hard time keeping up with demand! And like all things that become popular, knockoffs have begun… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Image Courtesy of Microsoft For the vast majority of Smartphone users, Android and iPhone have been doing quite nicely with a little RIM and WebOS thrown in for good measure. The Windows Mobile fans have been left with broken hearts — and dreams of one day seeing a super comeback from Microsoft’s mobile platform.  With the announcement of Windows Phone 7 in the past year I think some of that fire has been rekindled, but for most has left a sour taste from the likes of WinMo 6.1, and 6.5. I currently use a HD2 running a heavily customized 6.5 ROM, which is really the only way I feel that WinMo is usable. I have some interest… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Here’s what looks to be the last chance to get in on a Gear Deal for a 15.6″ Dell Inspiron notebook with $100 off AND a $30 Dell Gift Card. The notebook has nice specs that include an Intel Core i3-350M 2.26GHz, 4GB DDR3 memory, a 320GB Hard Drive, an 8X DVD+/-RW, 802.11n WiFi, a 1.3MP Webcam, a 6-cell battery, HD Audio 2.0 with SRS Premium Sound and, of course, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit OS. The 15.6″ notebook has an MSRP of $669.99 but our GearSponsor found it for just $569.99. Add in the $30 Dell Gift Card that comes with it and the price is effectively just $539.99. For Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Dan: There are iPad cases and then… there are iPad cases. The Orbino Padova for iPad is an iPad case: It is made of premium leather, it has a premium design, and it carries a premium price tag. Judie: Orbino has been making leather accessories for PDAs since at least 2001, when I can remember Julie reviewing their Palm V Series case on The Gadgeteer. In more recent years they have “gone Mac”, creating Luxury cases for iPhones, iPods, MacBook Pros … and now… Continue reading on Gear Diary …