I recently found my first laptop bag.  The bag is from an era when laptops were big, bulky and weighed a ton.  Simply being able to carry them made them mobile.  The bag was huge, heavy and had no features.  Today, mobile computing keeps getting smaller.  Full screen laptops are much thinner and netbooks and MacBook Airs seem to be the best way to be on the move.  As our devices shrink, so should the bags we carry them in.  Thinner and lighter have become a must for my gear.  Some of my favorite gear bags come from Everki.  They are stylish, affordable and packed with features.  I have been using the Everki Agile… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Welcome back to the GearGames weekly video game release feature here at Gear Diary! As we approach the start of the sprint towards the end of the year, we see the last gasp of major new releases: after this week anything new is doomed to sell poorly and get no attention, so there will be little of consequence. But for this week we have three big releases … actually two big ones for North American gamers. We have the long-delayed PS3 Gran Turismo 5, which is graphically beautiful but is unclear on whether it can deliver the top notch gaming players have been waiting for. Also, the Wii game Donkey Kong Continue reading on Gear Diary …

My dad gave me a ride home from work last night. During the drive he went to call his mother (my grandmother) and her line was busy. So he tried her cell phone. No answer. This went on for a good ten minutes; we’d chat, he’d try both numbers, we’d chat again. Finally he started to get really nervous, and he called my uncle to go check on her. As it turns out, she was just fine. Her phone was just off the hook. Again. She doesn’t keep her cell phone near her, and she can’t hear the faint, indignant beeping of the phone when it’s not on the cradle, so it sends her kids into a… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

SCOTTEVEST recently released, and we reviewed, new travel boxers that have a pocket built-in. Forget the pocket… they are just plain comfortable. Now there’s a new line of undergarments available. No, they aren’t for the tech-lover or the frequent traveler but rather these bras and underwear are intended to keep prying TSA eyes from checking out your “stuff”. Yes, lead-free, radiation shielding underwear is now available for this individuals who are outraged by the naked-body scanners the TSA is now using. Here’s the detail directly from the company… Rocky Flats Gear ™ is the US manufacture of a revolutionary flexible, attractive, lightweight, Lead (Pb) free, radiation shielding garments for individuals Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Zinio has launched a new promotion that just might win you an iPad! In fact, they are giving an iPad away for every 1,000 new people that sign up for a Zinio account. That is a pretty awesome promotion and, with the rate at which Zinio is growing these days, it means the company may be giving away a ton of new iPads in the coming weeks. Here’s all you have to do. Visit the “Dear Santa, Send Me An iPad” promotion page. There you will find these instructions- Enter your email address to enter the Dear Santa iPad Giveaway. After you press “Send Your Letter”, you’ll be entered to win an Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Yesterday Oprah surprised her audience members, who were a group of people who had all “given-back” in some way to their communities, with her “favorite things” show.  The annual event in which Oprah showcases her favorite products of the year and gives each audience member one of them has become the hottest ticket in daytime television.  There’s always one or two hot “tech” items included in the mix.  From a Blackberry one year to a Samsung camcorder another. This year 23 products made the list.  Instead of detailing all 23 I just wanted to share some of the ones I think you’ll find most interesting here. Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Was reading through the articles on Netflix late arrival to Android and came across this post over on ZDnet.  The author’s headline sates that Netflix is not out for Android because of the dreaded platform fragmentation.  We had a gear chat about it, but first let’s include a quote from the official Netflix blog post: We regard Android as an exciting technology that drives a range of great devices that our members could use to instantly watch TV shows and movies from Netflix. We are eager to launch on these devices and are disappointed that we haven’t been able to do so already. The hurdle has been the lack of a generic and Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Not to be outdone by Kobo, Amazon has announced they will support ebook gifting this holiday season! All you need to know is the recipient’s email address to give them a book, and since Amazon has apps for Android, iOS, and Blackberry the recipient doesn’t even need a Kindle! If you need ideas, Amazon even thoughtfully included their editors picks in the press release below. Be aware, though: it doesn’t look like you can gift Kindle games, just books. Kobo’s gifting program has been announced, Amazon’s is rolled out…who wants to start a countdown for when B&N announces theirs? For the First Time, Give the Gift of Kindle Books (No Kindle Required) Kindle Store the first Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Wow … the massive sales just keep on rolling in! As I mentioned in my post, Deals4Downloads is a great site for checking out deals, and they continue to be great about not just posting great deals, but actually sending me info to help me out! Last time I listed everything from Strategy First as a new site, and had been doing the same for GamersGate as they get less coverage than the ‘big’ sites – but now I am cutting back on every site to only the best stuff I find. So let’s get right to it! Impulse Impulse Weekend Buys Sale, including … Galactic Civilizations Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Ever heard of the “bait and switch”? Of course you have. That’s the game in business that advertises one product and then, when it is not available, pushes you to buy something else. In almost every case the “something else” costs more and offers less. It is certainly not the most consumer-friendly approach… to say the least but it works for the bottom line. Well, Verizon might not be playing the “bait and switch” game but they certainly have found their own way to screw customers. Here’s the story- Our friend Joel Evans bought a Samsung Tab from Verizon and quickly discovered that their “policies” all play into lining Verizon’s pockets and, in… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

It has been a while since we covered one of my most-used iPhone and iPad apps but there is some great news about Dragon Dictation that is worth sharing. First off, a big congrats to Nuance on the inclusion of the Dragon Dictation app in the iTunes “Hall of Fame”. That’s right, out of the hundreds of thousand apps in the App store Dragon Dictation was selected as one of the 50 to be included by Apple in the iTunes Hall of Fame. Personally I could not agree more. In fact, I would easily put it in the top dozen were it up to me. You can read all about it here Continue reading on Gear Diary …

While at CES last year I had to chance to chat with the team from Pong. The Pong case for the iPhone was the first case which was designed with the goal of blocking the iPhone’s potentially harmful radiation from reaching your brain. Then a few weeks ago at the Pepcom Holiday Spectacular I ran into the gang from Case-Mate. They informed me that they had teamed up with Pong and were going to be releasing a new version of the Pong case very soon. Well the case has arrived and it’s called the Case-Mate Bounce. The Bounce case features the same quality and design elements you’ve come to expect from Case-Mate coupled… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

This is going to sound jaded and awful, but I am going to say it anyway: One of the absolute best things about being a product reviewer is that sometimes companies surprise you with packages containing items you didn’t know existed and you certainly didn’t expect to receive … and that you can’t wait to try out. But on the other hand, one of the absolute worst things about being a product reviewer is that sometimes companies surprise you with packages containing items you didn’t know existed and you certainly didn’t expect to receive … and you don’t necessarily even want to remove from their wrapper. It’s true. So today FedEx pulls up… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

The Harry Potter series has a great tradition with my family. The first book exploded on the scene when my younger son was just 3, and as a result I was reading the books aloud to both boys and my wife, providing all of the voices. As the movies arrived alongside new books I modified my voices to more closely match the movie actors. And even when the last book arrived, in spite of the fact that my two boys tore through re-reads of the entire series in less than a week … they wanted me to read it aloud, and Continue reading on Gear Diary …

You know we love out SCOTTEVEST gear here on Gear Diary. I mean, last year was an SeV holiday season with all of us sporting new clothing with tons and tons of pockets and this fall we have been privileged to feature much of their new line. That started when Judie had a chance to offer the first looks at many of the women’s jackets AND the men’s jackets. We then got to review some of the new line. There’s the awesome Outback, the super-warm Revolution Plus and even the new SeV travel boxers. And we aren’t done yet… Continue reading on Gear Diary …