I have looked at a lot of stands and very few offer the flexibility of the Griffin Loop. You can have the iPad in the portrait or landscape mode, and if you just want to read you can lay it on it since it have a comfortable incline to read from. I like how it has a lip that you can also lay it on an incline in portrait landscape mode and read and type comfortably, the nice part as well is the soft nonslip rubber outlining the whole cradle helping the iPad to sit securely and you can charge while its on that stand as well, an excellent stand for $30 which is a pretty good deal.

Link: Griffin

There was some buzz about the Sony Dash, but unlucky for Sony they released this little product at the same time they launch the Apple iPad. Its a media delivery device which concentrates on connectivity and information, everything you can do with a laptop or an iPad but simplified and cheaper at $200. To me it looks like a night stand device with a lots of information and different applications running on the screen. It integrates with Facebook, Twitter, email and weather to stream it onto the device for your viewing pleasure.

There is always going to be comparisons with the iPad, but this isn’t an iPad and isn’t meant to serve the same reasons. Keeping in mind that this little guy has over 1000 applications to choose from, some a little bit more annoying to setup then the others, and this isn’t like choose applications from Apple but still 1000 isn’t a small number. You can have your GMail viewer or your Twitter account, as well as other more complex widgets. Its not meant to be portable as it is wired for power, but connects to the internet via wifi and had a USB connection. For $200 it looks like a cool night stand alarm replacement which keeps streaming data, its not for everyone but if your a technophile then you would appreciate it.

Link: Luxist

From RCA to HDMI, if your in the UK it you would have also have been through SCART, and now hopefully coming soon the HDBaseT. In simple terms HDBaseT is our regular Cat5e or home Ethernet cable, which is a great new development even though a bit late. I always wondered why they didn’t use ethernet cables before for regular tv broadcasting, it seems that they have just got around to agreeing to it. Since ethernet can easily handle 1080p its a given that it can handle all forms of HD broadcasting, and LG, Sony, and Samsung are already onboard, so hopefully it will take the fast track to consumers. A perfect idea to utilize current technology for advancement of broadcasting and high definition tv, now I will look forward to this technology being utilized soon and it looks like 2011 will be the year its coming in.

Link: UnPlugged

There is no question that the Apple iPhone 4 is a very good looking gadget, but this antenna issue has turned it into a crappy phone. With no real fix from Apple in sight, iPhone owners have to do with the fixes currently out there. This is the hottest fix yet, a aluminum machined case to fit the iPhone 4 perfectly. The iPhone 4 can’t take too many drops or else it will shatter, and reception issues, but with this case there is a lining covering contact between the case and the metal lining of the phone stopping all interference, and it wil protect from all forms of drops and falls. And it doesn’t come cheap at $80 but a cool case and fix for Apple’s antenna issue, looks good.

Link: Gizmodo

For several weeks now I have been having issues with my ReadyNAS 1100, its been running perfectly for the longest time. I made the upgrade from 4 x 1TB drives to 4 x 2TB drives, with X-Raid configuration I get about 5.55 TB worth of storage on my Network Area Storage device. Overall the ReadyNAS is a fantastic and extremely durable piece of hardware with great support from Netgear if you have any issues that needs warranty replacement. The best part of owning the ReadyNAS is its user base, the online forums have such a wealth of information that you are always helped by someone more experience, be it a network issues or a hardware issues. In my case I began facing issues with it, any file bigger then 400 MB it would hang in the beginning of transfer, from “30 seconds” to “2 minutes” to “55 minutes” then it would just hang.

First thing I did was check health status and go through the logs several times, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary, there were no bad sectors on the hard drives. So I kept checking network for issues, changing different network components, even giving the PC a direct connection to the ReadyNAS mounted on the rack to test it, but I still got the same transfer issue. After going to the forums I found someone with the same issue but going into extreme detail in the forum, told me where to check the Hard Drives for the “Smart +” status and see if there are any issues, and turns out one of the drives recently had over 65000+ Raw Error Rate which would lead me to agree that there is an issue with the drive, a way to test it is to take it out and try another transfer to see if the files transfers without issues.

Turns out the drive that had issues is a drive that had ATA errors that increased to about 6 over time. When I took out the drive and did a transfer turns out that it was the faulty drive. Luckily I already had a spare Hitachi 2 TB drive that I inserted to replace it. Now the annoying process is going through the HD replacement with Hitachi even though it is warrantied for 5 years they are making this a very annoying process, unlike Western Digital who make it such a simple process, Hitachi is annoying with all their back and forth but I will get my Hard Drive RMAed and replaced!

All these companies releasing 3D capable TVs, AV recievers and more. Now Sony, Microsoft, and Wii are talking about 3D games and when they think they will come to market. Some manufacturers are even releasing new 3D TVs without the need for 3D glasses, even after seeing it at a recent expo it did give me a decent headache. Wide spread adoption of 3D TV is going to be harder then adoption of Blu Ray which still hasn’t taken off, they will try pushing it through broadcasting but I still don’t think people will be drawn to it as much as they would like to think. Key anaylists think that porn is the key to the early adoption of 3D TV but lets see how they plan on doing that.

Drawbacks of 3D:

• It isn’t standardized, meaning that different manufacturers have different ways of presenting TV on your screens. Which means that the 3D glasses that work for your Panasonic screen won’t work for your Samsung screen
• If your looking at the wrong object on the screen you may still get a little nauseated or develop a headache, so basically you have to know where is the right place to look
• 3D TV without 3D glasses do give you a headache if your looking at them for too long and it only took me about 5 minutes

“Adult videos will likely be an incentive for consumers to buy a 3-D TV,” says content analyst Yuji Fujimori, at Barclays Capital in Tokyo. “It’s worth paying attention to the move because it’s lack of content that’s hindering expansion.”

Link: Kotaku

One’s of Dells great product lines are its screen’s, over the past decade they have come out with great screens from the 20inch to the 24inch, and now representing the best they have is the new U2711. With an extremely high resolution of 2560×1440 pixels, and multiple inputs. The U2711 impresses with its beautiful colours, wide viewing angles, relatively deep blacks and fair shadow detailing. Great for watching movies, editing photography, and daily use, its pretty good for gaming but not as intense gaming use that people have in mind. It is a match for the iMac 27″ and some of the same components. I have been looking at this screen for a while, lots of positive reviews, the price is high but its an excellent screen that will last you a long time. I have had my 22 inch for three years now and they are excellent screens, but two 27inch will be huge.

Inputs:

• 2 DVI
• HDMI
• DisplayPort
• D-SUB (VGA)
• Component
• Composite
• S-video

Price: $1049 – Dell Price

I have been hoping for this App for a long time, Comics have made my iPad indespensible. I love the Marvel App, I’m just annoyed at how slow they are releasing the comics which I am following, I go nuts not being able to read more. Now with DC I will have a large variety of comics to read, but the problem is that I have a lot of comics sitting on my shelf. Its great that they built the application on the Comixology platform which is smooth and high-resolution, with the perfect animated transitions between the scenes, the same as what Marvel did. So I will be buying comics that I don’t have, currently I have a lot of Green Lantern Comics which I ordered a long time ago, so I’m ordering a lot of Batman/Superman comics that I haven’t seen before, a new storyline to enjoy.

Now to look forward to:

• Superman/Batman
• Wonder Woman
• The Flash
• Green Lantern
• Justice League: Generation Lost

Link: Gizmodo

Stumbling onto this video at Crackberry is a good sign, I have had my Blackberry Curve 8900 for 1 year and 7 months now, and this thing is falling apart. The trackball is still faithfull and the phone is operating but it can’t read the micro-SD card anymore and hangs every once in a while. I’m surprised it lasted this long after what I put it through, and I have been waiting for Curve update, and here you have it. It will be running the 5.0 OS and now the rumored 6.0 OS which is fine by me. This isn’t a revolutionary phone but an overhaul of the phone to current technology, and I’m happy that they have mostly worked out the kinks in the new OS, so I’m hoping that it will be a smooth operating OS without any issues. The strange part is the guy on the video calling the Curve 8900, the “8500” which is new to me, other then that it looks like a good upgrade to the current phone, I just hope they don’t take too long to release it.

I’m a firm believer in quality sound from your computer, and usually its a combination of the right sound card with the speakers. In this case I have an excellent Logitech 2.1 Speakers and never found any reason to replace them, and they are still doing their job. Recently hearing the Bowers & Wilkins MM1 Speakers, I was blown away, they are makers of some exquisite speakers, and now they have made the MM1s. The crisp sound quality is fantastic, you can hear the highs and the lows, from music to TV shows and video games. The remote is simple to operate and has all the controls you need. Whats surprising is the amount of base these little guys pack into the small speakers, I have a large subwoofer sitting under my desk and it booms, but these little guys do pack a punch they you wouldn’t need a big subwoofer under your desk. I pretty much watch most of my TV shows and anime at my desk, legs up and sound blasting, I’m happy with the speakers I have but if they weren’t as good as they are, I would go for the MM1s in a heart beat. They are bit pricey at $500 but Bowers & Wilkins make quality products, and they usually last a long time.

Link: Bowers & Wilkins