Voltaic has announced at CES a new laptop bag that is solar powered and is able to actually charge the laptop.  Of course, the bag has to be in the sun to do this which I'm not sure how keen I am about that. But imagine a scenario where you're outside for a long period of time. This would be quite helpful then. At $599, it isn't cheap so you would have to really need this capability to justify the cost. I'd be more inclined to just bring an extra battery with me. My laptop gets 5 hour...

I'm not going to cover specific media player gadgets. I'll leave that to others, I just can't get that excited over music players. Just not my bag. But one trend I noticed with MP3 players is the addition of new features such as iRiver's W7 incorporating GPS into their player.  My ideal portable device would let me play music and videos, use GPS, have 802.11 support, optional 3G support, a fantastic web browser and be relatively small with maximum screen size.  Or put another wa...

Walter Williams has a great column demonstrating some of the myths regarding greed, need, and money. http://townhall.com/columnists/WalterEWilliams/2008/01/02/greed,_need_and_money

One of the cooler things I saw at CES this year was the arrival of mini laptops that didn't suck. Over the past couple of years, I've seen more and more people (including myself) starting to use full-sized laptops as their main machines. I think there's a reasonable chance that these mini laptops (laptops weighing less than 2 pounds) might be the next step.  Two in particular stood out. OQO Model 2 First there is the OQO Model 2 . Running Windows Vista, it seemed reasonabl...

To prove I'm not narrow minded about Microsoft Sync, I would be willing to take this Sync-equipped car off their hands because that's just the kind of guy I am this week.

Okay, that's pretty cool.

Almost everything I saw from Microsoft at the show was pretty impressive. But Sync was underwhelming. Sync is Microsoft's technology for integrating technology into cars. It's a great idea. But the execution is the problem.  The Sync issues are similar to the issues I have with Windows Mobile. Over-engineering, design by committee and inelegant. Their demo of voice recognition really highlights the klunkiness of the system. (paraphrased) Person: Phone Car: Phone ready ...

For those people who have been wanting to jump into high definition video viewing on their fancy new HD televisions but didn't want to have to pick between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray can pick up LG's new "Super Blu" (BH200). It's a bit pricey at $999 but for those who want to jump in now but don't want to be the owner of Betamax v2, it's the first dual player of its kind. LG also had a ton of really other cool things to show that I wish I could give them all adequate attention.  A wireles...

Garmin had several new GPS devices to show off.  For those who have been thinking of picking up geo caching or getting a GPS for their car but wanted to wait a little longer, you need wait no longer. nuvi 880 The 880 adds speech recognition for navigation on the road. It makes use of MSN Direct services for getting the latest data from the net. Thanks to its use of MSN Direct, it gains features such as traffic conditions, fuel prices, weather reports, movie listings, local events...

Intel had one of the most impressive displays at CES and one of the more impressive showcases was the myriad of real-world uses of the Intel Mobile Core Duo processor. In one example, a eco-PC using it along with the 950gm Express chipset achieved an impressive PC experience while using less than 60 watts of power (i.e. less than a common light bulb). In addition to being able to be used for eco-friendly PCs, they can be used in extremely small form factor PCs. The PC that the Intel...

  DeskScapes is a program that allows users to play animated wallpaper on their desktop. For the past year, it has been available exclusively for Windows Vista Ultimate users as way for users of Windows DreamScene to play dynamic animated wallpaper in addition to video content. On January 16th, Stardock intends to make DeskScapes 2.0 available in beta form to users of Object Desktop. DeskScapes 2.0 will include dynamic animated wallpaper with the program and supports all versions of Wi...

  The Samsung booth has some really amazing video cameras coming out.  The one that really caught my eye -- the SC-HMX20C.  First, it's quite small. Far smaller than my current camcorder (it weighs less than 1 pound).  Secondly, it uses flash memory for storing video and will accept external flash memory modules.  And third, it records at 1080p.  One advantage it has that other high-definition cameras do not have is that it records natively at 1920x1080 as op...

It took over 2 hours to get to CES today. The size of the show this year seems to, but doesn't necessarily, dwarf previous years.  So I just got to the show and have just finished visiting the Microsoft and LG booths. There's some really cool stuff being shown. I'll write more about it when I get to the press room er I mean, blogger room. Incidentally, bloggers are definitely not treated at the same level as press (our badges are white, press is read).  Which is ironic since many if...

Once upon a time there was a collection of programs called Object Desktop. The most popular of these programs were WindowBlinds, IconPackager and DesktopX. Millions of people around the world tried these programs and for the most part liked them. But users also often found it difficult to get a consistent look across their desktop since the different programs worked on different parts of the computer. In time, a number of skinners helped popularize the concept of "Suites". A suite is a col...

Great Britain. The United States. Canada. Italy. Belgium. These are nation states. And their future is unclear.  Nation states have historically provided 2 key benefits: The ability to pool resources for a common defense and a single market. Globalization and the slow pacification of the modern states of the world are taking away much of that benefit. For example, what exactly does Texas get out of being a state in the United States? What about British Columbia in Canada? W...