TechLore - Geeks on Gizmos

GraGraph home earthquake meter

Gizmos For Geeks — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 07:32:00 GMT

No, it’s not a predictor of impending quakes, but the GraGraph will sound an alert and tell you how large the earthquake is on the Richter scale (anywhere from 3 to 10). Hopefully, you’ll never have to use it, so for that reason, it has a built-in LCD clock, alarm and night-light! The GraGraph will also record prior seismic activity. It runs on 4 AA batteries. This is a Japanese product, but you can snag one from an importer of Japanese products. Gimme! Price: $185 (Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting) Bookmark/e-Mail

Review: PricePirates price comparison software

Gizmos For Geeks — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 20:27:07 GMT

PricePirates is a piece of Windows freeware that lets you compare prices in eBay auctions ( you can select what country), Amazon.com and Shopping.com. Each of those product sources show up in different tabs in the software and automatically populated once you switch to a tab. There is also a tab with a Web search (although I don’t know why you would bother with this when there are much better search engines out there). I found that the results were a bit hit or miss on the Amazon.com and Shopping.com tabs, although eBay results looked fine. For example, a search for ‘ ipod touch 8gb ‘ did not return the actual iPod listed on Amazon. On the plus side, search results came back quickly and re-sorting results by description, price, time left, etc. was also very fast. PricePirates also features your own personal watchlist, the ability to search multiple eBay and Amazon stores in other countries, eBay store searches, and even the ability to submit a bid directly from the app. PricePirates has potential. If it could search on multiple shopping sites ( a la Pricegrabber ), or perhaps focus on auction sites, and compare items across multiple auction sites,...

Review: Schick Quattro Titanium with Trimmer

Gizmos For Geeks — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 04:05:00 GMT

It may be a bit amusing to think of, but the competition amongst shaving companies is fierce. Consider this - it’s well known that Gillette spent over $750 million on the R&D costs for the Mach3 razor. But I’m here to discuss the latest from Schick which as far as I know is a first. It’s a safety razor with replaceable blades and a powered trimmer on the other end (at the far end of the stylized marketing photo). The Quattro Titanium with Trimmer (there’s also a model without the trimmer) sports a 4-blade razor with a 5th blade on the back of those main 4 for edging. These blades are titanium coated for reducing nicks and cuts. I still maintain that cuts still happen, despite the added lotion strips, etc., but I’ll certainly take anything that vendors throw in to mitigate the possibility. The other end of the handle has the 4-position trimmer. The shaft of this razor is significantly thicker than any other popular razor out there and has a lot of heft to it, which is a bit strange at first if you’re used to traditional razors (even the powered ones). The reason for this weight is...

Pizza Scissors - cut those slices accurately every time

Gizmos For Geeks — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 05:39:28 GMT

I love these things. Another example of “why didn’t I think of that?” These pizza scissors cut through pizza without scratching the pan underneath it, and also serve as a serving spatula to get the pizza slice onto plates without spilling. The parts separate for easy dishwashing (in the dishwasher is fine). I don’t want traditional roller pizza cutters any more! Gimme! Price: $9.95 (Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting) Bookmark/e-Mail

Hava Platinum HD - TV Place-shifting

Gizmos For Geeks — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 07:01:00 GMT

If you’re looking to access all of that TV and video content you have ‘trapped’ at home, and you were thinking Slingbox , think again, because they’re not the only game in town. Enter Hava. The Hava Platinum HD arguably has more features than the Slingbox Pro. Connect any of your HiDef video sources to the Hava and then access it over your home network on your computers, or over the Internet, plus compatibility with Windows Media Center to let you create a virtual TV tuner. Hava Platinum functions as a DVR so you can pause, rewind and fast-forward in DVD quality using MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 format. You can connect it via the Ethernet (802.3) 10/100 NIC to your network, and can even view it on your mobile phone. The PC client even allows you to burn your TV shows to DVD. If you’re interested in wireless access, Hava also has a version with wireless connectivity, the Titanium HD WiFi . Gimme! More info from the manufacturer Price: $114 (Please note prices are subject to change and the listed price is correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of posting) Bookmark/e-Mail

Amazon Prime - the free shipping club

Gizmos For Geeks — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 19:42:00 GMT

If you shop even a fair amount at Amazon.com , then you should know about Amazon Prime. It’s pretty simple - pay an annual membership fee and get unlimited free 2-day shipping, unlimited upgrades to 1-day shipping for only $3.95. You can order as little as a tube of toothpaste if you want. In case you’re not sure, you can try this for a month without risk. Give it a shot . What do you have to lose? Bookmark/e-Mail