Gizmos & Gadgets

[ercarta]

I am in the market for one of those handheld GPS navigation units. Does anyone have a take on which is the best and also the most cost effective?

There are too many and the prices are all over the place. :confused:

[Matt]

Well, first it depends on what you want to do. I have an old Garmin GPS-3+, and it works fine. However, it has no concept of street navigation. It basically has a limited major street map in there, and where you are is overlayed on top of the map. So, you can see where you are and a dot trail showing where you've been, but if you want to go to 123 Main street it can't help you. If you've been there before (or if you know the coordinates) it can show an arrow pointing in the direction the destination is relative to you.

I believe some of the newer handhelds have real street navigation capabilities, but I haven't seen any of them myself.

For real navigation, I use Copilot Live on my laptop. It is a small USB GPS and then a full blown navigation program that runs on my laptop. Not exactly handheld though. :)

[ercarta]

I want a reliable one that can find 123 Main St. and can also work with highways well. A client I worked with early last week had one but I didn't ask what make his was. We spoke about it for a while and he did mention that he payed about $500 for the unit he bought. The guy swore by it.

[ercarta]

Are there any watch collectors here? What's your favorite brand of watch?

[ercarta]

Does anybody own the new Blackberry handheld unit? How does it stack up against the older model? I'd love one but they are so pricey. :confused:

[wishiwas]

I wear Swatch.

[ercarta]

Swatch is a great company. I owned a Swatch wristwatch at one point and it lasted for quite some time. The warranty isn't bad either. If you send it back, you get a new one.

Did you know that the Swatch Group owns a handful of the prestigious Swiss watch companies in the industry. For example... Blancpain, Longines, Omega, Breguet, Rado, Tissot, & many more?

That's one reliable watch on your wrist Wishiwas. ;)

[ercarta]

Awww, man! I'm looking at the new LCD plasma by Sony. $3500 for a 32in, I'm tempted! This thing is hot. I wish they were'nt so pricey I'd make like the Flinstones and CHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGE it tomorrow. Sony Wega LCD Flat Panel ROCKS. :D

*Why are they taking so long for the price points on these flat panels to be lowered? Don't these company's want to do volume, isn't that the way to profit these days? :confused:

[LostinLaMancha]

Are there any watch collectors here? What's your favorite brand of watch?


I have a kenneth cole, coach and guess.

[LostinLaMancha]

Awww, man! I'm looking at the new LCD plasma by Sony. $3500 for a 32in, I'm tempted! This thing is hot. I wish they were'nt so pricey I'd make like the Flinstones and CHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGE it tomorrow. Sony Wega LCD Flat Panel ROCKS. :D

*Why are they taking so long for the price points on these flat panels to be lowered? Don't these company's want to do volume, isn't that the way to profit these days? :confused:


Doesn't Plasma burn out real fast?

[ercarta]

I don't know about that, however I do now know that ever since the craze for LCD tv's began projection television sets have gotten really cheap. I just found a Samsung 47in tv in a store for a grand even. I may just go projection instead of the plasma for now. I love how fast technology becomes obsolete. For a guy like me that won't buy if it's not a deal it's great. A grand for a 47 in is unbelievable. :eek:


Doesn't Plasma burn out real fast?

[NSK]

In terms of overall quality, you still can't beat the good old CRTs... LCDs and all other new flat panels are getting better all the time, but they still can't hold a candle to CRTs in terms of quality. Of course, the bulk of the CRTs is another matter.

[Matt]

My parents got a Samsung DLP rear-projection for Christmas, and that thing is beautiful. I was never impressed with 99% of LCD projection screens, with their narrow viewing angles. The DLP looks great from a very wide angle, both horizontal and vertical.

Personally, I have a DLP projector (Infocus X1). It is only useful in the dark (I have a smaller normal CRT for casual watching), but it is awesome for movie nights. :)

[ercarta]

Can someone elaborate? What's CRT? I know DLP & LCD, yet somehow have never heard CRT with regards to a television or a screen? :confused:

[Matt]

Can someone elaborate? What's CRT? I know DLP & LCD, yet somehow have never heard CRT with regards to a television or a screen? :confused:

CRT is "cathode ray tube". It is the standard old TV systems that have been used forever.

DLP is a system of thousands of microscopic mirrors that tilt back and forth to reflect each dot of light out onto the screen, or to reflect it off to the side (for no light). DLP is naturally a single color, but what they typically do is put a "color wheel" in front of it, that makes it red-only for a split second, then green-only for a split second, then blue-only for a split second. Flash through all the colors set to on really fast and you have white...

LCD really comes in two basic varieties. Smaller flat-panel systems (popular today for flat-panel computer monitors) are direct-view systems, where they use LCD panels (the full size of the viewable screen) that can toggle each pixel on or off (with sub-pixels of each color) in front of a backlight.

Big screen LCDs are typically rear-projection, where they shine light through a small LCD panel, but then use mirrors and lenses to project it onto a big screen.

Rear projection TVs used to be very deep, but they've made big advances in the past few years in being able to make remarkably thin (like 1-2 feet deep) large rear-projection DLP or LCDs. My parents 50 inch DLP was only like 16 inches deep.

Oh, and there are rear-projection and front-projection projection CRTs, but they aren't so popular these days. A rich friend of mine bought a CRT projector, which weighs something like 100 pounds, that he then had to mount to his ceiling. It then projects across the room onto a screen on the wall. I hear calibrating it to look right is quite a project and needs to be repeated several times a year.