Tech Blog

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By now you should have had all your major gifts bought, wrapped and out of the way, but what about the little things, the cool tech toys that just fit in that stocking, hung by the chimney with care.

Fear not, I've got  a stocking stuffer list that will help you out in these final few hours before the big guy stuffs himself down your chimney to deliver the Christmassy booty, leading off with:

Zhu Zhu Pets
Arguably the hottest gift this year. Mate a Roomba with a Hamster and this is the result. It's cute, furry, explores the room kicking up dust-bunnies and chasing family pets.

The company line:

The best alternatives to real live hamsters, Zhu Zhu Pets™ hamsters don’t poop, die, or stink, but they are still a riot of motion and sound. Darting around in their hamster tubes, busily scurrying from room to room, you never know where they’ll go next! Simply pet the hamster’s back, set him down, and watch him Zhu Zhu Zhu-oom!

Of course, what Cool toy would be complete without a Zany TV Commercial:


And finally, believe it or not, there's an app for that:

Ok, enough fun and festive frivolity. On to more serious stocking stuffer tech.

Boring but butt-savingly essential backup
Yes, I know savingly isn't a word, but saving butts is what it does, it works so it stays. Just like the backup tech from Clickfree works (which really isn't boring but I need a B word for alliteration) . I wrote before about the Clickfree C2 automatic backup USB drive; to summarize, it's easy, and it works.

And it still works. My unit has been doing daily and weekly backups for me since October. I've restored a few files from the drive, and moved them between computers without problems.

You may already have a USB drive around, and not want to buy another just for an automated backup system. And that's where the Clickfree HDD Transformer cable comes in.

Basically it's the Clickfree backup software, in a cable. You simply plug your drive into the USB port on the cable, plug the cable's USB connector into your computer, and provided you've got autostart enabled, your system starts backing up. Oh look, a handy video that goes into more detail...

And finally, the ultimate stocking stuffer
Yes, the iPod Touch is quite likely the coolest device on the planet that's not been glued to a cell phone. The more I use mine, the more I realize it's become my personal computing device. Wi-Fi and bluetooth, hundreds of thousands of iPhone apps, multi-media functions...what's not to like?

Late last week, Krypto blogged about Smartphones vs. Computers - and made many great points supporting the smartphone; it wins hands down over a computer from the mobility perspective alone!

But if you want that smartphone tech, without the weight and expense of a Canadian wireless data package, then the iPod Touch is the way to go.

Or perhaps Microsoft's Zune, though I've not used one so have no baseline for comparison.


Your turn
So, my stocking is hung by the chimney with care...if you were ol' Santa, what would you put in there?

Message Edited by bgrier on 12-21-2009 10:35 PM

Message Edited by bgrier on 12-22-2009 09:42 AM