GadgetReview

It’s a shame, because Emobile’s Pocket WiFi 3G Router (i.e. MiFi) sure is pretty, but won’t be coming to the States or Europe any time soon.  But for those of you residing in Japan you can grab one for 5,980 yen if you sign a 2-year contract and you’ll be able to connect up to 5 WiFi enabled devices to the portable router enabling high speed Internet access any where you roam.  Battery time is up to 4 hours and it includes a microSD card slot (bit torrent server?).

[via iSmashphone]

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And there’s yet another competitor throwing its hat into the steadily crowding e-reader arena (we get any more hats in there and we could open up a millenery shop!), but it’s not exactly from a source you’d expect.

Creative Labs is taking a run at the market, with a unit they’re calling the Zii MediaBook.  Now, this actually has some pretty choice add-ons with it, like a touchscreen, text to speech functionality (it will READ you a book) and an SD slot, plus, it will be “Internet-enabled”, though no one’s sure if it means 3G or WiFi.

Also on the unsure list are the Zii’s release date, its price structure and any content delivery methods, (pictures of the device were also in short supply) though word is Creative’s in talks with several different providers, and not just for books, either.  This could be one to watch…or Creative Labs could think better of it and stay out altogether.

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Available next month, GM’s AutoNet will let you literally install a WiFi hotspot in your car.  The unit plus installation will cost $500 and there will be a monthly charge of $30 for a 1GB cap.  There is also a 5GB cap offered but no price is known as of now.

The range will last up to a radius of 150 feet away from you car and would be great for camping, tailgating, and beyond.  You could even have traveling video game competitions in your SUV while you drive from Inglewood to Compton.  Anybody like this product?

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So remember just yesterday, when I was getting all poingy happy about the half e-reader / half netbook hybrid?  Well, I think I may have just beat that level of awesome but in a totally different direction.  Today I’m talking about the Kohjinsha PA, a combination netbook and tablet PC.

No, seriously–this sucker has a 4.8″ WSVGA touchscreen, 1.33GHz Atom CPU, 512 meg of RAM and a 32 GB SDD.  The battery is slated to run for 7.5 hours, and it even comes with an SD slot and a 1.3 MP webcam, all in a netsurfing portable tablet PC.

I am profoundly impressed by this, even though my chances of ever using such a device are so slim as to approach zero.  I draw like a cat with a pen in its mouth after ingesting large quantities of peyote, so a tablet PC to me is almost less than useless. But still, I’m impressed–and the price is pretty impressive too.

If you want one of these bad boys, you’ll have to shell out a whopping $758 in Japan.  Preorders are going on, and the prices range between $867 and $921.

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Today I’m going to introduce you to a truly awesome gadget that you can’t possibly get your hands on before Christmas unless you know somebody or can shell out epic bribes.

We’re talking about the eDGe, and this little beauty is worth the $490 you’d shell out for it for one very good reason: it’s a netbook and an e-reader.  All at once.  That’s right, it’s BOTH.

It’s WiFi enabled and looks vaguely like a Nintendo DS that you hold constantly upright, like an actual book.  It runs on Google’s Android system, joining a growing family of same, and can serve all the functions of both a netbook (send email, instant messages, surf the web, run apps, write notes and so on) and an ereader (it’s got a 9.7 inch E-ink e-paper display on one side and a 10.1 inch LCD screen on the other, just so you know what side gets what)

Their creator, Virginia’s Entourage Systems, has started taking preorders for the devices, so you can sign up for them now.

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Strap in and brace yourselves all over, kids, because I got a HOT list of deals here for the upcoming Black Friday sales!  Seems that Office Max dropped the dime a bit early on what they’ll be offering up for cheap the day after Thanksgiving (early?? It’s not even HALLOWEEN and they’re talking Black Friday!), but their incredibly gauche behavior brings you a whole lot of deals.  Check THIS out!

How about an Acer netbook for $150?  I know, you’re probably blinking rapidly and reading that again, but it’s true.  And it’s not where the deals end…but where they BEGIN, my friends. How about a Compaq Presario AMD Athlon II dual-core CPU for $240?  Maybe you like the DVDs…well, you can get a Memorex portable DVD player with seven-inch screen for $30.  Start hunting for couch change now and by Thanksgiving you should have enough for even a Magellan RoadMate 1440 GPS.  Just $70!

It’s enough to make even the most hesitant shopper think twice about clutching the wallet in a death grip.

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Road warriors listen up: this is the world’s smallest WiFi N compatible router, the Trendnet TEW-654TR.  It measures 2.5″ wide by 3.25″ long by 0.75″ and includes a carrying case with slim Ethernet cord and USB plug for powering it via your computer (AC plug also included).  You can grab one right now from Thinkgeek for $80.

• World’s smallest Wireless N travel router
• Access Point and Access Point Client modes
• Easily share a single internet connection with multiple users
• One-touch Wi-fi Protected Setup
• LED Display
• Reset button
• Dimensions: 2.5″ x 3.25″ x 0.75″
• Includes: carrying case, CD-ROM, a thin 3-foot Ethernet cable, power supply, USB cable

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So the early word is that, finally, we may have a Kindle killer on our hands, and it’s from a little known outfit called Plastic Logic.

The Que, as it’s called, will see the light of day for the first time ever at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas (booth 11840, in case you want to know exactly where to go) on January 7th.

What’s interesting about the Que is that it’s less than a third of an inch thick, yet is WiFi enabled and can handle PDFs, Word documents, and Excel documents.  Plus, the battery life, according to reports, will be measurable in days, as opposed to hours.

The early reports that call this a Kindle killer have one significant hurdle in front of them–namely, answering questions about the price of the device.  The Kindle runs $279, and Sony’s model runs $199…but how much does the Que sell for?  No one knows yet, and we likely won’t know until we can hit booth 11840 for ourselves.

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Sweet Mary!  Google is offering free WiFi on all Virgin America trips from November 10th to January 15th.  If there is/was ever a way to get me to buy a ticket via email solicitation this has to be it.

In an effort to “keep they heads ringing”, this new Equaliser music hat uses a sound reactive blue luminescent display to actively show the world around you that you’re listening to music by a constant surge of ascending and descending lights you’d typically associate with a digital equalizer.  Nice giant sentence I just cultivated!

Looking a a bit to close to the WiFi symbol, you’ll probably be mistaken for some type of roving bandwidth experiment.  To that effect, this could work it’s way into someone’s creative Halloween costume no diggity.

As you can see from the picture, all you do is plug your MP3 player in and the hat will play the music back through embedded speakers and also do a little EQ light show.

You can pre-order the hat now but stock won’t filled until next week.  The pricing is at $32

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