A surprisingly rich little camera
Just as I was about to give digital cameras a rest in this column, a gorgeous little device popped up in Radio Shack stores last week:
The E850, made for GE by General Imaging, has a surprisingly rich feature set, including 8 megapixels, 5X optical zoom, and a 3-inch LCD. At $200, it's an incredible bargain.
GE (ge.com/digitalcameras) says you can get most of its cameras with a black, silver, red, white, or blue finish, with silver trim.
The E850 includes many of the so-called advanced features that are now standard on many digital cameras, such as face detection, image stabilization, and red-eye removal.
If you do not need a camera with as much juice as the E850, GE's A730 features 7 megapixels and 3X optical zoom, and a 2.5-inch LCD, for about $129.
I prefer the E850 for its smarter looks. Rather than placing all of its controls on the top of the camera, General Imaging designed the E850 with its control knob and zoom and telephoto button next to its large LCD.
PC Video
TV on your PC, while you work
At a magazine I once worked at in New York, there was an art assistant who spent her days in a cat-and-mouse game with the art director, covering her PC solitaire game with a Photoshop window whenever he poked his head out of his office.
Nowadays, there is so much more to hide from the boss, like your favorite TV reruns. Hauppauge Digital (hauppauge.com), which makes TV broadcast and cable receivers for PCs, recently updated its WinTV recording and playback software. Now you can truly multitask with Hauppauge's PCI card tuners installed: You can watch Judge Joe Brown in a window on your PC, while banging out e-mails.
WinTV users can watch, pause, or record shows in a window or in full-screen mode. The company has also rearranged the buttons in the software's display window.
Mac users can also tune in TV programs with Hauppauge's myTV USB devices, which connect to your antenna or coaxial cable. (I have not tried this myself.)
Entertainment
Custom poker chips are a winning idea, though company's crude website is not
Poker never held much mystique for me until I received a packet of customized poker chips with my mug, and my name, printed on them. Now I can't pass one of those multipurpose gaming tables at Costco without asking my wife if we can buy one to replace the dining room table.
I got the samples from A-Z Software Solutions and Services of Simi Valley, Calif. A-Z sells the Original Poker Chip Customizer, a kit for branding all of the play money in your man cave.
The kits start at $30, and you pretty much get what you pay for. The standard edition includes a disk with the chip-customizing software for your PC, which you use to lay out your images and type for output. The kit also includes round poker chip labels for an inkjet printer, and a plastic holder to help you center the labels on the chips.
A better deal, if you don't already have a ton of chips, is the company's deluxe kit. For $60, you get (in addition to software and labels) 300 assorted chips, five dice, two decks of cards, a large "dealer" button, and a sturdy metal case.
Family (and good taste) warning: The Original Chip Customizer website includes a sexually crude video ad that makes the unlikely claim your custom chips will make you more attractive to the opposite sex. (I thought only beer and sports cars did that.)
Also, the website has no company or contact information, except for a single e-mail address. I find this disconcerting. I normally do not do business with vendors that make themselves hard to reach. But a gambling man or woman might accept the risk.
Innovative last week
IPod alarm clock lights up room
There are a lot of ways to dock your iPod, but not all will light up your room like the iH4 alarm clock from iHome. The iH4 (in black or pink) has two strips of adjustable LED "accent lighting" and a mini-tower design. You can wake up to your own music, on your fully recharged iPod, or a buzzer (if that's what you really need to get out of bed). The alarm clock also punches out some decent bass for something of its size. The iH4, about $50 at ihomeaudio.com, comes with a remote control that works with both the clock and your iPod.
