Jitterbug J

Jitterbug J

It’s marketed as a cell phone for seniors, but it is a great phone for anyone who just wants an easy-to-use and easy-to-see cell phone for placing and receiving telephone calls. The Jitterbug J is a phone that anyone can pick up and start using immediately. The numbers are large and the on-screen prompts are put in the form of a question that you simply answer using the “Yes” or “No” buttons. The Jitterbug J is a sturdy and very well designed phone that is made by Samsung.

Seniors will find this phone very comfortable. The flip-open design make it very easy to use and when open it has the feel of a regular old-fashioned telephone. There is even a comforting dial tone when you open the phone. The part of the phone that goes against your ear is padded and formed in such a way that the large speaker is properly placed on your ear every time you use it.

The Jitterbug J also comes with special services. There is an operator available 24-7, 365 days a year . The Jitterbug operators are patient, knowledgeable, friendly and U. S. based. They can be used to place calls, to update the address book, and to perform just about any tasks related to your Jitterbug phone. You may not ever have to call the operator or you may want to use them to place all your calls. The decision is entirely yours.

You can also decide which services you want on your Jitterbug. You can get daily health tips, a weekly personalized wellness call, and/or access to a live registered nurse for 24-7 answers to health-related questions. You can also subscribe to MyWorld which gives you customized weather, sports, stocks, trivia, horoscope, and lottery results. These special services carry an extra$4 a month charge with lower-priced plans, but are often included in the higher-priced plans.

Rate plans range from $14.99 to $79.99 a month. Jitterbug uses the cellular service from other major carriers, so coverage is very good. You can only use the Jitterbug service with the Jitterbug phone. Rate plans are either comparable or just slightly more than those with larger carriers like Verizon. A big difference is that Jitterbug doesn’t require a 2-year contract. In fact, you don’t have to sign any contract at all. For that reason, you do have to incur a $35 activation fee. Although I don’t like that extra fee, I can understand. Without that, people might be turning on and off their service every week.

The cost of the Jitterbug J was recently reduced from $147 to $99, making it very attractive. It is also a great phone for those with vision or hearing impairments. It comes in a pearlized white, black, and red. It makes a great present for a parent or grandparent. Be sure you check it out.

The Bottom Line:

The Jitterbug cell phone was designed for seniors, but it is a good phone for anyone who doesn’t need a camera or an MP3 player and who doesn’t want to sign a two-year contract.

It is also a good cell phone for the millions of people who have a decline in vision, motor skills, or hearing. Since there is no contract and there are small rate packages available, it is also a good phone for those who only want a cell phone for emergencies.

The Jitterbug J not glitzy, but it is comfortable, easy to use, and sturdy. There are no nested menus or confusing icons. It is nice to have extra features that can be turned off if you don’t need them. Its similarities to a regular old telephone will make it comfortable for older people, while its ease of use will appeal to everyone.

The Good:

• Excellent design
• Very easy to use
• Big buttons
• Most like regular old telephone
• Sturdy
• Cushioned ear piece
• Good Service
• U. S. based operators
• Very good sound quality
• Bluetooth
• Very good price
• No service contract
• Excellent operator services
• Excellent call quality
• Very comfortable to use

The Bad:

• Exztra activation fee
• Extra cost for MyWorld (equivalent of free apps)
• Battery indicator not prominent
• No easy way to add recently called or received numbers
• Voice mail is an added cost
• A little bulky

COMFORTABLE & EASY To Use Jitterbug J Phone!

Tomorrow the Doid X will be on sale at Verizon stores. Verizon couldn’t have chosen a better time to introduce their new Android phone, the Droid X. Consumer Reports, newspapers, and blogs have all been slamming Apple and the iPhone 4 for it’s antenna-reception problems. It seems that if you hold the iPhone 4 in a normal way in your left hand, reception is cut off. Steve Jobs has added to the upset with Apple by indicating that there is nothing wrong with the phone and people just shouldn’t hold it that way. Add that to the fact that everyone seems to be unhappy that the iPhone is only available on AT&T, and  you have a perfect storm. If the Droid X makes a splash it will be a great chance for Verizon to grab many of AT&T’s potential iPhone customers.

I am excited to say that my Droid X just arrived. I have been using an iPhone for two years. But now that my AT&T contract is over, I may actually be one of those who will switch to Verizon. I’ll let you know after I take a good look at the Droid X. My first impression — it looks great. Come back to read my full review.

The Sonos 5-Speaker S5 Player

The Sonos 5-Speaker S5 Player

Once you have your entire music collection in a digital form, you don’t want to play around with records, tapes, or CDs anymore. You just want to listen to your music. Of course you can do that on the computer or on an iPod or other portable digital music player. But sometimes you want really good quality sound for your listening pleasure at home. That’s where the Sonos Multi-Room Music System comes in. The Sonos S5 player is a fairly small device, but it has 5 built-in speakers so it sounds great. If you add a $99 ZonePlayer and the Sonos will work with your wireless router allowing you to move it anywhere in the house….or you can buy an S5  for every room in the house. With a ZonePlayer attached to your wireless router, each S5 Player will work with your wireless network. At $399, the Sonos S5 is not cheap, but you get a lot of sound for your money. For the most part, setup is easy.

Although the Sonos controller is great, it is pretty pricey at $349. Luckily you can also use a free app on the iPhone or iPod touch to choose your music. You can also control the music right from your PC. No matter which option you choose, if you have more than one Sonos player, you can play different music in each room and you can control the volume of each room separately. If you are having a party, you can play the same music throughout the house. In the “good old days” you had to invest in a special sound system for each room and put wiring in the walls to accomplish the same thing.

Summary:

The Sonos S5 is one of the best choices for a whole-house, high performance, wireless digital music system. Setup and implementation are easy. The S5 ZonePlayer has excellent sound quality. The $399 S5 ZonePlayer gives you a lot of sound and ease of use for your money. Although there are a few incompatible routers and you may have to adjust any software firewall that you may have, everything just plain “works”.

If you can afford one for every room of your home, your home will be brimming over with music. Yet, if you only want to purchase one, with the addition of a ZoneBridge, you can move the S5 Player to any location in your home at any time for music where and when you need it. You can use its alarm function to wake up to or use its sleep function to turn off automatically.

Being able to control the system from your iPhone or iPod Touch is a nice additional feature that can save you some money.

The Good:

• Good design
• Excellent sound quality
• Compatible with wide array of music services
• Plays a wide variety of formats
• Good interface
• Good value
• Easy to set up and use
• Alarm & sleep functions
• Can be used with NAS and other devices
• Can be used with iPhone and iPod Touch

The Bad:

• Some software firewalls need adjustment
• Expensive controller

You can real a more detailed review with pictures at HardwareSecrets.com.

Internet Time Machine Web Site

Internet Time Machine Web Site

People often complain to me about how fast today’s world moves and changes. There is no doubt that everyone from the tech savvy Internet marketeer to the everyday consumer has trouble keeping up with today’s trends as well as today’s technology. People’s interests are constantly changing and staying on top of the trends can be a daunting task.

That’s where this new Internet tool shows its prowess. The Internet Time Machine — BTW, I love the name! — is a website that tracks current trends and allows the user become aware of potential niche marketing opportunities.

The Internet Time Machine scours the web to see what people are searching for. They have become such experts at this, that they have created their own new search engine called NowRelevant.com. By monitoring 40 million words and phrases, they give you the top trends, and identify new nitches and hot products as they develop. The results from this search engine give you historical as well as recent top trends. The Internet Time Machine tracks the supply and demand curve. They actually let you see what’s in demand and where the supply is not meeting that demand. This allows you to pick up on new ideas and trends that you can monetize through the Internet.

You can check this service for free. The site is filled with interesting articles and videos. You may want to check it out just to see how well-implemented the idea is and to get a taste of the current trends. If you like what you see, you can purchase a premium membership for even more information and daily trends. Current interesting information on the site includes articles like “Chinese Web Traffic Secrets”, “Mangosteen”, and “An iPhone Niche to Make Money with”. You can even use The Internet Time Machine as an affiliate marketing product.

There is nothing more interesting that deciphering the current trends. Whether you use The Internet Time Machine to make money or to just ride the trends, it will give you a truly unique and useful perspective.

Microsoft Office Online

Microsoft Office Online

The Internet has spawned an abundance of free programs. Last week, the word “free” even became associated with Microsoft Office, a suite of programs that has long been one Microsoft’s biggest cash cows.

Yes, you can now create documents in Word, Excel, PowerPoint or OneNote without having to purchase the programs. Word, Excel, and PowerPoint are the most-used programs in the Microsoft Office suite. They are used for creating word processing documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. OneNote is a free-form information gathering and multi-user collaboration program, which is useful, but not as popular.

In all my years in the tech world, I have never know Microsoft to give away one of their Office programs. Now, however, Microsoft is facing immense pressure from Google and others who have free programs similar to Microsoft Office. Google has an online version of Office called Google Docs and there are at least three other competing office suites being given out at no cost.

So Microsoft has joined the fray. Their new free suite of Office applications are entirely Web-based. That means that you can create documents in any of these programs only when you are online. The programs themselves reside on the Internet. Now, that is not all bad. It means that you can access the programs as well as your documents, from any Internet-connected computer. You can also give others the ability to view and change any documents you choose. So it is perfect for collaborating with others. The documents that you create are stored at Microsoft’s online storage called SkyDrive. Microsoft offers every user 25GB of online SkyDrive storage space for free. You can also download any documents that you create to your own computer.

Using Microsoft’s Office on the Web is easy. If you use Word, Excel, or PowerPoint, the interface will be familiar so there will be no learning curve. In fact, only the basic functionality is given, so these programs are really easier to use than the full versions.

To give you an idea of the difference, let’s take Word, Microsoft’s word processor. The full 2007 version has eight tabs with things like “References”, “Mailings”, and “Review”. The average Word user never even looks at these tabs. The Word Web App version has only the three most used tabs:  “Home”, “Insert”, and “View”. These three tab give you everything you need to create an average word processing document.

In order to use these new Web-base Office applications, you simply surf over to http://office.live.com,type in your Windows Live name and password and click on the logo of the program you want to use. If you use Hotmail or any other Microsoft online product, you probably already have a Windows Live account. If not, you are given the opportunity to set one up. Again, there is no cost for this.

In my testing, the Web Office programs work quite well. The only caveat was that all of the documents are saved with the new file extensions that Microsoft uses for Office 2007 and 2010. The names for these documents end in “x”, like .docx, .xlsx, etc. This doesn’t matter if you will be sharing the documents online by inviting people to view them. If, however, you are going to save the documents to your computer and then sent them to someone, that person would not be able to open the documents with older versions of Office unless they install Microsoft’s Compatibility Pack for the 2007 Office system.

Feel free to test Microsoft’s new offering. You may also want to try the competing products. Google has a free online suite of office applications called Google Docs. You can use it by visiting http://docs.google.com and signing up to get a free Google account. Like Microsoft, Google offers free online storage for your documents.

OpenOffice.org 3.2 is a full-featured set of Office-like programs that are also free. These are not online, but can be downloaded directly to your computer and used at any time. They are available at http://www.openoffice.org.

IBM Lotus Symphony 3 can be downloaded at http://symphony.lotus.com. Like OpenOffice, it is downloaded to your computer and can be used even if you are not online.

Zoho is a group of free online programs that are available from http://www.zoho.com. Zoho has a large selection of productivity tools in addition to their Office-substitute applications.

All of the above mentioned suites of programs include a word-processor, spreadsheet, and presentation product. Some include additional programs like database and drawing programs. Each gives their programs unique names. For instance, OpenOffice has Writer which is a substitute for Word, Calc for Excel, Impress for PowerPoint and Base for the Access database.  Google calls their programs Documents (Word), Spreadsheet (Excel), and Presentations (PowerPoint).

When you think about it, these are fully-functioning intricate programs that we can get for free. There may be no such thing as a free lunch, but there certainly are some great free programs right now. You will want to be sure to check them out.

HP Officejet 8000 wireless printer

HP Officejet 8000 wireless printer

Looking for a wireless printer that produces good quality prints with low ink costs? Then you will want to take a look at the HP Officejet Pro 8000. This printer is called an “Officejet”, but it is also suitable for home use and you get quite a bit for the $179 price tag. The wireless setup, though time-consuming is easy. The duplexer is wonderful. You can use it to print on both sides of the paper. This combined with the low ink costs, make this a fairly inexpensive printer to operate. I did have trouble with the cover of the paper tray. If not placed on the printer accurately, it can fall off and break. I also found that the printer does a lot of grinding and noise-making. This is part of the normal HP process, but it can be very disconcerting.

You won’t have to put paper in this printer too often. It holds 250 sheets. Text is clear and crisp and color reproduction is good. One thing I really loved is that the ink is quite waterproof. After printer some colorful brochures, I left them out in the pouring rain. The next day, the paper was wet, but the brochure was completely readable with no smearing of any kind….Quite impressive.

The Good

• Inexpensive ink
• Very good text quality
• Wireless setup is quick and easy
• Excellent ink cartridge design
• Fast printing
• Good connectivity
• Good duplexer
• Excellent waterproof ink
• Compatible with HP iPhoto iTunes app

The Bad

• Setup takes too long
• Too large
• Aggravating bumping and grinding noises
• Paper tray cover placement must be exact

Check out my more detailed review with pictures at Hardware Secrets.

With today’s Internet tools anyone can have a website. It’s fairly easy to do, yet as time goes by, a lot of work goes into your website….adding content and keeping every thing updated. Your website becomes a living, growing thing that has a lot to offer visitors.

You know that website visitors will recommend your websites to others, but you have to make that easy for them to do. That’s where this website tool will help. The Pluzit tool allows your website visitors to easily  Bookmark and Share your website. Pluzit will put clickable links on the sidebar or the bottom of your webpage allowing your web visitors to  share your website through many different social media websites. You can list Google, Facebook, Twitter, My Space, Delicious, Newsvine, Slashdot, Spurl, and many more. There are about 260 different sharing services that you can use. You get to choose which ones you want to show up on your webpage. There is even a useful “email” button, so if you visitors aren’t into social networking, they can still recommend your site to others via email. Your web visitors simply clicks on one of these Bookmark Buttons and recommends your site to others. This allows you to share your website content directly from your webpage.

Pluzit also offers free analytics so you can see how many visitors have clicked on your Pluzit links. Pluzit makes it easy to implement this system. You simply click on “Get The Pluzit Button”, then copy and paste the code they give you into your website. There is even a Videotour that explains in detail exactly how to do it.

Pluzit also has a Pluzit button that allows you to share a website directly from your browser. Just click on “Pluzit for Surfers” to install this browser plugin. It is available for Internet Explorer and Firefox. Once installed, when you visit a website that you like you can use the Pluzit button that appears on your browser toolbar to bookmark that site and/or to subscribe to its feeds.

Verizon's Droid Incredible

Verizon's Droid Incredible

When three companies like Google, Verizon, and HTC (an impressive hardware company) get together, the results have got to be good. At first I thought that they were being a little arrogant when they named this phone “Incredible.” After  testing, however, I’ve decided that the name is justly given. This phone really is pretty incredible!

I spent the first few days of testing trying to pry the Incredible out of my husband’s hands. Now you have to understand that he is not at all a geek. In fact, he usually looks at the phones I review, presses a few buttons and hand them over to me. However, the Incredible really got his attention. He thought it was remarkably easy to use. Before I knew it he was checking his email and making phone calls on the Incredible. In fact, he liked it so much that he wants me to look into changing to Verizon so he can get an Incredible.

That said, I also liked the Incredible. The hardware is very good. It is probably not as spectacular as I expect the upcoming iPhone 4 to be, but it was the Incredible’s operating system and interface that impressed me. The Google Android 2.1 operating system is much better than previous versions and Verizon has already announced that the Incredible will get Android 2.2 soon. Add to that the fact that Android is supplemented with the HTC Sense interface and you have a real winner.

Not only can you do voice search on this phone, but it’s voice recognition is good enough to be able to speak your email message and have the phone type it for you. The Sense interface allows you to have 7 home pages and to access each by clicking on a thumbnail rather than scrolling through each one. On top of that, I found the HTC on-screen touch keypad easier to use than the touch keypads on either the iPhone or the regular Droid.

Browsing on this phone is quite pleasurable as screens appear quickly. Also, when you pinch-to-zoom, the text redraws itself automatically so there is a lot less scrolling. The speed of the processor shows up in other tasks as well. I never had to wait for the Incredible to perform a task. This phone also has a good camera with an excellent interface. I could only find one major flaw in the phone. It is difficult to see in bright sunlight. All-in-all though, this is a phone that will appeal to all levels of users.

The Good

• Responsive touch screen
• Speedy processor
• Excellent on-screen keypad
• Haptic feedback
• Excellent browsing experience
• Good email & messaging support
• Great camera controls and interface
• Good design
• Sense overlay makes it easier to use
• Useful speech-to-text
• Tethering allowed
• Pinch-to-zoom auto formats text
• FM radio

The bad

• Poor visibility in bright sunlight
• Battery life could be better
• No dedicated mute or camera button
• Plastic parts seem a bit flimsy

Check out my detailed review with pictures at HardwareSecrets.com.

Samsung ML-2525 Laser Printer

Samsung ML-2525 Laser Printer

As laser printers go, the Samsung ML-2525W is a pretty stylish unit. The all-black printer has a boxy look, but it is softened by rounded corners and an elegant-looking textured top. One of it’s best features of this monochrome printer is the fact that it is very compact and has a small footprint, making it perfect for home and/or small office use.

It has excellent print quality and good paper handling. These two features combine to makes it a good all-around printer. It  can be attached to a network with an Ethernet cable or it can easily be set up to link to a wireless network. If you have a wireless network, this lets you put the printer anywhere, which is another nice feature.

This printer has high-capacity replacement cartridges available which keeps the cost of toner low. If you don’t need to print in color, owning this printer can save you a lot in consumables. In fact, it is a nice printer to add right alongside of your color ink jet printer. Use the ink jet when you need color. Use the laser printer when you don’t. If you have been using your ink jet to print everything, you will see an immediate savings on your ink costs.

The printer also has a single sheet feed and that handles envelopes, labels, and thick paper quite admirably. Samsung has also developed software called AnyWeb Print that lets you format a Web page or combine information on various web pages for printing only what you need. The ML-2525 also has a very useful “Cancel” button, which stops the printing immediately.

The Samsung ML-2525W retails for $149.99. It also has a baby brother, the ML-2525, with similar features, but no Ethernet connection, for $119.99. Unless you need the network connection, go for the 2525 and use the USB connection to keep it near the computer or place it anywhere in the house if you have a wireless network.

The Good

• Small footprint
• Stylish
• High-quality print
• Compact
• Generous paper capacity tray
• Inexpensive
• Cancel button
• Wireless networking
• Both Ethernet and USB connectivity
• AnyWeb Print software

The Bad

• No EasyScreen Print button, which is available on the cheaper ML-2525
• No autoduplexing
• AnyWeb Print software only available for Internet Explorer
• Demo button fairly useless

Apple’s new product announcements are always interesting, but today’s arrival of the iPhone 4 was quite dramatic. Steve Jobs announced over 100 new features. This is one time when watching the latest technology news is more than worthwhile. Not only are the new iPhone features groundbreaking, but others are sure to try to follow Apple’s lead. This means that we will all have better portable devices in the near future.

Here are a few of the iPhone 4’s new features:

• All new design — thin, thin, thin!
• Front-facing camera
• Retina display — an awesome new technology making the screen 4 times clearer
• A gyroscope in addition to the accelerometer, compass, proximity sensor, and ambient light sensor
• New camera system with illuminated sensor and LED flash
• 720p videos
• iMovie for the iPhone
• iBooks for the iPhone
• A bigger battery for longer battery life
• Farmville, Guitar Hero, and Netflix on the iPhone
• FaceTime WiFi Video Calling
• Multitasking
• Folders to store apps

Some of these, especially the Retina display are ground-breaking. You can bet on Apple to come up with the latest technology. Now it’s time to sit back and see what the competition does.