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Journalists Cover Microsoft, Using Macs

It’s not an easy time for Microsoft — with Steve Ballmer having to field questions about being “buffoons” and an “evil empire”  at the shareholder’s meeting (.doc) — so when they get together “the world’s most influential technology pundits and online writers” (nb: we weren’t invited) for Mobius to discuss super-secret mobile tech you’d think [...]

Guide To Black Friday Apple Bargains: Cheap MacBooks, iPods and Accessories Galore

Here’s a guide for finding the best bargains on Apple-related gear during the infamous Black Friday sales on November 27. We’ve compiled a comprehensive list of gear from leaked photos of sales flyers and descriptions of sales.
The bargains include a 2.26 GHz MacBook + $150 gift card at Best Buy for $999.99 ; a 32GB [...]

Review: Voices Is Today’s Best Thing Ever, Grab It Now While It’s Cheap

New on the App Store is Voices from the clever folk at Tap Tap Tap. You can guess what it does.

Open it up, pick a silly voice. Helium is pretty silly. A microphone appears and the app even clears your throat for you (try it, you’ll see what I mean). Now speak your brains, and [...]

Review: Sony Walkman S540 Series Video MP3 Player

Press releases, you will hardly be surprised to hear, are rarely very interesting. But one arrived in my inbox a couple of weeks ago that made me double-take.
“Sony’s S Series Walkman,” it chattered, “is a serious challenger to the iPod Nano.” Gosh, really? Perhaps the Cult had better have a look at one, then, despite [...]

Daily Gadgets: Refurbished Apple MacBook Pro, Floating iPod Speakers, Internet Media Tablet

Today’s deals include refurbished Apple MacBook Pros, starting at $1,349, Floating iPod speakers from Excaliber,the Archos 5 Internet Media Tablet and many more.

Details of these and more Daily Deals can be found on the CoM Daily Deals page.

The Apple Store has 21 factory-refurbished MacBook Pro notebooks in its Special Deals section. (Click on “MacBook Pro” in the left sidebar to find them.) That’s the best selection we’ve seen in several weeks. With free shipping, many are at lowest-we’ve-seen prices. All come with a 1-year Apple warranty, the same as new Macs. Sales tax is added where applicable. Items are removed from Apple’s site when they sell out. The systems, each with free shipping:

Unibody MacBook Pro MB470LL/A Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz 15.4-inch Laptop, ($1,349)
Aluminum MacBook Pro MB487LL/A Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz 15.4-inch Laptop, ($1,349)
Unibody MacBook Pro MC026LL/A Core 2 Duo 2.66GHz 15.4-inch Laptop, ($1,699)
Aluminum MacBook Pro MB486LL/A Core 2 Duo 2.5GHz 17-inch Laptop, ($1,799)
Unibody MacBook Pro MB604LL/A Core 2 Duo 2.66GHz 17-inch Laptop, ($1,949)

Excalibur SoundMaster 145 Floating Wireless Speaker System for iPod for $39.99 with free shipping. (That’s $13 under our mention from June and the lowest total price we could find by $57.) An iPod dock transmitter and one speaker are included, but the system is expandable.

Archos 5 250GB 4.8-inch Internet Media Tablet for $279.99 with free shipping. (It’s the lowest total price we could find by $50.) This media tablet features a 4.8-inch 800×480 touch-screen LCD, 250GB hard drive, 802.11g wireless, USB connectivity, and compatibility with Mac and PC.

Kodak EasyShare Z1085 IS 10-Megapixel Digital Camera in Black, $88.99 with free shipping. (That’s a buck under our mention from two weeks ago and $70 under the best we could find for a new one.) Features include a Schneider-Kreuznach Variogon 5x optical zoom, video capture up to 1280×720, optical image stabilization, a 2.5-inch LCD, SD/MMC card slot, 64MB internal memory, and more.

Kingston 19-in-1 External USB 2.0 Card Reader, model no. FCR-HS219/1, for $13.69. (With free shipping, it’s $1 over our March mention, since expired, but it’s the lowest total price we could find by $5.) It features compatibility with virtually every kind of media card.

Several free applications are available for a limited time from Apple’s App Store, with price drops from $1 to $4. The apps:

AwesomeSauce Apps’ myMassage: Vibrating personal massager
DMBC’s iSurvive – Military Grade Survival Manual: Survival manual
Mark Locker’s GPS Info: Raw GPS information
Mediafly’s Mediafly: Video + Audio Podcast Edition: On-demand personalized video channels
9Bit Labs’ iNietzsche (pictured): “Pocket-sized existentialist”
99Games Online Private Limited’s Aqua Jigsaw: Marine life puzzles

Samsung SyncMaster 23-inch Widescreen LCD Monitor for $219.99 with free shipping. (This $20 mail-in rebate cuts it to $199.99. That ties our May mention as the lowest total price we’ve seen for this display.) It features a 2048×1152 native resolution, 5ms response time, 20,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, 300 cd/m² brightness, and DVI-D and VGA inputs. Rebate expires July 31.

Other World Computing cut prices on many of its OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro FireWire 800/USB 2.0/eSATA RAID Drives, as noted below. Ground shipping is $5.75. Each drive includes Intech Hard Disk SpeedTools, ProSoft DataBackup II, cables, and 3-year warranty. The drives:

640GB with 32MB cache, $199.99 (was $210)
1TB with 32MB cache, $219.99
1.5TB with 64MB cache, $279.99
2TB with 32MB cache, $289.99 (was $295)
2TB with 64MB cache, $319.99 (was $330)
4TB with 64MB cache, $719.99 (was $780)

Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB Serial ATA 3Gb/s Internal Hard Drive, model no. HD103UJ, for $84.99 with free shipping. This $10 mail-in rebate drops it to $74.99 ($0.07/GB). (That’s a $3 drop since our mention from a month ago and the lowest total price we’ve ever seen for this hard drive.) This 3.5-inch drive features a 32MB cache and runs at 7200 rpm. Rebate expires July 20.

Elgato EyeTV Hybrid USB 2.0 HDTV Tuner, model no. 10020974, for $119.99 plus $6.99 for shipping. (Although that’s $3 over our May mention, since expired, it’s still the lowest total price we could find by $2.) Powered by Elgato’s EyeTV 3 software, the EyeTV Hybrid provides analog and digital signal decoding, support for 720p and 1080i HD, S-Video and RCA connectivity for game consoles/set-top boxes, and a compact USB 2.0 enclosure. Deal expires July 14.

About the author

Ed Sutherland

Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.

Email the author | Read more posts by Ed Sutherland.

2 comments

    [...] wireless, USB connectivity, and compatibility with Mac and PC. … See original here:  Daily Gadgets: Refurbished Apple MacBook Pro, Floating iPod … July 10th, 2009 in Mac info | tags: 802-11g-wireless, directors, hard-drive, lowest, may-change, [...]

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