I’ve already seriously nerded out Dethroner over the last few days with all the Dungeons & Dragons, Choose Your Own Adventure, and gadgets, but… let’s take it over the top with this twenty-sided pecan die. Constructed from 20, hand-made equilateral pans held together by industrial-strength magnets. It’s a thing of beauty—and they’ve left detailed instructions […]

Buying a surround sound system to match your newly-acquired HDTV is definitely recommended—it really does add a lot to the experience. But if you start trying to price out audio systems, it’s easy to nickel and dime your way into the poor house. Avoid this at all costs—ain’t no Dolby DTS on the streets.
The thing […]

Have you done any special tricks to keep your HDTV and home theater gear from taking over your whole space? I’d show you my setup, but it’s not all that special—I use a projector in the living room, so when it’s off it’s just a wall (or the screen if I am too lazy to […]

Al D. writes:
What’s gonna be the best bang for my buck in a sub $150 music player? I’m thinking maybe not the ipod.
When it comes to MP3 players, there’s iPod and then there’s everything else. If you’re planning on buying an MP3 player for someone else this year, just get them an iPod—it’s still […]

That’s about as close to off-road this Hummer’s ever going to get.

I have a couple of pedantic niggles with “Uncle Mark’s 2007 Gift Guide and Almanac”— 2 megapixels isn’t high-enough resolution for casual shooting—four megapixels is; the Playstation 2 has more than two good games—but I’m tits over tea kettle with the general format. Rather than wasting time discussing the merits of a variety of products, […]

I’ll leave his name out of it since there’s no reason to be rude, but these two emails made me laugh. Hopefully by sharing them we’ll help you avoid the same problem in the future.
Last Christmas I bought our family (well, OK, ME) an HDTV. Nothing special.. actually one of the cheapest I could […]

Anonymous wrote the following series of questions:
I know this doesn’t have a simple answer as I’ve tried to answer it for friends and relatives, but I’d like to get your input, what has a better picture: plasma or LCD?
They’re both roughly the same, really. Plasma has deeper blacks and a better contrast ratio, while LCDs […]

You enter the yawning archway to find a vast antechamber filled with mirrors and light. Around you khaki-clad gnomes scurry, stealing between the gleaming, polychromic plastic troughs that carve up the floor of the chamber like coral in a reef. Entranced, you are led by forces beyond your ken to the dark recess near the […]

Disclaimer: I am one of them—a consumer electronics reviewer.
• Most of us are not engineers. I have a background in IT, which gives me at least a basic understanding of the principles of programming and networking, as well as a cursory knowledge of electronics, but mostly I’m just a guy who has played with a […]