2006 Holiday Gift Guide
By Suzie Ridgway
November 20th, 2006
Imagine smiles a mile wide when they open the gift from you this year. Whether you're picking up great gadgets for your loved ones, or a few for your technology-loving self, we've found the best gadgety gifts and accessories to give (and receive) this holiday season. Our convenient gift guide below, complete with prices and where to buy, features hand-picked items for everybody and every budget to make shopping a no-brainer. Happy gifting!
Pioneer PDP-5070HD
Street Price: $3499.99
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Get the most bang for your hi-def buck with the Pioneer PDP-5070HD. This 50-inch high definition plasma TV has WXGA Resolution (1365 x 768), as well as deeper blacks, outstanding color contrasts and a 160-degree wide-angle view, with no color or picture distortion horizontally or vertically. The set also features a fully integrated media receiver with a dual NTSC and ATSC tuner with CableCARD™ Interface and 10 independent HDMI inputs with the ability to handle a 1080p/24Hz signal, as well as split screen/picture in picture modes, the V-Chip Parental Control, TV Guide On Screen and a handy Home Gallery allowing easy digital photo viewing via a USB connection.
StudioTech Ultra U-22T
Street Price: $1099
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If your new plasma is sitting on top of an old dresser, it's about time to give your beauty its rightful perch atop a royal techno altar. The carefully crafted StudioTech Ultra U-22T component cabinet, made of hardwood veneer, is a generous 67" wide, making it perfect for wide screen televisions up to 70 inches and 250 pounds. The black mesh screened front doors serve a dual purpose of keeping components cool and allowing infrared remotes to do their jobs. Additional design conveniences include easy-to-remove rear panels making cable management a snap, extra wide center channel speaker capacity, six internal shelves and expansion choices such as drawers for your media collection, cooling fans for your higher powered components or a sliding shelf for your turntable. Elegant styling includes brushed steel handles and European hinges. Available in Rosewood, Black Ash or Cherry. 22.75" H, 66.75" W, 23.875" D, The StudioTech U-22S standalone pieces can be added to the aforementioned component cabinets or used by themselves. 22" H, 24 3/8" W, 23 7/8" D.
Orb Audio Mod1 Speakers
Street Price: $639
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Five Mod1 pod-shaped satellite speakers and one powerful Super Eight audiophile subwoofer make up the Orb Audio Home Theatre System, offering high style and exceptional performance. Orb Audio's "Small Speakers for Smart People" offer bombastic 5.1 surround sound rivaling big box speakers and comes in Pearl White Gloss or Metallic Black Gloss or, for an additional charge, Hand Polished Steel (+$100) or Hand Antiqued Copper (+$150).
Audio Engine 5 iPod Speakers
Street Price: $349
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Audio Engine 5 allows you to power up your iPod (or any portable audio player that charges via USB) while listening to your tunes with a built in power amp. Designed for compatibility with portable audio players, plasma TVs, game consoles, PDAs, mobile phones and more, these stylish and compact bookshelf speakers smoothly deliver solid sound for your living room, bedroom or home office. The silk dome tweeters for a sweet sounding high end along with Kevlar woofers and built-in subwoofer ports that deliver super low-end bass make for one slick system at an affordable price. The speakers are available in black or white and come with and a 30-day money back guarantee to boot.
Logitech Wireless DJ
Street Price: $249.99
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Play all of your PC's downloaded tunes through your home stereo with the Logitech Wireless DJ. Simply connect your PC and stereo and the wireless remote will allow you to view, scroll through and select songs from your MP3 or WMPA collection, as well as Podcasts and Internet Radio, right from the sofa. The DJ Add List function will allow you to select tunes as the mood strikes during your next party, or you can pass it around so guests can select which songs they would like to hear without an interruption in the music. Compatible with iTunes, Windows Media Player, Musicmatch and others.
Motorola KRZR
Street Price: $149.99
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Motorola's newest cell phone on the market is their thin, reflective MotoKRZR offering up a sleek design and clean lines. The metallic gloss front with razor-thin design is a scant 16mm thin x 42mm wide x 103mm long and weighs in at just 3.6 ounces. This tiny little package delivers large on extra features, including a 2 MP camera, 25-minute video and audio capture (and playback capabilities), an MP3 player, high-speed web access and connectivity with compatible Bluetooth devices. Additional features include two speakers on the chin piece as well as a mini USB port.
Nintendo Wii
Street Price: $249
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Wii takes players off the sofa and lets gamers get into the game with a wireless handheld Wii Remote Controller. The Wii controller gives players the opportunity to mimic backhanding a tennis ball, swinging a golf club, steering a car, wielding a sword and so much more from up to 30 feet away, while players watch themselves onscreen via the Mii caricature of their choosing. The white Wii console is small and inconspicuous at 8.5 inches long, 6 inches wide and less than 2 inches thick and, according to manufacturers, is about the size of 3 DVD cases stacked on top of each other. Wii Sports, consisting of five different sporting games, tennis, baseball, golf, bowling and boxing, is included with the hardware. The Wii console communicates wirelessly with Nintendo DS as well as the Internet via IEEE 802.11 or a Wii LAN adapter and is backward compatible with Nintendo GameCube games. Helpful and entertaining Menu, Mii, News, Photo, Forecast and Internet channels are built right into the console and accessible via the remote.
Sony Playstation 3
Street Price: $599.99
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The Sony PlayStation 3 delivers high-definition gaming with stellar graphics via the super fast microprocessor, the Cell Broadband Engine, offering depth and visual clarity like never before. PlayStation 3 offers the ability to access the Internet, store and view photos and play CDS, hi-def Blu-ray discs and DVDs as well as PS one and PlayStation 2 games. Additionally, the system easily interacts with PSPs to exchange photos, videos and music. The PlayStation 3 comes in two flavors, the core model with an upgradeable 20 GB hard drive, Blu-ray drive, an HDMI port and Bluetooth wireless controllers, and the premium model with a 60 GB hard drive, flash card readers and WiFi wireless networking.
iHearSafe Earbuds
Street Price: $24.99
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With all of the talk lately about hearing loss and earbuds, play it safe and grab some of the iHearSafe Volume Limiting Earbuds for yourself and your kids. The earbuds deliver sound up to 80 db, but no higher, regardless of how high the volume is cranked and are compatible with most MP3 players, GameBoys, video games, cell phones and stereos.
Sennheiser CX300 Earbuds
Street Price: $69.99
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While the headphone world is awash in canalphones from companies like Etymotic, Shure, Ultimate Ears, and a number of other companies new to this market like Creative, Sennheiser has always had to enter the scene with a little pizzazz. The CX300 is no exception, and their unique approach to the ear bud may appeal to a wider audience. Sennheiser rarely disappoints, and the CX300 continues this tradition.
Apple iPod Shuffle
Street Price: $76
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The new 1 GB iPod shuffle (2nd Gen.) may very well be the tiniest music player on the planet at just 1.62 inches long, weighing just about one half ounce. The affordable and surprisingly sturdy portable device holds up to 240 songs, can play for up to 12 continuous hours and can be clipped onto that mysterious fifth pocket on your jeans, your belt loop, or better yet, the stocking that's hanging above the fireplace.
Canon Digital Rebel XTi
Street Price: $799
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The 10.1 MP Canon Digital Rebel XTi is a great choice for a compact, lightweight EOS digital SLR camera that offers crisp clarity and an outstanding tonal range via the DIGIC II Image Processor and 3904x2598 pixel resolution. The speedy 0.2 second startup, large 2.5-inch LCD monitor, three frames-per-second shooting with a 27 frame burst, a precise 9-point auto focus system and compatibility with over 60 EF and EF-S lenses, makes this camera flexible enough for any photographer.
Samsung BD-P1000
Street Price: $799.99
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HDTV has surpassed the viewing quality of DVDs, now it's time to upgrade to the next generation of players, the Blu-Ray Disc player. Be on the cutting edge of this new technology with Samsung's BD-P1000 Blu-Ray Disc player, offering up exceptional clarity, color and multi-channel sound. Don't toss your old DVDs and CDs just yet; the Samsung player can handle it all.
Sony Mylo
Street Price: $349.95
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The Sony mylo (my life online) personal communicator is the latest cool tool keeping the kids connected. The What's Up screen lets them know who's online and how they can communicate, whether it's instant messaging via Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk or Skype, as well as Internet voice calls via Skype. The pocket-sized mylo can also access the web for wireless browsing, play ripped CDs or downloaded tunes (MP3, WMA, ATRAC), send and receive web mail, store photos and show videos.
Panasonic VDR-D300
Street Price: $599
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The Panasonic VDR-D300 is the first DVD camcorder to utilize three 1/6-inch 800k pixel CCDs instead of one single imaging device. Write the disc, then pop it into the DVD player to watch for instant gratification. The VDR-D300 comes loaded with Optical Image Stabilization to reduce the jitters, 3.1 MP still shot capability, 10x Leica Dicomar optical zoom and a mighty flash. The camcorder comes with a battery and charger, DC cable, remote, shoulder strap, A/V and USB cables, a 3-inch DVD-RAM disc, a software CD ROM and, of course, an owner's manual.
Thanko USB Optical Mouse w/ Warmer
Street Price: $25
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Those with cold hands (especially during the winter months) can rejoice with Thanko USB Optical Mouse with Warmer. Not intended for the sweaty-palmed hardcore gamer, this palm-warming mouse, connected via a USB port, has comfortable rubber padding and allows the user to adjust the heat from the back of the mouse to the desired comfort level.
Belkin Freestyle Wireless USB Hub
Street Price: $129.99
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Not too sexy, but oh so liberating, the Belkin Freestyle Wireless USB Hub offers an easy way for you to connect your ever-increasing number of USB devices to your computer. The hub takes you from one to four ports without a cable and with no additional software.
Or, opt for the prettier and cheaper, but not wireless, Belkin USB 7-Port Plus Hub (F5U307). The lime green USB stacked hub turns one measly port into seven. $49.99, www.belkin.com
Blackberry 8700c
Street Price: $249.99
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They don't play music or take digital photos. Oh no. Blackberrys are serious devices intended to keep busy people organized and communicating via email and phone. The Blackberry 8700c is the first broadband Blackberry, working on Cingular's EDGE network, which gives this model faster downloads – further enhancing the "crackberry-ness" of the device. The new model also has double the internal memory, a 35-key QWERTY keyboard and now, new MP3 ringtones to add a little humor to that endlessly ringing business phone.
Logitech Harmony 1000
Street Price: $499.99
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The Logitech Harmony 1000 Advanced Universal Remote is truly an advanced version of the universal remote, complete with an intuitive touch screen control, as opposed to buttons, designed for the serious home theatergoer. The screen displays options most relevant to the device you are accessing, such as track controls while listening to CDs or skip forward and back controls while using the DVR. To load up commands, the Harmony 1000 utilizes an online database to download codes of 175,000 devices for over 5,000 manufacturers by matching a component's model number to the codes and commands stored on Harmony's website. These codes are then programmed automatically through a USB connection.
OQO 01+
Street Price: $1399
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Need a serious stocking stuffer? The OQO 01+ uPC may be your answer, as it is quite possibly the most portable PC in the world. This tiny, full-featured Windows XP system weighs in at under a pound, is less than one inch thick and is a touch smaller than ¼ the size of a standard sheet of paper. The small device is not short on performance with WiFi and Bluetooth capabilities, along with a touch screen, pointer, scroll wheel and a slide-out thumb-driven keyboard. The 01+ also sports a Transmeta 1 GHZ CPU, 512 MB RAM and, to reduce the chances of lost info, a shock-mounted 30-gig hard drive that will park the drive in the event the unit is dropped. The unit has a 3-hour max battery life, even with a smaller battery.