Drums:

Drum Kit Shirt: Sure, you could by a real drum kit—but that can be expensive. This drum kit shirt plays seven drum sounds when you tap different areas and it will only set you back $30. [Think Geek via Link]

Drum Table: Yup...it's a table with drums built-in. The way I see it, this would be a great way to score with the ladies when everyone is drinking at a party. I mean look at this dude, he seems well on his way to a foursome. Prices range from $800 to $2,900. [Musical Furnishings via Link]

DrumPants: By dismantling a MIDI keyboard and hooking it up to his pants with a couple of piezo transducers, Tyler Freeman was able to turn his legs into playable drums. If you throw the shirt on top of this, you would basically turn your entire body into a giant kit. [Link]

Guitars:

Angel Sword Guitar: Slay your fans with rock and slay your enemies with steel. Too bad this nerd axe is a one of a kind item. [Link]

Gibson's Robotic Guitar: If you are too lazy to manually tune your guitar, this Gibson will do it for you at the push of a button. Servos tune the guitar to one of seven presets with A440 as a default and the remaining six based on hit songs. Unfortunately, this limited edition instrument will set you back well over $2000 if you manage to find one. [Gibson via Link]

Moog Paul Vo Edition: Moog, a company known for their synthesizers, have branched out to the world of guitars with the Paul Vo Edition. What makes it worth $6500 you ask? Well, it sure as hell isn't looks. However, it does claim to have "infinite sustain." Sure, you can already achieve similar effects with pedals, but the Moog product site claims that it is "like no other sustainer; infinite sustain on every string, at every fret position and at any volume. You may have heard sustain before but not with this power (we call it "Vo Power") and clarity." [Moog via Link]

Synthesizers:

Beamz: The Beamz system uses a series of six lasers that play sounds from instruments like the guitar, violin and even the cowbell when the beam is broken with your hand. If it feels like a Sharper Image gadget to you, good call. Beamz was on sale there before the company went belly up. Don't let that deter you though. You can still get your hands on one from the Beamz website for $400. Oh, and this video is the most hysterically uncomfortable thing I have watched in a long time. [Beamz via Link]

Korg DS-10: Unlike Guitar Hero, you can actually use this game to make music. Basically, Korg took their famous MS-10 synthesizer and squeezed it onto a DS. It features a four-part drum machine, six-track (analog synth x 2, drum machine x 4) /16-step sequencer, delay, chorus and flanger sound effects and the ability to exchange sounds and songs and play multiple units wirelessly. Currently available in Japan for 4,800 yen ($48). [Korg DS-10 via Link]

Piano:

Mini Grand Piano: Have you priced grand pianos lately? Yeah, we are talking tens of thousands of dollars. The good news is that this version from Segatoys will only set you back $570. The bad news is that each one of the playable keys is only 4mm wide. It may be mini, but you can still play like mozart with a stylus. [Audiocubes]

"Alternative" Instruments:

Light Up Tambourine: Okay, maybe cool instruments aren't your thing. However, that doesn't mean you can't rock out. Hey, Davy Jones got lots of chicks playing one of these back in the day. Available for $15. [LB Toys]

Air Guitar (Bonus): So you are good at Guitar Hero but you lack actual musical ability. No worries—you always have air guitar. And if you are wondering how you can get groupies doing something so lame, check out the video of air guitar champion Ochi Dainoji Yosuke doing his thing. So the lesson here is that it's not what you play but where you play it. I'll bet groupies are into anyone performing on a stage. Available for around $4. [stuff4me]

[Image via CNET.au]

You're more likely than ever to buy a smartphone, not just because they do so much more than dumb feature phones, with real email, decent web browsing and downloadable applications, but because they're cheaper than ever. With the exception of some expensive ass unlocked-but-unsubsidized European models, you generally don't have to pay more than $300 for a balls-to-the-wall smartphone—though the voice plan plus data fees can easily run you $80 or more per month. Here's a rudimentary overview of your choices (more now than ever before), why you might pick them, and why they might suck for you.

ANDROID by Google
The splashy new entrant into smartphone land, Android is Google's Linux-based open source mobile platform meant to bring real, constantly connected internet to phones. Even though it's debuting on a single phone, the G1 from HTC, expect to see the free OS show up on tons of phones, from HTC, Motorola, and others. It's totally modern and powerful, and the fact that it's open source makes it incredibly appealing to some developers, so most signs point to awesome applications and mobile internet.

Why You'll Use It Unlike BlackBerry, iPhone or Windows Mobile, there are no limits on what application developers can do. So its real strength is the power that developers hold—we're hoping to see some of the wildest, most innovative applications hit Android first. You'll have tons of hardware options, from low to high end, and pretty much any input you want—touchscreen, QWERTY, whatever—once the ball gets rolling. This is the ultimate geek phone.

Why It Sucks Developers have to plug a lot of holes right off the bat, like the complete lack of business features. If they fail to come through, it could fall flat. Not as elegant as the iPhone (though it beats, say, Windows Mobile, by leaps and bounds), it still doesn't quite pass the "mom" test.

BLACKBERRY by RIM
Research in Motion's BlackBerry started out as a glorified two-way pager before evolving into what most consider the best smartphone for email. It is also a shining validation of tightly integrated hardware/software model—they make the phones, they make the operating system. Previously it was a phone that corporations gave to people in suits because of its BlackBerry Enterprise Server, which integrates it with a corporation's email, plus its Exchange support and high security. Now, though, it's increasingly popular with real live people. The BlackBerry Bold offers the latest version of the standard OS, while the recently announced Storm uses one modified for a touchscreen.

Why You'll Use It It has the best email experience around—in part thanks to their traditionally awesome keyboards, so the touchscreen Storm is something of a risk. The OS is really to easy use, with everything neatly presented up front using rows and rows of icons. There's a reason it has surpassed Windows Mobile in marketshare and is the corporate drone phone of choice. Also, RIM seems intent on juicing up its already solid dev community, so expect even more great apps in the future. (Catching a pattern with the importance of apps?)

Why It Sucks It's totally closed and proprietary. You've gotta buy a BlackBerry phone to get the OS. If you're not using the Bold, Storm or the Flip Pearl, it's not very sexy and can easily look dated. Also, in past models, the web browsing experience was absolute garbage. Now just finding its stride as a consumer device, it's not as media-centric as some others, but that is fortunately changing as well.

IPHONE OS X by Apple
Some haters still stay that the iPhone isn't really a smartphone, but for all practical intents and purposes it is. Running a stripped down but very real version of Mac's OS X, it's one of the most powerful and modern OSes of the bunch.

Why You'll Use It It's the most attractive and usable smartphone around, period. It has the best mobile internet browser, largely thanks to multitouch navigation. But its killer feature might be its ability to run third-party apps, which come from one of the most vibrant dev communities around, and are often—but not always—actually useful. Not to mention that, as an iPod, it's also the best music phone on the planet—at least until that mystery Zune phone appears.

Why It Sucks For being so powerful and modern, it can't do things even the dumbest phones do, like MMS, or copy and paste, a smartphone standard. Also email and corporate features aren't quite up to BlackBerry standards, lacking email search among other deficiencies. Apple tightly controls it, which might hurt development and innovation. And the whole making a phone call thing itself still kinda blows.

WINDOWS MOBILE by Microsoft
Unlike the iPhone and OS X, the only thing Microsoft's smartphone OS shares with actual Windows is the name. It has its roots in Windows CE and originally went by the Pocket PC moniker before becoming Windows Mobile. Mostly for corporate troopers, the current version number is 6.1, and it comes in touchscreen and non-touchscreen flavors. It recently fell behind RIM's BlackBerry in marketshare.

Why You'll Use It Diehards swear by its power, even if it isn't so easy for Joe Six-Pack to pick up and run with. It runs on handsets from a bunch of manufacturers, and unlike the BlackBerry and iPhone platforms, you can build your own device to run it. So much of the most advanced mobile hardware you'll lay your eyes on runs Windows Mobile, including the HTC Touch HD and Sony Xperia X1. It's got a corporate soul, so it's designed for business users, and it has specialty applications (like in the medical field) that some professionals need and can't get anywhere else.

Why It Sucks There's a reason premiere Windows Mobile handset makers have become increasingly adept at covering up the user interface: It's frankly terrible, especially when it comes to touch navigation. It isn't a great media phone, has a god-awful native browser and doesn't look so hot either. Unfortunately the next version, WM7, is over a year away.

PALM GARNET
Oh, whither Palm. Without getting into the complicated story of Palm's various fits, seizures and splits, the Palm OS goes all the way back to 1996, when it powered Palm's PDAs. All but dead now, its last hurrah was on the Centro before Palm plunged ahead with Windows Mobile. Supposedly work on its Linux-powered follow-up is well under way, but it's been delayed multiple times.

Why You'll Use It Though dated, the Palm OS makes a great starter smartphone, hence the success of the cheaper-than-dirt Centro. The learning curve is shallow and it provides most of the smartphone features you expect, even if it does look like it's still trapped in 1996.

Why It Sucks Uh, it's basically dead. You probably won't see it on another phone post-Centro, Palm's more pricey phones use Windows Mobile, and prospects on the upcoming Palm OS overhaul are dicey. (They should take Android and use it as a powerful foundation for the next Palm OS, but that's just my two cents.)

SYMBIAN by Nokia
Symbian is the world's most popular smartphone platform, thanks to Nokia. The most prominent variant right now is S60. While it doesn't seem so ubiquitious in the US, abroad it's far more common. It powers some seriously sick hardware, like Nokia's N series, and has a solid dev community, though the free side of that isn't as big as on other platforms.

Why You'll Use It Did you miss the "world's most popular smartphone" thing? Buy a Nokia multimedia phone, and you buy Symbian. It offers a lot of the best smartphone features—strong email, web and calendar, plus a large global development community—in a package that is far more usable than Windows Mobile. Also, it works with Macs with far less hassle than Windows Mobile.

Why It Sucks It can be overly complicated, and still not as easy to use as a BlackBerry or the iPhone. If you're not using a really solid piece of hardware, it can be really sluggish. Also, connecting to the web can be annoying. And while it's on handsets from a couple of other manufacturers, for the most part, you had better love Nokia hardware.

And that's pretty much the lay of the land, at least for now.

Something you still wanna know? Send any questions about dumbphones, dumber people or Mark Wahlberg to tips@gizmodo.com, with "Giz Explains" in the subject line.

Earlier this week we reported on a rumor about a new "secret" manufacturing technology by Apple. Supposedly code-named "brick", this "revolutionary" process would carve a MacBook shell out of a single block of aluminum. Business Week echoed the unconfirmed information, quoting the usual analysts and citing an Apple patent, implying that the rumor may be true. Today, Engadget published an alleged spy-shot claiming that it looks like a "fancy new MacBook Pro carved out of a single piece of metal." But does it? And does the Apple patent prove anything about this fabled process?

Here's the photo that Engadget thinks is the MacBook Pro made out of a single piece of metal, passed through a Shadows & Highlights and the Levels tool in Photoshop:

Clearly, there's a seam between the top plate and the side plate. Maybe you can argue that the seam is a design feature, but then why bother going with a process that is designed to eliminate seams? A process that, according to the analysts quoted by Business Week, is "very time-intensive" and "expensive"? The original rumor even points out to a completely new factory, which seems to me suicidal in the middle of a recession.

On the other side, the seam may be an effect of the plastic that is on top of the cover, and the top of the laptop may indeed be carved out of a single piece of aluminum. But even if we assume that it is a piece of plastic on top, there are other things to consider in this story.

Business Week argues that the manufacturing technology will allow for a completely new look in the MacBook family. Indeed, when I first heard about the rumor I imagined a wild new shape. Something completely rounded—like the iPhone—in which the componentes would magically slide in and out.

However, the case we are seeing above, while elegant and simple, is not that radically different from what we are seeing now in the MacBook Air or current MacBooks Pro. Instead of having a three-dimensional shape holding the components and ports with a flat lid on top—like we have right now—this image seems to be precisely the contrary, while basically keeping the same look.

This is a perfectly valid option and we are not saying that the image above is not the real McCoy. We are saying that the stories, the "brick" rumor, the "radically" different MacBooks Pros, and the image above seem to be not compatible with each other. That's why one of them has to be false or, at least, divergent from what we have been told so far.

Then, there's a final element in all this: US Patent 7310872, which Business Week quotes in the article as an indication that Apple may be working in this method. However, far from describing the process the brick rumor is referring to, it describes a unique welding process.

A computing device having an improved enclosure arrangement is disclosed. One aspect of the enclosure pertains to enclosure parts that are structurally bonded together to form a singular composite structure. In one embodiment, structural glue is used to bond at least two unique parts together. Another aspect of the enclosure pertains to enclosure parts that are electrically bonded together to form a singular integrated conductive member. In one embodiment, conductive paste is used to bond at least two unique parts together. The improved enclosure is particularly useful in portable computing devices such as laptop computers.

As you can read in the summary and the illustrations in the gallery, this laptop building technique is all about welding and not about carving. According to the description, the new welding method will result in a strong single composite structure. It won't avoid the seams and screws, but it will reduce them. It will also increase the strength of the whole case and avoid the excessive costs of developing the completely new secret factory that the original rumor speculates about.

This welding technique seems like a progressive step, one that will provide a better product to consumers without spending too much money in completely revamped manufacturing during a time of recession. This seems more logical and affordable for a company traditionally obsessed with product margins and keeping costs down. It makes sense.

On the other side, all of it could be true. Maybe the image is real, that's a plastic on top, and the top of the new MacBook is carved out of a single block of aluminum, despite the extra cost, just too look like a simplified Titanium PowerBook, one of the most successful computers in Apple's history. And maybe the new welding technology will serve to put the resulting surfaces together.

Whatever the case is, always remember our first rule of rumors: Never believe them. Specially the ones about Apple.

Hanging out at sites like Giz may have instilled in you an insatiable, pocket-emptying gadget habit. But now we're entering a new era—the old guys on the TV are saying that soon we may not even have pockets, let alone money for them. Don't panic though: You've probably got a wealth of gadgetry sitting underutilized in your living rooms, closets and basements, just waiting to be given powerful new (not exactly authorized) features. For free.

I've collected the best firmware replacements, software mods and homebrew hacks from the DMCA-flouting, EULA-hating frontiers of gadgetland that'll breathe new life into your stable of hardware and maybe—just maybe—let you feel that lusty new-gadget rush again.

Turn Your Xbox, Old PC or Apple TV into a Genuine Media Center

Xbox Media Center is about as refined as an unauthorized hack can get, playing back virtually any audio and video format, running a bevy of console emulators and still playing your Xbox games. To be honest, this should almost be viewed as a natural update for every Xbox, which at its core is a slow but functional PC with an easy TV connection. (Any actual PCs you have lying around can run a PC-ported version of XBMC.)

Boxee is a very slick fork of the XBMC project for Mac, and it's available for Apple TV. As shipped, the Apple TV works fine within the closed iTunes ecosystem, but Boxee's support for virtually every video codec and free online video like YouTube, CNN, BBC, and Revision3 will suit your new, more destitute lifestyle a bit better.

Difficulty: Easy to Moderate. Installation is pretty straightforward in most cases, with simple Boxee and XBMC setup programs available for Windows, Mac and Linux. Before you load XBMC, though, you have to mod your Xbox with one of these methods, many of which require a specific game. After that it's all install wizards and lollipops.

Installing anything on the locked-down Apple TV used to take some serious finagling, but there are now tools that will create an automated Boxee installer on a flash drive. Just plug the drive in, restart and you're good to go.

XBMC Online Manual

Boxee

Make Over Your iPod, Archos, iRiver or Sandisk with Rockbox

It's hard to look at the current generation of media players and not admire their diverse capabilities and extensible software platforms. That's not to say that your 5th-gen iPod doesn't play back music perfectly well, or that your iRiver H10 still isn't a kickass media player, but they do feel a bit dated. Rockbox replaces your MP3 player's operating system with something more substantial, effectively making it a completely new device. You get endless codec support, advanced audio options, dozens of games, useful apps like a calculator and a text editor, plus you can choose from tons of different interface skins for a unique look and feel. Rockbox's tweaking possibilities mean you will earn admiring "what is that?" questions from friends, and it won't cost you a thing. If your player isn't supported yet just hold on—everything from the Zen Vision:M to the Toshiba Gigabeat S has a fairly active dev team.

Difficulty: Easy. Rockbox has an automated tool called the Rockbox Utility available for Windows, Mac and Linux. It does the work for you. Even better, it often automatically configures your player to dual boot with its original OS.

Rockbox Official Site

Convert Your PC or Notebook Into A Much More Expensive Mac

It's undeniable that Macs are too expensive. For many, they are considered a luxury item whose added cost doesn't justify the benefit. Luckily Apple's switch to an Intel platform opened up a world of unauthorized OS X installations which can turn your existing PC into a powerhouse Mac Pro workstation, or morph your MSI Wind or Asus EeePC into the Mac netbook that should be in their goddamn product line anyway. Check the hardware compatibility list to see if your PC is eligible for the upgrade.

Difficulty: Moderate to Hard. If you're not morally opposed to downloading iATKOS and Kalyway, which are pre-patched Leopard install DVDs (this is bit torrent territory), then the process is much like installing any other OS. If you insist on building your own patched install from a DVD you own, then, well, good luck. Always check hardware lists first, though, because driver support is everything.

OSX86 Project Page

Flash Your Crappy Router Into a Top-Line Piece of Hardware

The DD-WRT project exists for a simple reason: Most routers are physically very similar, but are priced differently because of functionality derived from software. The DD-WRT firmware unlocks the potential of the most basic routers out there—too many to name but damn if yours isn't on the list. As it turns out, your budget model is kind of impressive: Program-specific traffic throttling, professional level wireless security and radical signal boosting are just a few of the dozens of new features that can be enabled.

Difficulty: Easy. If you can't manage this one, then you don't deserve a router—installation just takes a few clicks on the device's default configuration pages. A word of caution, though: Make sure your router configuration page is totally compatible with your browser before the operation, as some choke on Firefox and can botch firmware upgrades. Stick to IE if you have the choice.

DD-WRT Project Page

Download Updated Maps For Your Old GPS

I'm referring of course to capital 'D' downloading here, mainly because at the moment GPS map updates are a racket. You could spend hundreds of dollars on map data that is freely available on Google Maps, Microsoft Live and MapQuest, among others, or you can just, you know, not. Map packs for Garmin, TomTom and Magellan units are floating around torrent sites and usually don't require much more than a simple CD image mount and run routine to set up. (Guilty conscience sold separately.)

Difficulty: Easy to Moderate. If you're just running a copy of a CD, then you'll be able to use the installation wizards. Some more involved methods for Windows CE-based devices require some SSH file transfers, but these are relatively rare.

Jailbreak Your iPhone for Wi-Fi Internet Tethering

Two internet plans are enough, but to sign on to a mobile internet contract when you've already got unlimited iPhone data feels kind of stupid. Jailbreaking your iPhone is now about as easy as performing a firmware upgrade, and there are actually multiple tethering apps. PDANet and iPhoneModem both work a treat, but keep in mind that excessive usage could draw AT&T's attention and ire: Tethering is not allowed on the data plan, even though it works fine. Both apps are available in Cydia, where you can also find a limited assortment of other apps that don't have a place in the app store.

Difficulty: Moderate. Jailbreaking can be managed through the Dev Team's fantastic Quickpwn tool, but it does take a few minutes and can go wrong if instructions aren't followed closely. After jailbreak, Cydia and Installer fill the role of the gray-market app store, functioning as simple package managers that are arguably as polished as their more legitimate younger brother.

PDANet and iPhoneModem take different approaches to tethering, but neither requires more networking expertise than it would take to, say, set up a router.

iPhone Jailbreak

PDANet

iPhoneModem

Turn Your Wii Into a Free Emulation Machine

It's more than a little infuriating to have to repurchase your childhood library of console games from the Virtual Console, especially when free PC emulators and accompanying ROMs abound on the old intertubes. All you need is a copy of Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess, an SD card and an SD reader and you're ready to install A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia, which is pretty much all anyone has ever really needed since this whole "Video Gaming Television Machine" thing got under way in the first place. Throw in extended media playback and some helpful widgets for an extra value-add.

Difficulty: Moderate. This is one of the only hacks here that needs additional hardware to work, even if it's basic. The good news is that once you find a copy of Zelda and load up your SD card, the process pretty much takes care of itself. Further app installs are taken care of through a intuitive dedicated channel.

WiiBrew WIki

A great resource for similar projects is our industrious sister site Lifehacker, where you can find a veritable treasure trove of tutorials and tricks. Have you postponed any gadget purchases until you're sure your bank is solvent? Have any other budget hardware resurrection techniques that we missed? Let us know in the comments.

First Place — OK, even I can admit this is pretty good
Second Place — I don't know where I got this reputation
Third Place — I wish

You know the Envy is well designed when you experience the initial unboxing. Generally, we're bored by the very notion of "unboxing" these days, but word is that Voodoo's chief designer is a packaging fanatic, you can totally tell by the elegantly nested, extra-heavy packaging that so carefully holds such a light, thin little notebook.

Once you have it out of the box and ready for action, you really notice how closely the Envy resembles a miniature black MacBook Pro, with a few distinct design choices to separate itself from an Apple: It's got a continuous glass face with embedded screen, so the whole front except for the webcam is seamless. And it's made of carbon fiber, which means it can be thinner (at the widest point) than a MacBook Air, but have a removable battery like a MacBook Pro.

The carbon fiber, along with a rather noisy fan, lets heat dissipate easily, so there's no sudden burning sensation on your legs when you're using it on your lap. I don't know if carbon fiber is a better sound resonator than aluminum, but the Envy's speakers sound great for being so small. They're not just better than MacBook Air's mono speaker but MacBook Pro's stereo speakers too. The carbon fiber is slick but smudgy. It didn't take long to make it look used, though a quick wipe will make it good as new—for like five minutes.

Sizemodo: Voodoo Envy 133 vs MacBook Air

To put it as bluntly as Voodoo boss Rahul Sood puts it, "This laptop is not a gaming product." It's not going to play Crysis at all, though it might achieve other, lesser games with the settings dialed down. You can tell it's not a gaming laptop because of the fact that Vista gives it a 3.1 rating out of 5 due to its integrated graphics and shared video memory; that PCMark gave it 2100 (the world's hottest machines top 15000); 3D Mark won't run because Envy's nice 13.3" 1280x800 screen is nevertheless too low rez to test; and it's not covered with flared plastic and blinky LEDs that go from green to red as you take hits during a game.

As you might know, the basic design was Intel's. The original Metro concept had some shortcomings though. It was made of plastic and had some questionable heat management. "There's no way you could sell the Metro because it would fall apart," says Sood.

Besides heat management, the key was to make the Metro design capable of carrying a removable battery that is nonetheless super thin. And it's a good thing, because the battery life on the Envy isn't great. In the most extreme situation, where it was powering the outboard DVD player and playing a movie, I could only get it to run for an hour before completely crapping out. That means no watching movies on airplanes, I'm afraid. In other less strenuous tests, the battery dwindled fast. Let me make this clear: The battery life on this baby sucks.The DVD player connects in an ingenious way. It uses an eSATA port that doubles as a USB port. Since eSATA doesn't yet have a bus-powered spec yet, the Voodoo guys figured out a way to draw power from the USB part of the jack, while doing data i/o through the faster eSATA jack. Sood says that they actually patented this technique and that's good for Voodoo, since it's certainly bound to catch on.

The little laptop even has an ExpressCard slot, which makes up for its lack of SD card reader—SanDisk makes a very nice multi-card reader for ExpressCard. It also means it won't take up a USB port to run a 3G modem, if you can get an ExpressCard version instead.

As you may recall from the launch, it has a few other gimmicks, like a slightly oversized power brick that, for its bulk, contains a mini Wi-Fi router, so you can plug Ethernet directly in. It also ships with a smart HDMI-to-VGA dongle for people who want to use it in presentations but don't want to convince corporate IT dudes that HDMI is in fact a viable video standard.

It also has a pseudo-multi-touch "pinch" feature like on a MacBook Air (or an iPhone), but instead of a smooth flow, I noticed it was kinda jerky. It could still come in handy, but to be honest, I am not sure how handy the Air's multi-touch is at this point. I consider all of this proof of concept for now.

Speaking of the trackpad, it's supposed to lock down when you have two hands on the keyboard. I don't know if I have funny shaped hands, but from time to time, I still find the trackpad acting up while I type, executing weird app and system requests, but given the fact that I have typed an awful lot with my hands touching much of the trackpad as I went along, I can easily say the auto-safety works 99% of the time.

The gimmick I am most interested in is the lightweight Linux OS called Voodoo IOS. It's the Splashtop instant-boot OS we've started to see in other places as well, and having finally sat down and played with it, I see a lot of promise. At startup, you can select to enter Windows or choose Skype, media player, web browser or photo viewer to take you into the VIOS environment. I was eager to try this out and can say that it works as billed, though I'm still divided on its ultimate practicality.

It is very handy to hop into VIOS instead of launching Windows when you want to do something minor, like launch a web browser or Skype, but I am vexed by the fact that, to enter VIOS, you have to shut down Vista and reboot—rather than choose it as a reboot option from Vista. Once in VIOS, the apps have certain limitations: The Linux version of Skype can't support the built-in webcam, copying photos from a memory card to the photo browser seemed impossible (if I'm wrong I'll settle for unintuitive), and the music program worked but just made me miss iTunes. The browser was fine—a Linux version of some Mozilla variant, if I'm not mistaken. Over all, it seemed like a pretty nice Linux environment, clean and fun, with quirky interface features like a flaming Voodoo face signifying a short wait. Who knows, it may even be a fertile ground for savvier software tweakers to play around in. Update: Just got a couple of nuggets regarding VIOS/Splashtop: Its hacker friendly open-source info is here, and it's up to Voodoo (and HP) to update the Skype on the VIOS in order for the webcam to work, so get crackin' Voodoo!

Voodoo IOS app walkthrough

Overall, I can safely say that this was the most satisfying experience I've had with a Vista notebook, and I've tried quite a few. Even while I was prepping this, my Mac started acting funny and I realized that if I had to switch to it full time, it would be far from disastrous. The only reason besides the questionable battery life that I am not gushing is that this laptop costs a hell of a lot of money. The fairly basic config with an 80GB 4200rpm hard drive that I tested starts at $2,450, and the 64GB SSD versions don't even kick in till $2,900. (The most barebones unit available is $2,100.) If these babies could come in even $500 lower, I could see a value proposition, but as it is, it's too high a price, especially when something this nice is still so far from perfection. [Voodoo Envy 133]

Wallet full of cash and bags at ready, I stood, mouth agape, in front of the five-story electronics bazaar in front of me. It was one of several dozen in Shanghai, magical places where floor after floor are filled to bursting with gadget vendors begging you to stop by and see their wares. Like Circuit Cities on crack, everyone inside is desperate to make a sale and every price is negotiable. Welcome to the way the Chinese—or at least the majority who live in megacities like this one—buy their electronics.

Just minutes earlier, I had directed a taxi driver to take me to one of the bigger tech marts, the Shanghai PC Mall, located in the Pudong area of Shanghai.

“Are you sure you don't want to go to a Best Buy? We have those here now,” he said.

It's true—Best Buy opened its largest store ever in Shanghai in 2006. Since then, it's cut the red ribbon on a second outlet and recently received permission from the government to start building four more. But what would be the point of me going there?

One of the more ironic qualities of buying electronics in China is that, despite all components being made here, foreign company goods still count as imports. Suggested retail prices are pumped even higher than they would be in the U.S.... unless you know how to negotiate for a better deal. But Best Buy frowns on bargaining, even in China.

“You aren't a local. The shopkeepers will tear you apart,” the taxi driver warned, laughing, as we approached the Shanghai PC Mall.

Well, we'd see about that. I marched resolutely in, and was automatically bombarded by three sales clerks from three different booths, all hawking the latest notebooks from some of the best known corporations—Sony, Toshiba, Dell.

“Come and browse for a minute, maybe you'll see something you like,” said one.

“Go this way, we have a special today that you might be interested in,” warbled another.

“What do you need? What do you want? Tell me, I'll find you a good deal,” the third trilled.

In every cubicle-like row is a representative who'll help fix your PC problems and, if you're not careful, sell you something you don't need.

I have to admit, the intensity startled me. Coming from New York, I was used to aisles of disaffected or otherwise nonexistent employees. The last time I'd seen such fervor was when a kid in an oversized blue shirt confirmed that I was buying something expensive and insisted I needed a longer warranty. I scuttled off quickly and the three salespeople automatically turned around to beset the next person to enter.

This time around, I wasn't hunting big game. Televisions, netbooks and DSLR cameras would have to wait until I'd become more confident in my chaffering... and had more cash.

Debit cards are still pretty rare in this country, and credit cards even more so. Most transactions still rely, ridiculously, on cold hard bills. To buy a decent laptop, I'd have to stuff my pockets with over a thousand 100-yuan notes—Chinese currency's largest denomination.

Every booth sells its own unique mishmash of gadgetry, impervious to categorization or order.

On this trip, my list was more mundane, consisting mostly of accessories and doodads. I stopped at a booth with at least thirteen brands of webcams crowded around an LCD screen. Some were from established names like Logitech, others were made by local companies I'd never heard of. After waffling a bit over the specifications of each option the shopkeeper presented me, I asked how much for a simple Chinese-branded 3-megapixel number.

“180 yuan,” she said. I paused then responded that I'd actually take it for 100 yuan.

“Done!” She packed it up quickly, grinned and stretched out her hand to take my bill. Damn it. I'd done enough bargaining in my life to know that when a deal is resolved this quickly, I'd probably been suckered. Sure $15 U.S. isn't a horrible price to pay for a webcam, but who knows how cheap I could of gotten it for if I'd been a little more ambitious.

I vowed to stick to brand name goods from then on, where at least the obsessive hours I'd spent browsing Consumer Reports and Newegg.com would give me some indication of their true value.

Floor upon glorious shiny floor of stuff!

With that in mind, I next tried my hand at nabbing a wireless router. This time around I went for something I recognized: an 802.11b/g Netgear that would run about $40 in the US. The starting price this time around was 300 yuan (or about $45). I countered with 150 and was scoffed at. Employing my best “Well, if you really aren't going to sell it to me for that much, I guess I'll just be on my way” look, I got the clerk to sigh and give it to me for 200 yuan. $10 off the US price and no sales tax added on at the end of the deal. Not too shabby.

In the next hours, I haggled over everything from speakers to hard drives to extra RAM for my laptop (installed for free, with an extra discount thrown in if I left my old memory sticks with them). I came home that day, arms loaded with new stuff, satisfied with having saved a good 20 to 25% off of US street prices.

Yes, those are iPhones (and real ones, too). No, they're not supported in China yet. Don't tell anyone, okay?

And yet, I had also figured out why Best Buy, despite its inherent inability to ever compete on cost, was doing so well over here.

Negotiating for what you want is a pain. Being accosted by vendors trying to convince you that they're the ones you should buy from is a mess of stress. Worrying about whether everything will work as promised at home is downright draining. And the funny thing was, I approached the experience as an informed consumer. It must be a thousand times more frustrating for someone with less experience, who would undoubtedly realize too late that they paid way more than they should have.

What Best Buy offers in China is a haven for the emotionally fatigued. Their stock comes at a hefty premium, but with none of the uncertainties of the tech bazaars. You'll never turn around and find the next vendor selling what you just bought for 10% less. There is no “if only I were savvier” moment. Oh—and if something is wrong with your purchase, Best Buy won't yell at you for being a doofus when you return it (well, at least not over here. The Consumerist says things might be different States-side).

That kind of psychological assurance has put the company in a peculiarly powerful position. Despite initially dire predictions, Best Buy's Shanghai outlet is now one of the company's top-10 revenue generators worldwide. This is probably why three of its four new China stores will be located in this city.

But would I head there the next time I need a quick gadget fix? Heck no. Somewhere back at the Shanghai PC Mall, there's a netbook with my name on it. And it's waiting for me to win it in a bargaining battle for the ages. Paying retail? That's for sissies.

Who doesn't love bargains (and Jackie Chan)?

[Thanks to Josh Bancroft for several of the images]

Well, things aren't looking too great economy-wise. We might just be headed for a depression, which means you'll need to start changing your lifestyle. While you may start out by changing your lifestyle in subtle ways, you need to be mentally prepared for the fact that more, well, drastic measures may be necessary in the not-too-distant future. Luckily, I've hand-picked 10 gadgets that may be necessary in our frightening, Lehman-Brothersless future.

10. The first thing you're gonna want to do is start saving money. This Tomy RPG Piggy Bank makes saving money fun by featuring a simple game on the front that utilizes the money you insert into it. Make saving a game, you'll be more apt to do it! [Link]

9. A good way to save money is to stop using so much electricity. This energy saving remote lets you cut the power to all of your home theater electronics that suck up juice even when they're off. This should save you precious dollars every month. [Link]

8. Not everyone will be as responsible as you, and they may get desperate and try to steal your precious financial documents. Keep them locked up in this really intense hard drive/safe combo. It's fireproof and waterproof, so you can be sure nothing will happen to your data. [Link]

7. It's not just your digital property that you need to protect, its your physical property as well. This lock uses your fingerprint to allow access, so only you and your family will be able to get into your house when the looting and rioting begin. [Link]

6. OK, so they've cut the power to your home and you've barricaded yourself inside. You obviously can't go to the grocery store for food as all of the stores have been overtaken by roving bands of weapons-wielding former stock brokers, so you should ensure you've got plenty of non-perishable food to last you through the financial crisis. [Link]

5. So they set your house on fire, forcing you to flee into the woods. What you'll need is a tent that's quick to set up and quick to pack up when you hear the sounds of the bloodthirsty brokers crashing through the underbrush. This self-pitching tent sets itself up in the air as you throw it, allowing you to set up camp quickly and easily. [Link]

4. You'll want to be able to know the weather and charge your phone while you're on the run, and this is the device to do it for you. Assuming the national weather services haven't been overrun and destroyed, you'll be able to check on the forecast while charging your gadgets with this. [Link]

3. You need to escape the city, where all the former bankers are based, and since cars are susceptible to bombs and rocket launchers, you'll need something a bit more tough. The Rhino can withstand just about anything that's thrown at it and keep you and whatever is left of your family safe inside. [Link]

2. OK, so you needed to get out of the Rhino and dole out some punishment man-to-man. This recoilless auto shotgun can fire off 300 rounds per minute, making quick work of anyone with a blue shirt with white cuffs flecked with human blood around. Just make sure to pick up plenty of extra ammo while you're at it. [Link]

1. So you didn't make it. That's disappointing! You can at least leave a lasting memorial to yourself with your last near-worthless American dollars by purchasing this digital tombstone with your dying breath. It can display videos on its LCD monitor of you in happier times, buying gasoline for less than $150 a gallon and owning a house that actually has some value. Maybe in heaven things will be like that again. For your sake, I hope so. [Link] [Top image via Pink Tentacle]

High on the list of gadget annoyances that make me want to scab my eyes out with a spork—just below cables and batteries—is the unfettered proliferation of memory cards. Even though they all fundamentally do the same thing—store data for handheld devices—they come in a million different sizes and shapes from almost as many companies, giving birth to retarded but necessary accessories. Anyone looking for proof of this can stop at the 80-in-1 card reader. Unfortunately, many of these dumb pieces of silicon and plastic aren't going extinct. As a consolation prize, here's an illustrated guide to all the ones you actually need to know.

CompactFlash is like the Big Mac of memory cards: It may be bulky, but no McRib is going to take its place any time soon. It long ago moved out of the consumer-oriented gadgets now primarily using SD card, but it's the go-to for pro digital SLR cameras because it's durable as hell, it can hold more data (up to 100GB) and transfer it a lot faster (up 66MB/s with the revision 3.0, though higher capacity cards don't yet reach that rate). All of that matters if you're shooting massive RAW photos at several frames a second in less-than-pampered conditions.

CompactFlash UDMA: The latest version of the CompactFlash spec, 4.0 adds support for the Ultra DMA 133 interface, pumping the maximum data transfer rate to 133MB/s. Looks the same as a regular CF card, but will have UDMA stamped on it. Enables longer burst shooting in the latest DSLRs, besides just sounding impressive. Of course, this parallel ATA interface is on the fast track to be slow balls, with a serial ATA based spec in the works that'll deliver 3-gigabit transfer rates, that is, nearly 400MB/s.

Secure Digital, better known as SD, is the memory card of the people. This sliver of plastic is the reigning king of storage in everyday gadgets, from digital cameras to the Nintendo Wii to non-iPod MP3 players to hell, my (admittedly fancy) alarm clock. Most new (non-Mac) notebooks come with an SD card slot, even if they don't support other cards. Its primary advantage over CompactFlash is smaller size—maybe the perfect memory card size, even. On the other hand, the standard version format is significantly slower, stores less data (the spec allows for up to 2GB, larger sizes exist) and is way more fragile. But damn if they aren't cheap.

Secure Digital High Capacity pretty much spells it out in the name—an extension of the SD format that allows for more storage (up to 32GB) and much faster write speeds (SanDisk's latest hit 30MB/s). Classes—2, 4 or 6—let you know what the card's minimum transfer speed is. The major catch is that while they look the same as a regular SD card, SDHCs won't work in older card readers. Most electronics are quietly swapping in readers that can support SDHC, and of course regular SD cards work wherever they physically fit.

MiniSD is, you guessed it, a smaller variant of the SD card format that's about a third of the size. And yes, there's an HC variant to bring its capacity past 2GB, just like SD to SDHC. Originally for the mobile phone space, it's basically been squeezed out by the even retardedly smaller microSD. Truth is, miniSD is all but extinct now. Fortunately it usually comes with an SD slot adapter, so old ones can just be used as standard SD cards.

MicroSD and its microSDHC step-up are ridiculously tiny, and though they're used in MP3 players and other gadgets, they now completely dominate removable storage on cellphones. They've got basically the same specs as the other SD and SDHC card flavors in theory, but they're not quite as speedy or obviously up to the same crazy capacities. Officially they are way too easy to lose.

MultiMediaCard is the format from which SD and its offspring descended. (Its looks should give it away.) There are a few variants, but since it's been displaced by its SD spawn, you probably won't run into them. They're even dissolving the MMC Association, if that tells you anything. The important thing to know is that if you come across one, it'll work in many—but not all—SD card readers.

Memory Stick and its 300 variations: Okay, it gets kind of ugly with Sony's essentially proprietary Memory Stick format. Once upon a time, Samsung, Sharp and possibly others had Memory Stick readers in certain portable electronics, but the days of non-Sony Memory Stick sightings are long gone. If I could punch the embodiment of Sony in the nuts for any single reason, it would likely be due to the continued existence of all 65,000 Memory Stick formats. Here's the rundown:

The original Memory Stick, which is now obsolete, ran in sizes from 4MB to 128MB. There was also the Memory Stick Select, which was basically like two Memory Sticks crammed together with a switch to flip between the two.

Memory Stick PRO was the first legit sequel to the Memory Stick. It's faster, and theoretically holds up to 32GB, but has only been released in versions up to 4GB. PROs with more than 1GB of storage use a High Speed mode for faster transfers.

Memory Stick Duo was Sony's stab at getting small, shrinking its hot-dog proportioned Memory Stick into an SD-card sized package. Otherwise, it's just like a regular Memory Stick, stuck at 128MB and all. With an adapter it'll fit in regular Memory Stick readers too.

Memory Stick PRO Duo has the same SD-like form factor as the original Duo, but allows for much higher capacities and transfer speeds, about on par with SDHC cards. The highest capacity card is currently 16GB. Yes, there's still more Memory Stick where that came from.

Memory Stick PRO-HG Duo is the latest and largest mouthful of the Memory Sticks. Its big hurrah is that its 8-bit parallel interface gives you transfer speeds of up to 30MB/s, and the faster rates are majorly important for HD cameras. There is, unbelievably, another version, the PRO-HG Duo HX.

Memory Stick Micro aka M2 is the tiniest end of the line, comparable to a microSD card. Guess what it's used in? Sony Ericsson phones. Sadly, SanDisk participates in this farce of a format, along with the PRO-HG. The fattest available size is 16GB, which is notably pricier than its microSD cousin. Predictably, cards with heftier storage don't always play nice in older readers.

xD-Picture Cards are another BS format, created by second-tier camera makers Olympus and Fujifilm, that should just roll over and get smushed by the SD train. There, as always, a few different flavors—M, H, and M+—each one successively boosting capacity and/or speed but all fitting in the same small thin form. They're really only used in (you guessed it) Olympus and Fujifilm cameras—Kodak dabbled before hopping on the SD Express—and pathetically they only hold up to 2GB. Die already. Update: Okay, it does have one legit use—as a commenter has pointed out, it's descended from the extinct SmartMedia format, and provides easy access to a standard NAND flash chip, making it ideal for ROM-dumping for hackers.

SxS is another Sony-developed format, but it's geared toward pros and HD camcorders, with transfer speeds of 800Mb/s. It's available in sizes up to 32GB, but obscenely expensive—Sony sells the 16GB card, with one hour of recording time, for $1100. Conveniently, it uses the ExpressCard form factor, so it'll pop right in some notebooks.

P2 is another fancy ass, pricey pro-level card for camcorders, but it was developed by SD-pimpin' Panasonic. Not surprisingly, it was originally a bundle of SD cards in striped RAID array, but now it just uses core memory components in a RAID setup, contained in a ruggedized shell that fits into PC Card slots. It too goes up to 32GB, but the transfer rate is slower than SxS, at around 640Mbps. On the other hand, it's cheaper too, at $900 for a 16GB card.

And that, friends, should just about do you, at least for a little while, or until Sony releases its next Memory Stick flavor of the week.

Something you still wanna know? Send any questions about memory, Johnny Mnemonic or blackjack to tips@gizmodo.com, with "Giz Explains" in the subject line.

P.S. What other kinds of tech would you like to see an illustrated guide for?

Meet Dorothy. At 150 inches diagonal, she’s the world’s largest plasma screen and the biggest direct-view TV ever made, built (and named) by Panasonic. We got to play with her recently and as you've seen, it was mind-meltingly awesome. Even though firsthand experiences with Dorothy are akin to filling a leaf blower with nitrous oxide to jet-huff directly into your brain, Dorothy's backstory is almost as incredible, especially when it comes to manufacturing, shipping and yes, managing all the electricity needed to fire her up. So even though you will absolutely never own one—except for you Giz-reading NBA stars and platinum-selling rappers—the story of the world's most advanced television is a thrill, and serves as a crystal ball to the future of all TV. Come, talk to her. She's intimidating, but it'll be good for you.

Why "Dorothy"?
There are currently five 150-inch Panasonic plasmas in existence—and a sixth for CES 2009 is currently being assembled. They’ve been named, appropriately enough, like hurricanes—starting with A and working down. Dorothy’s number 4, hence the D.

Why 150 inches?
It’s all about the upper limits of the manufacturing process. Panel factories crank out the largest single piece of “mother glass” they possibly can, so that they can cut more large TVs per pane of manufactured glass. The ultimate size of a piece of mother glass is limited by the glass’s strength and uniformity—how large the thing can get without cracking. Panel makers will always be pushing this boundary, because the more 50-inch TVs you can get out of each single assembly-line run, the more money you can make on them even if they're selling at lower prices in stores.
Panasonic’s previous biggest piece of mother glass was 103 inches (remember?), from which four 50-inch plasmas could be cut. Their new manufacturing plant, Amagasaki 5 in Japan, has pushed the max to 150 inches—enough glass to birth nine 50-inch plasmas. Dorothy’s as big as she is because she literally swallowed nine TVs. When manufacturing evolves further, creating even larger panes of mother glass, you could see larger trade-show sets, provided they fit through the convention-center doors. 103 inches, how quaint. And look at that lil' 42-incher, looking fit for bathroom viewing only by comparison.

What’s the resolution?
Typically called 4K, it's resolution is 3996x2160. Even though you could technically call this 2160p, it's important to recognize that it's four times as tight as 1080p. Think four 1920x1080 panels Voltroning together to make something that's 8 megapixels, as opposed to the best current TVs' 2 megapixels. The annoying thing is that the industry went from measuring vertical resolution—720p and 1080p—to horizontal resolution—2K and 4K. (More on that here.)

As a result, watching a 1080p Blu-ray disc upscaled on Dorothy is akin to watching a standard-def DVD upscaled on your HDTV. As you can see in the shot below, the upscaler uses two pixels to render a one-pixel wide line from a test disc. But at Dorothy’s scale, it’s less about spotting compression artifacts, which are most visible when you’re close enough to induce nausea anyway. It’s about getting your face blown off.

How’s it stack up to Pioneer’s Kuro, one of the top plasmas in the game?
As far as motion-resolution goes—the all-important ability to maintain crisp images while they’re in motion on the screen—it's actually better. According to HD Guru Gary Merson (who was more interested in running his calibration discs on the 150 than sticking with us for some Counter Strike, God bless ’im), the 150-incher, even as a prototype, scored a resolution of 920 lines on a 1080i signal. Pioneer’s ’08 Kuros, the next best, scored 900. Our bet is that Dorothy can't best the Kuro in the contrast department, but as you can see from all of our shots, it's no slouch. Check out more performance specs in Gary’s 125-TV mega-guide. Below: Gary testing motion resolution.

How much power does she suck down, and at what cost?
Dorothy is addicted to raw electricity—we’re talking two dedicated 15-amp, single-phase, 208-volt lines which produce around 3,000 watts on average. Dorothy peaks at around 7,000 watts of direct consumption. Not exactly EnergyStar.

If I plugged Dorothy in at my apartment (that is, after removing my second-floor balcony door and window and much of the exterior wall while at it, and hiring a crane to bring the TV in), Dorothy’s juice habit would run me around $1.50 per hour of use, at ConEd’s current price of 22 cents per kilowatt-hour. So, after renting the Godfather Blu-ray set, factor in about $15 more in electricity charges for watching the whole thing.

How much heat does the thing put off?
We were expecting getting close to Dorothy was going to feel like putting our faces in a toaster oven. Even standard-size Kuros can feel a little warm. But surprisingly, up front, the heat was far from extreme. It very well could be channeled out the back, but we didn’t see any industrial-grade heat sinks behind her, either, or hear any fans blowing away. (Note: We're not allowed to show photographs of Dorothy's rear, though we did have a peek.)

How much does she weigh?
Around 1,700 pounds not including the stand. For comparison, an actual Mini Cooper with Adam in the driver’s seat weighs about 2,800 pounds.

How does Dorothy get around?
With great care and difficulty. After her inception at Amagasaki 5, Dorothy and her sisters were tested then sent on the trade-show circuit. Unlike the 103, they’re too big even for wooden crates. All that protects Dorothy and her sisters from the elements are the thin membranes of bubble wrap and Styrofoam wrapped around them, and the tarp draped over the open shipping cage. That’s all. Here's a fun fact: Only two 150-inchers can fit in a single 747 cargo hold at a time.

Although we saw a 150-incher at CES last January, Dorothy’s first trip was to IFA in Berlin this September. Afterward, she headed for Panasonic’s North American HQ in Secaucus, NJ where we got the chance to meet. She’s due to appear on Wall Street today (unfortunate timing for the poor girl) for the official US debut, then on to trade shows in Dubai, Singapore and Hong Kong before returning home again to Japan.

Thanks for the facts, but what was that about a "mind-meltingly awesome" experience again? Any way to demonstrate that, say with a video of Gran Turismo 5's in-car view?
Why yes we can, and we'll throw in the 42-inch steering wheel for free:

There's more where that came from: check out more hands-on 150-inch action here and here.

How big is too big? That's the question that you inevitably ask yourself once you spend any amount of time with Panasonic's new 150-inch plasma TV prototype. We visited it in Panasonic's towering warehouse in Secaucus, New Jersey last Friday, running it through its paces with 4K footage, Blu-ray movies and Playstation 3 games. After spending a day with it, was it the type of thing I honestly wanted to set up in my living room?

Maybe. Maybe not. The standards that we use to measure other TVs don't apply here. Have you ever seen a TV taller than yourself? A TV that uses more energy than your washer and dryer? A TV that needs to be carried around on a forklift? I'm guessing you haven't. This thing is in a category all its own.

Man, is it impressive. If you stand within a few feet of it, it fills your entire field of vision, quickly making you motion sick if you're playing video games or watching a movie with lots of action. Even standing 20 feet away, you still feel like the TV is the only thing in the room. It's a 4K set, so if you've got the proper ultra-HD footage pumping into it, it makes 1080p look like a second-rate resolution, but even with 1080p, it's absolutely stunning.

Iron Man looked like he was going to jump out of the TV. Robert Downey, Jr.'s baby blues were the size of watermelons in anything closer than a medium shot. Everything was just so big. Seeing a shark leap fully out of the water to devour a seal in Planet Earth becomes even more mindblowing when the shark approaches life size.

And video games? Forget about it. You haven't lived until you've played Call of Duty with life-sized enemies. As I decimated Mahoney over and over again (note to Mahoney: you suck), I felt my hands getting slick with sweat on the controller, my head whipping back and forth to try to see him around corners. My body felt a dissonance because I wasn't moving my legs or having my body jolted with recoil from my automatic weapon.

I've played video games on big TVs before. I visited Panasonic last year to do similar, uh, "tests" on their 103-inch plasma. And while that was awesome, it still felt like playing games and watching movies on a really big TV. The 150 transcends regular TV to become something more. It's like something out of a sci-fi movie, a living wall, a form of primitive virtual reality. It's so overwhelming that you can't really fathom putting it in your house because you can't see it fitting into any kind of reality you inhabit.

Inside the warehouse, we placed a 42-inch plasma next to it that looked pathetic, like something you'd put over your toilet to watch SportsCenter while you take a leak. I wanted to put it in my pocket. Even the 103-incher looked sad and small next to it. And trust me, a 103-inch TV doesn't look sad or small in too many situations.

If this were a true review, I'd have to complain that, since a 4K TV does to 1080p what your new HDTV does to standard-def, you're bound to watch a lot of crappy looking TV on this. If 1080p looks bad, think about all of the channels that come through in standard def. And if you're planning on streaming Netflix movies via your Xbox onto this TV, be prepared for digital artifacts the size of your head.

But you know what? This TV isn't designed for you to put in your living room. Sorry. It's a TV from the future, generously time-teleported back to the present by our friends at Panasonic. You aren't going to hook a VCR up to this thing, and neither are they; it is designed to run with precision-mastered footage, and our current lack of worthy video doesn't diminish the ridiculous potency of the thing.

Believe it or not, Panasonic will begin selling the 150-inch plasma sometime next year, probably for about twice as much as the $70,000 103-incher. Will it be snapped up by anyone? Probably. There are always sultanates and NBA stars looking to have the biggest and most expensive TV in the world, and this definitely fits that bill. But again I'll ask: Is it something normal people would benefit from having in their living room?

I'd say no, but not out of broke resentment and the fact that this would quadruple my energy bill and require me to knock down most of the walls of my home to even get it inside. I don't think people should put this in their living rooms because, when you get down to it, this isn't a TV. I don't want to imagine people watching Two and a Half Men on it. To check the weather on The Weather Channel on this thing would be an act approaching sacrilege. It's more than a TV: it's a glimpse into the future, it's a brazen display of hubris and overkill, and it's a visceral, skin-searing experience. It belongs on spaceships and in museums, not in living rooms. It's only right.

When the T-Mobile G1 was shown off in NYC last week, it didn't have the gusto of a Stevenote. There was no "boom!"—no "one more thing!" And as a result, many (including us) felt a bit underwhelmed, and were quick to interpret the device's inconsistent GUI as an indicator that the lack of attention to detail would doom it.

But allow me to remind all of those getting their naysay on this early in the game that we've seen only a fraction of what the G1 can and will be able to do with the open-source Android OS. And when Google's mobile machine is finally humming at full power—with an army of coders cranking out add-ons for the Market, today's skeptics—including some of us—are going to have to eat crow. It's not about pretty icons, Apple fanboys, and its not about business use, Windows Mobile Nerds: its about giving people the true tools to build whatever they want without lame App Store limitations and OS handcuffs. It's about giving phone makers shackled to Symbian and Microsoft's phone OS the chance to build with something different and better and free. And who's going to complain about that?

Back to Apple for a minute: The iPhone has brainwashed us into thinking everything that's revolutionary and exciting in the gadget world needs to be a sex object. Now, I enjoy an Apple hardware brainfuck as much as the next, but a phone is never a better phone because of hardware alone, and Google knows this too. And it will be entering the market at a time when iPhone’s software strategy is starting to show wobbly legs. If you’ve been reading our weekly app roundups, you’ve probably noticed the story shifting away from clever developers doing cool things no one previously thought possible to more about what Apple won't let iPhone developers and users do with their phones. As a result, we’ve seen tons of variety, but not a lot of depth. There are a ton of clever calculator apps of various kinds. There are a ton of games, a ton of flashlights. But in the groundbreaking and unexpected functionality department, all anyone can hear lately is crickets. And Apple's lawyers trying to get the crickets to sign an NDA.

No one else makes a legitimate phone OS with all this support that can be tweaked down to the very roots. For one thing, I'm excited to be able to download an entirely different version of all of Android’s core applications if I don't like the default 1.0 versions—and that’s every app, everything from the dialer to the contacts manager—something that's technically possible in WinMo but often comes off more as an awkward re-skinning and not a top-down integration. I'm excited to add system-level features to my phone for free, and not just apps that are only allowed to bounce around on the surface. These are the benefits that an open platform will allow developers to provide to Android users, and the benefits that Google hopes all mobile phone customers will come to expect from their phones as a result.

This is all banking on the platform being successful, of course, which is obviously up in the air this early on. But would Google mount such a huge undertaking as Android if they were only expecting to be a different flavor of Windows Mobile? That seems hard to believe.

Everyone who gave the G1 a quick run-through last week was in reality testing a product still in beta. Because as we’ve said repeatedly, Android is now in the hands of its developers (from within Google itself as well as third-parties), who will have unprecedented access to all parts of a mobile phone and a centralized distribution network (Android Market) in order to do things that have only been teased until now. It’s all banking on the Market, and its ability to attract grade-A content that will provide even novice cellphone users with many opportunities to greatly customize their phones.

To do this Android will need one thing: critical mass, on both the developer and consumer side, in that order—with each reinforcing the other. Its pre-release may be sold-out, but on October 22 there probably won't be campers and local news crews stretched for miles outside of the T-Mobile store. That's because Google knows who they need to go after first—the developers. The geek community. It wasn't a coincidence that at launch, Sergey Brin came on stage on Rollerblades bragging about his accelerometer phone-toss app that he wrote himself. This first release is all about getting developers into Android, and giving them a similar open dev environment that Larry and Sergey will be the first to tell you they couldn't have built Google without. The iPhone didn't get that until version 2.0, many firmware releases later—and it's still not nearly as open as Android will be. (The iPhone also couldn't reliably hold a call without dropping for many until version 2.1, but that's besides the point.)

Open source has failed many times before, critics will say. Here's why Android will not fail in this regard: governance. Google told us that priority number one right now with Android is setting the standards by which the project will operate—what makes a device Android 1.0 compatible, how often full system upgrades will be offered, and the like. One thing that's fairly evident, though, is that an upgrade path will have to be fairly regimented (closer to Ubuntu’s strict twice-yearly schedule, rather than the “release whenever we feel like it” model found in other smaller projects) in order to keep all of the members of the huge Open Handset Alliance all on the same page. There will be no folks still waiting for their carrier to release Windows Mobile 6.1, years after it was made available. Android will not and cannot operate like this—to keep the Market thriving, all of the developers and users will need to be on the same (regular) release schedule. So, while they're taking care of the problems of being open source, they're also taking care of the same problems that a paid platform like Windows Mobile has.

Google has their eyes on the long haul with Android. Which is why reactions to a somewhat scattered UI in the very first implementation is not something they're worried about too much. This is a platform about further reducing the mobile carriers to raw pipes of data, and giving full control to the consumer. It’s about creating a critical-mass open-source ecosystem. And even if they fail to sell a ton of handsets, they've already put pressure on all the carriers and phone makers by the fact that they've created a free alternative that does not have to win to impact the players in this industry.

Of course, all of these arguments can be debated, but there's one thing that no no one can argue with: You don't take Google lightly.

Aperture Settings
The coolest thing about shooting with a DSLR is the fact that you can switch lenses, so the second coolest thing is inherently that you can tweak the aperture. (As a video camera shooting a constant 30fps, there's of course no shutter control.) I found that shooting family members with a 50mm lens at really low f-stops can be amazing as long as they're not moving around so much. If you have a moving target, like a cat, for instance, you can just dial up the f-stop to narrow it. You may sacrifice a bit of the intimacy of a portait shot, but you can keep your moving subject in a greater depth of field. As you can see from the rubber duck shots, though, it's not too great a depth.

Manual Focus and Zoom
I find that shooting with a tripod makes everything a lot easier with this camera, which is of course a flaw when it comes to mobility and capturing the moment. Staged shoots—like the one above, and the far more aesthetically pleasing Vincent Laforet Canon 5D Mark II film—are pulled off by reducing the amount of camera movement. At the same time, you can make use of this by doing funky focus tricks, like the rack focus shot above with the duck, the knife and the Giz logo. Manual zoom is also good and bad—you can't really achieve the kind of speed I get at the end of this vid when using regular cameras; however, even when I was being careful, there was a little jostle. I decided to keep it for effect, but it's a bit annoying. (Maybe a more expensive tripod would help.)

Color, ISO and Other Settings
Pretty much anything you can tweak before shooting a photo can be done with the D90. If you want a movie in black-and-white or any range of color settings, just go into the shooting menu and make it so. Same goes for exposure settings, ISO and a lot more tweaky options. I was (accidentally) shooting with a high ISO for much of the duck shoot, and you can really only see a good bit of noise when I was in the high f-stop tight aperture setting. Truth is, you can unexpectedly do a lot of cool stuff in low-light thanks to the D90's ISO control.

A Few Things To Keep In Mind
• It's important to focus beforehand, and if you're in Live View on manual focus, you can tap the magnifying glass to zoom in (digitally) to get a better focus on your subject.

• When using Live View, the auto-focus is slow because it uses contrast or face recognition. Also, again, this can only be used to set up the shot, and can't be used when shooting vid.

• Holding AE-L AF-L button will lock the exposure setting when you're shooting, so panning from a bright window to a dark corner won't screw up your carefully constructed ambience with a quick lighting change. (Of course, manually panning and adjusting your focus will probably mess up the shot anyhow.) Reader TimmyTimeTravel just told me about this article, which contains an additional AE tip: "To set your camera for AE-L (hold): Menu > Custom Settings (Pencil Icon) > f (controls) >> Assign AE-L/AF-L Button > Ae lock (hold) > Ok"

• Very important: Camera settings don't take for some reason unless you exit Live View. So if you change your aperture or ISO or some other setting, exit LV, then pop back in to see the change.

What Not To Do
Here in a second video I'm including some shots of me and Wade the Cat to show you how hard it can be to manage the thing when you're not really working at it. Notice how shaky everything is, and how objects come in and out of focus all too easily. Aside from the fisheye bit (in there because how can you not shoot your cat with a damn fisheye?), the video was shot at pretty wide aperture setting, partially explaining the inability to keep focus:

Update: Though I shot this in 720p, I had to edit it and compress it to put into our servers. I'm no pro, of course, but some blurring of in-focus shots did happen in the conversion process. The following are actual frames pulled from the movies seen above, preserved much closer to their native resolution:

[Nikon D90 on Giz; song in duck vid was "Tasty" by The Grift]

Tomorrow I embark on a week-long vacation that will have me hiking up mountains, enjoying art and music and dining in fancy restaurants. Needless to say, I am looking forward to it. The only thing I am not 100% about is the hotel room. I've never stayed in this particular chain before and I got it at a great price—which has me a little concerned. What's wrong with it? Is it nasty inside? Is that where all of the local hookers and drug dealers go to conduct their "business?" Fortunately, there are plenty of gadgets out there that can help give budget-minded travelers peace of mind in scenarios like this one.

Handler Anti-Germ Hook: If you find yourself staying at a seedy-looking hotel, the Handler will help you negotiate potentially germ-ridden obstacles like door handles with ease. Plus, it is available in a wide range of colors for the stylish hypochondriac. [HandlerUSA]

HYSO Doorknob Germ Killer: If you are looking for something a little more advanced than a simple germ hook, the HYSO Doorknob Germ Killer will spray a mist of hospital-grade disinfectant on a handle or knob every 15 minutes. [Link]

SteriPEN: If you are planning a trip to Mexico a foreign country and are a bit concerned about the quality of the local drinking water, the SteriPen can put your mind at ease. The UV wand will kill any bacteria and viruses that may be present without having to resort to boiling. [SteriPEN via Link]

UV Disinfectant Wand: Basically, this wand is a SteriPEN for your surroundings. The UV light will detect bodily fluids that may be present int the room and kill 99.9% of bacteria and viruses when you hold it over a suspicious area for 10 seconds. It is available in the compact, clamshell shape seen here as well as a megawand version for that Motel 6 near the red-light district. [ThinkGeek via Link]

Foot Flush: Nearly everyone has a fear of germ-ridden public toilets. The foot flush offers an easy-to-install, hands-free toilet flushing exper