Motorola iRadio (www.motorola.com)
In response to satellite radio, Motorola iRadio is a new service that debuted this year at CES. Select and customize six preset radio channels from a list of more than 435 commercial-free channels and manage your own personalized playlists from your personal digital music collection. iRadio can be downloaded onto any iRadio-enabled Motorola telephone, or any phone that has a Bluetooth connec-tion.
Pros: Warner Music Group Corp. and Universal Music Group have already joined the Mo-torola iRadio revolution, offering highly acclaimed artists direct to your mobile phone. What’s more, some artists will feature exclusive programming created just for iRadio listeners.
Cons: At time of writing, no specific carriers have signed onto the iRadio service, but Mo-torola insists parties are interested and are still in talks.
Price: $10 (US) per month (no details for Canada available)
Nokia 9300 (www.nokia.com)
The Nokia 9300 is a high-end smartphone that blends workstyle and lifestyle into one sleek and slim device. On the outside, the 9300 is an elegant mobile phone, but when you open it up, you have a full keyboard and colour screen visible at almost any angle. A five-way joystick allows you to easily navigate through menus and at 80MB, the unit has ample room to store emails, docs or multimedia files.
Pros: Allows users to communicate via email, talk on the phone and use other tools all at the same time.
Cons: Bulkier than most phones, this unit doesn’t have a backlit keyboard and the expan-sion slot is awkwardly placed.
Price: $690 (CAN), $600 (US)
Samsung Helix (www.samsung.com)
You’ve seen the posters and billboards, heard the ads and seen the commercials. XM Satellite Radio is America’s number one satellite radio service with more than six million subscribers. Featuring 160 digital channels, XM Radio is broadcast live daily from various studios around North America, and touts 100 per cent commercial-free music channels. And now, brand new for the service is a collaboration with Samsung, offering three new portable audio models that will combine the capabilities of XM radio with an MP3 player. The Samsung Helix is a phone that allows users to customize jukeboxes to play hundreds of radio channels. Starting this year, XM Radio will also be available in 160 different new vehicles.
Pros: Less than 5 ounces in weight, the Helix can store up to 50 hours of XM programming.
Cons: The unit is expensive.
Price: $400 (US) and $12.99 (CAN)/month, $12.95 (US)/month for XM service.
Brother QL-550 (www.brother.com)
Brother’s P-Touch QL-550 is a small unit that produces die-cut labels in a variety of sizes, including address, disc, shipping and CD/DVD labels directly from your PC. You can view your customized labels on your computer and then print directly from Microsoft Word, Excel or Outlook almost instantaneously. This latest model also features an automatic tape cutter for cleaner label cuts.
Pros: Extremely fast and produces very sharp labels.
Cons: The supplied label-printing software is tricky to control.
Price: $169 (CAN), $145 (US)
Xerox 8550 DP (www.xerox.com)
This network printer achieves stunning colour on any type of paper. Crayon-like cubes of solid ink are quickly heated and all colours are printed at once for guaranteed alignment. The ink is dry as soon as prints come off the press. This fast and easy printer offers watermark, two-sided, booklet and secure printing features.
Pros: Very fast, this unit is under priced for its features. Good value for small- to me-dium-sized offices.
Cons: Because solid ink is waxy, you can’t write on prints with a ballpoint pen and you can sometimes smell the ink while printing.
Price: $1,564 (CAN), $1,345 (US)
Brother MFC-9420CN (www.brother.com)
This Brother laser printer/photocopier/scanner/fax machine lets you do pretty much anything you need to — in colour. With an easily navigated interface, this network-ready machine prints up to 31 black or eight colour pages a minute.
Pros: Use the Secure Print feature to password-protect files going to print, so your docu-ments won’t spew out until you enter the code into the printer’s interface.
Cons: Noisier than most network printers, this unit is slow to get going.
Price: $1,099 (CAN), $945 (US)
TOTEM TRIBE I, II, & III (www.totemacoustic.com)
These wall-hanging speakers from Totem Acoustic are the perfect friends for your flat screen TV. The Tribe line is available in three models, each with long-throw woofers and tweeters, which help achieve maximum sound range and quality.
Pros: Produce a bigger, warmer sound than most on-wall speakers.
Cons: With wall-mounted speakers, hiding wires requires extra care and time.
Price: $875-$1750 (CAN), $750-$1500 (US)
EPSON MOVIEMATE 25 (www.epson.com)
The Epson MovieMate 25 is a portable projector with a built-in CD/DVD player and speakers, making this unit a home theatre system out of a box. You can plug in your TV or video game system for ultimate viewing pleasure, and can even do so during the day thanks to the ultra-bright 1200-ANSI lumens light.
Pros: Long list of functions, easy to setup, incredible image quality in many lighting conditions, and its affordable for an entire home theatre setup.
Cons: The size of toaster oven, some might find the unit a bit bulky for a livingroom table.
Price: $1,599 (CAN), $1,373 (US)
SONY BRAVIA XBR (www.sony.com)
This sleek, stylish LCD TV offers the sharpest picture HDTV can provide. The 40-inch model features resolution of 1,366 x 768, colour temperature presets and a USB port so you can view photos or video from any Sony camera. If you like to keep your DVD and VHS players — or even your PC — plugged in, you can make switching between media easy by renaming video channels to match the device you’re actually watching.
Pros:Incredibly sharp picture and sleek, thin design.
Cons: The TV comes with a hefty price tag compared to the competition.
Price: $4,499 (CAN), $3,865 (US)
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