Why the Sony PSP 3000 I hear you ask. Well, I had one of the original Sony PSP’s a long time ago and found it to be ideal for what I wanted. The Sony PSP 3000 has come a long way sine that original model came out.

For starters, the Sony PSP 3000 is thinner and lighter than ever before. This is great for gamers because you’ll be able to play longer without getting sore wrists. Although, having said that it’s not that much thinner. The Sony PSP 3000 now has a built in microphone and a better screen as part of the upgrade features. That built in microphone will allow you to use Skype or for online gaming. There’s a TV-Out socket on the Sony PSP 3000 too, which allows you to connect it up to almost any television set and play your games via that screen. You could, if you wanted to, use it to watch movies too.

The battery on the Sony PSP 3000 will allow you to play games for between 4 and 6 hours, or watch movies for between 4 to 5 hours. The battery life could be better, but it would see you through a long train or car journey quite easily. I’m pretty sure that there’s an in car charging kit available too.

Priced between £129.99 and £159.99 the Sony PSP 3000 is cheap enough for almost anybody these days. Don’t let the low price fool you into thinking that the Sony PSP 3000 doesn’t pack a punch, because it does. The graphics are crisp and sharp and playability is awsome. I’ve taken the Sony PSP 3000 with me on my travels and it really does help to pass the time. All I need now is for buses to provide power outlets to re-charge the battery.

I needed to get a scanner, but instead of going for a stand alone device, I decided that a multifunction device would be a better option in the long run. I know that I’ve posted about getting a Brother DCP-6690CW, which I still want, but at this time the Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer suits my needs.

It scans, copies, prints and faxes. In addition to that, you can plug a whole host of memory cards in to it, which is great. I have SD cards and Sony Memory Sticks all over this place. I’ll list the exact cards it takes in a minute. I wanted to write about setting the Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer up on a MacBook, or at least my experiences with setting it up on the MacBook.

I installed the drivers for the Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer on to my MacBook as directed, but it wouldn’t work. It kept telling me that I hadn’t installed the printer on my laptop. I clearly had, so I decided to uninstall it and get the latest drivers from the Lexmark website. I started the whole process of installing the drivers for the Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer again. This time the printer installed, but I was getting an error about the colour tables not being installed correctly. I tried uninstalling and re-installing the drivers again with no luck.

I contacted the Lexmark support team via their UK website and through Live Chat. This was a new experience for me. I was talking to one of their technicians who tried to guide me through the process of finding out what was wrong with the installation, but he couldn’t sort it out either, so I was transferred to a Mac Technician who took over control of my MacBook and had a look at the problem remotely. This was fascinating to watch. Apparently I’d downloaded the wrong drivers and needed to get some other ones which he sent to me. This process took a little bit of time but wasn’t the usual kind of customer service I’ve received.

I have to highly commend the good people at the Lexmark Technical Support centre for their amazing effort in getting my Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer working properly on my MacBook. It now works flawlessly.

So, back to that list of cards that the Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer can handle:

• SmartMedia
• CompactFlash
• Memory Stick
• IBM MicroDrive
• MultiMediaCard (MMC)
• SD Memory Card
• xD Memory Card
• Memory Stick Pro

Quite an impressive list.
My experience with using the Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer are nothing but good up to now. I’ve successfully printed off documents and pictures and sent faxes. The quality of the output is pretty good too for what I want this particular printer to do.

I’m really happy with my Lexmark X5495 Multifunction Colour Ink-Jet Printer and I’m sure that if you get one, you will be too.

As I am writing this blog post, the dongle is trying to upload a picture to a blog. Now, the file size of that image isn’t very big to be honest; it’s about 48Kb or so. The trouble is that here in Wales, where I live at least, we don’t have 3G coverage. There are only a few places in Wales that actually have a good 3G coverage.

I’m not placing all the blame on O2 here because it seems that all the networks are the same with only the larger cities having some sort of coverage. This is all well and good, but I live in a rural environment. The 2G network coverage here is excellent though.

I really want to be able to use my O2 Mobile Broadband Dongle to it’s full potential, but having such restrictive connection speeds is hampering me from doing so. There’s an opportunity for O2 (and the other networks) to make some money from upgrading their network too. Obviously I understand that It’ll cost the providers money to get the 2G network updated to 3G, but in this age where information, and the speed at which we get that information, is so important to people, the providers should really be able to provide the service that is required.

I feel that once again the majority of Wales is missing out on the high speed links that most of the UK are enjoying at the moment. I currently have 8Mb broadband at home, which is great. It’s nice and fast and seems to be able to cope with the majority of things I throw at it. But, having said that, 24Mb broadband is being rolled out in other parts of the UK. Yes, you’ve guessed it, in the larger cities of the country.

Come on O2 (and the other networks), let us in Wales have the same service as other parts of the UK. Don’t leave us behind. Thanks

I am currently a student at Bolton University studying for a degree in Special Effects Development. The first year hasn’t exactly been an easy ride. We’ve had a whole lot of problems because we’re doing the first year of the degree (well three of us anyhow)  at another location. The three of us are doing the first year at Coleg Harlech, which is a Further Education college in North Wales. All three of us that are on the Special Effects Degree course have been past students of the college. I wouldn’t be in the situation I’m in now if it wasn’t for the great staff at the college. If I’m honest I’ll be quite sad to leave there.

Anyhow, our first year is up and I thought I would let you know that I have passed my first year with flying colours. We still have a film to make, but that’s more of a labour of love now rather than an obigation for the course. We feel that we need to get this film made because of the time that we’ve spent on the planning and preperation for it.

We’ve already filmed it once, but the tape got corrupted so we’ve decided on doing a re-shoot. The main reason for this is because we don’t want to let the actors down. They gave us their time for free, so it’s only right that we produce the best possible piece of work for them rather than us. We’ve been marked on the work that we’ve done already.

The idea is that we produce a film and a prper DVD in the end with extra features and behind the scene stuff. That’s the idea anyway. Obviously I’ll upload an show you the finished piece of work.

When you see these kind of lights usually they cost a fair bit more than the £10.95 that you can get them for by using PriceGrabber. They’re a real bargain to be honest.

So what are the Mathmos Wind Lights? It’s quite simple really, they’re LED lights that use wind to power them up. SO all you need is a light puff of wind to get these little beauties lit up.

The 6cm propellers power two LED bulbs, in red or blue, that will be enough to light up your garden path. You don’t need any batteries at all with the Mathmos Wind Lights because they’re powered by wind. How cool is that!

You can use the Mathmos Wind Lights wherever there’s wind really. No need for a battery or a power supply with the Mathmos Wind Lights. Just hook them up wherever you decide that you want light and watch as the wind makes them glow brightly.

As I said earlier, the Mathmos Wind Lights are only £10.95 if you go through PriceGrabber of course. Sadly, I don’t have a garden that’s big enough to justify buying these in bulk, but if you do they’re well worth the investiment. The Mathmos Wind Lights are obviously good for the environment as well as your pocket, so why not grab a few of these great gadgets.

The ECCO GPS Keychain is a tiny GPS system that will help guide you and show you the way back to your desired destiniation. With the ECCO GPS Keychain you don’t hve to remember the small detail of where you left your car or, where you’re staying for the night. In fact the ECCO GPS Keychain is ideal for any situatuion where you have to find your way back to your original location.

With the ECCO GPS Keychain all you have to do is “lock in” your location on the ECCO GPS Keychain then, when you’re ready to return, follow the instructions on the screen to find your way back. Wht’s good with the ECCO GPS Keychain is that you can store three locations within the tiny device.

I’ve always found myself lost at one time or another, and the ECCO GPS Keychain sounds like the ideal solution for those situation. Obviously, I don’t want to tell everyone that I get lost on numerous occassions, but sometimes it’s good to have a device like the ECCO GPS Keychain to help you out of a sticky situation.

Available for as little as £69.95, the ECCO GPS Keychain is a great little gadget to have in your arsenal if you travel around or get lost a lot. Grab yours today!!

Apple, Nokia, SonyEricsson, NEC, LG, Samsung and Texas Instruments have all backed the move to create a single micro USB style charging socket on their mobile devices from next year.

It will be great to see this because my iPhone keeps running out of battery in the most inconvenient places and I rely heavily on it to keep in touch through SMS, Facebook, Twitter and email. Being able to use any charger would obviously be a great bonus.

It would also be a great move for the environmentbecause people could use the same charger for any number of mobile phones. The manufactures could offer the mobile devices with or without a charger. As I said, it’s a great move to make the socket an universal one for all manufacturers as it’s going to mean that anyone can charge their mobile anywhere there’s a charger available.

This is definitely a move in the right direction for a change.

The Flip range of cameras have been a phenomenal hit all around the world and it’s easy to see why. They’re so easy to use and convenient to carry around that anyone can now capture funny clips of their friends or that breaking news story that’s happening at the end of your street.

The Chrome Flip Mino HD records video in stunning High Definition as the name applies, with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. Now, as many of you will know if you’re a regular reader of this blog, that I have an Apple iPhone. The 3G iPhone that I have doesn’t record video in any format so a Flip Mino HD would be a great addition to my arsenal of gadgets.

I do think that a Chrome Flip Mino HD would compliment the iPhone better than a black or white Flip, but that’s just a personal opinion. I do think that I should get one of these great little cameras just to use when looking for locations to film at. What better way to show the rest of the team a location? You could actually film the shots you were thinking of doing with the Chrome Flip Mino HD and use it as a pre visualisation tool when planning your film. That’s what I would do anyhow.

So the Chrome Flip Mino HD is available now for the great price of around £157 and it’s still the worlds smallest HD camera. Grab yours today!!

Farrah Fawcett was probably best known for being a pin-up model back in the 1970’s and for being one of “Charlie’s Angels” in the hit show of the same name playing Jill Munroe. She also starred in a number of movies. She was diagnosed with cancer in 2006, but four months later was given the all clear. Then in 2007 she was once again diagnosed with cancer.

Michael Jackson, the self named “King of Pop” has undoubtedly been an influencial figure in the world of music for over 3 decades. He released his “Thriller” album in 1982 and it went on to become the world’s best selling album of all time. He was also know for having a lavish and sometimes eccentric lifestyle. This was backed-up when he bought Neverland; his fairground themed home. In later years his life had been dogged by allegations of child abuse and ill health.

Michael Jackson was due to start a gruelling 50 date concert at the O2 arena in London.

I hope that both Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson rest in peace. They will both be missed.

Having a MacBook I thought that burning the MP3 files to a CD would be as easy as everything else is on the MacBook, but I was mistaken. I thought that iTunes or GarageBand would be able to do it, but alas no.

My thoughts then turned to getting the files from the MacBook on to a USB Memory Stick and using a PC and Nero to burn the disc. But before I did that I decided to have a look on the internet to see what was available for the Mac. I found Roxio Toast 10.

Roxio Toast 10 was exactly what I was looking for. Roxio Toast 10 does cost more than your average software, but it was well worth it. PriceGrabber has Roxio Toast 10 Titanium for £56.47. Roxio Toast 10 is so easy to use too as you’d expect from any Mac software. It was simply a case of choosing what kind of disc I wanted to burn (in my case an Audio CD) and dragging the files over, then pressing a red button to burn. That was it, my CD was burned and ready to use within a few minutes.

So, if you’re looking for a solution to burning CDs and DVDs on your Mac, then I would suggest Roxio Toast 10. There are two versions available too, Roxio Toast 10 Titanium and Roxio Toast 10 Pro. The Pro version costs a bit more than the titanium version though.