Alex Kidman

You get the idea.

A very busy week wound up with a review at CNET.com.au and a whole bunch more of Gizmodo posts. Normal, slightly quieter service resumes next week, but it’s still not going to be “quiet” by any reasonable measure.

Dell Inspiron N301: “Dell’s inexpensive Core i3 Inspiron isn’t incredibly inspiring, but it’s not intolerably insipid either.”

And then over at Gizmodo, a whole bunch of not-always-all-that-brief posts:

New iPods? We’re Going To Need New Cases

Breakfast Wrap: Best Of Wednesday Night

Aussie Apple TV Owners Get Short Shrift

ABC’s Mobile Division Cracks New Records

Hitachi Gets A New Life(Studio) Down Under

Buy An Avatar Or Headset, Make A Wish Come True

3D Glasses – Perhaps I Need A Smaller Head

Microsoft’s Home Of The Future Is Suspiciously Clean And Shiny

Breakfast Wrap: Best Of Friday Night

Hands On With Telstra’s Ultimate USB

An Appropriate Solution To Australia’s Election Woes

Am I The Only One Creeped Out By What’s Happening To This Flash Drive?

What’s The Oldest Gadget You Still Regularly Use?

“Morning noon and night it’s drink and dancing, some quick romancing, and then a shower..”

If only the life of a tech journo was quite that simple. Also, I’d look dreadful in fishnets. You know it, I know it — let’s not go there.

Instead, we could go over to Hydrapinion, where this week’s column looks at a certain Telstra mystery:

Why doesn’t Telstra have a portable WiFi router?: “The thought struck me that for all Telstra’s posturing about taking a technology lead, it’s an area where the big telco is sadly lacking.”

Or over to MacTheReviews, where I’ve been delving into the dungeons of Torchlight:

Torchlight: “Guess what happens when you establish a mining colony on top of a huge pile of magical crystals? If you guessed “nothing, everybody just mines the crystals and grows rich on the profits with no side-effects at all”, then you’re clearly not built for games design.”

And that’s not counting this week’s guest editor spot at Gizmodo, which has seen me write the following diverse mix of articles:

Breakfast Wrap: Best Of Tuesday Night
The Apple Geniuses With Time On Their Hands
A Brief Crowdsourced History Of Time Travel
Microsoft Gets Moving On Aussie Kinect Launch Date
Foxtel Shows Off Pay TV, Xbox 360 Style
AFL, NRL Get The 3D Go-Ahead
I Can’t Have A Bat-Utility Belt
New iPods? We’re Going To Need New Cases
Breakfast Wrap: Best Of Wednesday Night
Aussie Apple TV Owners Get Short Shrift
ABC’s Mobile Division Cracks New Records
Hitachi Gets A New Life(Studio) Down Under
Buy An Avatar Or Headset, Make A Wish Come True
3D Glasses – Perhaps I Need A Smaller Head
Microsoft’s Home Of The Future Is Suspiciously Clean And Shiny

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m tired…

“I’m tired, tired of playing the game,
ain’t it a crying shame,
I’m so tired!”

Lots of irons in the fire at the moment, even though it might seem rather quiet on the publishing front. My regular blog/column at Geeks2U continues on, however, this week looking at waterproof technology and ’80s Scottish Pop bands. Mostly the former.

Geekspeak: Technology and water don’t mix: “Or do they?”

A couple of Sony Vaio products for your perusal today at CNET.com.au. They’re fine to read, but don’t try to pronounce the product names, unless you’re already fluent in Welsh.

Sony Vaio VPCL118FG/B: “Sony’s all-in-one PC isn’t cheap and it could do with more storage, but otherwise it’s a highly attractive option for those who crave simplicity.”

Sony Vaio VPCCW15FG: “Sony’s latest vibrant Vaio has plenty of grunt, but nowhere near enough power.”

*Yes, I know, Hasbro. Scrabble. Trademark and all that. But if there’s multiple branded Monopoly games, why not Scrabble?

What a daft lyric. I mean, it’s all very inspiring and all, and I’m sure given the Proclaimers’ generally energetic walking style that it’s highly aerobic to boot… but then the 1,000 mile trek just to fall over? She’s going to take one look at the sweaty, unconscious mess in front of her, and then go off with the smarmy looking guy in the leather jacket instead, guys…

All of this has no bearing on my writing work, however. That was what you were here for, right?

Well, in a predicably Apple-y way, there’s this at PC Authority:

First Look: The New Apple Macbook: “Is Apple good at design? Usabilty? Both or neither? Also, where has all the Firewire gone? Alex Kidman has been testing Apple’s new Macbook and gives his first impressions.”

And then this news piece, with nothing to do with Apple, at APCMag.com:

Samsung announces the 7.9mm TV: “Time to throw away that existing LCD or Plasma — it’s a chunky beast. Or at least, that seems to be what Samsung, Sony and Philips are thinking.”

I haven’t written a tech preview for a while, although I used to write tons of the things. Still, this one rather invited my particular (and, I’m told, cynical) writing talents:

Sony Vaio CS Series Preview: “Do we really need to point out the potential embarrassment when you show people that your laptop really “comes alive” when you stroke its “special area”?”

The words — they just keep on coming. Such is the case with this review, live now at CNET.com.au:

Sony VAIO LT VCG-LT28G: “It’s tough not to look at the VAIO LT VCG-LT28G and think two things. Firstly, that Sony has once again outdone themselves in making a product that’s probably superbly easy to track through shipping warehouses, but impossible for consumers to actually pronounce…”

It is, as they say in the classics, a real pea-souper out there right now. And I may have tripped over a chunk of ham while taking the bins out.

There. Some personal detail, to keep those clamoring for more personal stuff happy, and less of the relentless shilling of my writing services. By “less” of course, I don’t mean, “none”, as evidenced by this news bite at PC Authority yesterday:

Sony extends Bravia Sync offerings: “Sony aims to save the day with smarter remote control. Which is great — as long as you genuinely adore Bravia TVs.”

Then again, Mr Jackson has a line in wacky lyrics too. Or possibly stupid. I mean, it’s 250-odd kilometres of river, weighing in the billions of tonnes. It’s also rather wet and slippery. Quite how am I meant to hold onto it at all?

In any case, that once again has nothing to do with another one of my published works, this time live at CNET.com.au:

Sony Handycam HDR-SR10: “No doubt, Sony’s marketing department would, at this point, be using the phrase “consumer choice” somewhere…”