The Buzz

SanDisk, the second largest seller of MP3 players in the U.S., released several new products at the annual gadgetfest. There's the Sansa View (right), the company's first widescreen portable media player. But the real talk of the show was the Sansa Connect, a Wi-Fi enabled MP3 player that garnered two “Best of CES” awards from CNET and Laptop magazine. The palm-sized Connect allows users to access music from any wireless hot spot. The 4GB model: $250. Available late 2007. sandisk.com.

A novel source of power relies on a century-old technology—radio frequency (RF). Powercast, a Ligonier, PA-based startup, was at CES last month to publicize its Wireless Power Platform, a new concept that will keep batteries in cell phones and other small devices charged, all without wires. Like an FM station, the platform uses a radio frequency over a small area, with transmitters beaming the juice to any battery-operated item outfitted with a Powercast receiver. Powercast products will debut in 2007. info@powercastco.com.

I can go here, I can go there. International travel has never been easier. Why let the language barrier slow you down? The 12-Language Speaking Global Translator (Model TGA-490), from Franklin Electronic Publishers, contains more than 450,000 words and 12,000 phrases in 12 languages, all in recorded human voice. Released last month at CES, the tool displays Chinese, Korean, and Japanese words phonetically in Romanized alphabet form, as well as in Asian characters. There's also an MP3 player, world clock, and voice recorder. $229.95. www.franklin.com.

Polaroid, that familiar old brand synonymous with instant pictures, is offering a new media storage device, which the company presented at CES. The 40GB Media Backup–Photo Edition makes easy work of backing up your photo collection, up to 40,000 images. Just plug into the USB port of your PC, and the gizmo automatically searches, copies, and stores all your pics. There's no software to install or configure, you don't even have to click your mouse to start the thing. The device includes other convenient features, such as online sharing of photos. So what's the message here? Well, it's certainly worth repeating: back up and save. $129. www.polaroid.com.

While everyone enjoys gazing up at the night sky, we, at least, couldn't tell the Gamma Andromedae from Corona Borealis. (That's a star and constellation, respectively.) Enter SkyScout Cards, interactive guides designed by Celestron for use with its GPS-enabled telescope SkyScout. The cards, “Astronomy for Beginners” and “The Sky Explorer,” fit into SkyScout's SD slot to take stargazers on a guided cosmic journey of more than 6,000 viewable celestial objects. The Explorer card, for example, helps users learn the position of key constellations, including mythology and historical facts pertaining to each. $19. Available summer 2007. www.celestron.com.

Wikipedia, the popular online encyclopedia created entirely by Web users, now sports a new search engine. Called WikiSeek, the just launched tool is restricted to searching Wikipedia pages and its embedded links. Users, therefore, can expect high quality, limited returns on a search, rather than having to wade through oceans of material, including all the junk retrieved through a standard search engine. Created by Palo Alto-based company SearchMe, Wikiseek is available as a destination Web site as well as inside Wikipedia as a Firefox extension. Wikiseek will donate a majority of the site's advertising revenue to the Wikimedia Foundation, which operates Wikipedia.

Belkin's TuneStudio is the first four-channel sound mixer created for the iPod, enabling novice podcasters and seasoned musicians alike to create high-quality recordings on the Apple device. Created for the fifth generation iPod (video), TuneStudio allows the input of up to four instruments or audio sources and records the sound onto an iPod for instant playback. Bands can easily attach instruments and mics to the device and record jam sessions on the fly. Podcasters can use TuneStudio to record shows in a studio or on location. The device is set for release in summer 2007. $180. www.belkin.com.

Makes a tasty burger—the Hormel variety, that is. E-mail spam is another matter, costing up to $87 billion per year in direct costs and lost productivity, not to mention those nasty viruses that frequently accompany the insidious messages, according to IT Security. The online journal recently issued “Eliminating Spam From Your Inbox,” a top 10 list of safeguarding methods, including various spam filters and safer ways to Web surf. Taking revenge on spammers, while tempting, can get you fined and doesn't make you a better person. www.itsecurity.com.

Clix, that other MP3 player by iRiver, has a dedicated following of its own. Fans won't likely be disappointed by the new flash-based Clix2, which was released to good reviews at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas January 8–11. Sporting intuitive controls, the Clix interface has been compared to the iPod for ease of use. The next-generation model has a thinner profile and a sharp 2.2-inch OLED screen, which features rich, saturated colors. There's also video playback, an FM radio, voice recorder, and up to 25 hours of battery life. Clix2 comes in 2- 4-, and 8-gigabyte models (maximum capacity on the earlier Clix was 4GB). Prices will be comparable with the iPod Nano on a per-gigabyte basis. www.iriveramerica.com.

Seagate Technology has launched a new line of portable storage devices called FreeAgent. More than just a hard drive in a box, claims the company, the stylish units combine desktop and online solutions that allow users to take along their content, share it with anyone, and sync it with just about anything. With the FreeAgent Pro line of 320-, 500-, and 750GB data movers, you can copy your e-mail and contacts from Microsoft Outlook to an iPod, for example, or automatically upload photos to the online photo manager Shutterfly. The FreeAgent Pro line also allows users to keep a private account on Seagate Internet Drive, a paid online storage service. The 320GB unit costs $200, the 750GB, $420. For more information about other FreeAgent storage products, visit www.seagate.com.