This week’s Daily Giz Wiz Netcasts were recorded live at TWiT Cottage as we race toward #1200!

Daily Giz Wiz, Week of October 11, 2010 Netcast 1196 Happy Columbus Day!

Wild Planet introduces the most sophisticated Video Spy Trakr yet! 

Last time I was at TWiT Cottage two pixies showed us the new Wild Planet Spy Video Trakr 360. On this trip, a spy (named Kim) from Wild Planet showed us the new Wild Planet Spy Video Trakr that’s programmable and remote-controlled. This really high tech vehicle can digitally transmit color video, audio and data. But for the young budding Leo Laportes’ out there, it also enables users to create, download and share custom apps, yes as in applications. Right out of the box, the Spy Video TRAKR offers robotically-enhanced vision Wild Planet calls Cyborg Vision. But wait, there’s more! You can use the low-light Night Vision visibility when going into dark rooms. This vehicle can memorize and retrace mission routes with a technology called Path Mapper. The TRAKR's 2.4GHz digital RF transmission sends live digital video and audio to a full-color LCD screen and speaker on the remote control, so users can see and hear what's going on wherever the TRAKR goes. You can do things like record a special message, then send the TRAKR into someone’s room and play the message. Or enter the room, look around and hear what’s going on in the room. Sneaky! This is a lot of technology for under $130. 

http://www.shopwildplanet.com/prod/WPT70337.html 

Hear this Netcast: www.twit.tv/dgw1196

It’s 1994 and I buy the Cobra 29 LTD WX Classic CB radio for my boat.

Daily Giz Wiz, Friday, October8^th, 2010, Netcast 1195 

16 years later I do a web search to find if there’s anything written about in on the web and I find its still being made! I found a lot of other interesting stuff too. First of all, the Cobra 29 LTD is probably the most famous CB radio ever made! The 29 LTD has been around since the 1970's, in various incarnations - originally known as just the Cobra 29, and later the Cobra 29 LTD. I bought the 29 LTD WX, which came out after they added 7 weather channels and emergency weather alert tone. Another upgrade was a backlit faceplate. Along with that feature, Cobra added NW for NightWatch. Another feature they added was SoundTracker a technology to help reduce static. The unit that had all those features was the 29 LTD WX NW ST. And now back by popular demand - The Cobra 29 LTD is back...and better than ever! According to Amazon, it has professional driver-requested improvements, which include a front panel microphone connector (for convenient in-dash installation), a 9-foot microphone cord (for easy reach anywhere within the cab), and tactile controls (for added convenience and safety when adjusting functions). The cost varies by retailer, but I’ve seen it for just about $100. Now that is some long life for a gadget! 

Here’s a list of places that carry the Cobra 29 LTD: 

http://tinyurl.com/25poxn2 

Hear or SEE this Netcast: www.twit.tv/dgw1195

My watch is “watching” you!

Daily Giz Wiz, Thursday, October 7^th, 2010, Netcast 1194 

When I saw an ad for the Wristwatch Spy cam I was interested. The watch wasn’t bad looking in the picture and I thought it might be fun to always have a camcorder with me. It was about $45 with shipping from Meritline and I bought one. Learning how to use it is not very easy. The flimsy little instruction sheet is written in poor English, so you have to play hit and miss as you try to get it to work properly. If you want to set the proper date & time you have to write a mini program and download it the watch. I never got that to work properly. If you can’t find where the special USB connector goes, you'll discover you have to unscrew the left stem to find it. And don't lose the supplied USB cable, because it’s probably specific to the Spy Watch. The watch keeps time pretty well, but it turns out the tide function, which I was excited above, is just painted on the dial and doesn’t actually work. It has 4GB of memory and you can’t add more. The video it shoots is okay, but there it a major problem with this watch that no one seems to mention. On your video sound track will be the VERY LOUD ticking of the watch!!! It pretty much ruins anything you shoot and makes the watch useless as a DVR. Snapshots are okay because there’s no “ticking” to ruin them. The company says the watch has 1.3 mega-pixel high-definition AVI video recording at 30 frames. Oh yeah, the sync between my voice and the video was also terrible. I didn’t bother shooting any JPEGs because I wanted the watch for video. The internal lithium-ion 3.7v/260mAh battery charges via the USB cable. The light it supposed to turn steady red when it’s fully charged in a few hours, but I left it plugged in for two days and it never showed as fully charged. Here’s a test I did with the watch. I think you’ll NOTICE the annoying ticking sound. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VBNwSI0JDU

http://www.meritline.com/waterproof-spy-watch-hidden-recorder-camera-dvr---p-46544.aspx 

Hear or SEE this Netcast: www.twit.tv/dgw1194

Watch TWiT programs, including The Daily Giz Wiz on your big screen TV!

Daily Giz Wiz, Wednesday, October 6^th, 2010, Netcast 1193 

Roku, the folks who build those neat little black boxes that let us stream high-definition content from the Internet to our flat screen TV, have introduced 3 new models. They range in price from about $60 to $100 and they’re smaller than ever. All three models can stream high-definition playback from Netflix, Amazon, Pandora, even TWiT. (Assuming, of course, the original content is in High Def.)  Yes, you can even watch The Daily Giz Wiz on your big screen TV. The price of the Roku box depends on the number of connections and features you want. The more expensive high-end boxes include an Instant Replay feature that stores content briefly, so you can see it again, even though it’s streaming video. Here’s something to be aware of. If you’re going to use the component video (red, blue, green) connection, you will need a special cable with a 3.5mm connection for the Roku box end, and the standard red, blue, green connections on the other end. This cable is not included. That was one way to make the new Roku boxes much smaller, by eliminating the jacks for each of the separate component cables.   Check out the Roku website to see the various features for each of the new boxes which are now available. I love my Roku box and use it to stream all the TWiT video to a flat screen TV at Gizneyland. All 3 boxes include remote control.

www.roku.com 

Hear this Netcast www.twit.tv/dgw1193

Leo puts his sole into this Turn The Table Tuesday!

Daily Giz Wiz, Tuesday, October 5^th, 2010, Netcast 1192 

This week’s Turn The Table Tuesday wasn’t the 2 X 4 Leo threatens to use as his pick of the week. Instead, it was a shoe. Actually the company, MBT, doesn’t think it should be called a shoe. This is how they explain it on their website: “We named our footwear MBT, and refused to call it a shoe. Because MBT is totally different: Its sole is curved, not flat. It is unstable, not stable. It activates your muscles instead of undermining them. It has a positive effect on the entire body, not just the feet. In other words: It is the antithesis of a shoe.” So how did Leo decide on doing non-shoes for his weekly pick? Turns out Leo has been having terrible pain in his heel when walking. (He explains in more detail in the Netcast.) Someone recommended MBT and Leo says they are working great for him! It’s almost like a walking version of the ball Leo sits on. You’ve always in motion, but in the case of the MBT’s there’s no pressure on the heel. (There’s a lot more about this technology at the company website.) Leo also mentioned that there are a lot of knock-offs out there that aren’t effective. As Leo pointed out, and as you can see, these are not great looking shoes. Sorry, non-shoes. But you don’t buy them for fashion. And they are not inexpensive. They range in price from about $150 to $249.00. (You get both right and left non-shoes for that price.) However Leo said to be sure to check out the web where you can usually find discontinued styles for half or sometimes more off. I checked Amazon and they did have many discontinued styles on sale.

http://mbt.com  

Hear or SEE this Netcast: www.twit.tv/dgw1192