Episode 948

Halloween on D Street
In Petaluma, the centre of activities at Halloween is on D Street with all its period mansions.  For another explanation of D Street's history, check out Episode 676.

Leo's Beatles Collection
Leo bought the stereo box set of the Beatles CD Collection, forgoing the original mono version which has fewer albums but is, bizarrely, more expensive.

Pogoplug
Don Owar heard about the Pogoplug in Episode 817, bought it and is loving it.  Now he has his own server in the cloud.

Dropbox
An alternative to the hardware Pogoplug is the software Dropbox, a very popular service which Leo highly recommends, giving you 2GB of online storage for free, accessible from any computer.

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Episode 947

DVD Rewinder
The base of the Breville Kettle reminds Dick of the DVD Rewinder, which a listener wrote in about in Episode 172.

The Imaginary DVD Rewinder
A Breville Bonus
Leo also recommends a Breville toaster, which from his description sounds like the Die-Cast 2-Slice Smart Toaster.  It has a "Lift and Look" function that gently raises the toast to let you see if it's done yet, and an "A Bit More" button for a little more browning.  The Bagel setting only toasts the inside.  There is also a 4-Slice version.

Breville Die-Cast 2-Slice Smart Toaster
Sonos
Another letter from the PR profession.  Karm Lineman thanks Dick for covering the Sansa Clip Plus (Episode 911), and is sending Leo a review unit of the Sonos ZonePlayer S5, a distributed music system and an alternative to Leo's earlier Eos Wireless Speaker System in Episode 887, where Leo himself mentioned the Sonos music systems.

Leo's Bumper Sticker
For a picture of Leo's "Screw You" sticker, see Episode 917.

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Episode 946

The Jabra Stone
Hot on the heels of the Jabra Halo (Episode 923), Dick introduces the Jabra Stone.

Jabra Stone
Comic Con
Over the cold and miserable weekend in New York City, Dick went over to the Comic Con, and met Tom Wopat and John Schneider, co-stars of The Dukes of Hazzard.  Talk of stars who had a glorious past reminds Leo of what what a friend told him when she was mad with Leo: "At your peak, you were a little known celebrity on a minor TV channel."

Leo's Schadenfreude
A recent Sunday edition of the New York Times on 16 October 2009 featured an article on G4 and its signature show The Attack of the Show (renamed from The Screen Savers), whose audience on a good day was reported to be about 114,000.  Not that Leo is bitter about G4, but he is happy to reveal that a little show like the Daily Giz Wiz has an audience of 75,000 a week, and the flagship show This Week In Tech has 175,000.  This is the first time that Leo has seriously talked about the audience number of the Daily Giz Wiz.

TWiT Video Channel
The TWiT Video Channel is coming soon.  The announcement was made at Blog World Expo on 16 October.  The TWiT Network is partnering with Mediafly to distribute video versions of their shows on multiple video platforms, including the Roku and smartphones like the Palm Pre, Blackberry and other Android phones via phone apps, Zune, and the Logitech Squeezebox.  For a report of the announcement, check out GearDiary.  For the list of distribution platforms, see TWiTonMediafly.com.

The first 5 shows to be rolled out are TWiT, TWiF, TWiG, MacBreak Weekly and Windows Weekly.  After that, the Daily Giz Wiz is likely to follow in a month or two.

Flash Memory Advances
Matt Nagel, a Tech PR for Cohn & Wolfe, works on different products including SanDisk.  He was amused to hear about the price of the original SanDisk Cruzer in 2002 (Episode 940), the 256MB-SD card version of which cost $200.  He notes that the recommended retail price for the latest Cruzer is $32 for the 4GB version, and $134 for the 32GB version.  The 4GB version is available for $15 at Best Buy.  Matt has also offered Leo SanDisk's latest and fastest CF card, the Extreme Pro.

SanDisk Extreme Pro CF Card
Coby Snapp CAM3000
Speaking of deals, Dick learned that the little camcorder from Coby the Snapp CAM3000 (Episode 938) was sold as the deal of the day by J&R at $20.

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Episode 945

Gadget Zoo
With the Safety Fish, the Toothpick Bird, the Penguin Tea Timer, and the Fun Friends Phone Covers (Episode 274), Dick could build a gadget zoo.

Halloween Attire
Dick had the T-qualizer T-shirt (Episode 439) about 2 years ago, but this year for Halloween, he might wear the WiFi Detector T-Shirt, similar idea, available from ThinkGeek, or he might wear his Alligator Shower Cap.

WiFi Detector Shirt
Audible Specials
Michael Kaplan has become a fan of Audible as a result of the Daily Giz Wiz, and wants to point out that apart from the monthly credit, Audible from time to time introduces special offers - great books at very good discounts.

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Episode 944

From the Boonies
Long-time listener and first-time letter-writer Mark P lives in the boonies of northern Canada, where the internet is slow, and has to wait till he travels down south to download his TWiT podcasts.  Thanks to the new iPhone 3.0, he can now listen to his podcasts at 2x speed.  He's been listening to old episodes of the Daily Giz Wiz, starting with Episode 1, 5 to 10 episodes at a time, despite Dick's and Leo's severe warnings.

TWiT Home Office
Mark P also suggests, for the relocation of the TWiT Home Office, St-Louis-Du-Ha! Ha! in Quebec.

Desperately Seeking the Toothpick Bird
Mark P bought the Vinturi Wine Aerator (Episode 868) for his sister, but cannot find the Toothpick Bird (Episode 282) anywhere.  It used to be carried by Archie McPhee, but no longer.  You can still find it on Amazon.

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