ISSUE 426: THE HIGH-TECH OFFICE--Alan
Zisman
Sorting through Santa's sack of goodies
reveals plenty of high-tech possibilities - Dec 23 1997
By the time you read this, Christmas should
be about here. Instead of offering suggestions for presents to buy for
others, I'd like to propose that you take advantage of the season and
get something for yourself. That way, you can be sure that it's
something you want.
In keeping with the nature of the column, these are
all high-tech gadgets. And they're all things that I'm sure you can
justify as being business-related, and so tax-deductible. Be prepared
-- none of these are under-$20 items like a mouse-pad with a picture of
your loved one(s). If you're going to be getting yourself a gift, you
might as well make it worthwhile!
In looking for items for this list, I've searched for
things that could be productive, but also fun to mess around with. So
I've ruled out items that you might find simply fun (such as game
software) and also things that are simply productive (like, say, a
faster modem or a tape backup drive). Much of what I was left with
seemed to involve graphics, since there's a bit of the wannabe artist
in all of us.
* Digital cameras have become increasingly popular and
affordable. Check models ranging from about $400 to around $1,000. Nice
features include big LED viewfinders and resolutions of 640x480 or
larger, allowing you to take shots that will display as full-screen on
your computer monitor. Everyone ought to have one of these. The only
reason to wait is that they're a rapidly evolving product category --
which means that next year's models will almost certainly be better.
* Hooking your computer up to the TV cable allows you
to capture still pictures from video, watch the business news in a
window on your computer, pipe through the audio... Check a replacement
for your current video-card such as ATI's All-in-Wonder-Pro
(about $300 -- PC only) or devices that simply plug into the back like AverMedia's
TV-Genie. (Some Macs already let you attach a TV cable directly to the
computer.) Hardware such as Play Inc.'s Snappy (under $200)
plugs into your printer port (PC only) to let you snap pictures from
any video source. But you can't really use it to watch TV on your
computer. There's no sound and it only updates the screen every few
seconds at best.
* Once you get your digital pictures, make sure you
have some sort of software to let
you clean up your shots. MetaTools' PhotoSoap, Microsoft's
Picture-It and Adobe PhotoDeluxe are all worth a look and all
priced under $100. If you want more power for more money, and want to
play at being a real graphic artist, look at products such as the
industry standard Adobe PhotoShop or Corel PhotoPaint
(available on its own or part of the Corel Draw package). MetaTools
PowerGoo (as low as $29) describes itself as "realtime liquid image
funware," treating your photo as if it was printed on putty. You can
pull, pinch or reshape it freely. Easy to use, the effects are better
seen than described. Can you convince your accountant it was for
business use? Well, maybe (remember, we all have a creative side).
* Recordable-CD drives have taken a drop in price,
from around $1,000 to around $600. And blank discs have dropped from
around $25 each to about $5. Since nearly all new computers can read
CD-ROMs, CD-writers have many potential business uses, such as
producing near-permanent archives of your files. But they can also be
used, for example, to make your own compilation audio-CDs, getting your
favourite tracks from multiple discs onto a single disc. Products such
as Adaptec's Easy-CD-Creator (under $150) promise you can put
your old LPs onto CD, filtering out the pops and scratches in the pro-
cess. And while the last-generation CD-writing hardware I reviewed in
this
column just a few short months ago re-
quired an add-in SCSI card, new products such as Hewlett-Packard's
CD-Writer Plus 7100 plug right into the IDE adapters that are already
in most PCs.
* You may use your computer to play games as well as
for business. If so, check out the Sidewinder Force Feedback joystick
from Microsoft. With it, you not only control your game action, but you
literally feel the force -- the vibration of the motor of that race
car, for example. It really does add a whole new dimension of realism
to game-playing. It does require games to be specially written to
support it (several are included in the package) and it does cost a
couple of hundred dollars or so. And I guess it will be hard to
convince Revenue Canada that it was a legitimate business
expense.
But you've worked hard all year. Treat yourself to
something good.*
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