By the time the format war was over, I knew I need a high def player of some kind. I started by buying a HDTV, but I wanted to wait until the final profile was available before I bought a blu-ray player. And, as long as I was waiting, I wanted the prices to drop some. As soon as I heard about this player, I was sold. I got one two weeks ago, and I am thrilled.

Before I got it, I was trying to understand what I would need for set up. Turns out I was making too much of things. All I had to do was hook up my new player via HDMI to my TV and I was good to go, although a direct connection between this and my TV and another one between this and my sound system is even better.

I have a 720p/1080i TV, but the difference was immediately evident. I've watched several movies, and they look amazing. I did some comparisons between blu-ray and DVD, and there is no comparison. Every scene I paused and compared looked so much better in blu-ray.

I also did some comparing with upconverting my DVDs. The quality of the upconverted picture really depends on the quality of the disc. Some of my older TV shows don't look that impressive. But new TV shows and old movies that have been restored look great. Not blu-ray great, but certainly better than they did.

You may have noticed that I mentioned hooking my player directly up to my TV. I know true home theater buffs are screaming in frustration. But there's a simple reason for it. My sound system is ancient. Probably 7 years old. It doesn't have an HDMI input. While initially, I ran the sound from my TV into the system, I am now using an optical digital cable to run it directly from the player into the system. The first option sounded fine, but the optical digital cable is awesome. Of course, I tweak some settings on my sound system, so I am getting far superior output from it now, too, than I was before. I may not be able to put this player through all its paces, but what I am getting is amazing.

This player is final format 2.0 compliant. That means you can hook it directly up to the internet for firmware updating and Blu-Ray Live features. I've already had one firmware update, and it was quick and painless. The SD slot is right in front of the TV, so using that for Blu-Ray live (or to show off pictures) shouldn't be a problem either.

I'd heard horror stories before I bought my machine about how long it takes to load a blu-ray movie. I haven't noticed it being that bad. True, it takes a few seconds longer then a DVD does, but it's not the slow start up and loading time I had feared. Of course, even with my DVD player, I generally set the disc in it and grab some water before I sit down to watch. This habit makes my wait time absolutely nil.

One feature I love with the remote is the fast forward. There are multiple speeds, but on the slowest, you can still hear the dialogue. People's voices and even emotion are still discernable. It's a great way to watch something a little faster if you want to move on to a favorite scene.

It's been hard waiting to get a blu-ray player, but this one was well worth the wait. I will be enjoying watching movies on it for a long time to come.

What's the catch? 2 sleeve cases at half the going price of many single cases? No deception whatsoever. It's merely an ingeniously simple, quick, and effective way to assure that the silvery backside of your iPod remains untarnished and that if the precious device is, heaven forbid, dropped, some of the shock of the fall will be absorbed by the cover. The rubbery material is just thick enough to serve as a reasonably resilient and potentially protective bumper while remaining thin enough to permit operation of the iPod in virtually any speaker-dock without removal of the sleeve.

Of course, you'll need to spring for a portfolio-style case if you wish to protect the glass screen. (Or, if you're merely wary of scratches, you could cover it with one of those clinging, transparent sheets.) But face it. How often have you found such elaborate cases too cumbersome to be worth the bother? You're not protecting an expensive, appreciating asset, and like it's very name suggests, the Touch is built for communicating with other users and surfers. Why get all fussed up about insulating it?

The Belkin Sleeve slips on the iPod in a microsecond and with a gesture that's totally intuitive. So if like me your pajamas are blue and your street wear black, living couldn't get much easier. (Hint: Although I'm currently seeing the package offered by an Amazon sub-vendor at a lower rate, you may wish to order the item directly from Amazon if you have Prime.)

This terrific little fax/printer/scanner, for less than $90(!), is compact and lightweight--about 8" tall, 16 ½" wide, and (without the paper tray) about 11" deep, taking up relatively little desktop space, an all-in-one machine.

So far it does absolutely everything I've wanted it to do. User friendly and largely self-explanatory, it requires no complicated instruction manual or ramp up time for those of us who are not especially computer savvy. Printing is fast and "enthusiastic"--it spits out copies quickly and with such force that they end up on the floor if you don't have the tray extension pulled out.

For ordinary home use, this machine has been perfect. By setting the printer for "draft" mode, I get much longer use from the (very small) print cartridges, and the quality of the copies is adequate for what I need. For photographs, I would, of course, want higher resolution, but that is an option, too.

This is obviously not the equivalent of the big OfficeJet Pro machines that I've had in the past, but those are expensive, extremely heavy, and take a huge amount of space. I'm flabbergasted that this little machine is so good at one tenth the price of the OfficeJet Pro! Mary Whipple

After living in the Boston area for years (and spending a great deal of time being lost) and now being equally lost in the twisty hills near Philadelphia, I broke down and ADMITTED that sometimes, a GPS device would be just dandy to get me to an unfamiliar location.

I chose the Tomtom based on some good reviews--here, thank you, and a great price point (also here, thanks Amazon.) For $149, you can get a reasonably fully-featured car GPS with simple-to-use features and user-updates for free plus extras.

1. The out-of-box experience.

Here is where the one star comes off a five-star rating. The anti-theft extra thick, sealed plastic bubble pack required a laser cutter and a nuclear detonator to open. Lacking these household tools, I had to carefully cut the plastic open with sharp scissors and a hunting knife, risking cutting myself. I understand that stores want to display these on a rack, and that some not-very-nice people try to slip their larcenous little hands in to steal the loot, but this package resisted me for a solid half an hour. How about packaging ones for direct shipment in a box?

The instruction book is slim and is mostly in iconic (picture) format. I realize people can't or won't read; but puzzling out someone's idea of what I am seeing is actually slower than moving my lips when I read.

The unit has a nice map-like piece of paper protecting the screen, nice touch. The screen is plastic. The mount is a sticky suction cup, and there is a left-handed option. There is also a speaker mount because the voice is very faint. I chose "Mandy" (one of the free voices) and she whispered her directions to me, over the sound of my engine. Not great. Will be trying the speaker. The Brit voice option, male or female, was absolutely annoying. How about a Cockney or Aussie option? Or a really bossy German-accented English? That'd be cool.

The real issue was the start-up. I decided I wanted to see it in home first rather than in the auto, so I fired up the USB attachment. The menus were so-so, first, actually, you have to update all kinds of options and you aren't even SURE if you want them but what the hell? I took them. This took about 30 minutes.

Then I fired up the unit and holy hell, it was totally in Finnish. Yes, I realize the Finns are without a doubt the world's finest creators of cell phones and GPS devices, but if my unit had defaulted to ENGLISH when initially turned on, about 3 billion more people could have understood the initial unit instructions. I puzzled my way through to find the options menu to change language and finally got English. Setting "English" in the software for the at-home function had NO effect on the unit which persisted in spitting umlauts, diacritical marks and a lot of double "a's" and "u's" at me until I learned Elementary Finnish (Foreign Service Level 1) in a hot hurry and got it to quit that stuff and get back to English. I'm not a language-o-phobe by any means, being tri-lingual but I draw the line at Finnish.

So one star is off for out-of-box, kind of rocky start.

2. Into the car
I plugged the unit into the cigarette lighter and it fired up, (and having then finally changed it into English), it was very easy to set up directions to my office. Yes, yes, I know the way to my office, but it was a CRITICAL test because Garmin and other units seem to think my office is way across town, in a similarly-named center. The Tomtom, with the updated maps and user-corrections, recognized my office complex right away. Bravo! No more sad calls from confused visitors looking at the wrong office center, and late appointments to my place if you are using the latest version of this GPS.

The voice was rather dim, telling me where to turn (like I didn't know) and I can see I will need the speaker if I intend to use this in my forays to parts unknown. Having the radio on is really tough; if it's yapping at you, you will miss critical information. The screen display is nice--shows the route, your speed and the suggestions by the state (lower...) and the miles left to your destination.

There are options for traffic reports, for fuel stops, alluring shopping possibilities (this should be interesting) and other attractions, assuming you are in a place with attractions. Here, the attractions are a large statue that looks like one of the Fantastic Four crushing a car (The Monster Mile at the Dover Downs Speedway), The Wye Oak, a large tree that blew down and doesn't exist anymore and the Mason-Dixon Line marker. That's about it.

The unit did take me to parts unknown "north of the canal" (the fearful divider between North and South Delaware.) It adapted to several wrong turns I deliberately (hah! right!) made and directed me, even through back streets, to my destination. On the way home, however, it made some peculiar choices in ways to get there--roads I never would think to take. Next time, I'm going to try the suggestions, but I think some of the observations that the routes chosen are rather wonky is probably CORRECT. Also, I put in a favorite restaurant, and drove there from work, and it missed the correct intersection to turn in, taking me one more and farther away than would be optimal, though do-able. In short, not perfect. But I love the feeling of being able to go to parts unknown and have some probably expectation of getting there without being entirely lost.

3. Summary

I like this unit a lot--it's portable, reasonably full-featured and has a three hour battery. The instructions could be better. The voice could be louder, but over all, I'd recommend this one as very user-friendly ONCE you get past the box opening stage.