Review

The Amazon Kindle Touch is quite a remarkable little machine. In many ways, it can be seen as a halfway point between the Fourth Generation Kindle e-Reader and the Kindle Fire Tablet. However, it's not simply a glorified reader, nor is it a stripped down tablet. Rather, it is another way in which Amazon is building on its lead in the e-Reader market by optimizing the reader interface and user controls. With the Kindle Touch sure to find its way under many a tree this holiday season we put the device through its paces with a hands-on review. Read More

Snapheal, to be released on Wednesday, is a photo editing app for Mac which "can do magic", at least according to MacPhun, the app's developer. In addition to the usual tweaks and minor edits allowed by vanilla entry-level photo editing software, Snapheal allows you to erase whole objects - including large ones - from your photographs. Gizmag took an advance copy of Snapheal 1.0 for a spin. Could it be magic? Judge for yourself. Read More

It may not have been the first e-Reader on the market sporting E ink's electronic paper display - Sony's LIBRIé claimed those bragging rights when it debuted in Japan in April 2004 - but since its launch in November 2007, Amazon's Kindle has risen to dominate the e-Reader market. In that time, it has also gone through a number of updates, including the Kindle 2, the Kindle DX, Kindle 3 and most recently, the Kindle Touch and the first Kindle without an E Ink display, the Kindle Fire. The latest updates to the line-up also saw the Kindle enter its fourth generation, and with the Touch and Fire having the lion's share of attention, we decided to turn the spotlight on the 4th-gen Kindle with a review. Read More

Way back in January 2010, a short demo video of a new digital instrument prototype was posted on YouTube by its creator Michael Zarimis, and went viral. From the millions of views, a list of prospective buyers was drawn up and the Misa Digital Guitar soon began its journey towards commercial availability. By the time the next CES show arrived, the instrument had ditched its gleaming white ABS plastic casing and gone over to the dark side, received a few design modifications, and been officially named Kitara for its public debut. The Kitara has now been made available for purchase, and I've spent the last few weeks getting to grips with this innovative new instrument - being rewarded for inventive experimentation and punished for bad playing technique. Read More

I've just spent a day with a pre-production unit of Kogan’s new 8-inch Agora tablet and while it's fair to say there's an element of "you get what you pay for" at work here, that’s not to say the Agora is bad - it's an indication of just what kind of technology can be had for a fairly minimal outlay these days. If you're in the market for a budget priced tablet to keep the kids entertained on a long car trip or something to check the occasional email and spot of Web browsing then it will do the trick nicely, but don't expect the same kind of user experience you’d get when investing more money on a better specced unit. Read More

Nintendo's 3DS has been in the wild for a while, but now that the hype surrounding the device has died down a bit we decided to cast an eye over the console that promised to revolutionize portable gaming when it was released earlier this year. The 3DS follows the clamshell form factor Nintendo first introduced on the Game Boy Advance SP back in 2003 and the look and feel of the console will be pretty familiar to anyone who has used any of Nintendo's DS line, but the 3DS sees a couple of useful design changes in addition to the headline-grabbing 3D capabilities. Read More

Electronics-loving orthodontic clinician Dr. Mark Brickley has developed a collection of electronic circuit-building experiments, tested them on unsuspecting colleagues, and then squeezed them into a retro mint tin. After a few refinements, the Minty Geek Electronics Lab 101 kit was recently launched at the Maker Faire in Newcastle, UK. I spent a very productive few hours getting to grips with my inner geek and experiencing a genuine sense of achievement as I managed to create a morse code generator and an alarm that alerts me when someone opens the lid of my cashbox. Read More

For the rest of 2011, I'm visiting a new country every week or two. I'm not the biggest fan of getting lost, asking for directions, or getting ripped off by taxi drivers, so keeping my iPhone's battery charged is high on my list of priorities. I came across Mophie's Juice Pack Powerstation while I was doing my pre-travel gadget shopping, and was surprised at how small, light and cheap the unit was. So how does it stack up? Read More

Armour Home recently announced that it has been appointed worldwide distributor of Phitek System's BlackBox range of Active Noise Rejection (ANR) headphones and earphones. Phitek says that the level of ambient background noise can reach 60dB in a busy street, 80dB in the office and up to 94dB in the cabin of a passenger jet. The company claims that its technology is capable of reducing ambient noise levels by 90 percent or more, and I've been sent some C18 in-ear phones for review. Read More