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Friday, November 2, 2007
Cat boxes and a few out-of-the-box gadgets
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
My job brings me in contact with plenty of high tech gadgets - including one responsible for my late cat Buddy’s nervous breakdown.
Blame a robotic cat box cleaner. Buddy sure did. The device had metal rakes that cleaned the surface after the cat’s visit. Electronic sensors told it when to rake and when to leave the cat alone.
The trouble started when the box started its cleaning process before Buddy finished his process. Long after the incident Buddy would sit and watch the cat box, silently plotting.
Happily, the cat box was soon moved to the basement and Buddy lived years more.
Not all electronic gizmos are so fiendish. Some actually deliver on promises made on a Web site or on the box. And in light of the psychic damage the bad ones can do, today we’ll sing a few praises of the ones I’ve had that are worth welcoming into your home.
Topping my list is a desktop weather station from Brookstone. At first it seemed like a high-tech novelty that would soon find a final resting place in a junk drawer.
But it offers the current temperature, projected high and low for the day and the forecast at a glance, and not a day passes when I don’t give it a look. Unlike weather stations that require wireless or wired sensors in the yard, this gadget gets weather information using its built-in receiver. There’s no installation required, just add batteries and go.
It senses your location automatically and the small screen offers a 5-day forecast that has been at least as accurate as what we get from other sources.
Brookstone carries this device in its online catalog at http://www.brookstone.com. Look for the 5-Day Wireless Weather Forecaster priced at $85.
Next is something I wish I didn’t need - a wireless home security system to detect prowlers.
Most home security systems, especially those that are monitored, can sound an alarm if someone breaks into your home. But this system warns you while the prowler is still outside.
I bought The Reporter Expandable Wireless Alert System from the online Radio Shack catalog. It comes with a receiver and a wireless sensor that can warn of movement in your yard, in a garage or carport or on a patio. I paid $80 for the system (Catalog No. 49-429) and another $50 for a second wireless sensor (the receiver can handle four remote sensors).
I worried it would buzz constantly as trees waved in wind, or as my beagle moved about the yard. But in about a month of constant operation there has only been one false alarm.
The only downside is the unit’s cheap plastic appearance. Some assembly is required but once you decipher the instructions, it is a five minute job.
My interest in the next item was sparked by an online review of a gadget that will hit the market in 2008 from the Swiss Army Knife company.
It’s a cooler made for laptop computers. You place a laptop computer on top of it and built-in cooling fans keep the laptop from overheating.
Laptop computers - unlike desktop models - are not designed to run 24/7. They get hot to the touch if left on constantly and that heat can eventually hurt the circuitry. With the growing trend to use a laptop as a family’s main computer, many laptops are left on for hours if not constantly.
The Swiss Army Knife product isn’t on the market yet but there are other laptop coolers available now.
You needn’t buy one. Just pick up a cake cooling rack and rest your laptop computer on it. The heat from the bottom of the laptop creates air currents beneath the rack and that ventilates and cools the computer. It’s not as efficient as a fan but offers enough protection for most laptops.
That’s my take on some useful home gadgets. It’s my firm opinion that Buddy would approve of them all.
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