Samsung UE55C8000 - 55" 8 Series 3D LED-backlit LCD TV - widescreen

Samsung UE55B7020W 55-inch Widescreen Ultra Slim Full HD 1080P Crystal LED TV with Media 2.0 and Freeview


It's the Samsung LED C8000. With its explosive 3D capabilities and immersive HyperReal engine, it delivers the world as you've never seen it before. Its LED screen amplifies images to such an extent that it's hard to believe they're coming out of an ultra-slim TV. Richer colors, smoother motion and mega contrast levels combine to make an unparalleled viewing experience. So whether you're watching your favorite television programs, web content or a video you shot yourself, it was designed to blow your mind.

New Samsung UE55C8000 TV

First of all, the look is very stylish. The brushed titanium effect is simply brilliant. Even though the screen is whopping 55", it doesn't look unfittingly huge. The ultra-slim design is really stunning. 

All the connecting ports are conveniently located. Some accessories are supplied to tidy up the cables, but that seems quite difficult if you have too many cables. Very easy to fit the stand. The stand is quite stable and sturdy, and stylish too. 

Overall the TV enhances the aesthetic of the living room significantly. 

The remote control is a cool one. There is a button to turn on the back-light so you can see the keys when it is dark. 

The package does include a free pair of 3D glasses, although Samsung website might have said otherwise. 

Installation is extremely easy. I use Sky+HD, but it can receive FreeView HD through freeview antenna. It also has built-in Freesat receiver. It is supposed to tune Freesat channels without the need of a set-top box if you connect satellite dish cable to the TV through that adaptor. But I was not able to test it because the adaptor was not included in the package. 

Watched the Monster vs Alien 3D using Samsung BD C6900 3D Blueray player and the experience was simply breathtaking. Overall picture quality in 3D and 2D HD mode is superb. 

Recently I've also watched a few football matches on Sky 3D channel on this TV. Experience was not as exciting as Monster vs Alien 3D blue ray, but still amazing. I felt like touching the players when they were taking corner kicks. 

Contrary to many comments about poor sound quality experienced in ultra-thin TVs, I found the sound quality in this TV to be excellent. Sound was clear and crisp and you have option to change the sound mode quickly (using the Tools button on the remote) between voice, music or movie. Even at 25% of the max volume level, the sound strength was very good. 

There is an option to watch the 2D video in 3D mode. The TV converts the images but the effect is not very pleasing - there is not much depth and the image gets a lot darker if you do so. Also it works reasonably well if the original material is in HD. 

Normal definition 2D picture quality is not that great either. Well. it could be because I'm watching the big-screen TV from only a distance of 11 feet. But the quality is still better than most other big-screen TVs I've seen so far. I tried to adjust several picture parameters to get a sharper and clearer normal definition pictures but nothing helped. I got the best result by turning off MPEG noise filter. I hardly see any impact of motionplus feature on quality of picture while watching football match on HD. Perhaps I need to adjust the settings a little more. Unfortunately there is no way to save your parameters in a customised profile which you can switch to. The existing settings e.g. Movie, Standard, Dynamic, Natural etc cab adjusted but should be saved on the same name. You can reset to factory settings though. But it would have been better to have a few customized settings options. 

I've seen a few high-resolution photos through USB stick - simply stunning! 

I haven't tried the networking option as it needs a USB dongle. Since my Blueray DVD player has in-built wireless adaptor, this feature is redundant to me. I browse the Internet using the DVD player. 

There are adequate number of ports for different input sources. However, there is no option to choose your own names for the input sources. You have to select the names of sources from a pre-defined list of names. For example if you connect PlayStation in one and Wii in other, and you name them both as Games, then user will get confused. This simple feature of editing the input source name should have been there. 

In many TVs, if you connect the headphone into headphone socket, the main speaker is still active. But in this TV, the main speaker goes mute. You must remove headphone jack to listen through main speaker. However, there is an additional audio out port that fits 3.5mm stereo jack. If use a wireless headphone connected to the TV always, without muting the main speaker, this additional port is extremely useful. 

If the broadcast channels are HD channels, then the TV automatically shows the picture in 4:3 format if the original is in 4:3. But for non-HD channels, the 4:3 format pictures are stretched wide to fill the screen. You need to change the picture format manually every time you switch from a 16:9 channel to a 4:3 one and vice versa. Simple feature of automatic format switching is not possible, which is a pity for a high-end TV like this. 

Be careful when you are buying the TV from non-UK retailer. You may not get an option to choose "UK" as your country while installing and you may run into problem during Freeview tuning. I called the Samsung customer service, and they said each TV is meant for a set of certain countries. 

Overall the TV is brilliant for its HD and 3D picture quality and sound quality, but it has some room to improvement in user friendliness. 

Canon Powershot SD4500IS

Canon PowerShot SD4500 IS Digital ELPH - Digital camera - compact - 10.0 Mpix - optical zoom: 10 x - supported memory: MMC, SD, SDXC, SDHC, MMCplus

I had my doubts before purchasing this one. From previous reviews it was clear that the picture and video quality are good, but battery life is really bad. And after using it for a while, it turned out to be true. 
It is a fairly simple device to use and for casual everyday picture/video taking it is a good device. Image stabilization is good and it has pretty good low light capabilities. Picture quality is also decent for a point-and-shoot camera. 
What impressed me the most about this camera, both on the fact sheet and in real use, are the video capabilities. It does full HD, has dedicated video recording button and one can use the whole 10x optical zoom while recording. The video quality is good. It definitely rules out the need to take a dedicated video camera for every trip. Image stabilizer does reasonably good in handheld mode and even in full zoom level, but then again don't expect too much while doing handheld video shots: it is a rather small camera and for completely shake/wobble free shots, one must use some kind of extra equipment (like tripod or handheld steadicam). In addition, it has a nice feature of doing slow-motion shots in low resolution. It is definitely cool feature to experiment with and provides true slow-motion clips for experimental video editing. But that's about it, for practical purposes the video is far too low resolution. 
And then there is the battery life... I guess I can wrap it up shortly: it is bad and having 1-2 or more extra batteries is a must. I purchased it with some cheap non-Canon replacement battery and it payed off immediately. Wish I had bought even 2-3 of those. Though, I didn't see any reason to buy a Canon brand battery, because it was about 1/4-th of the camera price, way too high in my mind. 
There are definitely better cameras out there, but it is a rather solid everyday point-and-shoot camera, with plenty of zoom and image quality. Video shooting capabilities are a reason to consider this piece. And you can get one for pretty cheap by now.


The Automatic feature is wonderful for most shots, even detecting the type of shot and making settings to match. 

The special additional features make the camera fun. A few of them are: 

1. Set it to take 5 rapid shots and the camera picks the best one. 
2. Set it to for smiles and it will wait until it detects a smile before taking the photo. 
3. Set it for wink and it will take the shot after detecting the wink - this lets you get in the photo and signal when the camera takes the photo. 
4. Taking photos at night, the camera combines 5 photos to create a great nighttime shot. 
5. The movie feature lets you take up to 2 hours of video, if you get a 32 GB card. 

All this plus Consumer Reports rates its predecessor as one of the top 2 digital cameras, and this one is even better.

Kindle Keyboard 3G. Free 3G Wi-Fi

Kindle Keyboard 3G, Free 3G + Wi-Fi, 3G Works Globally, 6" E Ink Display

The weight of the Kindle is a significant factor. A large paperback or hardback can be annoying to read, especially if you're in bed. Remember holding a heavy paperback above you? Or how annoying it is when you lie on your side and one page of the open book is easier to read than the other? Or pinning a book open on the pillow with one hand as you read? Well, all that's out the window. Reading a lightweight e-reader is comfortable and handy and it's almost impossible to lose a page. Need to stop reading for a moment? Just put the Kindle to one side, and when you return it's still there, on the same page. The only time I lose a page is when I grip either side of the device wrongly and turn a page forward or backward unexpectedly; easily resolved though.


I've tried turning pages on other devices. For example, on the iPad there's a page-turning graphic where the page rolls across the screen under your fingertips. Fact: page-turning is NOT the exciting part of reading a book. If you're enjoying a book you don't even notice that you're turning the pages. However, when I tried a different brand of e-reader I was dispapointed at the slowness of the page turns and the way the device seemed to have a fit as the page refreshed. It was distracting. This is not a problem the Kindle suffers from. The page turns are swift and delicate and do not interrupt the reading experience. On top of all this, you've got a crystal clear display and the ability to adjust the font size.

The first book I downloaded and read was "I Shall Wear Midnight" by Terry Pratchett, which had just been published. I found that, just like with a book, you soon forget you're turning pages and you get lost in the story. This is exactly what I hoped for. If the device had intruded into the reading, it would have been a lesser experience than using a book. I hope the day never comes when the Kindle beeps when an email arrives - this device is geared toward reading and I hope it stays that way. At the moment it is unobtrusive and the reading experience is fantastic.

The book browsing and buying experience is good, as expected. It's perfectly fast on WiFi. I haven't really had cause to test the 3G yet. The experimental web-browsing function works quite well on Wikipedia, although is not something I'm particularly interested in on an e-reader. The music plays nicely, and the text-to-voice function is pretty good, although everything sounds like it's being read by Stephen Hawking. However, the quality of the speakers is very good (better, I think, than on my iphone) and so proper audiobooks come across loud and clear. These are certainly interesting features and it doesn't do any harm for them to be there.

There's a free Minesweeper game if you press ALT+SHIFT+M. This is quite a fun 'easter egg', but I wouldn't want to encourage Amazon to detract from the main function of the device: reading. Not sure why there's an unused microphone on the device either. Goodness knows what they're planning. :)

I've had the device running with WiFi turned on for 6 days now and it's just started telling me that the battery is beginning to run low. I'd say there's still about 10% left in it, judging by the little battery symbol. That's impressive, considering I've been using it a lot. I'll probably turn the WiFi off between book purchases in future, though. It's going to be great for holidays.

I've also tried sending a Microsoft Word document by email to the device. It was a fast transfer and the final result was startlingly decent. It was nice seeing it displayed so well on the device.

The pricing of the ebooks is a bit odd; always shifting, and sometimes books disappear from sale (not from the device, though, as far as I know). I've been lead to believe this is because the UK prices are sometimes tied to the US prices. As the exchange rate fluxuates it affects the pricing. There's also some kind of dynamic pricing where Amazon will beat competitors' prices while they're having a sale. I don't know if this is true, but it seems to go some way to explaining why a Stephen King book will be £5 one day and £9 the next. It seems at the moment that there's a lot of significantly discounted bestsellers - which is a Good Thing. :) Hopefully prices will continue to drop as Kindle uptake increases. It certainly seems to be common sense that the saving made by publishers not having to print and distribute books should be passed on to the reader.

Overall, I'm so pleased that the device is as good as the advertising made it out to be. I'm going to start ditching the hundreds of paperbacks that I have in the house as I feel confident that e-readers - and in particular the Kindle - are the way forward.