A New, Souped-Up Gran Turismo

If you were one of the lucky ones to score a PlayStation 3 (PS3), hopefully you discovered Sony’s Christmas gift to you . . . a free download of Gran Turismo HD Concept. It will only be offered for a limited time, so if you haven’t downloaded it already, you should take advantage of this as soon as you can!

I’ve always been a huge fan of the Gran Turismo games, and was looking forward to this version coming out. The first thing that caught my eye was the astounding graphics. I must say that the PS3 is the perfect machine to play this game on. You can see everything so clearly, from the details on the cars to the snow-capped mountains in the background. It definitely takes complete advantage of the PS3’s hardware performance by providing you with full HD 1080p resolution.

The game was developed by Polyphony Digital, Inc, and features an all-new course for you to be the first to drive a Ferrari on a PS3. You’ll have access to the Elger Nordwand course and can compete in Time Trial races to collect and unlock new cars. As you go on the cars become better and better. Upon unlocking your first 10 cars, you’ll then have access to 10 more “Tuned Cars” and a new driving mode called “Drift Trial.”

The “Drift Trial” mode allows you to master the art of drifting and achieve ultimate control of your car. Your drifting technique will be tested as opposed to your lap time. You earn drift points based on your drift angles, racing lines and speeds within evaluation zones located at various turns on the course. For each evaluation zone, the results are based on the number of flags and a numerical figure. The point total from all zones determines the players drift points for the lap and is counted toward the rankings.

While you’re connected to the PlayStation Network (PS Network), you can upload your times and view the Top 10 rankings for each car and mode, along with play and save replays online. You can even view other driver’s trials for yourself. Doing this is actually beneficial to motivate yourself and watch how others handle the track while admiring your PS3’s wonderful graphic quality.

Here are the featured cars in Gran Turismo HD Concept, in order of how you unlock them:

1995 Suzuki Cappucino
1989 Mazda Eunos Roadster
2004 Acura Integra TYPE R
1996 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IV GSR
2006 Infiniti G35 Coupe
2005 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX GSR
2005 Lotus Elise 111R
1994 Nissan SKYLINE GT-R Vspec II
1995 Toyota Celica GT-FOUR Rally Car
2006 Ferrari 599

The “Time Trial” mode lets you unlock these cars by beating the target time on the Elger Nordwand course. In addition to the access to tuned cars upon unlocking all the cars, you’ll have the option of racing the course in the opposite direction. Also note that you can drive with either automatic or manual transmission, set your traction level, stability management (to prevent skidding) and select your own tires (front and rear).

The award-winning Gran Turismo franchise has so far sold over 45 million units worldwide for the PlayStation platforms. It is the racing game of choice among the automotive and gaming audience for its true-to-life graphics, physics, real-life cars and tracks. “Gran Turismo HD Concept provides the PS3 and automotive fans a glimpse into the future of Gran Turismo,” says Kazunori Yamauchi, famed creator of the Gran Turismo franchise. “With the power of the PS3 technology, the world of Gran Turismo is refined by its full HD visual presentation and unique interactive experience, resulting in an even more realistic and true driving simulator,” he adds.

Take advantage of the free Gran Turismo HD Concept download yourself by connecting your PS3 to the PlayStation Store (PS Store). It has an ESRB rating of “E” for Everyone. Other available free (downloadable) PS3 games available are Blast Factor (action arcade), Calling All Cars (action arcade), flOw (Zen), Go! Sudoku (puzzle), Go! Swizzleblock2 (puzzle) and Lemmings 2 (puzzle).

Choosing A Bluetooth Headset

I remember years ago I was one of the first people around to own a Bluetooth capable phone along with a Bluetooth headset. People used to think I was crazy since it looked like I was talking to myself. There was no wire coming out of my ear and I had my hair covering the headset so you couldn’t see it. Furthermore, when I would talk about Bluetooth, most people didn’t know what I was yappin’ about, and I think the funniest one was the woman that thought I was referring to a dolphin.

These days everyone knows what Bluetooth is, and lately I’ve been receiving many questions from my friends about what Bluetooth headset they should buy for their phone. As silly as it sounds, the first step is to make sure your phone is Bluetooth capable. I’ve received trouble calls from people trying to setup a Bluetooth headset, and it turns out their phones are not even Bluetooth capable. So, don’t just assume you can use a Bluetooth headset with any phone – the phone needs to be Bluetooth capable as well. These days it’s almost the norm with phones, but just check to be absolutely sure.

Tre are so Bluetooth headsets to choose from, but you need to choose what works best for you. There seem to be two main types: the ones held up with a loop going around your ear and the ones that have to be jammed into your ear. Ideally you’d wear it all the time comfortably while you’re expecting to receive and make calls. With this in mind here are a few of my top picks:

Aliph Jawbone Bluetooth Headset
Literally just announced from Cingular Wireless as I was writing this story, this is the latest on the market. Jawbone is the first adaptive Bluetooth headset with Noise Shield technology, which eliminates background noise so your calls are clearer. You don’t have to worry about ambient noise since this noise-canceling system continuously adapts to your changing environment.

This Noise Shield technology was originally developed for Aliph for DARPA (The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), a research and development organization for the Department of Defense. It was created to enhance communications in the most hostile and rugged environments in mind. The headset’s built-in sensors and software continuously adjust at 500 times per second to identify and isolate your speech, subtract the unwanted noise and automatically enhance the audio with frequency boosting.

The Jawbone comes completely charged out of the packaging, and will last you six hours of talk-time or 120 hours of standby time on a full-charge. Since it requires no batteries, it’s a very lightweight 14 grams and is comfortable to wear on your ear with its soft and smooth underside. It comes with earloops in four different shapes and sizes to ensure customized fit and maximized stability on either ear.

It will cost you $120 and comes in silver, black and red, and is currently exclusively available at your nearest Cingular Wireless store (silver only). All colors will soon be available in early January on www.jawbone.com (see the instructions on the website for the pre-order requests – they’re offering free shipping). The Jawbone made my jawbone drop, so I’m waiting for the red one. To see a video demonstration, click the “Meet” link on Jawbone’s website.

Jabra JX10
I was so happy with my Jabra headset “way back then,” but the contacts on the charger broke, and it was the end of it. The Jabra JX10 would be my second choice to the Jawbone, and it would have been a good replacement for my previous Jabra. As with the Jawbone, it’s completely rechargeable, so it’s not bulky (10 grams).

Some features include a one-touch pairing button, automatic volume control, voice dialing, call waiting, last number re-dial, and optional charging from your computer via USB (comes with a desktop charging cradle). It will give you six hours of talk time or 200 hours of standby.

You can find the Jabra JX10 in silver at your closest Best Buy (www.bestbuy.com) or CompUSA (www.compusa.com) for $179.

Motorola H700
This is what my husband is using now. He just “had” to buy it after we bought our his and hers Sony Ericsson W810i Walkman phones (which I wrote about a month ago). He loves this thing so much that he wears it around the house and outside in the yard without even realizing it.

The H700 is Motorola’s lightest headset to date. It has easy on/off feature, as you just flip open the microphone for calls, and fold it back in when you’re done. You can mute calls right from the headset. The talk and standby times are the same as the JX10 – six hours talk and 200 hours standby. It’s completely rechargeable and comes with a travel charger as well. There is also a built-in chipset with echo and noise cancellation software. I’m not sure how the noise cancellation compares to the Jawbone, but the hubby seems to be happy with the H700.

The Motorola H700 is the least expensive of these three headsets, available for $100 at your nearest CompUSA (www.compusa.com), Best Buy (www.bestbuy.com) or Motorola (www.motorola.com).

Whichever you choose, keep in mind that although Bluetooth headsets are a bit more pricey than a regular plug-in headset, they can be used to connect to other Bluetooth devices, such as your computer for a virtual conference. I think it’s definitely a good investment, and you don’t have to worry about wrestling with a pesky cord with your 30-foot Bluetooth range.

OpenOffice.org

Many of you have been asking me about alternatives to Microsoft Office, and if there are any cheap or free ones attainable out there. The answer is, yes! So, especially if you’re broke from Christmas shopping, spare yourself paying Microsoft the $500 because OpenOffice.org is absolutely free, and it can do just about everything the regular Microsoft Office can.

OpenOffice.org is a free office suite of applications that is installable on Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and Solaris. OpenOffice.org is a part of a project has been in the workings for many, many years, but OpenOffice.org 2.0 was presented to the community to download in late 2005, and a recent 2.1 upgrade became available this December. It comes in 36 languages (with more on the way), and it banishes software segregation and isolation with its ease of use and compatibility with Microsoft and other software.

When you open it up, it’s not like Microsoft Office where you actually launch a specific program (i.e. Word, Excel, PowerPoint). It comes up as one application in OpenOffice.org, and you choose one to use. The suite offers a database module Base, to complement the word processor Writer. Calc the spreadsheet manager is similar to Excel and Impress is PowerPoint-like. There’s also a Draw program for you to doodle in, or more sensibly, put your graphics in to edit. These are all the programs you need to feel productive in an office environment. Not only that, but when you create your documents, you have the option to save it different formats, including the standard Microsoft way.

OpenOffice.org was released with the aim of reducing the dominant market share of Microsoft Office, and providing a free, open and high-quality alternative. That it definitely does. I can sit here all day and use it as I would the regular Microsoft applications, and it doesn’t bother me. While it doesn’t look exactly identical to the Microsoft applications, it’s close enough for me. All the tools that I would use in a typical day are there.

You probably wonder how something this good can be free. What makes this possible is the fact that it’s part of an on-going project and built by a community of people and companies. It is offered to you under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL), which gives it a free software license. Sun Microsystems is the primary sponsor and contributor. In addition, Novell, Red Hat, Debian, Propylon, Intel, independent programmers, translators, writers and marketers have made this project possible for you to benefit from. It is becoming the choice of businesses and governments around the world, with over 49 million+ downloads since the project’s inception.

“OpenOffice.org is on a path toward being the most popular office suite the world has ever seen, providing the users with safety, choice and an opportunity to participate in one of the broadest community efforts the Internet has ever seen,” says Jonathan Schwartz, President and COO of Sun Microsystems. “As a member of that community, I’d like to offer my heartiest congratulations.”

If you would like to throw your own two cents in, you can contribute to this project by reporting valuable feedback about bugs you find in the software, or make a donation (via PayPal or credit card) to help keep this going.

You probably don’t have to guess what the link is to find the program, but just in case you didn’t already catch it, go to www.openoffice.org.

If you’re using Mac OS X, be advised you have to download NeoOffice 1.2.2 (which is what I did) to experience OpenOffice.org. NeoOffice is the Mac OS X office suite based on OpenOffice.org, only with the look you would expect from a typical Macintosh application. Since OpenOffice.org is primarily geared towards Windows and Unix user-interfaces, NeoOffice has been successful at making it look just like a Mac application. Download this at www.neooffice.org.

Volunteer Hawaii

With the giving spirit in mind, why not give yourself? That’s one of the best gifts you can offer. You can find multiple local volunteering slots with Volunteer Hawaii (http://volunteerhawaii.org), a virtual volunteer center to link your interests with what’s available. It’s also a service recently added to United Ways in Hawaii.

When you first click on the website, you’ll see links to the different volunteer opportunities available. The link to pay attention to if you’re looking to volunteer for this Christmas season, is the Holiday Opportunities link. There you’ll find a variety of requests such as toy drive helpers, gift wrappers, receptionists or Santa’s helpers.

Throughout the rest of the year, consider other chances . . . there are so many to choose from! You can search for a specific event you want to help with, browse for all openings or make donations. To narrow the search down, you can enter in your zip code, category of interest or age group (if applicable). Just about anything you can think of is on there from domestic violence (my personal interest as a survivor) to substance abuse to homelessness and yes, even technology (people looking for webmasters, etc.).

If you’re on the other side of the fence, representing an agency that needs people, you can easily sign up and post your request on the website for prospective volunteers to see.

Volunteer Hawaii is a free service provided statewide to our community. The organization energizes and inspires people to actively create a stronger, safer and healthier environment that we want to live in.

This website is unique, and makes volunteering extremely easy and very accessible to everyone. You should definitely take advantage of it. However, if you have no computer, and still living in the dark ages of no Internet access, you can dial 2-1-1 from your home phone, and it will automatically ring a Volunteer Hawaii specialist to search the database for you.

Send An E-Card For The Holidays

So you do realize that Christmas is in a few days right? I hope you have all your shopping done, and packages and cards mailed out. Realistically, I know many of you haven’t had the time to do any of this, or just suffer from an extreme case of procrastination. Either way, there’s still hope for you if you send your greetings electronically.

E-card sites are nothing new, but as we move further into the digital age, these will probably be more and more common than paper cards. E-cards are also useful for your loved ones that live on the other side of the world where you can’t easily snail mail things, so you don’t have to consider e-greetings as pure last-minute alternatives. Here are some sites for you to send free e-cards :

Apple iCards (www.apple.com)
This is my personal favorite site to send e-cards from. Apple’s cards have a simple, classic, elegant look to them that you’re sure to love. If you’re a .Mac member, you can use your own photos. When you go to the website, make sure you click on the .Mac/iCards link.

Hallmark (www.hallmark.com)
Send free electronic greetings with e-cards and postcards with personalized messages. Cards for all holidays and occasions are available. You can send animated greetings using your own photos using the Smilebox software (PC only).

American Greetings (www.americangreetings.com)
Create free e-cards, printable greetings and invitations for Christmas, birthday and all your events. All year long, there are so many to choose from, including your own pics. If you send an e-card with Yahoo! you will end up with an American Greeting ‘s service.

Blue Mountain (www.bluemountain.com)
I remember Blue Mountain being around back in the days of dial-up Internet access. “Way back” in those days is when I first started sending e-cards from this site to those who were advanced enough to possess an e-mail account. It’s actually another arm of AGINTERACTIVE (American Greetings).

Amazon (www.amazon.com/gp/ecards)
Choose from 14 different categories of cards. There doesn’t seem to be as wide of a selection or capability as the ones mentioned above, but the cards are fairly decent.

There are so many more e-card websites out there, but the links mentioned are the ones that I consider to be the cream of the crop. Just remember that Christmas isn’t about what you give someone or how much money you spend, so e-cards are actually perfect, whether you are indeed a procrastinator or on a tight budget.

Holiday Photos – On The Go, Hassle Free

With all the pictures you’ve been taking for the holidays, you’re sure to have lots of photos to print out. There are so many printers on the market to choose from, so it may be confusing as to what is actually good. Canon came out with a line of portable printers that are virtually hassle-free since they don’t need to be hooked up to a computer. You can take these portable printers to your holiday parties, weddings or other special events for on the spot printing. Heck, one of these can even fit in my biggest purse.

“Whether people capture photos from a digital camera, camcorder, cell phone, or even a PDA, Canon’s new compact photo printers make it easy to quickly print beautiful photographs from nearly anywhere,” says Yukiaki Hashimoto, senior vice president and general manager of the consumer imaging group at Canon U.S.A., Inc. “These printers provide consumers with portable digital imaging solutions that yield brilliant photographs,” he adds.

Canon’s trio of compact printers includes the PIXMA mini260 inkjet photo printer (my favorite), along with dye sublimation photo printers SELPHY CP730 and SELPHY720. These printers were created based on a Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) study of consumer buying habits that indicate women influence about 88 percent of consumer electronics purchases. The report revealed that women are motivated to purchase products that emphasize form factor. This data brought Canon to optimize these printers’ design and ease-of-use, while maintaining interest to each potential customer through image quality and performance.

Speaking from the not typical woman point of view, it doesn’t matter to me what the printer looks like, or how hard it is to use (I’ll figure it out), I just care about how it performs and how good the picture looks like after I print it. But these new printers seem to have it everything, the good looks, the performance, and they’re easy to use. I don’t know about you other women out there, but these are the things it would take for at least my girl buds to actually want to buy a printer like this.

The first mentioned inkjet based PIXMA mini260 allows you to generate high quality photographs with or without your computer from anywhere. Even if you don’t have an electrical outlet to plug into, the optional rechargeable battery pack ($79.99) will keep your printer powered out at the beach or in your backyard while you’re having fun with your loved ones. That in mind, you can print from just about any type of memory card: Compact Flash, Micro drive, Smart Media, Memory Stick, Memory Stick PRO, SD Card and Multimedia card v.3.31. If you use Memory Stick PRO Duo, RS-MMC v.3..31 or minSD, those require an additional adaptor.

The mini260 has an Easy-Scroll Wheel interface that gives you rapid access to every printer functions. You can easily utilize the available printer options by rotating the wheel to your desired feature and pressing the “OK” button. That makes it friendly to use, even to the most non-tech savvy person on the planet. Additionally, the printer has a 2.5-inch color high definition (HD) thin film transistor (TFT) display, for you to edit and preview the images before you print. You can print up to 9600 x 2400 dots per inch (dpi) on a borderless 4 x 6 inch photograph. It will take you about 59 seconds to print one out with the printer’s Smart LED equipped four-color ink tank.

The SELPHY CP730 and SELPHY CP720 are a little different (and a slightly easier on your wallet) because they are dye-sublimation models, as opposed to inkjet. The use of dye-sublimation gives the SELPHY’s prints a continuous tone photographic quality, and it’s laminated with a clear overcoat that protects the photographs from moisture and fingerprints.

The shape of the printer itself is a small compact, rectangular shape that maintains a user-friendly, and distinctive SELPHY concept. The CP730 has a 2.0-inch color LCD screen with an interesting trimming option, to make it easy for you to crop your photos before you print. There’s a handy red-eye correction tool that takes away that scary possessed look from your photos instantly. There’s a new My Colors feature that allows you to print in Vivid, Neutral, Sepia or Black & White. As with the mini260, the CP730 also offers a battery pack for complete portability.

The CP720 doesn’t offer as many bells and whistles, but it comes with a slightly smaller 1.5-inch screen with the capability of switching from normal to full-screen viewing. The automatic dynamic correction and Adobe RGB support better image quality.

Both SELPHYs feature retractable USB cables for convenient connection to PictBridge-compliant digital cameras and camcorders and card slots for SD, CF, miniSD and Memory stick. They print borderless 300 x 300 dpi 4 x 6 photographs as well as 4 x 8 panorama prints, credit card size prints or stickers when equipped with the optional paper trays and ink/paper sets.

My favorite of the three is the PIXMA mini260 since it has the highest dpi, and it’s inkjet. Plus I love that HD screen. You can find the PIXMA mini260 for $199.99, SELPHY CP730 for $149.99 and SELPHY CP720 for $99.99 at your nearest Ritz Camera (www.ritzcamera.com), Best Buy (www.bestbuy.com), Circuit City (www.circuitcity.com). A huge plus for every one of these printers is that they can print pictures from your Bluetooth-enabled camera phone or PDA with Canon’s optional BU-20 Bluetooth adapter for your printer ($79.99 – www.amazon.com).

Watching Your TV Shows Online

With all the time you’re out shopping, meeting up with family and friends, and running errands during the holiday season, chances are you’ve been missing a lot of your favorite TV shows if you don’t have access to a TiVo or personal video recorder (PVR). Of course you can always buy TV shows off iTunes or Google Video (for $1.99 each), but who really wants to pay for something you can watch for free anyway? As long as you have a high-speed Internet connection, you can take advantage of the television networks that are offering free streaming shows on their websites. Plus, these play with very few commercials – good if you have very little time to spare, yet still want your entertainment. I know this is old news to some of you, but I still run into tons of people who have never thought about watching their television shows online.

ABC (www.abc.com) was the first to try this concept earlier this year with four of its shows: Desperate Housewives, Lost, Commander In Chief and Alias. The trial ended on June 30 with great success. Because of this, when the Fall television season came around this September, ABC decided to continue the service with its ad-supported broadband player. Now you can catch full episodes of Grey’s Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, Lost, Ugly Betty, Day Break, Six Degrees and The Nine. You can watch the last four episodes of each, with the exception of Lost - the first six shows of the season are accessible since the show went on break until next year.

These ABC episodes are streamed in cinema-like 16x9 formatting, and you can pause, rewind, fast forward between “chapters” within each episode. Unfortunately you cannot download the episodes, and it doesn’t let you skip over the advertisements. It’s not too bad, because the ads are short in comparison to the ones you see on actual TV.

Shortly after ABC launched its service, CBS Corporation followed suit with its announcement of innertube, an advertising-supported broadband channel that offers a range of free entertainment programming to you Internet users. You can view full episodes of the following CBS shows: 3 lbs., The Class, CSI, CSI: Miami, CSI: NY, How I Met Your Mother, Jericho, NCIS, Numb3rs, The Papdits, Shark, Smith, Survivor and The Unit. In addition, there’s a ton of original innertube programming you can watch. I found that the pixel quality doesn’t look as good as the ABC shows, but there’s certainly more variety for you to view. As with ABC’s service, the shows are not downloadable, but can be viewed at www.cbs.com/innertube. It’s kind of strange because if you go to www.innertube.com, you’ll hit a tire company’s website, having nothing to do with CBS.

NBC just recently jumped on the bandwagon earlier this month when it put Friday Night Lights (viewable until January 3) and Heroes (until the show returns on-air) online at www.nbc.com. It looks like NBC is still experimenting with the service since some other episodes’ two-minute replays are available to view as opposed to an entire episode.


Out of the three, I prefer ABC since it has most of my favorite shows there. Keeping “free” and not spending any money on TV in mind, this whole Internet TV thing works for me. For shows not available online, I still rely on my good ol’ PVR to catch those.

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PlayStation3 Hope: For those of you still wishing for a Sony PlayStation3, Hawaiian Telcom is giving away two (one 20GB and one 60GB) for the holidays. If you’re a Hawaii resident age 18+ you may enter online at http://hawaiiantel.com. Hawaiian Telcom also just announced last week they are the newest authorized Sony reseller in Hawaii with Sony products on-hand at eight of the stores statewide.

Be A Star With SingStar Rocks!

I love music - listening to it, singing along to it in the car when I’m by myself, you name it. Despite that, I make no claim to be any great singer. In contrast, if he wanted to, my husband could have easily made a career out of his wonderful voice. He’s no stranger to the stage, singing in bands during college, and was a Concert Glee Club member from his alma-matter Kamehameha Schools. He’s not shy when it comes to karaoke or singing along to songs when we’re out in public. The difference between his voice and my voice is that he actually sounds good.

While we were at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) this year, we saw a game called SingStar Rocks! on display in the Sony section. As expected, the husband decided to try it out, and he naturally sounded good. It was one of his favorite games at E3 and couldn’t wait for it to come out. Well, SingStar Rocks! finally hit the store shelves a couple of weeks ago, just in time for Christmas, and the star wannabe in your life.

This game genre from Sony is new to us American gamers, however Sony’s karaoke series has been well known in Europe for about two years now. SingStar Rocks!, developed by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe’s London Studio, lets you live the rock star dream in the comfort of your own home exclusively with your PlayStation 2 (or PlayStation 3). Its sophisticated, yet simple to use interface features 30 real songs from yesterday and today (with actual music videos from the original artists). Just to name a few: Elton John/Rocket Man, Gwen Stefani/Cool, Aretha Franklin/Respect, Lynyrd Skynyrd/Sweet Home Alabama, B52/Love Shack and Blur/Song 2.

SingStar Rocks! is perfect for parties, being the next generation singing game that it is. Unlike any other singing game on the market, this game analyzes your vocal skills, based your pitch, tone and rhythm, and provides feedback based on how well or badly you sang. How you play it is up to you. Have it all to yourself as a one-singer gig, if embarrassed to let others hear you, or have up to eight players competing.

To gauge how you’re doing, just pay attention to the colors and the performance meter at the top of the screen. If you see red, your singing is really awful. Yellow is alright and green is perfect. I guess I didn’t do too bad the first time since I saw yellows and greens the whole way (with no reds, thankfully). Of course I had it set on the Easy mode while singing I Will Survive by Gloria Gaynor. You have the choice to set it on Easy, Medium or Hard.

Different gameplay modes include Solo, Freestyle, Pass The Mic, Battle or Duet. Whichever you choose, you’ll be laughing at yourself and others. Battle Mode enables two players to challenge each other and sing for the highest scores, while the Duet Mode calls for two players to each sing one vocal part of a duet, then combines their scores for a total. The Pass The Mic is a team mode where you perform a variety of different singing challenges – solo rounds, combined duets, medleys and surprised singer selections to ensure that everyone at your party has a chance to sing. This is definitely a good icebreaker at any party. Additionally, if you have an EyeToy camera you put yourself in the music videos, record your favorite performances (onto your Memory Card) and snap photos of yourself singing in place of the artist. You can also customize and enhance the playbacks with numerous audio effects.

SingStar Rocks! is rated E10+ for Everyone ages 10 and up, and is about $50 at your nearest CompUSA (www.compusa.com), GameSpot (www.gamespot.com) or WalMart (www.walmart.com). Additionally the game comes with two microphones with a USB converter. The SingStar Rocks! website is fairly comprehensive if you want to find out more details about this game: www.us.playstation.com (click on the SingStar Rocks! official game site link). There you can see various screen shots and videos from the game, and you can send out invitations via e-mail for all your future SingStar parties (up to 10 invites). I thought that was a neat service to offer.

Finding Your Way Around With GPS

Some people have a GPS (Global Positioning System) in their car or carry one around for directional help. It’s a cool thing to have, but that wouldn’t really do much for me at home here. Like most locals, I navigate using our “mauka” or “makai” sense of direction. (For those of you new here, that means towards the mountain or towards the ocean, respectively.) Our lush mountains and blue waters are in eyeshot from just about anywhere, so it’s simple to at least know what direction you’re headed in.

Driving on the mainland is a different story. During my last visit to Texas, I was so disoriented because everything looked the same – one big dry desert with nothing but cactus everywhere. I couldn’t tell north from south, east from west (especially if it was cloudy or at night). If I had a good GPS gadget during that time, it would have been ultra helpful to find my way around. For the next time I travel, there are a couple of these devices that caught my attention . . . the Garmin StreetPilot c550 and the TomTom ONE.

Garmin’s StreetPilot c550 GPS was named one of TIME Magazine’s top eight gadgets. It comes ready-to-go right out of the box, including pre-loaded maps of North America (with Alaska and Hawaii). It delivers the same easy-to-use affordable navigation as Garmin’s popular c300 series, along with multiple enhancements such as Bluetooth with hands-free calling, an integrated traffic receiver (FM traffic receiver notifies you of construction or weather delays / suggests alternate routes), mp3 player and of course the actual GPS navigator (maps with 2D or 3D perspective and turn-by-turn voice directions).

A highly sensitive GPS receiver provides faster acquisition times and maintains the signal under heavy foliage or tall buildings. Perfect for the car, it uses an automotive-grade, sunlight-readable anti-glare display, which makes it easier to see. If you leave it in the car, the Garmin Lock anti-theft feature disables the unit from performing any functions until you type in a four digit PIN, or take the unit to your pre-determined location. Optional software available on plug-in SD memory cards allows you to add new features to your c550 (Travel Guide or Savers Guide).

Very similar to Garmin’s little wonder is the TomTom ONE, it was named the “Best GPS Unit” at Europe’s Pocket-Lint.co.uk Awards. It’s ready to use right out of the box, just plug it in and go. It gives you clear and accurate turn-by-turn voice directions in more than 30 languages and 50 voices. The interface itself is available in 18 languages. You can display a compass on the screen to give yourself directional orientation (perfect for me – I always want to know which direction I’m headed in).

As with the Garmin, the TomTom ONE is physically slim, has 2D and 3D graphics, uses Bluetooth, has an anti-glare screen, and an SD card slot. Additionally, it has touchscreen technology, itinerary planning, thousands of points of interest available and a car speed linked volume (goes up or down depending on speed of car).

You can find the Garmin International StreetPilot for $700 and the TomTom ONE for $450 at CompUSA (www.compusa.com). Although both are excellent GPS products, for the huge price difference, you might be better off with the TomTom.

KOEI CORPORATION SHIPS DYNASTY WARRIORS® VOL. 2 FOR THE PSP

Dynasty Warriors is one of my favorite KOEI games. Unfortunately no room for me to write about it in MidWeek, but I just had to at least post its press release on my blog. This version is for the PSP and totally awesome as all Dynasty Warriors are . . . but portable just for the PSP.

Burlingame, CA – October 25, 2006 -- KOEI, recognized worldwide as the premier brand of strategy and action games, today announced that DYNASTY WARRIORS® VOL. 2 has shipped to retailers throughout North America. The martial-arts themed Tactical Action video game which is available exclusively for the PSP®(PlayStation® Portable) system hits stores on October 25, 2006.

About DYNASTY WARRIORS VOL. 2
Ancient China’s greatest warriors have rocked the foundations of heaven and earth for over 2,000 years. Now KOEI’s ‘Warriors Worth a Thousand’ return in a sequel that eclipses the original with an exquisite array of features!

KOEI’s Dynasty Warriors franchise is widely recognized for establishing the popular Tactical Action category. For the first time in the series, up to 4 players can engage in multiplayer combat including a Battle Royal mode. Players can now unlock up to 300 officers (three times as many as the original), and then wirelessly trade these officers with other players. Players can also manage a stable of up to 8 horses and elephants. Each mount will gain experience during battle and will prove a valuable military asset when setting out to conquer the game’s more than 50 stages and 31 maps.

DYNASTY WARRIORS VOL. 2 includes the complete pantheon of all 48 Dynasty Warriors®, with branching story paths for each kingdom. Game modes include Musou, Multiplayer and Free mode, plus a Camp mode where players can view detailed information on weapons, officers and stages. The game also gives players a full view of the battlefield action using the PSP®(PlayStation®Portable) system’s wide-screen display.

Developed by KOEI’s award-winning internal team, Omega Force, DYNASTY WARRIORS VOL. 2 is rated “T” (Teen- Violence) by the ESRB, and can allow play for 1-4 players using wireless (ad hoc) (Vs. Play). The suggested retail price is US$39.99.

Gamers can learn more at the DYNASTY WARRIORS VOL. 2 official minisite at www.koei.com.

About KOEI Corporation
KOEI Corporation, the North American subsidiary of KOEI Co., Ltd. of Japan, established operations in 1988. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, the company is now in its eighteenth year and is recognized as a leading content provider in the highly competitive video game industry.

KOEI is respected worldwide as the premier brand for Strategy and Simulation games, and is the innovator of the Tactical Action genre. The company's Dynasty Warriors® series has generated more than 9 million units in sales worldwide since its first release for the PlayStation game console in 1997.

KOEI develops, publishes, and distributes interactive software worldwide for video game systems and personal computers. For fiscal 2005, KOEI posted worldwide revenues of $223 million. KOEI maintains operations in Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Canada, China, Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Lithuania. The company constantly seeks the fine balance between entertainment, technology, art and education. More information about KOEI’s products can be found on the Internet at koei.com, koei.co.uk, koei.fr, and www.koei.co.jp.

Dynasty Warriors and the KOEI logo are registered trademark or trademark of KOEI Co., Ltd. “PlayStation”, “PS” Family logo, and “PSP” are registered trademarks of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. Memory Stick Duo™ may be required. Memory Stick Duo is a trademark of Sony Corporation. The ratings icon is a registered trademark of the Entertainment Software Association. All other trademarks are properties of their respective owners.

Safe Online Shopping

Since online shopping has come into existence, I jumped on the bandwagon right away and marked my beginnings of e-commerce participation. It’s so convenient to find just about anything I’m looking for, especially if I’m particular about the specific brand and model of the product. I usually find whatever-it-is, instantly without having to comb through a store’s shelves. Especially during this time of year, this saves me time and the headaches of crowds and fighting for parking. Although Internet shopping has its many advantages, there are some things you should keep in mind to protect yourself. To some of you these are just common sense things you probably already know, but to others this is whole Internet shopping thing just scares you, and it’s a brand new concept that you might not even want to attempt. As long as you’re cautious, it’s perfectly safe.

One of the first things you should do is make sure the websites you shop at are secure. A secure site uses encryption to transfer information from your computer to an online merchant. The encryption scrambles the information you send (i.e. credit card number) to prevent hackers from intercepting it. The sole people who can unscramble the code are those with legitimate access rights. You can tell you’re on a secure site when you see “https://” before the “www” portion of the web address. The “s” indicates the website is secure. Sometimes you will not see the “s” until you hit the actual order page. A second thing you can look for is a closed padlock displayed at the bottom of your screen. If you see the lock open, assume it’s not secure. A third indication you’ll see is an unbroken key. This ensures the site is secure.

You should always research the website you’re ordering from. It’s wise for you to purchase from companies that you’re already familiar with. Reliable companies will usually advertise their physical address and phone number you can call to ask questions. If you call, you should ask how they handle returned merchandise, complaints and how refunds are handled (if they’ll give you a full refund or store credits).

Be sure to read over the website’s privacy and security policies. All reputable e-commerce websites offer information about how your order is processed. It’s usually listed in the website’s “Privacy Policy” section. There you can find out if the merchant intends to share your information with third parties. Look for members of a seal-of-approval program. Three of the main ones are TRUSTe (www.truste.org), Verisign (www.verisign.com) or BBBonline (www.bbbonline.org).

Often times companies will try to obtain more information about you in addition to your name, address and phone number. Sometimes they’ll also ask for more information for their marketing purposes (i.e. hobbies, buying habits, etc.). Always provide them just the minimum, and under no circumstance, never EVER give out your social security number. There is no need for any merchant to ask for this. You only need to disclose the bare facts when you order.

To avoid becoming a victim of any phishing or spoofing (where consumers receive messages from dishonest sources disguised as messages from trusted sources), make sure you check the website to make sure it’s the correct company. Don’t click on any embedded link within a suspicious e-mail. In fact, I don’t click any links. To be extra cautious, I usually open a new window and manually type in the web address, even if it’s from a trusted source.

If you use your credit card to order, that’s the safest thing to do. If something should go wrong, you are protected under the federal Fair Credit Billing Act. You have the right to dispute charges on your credit card, and can withhold your payments during a creditor investigation. Make sure your credit card is a true credit card and not a debit, check or ATM card. These will expose your precious bank account to e-thieves, and are not protected by federal law to the extent that credit cards are.

Shopping with companies located in the United States will protect you from state and federal consumer laws. You will not receive this same protection if you place an order from a company located in another country. Additionally, being out here in Hawaii, you know that we can potentially rack up huge shipping fees. Try to choose a retailer that offers free shipping. This time of year, that’s not too difficult to find since many companies offer free shipping promos to lure online shoppers in, plus you can save yourself a little dough on no tax.

Before you start filling your virtual cart up with goodies make sure you consider the things mentioned above. For more information, check out www.onguardonline.gov (Federal Trade Commission), www.safeshopping.org (American Bar Association) or www.wiredsafety.org (online safety / help group). Happy e-shopping!