I don’t get why there is not a wide selection of RSS tickers for the Mac like one can easily find for Windows. What is available ranges from horrible to alright. RSS Ticker for Google Reader sits in the latter position. Its strengths are Google Reader intigration, quick display of feeds, direct tie-in with Google Reader for viewing all your feeds, and the ability to place the ticker on a wide screen.

It fails to give you control of your feeds subjecting you with old read messages for at least 24 hours cluttering up your news feed with archiac news. This drowns out the new posts and if you’re like me, you’ll miss the refreshed entries due to the numerous other feeds clogging up the ticker with stale items. Why is it not a standard to hide read posts? This seems idiotic to me. Additionally, the ticker likes to “blink out” every once in a while and present itself empty until the feed repopulates. Nice, more useless time wasting as I await something new to appear.

Other disappointments lie in the tiny favicons, lack of site name for each post, and non-intuitive controls. I stumbled over the procedure for closing the drop-down draw by accident after closing the entire application and reopening it for the first few minutes of use. Dude, I’m an IT guy and if it took me that long to figure it out, you’ve got a serious UI flaw.

Which leads me to one of my grandest complaints. There is zero support for this application. If you click the support link in the App Store, you are greeted with an icon in the middle of the page. Oooh, if I click it, it opens the website? Nice indicator on that graphic. Once there, nothing else is clickable like the contents bar one would figure would lead you to different sections. But wait, it gets better. While you “navigate” this site, you find yourself scratching your head. There is NO mention of RSS Ticker for Google Reader. It’s just games – kiddie games – that’s it. Forget about finding a support link or email address. Remember, nothig is clickable.

I feel this could be the ticker for Mac user if the mysterious author could accept input and correct a few minor issues. Give me new posts only and an easy way to close that drawer and I’m happy. Very happy.

Time to replace that first generation HDTV or maybe an older projector? Looking to upgrade your audio / video equipment to a true home theater experience? Wanna out do the local cineplex? Well, then start with the Optoma HD33 and prepare to impress yourself and your guests.

SvenOnTech received early delivery of the HD33, before it even hit the shelves at your local retailer, and we played with it for weeks. We enjoyed it so much that we forgot it was a review unit and not our unit. Needless to say, when it was time to send it back to Optoma, we mourned.

Give the review a read and see why we loved it so. Our feeling is that you will love it as much as we did. Probably more.

You won’t have to look hard to spot Harman Kardon’s latest portable speaker system for the iPod and iPhone. The Micro shrinks things down from its original big brother but doesn’t shrink the feature and sound list. In fact, it just out rocks.

Jump over to the review and be sure to watch the video review as well. This may just be your next boom boom for your iDevice.

It’s no surprise to tell you about our love for Logos (review) on the desktop but how about on the iPad? Well, I spent a few months digging into Logos for iPad and have just released the review of my experience. Give it a read to find out if Logos hit a grand slam with its iOS version or if got away with a base-hit.

Check out our video review of the all new Sonos Wireless Dock 100 and see how you can play Apple’s FairPlay protected content on any Sonos system.

If you’re looking for a case for your iPad or those cool, thin, protective films for it…or for the iPhone, then take a look at our reviews section. We just posted three reviews on a case and film protection for the iPad as well as a protective coating for the iPhone 3GS. Also, if you’re looking for a new and beautiful way to discover day-to-day news, you will want to read our review on Blancspot. Incredible stuff to be read!

While the iPad is simple as slicing butter with a hot knife for some, others wouldn’t even know how to wake it from sleep. That’s who Wallace Wang wrote “>My New iPad for. Helping with the basics such as syncing and sharing photos, calendars, and contact information, readers will be effective with their new tablet within a few minutes of opening the cover this No Starch Press book. Wang shows in easy to follow screen captures and well written instructions how to set up email, shop for music or video in iTunes, books in iBooks, how to rearrange icons and change wallpaper, as well as setting parental controls and privacy settings. My New iPad even shows one how to edit Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents using Apple’s iWorks suite of tools for the iPad.

Apple has done extremely well in putting the power of a smartphone into millions of peoples hands, most of whom have never had anything more than a standard cellular phone, bringing powerful tools with ease to the masses. The Cupertino-based company that invented the personal computer now hopes to bring that type of revolution to millions with its innovative tablet. Much like the iPhone but oddly different, the iPad may be a jewel buried deep in the hills to many. A large collection of iPhone users only use the basics of the wunder-phone never really knowing the potential of what they have in their hand. The iPad suffers from the same “blessing”. Wang has written a book that completely removes the mystery of the iPad and holds the hand of the timid first-time iPad user revealing features that one may have never discovered on their own.

I was impressed with My New iPad not from the view of being educated, as I already knew of every subject touched, but from a newbie stance. This book would be perfect for my mother who is a technical person but not a technology one. She’s not dumb, far from it, but she didn’t grow up in the Digital Age as I have. This book would walk her through everything she would need to get the most out of an iPad, even web browsing which she does in a limited way on her iPhone. The way the book is written and aided by the screen captures is excellent. She couldn’t go wrong. I easily could see the flow of Wang’s writing and never once did I ever think I was reading a dry and clinical user manual. Even as a user that knows this stuff inside and out, I was interested in what Wang had to write.

If you have a friend or family member considering an iPad but just doesn’t “know” if they are ready to make the leap from computer to tablet or they are just intimated by the whole idea, get this book and put it front of them. It will be well worth the $25 investment. It’ll serve them far better than any cheap plastic case at the same price.

I had been looking for a case for my iPhone that would protect the product but still be slim enough to slip into my wallet. Most cases available are rather bulky and make it hard to use the controls on the phone. The Flick forms closely to the phone allowing for full use of all controls. The Flick does not get in the way of the face of the phone but rather forms right around the silver edging of the face making a very nice outline.

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iFrogz is a rising star in affordable headphones and it has inched further in engineering and development with the CS40. Padded for comfort and yet keeping the style of the iFrogz line, the CS40 attempts to bring quality, comfort, and vogue onto your head. The question is, has iFrogz accomplish this?

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Mac users have been enjoying the benefits of SATA for nearly a decade and the protocol has finally become a standard in all computers manufactured today. From optical to platter based drives to solid state drives, SATA is the standard. Now that standard is starting to wash and soak into accessories making the eSATA port almost as common as the FireWire port. Interestingly enough, Apple does not put eSATA ports on its machines and many PCs are missing these ports as well, though I have seen quite a few PC laptops with them. If you would like to take advantage of the SATA speeds of the many accessories out there and you have a PCI-Express port, then may we interest you in a NewerTech MAXPower eSATA 6G PCIe 2.0 Controller Card?

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