If you missed watching it on Oprah, here’s the scoop. I’m saving my pennies.

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Have you seen the cute little mini laptops yet? Weighing less than 3 pounds, they are great for travel. The battery lasts for a number of hours and you can surf the net or read your email without having to break your back carrying a full size laptop. They often come with Windows XP (bonus), a built-in web cam, and internal wireless capability. Since these minis are streamlined, there is no built-in cd drive. That isn’t a problem for me since I have an external drive anyway (bought it so that I would have lightscribe ability).

The display on these little gems is only about 8.9 inches, so I was a little concerned that I would have trouble seeing the screen properly. But my 83 year old mother bought one last week and she loves it! Going south in the cold weather will be so much easier for her now she can keep in contact without having to carry anything too heavy. She was sitting in the library using the mini one day and someone came up to her to ask about it. I don’t know if it was because the machine was so cute, or she looked so cute using it.

After all the positive things my mother has told me about this mini laptop, I can hardly wait to get one. And right now Dell is selling their Inspiron Mini 9 for only $399, plus free shipping. This goes to show that those ‘women love diamonds’ ads aren’t always right. Some of us would rather have a nice new computer!

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Why would I need a fan for my laptop, you ask? Welcome to the rant of the day.

I have a Toshiba laptop which I like very much. I like the 17 inch screen. I like the big hard drive and having enough memory. I like that it has Windows XP instead of Vista (that I really like). What I don’t like is the fact that the last while it has started shutting itself off. Not fun when you are in the middle of writing something, but I have learned to save my work often.

I decided that it must be overheating, so I trotted my little self over to my favourite computer store (I won’t mention their name because I have applied to work there twice now with no success – and yes, they do have other old people on staff). Anyway, I bought myself a special fan that sits under the laptop and plugs into a USB port. My son has one and it works well for him. It was on sale, so cost me about $40. Reasonable if it worked. Unfortunately, it didn’t.

The fan does cool my laptop and keeps it from overheating, but it is still determined to shut down at regular intervals. Next stop – the computer repair store. Can nothing in my computer life go smoothly, or is there no such thing in all of geekdom?

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I finally bit the bullet and bought Dragon Naturally Speaking version 9. It’s speech recognition software that turns talk into text and is faster and more accurate than typing. You can do e-mail, instant messaging and surf the web – all by voice.

Well, I like this product very much so far. It says no training required, get started instantly. But I found that I had to teach it how I speak. The way I pronounce words seems to cause it some trouble. I probably had to train the program about three times, for maybe half an hour each time. Now it’s working and I’m impressed how well it does its job.

I bought the cheaper standard version on sale for $79. The regular price apparently is over $100, at least here in Canada. There is also a preferred version which is more expensive. The main differences: the preferred version also transcribes recordings from handheld digital recorders, has wireless microphone support, and turns text into speech as well. The preferred version also plays back your dictation so that you can correct it, inserts your signature or logo with a simple voice command and allows you to import and export your user files to any PC.

I find that for what I need, the standard version is fine. With it, I am able to create e-mail, instant messages and documents simply by speaking. I can surf the web by voice, although I haven’t tried that yet. It’s possible to get started fairly quickly and there are helpful onscreen tutorials to show how to correct the program by spelling out words and increasing its vocabulary. I’ve only begun to see all the possiblilities and am not doing nearly as much as Naturally Speaking is capable of. The standard version will dictate directly into any Microsoft Windows application, and control Windows menus and dialog boxes by voice.

A fairly good microphone headset is included with the program as well. So far, I am quite amazed with this product. It’s really something to speak and see your words magically appear on the computer screen. Find out more by clicking here:   Create Documents & Email Up To 4x Faster Than Typing – Buy Dragon NaturallySpeaking Preferred 10 from Nuance!

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I recently purchased a digital camera for my grandkids to use. Called “Kids Cam Digital Camera”, it’s advertised for ages six and up, but my three-year-old grandson was using it and had no problems at all. The camera supposedly takes 152 pictures , but that must be if you purchase a memory card or something. I’m one of those ‘hate to read instructions’ people, so I’ve only been able to take 20 photos at a time and then you have to download them to your computer so you can take more. Downloading the pictures was quite easy and the camera comes with software that allows you to edit and print your pictures using templates provided. There are also activities provided in the software package: a story maker, an edit center, a game center and a slideshow maker. There is also a Web camera program.

The photo activity software is quite good and the camera itself takes good pictures when used outside. There is no flash, so indoor pictures tend to be very dark. Since this kids’ digital camera only cost me $19, I can’t expect too much.

The main thing that I don’t really like about the camera is the fact that you can’t preview the pictures. There is no lens view or anything like that, so the pictures have to be uploaded to your computer before you can see them.

For a young child, it’s the perfect little camera. The one I have is gray with dark red trim. There were a few different colors, and the case is plastic, so it’s a fairly sturdy little unit for child.

According to the information on the package, the edit center allows you to add effects, distort the pictures and tweak them with 18 different editing tools. You can also add captions and use the painting tools that are included. The slideshow maker allows you to produce, direct and star in your own megahit. Now, I haven’t tried either one of those programs yet, although I imagine they’re fairly easy.

The camera and the software were quite simple to install. Although not useful for any serious photo taking, the Kids Cam is an inexpensive introduction to an exciting hobby.

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