2016 Father’s Day Gift Guide: Gadgets

Gadgets dominate our everyday lives, so a good starting point for your gift shopping is with dad’s phone. If he has the latest and greatest model, don’t bother, but if it’s been a while since he upgraded, he’ll probably appreciate a new iPhone or Android device.

If you’re looking for something a little different, however, we’ve put together some ideas for you. And for more great suggestions, be sure to check out the other categories in our Father’s Day gift guide.

Fibit Charge HR

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A Fitbit can be a great gift whether dad is already into fitness or needs a nudge to take better care of himself. It’s available in a wide variety of colors, and it’s a great gadget to track daily progress for all types of health and fitness measurements. It’s a particularly good tool for someone who needs to be reminded to be more active. Does that sound like someone you know? The Fitbit Charge HR is the brand’s most popular model and can track workouts, heart rate, distance, calories burned, floors climbed, active minutes and steps taken. It can also sync stats wirelessly and automatically to your computer and smartphones, as well as monitor your sleep automatically and wake with a silent alarm.

Fluance Turntables

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Vinyl has made a huge comeback, and dear old dad may love a new turntable if he held on to his old record collection. Sure, we all loved the convenience of compact discs, iTunes and then streaming, but the rich sound of a vinyl record on a great turntable and stereo system is hard to replicate. Fluance has just introduced its new RT80 and RT81 turntables that leverage the company’s extensive experience in audio engineering, signature sound and impeccable design. These belt-driven turntables utilize styluses that provide freedom from noise and distortion, clarity on musical peaks and channel balance. Pick up some new vinyl records for his favorite bands as well and enjoy some great music on Father’s Day.

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New Urbanite Select smartphone cases from Ballistic

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Ballistic has introduced slimmest series yet of smartphone cases, offering an elegant, pocketable design and lightweight, premium materials. The new cases are crafted with real wood and leather, as you can see in the photos above. We tried the black leather case for our iPhone 6 and liked the look and feel of the case. The cases are equipped with Ballistic corners, raised lips and a six-foot drop protection.

The cases are available in Dark Ash Wood, White Ash Wood or Buffalo Leather for iPhone 6/6S, iPhone 6 Plus/6S Plus, Samsung Galaxy S 7 and Samsung Galaxy S 7 Edge. You can find them at the Ballistic store.

  

2015 Holiday Gift Guide: Gadgets

Adults like toys too, so if you’re on the lookout for a memorable gift for your spouse, or just treating yourself to an early Christmas present, a cool gadget is always a great option. Of course, prices run the gamut in this arena, so you’ll need to be careful, but whether you’re shopping for the latest smartphones or something to please the audiophile in your life, you can find something that fits almost any budget.

Click the links within the write-ups to purchase each product online, and for more gift ideas, check out the other categories in our Holiday Gift Guide.

HTC One A9

There’s been a lot of discussion surrounding HTC’s newest addition to their award-winning One family that it looks suspiciously like the iPhone 6, and although the similarities are undeniable, if you’re a diehard Android fan that’s always been jealous of Apple’s sleek design, the HTC One A9 is the perfect compromise. It’s also a pretty solid mid-range smartphone, sporting a five-inch, 1080 x 1920 full HD display, 2TB of expandable microSD card memory, BoomSound with Dolby Audio and a 13-megapixel camera with Optical Image Stabilization. The camera includes some really cool features that photography nerds will love, like the ability to make moving time-lapse videos (called HyperLapse) and capture photos in RAW format for greater editing control; the added fingerprint sensor/home button is one of the best on the market; and the new Android 6.0 Marshmallow OS delivers improved performance across the board. The HTC One A9 doesn’t quite have what it takes to compete with the big boys, and because of that, it’s $499 price tag may seem a bit high, but for those who want an iPhone lookalike that runs Android, this is about as close as you’re going to get.

Polaroid Z2300 Instant Digital Camera & ZIP Instant Photo Printer

For as much as digital cameras have changed our lives, there’s just something about the instant gratification of a Polaroid picture that’s difficult to replace. The company aims to recapture that feeling by blending the old with the new in their latest line of products, like the Polaroid Z2300, a 10-megapixel camera that contains all the usual features – 6x digital zoom, 32MB of built-in memory, an SD card slot for extra memory and the ability to capture 720p HD video – but with the addition of a built-in printer that prints 2×3” photos. Though the Z2300 is too bulky and heavy to carry around like a normal digital camera, it’s great for birthdays, weddings and other gatherings to be used by guests who want to snap their own photos to take home as a keepsake. Of course, if you’d rather use the camera on your mobile device, or already have a collection of digital photos that you want to print out in the same wallet-sized format, the ZIP Instant Photo Printer delivers a more mobile and personalized Polaroid experience. Using the free iOS and Android app, you can add filters, text, emojis and borders, or even create a collage, for a truly one-of-a-kind photo. Both products make fun gifts, but if you’re buying for someone under the age of 35, we’d recommend the ZIP printer solely due to its smaller footprint.

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Product Review: Bud Light’s Bud-E Fridge

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The most difficult part of ushering the new Bud-E Fridge into my life was fitting it into my car. Once that was sorted, the smoothness took hold. The Bud-E Fridge will gently force your life to conform around your love of Bud Light.

This month, Bud Light launched the ultimate in smart technology innovation: the Bud-E Fridge. It’s a first-of-its-kind home smart refrigerator that enables you to view real-time information from your fridge via your phone, no matter where you are.

Developed from the ground up by Bud Light, the Bud-E Fridge provides you with real time updates – including the number of Bud Lights in your fridge, temperature and even when your favorite sports teams’ games are approaching – to make sure you never run out of Bud Light.

The interesting thing about the Bud-E fridge is the way people reacted to it. Without alerting house guests of its presence, I ushered them into my living room quietly to gauge their natural, organic reactions, and every single person smiled and laughed immediately when they saw it. Half of them asked for a Bud Light, which I happily served.

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The coolest physical feature of the fridge is the LED readout on the outside front of the door, which displays the exact number of Bud Lights you have in your fridge (seven at time of publication) at that exact moment in time. Go ahead, help yourself to a BL, and let the door close. Notice anything? The Bud-E fridge LED readout subtracts from your overall total and makes a sad sort of “wah-wah” sound as the number decreases.

The coolest non-physical feature is the Bud-E app. From your smartphone, numerous features are available. You can see exactly how many Bud Lights are in your fridge to plan a potentially necessary trip to the store, and the Bud-E Alarm sends a push notification that lets you know when someone is getting into your fridge and reducing your precious stock of ice cold beer.

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Superheroes: A Comic Caper Production

The birth of Superheroes goes back to the 1940’s, and they have come a long way in becoming legends of our times. The history states, that when Superman was in the theater, they were movie goers who cared less about a man jumping from one apartment to another, or flying from space you can’t even think of jumping. That’s what superheroes were meant to be, and Christopher Reeves was an actor, who was an insignificant person then, however, is a prodigy for future superheroes now. Marvel Comics was the creator of the first celebrated superhero, which went on to make much more such as Captain Marvel, Captain America, The Phantom, Blade, X-Men, and the most recent Spiderman.

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