BuyMeGetMe.com

BuyMeGetMe.com is attending “Piping Live!” – the week-long, citywide run-up to the grand championship competition this weekend.

We’re talking about the best bagpipers on the planet currently competing at the International Piping festival in Glasgow, Scotland.

On Saturday night, the top-tier of the world’s finest large band finals will be broadcast live on the BBC. It simply known as “The Worlds.”

This is a serious musical event and all you have to do is look around in any direction to realize that Glasgow is a city which is seriously “pipes” crazed.

There have been hundreds of piping events, this week, spread out all over the city, proudly showcasing some of the world’s top international players who come here to perform alongside Scotland’s finest homegrown talent. Super-talented musicians come from such far-flung places like the United States, Canada, Pakistan and New Zealand.

This above video is just a small portion of just one of those events.

Willie McCallum, the eight-time winner of the Glenfiddich Solo Piping Competition was caught in the act amazing hundreds of fans at Todds Bar on the campus of Glasgow’s Strathclyde University.

Enjoy!

Consider yourself lucky if you’ve avoided all the hype so far.

Microsoft has been trying to build-up a head of steam in advance of the release of their third-generation portable music player – the Zune.

The new model is called Zune HD and Microsoft has been deftly “leaking” information about the newest device.

In addition to Wi-Fi synchronization Zune is also capable of storing and playing of your compressed music files – will also store and play compressed high-definition video files (up to 10 hours worth, 720p), let you listen to HD radio stations in your area (if there are HD radio stations to listen to) and also browse the Web. The HD moniker makes sense.

All of this is facilitated by the first Zune touch-controlled screen. It’s a 3.3-inch (diagonal), 19-by-9 inch OLED beauty capable of 480 by 272 resolution.

There are also some interesting accessories about to be made available for the new player: the Zune HD and AV Dock charges and syncs while playing 720p HD videos on HDTVs – and you can play HD Radio, music and podcasts from your new Zune through your car stereo with the Zune Premium Car Pack.

There are actually two new Zune HDs: a 16GB Black model ($219.99 MSRP) and 32GB Platinum ($289.99).

You can order them online as well as from Amazon.com, Best Buy, Wal-Mart and Microsoft.

Beginning Saturday, both 16GB and 32GB Zune HDs will be available in five different colors with the option to customize them with one of 10 new engravings designed by guest artists.

Two points of order:

Microsoft has never supported full-fidelity (16/44) WAV music files on Zune hardware or software. Apple does support those files (and higher resolution, 24/192 files) on iTunes and iPods. Hopefully Microsoft will step up to the plate and allow good-sounding files to be played on their portable devices.

Does anyone know what a Zune is? Does anybody really care? Do you know anyone who owns one – or is thinking of buying one? I don’t.

All things being equal, I think HTC’s new Touch Pro 2 is a good smartphone. What is not exactly equal is the price that T-Mobile is asking for it – $349.99.

From this point on it doesn’t matter what I have to say about the phone.

I can tell you that it runs on Windows Mobile (the older version 6.1), has a 3.2 megapixel camera (video/stills), a tilting touchscreen, microSD memory card expansion slot, stereo Bluetooth and operates on T-Mobile’s speedy 3G data network.

But it sells for $349.99.

I could also tell you that the is no Wi-Fi and that the Touch Pro 2 is a physically large and heavy handset (2.4 by 4.6 by 0.7 inches, 6.6 ounces) but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The extra heft allows for one of the roomiest and comfortable slide-out QWERTY keyboards on a modern-day handset. It also allows for a large, rechargeable battery which is said to offer as much as 8.5 hours of talk and 20 days of standby power.

But, it sells for $349.99.

In my tests I found the phone to feel large and heavy in my hand, but typing on the keyboard was a breeze and it was able to receive 3G signals in places where other T-Mobile phone could only dream about.

None of that matters. What does matter is how the phone has been priced. $349.99 (with a two-year service agreement). It is a death sentence for this or any other over-priced modern-day cell phone.

With loads of smaller, feature-laden smartphones to choose from – from Apple, Palm, BlackBerry and even HTC (Android-based models) – and with many more on the way why would anyone spend that much money for this phone? Or any other phone?

The real question here is why T-Mobile priced it so high. I can guess that the they approved the phone design months ago as they were just beginning to build-out their 3G network. At that time, the phone seemed like a good idea. But now, with the competition heating up, there are too many other smartphones they need to subsidize. So, the bottom line is that the Touch Pro suffers.

Whatever the reason, I don’t see how they can market such an expensive model.

I hope this is not the beginning of a trend for cellular providers to decide for us which phone designs will be heavily subsidized and which ones will be barely discounted. Pricing some good smartphones out of the reach of most customers doesn’t seem like a smart business practice.

Of course, you can still watch some local games on over-the-air TV.

Or you could probably catch a few innings on a laptop or smartphone.

But now, there’s a way to watch your favorite team on your favorite flat-screen TV – live – via your Roku.

Roku has just announced that MLB.TV Premium subscribers can now watch live MLB games from across the country using the $99 Roku digital video player. This is in addition to Netflix and Amazon on Demand downloads on your Roku box.

With an MLB.TV Premium subscription and a Roku you will be able to enjoy live, out-of-market baseball games in high definition quality (where HD broadcasts are available) as well as access to on-demand games from the past seven days.

This is very, very cool. Don’t forget, Roku not only provides you with high-quality video and audio – it also allows you DVR-like, full control over the action via their little remote unit. That means you can pause, rewind, fast forward and resume the action all from your comfy chair.

If you already have a Roku player, it will automatically be upgraded (over the next few days) to display your new MLB.com channel. If you’re like me and can’t wait that long you can click the ‘Settings’ button, then ‘Player Info’ and select ‘check for update’. If that doesn’t work the first time – try it again. It took me two times to update my Roku box.

If you are not an MLB.TV Premium customer, go to www.mlb.com/roku for more information on how to sign up.

If you are not a Roku customer, what the heck are you waiting for? Head on over to www.roku.com to purchase a Roku player of your own for only $99.

Considering Roku’s great-looking, high-quality video output it’s probably one of the best hundred bucks you can spend these days.

I’m hoping that other professionalo sports will follow MLB’s lead onto the Roku.

In Western Europe, free-standing fireplaces are an art form. They not only have to provide heat but they also have to adhere to the European aesthetic – so they must look good too.

That’s why no one should be surprised that one European manufacturer, Atria, is marketing a fascinating looking freestanding fireplace they call their “La Malle a Feu” or “Box of Fire”.

Atria’s freestanding fireplaces are meant to be moved around. You can use them indoors and out. Built-in carbon monoxide, anti-tilt, security and overheating detectors are standard.

There’s no need for a flues or ductwork because these fireplaces burn odorless and smoke-free denatured ethanol. Atria fireplaces hold up to 2.5 liters of fuel and a one liter bottle is said to last between 2-4 hours.

The official description of the Box of Fire loses a lot during translation. But, you’ll get the idea:

“The opening of a glittering treasure on the flexibility of an off-stack, the “Mall Fire” captivates and astonishes observers transformist this furniture. Exceptional products, flames dancing in the mirror, “La Malle à Feu” combines discretion and exceptions.”

At the current time, if you want an Atria fireplace you have to import one yourself. The company’s premier showroom is located in Paris (another good excuse to go). Their products are currently sold in France, Italy, Switzerland and Turkey.

But, fear not. You can find some interesting looking, ethanol-burning, freestanding fireplace designs for sale here in the United States too.

Check out the offerings from ecosmart fire, homedosh.com and completelystainless.com.

Prices run anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars – and up.

It had to happen. With prices of everything rising to obscene levels there had to be someone who would try to market a set of loudspeakers for a million dollars.

Swedish company Transmission Audio went one better. Actually, one million better. They have just announced their new, top-of-the-line home speaker system – and it retails for $2,000,000 U.S.!

Transmission Audio’s Extreme Performance Series “Ultimate” speaker system is a monster. It’s 37-feet long, 7-feet high and weighs more than 8,000 pounds. And if that doesn’t scare you away here are some more facts you need to know:

The system contains four separate dipole subwoofers, (seen in the middle), made from a total of forty, 15″ woofers…

The system comes complete with its own preamp and monoblock power amplifiers to match.

A few other things you should know, if you’re interested, you’ll have to do some footwork to actually hear this set-up. Ultimates are only sold in Great Britain, Hong Kong and, of course, Sweden.

But, this pricing scheme has gotten them a lot of publicity.

Transmission Audio’s Website is either very, very busy or they’re in the process of updating the information.

Quite the high-class to-do, this morning. Officials from Sprint, Samsung and the Nature Conservancy were in attendance at The Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in NYC for the public unveiling of Sprint’s “Corporate Social Responsibility Priorities” and the announcement of their new Reclaim cell phone.

Sprint Nextel wants you to know that they “view corporate social responsibility as a long-term, strategic approach to balancing business opportunities with social, economic and environmental responsibilities”.

• Sprint is the first U.S. wireless carrier to establish a set of environmental design criteria for future devices and accessories.

• Sprint is committing to reduce paper usage by 30 percent during the next five years. They were recently ranked highest in corporate environmental and sustainability reporting among all U.S. telecommunications carriers.

They’re really serious. Breakfast was served on recyclable bamboo plates along with wooden utensils. Even the handout “thumb drive” with press releases was covered in some sort of wood-like substance.

That said, Sprint also wants you to know about their first “green” cell phone, the Reclaim (M560), made for them by Samsung. It’s a good looking handset with a slide-out QWERTY keyboard, microSD (up to 32GB) memory card slot, stereo Bluetooth, a 2 MP camera and navigation software.

It comes in two colors: Earth Green or Ocean Blue and will sell for a few pennies under $50 (with a two-year contract).

So, what makes the handset green?

• Bio-plastic material, made from corn makes up 40 percent of the Reclaim’s outer casing. Samsung Reclaim is free of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), phthalates, and nearly free of brominated flame retardants (BFR): three materials commonly targeted on green electronics guidelines.

• The charger is Energy Star approved and is equipped with a visible notification to alert the user when to unplug the handset once it’s fully charged.

The Reclaim will be available in Sprint stores beginning Aug. 15th.

I’m not talking about Wi-Fi, although it can be part of the equation. What most people have now are local area networks (LANs) that receive an Internet feed over a wire from wide area network (WAN) providers (Cable, phone company, Fiber/FIOS, Satellite, you name it).

This is 100% wireless Web access. No wired connections like you need for cable, DSL, satellite or fiber/FIOS.

So far, currently popular 3G cellular (UMTS, EV-DO) networks are speedy – but they’re not even close to wired data WAN speeds. OK speeds for cell phones. But Sprint’s “turbo-charged” Clearwire 4G WiMAX network is up and running.

Introduced last year in Baltimore, their 4G Internet data network offers blazingly fast up and download speeds. I’ve tested the system a number of times and I’m very impressed. When 4G gets to New York I’ll be the first on line to sign-up.

Just so you know, Verizon and most others are also busy building their own 4G data system using the LTE (Long Term Evolution) standard.

Sprint currently offers 4G/WiMAX service in Baltimore and will officially launch 4G in Portland, Atlanta and Las Vegas in this month. Charlotte, Chicago, Dallas/Ft. Worth, Honolulu, Las Vegas, Philadelphia and Seattle are slated to be Sprint 4G cities by the end of this year.

But today’s announcement is what’s so appealing. Sprint’s two new Mobile Broadband Router products connect multiple Wi-Fi-enabled devices at 3G or 4G mobile broadband speeds where those fast networks are available.

Sprint Personal Hotspot PHS300S (up to 4 simultaneous Wi-Fi connections) and Cradlepoint MBR-1000 Broadband Router for business (up to 15 connections) handle 3G/4G data via plug-in modules. The devices change 4G from outdoors into Wi-Fi indoors. You can simultaneously connect Wi-Fi-enabled smartphones, laptops, MP3 players, cameras, gaming devices and other Wi-Fi-enabled devices at 4G network speeds.

The Personal Hotspot retails for $159.99. The Router retails for $249.99. Monthly high-speed data plan charges range from $39.99 to $79.99 per month (plus tax and tip).

What do you pay for slower, wired Internet access?

Research in Motion’s new BlackBerry Curve 8520 is a quad-band, T-Mobile world phone. At first glance it doesn’t seem like much: it’s a 2.5G phone so it’s not “AS” fast as some other designs. Plus, the Curve’s “candy bar” shape makes it seem like many phones that came before it.

But, don’t be fooled. What is inside (and outside) the 8520 makes it very special.

Inside, the processor has nearly doubled in speed from previous Curves. It seems a lot faster than my BlackBerry Flip. Internal memory has quadrupled (to 256MB). Camera (stills/video) is 2.0 megapixels. Wi-fi is of the 802.11b/g variety. Bluetooth is 2.0 (mono/stereo). The replaceable/rechargeable battery pack is an 1150 mAh cryptographic lithium cell. Storage is handled by a microSD card (up to 16GB cards are available, a 1GB card is provided).

On the outside, a few improvements of note:

The horrible BlackBerry roller-ball pointing system has been replaced with a nifty clickable track pad. Just glide your finger over it gently to navigate. I found that it works very well in preliminary tests. This new pointer is so good that it will probably find its way into subsequent BlackBerry designs.

There are a set of dedicated audio (and video) controls on the top edge of the handset. They’re where you’d expect “on-off” switches to be. The stereo headset jack is on the left side edge and rubber-covered volume controls are on the right.

The screen is now flush with the handset body. It looks a lot nicer.

Overall the 8520 measures 4.3 by 2.4 by 0.55 inches and weighs 3.7 ounces. The battery is said to be good for 4.5 hours of talk and as much as 17 days of standby. As always, your mileage will vary depending on how you actually use the phone.

I don’t have a problem with the phone working on GPRS/EDGE and not 3G networks. It saves on battery life, works nearly everywhere on the planet and keeps actual phone construction prices down. Just don’t expect to watch your favorite YouTube videos on your 8520.

This phone also has T-Mobile’s UMA (phone-calls-over-Wi-fi) system. It’s a HotSpot calling service which lets you make/receive voice calls and data over almost any accessible wireless network. At home that means you use your cell phone for VoIP calling. I’ve been using it for more than a year. It works like a charm.

The only feature on the new phone that I don’t like is the back cover. There are rubberized strips on the top and bottom edges – but the battery compartment cover is plastic (not to interfere with the circuitry). It opens easily with a fingernail. Unfortunately, on my sample, it doesn’t close as securely. Seems a bit loose.

T-Mobile starts selling the 8520 on Wednesday. They’ll be charging $129.99 with a two-year service contract.

Wal-Mart has already started selling the same exact phone for $48.88 (with a two-year T-Mobile contract)! Where would you buy yours?

It’s nearly two years since I met my first Asus Eee netbook.

Back then, the idea of a small/cheap portable laptop was just starting to gain traction. The term netbook was not yet a part of computer industry jargon.

Boy has that changed.

In less than two years the Asus Eee PC has gone from tiny portables (with mini 7-inch screens) running only Linux to larger, beefier yet slim devices with real notebook-sized screens and keyboards, with nice-sized hard drives, with your choice of Linux or Windows XP. These days there are many imitators.

Now comes the newest and slickest member of the Eee PC family the Seashell 1101HA. While only slightly larger on the outside, this new 3.2-pound Eee Seashell sports an 11.6-inch, “high-definition”, 1366 by 768 pixels, backlit LED screen, a 2.5-inch, 160GB hard drive plus an extra 10GB of online storage, an “ergonomic” keyboard (designed for comfort), 802.11n Wi-Fi (the latest speed demon) Bluetooth and a claimed 11-hour battery pack. More about actual, tested battery life in a minute.

The 1101 is powered by an Intel Atom Z520 processor running at 1.33 GHz. Note that it’s the new Z-series chip not the older N-series. It comes with only one GB of RAM (because that’s the maximum allowed by Microsoft for netbooks).

The 1101 ain’t bad on the outside either. My beautifully appointed test machine came in shiny black, with 3 USB ports, a VGA port, an Ethernet port and a slot for a Compact Flash card.

As for included software titles, there are trial versions of Norton Internet Security, Microsoft Office and a non-trial versions of Microsoft Works and Skype.

In my preliminary tests, I’ve found:

The 1101HA is faster, right out of the box, than any previous Eee PC. A lot faster! And, if that’s not enough, you can make faster still by tweaking the computer’s BIOS. There is a setting which allows you to “overclock” the processor by as much as 30%. You should see this baby fly at that 30% setting.

At regular processor speeds, the battery indicator measured 10.6 hours of power available after a full charge. I’ve never seen that before on a laptop or netbook. After overclocking (see above paragraph), the battery indicator read a solid 10-hours. That is just amazing.

Streaming full screen HD videos look pretty good on the 1101. Lip synch is almost perfect on YouTube streams. Best I’ve seen so far from a netbook. Just think what would happen if you could run 2GB (or more) of RAM.

On the other hand, there are two problems I’ve found. First, the sound quality coming from the built-in speaker(s) is not as good as the 1101’s video. It’s on the tinny side of neutral. Adjusting the built-in equalization software helps a little.

The other problem is more of an annoyance than a real problem. The glossy black finish on the plastic shell shows fingerprints way too easily. That’s why there’s a special cleaning/polishing cloth in the box (along with a neat little computer sleeve/case). There’s also a white version which should hide smudges better than the black.

The Asus Eee PC Seashell 1101HA retails for $429. But, if this model is anything like older Eees – expect that price to begin dropping almost immediately.

Overall, this new, almost-too-big-for-a-netbook sized Eee PC is a winner.