This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Eye-Fi. All opinions are 100% mine.
I’ve been moaning and groaning lately about my problems with my photo blog– I just don’t have time to deal with the photos! I loev taking photos, I love looking at them… but it has become a hassle to download them from the SD card, load them into my computer, edit them, upload them to my photo-sharing site, and *finally* post them on the blog. It would be really nice to skip a few of those steps, if I could.
Well, I can! There’s this nifty gadget called Eye-Fi and it’s the hottest little thing to hit the gadget world. The SD card has wireless capabilities. When you purchase the card, you activate the wireless functionality, and snap photos. The Eye-Fi comes in four different SD cards with up to 4GB memory, each with their own functions: Home, Share, Explore, and Pro. This brief video starring Erin Manning gives a quick rundown of how Eye-Fi works.
I like the idea! Of course, I’d have to take quality photos the first time (I am known for snapping 4 to 5 photos of the same thing, just in case most don’t turn out. I think it’s a precaution from my celluloid camera days).
The Eye-Fi looks good not only for it’s ease in uploading photos wirelessly, but it also has an automatic backup setting that organizes all photos by date onto your computer! It will also upload videos from your camera as well as photos.
I think it’s a photographer’s (and photo blogger’s!) dream. And if you go to the website, you can see that there’s a new Eye-Fi card with 8GB capability now! Plus, there’s a nice special for getting an Eye-Fi free if you purchase 200GB storage with Google. Check out the Eye-Fi website for more details.
This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of 123 Media Max. All opinions are 100% mine.
This is timely. It’s a superior media backup and burner software program, very affordable and just in time for the holidays; not only as a gift, but also as a way to create gifts. With the personal computer becoming more powerful, with peripheral media creators and software becoming more user-friendly and affordable, we can now create our own videos! Moreover, these videos can be copied and burned onto DVDs for family and friends to enjoy, too.
OK I’m jumping the gun here. This 123 Media Max is very versatile software, and does many things. Moreover, it boastsBlu-Ray Copy Breakthrough which allows you to make backup copies of Blu-ray movies to standard DVD-RW, retaining the excellent HD quality.
The list of features is extensive, too extensive for me to list here entirely. But these are the main features the 123 Media Max software offers:
Convert audio files and CD tracks to mp3s for easier editing and managing.
Convert video files to DVDs.
Convert any DVD to DivX, AVI, Windows Media Video (WMV), and MPEG4 files. (wow!)
Make your own ringtones from CDs, mp3s and audio files
Convert and burn YouTube, Google Video, Metacafe, MyVideo, blip.tv, Putfile, Break and Myspace videos to DVD.
Backup Blu-ray movies to DVDs; the copied DVDs retain high quality and are playable on DVD players or your Sony PS3.
Back up any DVD movie to DVD.
Make a DVD from multiple video files; you can the audio and video pieces independently, too!
Loads more
I make a lot of audio and video compilations, so to me this software looks fantastic. Plus, we have some very valuable DVDs and DVD collections that would break my heart if they became damaged or corrupted. And Blu-ray movies are pricey– the 123 Media Max backup feature is a perfect way to have backups on hand in case anything happens to the original. Or, if you are like us, use the backup copy and store the original for safe-keeping.
Check out the software. This would make a very nice gift for any audiophile or movie maker or movie buff on your gift list. It’s affordable and looks really nice! Make sure to go to the website to check your computer specifications before purchasing.
This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Eye-Fi. All opinions are 100% mine.
I have a slew of blogs, and one of them is a travel blog. We have THREE cameras and a camcorder with which I or the kids take photos. It’s so much fun to snap photos! But when it comes time to get them off the camera and upload them– what a snooze! It’s become quite a chore. I usually leave the photos in my camera until I have time (or motivation) to work on them. Then, there’s the tagging, the organizing into folders…. BOOOORING. :S
I’ve seen a gadget on a few other blogs, and now it’s my turn to take a look at it: it’s called Eye-Fi. It’s a very special SD card, and it basically allows you to upload your photos and videos wirelessly from your camera to your computer, or even to your photo-sharing website (such as Flickr, Shutterfly, WalMart, etc) even if your computer is off. All you need is a camera that takes SD cards (and most digital cameras do) and a wireless connection at home (through your Internet router). Very cool! There’s a video by Erin Manning that shows how the Eye-Fi cards work. I found it very informative.
The Eye-Fi SD cards have 2 to 4GB space on them for photos and videos. It will automatically back up and sort your data into folders organized by date.
Technology just never ceases to amaze me. The Eye-Fi is the first wireless SD card. I had to go to the Eye-Fi website to see how this thing works. There’s a small wireless device in the SD card. You must activate the card first, then take photos for upload. There are four kinds of Eye-Fi cards: Home , Share, Explore, and Pro.
Home works in a basic way. It uploads only photos to your computer through wireless. All you have to do is snap photos, come home, and turn your camera on. The Eye-Fi will do the rest. It only comes in 2 GB size.
Share is a step up. It will upload photos and videos to your computer AND to your photo-sharing site. It comes in 4 GB size.
Explore is a little more adventuresome. The Explore will locate nearby Wi-Fi public networks, and upload your photos and videos wirelessly to your online sharing website, and will also tag your photos by location (called geo-tagging).
Pro is the top of the line. It will upload photos, videos, and RAW files and do everything the Explore does; but Pro also accepts Ad hoc wireless uploads.
You can visit the Eye-Fi website to see a comparison of the cards and more information. The cards aren’t terribly expensive– only a little more than a high-speed SD card would be. It’s all very convenient! I love the geo-tagging feature, that would save me a ton of time. Eye-Fi may just be the wave of the future, eh?
There are SO many super free software programs out there. I am amazed that some of them are free, because they are so good, like OpenOffice, Gimp, Irfanview, Comodo, and others. But for years, file compression software is NOT free. WinZip has held the line at #1, for some od reason– because it is not free! And after the evaluation period, there’s a nag screen that never goes away! I don’t think WinZip is so hot that I need to pay $40 for it…. I mean, file compression?! Who uses that stuff every day?
Then there was WinRAR. I downloaded it free on a computer a couple of years ago. But it looks like WinRAR is no longer free (and I found it hard to use). :-p This is simple file compression software we’re talking about. I could never understand why the amazing stuff like OpenOffice or ? was free, and WinZIp and WinRAR were not.
Ah! But I have JUST discovered some FREE file compression software! Donwload.com featured it– it’s 7-zip. It’s very, very basic– no bells and whistles here. But it work with all Windows operating systems, and it’s free! I don’t need fancy fil compression siftware program– just something simple that does the job when I have a job to be done. It’s free, it’s good. Check it out if you want.
About a year ago, I got the tiny Asus Eee PC, pre-loaded with a Linux operating system, Xandros. While the OS wasn’t too bad in of itself, it had a ton of junk in it that I couldn’t uninstall (like a goofy Chinese dictionary, and a Mr. Potato Head Paint program). The OS gobbled up all hard drive space except for a meager 200 MB.
I have tried an Ubuntu OS a few months ago, but couldn’t get the thing to connect to wireless, so I went back to the original Xandros. It was shortly after that I heard of a new Ubuntu OS made specifically for netbooks, called Easy Peasy.
IT’S GREAT!!! We love it! It was a breeze to install, a breeze to use. It really is Easy Peasy. There were some excellent instructions here, and the Easy Peasy Wiki was helpful, too. The only issue I ran into was installing the OS onto the netbook– you can run it from a USB drive, which is very cool. But I wanted to install it onto the netbook. It was easy enough (guess that’s why they call it Easy Peasy, huh?), but I wasn’t expecting it to run off the USB first.
I think it’s a good, speedy alternative to Windows for any netbook. There’s been a massive influx of alternative Windows-less programs (such as Firefox, Open Office, etc) and Easy Peasy works with them all. Very nice. Thumbs up from Mrs. M!
It would be really nice to skip a few of those steps, if I could. 
There’s this nifty gadget called Eye-Fi and it’s the hottest little thing to hit the gadget world. The SD card has wireless capabilities. When you purchase the card, you activate the wireless functionality, and snap photos. The Eye-Fi comes in four different SD cards with up to 4GB memory, each with their own functions: Home, Share, Explore, and Pro. This brief video starring Erin Manning gives a quick rundown of how Eye-Fi works. 
![[del.icio.us]](http://images.del.icio.us/static/img/delicious.small.gif){kind=small}
