Phonescoop.com – a good source for checking out new phones and voice-enabled devices.

QuietPC.com – a neat site devoted to methods of making your PC silent (important if you want to develop your own PVR, or sleep in the same room as a running PC).

Since Slashdot rejected this article when I submitted it to them, I guess I’ll put it here. Sonicblue, makers of Replay TV and the Rio portable MP3 player filed for bankrupcy.

This bums me out, because I really liked how they were antagonizing the media industry with commercial-skip and file sharing features. Coincidentally, part of the reason they went under (as mentioned in the article) is because of all the money they were spending on legal fees fighting battles with these companies. It also seems consumers didn’t demand these features in sufficient numbers, and chose to buy TiVos instead.

I think it will be interesting to see if the build-your-own PVRs take off… like MythTV and Freevo.

Although I’ve never seen the Neuros, it does seem to have most all of the features I would want in an MP3 player. It has an FM tuner, which is nothing special except surprisingly rare in portable MP3 players. The crazy fun features start here though: MyFi which lets you broadcast your music over FM radio, allows you to easily use this device in your car, or even at home if you want to easily play MP3s over a stereo system. HiSi is even cooler, as it lets you record a snippet off the radio if you like a song but don’t know it’s name, and when you sync with your PC will go online and find out. The 128 MB version can be upgraded to a 20GB version with an optional backpack that fits over the device – very cool, although bulky.

The device still doesn’t seem to match the form factor of the iPod, but does have some very nice features that the iPod doesn’t. Also, a recent Slashdot article indicates that they are going to start supporting the Ogg Vorbis format and the Linux platform. I’m looking forward to seeing one.

As reported on Slashdot, this site has a nice overview of the latest Palm-OS powered devices. As usual, the devices from Palm itself are the least impressive. Some of the others are pretty neat -looking, although it’s difficult to justify a $700 device when you can get a laptop for the same price these days.

Also worth a look are the new Linux handhelds (I have the Linux-based Sharp Zaurus as well as the short-lived Agenda, aside from my older PalmOS-based Clie). I’m still wating for a solid phone/PDA combination with an attractive form factor, but so far I haven’t found one. The upcoming Motorola A760 looks promising though.

As seen on Slashdot, this page shows some really neat gagetry in cars. The Bluetooth one is my personal favorite.