Can a speaker save a marriage? Before answering consider the case of a certain editor of a certain gadget web site/blog that likes to sleep with the radio on. Not just any radio, but a fire department scanner. Now, consider the long-suffering wife of said editor, tired of being awakened by the bing-bong-BAZ of the fire department "toning out" an alarm on her husband's bedside radio. (Remember the sound from TV's "Emergency!"?)

Over the years, the editor/husband had tried a number of pillow speakers, mostly from Radio Shack. These were large, made of hard plastic, didn't sound very good, and were a literal pain to sleep on.

But, into every life a little happiness must fall, and so one day, Bobby Ray, the Fedex guy, arrived with a small package. It was from Bob Crane of C.Crane Co., purveyor of an eclectic collection of neat gadgets and goodies. Inside was his patented SoftSpeaker Pillow Speaker ($19.95), a small, high-quality speaker, that slips inside it's own pillow-soft foam cover. 

The SoftSpeaker package then slides into your regular pillow and allows you to listen to the radio, iPod (read my six video iPod predictions), or whatever at low volume without keeping someone else awake. Even if the person is sleeping right beside you. Can a speaker really save a marriage? Well, I won't go that far, except to say one editor's wife is finally getting a good night's sleep. And she's much happier thanks to Bob Crane's invention. 

Aside from the morning commute, I listen to 80 percent of my music on my PC. The quality isn't bad, but it isn't nearly on par with a decent stereo system.  For that you are going to need a Digital Audio Converter (DAC) like WaveLength Audio's Brick ($1,750, list).  The Brick connects to your USB port and works like a high-end external sound card. Free from the interference of the PC's other components, this is an ideal way to link up to high-end stereo equipment.

Of course, the price tag is way above what most casual can afford. (Right now, anyway) Still, I wouldn't be surprised if this type of external DAC becomes more common as more people start putting PCs in their entertainment centers. 

[[Found on MSN's TechFilter]]

I love Ubergizmo.com. I love it even more, now that you can view the site on your PSP.

It's accessible through psp.ubergizmo.com.

Talk about getting the hottest gadget news on one of THE hottest gadgets!

Kudos!

Pioneer will be unveiling its new AVIC-Z1 "intelligent" navigation system at the SEMA car show in Las Vegas next week.  I'll be there, on the showfloor, to get the details (to post here on GearLog.com and on TechnoRide.com).  But so far, it sounds pretty cool.  Of course, there's no telling if it's just hype. 

I just spoke with a rep from Pioneer's PR department and he wouldn't budge on any details, except to say that the AVIC-Z1 will be an in-car navigation system, so more than likely it will have to be professionally installed in your car.  He went on to say, the intelligent navigation system "will be what separates us from all the other navigation systems."  But that may just be PR talk. 

I want to know if it will have SiRFStarIII.

(Sorry about the poor photo--it's from a press release!)

IBM showed off the new Xbox 360 processor at the In-Stat Fall Processor Forum in San Jose yesterday. Our reporter on the scene (thanks, DDT) told us that it's comprised of three 64-bit PowerPC cores, each running at 3.2GHz, which is "the highest core speed" ever achieved by this technology, according to Jeff Brown, IBM's chief engineer for the Microsoft CPU Project.

Wow.  With three 64-bit cores, games that are written, with a proper multithreaded architecture, will just fly.  The trick, as always, is to write code that lends itself well to parallel processing (I tried once back in comp sci school, and I think I broke my frontal lobe).  Hopefully game developers will pick it up faster than I did.

Of course, the ExtremeTech folks go into enough detail to make your head spin, but I just love that stuff.

Dell released the latest addition to its premium XPS line today. The XPS M140 ($1,747 direct) is designed for super simple media handling. It ships standard with a 2.13 GHz Pentium M, 1GB of RAM, and Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. The system performs well, but as a portable media center it comes up a little short. There is no TV tuner card included so you can't use it as a PVR out of the box, but you can buy one separately. And without discrete graphics, serious gamers are going to find it a little underpowered.

Still, as a high-end laptop the XPS M140 is surprisingly good value for a premium product. Just make sure you use the E-Value code (1111-M140PC) to get the bargain price. For more details, check out PC Mag's full review.

Sony's Cyber-shot DSC-W7 digital camera isn't small enough to fit in my purse, but its picture quality and price ($375) make the W7 worth checking out.

Shooting at 7.2MP with a 7.9- to 23.7 mm zoom range is quite nice, and I'm glad that Sony chose to include a viewfinder on the model for those bright days. The menu system could be a bit more helpful, since the different scene modes don't include the mode name or a description on the LCD display.

Here's a look at its performance, along with some images of the camera.

What's the best CPU for your needs—within your budget? It's not about raw performance, but rather price/performance ratios. ExtremeTech tested 23 mainstream desktop CPUs from AMD and Intel to find out which gets you the best bang for the buck.

It's been some time since I've paid close attention to my CPU choice, but Loyd Case has created a useful scorecard that relates to all classes of users, not just gamers. It is an extremely comprehensive--and sometimes surprising--report.