Apple Reviews

Monster makes good cables and often has products other people don't have, but this isn't the case here. This is a very common cable available in your choice of lengths from stereo and electronic stores. I have an iPod and a Bose home theater system and get perfect sound from the 6-foot, $6 version from Radio Shack. All you need is a stereo mini-plug on one end (plugs into the top of the iPod) and RCA red and white stereo jacks on the other (plug into the "input" jacks on your stereo).

If you intend on hooking your ipod up to your home stereo, go get the cheap $5.99 cable at radio shack. If you intend on taking your ipod with you while you're in your car, get this cable. Monster uses twisted pair wiring for a reason, to reduce noise, the kind of noise you might find in a car with an expensive system. I installed this cable on the head unit in my truck, the contacts are indeed tight, but I know for sure that they won't come unplugged while i'm driving.

7' is pretty long, it could be shorter. I only need a good 4' from the back of the head unit, down around and up to the front of the head unit where the ipod is mounted. And it is a bit expensive, but I think its worth it for this purpose alone. I don't see it as paying for hype, i see it as paying for a quality product that will probably outlast the ipod itself by years and years.

This is for owners' of Klipsch ProMedia 5.1 Speakers, including the New Klipsch ProMedia Ultra 5.1 Speakers.
I assume of course you already own the Klipsch DD-5.1 Digital Decoder PreAmplifier for these speakers.
The Price has dropped from $170.00 for the Klipsch DD-5.1 Digital Decoder PreAmplifier,
to a much lower price of $100.00 for the Klipsch DD-5.1 Digital Decoder PreAmplifier,
as of the date December 13, 2003.
Purchase three (3) of the Monster Cable iCable for iPod, for each set of the Klipsch Speakers and the matching Klipsch DD-5.1 Digital Decoder PreAmplifier.
Your ears will not have to contend with,
the three (3) poor quality Klipsch Y-Adapters which are supplied with your Klipsch DD-5.1 Digital Decoder PreAmplifier,
and the three (3) poor quality Klipsch cables which are supplied with your Klipsch ProMedia Speakers.
A total of six (6), *** POOR *** Klipsch Cables.
The three cables go / route from the back of the Klipsch ProMedia Powered Subwoofer to the back of the Klipsch DD-5.1 Digital Decoder PreAmplifier.
The Monster Cable iCable for iPod's only limitation is the short seven (7) foot length.
You must place the Klipsch ProMedia Powered Subwoofer within seven (7) feet of the Klipsch DD-5.1 Digital Decoder PreAmplifier.
Sure the cost is a very expensive $90.00 for three of these Monster Cable iCable for iPod,
but once purchased and hooked up,
you know the sound signal is being transmitted via a quality single cable,
rather than having the sound signal being transmitted via a cheap cable with an additional cheap Y-adapter added / joined.
!!! NO MORE two seperate cheap cables, &
!!! NO MORE two seperate cheap cables which MAY disconnect from each other.
One single cable is always better than two,
PLUS
QUALITY is what you are paying for.
NOTE: Monster Cable iCable for iPod has a 1/8" Mini Jack on one end which is the correct size required for use by the Klipsch ProMedia 5.1 speakers and Klipsch ProMedia Ultra 5.1 speakers.

The printer is not very old, 1-2 years or so, but has the grey matting that many others seems to have found. Not through the first toner cartridge yet. A new drum and toner would cost as much as a new printer so I won't be taking that route. Very dissappointed. Would have rated 4-5 stars before this fault, but I now feel like I have been robbed.

I have owned this printer for over a year and a half (bought new)and at first it printed clean and crisp pages but not anymore! Pages are dingy grey colored and warped. I have not even used all the original 3,000 page toner cartridge and now the drum unit is shot! Brother claims a new drum and toner will fix this problem but, others state differently. Besides, the cost of a drum ($179.99) and a 3,000 print toner ($56.00)is more than I paid for the entire printer! Too bad Brother, I'm going to Lexmark or HP for my next lazer printer.

This is my second Brother Laser Printer,the last being the HL-1240, which I still use. The Brother HL-1450 is reliable, fast, easy to set-up.

Expanding memory is easy. I happened to have an old 16 meg simm laying around, so out went the four meg, and in went the 16 meg, for a total of 24 megs (4 megs are built in).

Actually there are two annoying things about this printer. As noted above, in order to add memory, you first must remove the pre-installed 4 meg chip. It would have been nice to have 2 slots, to avoid removing the factory-installed simm. Also, simms are cheap but nearly as cheap as SDRAM and faster forms of memory. The second item of annoyance is the optional additional paper tray. Only Brother makes it and apparently only they sell it. It goes for $200. Geez, I could almost buy a second printer for that!!!!

These two factors don't influence what this great printer does--print fast, high-quality documents! BTW graphics look especially sharp. Now only if Brother would introduced an affordable COLOR laser printer....

Pretty versatile scanner, it looks cool too Silver lid with cool grooves and the button panel is cool plastic with silver pin-stripes which surround the five buttons to make your scanning tasks convenient: scan, photocopy, email, OCR and Web photo sharing. It does reflective (regular things like photos, typed or handwritten pages, etc.) and both positive and negative film with the Lightlid attachment.
The pros are that the software it comes with are pretty good, especially the interface of the Twain program Microtek Scanwizard which you can keep in either simple, easy mode or advanced mode or switch between the two interfaces as you like. The ABYY Fine Reader Sprint is pretty decent OCR Software at recognizing text; you can try and then purchase the full version of ABYY Fine Reader if you need that. If you are a digital camera aficionado or want to be, Adobe Photodeluxe does a decent job at editing your photos and Ulead Photo Explorer SE does a pretty good job at keeping you organized and the real version of Photo Explorer isn't that expensive if you need more options. Along with the online photo sharing and fairly decent scanning speeds, you get alot for your buck.
The cons are the name: ScanMaker 4800, you think it's a better or stepped up version of the 4700 but it's not, it's more of a stepped up version of the 3800. The 4700 is built much more sturdily and it has some better software that comes with it but you do pay for those "extras". The results from the film scanning with the Lightlid attachement are far from stellar, photos are better to scan.I also wish they made the Lightlid (the film-scanning add-on) with a little bit longer cord. Another con I think is that there is no off button (I unplug it to turn it off) or sleep button(low powered idle mode). Plus the scanner won't go into sleep mode unless you run Microtek ScanWizard each time you turn your computer on(this won't be a big problem if you always leave your computer on you just have to run ScanWizard once).
If you need a low-priced, lightweight scanner which is good at scanning photos with good 48-bit color depth and great DPI then this is the one for your home or small office.

I seem to be in the minority of scanner users who actually scan documents and not photographs. By scanning documents, I have slowly been turning my paper into digital images. Depending on scan quality, and image file format, the contents of a filing cabinet can be safely held on a CD-R.

With those goals in mind, I searched for a dependable scanner. Higher-end models had document feeders, but given my experiences with previous scanners...I decided that they were not rugged enough to elicit that kind of cash. I ended up with a middle of the road model - the ScanMaker 4800.

I started scanning and shredding. After a few weeks of playing with the software and the scanner, I can say it is on par with (or better than) the other scanners I have had. To stress test, I was downloading a file from the internet, ripping a CD, playing an MP3, while scanning a document. The scanner would stop and stutter when the PC went to disk, but it never lost its place, and recovered nicely.

Pros: Easy to install, comes with Adobe PhotoDeluxe, and it installs the Adobe PDF software. After installing the adobe software, you suddenly have a "PDF Printer", and you can now generate .pdf files from Word or Excel by "printing" to their driver.

Cons: The OCR software that is included is a nag-ware (crippled) version. It doesn't exactly work that great, and it constantly begs you to buy the "Professional" edition to get better scanning features. I find that annoying. Luckily, I don't do OCR that much.

A 35mm film scanner attachment is included, but I have no reason to attempt to scan old film (I don't have any).

I was thoroughly impressed with this scanner upon taking it out of the box. Although it is bulky compared to the popular Canon flatbeds (670U, 676U) this model was surprisingly economical with desktop space. The exterior shell is nice and has a metallic shine to it. Simple five button layout. All in all, not a bad looking machine.

As with all other USB products I own, the installation was EXTREMELY easy, and the concise manual is written in plain English. Just as important, the Windows 2000 TWAIN drivers are very stable. Running ScanWizard 5 and importing to Photoshop 6 is very painless and simple.

Scans are pretty fast with 96-300 DPI resolution, but once I reach 600, it becomes a tortoise-like drag. I do a lot of scanning of magazine pages in full-color, and I wasn't impressed with the clarity until I reached 1200 DPI (although the maximum interpolation DPI goes as high as 9600). However, because my preferences for professional quality photos are high, most consumers shouldn't worry, especially if you're only using this scanner for web graphics and family photos. Black and whites and web graphics were very fast to scan, and I was impressed with the results. I'm sure most people won't need to go beyond 300 DPI anyway, because that's the best resolution for printing.

I stick with Adobe Photoshop 6, but the included software (Adobe PhotoDeluxe) is a trimmed-down version of essentially the same stuff. The ABYY fine reader program is pretty good with OCR but the Ulead Photo Explorer SE is the best program included, making organization of my scans very painless. Furthermore, to clarify another review, the 35mm Light Lid IS included for scanning film, although I haven't tried it myself yet.

As for the cons, the most disturbing thing is that there is no power button! The only way to turn it off is to unplug it, although there is a power-saving mode. Secondly, size does matter and I do envy the Canon owners who get a much sleeker model that is literally three times thinner. Another thing to note is that support is only available for 30 days. After that, you have to pay for the call. Fortunately, I haven't had to question anything yet, and that's always a good thing.

In summary, I say the buck stops here for scanner buyers. Do your research to confirm you need 48-bit color (most people don't, and actually the human eye can't perceive beyond 32-bit), and have the desktop space. The software, extra features and installation are a steal..., and there aren't any extra hassles to deal with either.

I bought the BJC 6000 in mid of 1999 ... I am happy I invested so much money on it. It work very well. With the photo ink and top photo paper, I can have close to real prints. All the limitation is the image itself. The money I spent on inks has exceed the [amount] for the printer itself.

The interface was in parallel, so some of my observation may not apply for USB version. The first page is always fast, but the next one will have to wait, and wait (For what?). That is the only cons I found and complain about. The speed is kind of slow at top quality, hey, that is acceptable. :)

The individual ink is a big plus. I found myself changing yellow more frequently then the other two.

Finally, the i850 seems to use the same inks as the BJC6000, which means i850 can't exceed the quality on the horizon direction.

We just purchased our second Canon printer. The first was a BJ-610 which has serviced us for over 5 years. It is now going to our son. We purchased another Canon because of the good luck we had with the BJ-610. We are purchasing a new digital camera and the new 6000 has the special resolutions to handle digital photos. It has the additional color cartridge for photos. My biggest reason for purchasing the 6000 is the individual color cartridges. My grandkids come over and love to print colored pictures. This will allow me to put in only the colors that have run out. Our primary use for the printer is home use and now with the new digital camera, photos. We have yet to put it through it's paces and with the information from a previous review (Rich, San Antonio, Tx), I'm sure that we'll be able to set the resolutions to accomodate the pictures perfectally.

i've had my canon bjc-6000 for three years now. as of today, it's finally crapped out on me. i have tried everything to fix it (performed all the maintenance, cleaning, etc.) and nothing. so, i've opted to buy a canon i850, which i've heard good things about.

so, for the three years it DID work, here's my thoughts:

PROS: individual ink tanks! for ANYONE who does even a marginal amount of printing, you should invest in a printer with ind. ink tanks - it's just common sense. i can't understand why other printer companies haven't followed suit on this kind of thing. i definately got my money's worth out of the 6000. i have printed hundreds of photos that looked pretty darn good, even without the optional photo ink cartridges. keep in mind, i've had nothing to compare them to. :) it has a lot of options to print your documents/photos, etc., so for the advanced user, or just a regular user, interface is pretty easy to use.

CONS: color photo printing in highest resolution mode takes FOREVER; about 8 mins to print a page with two 4x6 prints on it. so, it's not the fastest printer, by any means. and, it's noisy, too. it cleans the print heads all the time, and while printing, actually shakes the monitor and desk hutch it's sitting on. yowza! for general purpose printing, i would recommend using good paper and something other than the "auto" setting.

overall, it's been a great printer, but it's time to move on to newer and better technology! my biggest piece of advice to anyone buying a printer: get one with individual ink tanks! it's just common sense!

I was saving video to my hard drive and editing it 45 minutes after popping open the box on this card.

The card comes with a 6 to 4 pin Firewire cable, so no need to purchase one seperately (like I did not knowing that).

Manual is fine. Installation was easy (I have installed cards before though - not sure how easy the installation would be for someone who has never opened their computer's case before).

Software that comes with it did not work on Windows ME for me (even though the software's site says no problems are reported), but I'm using Windows Movie Maker and that's working fine for now.

I have an Athlon 800 on an Asus MB home built running Win2k. I popped the card in and powered up. There was a short message on the BIOS screen and Windows started. Since no dialog boxes appeared, I thought that the card didn't install, but looking at devices, there it was, running normally! I plugged in my scanner and everything worked fine.

I comes with a 6 to 4 pin firewire, so if you're hooking up printers or scanners, be sure to order a 6 to 6 pin cable.

Painless install, good price makes a great product!

I've been buying D-Link products for many years. Years ago, when they first hit the scene it was because of their cut-rate prices on network cards and hubs.

As their reputation for reliable products grew, so did my trust, and I started to buy their products regardless of price. As such, when I needed a Firewire card, I went with D-Link because of their reputation for reliability.

As far as I'm concerned, the best support advice I can give you is to check for compatibility before you purchase. If you are running a version of Windows that is not listed in the description, check with D-Link's website in advace to see if they have an updated driver. If you can't find the driver before the purchase, look for another card.

In my case, the card was directly supported by my version of Windows, so there was no trouble getting it to run. It used the built-in Microsoft driver.

I got it for $30 after rebate from Officemax. This is probably what it worths.

-Print. text on palin paper looks bad. Photo on its recommended photo paper looks grainy and shows horizontal lines, though the test page looks fine. In addition printing photo is very SLOW.

-Scan. Default page size is always Legal. No page size for 4x6 or 5x7 or 8x10, though it shows a lot of paper sizes from other countries. For Custom scan setting there is no actual Custom Window pop up for customization. After Preview scan you cannot crop and do actual scan. Scan quality seems OK.

I haven't tried fax features so I cannot comment on that. I am using WinXP. I called tech support and was told a lot of B***t, totally unhelpful.

I am going to use it as a sheet-fed scanner for document scanning in office. I have a HP V40 at home, a much better all-in-one.
-

I have recently purchased this machine for fax and mostly black and white print jobs for my home office. Since then I have purchased a digital camera, and have found this machine produces great framable pictures!!! I would highly recomend this machine for anyone who shops around and wants the most features and quality for the price. I have used up a few ink cartridges printing larger 8x10 photos, but the individual ink cartridges make it easy and cost effective to use. The only thing I am missing is a flatbed, but so far I haven't needed it and have been able to scan pictures through the document feeder. Also a great color copier.

I purchased the Brother MFC 3100C about two months ago and have been very pleased with it.

Text Quality:
The text looks sharp as in laser printers when you use cheap inkjet paper. I highly recommend buying inkjet paper( I bought a ream [$$$] and got another one for free. The sheets are heavier, which eliminates show-through and give documents a better feel and more durability). But the text looks good in regular multi-purpose paper too.

Photo Quality:
The photo output is excellent, using photo paper, but even in regular paper it looks nice. I printed some pictures and it looks very nice for a multi-functioning device.

Fax:
It is very easy to send faxes through this machine. You can send several pages at once. Just place them on the feeder, dial the number (there's a speed dial feature for #s you frequently send faxes to) and press the Black or Color Fax Start button. I never sent color faxes, so I don't know if it works.

Scanner:

The scanner is very powerful since it can scan images up to 2400 dpi of resolution. I scanned several photos and some text too and I have been satisfied with the results. (Tip: to scan photos, use "Paper Port" that comes with it. You have more control over the scanned pictures.)

Conclusion:

You can't go wrong with the MFC-3100C. Unlike Lexmark and HP multifunction centers, it features individual cartridges, so you won't have to waste ink if only one color runs out. In addition to that, I have printed a LOT of documents, including photos, and there's still more than half of ink to use. This "printer" is a ink saver!! Unless you really need a flatbed, I recommend it to anyone looking for a multi-functioning device. You won't regret it...

I purchased this printer last August, and am now on my second replacement. The feed mechanism broke on the first two units, and I suspect it's going on the machine I'm using now. My volume is not all that large, by the way.

Even when the printer is not broken, the ability to feed 11 x 17 paper is pathetic. Yesterday, it took me two hours to get two tabloid size pages printed, with about a dozen jams occuring in the process. I use good quality paper, am careful about positioning in the tray, and have tried all three trays with the same abysmal results. This, but the way, is when feeding one sheet at a time; I long ago gave up on feeding multiple copies!

Another thing: every one of the printers I've had feeds slightly crooked. This seems to be an HP thing as the 1220 I had before did the same thing.

On the plus side, print quality and speed are good, as least compared to other printers I've owned, and the multiple ink cartridges and separate print heads are a plus.

But when you spend as much time as I do clearing paper jams and returning broken machines, it's impossible to recommend this product. If you need large sheet print capabilities, avoid this model at all costs!

Works great for 1 year then it started locking up. I think it is something electronic because both the lights blink like crazy then it starts spiting out paper with some symbols on it. have to unplug it to stop it. Let me know if you want one I will send you mine.

I find the quality of prints to be just perfect...text is the best I have ever seen, nothing else comes even close.

the cartridges are really long lasting, hovewer not too cheap, but on the long run they pay off.

Quality of image printing is just excellent - a comparison to epson 1280 left the epson way behind.

the drawbacks - slightly crooked feed, a bit uncomfortable to insert new paper (especially when you change size), and terrible manual feed - it just grabs the paper without any aligmnemt and prints is crooked every time.

Overall, I love it.

I'm a computer programmer so I know what I'm talking about. I found a site w/drivers that would indeed install in Windows XP. I installed the drivers and plugged it in. XP did a great job of recognizing the tablet as a Human Interface Device but that's where my success ended. This tablet doesn't in any application, not even Windows XP!

Unless you're using an outdated 98 or ME machine, stay far away from this product!

It took my 2hrs to get the pad working. The drivers supplied with the pad were not compatible with ME, or at least on my hp platform. I checked out the website and downloaded the latest driver zip file (around 350k) and this worked so I am now functional. However, if this hadn't of worked I think I would have really been in it as the technical help files are no short of useless. In fact one of the comments in the help file was laughable ('if your computer says invalid systems disk then remove driver disk' - which isn't even supplied nowadays) I guess more constructive userfiles would be helpful. However, despite this the pad now works fine and although not terribly easy to draw pecisely with (I guess this takes prectice and alot of zooming) I can see advantages over a mouse. For the price of this unit it is very good and there is a good area to work with. Additionally the adobe 5 le software is worth having on its own. I hope this helps, happy hunting

I bought this tablet for my girlfriend when she was in design school. She's quite an artist and it worked great for her -- a hundred times better than using a mouse to draw.

It was easy to set up on Win98 -- you simply have to follow directions and install the software BEFORE plugging in the tablet with the USB (or serial) cable. The included Photoshop LE software is excellent (you can save $$$ if you want the full version). Also, the tablet works with Win XP but the driver is not Microsoft certified. I guess it may be erratic on some systems depending on the configuration. But if you have a USB Mac, I don't think you'll have any trouble.

Although the company that made it is out of business, this tablet works great for the price. You won't find a better option for students on a budget or kids on the old PC.

Professional artists and designers will definitely want to go Wacom.

I needed a way to play my iPod through my car speakers; I expected loud, great sounding quality of sound. I have tried cassette adaptors, which are just horrible.

This is a FM transmitter, meaning that it transmits a radio signal to a specific radio bandwidth, e.g. the popular radio stations you listen to like 95.7FM, plays its music through that specific bandwidth. The iTrip has about 100 different FM settings that you can select and play through. Problem is, a lot of FM stations are already taken up, and, a lot of stations do not work well with the iTrip. So really, more than half of the stations that are provided are useless.

Next, is the difficulty of finding the perfect station. I mean, who really has the time to go through each station to see which one works the best? I sure don't. I use the default setting of 88.1FM, which is fine, half the time. Other half of the time it is filled with static, and often, other bandwidths take over the dinky iTrip's frequency.

The sound quality is of course, radio quality. This means, poor quality. Default CD quality is 128kbps. Radio quality is only 92kbps. Which is, pretty bad. I was trying to play my iTrip on my friend's system in his car, and it sounded horrid. Also, I am one of those obnoxious people who like to play their music loud. Only problem with the iTrip is that if you turn the iPod's volume more than 85%, than the static gets 5x worse and the quality gets 2x as worse. The car speakers can only go so loud as well, so for people like me who turn their music up all the way, the iTrip does not provide that.

The only good thing about this is the "aerodynamic" shape and merging with the iPod. It fits right on top of the iPod, and doesn't have any cords. Very convenient. It also does not need to use batteries, nor does it need to be charged. It uses power straight from the iPod itself. So no cords, no batteries. That leaves the iTrip alone in the race for the best iPod radio transmitter.

I give it 3 stars because it is very convenient when compared to other radio transmitters of its kind for iPod users. However, it cannot be used for any other types of devices of course, so if you're stuck with just a CD player one day without your iPod for some whacked, random reason... you are stuck with just your earphones. The quality is horrible 65% of the time and finding a good radio station is hard. But besides getting direct connection with your stereo through adaptors and having the right deck for your car, this is the next best thing.

Someone earlier wrote;

>Radio quality is only 92kbps<

That is misleading. The new HD Radio signal is only 92kbs, but regular FM is analog, limited only by the multiplex stereo system in use that forces a high frequency cutoff at 15KHz. Technically, analog FM (without the required cutoff) would sound better than CDs, as it does not have the low bit rate of even CDs, and as a transmission system does not have problems with hiss as did old old tapes, or problems with scratches as did old LP records.

Of course most FM stations now play CDs or MP3s, and they often compress their signals to make themselves sound louder. But technically, FM sound is about as good as it gets, transmission-wise.

I have an iPod Mini and have been using the iTrip with this for about three months now. It works extremely well in the car (2001 Volvo)and through my home and work radios. I live in the Washington, D.C. metro area. I've used this in Baltimore and on drives out to the Eastern shore. I only occasionally get a little static which tends to go away within a minute or less. I am buying a second Mini and iTrip for my wife. ENJOY.

This company did not send my rebate. I would not expect that they provide any warranty or support if they do not honor anything as basic and simple to fufill as a rebate. I will not be buying any other products from American Anko or AVBTech (who make this mouse, as well as gaming force-feedback wheels ). I don't if American Action is just another name American Anko uses or a distributor name, but I think I will avoid them too because of this experience. If you want a vibrating mouse, buy a Logitech iFeel, which is optical, has a better software package, and a company that stands behind their products.

I am one of the many customers who got tricked out of the rebate by American Anko. The mouse box has TWO identical bar codes that both look exactly like UPCs. There is no way to tell which code is UPC and which one is EAN. If you send the wrong code, you will NOT get your rebate. I am pretty sure that this is done INTENTIONALLY to confuse the customer and NOT pay the rebate.

I was able to get a partial rebate for this mouse product since they said that I sent the wrong UPC code. I had to make a number of calls to convince them that there is no way one can determine what is UPC code and what is EAN code.

I hope all the people who got tricked by this company speak up and post their comments about this company. I am planning to write a letter to AMAZON as well as the BBB. If we let these things slide, companies like American Anko will continue cheating on us. If you need more proof that this company is tricking people out of their rebates, read the REBATE thread on the ANANDTECH FORUM.

I also saw in one of the reviews that the "real" UPC is covered up with another sticker, so you MIGHT not even see it!

I recommend that you NEVER deal with this company!

The product is allright, it works as advertised...BR>I was...confused about the UPC code so I send both the bar codes in the box. I tried calling the company for verification but they never pickup the phone.
The rebate check didn't come in 3 months, Neither did they send any communication.
I contact them by email and they replied that the proof of purchase I had send is not good enough. I had enclosed the Amazon confirmation printout & bar codes. They replied I should have included the packaging slip as well. This was never mentioned anywhere in the rebate form. After much haggling and after sending back the packaging slip I got a partial rebate.

The company is not customer friendly, so please don't buy this expecting help with product or mail in rebate..
I hope...such companies [stop] taking advantage of it's valuable customers.