Category Archives: Product Reviews

We caved… bought a Dyson

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Dyson D23 Animal

So we caved and bought a Dyson D23 Animal.

We went to look at Dysons, but I guess I’m too entrenched in software version numbers. I assumed the Dyson model with the highest number would be the newest/latest/coolest/funnest/most pimped out machine.

I was wrong.

Luckily Futureshop had a Dyson trained salesman who set us straight.  The D23 Animal has the power head for carpet.  The one we thought we were going to get had an air driven beater bar only, not the powered one – a CRITICAL difference when you have a golden retriever living in your house.

We’ve had it for a few weeks.  This machine cleans like no other vacuum.  It has such power, it sucks the downstairs out of the upstairs carpet.

Seriously, it was disgusting the dirt and filth that came out of the carpets upstairs, and the area rugs here on the main floor.

It wheels around really nicely. The hose is plenty long, but the power cord is a little too short.  As a bonus though, it does have a nice button that sucks in the cord and winds it up when you’re done vacuuming.

The joint on the power head turns really nice and is easy to get in corners and around furniture legs.  And it self-adjusts the height when you are vacuuming carpet so you don’t have to fiddle with any height settings.

It has a nice separate head for non-carpeted floors with just a simple brush on it, but I don’t think there is a way to attach the other head to the machine for storage that would make it handy and available for switching back and forth.  Futureshop threw in a bonus kit with a bunch of additional attachments. I can’t figure out when/why to use most of them, or where/how to store them.

This vacuum is not for amateurs, nor the weak.  It is heavy.  It’s a little awkward. I’m still not used to the fact the wand detaches above the floor power head, so if that is too long to suck things up with, you can compress it into a shorter wand.  Still awkward for dusting.

And as hard as it is to believe, I have already found a way to hurt myself on a new vacuum. I’ve banged and scraped my calf 3 times, in the same spot, on the little arm where the beater bar hang when not in use (see photo below).   Note to self: don’t vacuum in shorts.

It is a canister vacuum, so when I need to empty it (like after vacuuming half of our living room area rug), I take the big canister outside to the trash bin, and I hit the eject button that pops open the bottom and releases the dirt and hair and pennies into the garbage.

It does have a lot of plastic components, but they seem very strong and durable. It doesn’t feel like it is going to fall apart like the last vacuum we had (that did fall apart).

Golden Retriever hair still wraps around the beater bar, but it is easy to disassemble and cut the hair off.

It sits really well on the stairs so I can easily vacuum the staircase now.  Well it didn’t sit well the first time, until Jeff showed me I had it upside down.  Now it works better.

It compacts really easily to look like this for storage:

Dyson D23 Animal

It was a ridiculous amount of money, but at least it has a 5 year warranty, does a good cleaning job, and is a new toy to play with :-)

Lucky lucky ME!

Product Reviews, , , ,

Garmin Nuvi 1390TGuess who won a Garmin nuvi 1390T from GPSCentral.ca !?!

That’s right.

ME!

In their email newsletter yesterday, they mentioned they hid 3 easter eggs on pages on their site. I was taking a night off working and was sitting in the living room with Jeff, watching tv, each of us on our laptops, so I told him about it, and we each started surfing the GPSCentral.ca website, clicking on links, looking at their products, hunting for the winning eggs.

What a genius business idea! I spent an hour looking through all their products, and they have A LOT! I bought Jeff a really nice handheld unit for his birthday from them last year, but really didn’t have any idea of how broad their product base was until I spent all the time searching their website.

And then there it was!! I hovered over a link and saw easter-eggy link text. I clicked on it and there it was!! I won one of three of the prizes they were giving away!

I’m really excited. We have an older Garmin Nuvi but the last few times we’ve used it in Halifax, we realized how out of date the maps were. Map updates are pricey so we were thinking we might just use my iPhone from now on, but this will be WAY better!

:-)

Have our merchants lost their minds?

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It’s mid February. We have 3 feet of snow. Everyone is having ice and snow on the roof problems. School was cancelled yesterday in our 4 neighbouring counties. It’s winter.

We have this really awful ice dam across the entire back of our house with water leaking in several rooms. We don’t know why yet, except the back of our house doesn’t have much of a slope, doesn’t get any winter sun, and we’ve had repeated rain and snow storms since the beginning of January.

So I read yesterday about these salt based pucks that you throw up on your roof. They were called “Roofmelt”. They are safe for your asphalt shingles and will slowly melt through your ice dam, making channels for the water to drain off your roof.
Roofmlet
Woo hoo! Just want we need!

So I checked on the website and Canadian Tire had them listed. I checked our local store inventory online, and bingo! they were in stock.

So Jeff and I went to Canadian Tire to buy a pail or two last night.

Skip ahead 10 minutes and Jeff has to drag me out of the store because I’m starting to make a scene.

OK so I’m a little on edge, our house is leaking, I’m worried about our roof, I had a bad day at work, Bell’s network was down in the province so I had no signal on my iPhone, and I was hungry…

But I was almost pushed to new extremes when I went to Canadian Tire and found rows upon rows of grass seed, slug bait, mosquito repellant, and flower pots.

Not even one snow shovel. It is THE MIDDLE OF WINTER YOU JACKASSES!

So Jeff asked a young employee if he could show us where the Roofmelt was.

“Uhhhh…. I don’t think we have any… “, but he went to check the inventory computer anyway.

“No, I’m not seeing anything.”

And that is when I said, “Well I’m glad I spent the time this afternoon looking up your inventory online to verify that you had some first in stock before we made the trip.”

Then I started in on a rant about their summer inventory. Not to the young stock boy, just to the crowd, that didn’t exist. No one was around. But before I could step all the way onto my soapbox, Jeff dragged me out of the store laughing at my exasperation.

IF YOU CAN’T BUY ROOFMELT DURING THE ONLY MONTH OF THE YEAR YOU WOULD ACTUALLY NEED IT, WHY IS IT ON YOUR WEBSITE??????

So we went to Central. (our little rural town Home Depot knock-off). No roof pucks. But they did have a few bags of salt and sand still by the door. They had never heard of the product. Their project planning desk staff might be able to order us some though.

Next stop. Walmart. Walmart’s manager must live in Florida. Rows upon rows of patio furniture and bug zappers. WHO CAN EVEN SEE THEIR PATIO YOU JACKASSES! It’s FEBRUARY!! In the discount section between the cashiers and the exit there were a couple shovels and some mis-matched selection of salt products. No Roofmelt.

Atlantic Superstore. A couple bags of salt left. No shovels. Winter isle has been replaced with Easter merchandise.

If I bust my snow shovel, or the scraper for my car windows, will I be forced to hibernate until the next winter? Should I come back in the summer and pick up a couple spares???

I stopped by Home Hardware today. They had Roofmelt on their website too. Although their staff in the store today had never heard of it. After I described it, one employee thought it would be a great idea. I said that I guess I’ll have to order it well in advance since every store is full of lawn and garden supplies now. He said, hey! great idea, and you should buy extra and sell it. The other said, just use rock salt, that’s what we use. I said I heard that is a baaaaaad thing to put on your roof. The other guy said he’d never put rock salt on his roof.

Sigh.

Oh and did I mention that Jeff called every roofing company in the area? Only one guy will remove snow and ice from your roof, but he doesn’t have insurance.

We’ll pass, thanks.

Philips Fidelio Docking Speaker – My Review

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Philips Fidelio dock

Jeff bought me the Philips Fidelio Docking Speaker with Bluetooth for me for my birthday! It is a speaker dock for my iPhone.

I thought I’d give you a little review in case you were looking for a similar product.

PROS

  • Charges my iPhone – Now I don’t have to plug my iPhone into the wall with the charging cable it came with. While I’m using the speakers, it charges my iPhone. Love this!
  • Internal Battery – Not only does it charge my iPhone battery, but the entire speaker dock has an internal battery, estimated at 5 hours, that allows me to unplug it from the wall and take it anywhere! Like upstairs so I can sing and dance in the shower, and downstairs so I can be entertained while I’m starting a fire, or exercising on the treadmill.
  • Sound Quality – I really enjoy the sound of these speakers. I’m no a professional audiophile, but the sound is deep and rich with plenty of bass.
  • Bluetooth – Jeff specifically went hunting for a speaker dock for me that had Bluetooth. He said that is because I can never seem to put my iPhone down, so how would I leave it in a speaker dock. Ha! Many he had a point. Anyway, I just have to turn on the Bluetooth signal on my phone, and quickly sync it with the speaker dock, and presto! I’m listening to my iPhone without it even physically connected. The range is supposed to be rather limited, but I tried it from my bed when the speaker dock was in the bathroom, and it worked! The Bluetooth is neat if you are playing a game, so you can hold your iPhone in your hand, but hear the great quality sound from the speaker dock.
  • Input Jack – The speaker dock has an input connection so you can plug other items into the dock to use the speakers.
  • Light and Portable – There is a nice finger hole in the back where you can cup all of your fingers into it to carry it around. The unit is really portable and my iPhone seems well connected and doesn’t fall off when I’m rockin’ out around the house. Because it has the internal battery, and our WiFi reaches outside the confines of our house – I can see myself using this to listen to Sirius satellite radio outside on the deck and while I’m gardening next year!
  • iPads too! – I don’t have an iPad, but if I ever do, or if Mom is visiting with hers, I’ll show her that this speaker dock is designed to also allow an iPad to be docked. A separate iPad stand came in the box to secure an iPad to the dock.
  • Remote Control – This speaker dock also comes with a remote control! So I can adjust the volume, or flip to the next song, even if I have it sitting out of reach.
  • App – There is a free Apple App for this speaker dock. It has a couple of displays, with the time, or battery level, and you can play your iPod through one of the displays. It can also be used to use the speaker dock and your iPhone as an alarm clock!

CONS

  • Stupid Packaging – This speaker dock had product information firmly stuck to the top of it with some sort of sticky, stiff tape. When I pulled it off, it pulled the finish on the back under the adhesive. Nothing more aggravating than wrecking the smooth and sexy look of a brand new toy thanks to the manufacturer’s packaging oversight.

If you are shopping for this item, I have the Philips Fidelio Docking Speaker – Model number 8550/37.

Three recommendations. Take my word for it.

Product Reviews, ,

Recommendation #1: If you’ve ever had a cell phone, or texted, or used any device with a spelling auto-correct feature, you are going to hurt your ribs laughing while reading this site:

http://damnyouautocorrect.com/

Recommendation #2: Find a store that sells Yankee Candle products, and buy an “Autumn Wreath” scented air freshener for your car. Trust me.

Recommendation #3: Bookmark Brett Anderson’s blog at Accuweather.com –

http://www.accuweather.com/blogs/anderson/

I love his weather analysis and predictions and forecasts. If you read his latest blog and live in southern Ontario, you’ll know exactly how much snow you’ll be getting this weekend :D

Remington Epilator 6025

Product Reviews, , ,

Tucked away, nibbling on my brain, were the words of a dear relative who said, “Shave? Don’t shave. Pull ‘em out instead! I use an epilator”.

And those words kept nibbling away until I found myself standing in front of the razor isle in Wal-mart today. Knowing that if they sold one of these contraptions, well I would probably take it home.

Thank goodness I didn’t see any.

Until I read the price tag markers on the shelf and the word ‘epilator’ caught my eye.

I crouched down, and tucked away at the back of the shelf, almost as if this evil thing needed to stay out of the light, was the Remington Epilator 6025.

Seventy some odd bucks later and it was mine.

I am pretty sure I was hoping this machine had to charge up for a day first, but no, the damn thing can work fine on its cord right out of the box, or I could wait 16 hours to charge up its batteries.

“I’m going to try this,” I told Jeff.

I lifted my pant leg right there at the kitchen table.. just to see… just a few… just to see what this thing was all about.

Well sweet baby jesus it felt like electronic shocks on my leg.

42 tweezers, twirling around, on a high speed or low, ready to grab my hairs, hairs of any length, and rip them out by their root ball.

I took it outside, full of confidence that the cool autumn air, and afternoon sunshine would dull the sting.

That carried me through another two square inches.

“It sounds like a lawnmower,” Jeff said.

“It’ll be so worth it”, I mutter, “The box says I’ll be hair free for six weeks!!”

This was not going to be some easy walk in the park. I needed somewhere I could meditate with this thing.

Upstairs I went. Somewhere comfortable. Somewhere alone. Somewhere with a TV to distract me from my pain.

I sat on the end of the bed.

I plugged it in, and started it up. And cursed. Then turned it off. I panted. I cringed. Then did some more.

And 30 minutes later, my legs are hair free.

And red.

And maybe a little swollen.

But just wait. Tomorrow they’ll be glorious.

New Laptop!

Product Reviews,

I used to have a laptop years ago. I think it cost me almost $2500. The motherboard died once under warranty, and then a second time, shortly after the 1 year warranty expired. I loved having a laptop so I could watch TV at the same and I mourned its loss for years. (I actually still have it, just in case it could magically be repaired.) The power button had gone too and I had to use a metal paper clip in its place to make the electrical connection on the board beneath to make it power on.

My office in this house isn’t near the TV either so when I have to work at night, updating my websites and blogs and working for clients, I am in the other room and not near Jeff. I’m sure misses me when I’m in the other room, but likes having full control of the TV remote!

I’ve been saving up my business income so I could buy a laptop so I could blog more, and do some work while I’m watching TV in the evenings. But I wanted something smaller and lighter, more portable, so it would be easier to carry around.

I decided I wanted a little netbook about 6 weeks ago. I settled on the new HP Mini 5101 that just came out a couple weeks back. 10.5″ screen, fully portable, light, but little. I’ve tried to find it available to order in Canada and just haven’t had any luck.

But that gave me time to think more about it, and fiddle with the netbooks in the stores whenever I could. I decided that I wanted to go a little more full-sized, but not too big, since I have a really nice desktop computer with a great big screen now.

Today, since it was 33°C, we decided to go to air conditioned stores in our air conditioned car. We went to Futureshop in New Glasgow and I must have spent an hour fiddling with all the models and sizes. The best salesman ever, Don, helped me out. He reminded me a little of my godfather Rudy S. He was really knowledgeable (and patient) and even took me to other places in the store to teach me about more recent developments in computer technology and explain how they worked.

I finally settled on this one. It is a 13.3″ HP Pavilion dv3. (see specs – http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?logon=&langid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10125650&catid=25313#MoreInfo) The 13.3″ screen is more than big enough, and it is a backlit LED display rather than the traditional LCD. Don explained the difference and turns out it will be easier on the battery life. It seems very sharp and bright.

My only complaint so far is the left shift key seems like it is one shift too left compared to what my fingers are used to – but true enough my other two keyboards and ergonomic and split so I just have to retrain my fingers.

It feels really good that all the annoying extra work I do online was able to allow me this luxury.

As much as I hate spending any extra money, I did stay true to the promise I made myself years ago – next time I buy a laptop – buy the extra warranty. It always feels like a rip-off, but if I had it last time, I would have had a laptop for longer. (Plus I have a long history of dead hard drives and mechanical failures). Hopefully Don got a good commission.

Now are you all ready for more regular blog posts? Can you keep up?

ShamWOW!

Product Reviews

We are the proud new owners of 2 sets of ShamWOW’s!!

Jeff bought them for us when he was in Halifax last week.

Don’t you love the ShamWow commercials? Here is a little inside to Vince – the man on the commercial:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/28880253

Or watch the informerical! http://www.shamwow.com

(and no… we haven’t even used them yet!)

My on-going dialogue with Aliant

Product Reviews,

I am going to cut and paste my on-going discussion with Bell Aliant here – please rest assured that I am cutting and pasting this so the spelling and grammar mistakes are not my transcription errors.

Last night Jeff noticed our phone line was dead. I found a place on Aliant’s website where I could report the problem online. I filled out the form and got this response:

Hello!

Thank you for contacting Aliant Trouble Resolution.

Please try the following:

1. Unplug all telephone sets from all of the telephone jacks
throughout the home.

2. Aside from telephones, also unplug all Internet modems [dial and
HSI], fax machines, high-speed microfilters or any other phone
devices.

3. All phones and phone-devices must be left unplugged for 3 to 4
minutes.

4. After waiting 3 to 4 minutes, each phone must be plugged back in
one at a time. For testing purposes, plug the phone directly in the
jack [not through a micro-filter or fax machine, as the micro-filter
or fax machine may be causing the issue].

5. After each set is plugged in, check to see if the issue still
exists.

If the trouble persists, please reply and we will set up an
appointment for a technician to visit and fix the trouble.

If you have any other requests or inquiries, please do not hesitate
to contact us again via email or by phone at 1-800-773-2121.

Thank you for choosing Aliant. We appreciate your business.

Luc
Aliant Trouble Resolution
E-Contact Agent

So we followed their suggestions and the line is still dead. So I responded today at noon (I was home sick from work today).

We still have no phone service – since last evening. Is there a community outage or is this localized?

Lisa & Jeff Schuyler.

Hello Lisa & Jeff,
Thank you for contacting Aliant Trouble Resolution.

An appointment has been booked to send a tech on Friday, Sept 19/08
between the hours of 8AM and 5PM to fix the ongoing issue. If the
selected date doesn’t meet your requirements, please notify us and
we’ll make the proper modifications.

There are potential charges applied if a jack or inside wiring needs
to be replaced or fixed. The installer will advise you before doing
any changes.

If you have any other requests or inquiries, please do not hesitate
to contact us again via email or by phone at 1-800-773-2121.

Thank you for choosing Aliant. We appreciate your business.

Mike

My response:
We will both be at work from 7:30 until 4:30 on Friday and will not be home.

Hello,
Thank you for the quick reply. When would be a better time for you?

Should you have any further questions, or if you require assistance,
please feel free to contact us.

Thank you for choosing Aliant. We appreciate your business.

Have a great day,

Mike

I am home from work today. Tomorrow we are home after 4:30. I don’t know if your technicians only work regular hours or not.

Hello,
Thank you for replying. That is the only availible appointment we
have for Friday. The next Availible appointment would be for Monday,
Sept 22/08.

Should you have any further questions, or if you require assistance,
please feel free to contact us.

Thank you for choosing Aliant. We appreciate your business.

Have a great day,

Mike

Can you specify a specific time rather than the entire day??

Hello!

Thank you for contacting Aliant Trouble Resolution.

Can you provide us with your phone number, i’ll have a look if we
specify a visit.

If you have any other requests or inquiries, please do not hesitate
to contact us again via email or by phone at 1-800-773-2121.

Thank you for choosing Aliant. We appreciate your business.

Luc

Our home line that isn’t working is 902-783-28xx
You can reach us by cell at 902-968-06xx.
Even if we had 30 minutes notice before the technician was due to arrive, one of us could arrange to leave work to meet him/her.

Hello,
Thanks for replying. Unfortunately this is the only time we have
availible for a technician to visit. Is there any way to arrange for
someone to bet there?
Should you have any further questions, or if you require assistance,
please feel free to contact us.

Thank you for choosing Aliant. We appreciate your business.

Have a great day,

Mike

As I just said, there is a way to arrange someone to be here if we could have 30 minutes notice when you will arrive, rather than telling me anytime between 8 and 5.
Call me at 902-968-06xx with 30 minutes notice and I’ll leave work tomorrow during the day.

Lisa

Hello!

Thank you for contacting Aliant Trouble Resolution.

I have updated the information in our ticketing system to advise to
call 30 minutes in advance.

If you have any other requests or inquiries, please do not hesitate
to contact us again via email or by phone at 1-800-773-2121.

Thank you for choosing Aliant. We appreciate your business.

Have a great day!

Luc

As of 10pm this evening, our phone line is back in service! Yahoo!