Geekly Update August 17

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The AskBobRankin Geekly Update

• Car maker GM thinks the Internet may help them sell some cars. Beginning this week, about 225 dealers in California will be placing new cars and trucks on eBay. The deal, which began Tuesday, is part of Government Motors' turnaround plan and will be tested until Sept. 8.
• GM has also announced that its electric Chevy Volt, due out next year, will get 230 MPG, but with a $40K price tag, it may not be that great a deal. One cost/benefit analysis comparing the Volt to gasoline powered cars shows that you'll have to travel about 200,000 miles to break even for the difference in price. And that article didn't even factor in the cost of the electricity to recharge the car at home. (And doesn't the production of electricity usually require the burning of nasty fossil fuels?)
• Microsoft has announced pricing for the Windows 7 Home Premium Family Pack. For $149.99 you can get up to three installs. Upgrades will be $79.99 for Windows 7 Starter to Windows 7 Home Premium, $89.99 for Windows 7 Home Premium to Windows 7 Professional and $139.99 to upgrade Windows 7 Home Premium to Windows 7 Ultimate.
• Microsoft has announced that their new touchscreen media player will be out September 15. The Zune HD has a 3.3" OLED screen, HD radio, browser and WiFi. You can preorder now at prices of $220.00 for 16GB and $290.00 for 32GB.
• Next time you think about replacing your cell phone, consider the planet. Samsung has already released the energy efficient Blue Earth, and now it has debuted the Reclaim. Made of over 80% recycled materials, the phone is made from bio-plastics produced from corn. Available in earth green and ocean blue, it will only set you back $50.00 with a two-year contract from Sprint and $2.00 will be donated to the Nature Conservancy's Adopt an Acre program.
• Party on with the IPT-DS1 Partyshot Docking Station designed for use with Sony's new TX1 and WX1 cameras. Set it in the center of the action and the device recognizes and tracks faces and automatically pans, tilts and zooms. Best of all, you don't have to worry about being too soused to take them yourself, although the next morning may provide some embarrassing photos. Good thing it doesn't auto-upload your pics to Facebook or Flickr. You can pre-order the IPT-DS1 now and expect a September delivery.
• Best Buy inadvertently offered a 52-inch Samsung LCD HDTV for $9.99 this week. Although the mistake was caught when customers began ordering the $3400 TV online, the company has decided not to honor the price. Although they apologized for the error, customers will be refunded in full for the purchase. "Did we say 52-inch HDTV? Ummm, we meant 0.52-inch. Sorry!"
• CD sales may be less than ever but Nielsen Soundscan reports that vinyl is in, as 89 percent more LPs were sold in 2008 compared to the previous year. Almost 1.9 million vinyl records were sold in 2008, while sales of CDs fell 14 percent.
• Kentucky Fried is now KFC, Burger King is BK, Pizza Hut is becoming the Hut, but does rebranding Radio Shack as The Shack make sense to you? Sounds more like a place to go for fish fry, burgers and a shake. I poked around on some forums where people were discussing the name change, and the prevailing opinion was that Radio Shack lost its way when they tried to become a Best Buy imitator. Do they even sell soldering irons and integrated circuits any more?

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