Logitech Harmony Adapter for Playstation 3

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 27th, 2010 in Audio & Video Accessories.

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Logitech Harmony Adapter for Playstation 3

I have a Logitech Harmony 1000 remote, and I run a Pioneer Elite receiver, a Toshiba HDDVD (ok – not smart), an XBox360, a wireless headset controller, a Pioneer Elite upscaling DVD player, two computers with Zalman IR controls, and a Playstation 3. I could control everything with my Harmony 1000 except the Playstation 3. I tried the Nyko Blu-Wave product, and while I’ve been extremely happy with most Nyko products, I had tons of problems with it. From not being able to power up/power down, commands executing twice, etc., there were just too many issues to make it worthwhile. Considering that Sony’s bluetooth remote was so nice, it made sense to go to 2 remotes.

Well now I’m finally down to one without a sacrifice. This unit has it’s own AC power, so it works whether the PS3 is off or on, which is a huge advantage.

The other huge advantage over every other solution is that it contains every single command that the bluetooth remote has (I believe it is 51 in all).

Pros:
-Self-powered via AC adapter
-Works regardless of PS3 being on or off
-Contains all 51 commands, including the PS button
-Doesn’t take up a valuable USB port on the PS3
-Commands work in PS2 emulator of original 60gb PS3
-Range via Harmony 1000 is excellent
-No problems with double-commands like Nyko product
-Design matches Playstation 3
-Logitech had all the commands and screens for all of the supported remotes on their website on launch day (nicely done Logitech!!)

Cons:
-Price is a little high (it’s 3 times the cost of the Sony bluetooth remote)
-For that money, I would like to have had the option of a rechargeable battery so that an AC adapter wouldn’t be needed.
-Unit is small, but it seems like it could be smaller.
-It is still infrared from remote to receiver, so you have to aim it versus bluetooth which is omnidirectional.

Summary: If you want to get down to one remote, this is THE way to do it. If you want to save money, go with the omnidirectional Sony bluetooth remote (don’t go third part on that).

Reviewed by : M. Larsen “Diamond”,   May 12, 2009

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Crest Whitestrips Supreme Professional Strength 84 strips

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 25th, 2010 in Health & Personal Care.

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Crest Whitestrips Supreme Professional Strength 84 strips

As a dentist, I am often asked by patients and friends where to start in terms of selecting a bleaching product. Since Crest produces some very good products, I generally steer them to Crest products. However, there are a multitude of Crest bleaching products to select from, so where does one begin? Here is my advice in selecting and using Crest Bleaching products:

First, let’s begin with Crest Whitestrips Supreme Professional Strength. The bleaching strip is different from all the other Crest Bleaching products in two ways: It has a 14% hydrogen peroxide bleaching gel, and the strip is 50% thinner than previous products. The primary advantage to this system is (in general) a quicker bleaching result, and less exposure to hydrogen peroxide, as there is less hydrogen peroxide in each strip (which is why the strip is 50% thinner). One bleaches for 30 minutes a day for 21 days for maximal result. Crest also claims less gum irritation by using this product.

A brief review of the other Crest bleaching products is in order to understand the other options available. Crest White Strips come in as many as 7 different formulations. This can be very confusing for the consumer! Please remember the key difference in all these products is the strength of the hydrogen peroxide gel, and of course the price. The higher the dose of hydrogen peroxide, the faster the bleaching result, and the most costly as well. Here is a quick summary of the products:

1. Crest White Strips Classic (6% hydrogen peroxide, 14-day treatment). 2. Crest White Strips Premium (10% hydrogen peroxide, 7-day treatment). 3. Crest White Strips Premium Plus (10% hydrogen peroxide, and has 12 additional strips).
4. Crest Pro Effects (10% hydrogen peroxide, 10-day treatment).
5. Crest Advanced Seal (10% hydrogen peroxide, 10-day treatment).
6. Daily Whitening Multicare (6% hydrogen peroxide, 5-minutes/day, 6-week supply)
7. Daily Whitening with Tartar Protection (6% hydrogen peroxide, 5-minutes/day, has a chemical that discourages tartar from attaching to the teeth, 38 upper and lower strips)

In using any of the Crest bleaching products, please follow the specified instructions that come with each product.

1. For most products, the instructions will direct you to bleach twice a day for 30-minutes a time. The inner part of the strip has a chemical called hydrogen peroxide that causes the stains inside your teeth to be oxidized and turn white. Applying the strips has a small learning curve as you will probably bend or fold a couple of them before you get the technique down.

2. Leave the strips on for the time recommended in the instructions and do not overbleach your teeth, as this can lead to sensitivity. Crest bleaching products will generally work for most people, especially younger people and those with yellow stains.

Potential Disadvantages to Consider

1. Hydrogen Peroxide can “burn” your gums. If you notice a burning sensation when you use the product, it is the chemical oxidizing (or burning) your gums (it will turn them white with a minor chemical burn). Depending on how severe the burning is, it may cause you to want to stop the treatment. It is OK to stop the treatment for a day or two to let the gums heal. Once they are healed, resume treatment with the White Strips. Try to not get the strip too far up on your gums.

2. Your teeth may become senstiive during the treatment time. Try to tolerate the sensitivity if it is mild, but if more severe, take a day or two off to let the teeth settle down and then pick up where you left off. You may notice much more sensitivity to cold water, ice cream, etc. The peroxide causes a revesible inflamation of the inner pulp, or nerve center of the tooth and makes the teeth very sensitive to biting or cold drinks or foods. If your teeth become too sensitive, back off on the strips until the sensitivity is gone before resuming bleaching.

3. The strips only cover your front teeth, so only your front teeth will bleach. You may notice the distinct difference between the back (unbleached) teeth and the front (bleached) teeth. Since most people notice the front 6 teeth anyway, this is not a big deal. However, if you have a wide toothy smile, you may want to have a dentist make you a tray that will hold the chemical on the back teeth to whiten them too.

4. The bleaching effect works best on yellow stains. If your stains are due to tetracycline (brownish grey stains in a band on your teeth, your best bet is to have a dentist whiten your teeth in the office for two sessions and then use White Strips to continue the bleaching process.

Crest White Strips work for the vast majority of people. Younger people with yellow stains seem to respond better than older people or those with gray stains. If you have severely stained teeth, especially those with tetracycline (an antibiotic) stain, the strips may not work well for you.

If you are not satisfied with the results and still want whiter teeth, you can then see your dentist for a more concentrated in-office form of bleaching (called “power bleaching”).

Reviewed by : Jim “Konedog” Koenig, DDS,   April 20, 2009

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Ab Circle Pro

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 24th, 2010 in Exercise & Fitness.

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Ab Circle Pro

I purchased the Ab Circle Pro yesterday and just put it together now. It was a pretty simple task and did not take long to assemble.

I have been extremely skeptical about this product because of the horrible reviews. However, as a result of the commercials, I had a strong feeling that it would be a beneficial workout despite the quality of its parts. Therefore, I purchased it at Sports Authority because a 2-year warranty is available for $32.99, so if the product breaks in any way, the Ab Circle Pro may be returned for full refund or replacement. I have always been and always will be an AVID FAN of Amazon.com because I am delighted with the prices, free/speedy delivery and service. But, the warranty is not available here for this particular product, so that is the only reason I went elsewhere.

After trying the Ab Circle Pro, I must say I am definitely pleasantly surprised. I agree with others who posted that the parts could have been thought out a little better in order to ensure its stability and quality. However, I can undoubtedly feel the workout. I am 5′8″ and 143 pounds and am generally fit. I purchased this product so I can re-reveal my six-pack for spring break and this summer, and I believe that this will be the key to success. I am the type of person who is not necessarily motivated to go to the gym or stick to a specific ab routine of my own, so a product like this is perfect for me. It is definitely difficult, especially on the hardest setting with the handle bars as low as they can go. This product works the triceps, shoulders, chest, forearms, lower back, abs and inner/outer thighs (once the bar is removed). The extra sets of knee pads are definitely an added bonus (I’m assuming they were added to the newer models because of the painful reviews), and are necessary for a comfortable kneeling position. However, they proved dangerous to me because the added knee pads slid out of the knee bowl causing me to fall over and bang my knee on the bar. This was quite painful. Therefore, I would recommend duct-taping these pads to the knee bowls if you plan on keeping the Ab Circle Pro. Another complaint is that the feet sometimes lift off the ground with the momentum of your body, and could possibly be dangerous for tipping off the machine for people on the heavier side.

Overall, I am pleased with this product, but I do believe that some tweaks should and will eventually be made to the Ab Circle Pro. I would not advise this product for people who are not already fit and who are heavy and/or uncoordinated. I feel that this product is best for people who are young, don’t have achey joints (because of the kneeling position), and have the agility and coordination to keep up with this routine. I understand that the entire point of a workout machine is (generally) for people to lose weight, but I feel that the Ab Circle Pro would be best for the goal of toning, adding some muscle mass, and cardio. I’m glad that I purchased this product, because it is easy and fun enough to keep up with, and if it will ultimately make me more confident and fit, it is worth the $199 (+ price of one or two year warranty which I recommend). Try it out!

Reviewed by : Deal Finder,   Jan 21, 2010

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Graco High Back TurboBooster Car Seat, Wander

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 23rd, 2010 in Baby Product.

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Graco High Back TurboBooster Car Seat, Wander

I am very happy with this purchase. I am a Britax Mommy and have been since my son was born but just so happened to check Consumer Reports before I purchased his “Big Boy” seat and was glad I did.

They gave this seat the following review: Over all score 82 (the highest of any booster seat) Graco TurboBooster 8493 TurboBooster SafeSeat (Step 3) 8496 $50, TurboBooster SafeSeat (Step 3) 8497 $50,TurboBooster SafeSeat (Step 3) 8498 $50,TurboBooster SafeSeat (Step 3) 8673 $60,TurboBooster SafeSeat (Step 3) 8674 $70

This seat is actually several models but this one that I purchased allows for the back of the seat to detach when they are older and no longer need the back. It also comes with a neck pillow. Unfortunately I did not get this in my box and simply called GRACO and they sent one right out to me. Excellent customer service!

My son is not yet 3 years old but exceeds the mandatory weight and height limits to use the seat. He is not a large child but fits perfectly in it. I have posted his photo in the seat so that you can judge for yourself on the sizing.

From one Britax mother to another don’t spend the extra money on the name. Britax did not even make the Consumer Reports list. I am pleased and I am also very concerned with my son’s safety that is why I always purchased Britax. This time GRACO came out tops!

As far as my son being comfortable he is able to be free in his seat and still be safe. He can reach his toys and he can also nap comfortably. He dies not complain at all now that we have the new seat. I personally made a wise decision. The seat also fits great in my Xterra and both cup holders on the seat can be pulled out with east for snacks and drinks. I am however worried about cleaning them when they get dirty. It looks as if it will be a tedious job.

Reviewed by : Jirka “Two Little Chicks”,   Dec 27, 2006

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Flip MinoHD Camcorder

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 22nd, 2010 in Camcorder.

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Flip MinoHD Camcorder

I bought this camera because I compete in dog agility and wanted something quick to video in better quality than my regular digital camera “video” feature. This is really small, battery life is great and I bought mine at CafePres so I was able to upload a great picture of my dog on it. That said, when I did get the HD, my computer that wasn’t that “old” was unable to handle the HD software – jerky picture, not acceptable playback. So I did what every american with no money does and I bought a better computer, handed down my old one and tried again. I have to say, the software that installs itself is really kick

butt. And I love the frame by frame option. But my hugest pet peeve is the herky jerky with it. And I know, I know, I expected this. At first I had friends filming me and it wasn’t really bad at all. Until I had somebody else who I hadn’t told to really try and hold it still, it was DISMAL. OK I knew that would happen….The zoom is rediculous. You can zoom at first but forget about zooming while taping, the picture will bounce all over the place.

So, I’m thinking of seeing if I can find a less jerky one and handing down this one to my 16 year old son to use in his dorm.

If you really want this, make sure you know what you are in for. Battery life is great, software is great, you need a good computer with horse power. And expect jumpy videos. The small size is awesome, the screen is really small. Hopefully the next generations will get it right. I gave it 5 stars because it performs exactly as promised.

Reviewed by : Dog Crazy,   Jan 21, 2010

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Samsung BD-P4600 1080p Blu-ray Disc Player

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 19th, 2010 in DVD Player.

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Samsung BD-P4600 1080p Blu-ray Disc Player

I know there have been a number of mixed reviews about this product, and it almost deterred me from selecting it when I was looking for a Blu-Ray player to go along with a Samsung 50″ plasma HDTV I recently bought.

After having this player for a little over two weeks now, I can’t be more happy with it. I wasn’t sure how I was going to react to the unusual form factor, and I would not have originally thought about mounting a Blu-Ray player on my wall rather than keep it in a entertainment center, but it has worked out extremely well and I very much like having it wall-mounted for both access and use of the remote control.

The player has worked as smooth as silk and I have not had a single issue playing any DVD in my library, including titles burned on DVD-R and DVD+R disks.

I also really love the additional features of Netflix and Pandora and was amazed at the HD quality of the streamed Netflix titles.

I also like that with the wireless network access comes automatic firmware updates, which from I’ve been reading will prevent me from having to worry about newer Blu-Ray disk features from being usable.

I really have only two criticisms and one warning about this player.

I would really prefer it if the USB Wifi Dongle was positioned to be underneath the visible edges of the player. Having it stick out takes a bit away from the visual sex appeal of this player.

I will also say that they should issue one of these players to CSI graduate students for fingerprinting exercises. This thing is so sleek and shiny that you can spot fingerprints and smudges on it from a 10 feet away.

Lastly, if you are planning on putting this unit in a TV/Entertainment cabinet/housing, beware. Because it is a side-facing slot-loading player, you will not be easily able to load disks without turning the unit sideways each time. Fortunately for me, I enjoyed mounting it on my wall, but it would have been slightly annoying if I had had to stuff it in the new TV cabinet I bought at the same time.

Overall, I am thrilled with this unit and would easily recommend it to anyone looking for a leading-edge Blu-Ray player that will be a great home theater component for several years.

Reviewed by : Peter Backman,  Sep 20, 2009

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AeroGrow AeroGarden with Gourmet Herb Seed Kit

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 18th, 2010 in Home & Garden.

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AeroGrow AeroGarden with Gourmet Herb Seed Kit

The AeroGrow AeroGarden is a treat, especially during the cold months where working an outdoor garden is difficult. The instructions are easy to follow, the kit is well packaged, and the customer service people are knowledgeable when you need help. The online FAQs were lacking in my opinion, but at least they exist. Assembling the AeroGarden is not difficult and planting the pods is simple. Plug them into the holes and snap on the clear domes. Select the product you are growing on the display, have water and the first nutrients in the water reservoir and you’re all set. You can program the unit to turn off at a particular time and I’ve found that although the instructions said it’s not necessary, when the power went out, I had to reset the program. When the seeds sprout, remove the domes. When the signal light alerts you, add more nutrients. Always keep the water level high and use room temperature distilled water if you can, absolutely not well water. Raise the hood when the growth reaches within a couple inches of the lights. Watch for disease and bugs. Enjoy the harvests. That’s about it, pretty simple, not “dirty,” and quite tasty.

Watching the seeds sprout and reach toward the light is fun and the interactive “garden” can be simple or more complex, depending upon the seeds you select. I had a great experience with the herbs, but the replacement sweet peas I purchased were a disaster. I’ve learned that the peas seed package has been discontinued and I understand why. Fortunately, the telephone customer service person was fine and sent out a replacement of his favorite kit, the peppers. So far, so good with the peppers and I’m eager to have fresh hot peppers in the dead of winter without having to leave the warmth of my home. Unlike the more simple to grow herbs or lettuce, this is a more hands on kit, as pollination is necessary. It will be even more fun.

Until the nutrients are ultimately replaced with liquid (”like soy sauce”) product, the tablets need to be kept in the freezer. The first ones I received were all clumped together. The replacements were crumbly, but not terrible. They really need to be solid and firm, not mushy, powdery or in pieces. Can’t wait till the liquid nutrients are available!

I’m thinking of purchasing another AeroGarden but there’s one negative which prevents me from doing so. It is loud. I’ve tried all sorts of things, but I cannot reduce the sound level of the machine. When the machine turns off and the lights go out and I’m nearby, I’m more startled by the sudden absence of sound than the absence of light. This is the only reason for a 4 star and not a 5 star review.

Reviewed by : J. Offenbach,  Dec 18, 2009

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Western Digital My Passport Essential SE 1 TB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBABM0010BBK-NESN

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on January 17th, 2010 in External Hard Drive.

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Western Digital My Passport Essential SE 1 TB WDBABM0010BBK-NESN

My line of work requires that I have a lot of disk space to hold my data. I’m not talking about 20GB of software or files, but rather 450-600GB vmdk virtual disks used to keep a snapshot of our client VMWare environments; so over the last 2 years, I accumulated over 15 USB external drives that averaged 500GB in size. I required the external USB powered drives because I travel a lot and often run these images when I’m on battery power. I’ve run out of space so badly that my laptop lid is covered with Velcro so that most of these drives can stay affixed to my work environment….. You bet I received tons of grief from my coworkers, especially considering I work at EMC2, which manufactures huge Storage Arrays that go in Data Centers. I just couldn’t figure out a way to get one of those velcro’d to my laptop lid, otherwise I’d be set!

So, that covers “why” I need these drives, and what my main requirements are: USB Powered, Largest on the market to consolidate smaller ones, and as small as possible as it relates to physical space it takes up in my laptop bag.

These drives are the largest on the market that are self-powered from a single USB port, which is why these are a good candidate for my needs. While I realize everyone is frustrated with the USB cord being a micro USB rather than a traditional 5 pin USB that is commonly used on today’s digital cameras to sync, for me that was not a big deal at all. My Plantronics Bluetooth headset uses the Micro USB, as does my Griffin iPhone charging pack, so I was no stranger to Micro USBs. These drives allowed me to go from 12-15 500GB drives down to 5 of these 1TB drives, with the excess 1TB that makes up the difference between all my old 500GB drives and the new 1TB drives being duplicate files across the smaller drives that were identified once I was able to run Deduplication software over the holidays this year.
Now that I’ve had these drives for a little over a month, I can tell you what I don’t like about them, so that you can make up your own mind as to the importance that they have on your overall requirements from a drive. First off, everyone griped about the software auto starting when they plugged it in, but I always avoid double clicking on the drive letter in Windows Explorer and prefer to right click and either choose “Explore” or “Open File Location”. That allows me to view the folder structure before I format the drive to the File System of my choice.

A word of caution on these drives, which someone else mentioned as well, and that is the drivers for it do NOT auto install FROM the new drive OR from Windows itself. It is not recognized and you will start to get messages saying the drive can run faster under USB 2.0, which is happening because you need to manually go into device manager, right click on the device named “WD SES Device” that is identified as missing its drivers, and select update drivers. Now for the tricky part. You then need to choose to go find the file by browsing your PC for drivers, and these new drivers are located in the CD ROM drive mapping that was added to your PC when you plugged this new drive into your USB port. It will have a CD icon under Removable Storage, be named “WD SmartWare”, and have UDF underneath the Smartware word. You will need to dig a bit to find the inf for the drive, so here is the path that it’s mapped to on my laptop, and all you’ll have to do is change my E Drive with whatever yours is mapped to (E:\Extras\WD SES Device Driver). This should get you squared away, but REMEMBER TO COPY THIS FOLDER OFF TO ANOTHER PC OR DRIVE BECAUSE ONCE YOU FORMAT THE DRIVE, THIS GOES AWAY, AND SO DOES YOUR ABILITY TO EASILY FIND THE DRIVERS. I DOWNLOADED A DRIVER FROM THE WD SITE THAT WAS NEWER THAN THIS ONE, AND IT PLAGUED MY LAPTOP PERFORMANCE, SO I HAVE STUCK WITH THE ORIGINAL RTM DRIVERS.

Another word of caution is the opening in the drive itself where the micro usb cable plugs into on the drive is ridiculously fragile. A month in and after almost filling one of these TB drives up, the light stopped flashing on the side, I no longer heard the drive power on and start spinning, nor was it being recognized by my laptop. I about crapped myself because I’ve already been thru hell a year ago when I lost 1.5TB of client data that I had sitting on a Seagate 1.5TB 3.5″ SATA hard drive which had a flaw in its firmware where it would wipe your existing partitions clean off the drive AND write 0’s in the place of the data that used to reside on the drive and then corrupted the firmware itself IF AND ONLY IF you happened to connect that Seagate drive to a Dell PC that also had a conflict with it. So, all in all, I was pretty frustrated thinking I had lost another drive. But, there was another option. I talked to WD and they said they’d replace the drive for me, but I was obviously more concerned with the data on it. The drive was cheap enough to replace if it ever came to that. So WD sent me a new drive, and in the meantime, I took this drive apart to see if I could fix it myself or at least identify what happened to make it become a paper weight. Once I got the drive opened, it was quite interesting. These are not 2.5″ SATA drives like all the other usb powered drives….. It’s a 2.5 or maybe even a 2.75″ drive, but you can’t take it out of the plastic case it’s in and say slide it into your laptop, which is what I tried to do the first day I got these drives, so this was actually my second time under the hood of the drive cases.

Now, there was something I was very stoked about which was the fact that these drives use a very similar circuitry design that their larger cousin uses in the 3.5″ SATA drive in that you can unscrew about 6-8 hex screws and take off the green circuit board that physically connects the SATA pins to the hard drive itself. This is done intentionally as opposed to permanently affixing the SATA connector to the drive, because if the SATA pins break off, which I’ve seen happen numerous times before, the drive is dead and so is the data on it. With the board having the ability to be exchanged out, one for one, the drive powers up instantly. So in my case with this 1TB USB drive, the female connector was somehow damaged by the useless cables they provided because they kept falling out at an angle and must have bent one of the 5 pins that are required to power this drive. So on these drives, instead of the green circuit board having a SATA connector on it like 2.5″ and 3.5″ SATA drives use, this drive has the female end of the micro USB connection. What I did was take off the board that had the bad female connector and replaced it with the board from the new 1TB drive that arrived from WD. Once I did that, the drive powered up and hasn’t had a hiccup since, which was over a week ago. If you ever get into trouble with something like this on these drives, don’t be so quick to give up because there is usually an option available, but it was a bummer I had to even deal with this in the first place.

Lastly, and probably the most important comment I wanted to make was how absolutely flimsy the micro usb cords are that were provided with the drives, and how I’ve already had to return one of the 5 because the cord kept coming out while I was using the drive running VMs, and it eventually corrupted my data because of the constant on off on off on off on off on all day long. However, I am very pleased to say that I have found a total workaround for this and no longer have a problem with the cord falling out. I invested in new micro USB cords from Monster, link below, and they fit very tightly, have never come out, and I have seen a huge improvement in IO performance from these drives, which is an even bigger win. I know some of you will feel that for the price of the drive, working cables should be expected. And I agree, but they aren’t practical, and it was worth the investment of $15-$20 per cable to ensure I didn’t have to go through losing another drive. I actually feel these drives are a complete steal for being the only 1TB usb powered drive on the market, though, and have no regrets with them even after having to get new cables for them.

[...]

I know this is quite long, and I really only planned to add feedback regarding the USB cords, but once I started typing, I figured I’d help someone out who will undoubtedly run into the same situation I did but get through it without the stress and headaches! If you need pictures of what the inside looks like, email me and I can get them to you.

Reviewed by : Jason J. Volpe,  Jan 9, 2010

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Hello world!

Written by Best Buy PRODUCTs on March 12th, 2010 in Uncategorized.

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Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

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