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Canon cameras go wireless

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Canon takes its cameras wireless

Canon wireless camera

Well these Wi-Fi enabled cameras are certainly catching on. After Kodak and Nikon now Canon has announced a Wi-Fi model. Due in the UK early next year the Digital IXUS Wireless, great name fellas, is a 5.3 mega pixel compact snapper with a 2inch LCD and a 3x optical zoom. Just like the Nikon Coolpix P2 you can transfer images from the camera to your home PC and even set it up so that shots ping to your network the second they have been taken. It also works with PictBridge compatible printers too. And, in a really cool feature, you can even remote control your camera from the PC. It doesn't however have the Kodak EasyShare One’s option of instantly emailing images via a hot spot (like the Nikon, the Canon requires dedicated software to get wireless),but then again it is set to come in at around £400.

British Boffin special – the Reefski

Last weekend the Shiny Media crew were out and about at the British Invention Show in North London, where we spent many happy hours discussing innovative packaging solutions and checking out the future of roof tiling. There were however some real gems, especially this one - the Reefski. Straight out of Q’s handbook the Bondesque gadget is a submersible craft designed to take people on underwater adventure tours. In typical Bond style the real thing launches at high speed from the shore and then submerges beneath the waves to take its scuba-equipment clad passengers on a dive. If that hasn't got your all a quiver, then the fact that it is stacked out with all manner of high tech goodies from GPS systems, dive computers and spot lights for night diving really ought to be enough to, ahem float (or should that submerge) your boat. Alas, at the moment the Reefski is just the brainwave of Welsh inventor Robin Harris, here's hoping it won't be too long before it makes it into production.

Robot tea server

Meet Karakuri. She's a robot Tea Server, apparently based on a design that's almost four centuries old. According to the blurb, the robot doll "approaches surprised [for which read "freaked out"] guests with a full teacup on a tray; it stops walking when the teacup is taken, waits quietly, bows, then slowly turns around, smoothly scooting away with the empty teacup on its tray." Send her to the doorstep with the sweeties on Hallowe'en and she'll scare the bejaysus out of the kiddies. Yay for her! The little robot will set you back $169.95 ready made and $89.95 if you fancy having a go at putting her together yourself.

Control how Windows Explorer opens

For reasons best known to Microsoft, Windows Explorer in XP opens showing the My Documents folder, or some other equally pointless location when nine times out of ten what you want it to do is show the contents of your C: drive. Here’s the way to make it do just that. Right-click on the Windows Explorer icon or shortcut that you use most often (you can do it to all the others as well) and click Properties. In the Target box you should add the following ‘switches’ to the end of the command line: /n,/e,c: .These will tell Windows Explorer to open in the root of your C: drive. If you are using another drive or want it to open somewhere else just change the c: at the end. To save you the effort of typing it all in (and if you do note that there is a space in front of ‘/n’ and don't forget the two commas), just copy and paste the following command into the Target box: %SystemRoot%\explorer.exe /n,/e,c:

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