Cutting Those Cords
Sofa Seasoning. Like butter on a baked potato, the Pepper Pad 3($700) adds flavor to portable computing. This in-betweener-smaller than a laptop, bigger than a hand-held-is well designed for roaming about the house. With a bright screen and a thumb-friendly keyboard, it does a good job at handling E-mail, Web browsing, and electronic books. It's also a diary for tracking recipes or a sophisticated remote control for your home theater. Built-in Wi-Fi also connects it to a home network. You can buy a higher-powered laptop for less money than the PP3, but that laptop will be bulkier and less friendly.
Traffic Tips. Today's GPS receivers can route us around bad traffic, play soothing music, and flash photos of our loved ones. The Magellan RoadMate 2200T ($500) offers all that and more: It's also pocket-size for outdoor activities with an eight-hour battery and a $50 option to turn on topographic maps. But its menus aren't that attractive, and those traffic updates require a $100 antenna and cost $60 a year.
Unchained melodies. The Acoustic Energy Wi-Fi Internet Radio at C. Crane Co. ($300) releases Internet radio from the unfriendly confines of your PC. A user-friendly setup makes it easy to hear Egypt's Nile FM radio, or any of about 5,000 stations worldwide, and the wireless connection makes it easy to take the world room to room. The radio also tries to play files stored on your PC, but that can be tricky with Windows networking.
This story appears in the November 27, 2006 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.