For some people, those little white earbuds are the beginning and the ending of their music listening experience. For others, who need more color both in and out of their ears, we suggest a pair of Aerial 7 headphones. Founded on the principle that “great sound can be combined with with awesome, eye-catching design,” the headphone brand boasts several offerings that do exactly that, with the Tank model leading the auditory pack. 

Designed for DJs and bass-heads, the Tank accentuates hip-hop undertones and with its soft ear cup and swivel design, is a worthy and less expensive alternative to the often trebly mixmaster weapon of choice, the Sony MDR-700. Available in three colorways, Aerial 7′s Tank retails for $79.99 and comes with two cables, including one with a built in microphone for iPhone use. To learn more, visit Aerial 7′s site here.

Don’t you hate it when you’re immersed in session of Resistance 2 and get a message from an online buddy and, although you’d like to type back, you won’t simply because it takes too much time to write using your PS3 controller? (This is what happens when Kevin Clark hits me.)

Well, then this latest peripheral from Sony PlayStation, The Wireless Keypad, is for you.

Snapping on to any official PS3 controller, the QWERTY keyed, Bluetooth enabled device allows users to enter text and chat with friends online. It also features a touchpad mouse and short keys for quick connectivity to the PlayStation Network. And just like the PS3 controller, the keypad is charged by pairing it to a PS3 unit with a USB cable.  It’s also especially useful for those who will be frequenting PlayStation’s new social gaming community for the PS3, PlayStation@Home.

(Sure you could use a full sized keyboard, but what are you, some kind of PC gamer?)

Available now at Sony Style and wherever else video games are sold , the PlayStation 3 Wireless Keypad retails for $50.

The Vers 1.5R feels as light as it looks. This is coming from someone who lugged it home by foot, train, then bus, but just as well, felt the irrepressible urge to destroy the cumbersome packaging once there. (If it wasn’t for the return-after-review policy, I would have.) The terribly conspicuous box (it’s lime green) doesn’t swing corners well, and I very distinctly caused a subway scene at the turnstile trying to time my Metro-card swipe and “Go” advance with the passing-through of me and my new fixture. Nevertheless, it is light in weight and once in safekeeping, can easily be transported from nightstand to bookshelf and so forth.

Unfortunately, I first listened to the Vers 1.5R while it sat on carpeted ground and played Kanye West’s 808′s & Heartbreak (which, now, officially sounds strange everywhere), and I was far from impressed. Raising it to a more appropriate level – my kitchen counter – and switching the track to something less robotic, I finally experienced what the Vers boasts about.

Claiming that no music sounds better than when coming from a wooden instrument, the Vers 1.5R cabinet is harvested from sustainable-managed plantation sources, and promises that for every tree used, new ones are planted. The zero-tolerance protective packaging (there’s no bubble wrap to pop or Styrofoam to set afire) is made from 100-percent recycled paper, and there are no wire cable ties, plastic snaps, or adhesives, just screws – which makes for an easier disassembly, if ever needed.

The Vers 1.5R (also an AM/FM sound system and alarm clock) states it’s compatible with all iPod docking models, except for third-generations, but makes no mention of iPhones. I was able to navigate my first-gen iPod Touch through instinctive use of the provided 18-function IR remote; the pictures are self-explanatory (i.e. final selections are made via the press of a button embedded with a checkmark). However, once it came time to choose “Favorite” preset radio stations, signified by the symbol of a star and of which there can be ten, the instruction manual got plenty of page-flips and re-reads.

Even if switched to radio play or turned off entirely, the Vers 1.5R always puts a pause on whatever song was last sounding from your iPod, so when ready, you can listen from where you left off, without having to search for the track again. You can also access your iPod’s lists of artists, albums, and songs by pressing the remote’s “Menu” button the respective number of times. And for those who have a plethora of playlists, “Gym Workout,” “Drinking Games,” “Baby-Making” and the like, there’s a button that assists in those selections, too.

Treble and bass can be altered even at 25 feet away using the remote – which, by the way, is cheap-looking and made silver to match the two volume and tuner dials on the device itself but, on the upside, can’t be misplaced under a Post-It like the iHome’s thumb-sized and over-simplified control. There’s rear port design for a deeper bass response, 15-watt speakers, a 3.5mm auxiliary input that other personal audio players can be connected to, and a class D amplifier which tends to be more energy efficient by producing a lot less waste heat than traditional Class AB’s.

After using the Vers 1.5R for only two days, I, true to my nature, began to take it for granted. But, I didn’t realize it as such until I got into my car. Suddenly, all the noise coming out of my 3-part contraption (made up of tape adapter, charger, and iPod) sounded muffled, so much so that I began to unplug everything and check wires to ensure nothing had broken or split. I eventually chose to drive in silence. I had adjusted pitches, volumes, and balances, but to no avail. The music was now completely uninspired and lifeless.

The Vers 1.5R comes in Piano White gloss, and the real wood veneers of Bamboo, Natural Cherry, Natural Walnut, and Dark Walnut; prices range from $200 – $220 at www.versaudio.com.

-Danielle Cheesman

Unlike previous years, nothing groundbreaking was revealed at this year’s Macworld convention but aspiring filmmakers, musicians, and writers will be pleased. That “I’m A PC” dude won’t be.

17-Inch MacBook Pro:

• At 6.6 pounds and less than an inch thick, it’s the world’s lightest and thinnest 17-inch notebook.
• $50 anti-glare option on the screens
• longest battery ever

iTunes:

• By the end of the first quarter, every one of iTunes’ 10 million will be DRM-free, with improved quality of 256 kbps AAC encoding
• You can upgrade your entire purchased library to iTunes Plus.
• Three different pricing levels of $0.99, $0.69, and $1.29, depending on pricing from record labels

iLife:

iPhoto

• Faces: Tag someone’s picture with a name and iPhoto creates a snapshot of the person.  Then, using face detection, iPhoto will find other instances of that person in the rest of your photos.

• Places: Another way to organize your photos, this time according to where the photos were taken. Using GPS geotagging, iPhoto will produce a map with pins of where you snapped your pics.

• built-in support for Facebook & Flickr.

iMovie

• Animated travel maps: 3-D globe and 2-D map renderings showing where you’ve traveled in your videos

• Image stabilization to remedy shaky hands
• X-ray and aged film effects if you want to toy around with the look of your videos

Garageband

• Learn To Play a musical instrument with both a tutor and the instrument facing you on-screen.  It also features artist lessons from the likes of Sting, Norah Jones and Patrick Stump.

iLife ‘09 comes free with all Macs. Upgrades are $79, family pack is $99.  Available later this month.

iWork:

Pages:

• Offers a full-screen view in which the page is completely isolated so you can focus solely on what you’re doing.

iWork ‘09 is $49 with a new Mac.  Upgrades are $79, family pack is $99.  Available today.

Pics courtesy of Gizmodo (obviously).

-Devin Chanda

No matter how thin or light you think that fancy HDTV you got over the holidays is, it’s still too thick and heavy.

Well, at least compared to  JVC’s upcoming 32 inch Prototype TV.

Weighing in at a waif-y 11 pounds, and measuring just over 7mm thick, this model will be the envy of all of the other chubby flatscreens on storeshelves and will most likely inspire all of the other TV manufacturers to put their future releases on a strict diet.

Let me start this off by saying that (from a consumer perspective) I think Microsoft is a great brand. Aside from the fact that I spent most of Christmas day trying to get my aunt’s Dell to work with Windows Vista, I really have no qualms with the company.

Plus they make Xbox, and as we all know, Xbox is pretty awesome.

But the only thing that consistently irks me about the software giant (see what I did there?) is that when it comes to naming their products, they fail.

Some would even say, epically.

(Note: I’m deading that series. It’s 2009 and time for um, change.)

Take the upcoming software battle that’s going to Microsoft’s Windows 7 vs. Apple’s Snow Leopard for example.

I’ve haven’t been privy to check out either of these platforms, but based solely on their names alone, I’m going to have so say that Apple’s Snow Leopard is going to kick Microsoft 7′s virtual ass, simply for the fact that it has a much cooler name. In fact, Apple’s big cat stance has been sonning Microsoft’s numerical offerings since they released OSX Cheetah in 2001.

You know what Microsoft released in 2001?

Windows XP.

To date, Apple’s OSX platform has released iterations dubbed “Puma,”  ”Panther,” and “Tiger.”

(Maybe Cougar will drop when Apple’s old and withered but still looking for nubile young creatives.)

Microsoft on the other hand, has dropped programs with imposing names like  ”Windows XP Professional x64 Edition” and “Windows Home Server.”

Which means that if Apple ever wanted to ether Microsoft’s chances of winning the operating system name game, they could just drop the biggest cat of all, OSX Lion, to which Microsoft could counter with the ever imposing, Windows 8.

Rather than releasing tee shirts with Common and mud colored versions of the Zune, Microsoft should dedicate their resources to stepping up their product name game.

Look like a regular Austin Powers with this new Lomo camera customized and sexified by Paul Smith. With its striped metallic body, this slick shooter is listed at a relatively inexpensive price of $150, and anyone with an eye for distorted photographs (a Lomo specialty) will love the 180-degree wide-angle fisheye lens and the pod-like flash that reminds us of Hal from 2001: A Space Odyssey. One caveat: You must still be willing to shoot in film because the Paul Smith Fisheye No. 2 strictly uses the 35-mm variety. No digital option here. Of course, the Paul Smith website says the limited-edition camera is out of stock, so shutterbugs might want to keep their eyes fixed to eBay to nab this über-cool lensbox.

If you’re in the market for a new digital camera, you may want to check out latest installment in Canon’s G series, the 14.7 Megapixel PowerShot G10.

Amateur and professional shutterbugs will not only relish the G10′s 3″ LCD menu screen, but also its DIGIC 4 image processor, which improves signal processing speed and outputs higher picture quality.

The G10 is also smaller in size than a typical camera of its caliber, essentially putting the power of a high performance unit to the body that’s relatively the size of a point-and-shoot.

Available now at Canon retailers, the G1O retails for approximately $500, and comes with a battery, charger, neck strap, USB and A/V interface cables, Canon Digital Solutions Software CD, and a 1-year limited warranty.