Western Digital My Passport Ultra Anniversary Edition 2Tb

Western Digital releases a limited edition My Passport Ultra

I'm happy to admit I'm a big fan of Western Digital My Passport drives, and I've covered many of them for Micro Mart over the past decade. I know it's been that long because the latest design is a volume limited 'Anniversary Edition' commemorating 10 Years of My Passport products. Physically the Ultra Anniversary Edition bears an uncanny likeness to the Ultra My Passport Metal Edition, and looking at the specifications I'm reasonably confident that they're of the same core construction.

Transcend Digital Music Player MP710

The ultimate fitness and daily commute companion?

It's been a long time since we've had a dedicated music player in our hands. These days we tend to listen to our music collection through our phones, which is very good, but does pose a bit of an issue at times due to the size and weight of the device. However, the Transcend Digital Music Player offers superb playback of music in a neat 88 x 44 x 10mm package that weighs just 39g and looks for all the world like an iPod Nano. That's not all, though.

Lexar JumpDrive M20 Mobile USB 3.0 Flash Drive

Lexar creates a Janus device that presents two faces to USB connectors

Many tablets and phones, these days support a standard called OTG or USB On-The-Go. It's a standard that allows a USB port to flip direction, allowing USB devices to work as if they were plugged into a PC. By inserting a flash drive you can augment what storage you device includes, and it's generally easier/faster to connect up a flash drive to the PC to transfer documents you can access later on the phone or tablet.

Devolo dLAN 1200+ Starter Kit

Devolo strains to make electrical house wiring match four twisted pairs of gigabit Ethernet

I've reviewed many Powerline networking adapters over the years, and of these Devolo's are some of the best. I like the simplicity of its designs, and how they normally work out of the box without any encouragement. Where I've taken exception to Powerline equipment in the past is when gigabit Ethernet ports are added into the equation, ignoring that the technology isn't capable of that speed (or even half that level).

Stone-age technology

Phones, tablets and processors always seem to be improving, yet some tech has barely advanced in decades. We look at the stone-age technologies that are in need of a bit of evolution

Voicemail

Does anyone actually like voicemail? Born from the dying embers of answering machines, it once seemed useful - but not any more. Often you’re forced to wade through menus, pressing random digits on your handset to hear a rambling message with no actionable points, which would have been far better expressed in an email - despite the limitations of that medium, as we’ll discuss below.

Voicemail has evolved somewhat over time. Voice messages can now be attached to emails, or automatically transcribed by services such as VoiceCloud. Google also offers its own Google Voice transcription service, if you happen to be one of the three people worldwide who use Google Chat.

But none of this is enough to give us hope. The best we can wish for is that in the future our various personal systems become so interconnected and clever that they’re aware if we’re available to take a call or not; and if we’re not, they can invite people to call back later, leave a brief message to be automatically transcribed, or just leave us in peace.