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Twelve South MagicWand review
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Accessories, Apple, PC / Laptop, Peripherals, Product Reviews,
The Twelve South MagicWand aims to solve a simple-yet-annoying issue with the Apple Wireless Keyboard and Magic Trackpad. We've used the Wireless Keyboard and Magic Trackpad combo pretty much exclusively here at Gear Live ever since the Magic Trackpad launched back in July 2010, and while we've enjoyed it (heck, we haven't switched away from that setup yet after 16 months,) there's one problem. Despite the fact that the Trackpad and Wireless Keyboard line up perfectly when next to each other, they have a really hard time staying put.
What I mean is, you constantly have to bring the Magic Trackpad back over to its spot next to the keyboard. It's not something you need to do every few minutes or anything like that, but a few times a day we've found that the Trackpad has mysteriously inched its way across the desk and needs to be wrangled up and brought back home. The TwelveSouth MagicWand solves this.
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Apple Battery Charger makes wireless devices less annoying?
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Accessories, Apple, Editorial, Features, Wireless / WiFi,
I was thinking about why Apple would want to release their Apple Battery Charger product, since you can pretty much get batteries anywhere, and I think it comes down to Apple wanting to do their part in eliminating the annoyance that many have with changing batteries when a device runs out of juice. With the introduction of the Magic Trackpad, Apple now has three devices that are powered by AA batteries, with the other two being their wireless keyboard and Magic Mouse. According to Apple, they were able to come into the battery market with a few key advances. One such feature is an intelligent power management system so that once the batteries are charged fully, it goes into a low power state, using about 90% less power than your average charger. That’s nice. The batteries also have a long service life, which Apple says is up to 10 years. Also nice. Still though, this isn’t really a market that Apple needed to be in.
In our opinion, Apple’s goal here was to innovate a bit for the benefit of their own products. They sell you six batteries so you can have two in a wireless keyboard, and two in a Magic Trackpad or Magic Mouse, and then you can also have two always in the charger, ready to be swapped. It pretty much eliminates worry of running out of juice, which gives you all of the benefits of having wireless devices with none of the drawbacks since you always have two fresh batteries ready for you (unless you somehow have both the wireless keyboard and the pointing device run out at the same time.)
We like the strategy. You can pick up the Apple Battery Charger for $29 from Apple.
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