Special UK Hardware buys

IF YOU know of any good value IT sales (auctions, rebates, one-off, clearance, surplus, classified ads) going around in the United Kingdom, France, USA or Singapore, don't hesitate to contact me, at least 24 hours before the sales end.

Although a rarity, high street giant Dixons has managed to beat other online heavy weights like dabs or ebuyer. It is selling the Fuji S5000 for £205.99 online only, a handful of quid less than its competitors. The S5000 is a superlative camera. It gives you multiple exposure modes, a 1.5-inch bright LCD screen, 16MB XD memory card and a 10X optical zoom. Although it has a 3.1 million pixels CCD, Fuji claims that it is equivalent to a 6 million traditional CCD because Fuji's CCD has hexagonal cells as compared to others round ones. On top of that the S5000 has a 2.2x digital zoom and movie mode facilities. Its black body is rugged and quite sturdy, not plasticky, very professional and different from what you would normally find in this price range.

Every button and switch seems to be placed where it should logically be. It can record its image in RAW file format - which can be unwieldy due to the size but non destructive. Also the S5000 lasts longer due to its smaller power consumption and offers something called spot metering to capture complex image tones accurately. If you want to get the quality of an entry level Digital SLR without the price, then the S5000 might fit the bill. Only recommendations will be to buy rechargeable batteries and a bigger memory card.

Ebuyer is selling two items that are quite impressive on their own. First and foremost is the Mustek PVR-A1 personal media centre. At £99.99+VAT - nearly £50 less than competitors, it is a multifunctional portable device which allows you to do TV recording in MPEG4 compatible format. It is also a digital photo player, a digital voice recorder, a MP3 player, a USB storage device, a SD/MMC card reader and last, a digital alarm with time. More interestingly, it offers a DPS function with direct connection to a DPS compatible printer - no need for a PC. The PVR-A1 has a large 2.5" screen which according to reviewers is 320x240 pixels, usual NTSC VCD standard. It comes with rechargeable batteries and power adapter and weighs in at only 110g. It has built in 32MB memory but you would probably upgrade it to more. Also on the list is a built in microphone and speaker. The Personal Media center software offers loads of functions like file conversion, timer recording or direct printing. Buying two 256MB Secure Digital Cards will bring the total costs to £146+VAT. At last you will be able to watch your DiVX films on the train or see this morning's news.

Also for two more days, ebuyer is offering what is probably the cheapest 8x burner in the UK. The BenQ DW822A has something peculiar about it in that it is dual layer upgreadable, something which will come as a free official firmware around September this year. For now and for £34.03+VAT, you will get a dual drive with speeds of 8X for DVD+R write, It is also compatible with DVD-R. BenQ's Book Type Management enables the easy conversion of +R/+RW media to DVD-ROM format and can resolve compatibility issues with most consumer DVD devices. Walking Optimal Power Calibration (WOPC) dynamically adjusts burning power to ensure the best writing quality throughout the whole burning process. The patented "Tilted Control" keeps the writing angle at 90 degrees on the disc surface to ensure uniform writing. "Lossless Link" and "Seamless Link" prevent buffer underrun when writing. Finally, QVideo is designed as a user friendly interface program, providing a one-click solution for recording your DV to DVD disc in real time. With blank DVD prices falling down to 16p a disc, now is the best time to switch to DVD technology! Just bear in mind that it has CD-RW writing speed of only 8x and CD-R writing speed of 24x and that it does not support 8X DVD-R writing.

Down to gumtree.com, a HP Compaq NX9010 laptop is on sale for £499, all inclusive - boxed and sealed - a full £130 discount of high street prices. It features a Celeron 2.6GHz, 256MB memory, 30GB hard disk, a DVD/CDRW combo - 8x24x10x and a 15" monitor supporting XGA. It comes complete with windows XP home OS. It does have a comfortable keyboard and loads of other options like a modem, a network connection, two PCMCIA slots, three USB 2.0 ports and a floppy. Video is provided by an ALi M1535+ chip which can be used only for business purposes so you can forget about games. Running time is average at around two hours. Unfortunately one of the downsides is that it is quite heavy and bulky at 3.5KG, making it more appropriate as a desktop replacement. A good choice for businesses. µ