Whether you’re buying for home or the office, the internet has meant a revolution in shopping, with bargains to be had on pretty much anything you could ever want to buy. However, it is gadget buyers who have really reaped the benefits, with technology getting better and better, yet dropping in price. Here are our picks for the best budget technology buys out there.
MP3 PLAYER
IPOD NANO
From £99 apple.com/uk
Apple’s iconic iPod is now in its sixth version and this, the latest version of its Nano “mini” iPod, is by far the best the company has produced . While its bigger brothers, the iPod touch and the iPhone, may have got all the publicity, the Nano is a rare breed – not only a great budget MP3 player, but a great player at any price. The controls are simple, and the screen amazing – watching videos is actually possible (admittedly you probably won’t be ploughing your way through the Lord of the Rings trilogy on this, but for the odd TV show, it’s perfect). The styling is great, all curves and metal, and at first it looks almost too small to use. But pick it up, and it’s perfectly suited to pockets. The best MP3 player at any price, in our opinion.
PROS Great design, video playback.
CONS Won’t carry your entire library.
DIGITAL CAMERA
FUJIFILM Z5FD
£150 fujifilm.co.uk
Fuji’s latest 6MP camera (pictured above) has a massive feature list spanning everything from low-light shooting modes to face detection. It’s actually a pretty sleek – even stylish - compact camera. True, it won’t turn heads, but you certainly won’t feel ashamed to whip it out of your pocket, although annoyingly Fuji has decided to stick with its XD memory card format, so don’t rely on being able to use your existing memory card (unless, of course, you already have one which uses XD…). It’s well-designed, with a bright and easy-to-see 2.5-inch LCD screen. The 3x optical zoom is also useful, and the menus are simple to navigate through as well. Overall its a bargain little number that’s easy to pick up and shoot with – the perfect take-anywhere budget camera.
PROS Great price, very easy to use.
CONS Image quality not as good as more expensive cameras.
TRAVEL SPEAKERS
CREATIVE TRAVELSOUND 400
£49 creative.com
At almost £50 these might not seem like a budget pair of speakers, but bear with us – what you’re getting here are speakers small enough to fit into your briefcase, but ones which sound good enough to rival a lot of cheap hi-fis out there. They are a traveller’s dream, and are loud enough to fill most hotel rooms. You can plug them into either an iPod or your laptop, and they’ll run for hours on batteries. The sound quality is extremely good for speakers so small, and bass is well defined and solid, while vocals shine through. In fact, they’re not only perfect for the hotel room, but for the kitchen and bathroom at home as well. Crucially, they’re also a year or so old now, so it’s easy to find them discounted online.
PROS Great sound and highly portable.
CONS Not the absolute cheapest options on the market.
LAPTOP
SONY VAIO VGN-C2M/W
£591 sonystyle.co.uk
With its distinctive white and silver design, the Sony Vaio VGN-C2M/W stands out from the crowd and is an unashamed nod towards Apple’s design brilliance. However, it also delivers on performance. Weighing 2.3kg, it’s quite light and makes for a comfortable travel partner, with impressive battery life of 233 minutes. A particular strength is the 13.3-inch screen. With a glossy Super-TFT coating, colours are natural, but reflections are increased. Images are sharp and ideal for office and multimedia use, and DVDs look brilliant.
Processing power is provided by an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, and it’ll do everything but play the very latest games with ease, as graphics are provided by the integrated Intel chip, so 3D power is much lower. Simple games such as solitaire and chess can be played easily enough though, and it can also run more power-hungry applications like video-editing.
While the 100GB hard drive provides ample storage, it spins at a slower speed than many rivals, which means data is accessed slightly slower, but not hugely so. A dual-layer rewritable DVD drive also lets you save up to 8.5GB of data per disc. As with all Sony laptops, there is a complete set of software supplied – home office tasks, digital photo-editing and internet security are all included. However, you’ll need to add your own CD/DVD creation software.
With its combination of mobility, high performance and strong usability, this is a great budget portable.
PROS Great looks and performance, and the price tag…
CONS Only 2 USB ports, not fast enough for the latest games.
CAMERAPHONE
SAMSUNG G600
From free samsung.co.uk
Samsung’s latest slider phone is set to give Nokia a real run for its money. At just 15mm thick, it’s one of the thinnest phones you’ll find, and the design is superb, very slick, and well-built as well – there’s a satisfying slide action as you reveal the keypad. Crucially, there’s also a 5MP camera built in, and the pictures are excellent. The menu system is well thought out, and the keypad is also easy to use – you’ll be texting like a pro in no time. Overall, it’s a great all-round little handset, which may not be fully loaded with features (Nokia’s rival 5MP camera, the N95, has GPS and a proper headphone socket built in), but is perfect if you’re after something thin and fashionable.
PROS Superb design and ease of use.
CONS Lacks the advanced features of some of its rivals, such as satnav.
HEADPHONES
SONY MDR-EX81SL
£35 sony.co.uk
The first thing you should do when you buy a new MP3 player is throw away the headphones that came with it. Chances are they are tinny monstrosities which will make your lovingly crafted Kylie playlist sound terrible. At £35, these Sony headphones are a far safer bet. The sound is very good for the price, and there’s decent enough bass to do everything from dance to classical music. If you can afford it, we’d recommend upgrading to Etymotic’s ER-6i headphones at £80, but if you’re really on a budget you can do a lot worse than the Sonys – trust us, it’s the best upgrade to your listening you’ll ever make.
PROS Low price, decent sound.
CONS Very little, if you’re on a budget.
BAGGING A BARGAIN
For the canny purchaser, there are some simple ways to make sure you get the best price. Here are the best places to look:
EBAY
Recently there have been an increasing number of big name retailers using eBay to get rid of end-of-line stock, and it’s always well worth a look. There are, of course, always worries about buying from individuals or smaller companies, but with so many big names on the site it’s well worth checking out, particularly if what you’re after is more than a few months old.
DUTY FREE
Everyone has been tempted at some time in duty free, and airport shops have arguably been hardest hit by online shopping, not least in Europe where intra-EU duty free disappeared years ago. The market for electronic items has been especially tough, with margins nibbled away by strong competition from both online and offline retailers. Many airport retailers have tried to combat the loss of the ability to sell items duty-free by offering items tax-free, effectively offering items for sale at high street prices less the 17.5 per cent VAT. However, in general they aren’t the best deal – the discount price is still, in almost every case, higher than you’ll pay if you shop around online.
ONLINE COMPARISON SITES
These are really the holy grail of the canny shopper, as they’ll go off and scour online for you, showing prices from dozens of sites on a single page. Increasingly you can also access them from your mobile phone, which makes perfect sense if you’re out and about, and it’s the perfect way to see if the shiny-suited salesman you are negotiating with is really giving you the best price. Google has led the market with froogle, its comparison site, but it’s also worth checking out unbeatable.co.uk and dealtime.co.uk.
BUYING ABROAD
It’s well worth investigating prices abroad, although there are a few things to bear in mind, namely power supplies and warranties – it might well be a struggle getting your US-bought laptop repaired here, for instance. That said, with the exchange rate so strong in the US, it might just still be cheaper to buy a spare while you’re there…
Mark Prigg is the Science and Technology Correspondent at the London Evening Standard
