Back to School Gifts for Every Budget - Ideas from $100 to $500
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| Back to School Gifts for Every Budget |
| Ideas from $100 to $500 |
| Ideas for those with ~$1000 to spend |
Under $250:
Moving onward and upward in price always gets your "cooler" gadget and gear, but we still have to make sure we get good value for our money - and gear that is actually useful.
Sony Ericsson MBS-200 Wireless Portable Speaker - $129.99MSRP - As low as $69.99 Online
If you have a Bluetooth enabled laptop, cell phone or music player, the easiest way to share your music and fill a room is with a set of Bluetooth speakers. The Sony Ericsson MBS-200 Wireless Portable Speaker fills this need. This is a very stylish speaker that offers a lot in the way of good looks and sounds pretty good to boot. It certainly won't fill a large room and keep your party going, but it provides a great way to share music on your phone with others in the room.
Flip UltraHD Camcorder - $249.99MSRP - Find Lowest Price Online
Perhaps one of the most useful camcorders on the market is the Flip UltraHD. This camcorder is very small and offers great quality for such a small device. It records at 1280x720p and can be found online for under $180 currently. This camcorder can quickly become the hub for your online media as it has excellent software that allows you to easily upload video clips to YouTube. It comes in different colors that purple and yellow for those of you that prefers a more traditional look. The only downside is that it has no optical zoom, but the convenience of this little unit still makes it one of the best little camcorders you'll ever use - and you'll use it lots.
Below $500:
Most of these back-to-school recommendations have to do with media of some form or another and the first one in the sub-$500 category is perhaps one of the slickest devices for sharing and enjoying media in your home.
Linksys by Cisco Media Hub NHM410 - $479.99MSRP - Lowest Price Online
The Linksys NHM410 is a multi-function Media Hub that allows you to easily share data on the included hard drive, connected USB drives and even flash media cards to every computer on your network. The included software provides a great interface and you can connect directly to the device though windows file sharing as well. The handy display and controls allow you to monitor and control the device even without a computer connected. The NHM410 comes with a single 1TB drive and has room for an extra drive. This gives you a lot of storage and great upgrade options - all in very stylish package.
Lenovo IdeaPad S10-2 Netbook - $399.99MSRP - Find Lowest Price
In the crowded market of netbooks Lenovo has done a couple of things that make the IdeaPad S10-2 worth considering if you're considering an ultra-portable computer. The IdeaPad S10-2 is a bit of an upgrade from the original S10e in the fact that the 6-cell battery is standard. It also comes with a 10.1" screen that runs at 1024x600 and weighs in at a mere 0.7" thin. With a weight of 2.65lbs, it's one of the lightest netbooks around and offers Lenovo quality at a competitive price.
For those of you with a bigger budget, make sure you head on to the last page as we've got a couple of recommendations that will take a little more green out of your wallet.
