The Cheapskate

It's a match made in heaven: the Eye-Fi card and Google's Picasa.

(Credit: Eye-Fi)

About a month ago, Google made some serious price cuts to its Picasa Web photo-storage service. For example, a mere $5 per year now buys you 20GB of online storage.

In other news, Eye-Fi memory cards are really cool. They wirelessly upload photos from your camera to your PC OR online storage service of choice--like, say, Picasa.

Right now, if you sign up for a 200GB Picasa account for $50, you'll get a 4GB Eye-Fi Home card for free.

That card, which works in most digital cameras, normally sells for $69.99, so here's another way to look at the deal: Buy a 4GB Eye-Fi Home for $50, and get 200GB of Picasa storage for free.

Either way, I think it's a smokin' offer. Picasa effectively gives you an online backup of your entire photo library, along with basic slideshow, sharing, and print services.

I'm also an Eye-Fi fan, as manually copying photos from card to PC--and then PC to Web service--is a huge hassle. This is a great gift item, in my opinion.

This is a while-supplies-last offer, and I suspect it'll sell out quickly. So grab it while you can!

Backup deal: If you've been eyeballing "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" (and what avid gamer hasn't?) but unable to stomach the $60 price tag, the Microsoft Store has it for just $41.99 shipped. That's the lowest price I've seen anywhere.

This gorgeous camera packs a 3-inch LCD and wide-angle lens.

(Credit: Best Buy)

In the market for a new camera? Best Buy has the 8.1-megapixel Casio Exilim EX-Z150 for just $99.99. It's new, not a refurb, and a pretty sweet deal considering that it sold for $200 just last year.

I actually own this model, and I reviewed it for Wired last September. Here's a recap of the highlights, along with some updates based on months of real-world use.

The EX-Z150's wide-angle lens absolutely rocks, especially for snapping group photos in close quarters. I also love its mammoth LCD, which has spoiled me for anything smaller, and 4x optical zoom.

Unlike previous Exilim models, which forced you to wade into the menus to enable video mode, the EX-Z150 sports a dedicated video button: One push and you're capturing YouTube-ready footage.

In my original review, I was a little hard on the camera for being chunky, but the truth is it's really not. In fact, it's slimmer than some of Canon's popular pocket models.

Battery life is excellent, but it's a huge pain to have to take out the battery every time it needs charging.

Also, while I've found image quality to be quite good overall, videos often come out jerky. I don't know if a faster SD card would help, but this has proven very annoying.

Even so, if you're looking for a feature-packed camera that's attractively styled, easy to use, and reasonably pocket-friendly, the Exilim EX-Z150 for a hundred bucks (plus sales tax) is mighty hard to pass up.

Though still pricey, the 4GB Eye-Fi card is now a much better deal.

(Credit: Eye-Fi)

I really dig Eye-Fi memory cards, which wirelessly beam photos from your digital camera to your PC (and/or an online sharing service). But I always thought they were overpriced.

They still are, but at least you can score a deal on one: Costco has the Eye-Fi 4GB Anniversary Edition for $59.99 shipped. Nonmembers pay an extra $3, and nearly everyone pays sales tax.

In case you're not familiar with it, the Eye-Fi is a standard-size SDHC memory card (meaning it's compatible with most cameras) that happens to have built-in Wi-Fi.

When it's in range of your home network and your camera is on, the Eye-Fi automatically transfers photos to your PC. Alternately, it can upload photos directly to the online service of your choice: Facebook, Flickr, Snapfish, Photobucket, etc.

Ultimately, it's a convenience. A pricey one, yes, especially considering that you can get an ordinary 4GB SDHC card for about 8 bucks. On the other hand, the last time I posted this product, it was $99.

So now that it's $40 less, will you jump on it? Or are you satisfied with your perfectly cromulent SD card reader and/or USB cable?

Do you need power for your cell phone, MP3 player, digital camera, and other portable gadgets? Our friend Mr. Sun has an endless supply (well, not endless--5 billion years and kaput!). What you need is a way to harness those rays and turn them into energy you can use.

GoldenGadgets has just such a harness: the Portable Hybrid Solar Charger, currently on sale for $19.99--shipping will run you about $5.

What makes it a "hybrid" charger? Simple: It can draw energy from the sun (8-10 hours buys you a full charge--bad news for those of us who live in Michigan, where we're lucky to get 8-10 minutes of sun. Hey-oh!) or from a USB source like your PC, which does the job in about 4 hours.

The charger comes with a generous assortment of tips: BlackBerry, Motorola, Nokia, Mini-USB, USB, and iPod/iPhone. (Unless my eyes deceive me, there's also one for Palm, though the product listing doesn't mention it.)

Speaking of which, the product listing doesn't specifically mention iPhone 3G compatibility, either; however, one of the user reviews claims it works fine. (The demo video up top shows an iPhone getting charged, but it looks like a first-generation model.)

Sure, you can get an iPhone battery pack for as little as $6.99, but that powers one device and one device only. This eco-friendly charger can juice just about everything in your carry-on bag. Until someone invents a teeny little windmill, it'll have to do.

Free stuff! ArtsCow offers 1,200 free prints to new customers.

(Credit: ArtsCow)

You've probably seen freebie deals floating around from dotPhoto, Snapfish, and other online photo developers--50 prints here, 25 there--but nothing like this: ArtsCow.com is offering a whopping 1,200 free prints to new customers--600 4x6s and 600 5x7s, and in your choice of glossy or matte!

What's the catch? For starters, you're on the hook for shipping charges, which seems only fair. I tossed half a dozen 4x6s into my cart and the shipping came to $2.49. When I bumped the quantity to 100, the price went to $5.99.

I priced the same order at Shutterfly: $4.99 to ship 100 prints--plus $1.20 for tax. So ArtsCow actually came out ahead.

The other "catch" is that you're limited to 100 4x6s and 50 5x7s per month--and they expire if you don't use them. (Check the Credit & Discount section of your account to see the dates for each set of credits.)

Other amazing freebies for new members include two 11x8.5 photo calendars and two 20-page photo books. (Again, you pay for shipping.)

If all this sounds a little too good to be true, make sure to read the ArtsCow terms and conditions. There's nothing critical in there that I haven't already mentioned, and it's not like you're on the hook for anything if the company decides to terminate this offer.

I haven't tried ArtsCow yet, though I did sign up for an account (click the My Account link, as their "Join Us" banner doesn't seem to be working) and plan to start ordering some prints! Also, I poked around some user forums and found that most customers seem to be happy with the print quality.

If you've had any experience with ArtsCow, good or bad, tell your fellow Cheapskaters about it in the comments!

Power your portable devices for hours with Tekkeon's dirt-cheap travel charger.

(Credit: Amazon)

Tired of running out of juice when you're on the run? The Tekkeon TekCharge MP1800 is a rechargeable portable battery pack that supplies power to phones, MP3 players, Bluetooth headsets, and other mobile devices.

It normally sells for around $45, but Amazon is selling the Tekkeon TekCharge for $28.99 with free shipping.

The charger comes with seven adapter tips for use with most kinds of mobile phones, but you can also use the USB cable that came with your iPod, Zune, or other device. In other words, it's almost universally compatible, provided that your gizmo can be charged via USB.

The TekCharge sports a status meter that shows available power, a voltage regulator to prevent damage to devices and batteries, and even a flashlight, in case you get stuck in the dark. It comes with a drawstring carrying case too.

Just one oversight: Tekkeon doesn't supply an AC adapter for charging the TekCharge itself (which takes about six hours, according to CNET's mostly positive review). For that, you need a USB port or a wall plug that supplies power to USB devices.

If you can overlook that annoying inconvenience, you should find the TekCharge a very welcome travel companion. Although it is compact enough to slip into a bag or even pocket, it delivers hours upon hours of extra talk time, video viewing, audio playback, and more.

4GB of storage for 7 bucks?! At that price, buy two!

(Credit: Kingston)

Not every day offers $99 iPhones and $25 TV tuners. Sometimes, the deals are small and unexciting, the items utilitarian.

So it is today: Newegg has a 4GB Kingston SDHC memory card for $6.99. No rebates, no shipping charges.

That's the lowest price I've seen yet on a 4GB card (though only by $1). If you found a new digital camera under the tree last month, you definitely need high-capacity storage to go with it. A 4GB card can store about 800 10-megapixel snapshots or 60 minutes of video.

And, hey, there's nothing wrong with packing a spare card, in case you spot, say, Bigfoot. Or Paris Hilton. Or Bigfoot at a club with Paris Hilton. Could happen.

This isn't some no-name brand, either. All Kingston memory cards come with a lifetime warranty. Thus, this is pretty much a no-brainer for anyone who needs extra storage. A 4GB SDHC card for 7 bucks may be boring, but it's still a helluva deal.

(Credit: Eye-Fi)

Just got some interesting news from the makers of Eye-Fi, the Wi-Fi-enabled SD card that wirelessly beams photos from your camera to your PC (and/or an online service like Facebook or Snapfish): There's a new 4GB Anniversary Edition of the card, and you can get one for just $99. The catch? You'll have to walk into your local Costco.

Yeah, I know, that kinda bites. And $99 is still about $90 more than the price of a regular 4GB SD card. On the other hand, it's $30 less than the Web price ($129.99 at Eye-Fi's online store), and it saves you the hassle of connecting your camera to your PC or pulling out the memory card every time you want to upload photos.

I'm the first one to admit the Eye-Fi's not perfect, but you gotta admit it's cool. Mrs. Cheapskate (who's beautiful but not particularly tech-savvy) absolutely loves it. And at a recent gadget seminar I conducted at a local library, everyone went ape over the Eye-Fi.

Basically, you're paying a premium for convenience, much like you do when you buy a fancy universal remote for your home theater. Is it worth it? You'll have to tell me. At the very least, I'm glad to see they've finally bumped up the storage capacity (2GB just isn't enough in these days of 10-megapixel cameras). Oh, the Anniversary Edition offers "faster memory speeds," too, but the company doesn't provide any specifics on that.

(Credit: Newegg)

Need more storage for your digital camera? If you buy a memory card off the shelf at, say, Best Buy or Office Max, you'll pay way too much. Witness: Newegg has a Kingston 4GB SDHC card for just $7.99 shipped (lowest price I've seen yet, btw). And no rebates! Best Buy sells the exact same card for $37.99, plus sales tax.

Kingston is a well-known brand, and the card comes with a lifetime warranty. Just make sure your camera, PDA, MP3 player or whatever supports SDHC media (some older devices don't).

So... good weekend? My six-year-old played in his first peewee-football game, which was fun to watch. Oh, why the small talk? What more can I say about a memory card that's 30 bucks cheaper than you'd pay at retail?

Update: It appears the $7.99 price is good only when you combine the card with another purchase. My apologies! Looks like if you want the card on its own, it'll cost you another buck. Still not too shabby.