L’Asus Eee PC est un tout petit portable (écran de 7 pouces) qui tourne sous un Linux adapté par Asus, n’a pas de disque dur mais une carte-flash et qui a des performances très sympathiques pour le nomade qui n’a pas envie de s’encombrer avec un PC portable, tout en coûtant plusieurs fois moins cher qu’un ultraportable. En effet, il sera proposé en France, avec le clavier Azerty pour un peu moins de 300 euros d’ici une quinzaine de jours.

Les caractéristiques sont un peu cheap, 4 Go de mémoire (mais upgradable via un disque dur externe et un slot pour cartes mémoire SD/MMC), 512 Mo de RAM, un processeur de 900 MhZ, mais les performances sont très correctes grâce à la vivacité du support flash et à la légereté du système d’exploitation.

Avec moins d’un kilo, il peut tenir dans un sac à main ou un petit cartable, tout en répondant à 90 % des besoins d’un utilisateur lambda : mail et surf internet grâce à la connectivité wifi, base multi-média (vidéo et musique) et applications bureautiques. Evidemment, pas la peine d’espérer mixer de la musique ou éditer de la vidéo là-dessus, mais ça peut se faire à la maison.

J’en veux un.

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The fourth generation of Fiorino will be built in Turkey and will be available at the begining of 2008. With its cousins from Peugeot (Bipper) and Citroën (Némo), it will fill a ten-years old gap in little urban vans (the Fiorino Mk III, the Peugeot 205 Fourgon and the Citroën C15 were replaced by much bigger trucks, the Doblo, the Partner and the Berlingo).

Prices are told to be around 8000-10000 euros, a very good offer on the french market.

The new compact, economy van concept developed by Fiat and PSA Peugeot Citroen in partnership with Tofas.

The new LCVs developed in common by Fiat and PSA Peugeot Citroen and built in partnership with Tofas, which will be soon launched, represent a totally new option for the light van market by virtue of their compactness, useful performance and styles.
Measuring 3.86 meters in length, the new vans are surprisingly roomy inside, with a load volume of 2.5 cubic meters. A stowable passenger seat enables capacity to be increased to 2.8 cubic meters for a loading space length of 2.5metres.

These highly functional vehicles feature optimal loading height and large side-hinged rear doors and sliding side doors that make the loading bay easily accessible.

The bright, modern, roomy cab combines practical, functional features with advanced ergonomics designed to ensure comfort and well-being for intensive professional use. Standard equipment includes power steering for driving comfort, as well as ABS and a driver airbag for enhanced safety. Many other options usually found in higher-priced segments are also available, including parking sensors, a separate cab locking system and additional storage space.

Proven gasoline and diesel engines, both fuel efficient and environmentally friendly (119g/km of CO2 in diesel-equipped versions), help to lower running costs.

Main competitor will be the Renault “Short Kangoo” and the Renault/Dacia MCV.

You will find a lot of pictures here, here and here.

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Made in borosilicate glass, this little and handy coffee maker is frugal and nomad. All you need to make an excellente coffee is some almost-boiling water, quality coffee (of course), four minutes and two hands to activate the mechanism.

This model provides threes cup (a third of liter) and is about twenty cm high and ten cm of diamater. What is the best ? It only costs 12 euros. With all the money saved on a costly coffee maker and the need filters, you will buy excellent coffee for a long time.

Visit Melitta website

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The new Hyper (also available with serrated black blade) is a new design from CLB. Blade is 7 cm long, and is made of 440C steel, when right handle is made of G10. It weights about 100 grams.

The Red variation of the Rescom was called by a lot of customers, since safety workers don’t care about tactical choice of colours and don’t want their tools blending in the workstation. So even if this red isn’t very flashy (I prefer the way Victorinox or Spyderco resolve that question, with yellow or orange colored handles for their safety knives), it’s a very good thing. I’d love to see Böker offering aftermarket handles variations. That would be great.

The new Trance drop point blade is perfect for hunting chores – especially with its big belly. All other features of the successful Trance design remain unchanged. Fiber reinforced nylon handle, AUS-8 blade, frame lock and pocket clip. Blade length: 2 3/4“. Overall length: 6 1/4“. Weight: 3.2 oz.

The new generation of Subcom from Chad Los Banos is a compact size folding knife featuring a Hawkbill style blade made of AUS-8 steel. The distinctive blade shape makes it more effective for deep cuts. Fiber reinforced nylon handle, frame lock and pocket clip. Blade length: 1 7/8“. Overall length: 4 1/2“. Weight: 2.5 oz.

I’d love to see two variations around this model ; first an all-black version, that’s kind of pretty and second a true sheepfoot profile blade. This could be a winner.

All CLB products from Böker are available at EDC Depot

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A low-cost alternative to Benchmade ERT-1, the ResCom designed by Chad Los Banos for Böker or the rather similar Benchmade RescueHook, the Fox ERTool is made of 420 stainless steel and comes with a kydex sheath.

It’s available in two colours, black & military green. The sheath allow to kind of carrying, clipped to a pocket or wore around the neck.

Buy it at EE33

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Brunton offers a pair of chopsticks for eating outside (but cleanly) made of stainless steel and bamboo.

It’s weights less than 30 grams (1.6 oz) and lenght is about 8 cm (3.45 inches).

Retail price is $ 24.

Buy it at Brunton’s

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The Quicksilver Cuba is one of the newest offers from the watches line for surfers, and I think she’s really beautiful.

Available in black, golden or silver.

stainless steel case
stainless steel screw down case back
stainless steel bracelet with locking deployment butterfly buckle
faceted reinforced mineral crystal
3 hand quartz analog movement with date
10 ATM

Buy it at Islandsurf for $ 160.

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Not really a revolution in the domain of the penlight, but more something like getting near perfection, this new generation is a good all-around little flashlight, providing 24 lumens for seven hours running on two AAAs batteries through a regulated circuit.

Like most new generations, it’s a bit wider than the old ones, but that’s the price to pay to use commonly available batteries.

It weighs 45 grams (about 1.64 oz.) and lenght is 12.7 cm (about 5.3 inches).

Visit Streamlight website
Buy it at EDC Depot for $ 18

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Caran d’Ache 849 is one of my favourite ballpen, and while being very affordable, can still compare with pens ten times its price.

The 849 “Original” is a limited edition of the 1969 vintage model, with a special finish looking like old raw metal.

It comes loaded with a blue ink, medium Goliath, cartridge and packed in a special aluminium box.

Buy it at Skripta Paris for 25 euros.
Visit Caran d’Ache website

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The Zebra Light H50-Q5 comes with the very last Cree LED type.

With its extreme light weight, high brightness, long runtime and floody beam pattern, the H50-Q5 headlamp is the perfect choice for camping, hiking, task lighting as well as indoor use.

It’s one of the most ingenious and polyvalent headlight of today, and probably one of the most practical. I love the idea of changing the direction of headlight, like a Pentagon Molle light but with much less bulk.

Coming with glowing in the dark accessories, it’s really cool and seems to be the perfect complement of a good throwing Cree light like the Fenix ones.

It runs on a single AA battery of any kind for a maximum runtime of 80 hours at less than three lumens (two hours on maximum setting, which provide about 70 lumens of flooding light).

It weights 58 grams (2 oz.) loaded and dimensions are 18.3 mm (diameter) and 66.5 mm (lenght). It’s of course waterproof.

Buy it at ZebraLight for $ 49.
Read comments on CPF here, here and here.

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