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Hardware |
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This page provides links, findings
and recommendations about hardware in use by the
District and Palomar staff.
 Computing
at Palomar. This page will
provide links to employee purchase sites for Dell, IBM
and Apple computers and other hardware related
information.
"How
to monitor the health of your PC" (article
from Microsoft).
Tablet
PCs.
 We recommend the
Electrovaya
Scribbler tablet PC for superior performance and long,
reliable
battery life.
Also worth reviewing is the
IBM ThinkPad X41,
with its unique keyboard design.
CNET: Tablet PC 21st
Century Notepad?
Academic Technology maintains two tablet PCs available
for short-term checkout. Contact
Terry Gray for details.
Radio Frequency Personal Survey Devices (Clickers)
 We have obtained 64
each, in 2 sets of 32, which can be
checked out from Academic Technology for
classroom/meeting room use. The
clickers are from
eInstruction, and require
CPS software installation. We
have also site licensed the CPS software for
District use (PC only, required Windows
XP or higher). The CPS software is
installed on all mobile computer lab
workstations, and all Academic
Technology lab workstations.
Click here to reserve the
personal response system. You must
attend Academic Technology training on
the use of the clickers before checking
them out. To obtain training, call
ext. 2341, or email
hdavis@palomar.edu.
Digital Voice Recorders
 We
recommend the use the the Olympus WS-311M, WS-300 or WS-100 digital voice
recorder. Academic Technology checks out these digital
recorders for faculty members wishing to make audio
recordings, including those who wish to create a regular
podcast.
The
WS-311M0 is an excellent digital recorder that records in
wma format. It is also a USB device that will plug
directly into any USB port for file transfer.
Click here for more information.
Click here to request WS-311 check out.
Sound Cards.
 For
quality/performance/price consideration among the sound
cards we have tested and used, we recommend for
desktops, the Creative Labs
Audigy 2 and for laptops in the PCIMIA format, the
Audigy 2ZS. Significant noise reduction in
audio recorded directly through the sound card can be
achieved by using one of these cards.
Sound card how-to articles:
Portable media players (mp3
players)
This article from Microsoft will tell
you what to look for in an mp3 player.
A notable absence from the discussion is the
Apple iPod. If you have decided
against the iPod for whatever reason, this
article might be very useful.
 We
recommend the Apple
iPod as the mp3 player of choice in any
of its incarnations (including Nano and
Suffle). For playing academic podcasts,
the relatively inexpensive Suffle will work
fine. All the iPods work with the same
easy-to-use iTunes software. The iPod
does not support Windows wma sound format,
but will convert it in order to import files
unless the wma file contains Digital Rights
Management. (DRM is applied, for
example, to the downloadable audible books
from the San Diego County Library, which
supports only wma format.) We
recommend any of the Creative
Zen mp3 players, if you need one that
supports wma format with DRM, or simply do
not want to use the Apple iPod.
Audio microphones and headsets
To effectively use the new Horizon Wimba voice tools,
or to do more general audio work and interact with web
multimedia, we recommend using a headset with built in
microphone. This is not strictly necessary.
Any microphone/speaker combo will work. A
simple, low cost microphone, like the AM-32 from Labtec
(lapel mic for around $5.00), and a set of computer
speakers will work just fine. Almost everyone gets
a mic/speaker combo along these lines when they buy a
computer. A headset can increase efficiency,
though, especially important when participating in a
voice board, where hands free motion is important for
typing, or in Live Classroom, where echo from speakers
can be eliminated by using a headset.
Here are some audio samples from various headsets we
have evaluated, all variables being equal. We
recommend using a headset that plugs directly into your
sound card, and not a USB headset, which can be much
more problematic.
We recommend the following low-cost microphone--but
if you have one that came with your computer, try using
that first, before buying another:
|
Model |
Picture |
wav
Sample |
Price |
|
Labtec AM-32 mic only* |
 |
 |
$4.88 |
We recommend either of the following headsets, though
there are many others that would work well.
|
Model |
Picture |
wav
Sample |
Price |
Monitors
Monito how-to articles:
Related
Resources
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