Palm Centro (AT&T)

When Palm first announced the Centro on Sprint last fall, Palm OS enthusiasts were less than thrilled. They wanted a real high-end Treo replacement—not a budget model. But it turned out to be a pretty good handset, offering nearly all of the Treo's power in a smaller, lighter body, and at a low price ($99.99 with contract, and after a mail-in rebate). Now AT&T has its own GSM version, which is all-white and reminiscent of Apple products of old. In this new guise, the Centro is rather nice handset for 99 bucks, and offers much of the same power you'd get with Apple's baby for a quarter of the price—call it the poor man's iPhone.

OLPC XO-1

It has taken more than two years, but the One Laptop per Child initiative has finally released its much-anticipated laptop: the OLPC XO-1. The XO-1 costs $200 each to donate, but for a limited time—until December 31, 2007—people can avail themselves of the "Give One, Get One" promotion to give a $399 donation ($200 of which is tax-deductible): One laptop goes to a disadvantaged child in a developing nation, while OLPC gives you another one as a thank-you gift of sorts. (Think: PBS pledge drive, where they offer a gift to you of a DVD set for a $200 donation). This is certainly a different business model in this "me, me, me" holiday season: Instead of buying something for yourself, you buy technology for a child who needs it, with a fringe benefit of a gift laptop for your household. Just be advised, this limited-time offer is the only way you'll be able to get your hands on the XO-1 for the foreseeable future. After the end of the year, people can still donate the laptops, but they won't be getting one as a gift.

Iona Radio Cube

This Wi-Fi radio concept design from Cambridge Consultants is a rubber-edged plastic cube. Four of the sides are assigned your four favorite stations via a web interface (maybe some of you have more, but frankly, I think four about covers it for me). The minute some annoying commercial or crap song starts playing, you just roll the Iona over to the next channel. Gizmag says adjusting volume requires twisting the cube itself to the right (up) or left (down), though I'm not entirely sure what that means. The fifth side houses a mono speaker, and the sixth has a non-roly-poly on-off switch.

Asus' MS71

We hear it's pretty tough being a gadget with an identity crisis, and unfortunately for Asus' MS71, it definitely feels that pain. Thankfully for consumers who aren't turned off by rectangular (or atypically slender) mice, at least it provides a bit of extra utility. Quite simply, the base of the critter snaps off to plug into any open USB port; from there, it enables what's left to function as a wireless mouse and allows users to store an undisclosed amount of files on the appendage. No word on pricing or availability, but unless you place absolutely no value on ergonomics, we'd probably look elsewhere.