Information Technology World

Mon, Dec 21 12:40 PM New Delhi, Dec. 19 -- This has been one gadget-packed year: a zillion phones (and 500 million mobile users in India), the rise of the netbook, 3G data cards, power-packed cameras with incredible resolutions and HD video... So if you're planning on some Christmas shopping, here's my selection of nine candidates: bits of tech from among the many that 2009 had, that will serve you well into 2010 and beyond. Speed 3: the 3G Dongle The 2009 variant of the good old data card: lets you connect your laptop to the Net and email at blazing speeds. This USB stick is rated at 3 Mbps, and our labs squeezed 2 Mbps out of it. Expect to get about 1 Mbps as usage builds up. Way better than the 80 kbps-odd we got from older data cards. You can buy the Tata Photon+ for Rs 3,500, or the Reliance NetConnect, or others - BSNL and MTNL included, though I couldn't get the MTNL one working at 3G speeds; and MTS is "about to launch" one, but I simply could not