Top Christmas Gifts #3 - #4

Audio Server

#3 - Cambridge Audio 640H Music Server

$1300

Take a high end CD player by Cambridge Audio, the highly acclaimed Azur 640C, and give it wi-fi awareness, a 160G hard drive and the ability to rip and store music. You have the 640H Music Server, a high end audio component that can easily serve as gateway to the most discriminating sound system for your digital music. The 640H will wirelessly speak to your router giving access to music stored anywhere in your home network, you can even use it to connect to your Windows Media Center or an Extender.

Cambridge Audio has their own lossless compression method theyve dubbed Audio File which they say will compress up to 300 of your music CDs onto the built in 160G hard drive. Storing media in lossless form on a network gives you potentially infinite storage for CD quality music allowing you to access your music collection by artist, playlist or album title by remote control. True audiophiles are largely left out of the digital age through a determination to achieve as high a level of signal purity as possible. Connecting a noisy PC or even an extender to fine audio system isnt an option, Cambridge Audio provides the gateway to digital storage with this audio component that will be up to par with the most exotic sound system.

Microsoft Xbox 360

#4 - Xbox 360

$300-$400

The hottest Christmas gift of the year bar none, 2005 will go down in history as the Christmas of the Xbox 360. Any male between 9-45 on your list wants one BAD and dont forget the girls between the ages of 16-30 finding themselves video gamings fastest growing demographic. Xbox 360 is the next generation video game console, successor to the Microsofts original Xbox. 360 will specialize in HDTV resolution games and the all encompassing Live service where gamers can play each other online. Microsoft has decreed that ALL games for 360 will be written for 720P resolution, which will allow users to playback their own MP3 collection as game jukebox and will make use of an expanded Xbox Live service for multiplayer gaming or just for content downloads.

Multi-media options will abound on 360 as it also operates as a multi-media extender allowing Home Theater systems to access all sorts of media stored across the network. Xbox 360 is truly the next step in home entertainment and the killer gift for anyone with a complete Home Theater system that includes an HDTV.

Microsoft has decided to package the Xbox 360 in two price points; regular Xbox 360 at $399 and a money saving Core System at $299. The Core System includes everything you need to play the game minus a few key features found in the standard 360 for $100 more. In Core you get a standard controller with a cable attached to the system, the standard version gets a single wireless controller. Core includes the AV cable to connect you to your HDTV but doesnt include the removable 20G hard drive, headset, Ethernet cable and Media Center remote. Even with the complete version with all the bells and whistles added for the premium price of $399 youll still need to buy games and another controller to play with friends head to head.

The hard drive included in the complete system but not core will be required to play any of the first generation Xbox games like Halo2 that requires the use of its of own swap files on hard drive. Microsoft doesnt guarantee 360 will be backward compatible with all games from the Xbox, only a select few will be backward compatible and Halo2 is one of them, all backward compatibility will require the 360s removable (upgradeable) hard-drive.