In Brief

By Wilson Rothman

MIGHTY MOUSE The two things that annoy people most about their PC's mouse are the trackball (or "gunk collector") and the cord (too long or too short yet always in the way). The solution? Logitech's Cordless MouseMan Optical ($75), on sale at logitech.com Having traded in the trackball for an optical sensor, this wireless bionic wonder has only one flaw: an insatiable hunger for AA batteries.

RUMBLE SEAT If you think digital surround sound is for sissies and you've got a spare $16,000, the Odyssee Motion Simulator may be right up your alley. Four hydraulic "actuators" rattle and shake your La-Z-Boy like an amusement-park ride in perfect synch with such action-adventure movies as Twister and Jurassic Park. The device moves your seat only five-eighths of an inch, but that's enough to convince your body that a certain T. rex is getting closer every second.

FLICK DISCS Before you junk your VCR and go totally DVD, be sure to save the glory days captured by your camcorder. To rescue the best footage of your kids' games, recitals and birthday parties, send your tapes to LifeClips.com The company converts a variety of tape formats to DVD for $15 an hour. Digitizing your entire archive can be pricey, but with scene indexing you can, say, skip a missed penalty kick and jump straight to the goal that put your daughter in the family history books.

--By Wilson Rothman