Gifts $400-1,000…

So far, I’ve covered gift ideas under $100 and gift ideas from $100 to $399 for the gadget lover in your life. We’re continuing on with gifts in the range from $400 to $1,000. Here you start getting into purchases that you make once every 5 years or so. These ideas are also a bit more dynamic, especially laptops and desktop computers, since manufacturers will have the same basic model, but will add larger hard disk drives and more RAM on almost a weekly basis as costs for those items drop. However, these suggestions should give you a nice starting point and will prep us for tomorrow’s post – Sky’s the Limit (aka gifts over $1,000).

Here we go:

• Nikon D5000 Digital SLR Camera – I actually own the previous generation to this camera and will totally vouch for it. I bought it to capture our little girls growing up and thus far it has done admirably, considering we have a couple of thousand pictures we’ve taken in about a year. The biggest advancement since we purchased our model is the addition of HD movie recording.

  

• Toshiba Satellite – The biggest selling point on this laptop is its battery life. It tips the scale (according to Toshiba anyway) at over 9 hours of battery life. More realistically, with WiFi on, working with programs, and keeping the screen at a reasonable brightness, you might get closer to 6 hours, but that is still better than any laptop I’ve ever owned by about 3-4 hours.

  

• Panasonic VIERA 42-Inch Plasma HDTV – If you have browsed around this site, I hope you have checked out the In Action! section. A couple of months ago, I helped my buddy, Mr. G, pick out a brand new plasma HDTV. This is the TV that he ended up getting. He was just telling my the other night that he is so happy with it and everybody comments on how good it looks. Panasonic plasmas are pretty much the best TVs you can buy right now. Don’t let anyone tell you that LCD is better; its just not true.

  

Have any great suggestions of your own? Have an opinion on a camera, laptop, or TV in the $400-1,000 range? Feel a need to lash out at the world on a technology blog? Then leave a comment below.