Mari Silbey

Mari’s tech career started when she became the default “IT guy” in her first job out of college. Since leaving help-desk duties to the experts, she’s focused on trends in technology as a consultant, writer, reporter, analyst and at-home gadget tinkerer. Her current paid gig is with the non-profit organization US Ignite where she focuses on how networks and digital technologies impact smart cities. All posts on ZNF represent her own opinions and not those of US Ignite. Mari is a sucker for anything in the digital media space and covers interesting happenings in cable, telecom, and whatever else she feels like. Find her on Twitter at @msilbey.

Wireless Power: Too Much $$$, but One Promising Update

Wireless power options continue to improve, but I’m still not wild about spending money for a charging mat and a gadget case. It helps that prices are coming down, but even the latest entrant from Case-Mate – an iPhone/iPod solution called the Hug – still costs $89.99. And money is only part of the problem … Read more

Pine Trail Platform Makes Its Big Debut

Some time in the last twelve months, netbooks moved from the  geek and blogger realm to the mainstream. How do I know? I’ve been tallying up the netbook product launches from Vegas. So far I’ve counted new netbooks from Lenovo, Asus, Acer, Samsung, HP, Toshiba, Frontier, Haleron, and BenQ, and I could very well be … Read more

Pre-CES Data Backup with Clickfree

Since we all know by now that I don’t have the best track record in personal data recovery, I’ve decided to kick myself into gear in 2010 and test out a few different backup technologies. First in line, the Clickfree C2. I acquired a Clickfree Transformer Cable last year at CES, and true to its word, … Read more

Of Lenovo Launches and Leaks

Lenovo queued up a slew of announcements for CES this year, but while the press releases were scheduled for January 4th and 5th, Lenovo news was leaked all over the Net this weekend. For the ThinkPad line, Engadget reported first on a new X100e ultraportable netbook with an 11.6″ display and an AMD processor. Then … Read more

5 Things Missing from CES 2010

The Griffin Technology folks as pictured on the CES blog Not making the trek out to Vegas this year for CES? You’re not alone. Here’s a list of five things missing from CES 2010. Cablecos and Telcos Despite the fact that we now live in a connected world, many of the providers that make our … Read more

On the Road with WiMAX and Xfinity

While Dave’s been lazing around collecting TiVo and Clear QAM scoops this week ;), I’ve been recovering from two weeks of travel and preparing for next week’s trip out to Vegas. All the travel, however, has given me time to test out some new on-the-road tech. A trip to North Carolina proved fortuitous in light … Read more

Christmas Gadgetry

As anyone who’s read my posts in previous years knows, gadget giving in my family is practically a competitive sport, especially around Christmas. While I don’t think we topped last year, 2009 definitely brought in some great loot. My household landed a new Roku box, and I personally snagged a Kodak Zi8 video camera and … Read more

To Xfinity and Beyond! (For real this time.)

That’s right, today is the day that Comcast officially launches it’s version of TV Everywhere, not quite in time for Hanukkah. While the Xfinity name is somewhat unfortunate, it appears we’re supposed to think of the service as the next generation of Project Infinity. For those of you paying attention, Comcast launched Project Infinity back … Read more