Todd Bernhard

It's that time of year again. With April approaching, thoughts, at least in my case, turn to taxes. And to me, taxes mean receipts. If your accountant doesn't like a shoebox of receipts, do them, and yourself, a favor. Get a ScanScap iX500 Color Duplex Scanner ($495) from Fujitsu. This compact scanner can scan large and small documents with ease. It works as a duplex scanner which means it can scan both sides of a document. Plus, it scans in full color.

I recently reorganized my Home Theatre. I happen to have a wall-mounted projector and previously had to run wires to my equipment. Now,I use the Wireless HD Video Transmitter/Receiver ($169.99) from Nyrius. This allows me to put my DirecTV DVR box, my Apple TV, my Blu-Ray player, and my HDMI-switching soundbar in one corner of the room. Now, the Nyrius transmitter plugs in to the HDMI out port from the soundbar and sends the audio and video in HD quality to the Nyrius receiver, which is plugged in to the projector across the room.

My smart home runs on Wink, and it just got smarter thanks to the Wink Hub 2 ($99). This new version of the smart home hub adds Ethernet support in addition to 5GHz Wi-Fi support. This will make it more reliable and compatible with newer routers. The original Wink Hub is still available and still works fine. The newer home automation hub lists for $30 more and is worth it for the features mentioned. Technically, while the original Wink Hub lists for $69, it can often be purchased in a bundle that includes a few smart bulbs, etc., for that same $69 price, so it's not exactly a fair comparison.

There are a lot of free photo editor apps out there that let you create collages from your photos, but I found one that lets you also include videos. The appropriately named Photo & Video Collage (free) from Bits & Coffee lets you edit pictures and videos together in a collage. The photo editor app offers assorted collage formats, for free, with more options available by upgrading.