Channel Rack

Channel Rack

Top Winter Time Auto Products - Wiper Blades and Ski Racks

The auto market research that I conducted for this article was based on finding the top 2 products that most drivers could make use of. I wanted to select one every-day product that almost every driver could use, and another lifestyle oriented product. One that personalizes a vehicle and also makes the driving experience more comfortable.

Something As Simple As New Wiper Blades?

For my first product, I wanted to find something that would offer a solution to the harsh elements that the winter throws at us. Whether you live on the East, West, South Coast…. Or reside in Fargo North Dakota, every vehicle has a set of wiper blades that endure a heavy workload when it rains or snows. This is a product that many overlook and rarely look to improve.

New wiper blades can enable for much clearer vision of the road. As if the slick roads weren't dangerous enough, vision is impaired during bad road conditions. A new set of wiper blades helps keep your windshield free of dirt, water, and snow streaks when clear vision is most important. New blades are easy to find in local part store and on online for discount prices that are likely better than local part stores. Go with a top name brand, you'll be surprised to see the difference in effectiveness from cheap blades to High Quality blades. For such a cheap part that is so influential on your ability to drive during harsh road conditions, I would recommend going with quality here. PIAA, Rain X, Trico & Bosch are trusted brand names.

What's All The Rack-it?

For my second recommended product, I did research to see what the most popular activity was during the winter. Yes, beer drinking came up in my online searches ? but I wanted to find what the top activity was that directly related to vehicle products needed for the activity/lifestyle. It may sound obvious to you, but I was surprised to hear that skiing was the top activity. Maybe it's because I live in Southern California, but I was really surprised. When I think about skiing, I picture that classic 80's movie “Ski School” and all of the funny things that they did to win the competition at the end of the movie. So the perfect auto product to fit this activity would have to be ski racks. Most people don't ski by themselves; they go with family and friends. So anywhere from 6 to 12 skis are needed for the trip and that takes up a lot of cabin space. Not to mention the wet dripping snow they track after the long-days' session.

The solution; throw a rack on the roof and strap those skis down! Many fit both skis and snowboards. Same idea applies here as for wiper blades. Go with a trusted name brand. You don't want to see those expensive skis flying off the roof, and you certainly don't want the skis falling out of the racks and dinging your precious ride. Thule and Yakima make trusted products, and many newer sport oriented vehicles come with their racks straight from the manufacturer.

I once purchased cheap soft-surf racks and regretted it. On the way to the beach, one clamp broke and my board slipped and hit my trunk on the way out, leaving a dent on my trunk and a busted Channel Islands surfboard on the road.

About the Author

The top 2 auto products that I recommend for the winter time are wiper blades and ski racks from a thule dealer.

What is the best laptop for After Effects?

I'm looking at buying a laptop to do freelance video editing. I'm accustomed to working in my full-blown production studio with rack-mounted gear and fibre channel RAID arrays, but I need something to take with me when I'm editing on the road. What's the current buzz on this?

this is not a question of hardware but of software. i don't know what you're using in your studio, Windows or Mac based PCs.

if you're familiar with Macs a Macbook Pro is what you need, in case of Windows based machines i would recommend a laptop with the best graphics card available (GeForce Go 7900GS/7900GTX/7950GTX), 2GB Ram is also a must and preferably a Core 2 Duo processor. Furthermore you should get the most powerful battery because laptops with these specs have a High Power consumption.

Some suggestions (from cheapest to the most expensive) Dell Inspiron E1705, Toshiba Satellite P100, Dell XPS M1710, Sager NP5760. Sager isn't well known but top end.
http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/srch.to?stt=all&s=4294966732&in_dim_srch=1 (check the specs)

http://www.sagernotebook.com/pages/centrino_specials.html

Carrie Keagan's huge rack...Storage Rack with shelves.