<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"  Nail Dominance Framing hammers might be the brawny cousins of claw hammers, but the Stewart Hammer ($35) has an added dose of brains. The front-mounted claw is no gimmick--it boosts leverage for extracting nails. And the revolutionary 28-ounce head (24-, 22-, 20- and 16-ounce versions are also available) has the weight and balance required to drive long nails with a couple of blows. This is also one of the most durable hammers we&amp;#039;ve seen--a single piece of forged steel, with PVC covering the grip. stewarttools.com  STEWART HAMMER  LENGTH/WEIGHT:  Varies, from 16 in./39 ounces (pictured) to 14.5 in./28 ounces.CONSTRUCTION: The body is 1070 carbon steel, the grip is PVC. Available with a smooth or serrated face.EASIER EXTRACTION: The front-mounted claw has a slot that&amp;#039;s less likely to deform extracted nailheads than a rear claw. The upfront position reduces the force necessary to remove nails, and eliminates the need to flip the hammer around. WISH LIST   Green thumbs are fine and all, but can they open a beer? Leatherman&amp;#039;s Hybrid ($75) pruning multitool crams a slew of features, both gardening-centric and everyday-useful, into an 8.7-ounce foldable package. A thumb-accessible safety lock keeps the shears closed as you use the various tools, which range from advanced widgets, like a bark lifter/grafting knife, to Phillips-head and flathead screwdrivers, and a just-in-case bottle opener. leatherman.com  High and Dry Sometimes a specialized piece of gear can turn out to have wide appeal. The Outdoor Research DryComp Summit Sack ($59), basically a waterproof stuff sack with shoulder straps, was created to help break speed mountaineering records. But it&amp;#039;s equally good for anyone who wants a 12.2-ounce day pack with a waterproof rolltop enclosure. One warning--this pack has no support, so leave the kitchen sink at home. orgear.com  Zoom to Spare It&amp;#039;s getting tougher for compact digital cameras to stand out from the crowd--nearly every current model has the lens quality and image resolution to deliver print-worthy snapshots. But, Panasonic&amp;#039;s Lumix DMC-TZ1 ($350) is one of the smallest digicams to offer a 10x optical zoom. And its shake-correcting image stabilization system lets you take clear, long-distance pictures at up to 5-megapixel resolution without using a tripod. panasonic.com WISH LIST   The STX-250 X-Band ($199) is the first one-handed cordless band saw. With a 21,000-rpm motor, powered by a rechargeable 18-volt NiCd battery, the blade cuts through steel channel and copper pipes without the need for a vise. For more precise work, the 9-pound X-Band fits into an optional cutting station (right), turning it into a benchtop stationary saw. The company offers a free 30-day trial. Call 877-33STOUT for info. stouttool.com  Disaster Survival Kit A joint effort by the American Red Cross and Target, the First Aid and Emergency Preparedness Starter Kit ($30) is a smart way to brace for hurricane season. The modular kit--the red box containing first-aid supplies detaches from the larger case--includes items ranging from the obvious, like blankets and a transistor radio, to the ingenious, like a children&amp;#039;s activity book and crayons. target.com  Farm-Fresh Ants The 50th Anniversary Commemorative Edition Ant Farm ($20) pays tribute to five decades of amateur insectaria sold by Uncle Milton Industries. The company&amp;#039;s founder, Milton Levine, invented the Ant Farm after watching ants march through his picnic. His hunch, that trapped bugs would be fun, paid off. This retro-style farm includes burrowing sand and a coupon for a tube of live ants. unclemilton.com  Pushbutton Backup As an alternative to burning files to an ever-growing stack of CD-Rs, Maxtor&amp;#039;s OneTouch III Mini Edition ($150 for 60GB, $200 for 100GB) backs up your hard drive with the push of a button. This pocket-size external hard drive, which is powered through your computer&amp;#039;s USB connection, downloads copies of previously assigned folders when the OneTouch button is pressed. maxstore.com  PM LAB TEST By Glenn Derene With all the talk about a format war between Blu-ray and HD-DVD, we wondered: How much better are hi-def discs than standard DVDs? On paper, HD-DVDs sound great--720 to 1080 lines of resolution versus 480 lines for DVDs. But many new DVD players can &amp;quot;upconvert&amp;quot; regular discs to a higher resolution. We forced three testers to watch clips from the sci-fi flick Serenity on a 42-in. plasma screen, at 720p resolution, using two machines--the first HD-DVD player on the market and a DVD player that upconverts standard discs.  bgcolor=&amp;quot;FFFFFF&amp;quot;&amp;amp;gt;FEATURES Small and compact, can send signal through an HDMI cable. Plays DVDs at 480p; upconverts DVDs to 720p or 1080i. Renders movies in full HD through an HDMI cable. Plays HD-DVDs at 720p or 1080i; upconverts DVDs to 720p or 1080i.DRAWBACKS Has no optical digital output. Doesn&amp;#039;t come with an HDMI cable for use with HDTVs--HDMI cables range from $11 to $250 and up. Big and bulky at 25.5 pounds. Takes almost 2 minutes to boot up and play a movie. Limited selection of HD-DVDs.PICTURE QUALITY For both players the colors were well saturated and the blacks were significantly darker than on an ordinary DVD player. In both dim and well-lit scenes, the upconverted image from the inexpensive Philips player was almost as good as that generated by the Toshiba--which costs $420 more. As with the Philips machine, the testers noticed a considerable improvement over standard DVD players. Our subjects were able to consistently pick out the HD-DVD image, but just barely. Compared to the upconverting player, the only difference was the marginally crisper picture.BOTTOM LINE Forget the format war--DVD players that upconvert are cheap and deliver a major improvement on the discs you already own. Sure, HD-DVD picture quality is great, but the expensive HD-A1 shows many of the clunky flaws of a first-generation product. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.popularmechanics.com/home/tools/reviews/a740/3279591/>