Users Share Their Favorite Travel Gadgets

June 30, 2008 -- USA Today's Roger Yu asked Road Warriors to name a gadget that they regularly use or has caught their attention.

Harman-Kardon GPA 810

Price: $350

Vaughn McVey, an IT program manager from houston, recommends Harman-Kardon 810, a GPA/MP2 player. It can carry "about 1,600 songs. The GPA/music combination makes for one device instead of two," he says.

It's primarily a GPA navigator that renders voice directions and allows you to save your favorite stores and coffee shops. It can also play uploaded songs and movies and display photos. You can also use it as a hands-free phone by pairing it with a Bluetooth-enabled cellphone.

Shure SE210

Price: $150

Daniel Adam, a technology industry executive in Houston who's constantly looking to travel more lightly, substituted a noise-cancling headset with Shure SE 210. Shure's earphones have soft-foam tips that block out ambient noise while a "high-definition microspeaker" delivers "precise sound," according to the company.

"Once you get the right custom earpiece on the end, you will get a complete seal in your ear, and I found it cuts out as much noise as my (larger) headsets," Adam says. "Now I can lay on a pillow and not have a bulky headset present and one less set of batteries to carry."

Apricorn Aegis Bio

Price: $159-$279

Apricorn Aegis is a portable hard drive for paranoid business travelers who worry that sensitive company data may be stolen along with their laptop. The device is equipped with a biometric sensor and encryption software that authenticate its owner through fingerprints. Build with a "shock mounting system," it can withstand accidental drops and bumps, the company says/ It can also be used to transport data between the desktop and the laptop. Its hard-drive capacity ranges 80 GB to 320 GB.

"I have multiple computers that I use, so this is a great thing to store all of your data on one portable drive," says Chuck DiMeglio, a McLean, Va.-based consultant.

Belkin Mini Surge Protector

Price: $25

Gadget-loving travelers may want to consider this 6.6-ounce power strip, which comes with three AC outlets and two USB outlets. The Protector's plug can be rotated so that it fits into a wall socket vertically or horizontally.

Neat Receipts is a portable scanner that organizes and digitally captures the images of receipts, bills and business cards. You scan the receipt and its software parses and categorizes the data, such as payment, vendor and date. Data are captured in a column-and-row format and can be categorized specifically for the IRS. "We're about 80% accurate, but you can also go and edit," says Kevin Garton of Neat Receipts.

Small-business owners can use the device to track expenses. Employees of large companies that have their own expense software can use it to digitize receiptys and eliminate clutter. The IRS accepts digital copies of receipts as long as they can't be edited, Garton says.