Once you get comfortable with eBay you get a rhythm going. The money comes in; you package and ship, and put more items up for auction. You've invested in some useful software to help you with your eBay auctions - and now you're looking around for more things to "ease your way on eBay." Being a real fan of the "easy" way, I visited the Consumer Electronics show in Las Vegas, and found some items that have made my life considerably easier on the Internet.



Power Pac 6

I love taking digital photos and videos - whether for personal use or for my auctions. What I don't love is the blinking "low battery" warning. You know the drill, if you have many more photos to shoot, you can use a fresh set of Energizers, or if you're very lucky, you have a back up set of rechargeable batteries ready for use. I am always in the "new battery" category - maybe I just don't plan well.

I found the magic solution to my problems. Battery Busters has come out with an easy to use battery pack. At only 3" x 7" and about a pound and a half, you can use the supplied case and shoulder strap or clip it to your belt while you shoot your pictures. You can take 2,000 digital photos in one charge! According to their website,

You can recharge the Power Pac 6 as little or as much as you want. It has no memory effect and there's no need to drain the battery pack fully before you charge it. You can Stores the Power Pac 6 as long as you like and it won't drain out - it only looses 3% of its power per month in storage. It can also power any 6-volt portable - such as radios, games, CD players and more. The universal cord has six different adapters so that it will fit about anything you wish that requires 6 volts of power. Very simple to use, ready for charging right out of the box, the Power Pac 6 will save you time and money - enabling you to make even more money on eBay!

E-Stamp

When I heard about E-Stamp I was a little leery. As a home office user, I'd been stung by the postage machine "try us free" offers, and ended up spending more on the equipment than I did on postage. I also had to keep going to the Post Office to load postage into the meter. It really was not a satisfactory solution for my small office.

E-Stamp called to me with a sirens song - no more visits to the Post Office and no monthly fees like other online postage plans. It sounded too good to be true. E-Stamp's only charges are for the initial starter kit and for an optional scale that connects to the computer. (Hey, what's life without options?) E-Stamp charges a 10% convenience charge when you download postage to your computer, with a minimum charge of $4.99 and a monthly maximum of $24.99. I'd easily pay someone 10% of my postage cost to go to the Post Office and get stamps for me!

Still, you say, "I have to go to the Post Office to drop off my eBay packages." As I'm sure you know, Federal regulations require that any packages over 16 ounces be dropped off at a Post office counter. E-Stamp gives you considerable help in this area. When you get online with E-Stamp, you must apply for a U. S Postal Service license to print your own stamps. The Post Office offers some concessions to the licensees and permits you to hand a package of up to 5 pounds to your mailman. No more standing in line with a tower of boxes at the Post Office!!

I'm also very uncomfortable about new software. We've all had the experience of lockups and other programs not working when new software is installed. I tenuously ran the E-Stamp install and it went with no hitches. My computer rebooted and everything worked as before, only now I could print out envelopes and labels with postage directly from my favorite programs: Microsoft Word and Quick Books. My only hitch came when I attached the scale - which interacts with the software and allows you to accurately weigh any package up to 6 pounds. I had it hooked up to LPT2 and it wouldn't work. On a Sunday afternoon I called E-Stamp tech support, and without much of a wait, I was swiftly helped. They even stayed on the line while I moved the postage vault from LPT2 to LPT1. E-Stamp and its scale now worked perfectly, even with my zip drive on the same parallel port. They're open to help 24 hours a day - 7 days a week - now that's service!

E-Stamp will calculate and print postage for any class of postal service you may need. If you only have to print a few labels from a full sheet, the next time you use the E-Stamp software; it will remember where to print on the same sheet - no wasted labels! It can also add additional postage for Delivery Confirmations and insurance. It's convenient, reasonably priced and a must have for your eBay arsenal.