Advantages: Playmobil Lasts and Lasts
Disadvantages: Not Cheap, Requires Setup

...When I was a little person, back in the seventies, Advent calendars were simple. They were made of cardboard, with a little, fairly predictable picture behind each window. How things change. This year my parents decided to spoil their Grandchildren, nothing new there, and have bought them both very posh Advent calendars. Shortie, now aged 5, has a small collection of Playmobil which he adores, so my parents have given him a Playmobil Advent calendar. °**° Advent Calendars, a brief background °**° "Advent" comes from the Latin word adventus, which means "coming." Advent is the period of time before Christmas. Although Advent itself begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas, ttraditional Advent calendars have windows or doors which are opened each day from December 1st to December 24th, Christmas Eve. °**° The Playmobil Holiday... Read review

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Advantages: Easy to read, educational
Disadvantages: If reading in the Advent, as I did, you are tempted to read more than one chapter.

...A Christmas Mystery is one of Jostein Gaarders easier reads. It is set out in short chapters starting at the 1st of December and finishing on the 24th December. I read this book with my children, one chapter a day in the Christmas Advent. It is an enchanting story within a story. A young boy buys a special advent calender in which a story about a young runaway girl unfolds. The young girl travels across the world to the Holy Land and back in time to the birth of Jesus. The book is set out beautifully with wonderful illustrations which replicate the picture on the boy's advent calender. It is simple enough to be read to children but adults also benefit from the philosophical look at religion. When reading it with my children we also followed the young girl's journey across the world on an atlas. Overall an educational and riveting story.... Read review

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Advantages: Ride on heaven!
Disadvantages: Costly, Cumbersome - not easily manouvered!

...Ok then, having examined the commercial 6000 thoroughly in the stores, I am seriously of the opinion that it serves it’s purpose in the world sufficiently but is that good enough. Well I was delighted by this as other reviews of the 6000 were not particularly positive, especially from certain quarters, the petrol heads spring to mind - whats so wrong with the good old volts eh?..... I, however do not agree with these reviews of the 6000, but in fact find myself in with the people who are for it, in fact I've found I really do rather like the 6000, so much in fact i was lucky enought to have a test "drive" in the rear garden. I'm be lying if i said i wasn't impressed. NKneeling down afterwards you could literally see the sharp, regular, consistent cut compared to other "lesser" mowers. As with IBEA's other stuff the build quality... Read review

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Advantages: *GREAT* Battery life, speakers, graphics and Screen!
Disadvantages: Poor touchpad, unit is a little chunky to carry around for a long time

...The NC6000 is what I woulod consider a happy medium between life on the road, and a powerful gaming laptop. It's not often you see that, but with an ATI Radeon 9600 graphics card pre-installed as standard, you won't really get a lot better unless you seriously compormise battery life. As a Power laptop, the NC6000 shines. All applications positively fly, and you can easily multitask without having to slow down too much. 512MB RAM is easily enough for basic Internet and gaming, but the laptop will take upto 2GB if the need arises. Now I'll explain the NC6000's top selling point - It's large 4.4Ah battery. The pack itself is fairly small, but with the Pentium M being as energy efficient as it is, 5 hours is easily possible. When I purcahsed my NC6000 I upgraded to a larger 5.8Ah battery from eBay UK for around £50, giving me a total... Read review

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Advantages: ease of use
Disadvantages: none up 2 now

...I bought the ricoh 6000 this week, I've been searching shops and the net trying all the forums for info on the best camera, but reading these you would never buy one as theres always a couple compaining about every model going. Anyway i purchased the 6000 I only wanted to spend about £300 but this was £360 but came with AC adapter, 8meg carf plus an extra 16 mb card. It takes great pics(only used it in auto mode upto now) but theres so many settings you can choose I must read the manual that came with it. You get loads of software with it besides ricoh camera utility there is Arcsofts Photo Fantasy, Photo Impression and Photo Montage all 2000. Oh and you can also do short AVI videos with it.... Read review

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Advantages: It's Lego!!
Disadvantages: Not Cheap!!

...Continuing on my quest to review all things Christmassy, here I am with Advent review number 2. So with my deepest apologies to all those bah humbuggers out there, may I invite you back to Beckie's grotto. Why don't you pull up a chair, help yourself to a glass of warm mulled wine, and a mince pie (Marks and Spencers with a dusting of icing sugar to make them look homemade). This year, as always, my children have been well and truly spoilt by their Grandparents. In a departure from traditional or even chocolate Advent calendars they have both been given rather posh Advent calendars. Shortie has a Playmobil one, and big brother "Small Fry" (aged 7 and a half!) has a Lego Advent calendar. When I was little I always had an Advent calendar to count down the days to Christmas, but mine were cardboard and had little pictures of robins... Read review

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Advantages: Cheap, Lots of useful information in
Disadvantages: Non.

...as well as Cilla’s advice lines. Win the Lot – If you fancy your chances you can win everything on this page! In the magazine there’s a chance to win a hamper, cocktail goodies (I just need the 2 lads from Britain’s Top Talent Show to show me how to make a cocktail). Cut out & Keep Tips – Well what can I say about this except you get paid £60.00 for a tip and the crap some people offer is ridiculous. This is a tip I’ve just read “A handy vase, got a bouquet of flowers – cut the top of a cola bottle and stick them in” £60.00 for that – That’s better then writing reviews for Ciao. Kids Dinners - four mouth watering recipes for kids which look healthy and very appealing – yum yum Street Psychic – Wow this woman is brilliant, Jayne Wallace a clairvoyant travels to places over the UK and picks 5 passers-by from the street to read their destiny... Read review

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Advantages: The producers have made great use of story, plot, and graphics
Disadvantages: Square don't produce nearly enough Final Fantasy Films...

...*This is only a short review and so features specific details and does not delve into the physics behind the film* Only the second ever Final Fantasy film and the first one to be based on the story behind one of the games. Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is set two years after the events of Final Fantasy VII and there is a disease known as "geostigma" spreading through the population. Forced to face up to his duties, Cloud must once again take up his sword to fight for justice and to bring about peace and wellbeing. Of course, he still wields that classic buster sword - however there have been some modifications to it... The film was a much anticipated release for fans all around the world and people have had mixed reviews and opinions of it. Advent Children features all of the original games' characters such as Tifa, Red XIII... Read review

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Advantages: So much fun! Looks so cute. Unique and different
Disadvantages: Just for girls! Maybe not as Christmas themed as could be

...As a nice alternative to chocolate advent calendars, this year my boyfriend got me a 'Belville Lego Calendar' instead. I secretly wanted the 'Lego Advent Calendar' but since my boyfriend had got that one we couldn't have the same one! I was quite a big Lego fan when I was younger, and still am! But I am not so familiar with the 'Belville' selection of Lego since it is still quite new. Belville is the same as normal Lego.. but for girls. So lots of pink, girly and glittery things! (This is definitely not a unisex calendar!) We bought our advent calendars direct from the Lego website and they cost £12.99. The advent calendars are recommended for people 5 years + The calendars are very exciting. They are very thick (around 2 - 2.5 inches), and they are slightly bigger than a normal sized chocolate advent calendar. The front cover... Read review

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Advantages: Upgradeable and after almost 2 years problem free
Disadvantages: totally addictive

...I have read opinions on PC World and the Dixon group, including their Advent PCs, and whilst they may not be top notch, my Advent 8290 has served me well. When I bought it in June 1999 I was a complete novice and bought the machine that I thought would suit me for surfing the net and general word processing for work, and my husband for games. It had 64MB RAM, a celeron II and 7.85 GB hard drive. It had a Voodoo 3 graphics card and we got a 17" monitor, printer, scanner and digital camera with the package. I have not spent an evening or weekend since without doing something on my PC, either typing documents, surfing, Emailing, downloading, playing games, or watching DVDs (my husband has also learned Access and Excell)I have upgraded my RAM to 192MB, added another hard drive and a zip drive and I am now considering a CD rewriter. My next... Read review

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