I just bought a brand-new, director's cut Blu-ray movie and technically two PS3 games. Total cost: 50 bucks. You see, the deals are out there--you just need to know where to find 'em. So stick around for a list of surefire ways to entertain yourself without going broke in the process.

1. The Bundle Deal

On a recent excavation, Chris Locke unearthed an amazingly well-preserved fossil of Hilarofustis atarium, commonly referred to as the Atari joystick. This is the most recent "discovery" he has made, but among his Modern Fossils collection you can also spot long-dead boom boxes, aged iPods, obsolete hard drives, and ancient phones.

Yep, technology gets old, fast. While most formerly cutting-edge tech ends up in a pile of yesterday's trash, Locke does his best to preserve specimens the best way he knows how: by burying them.

My Palm Pre dialed 911 without my knowing it. "How did you find out," you ask? The dispatcher called me back to make sure I was all right. You don't see that in many product reviews, do you?

Well, forget about being first--I'm perfectly happy to write the last few words on the iPhone 3GS and the Palm Pre. I spent two weeks with each, using them as a normal human would--not as a reviewer sprinting to get first-posting bragging rights would. Which smartphone is really better (for me, anyway)? I'll tell you. But first, let me explain where I'm coming from.

You can't really take iGirl seriously. It's a goofy (with an emphasis on sad and borderline creepy) iPhone app featuring a pasty-looking, scantily-clad virtual girlie that you can customize according to your...ahem...interests. "We get e-mail complaints from conservatives that think [iGirl] is too perverted while kids complain that there's no nudity," says Resistor Productions CEO, Toby Batton. But that 99-cent joke helped kick-start a company and fund a new MMO (massively multiplayer online) fighting game, Disciple.

Game controllers are getting completely out of control. You want exhibits A through Z? Just look at the coverage that came out of the recent Electronic Entertainment Expo (aka E3).

Are you ready for the digital upgrade? According to Nielsen, 2.5 percent of the U.S. populace isn't. That works out to about 2.8 million people whose screens could go dark today. Statistics I see in reports and on the news tell me that "Younger, African American and Hispanic homes are disproportionately unready." They forgot to mention another demographic: stubborn nerds who are fed up with how Comcast handles cable's version of the analog-to-digital transition.

Like me. I'm a TVholic. I have a Media Center PC, with three digital tuners. I have a couple terabytes of storage for the stuff I record. I stream out shows to my Xbox 360 and PS3. I should be psyched for the digital upgrade, right?

Ever wonder what a journalist sees when he's on the road, covering the news? Well, here's a snapshot of a day-in-the-life at a trade show dedicated to video games. If you're reading this story from a site other than pcworld.com, you're missing out on all the candid photography that goes with it (click here for the full package).

There's this little tradeshow coming up next week, the Electronic Entertainment Expo (aka E3). Maybe you've heard of it? It's where all the hot new videogames come out to play. Yatta yatta yatta. Anyhow, it's a 300-ring circus of a trade show. Since I'm going to be there waving the flag for PC World, I was hoping for a little help from you--the readers--with a little social experiment.

At the Body Mechanix Gym in San Francisco, Joel Hornsby is the bona fide, certified "Mind and the Machine" master trainer. Can he be replaced by a videogame? To help me find out, Hornsby was good enough to spend an afternoon testing four fitness-focused games for the Wii. We set up a Wii balance board, then fired up some software to see what he thought of Jillian Michaels' Workout Ultimatum 2009, Gold's Gym Cardio Workout, EA Sports Active Personal Trainer, and Wii Fit (the Nintendo title that kicked off the videogaming/personal training craze when it launched a year ago).

What follows are two perspectives--that of an an over-the-hill, out-of-shape Average Joe gamer (me), and Hornsby's professional opinion--to help you select the best-bet at-home game workouts for you.

Forget all the yammering about the forced digital upgrade on June 12: After years of gripping a wretched remote and looking at lousy menus, I'm Comcastrating my cable service. Or, at least, I'm seriously considering doing so. After test-driving one $40 app for a couple of weeks, I'm ready to chuck that crummy cable box into the trash and forget about the digital-upgrade scheme. This is the story of PlayOn, the software that could ruin everything for cable providers--if the bugs are ever ironed out.

Imagine a software package that can stream just about any show to your Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, or, soon, Wii. Netflix? No problem. Major-network TV shows? Yep. Obscure stuff from Adult Swim? You name it, you can watch it. All you need is a PC and an Internet connection in the same house.

Dear [Insert name of gaming mouse producer here]: You suck. I can say this with some authority after testing your crummy products for over 20 years. Not only have you managed to create a mountain of useless plastic scrap and punched a hole in the ozone layer the size of New Jersey, but you've also crippled me.

The original idea a few weeks back seemed simple enough: Do straight-up, side-by-side reviews of the Microsoft SideWinder X8 and Razer Mamba wireless gaming mice--both hot-looking products. But plans change. We're taking a slight detour to the doctor's office first.

Pandemic warnings. Entire towns shutting down. Subway riders donning surgical masks. The end wasn't coming with a bang, but with a sneeze and a fever. Last week's news cycle--or the precursor to a zombie apocalypse? Watching TV, it was hard to tell. (Ask the prankster who doctored a BBC News page, or Mike "The Streets" Skinner, who created the mock music video "He's Behind You, He's Got Swine Flu.") I don't know about the flu, but after years of reading horror books, watching twisted flicks, and playing the splatterfest video games they inspired, I'm ready for the walking dead. One thing I haven't prepared for, though, is the sheer number of zombie games rising.

Here's what I'm wondering: Have we officially hit the zombie-meme overload point? I decided to find out--in between bouts of Left 4 Dead and Resident Evil 5 (both great titles)--by playing the latest dead-centric games roaming stores.