Keurig B60 Coffee Maker ($150)
Aside from the computers I use every day, our $150 Keurig B60 coffee maker probably does the most work out of any of our gadgets. This isn’t a great gift for the truly obsessed coffee snob in your life, but it’s a great gift for anyone who makes their own coffee every day and wants something that tastes better than standard drip machines can provide. Cleanup is the best part, too, since the machine uses single serve, no-mess “K-Cups” that are available in a mind-boggling number of flavors. The K-Cups aren’t cheap, unfortunately—they can run around 75 cents each—but the quality of the coffee and the hassle-free cleanup are worth it.
(MORE: Ask Techland: Good Laptop for $400 or Less?)
NeatDesk Document Scanner ($400)
I hate, hate, hate dealing with paper receipts and documents, but I have to submit monthly expenses for work, and my shoebox marked “TAXES!” is just plain sad to look at every day—and exponentially sadder to have to dig through every April. So this year I finally caved and started using the $400 NeatDesk scanner. It’s expensive, but it’s certainly easy to use and I’m cautiously optimistic that it’ll save me a ton of time when I do my taxes. There are three scanning trays: one for documents, one for receipts and one for business cards. Scanned items get dropped into the straightforward Neat desktop software, where they can be categorized. The software uses optical character recognition to glean pertinent info from receipts (such as tips and totals), names and addresses from business cards, and makes text documents searchable. Data can be exported to Excel, Outlook, Quickbooks, TurboTax and other programs, though I wish there was a way to just store everything online. This system is screaming for cloud-based storage features, so hopefully something’s in the works. There’s also a $200 NeatReceipts scanner that’s more portable and powered by a single USB cable, yet features much of the same functionality as the NeatDesk.