LET'S face it - folks just love a good deal.

No better time than now, with the bad times casting a pall over the spending skies.

But becoming a complete Scrooge is not the only way to tighten your belt.

Digital Life says shop, don't stop.

Just be smart and make your gadgets do double duty.

They have, anyway, in the past few years - with convergence tech allowing you to squeeze multiple functions under one roof.

Take a smartphone like the Nokia N95 that handles calls, surfs the Internet, has a 5-megapixel camera and plays videos and music.

It comes with 8GB of memory to boot so when you consider that the 4GB iPod Nano costs $248, wouldn't it be lighter on the purse to buy that phone, rather than to get a separate phone and music-cum-video player?

Here's how to stretch your moolah.

Turn PC to TV recorder

Instead of plonking over $300 on a DVD recorder, with which to record all your favourite programmes, here's a huge money saver.

Transform your desktop PC into a video recorder.

Install a TV card and upgrade to Home Vista Premium. This Microsoft operating system comes with Media Centre which can be used to receive signals and record TV shows.

Given that new desktops come with a minimum 160GB of hard drive space and a DVD burner, you can easily move the recorded programmes onto DVD discs.

Get game console to play Blu-ray movies

Just because everybody's going gaga over Blu-ray players doesn't mean you have to. Sure, it plays the latest high-definition movies like Transformers and Iron Man, so you can see all the little robotic bits, and, of course, hottie Megan Fox.

New technology costs, though - prices of Blu-ray players hover around $500.

Why not pick up a PlayStation 3 (PS3) game console?

Yes, what was traditionally a child's toy has now become a high definition must-have: At $549, the PS3 comes with a 40GB hard drive and built-in Blu-ray player.

You get to play games on it too.

Milk the game console as a media hub

If you already own a game console - be it the PS3 or Xbox 360 - turn it into a media hub to stream digital content such as videos, music and photos from one room to another.

Say, your console sits in the living room and the desktop PC is in the bedroom.

Hook up the console and computer to the same Wi-Fi or wired network using a router. Then, you can start streaming video, music and photos from your bedroom to the living room.

No worries about copying stuff into USB drives or blank DVD discs.

Upgrade on the cheap

This is for those who spent a big chunk of their money upgrading their sound system a few years ago, with an amplifier and speaker set, only to realise now that the amplifier does not have any HDMI or component inputs to hook up your new flat-screen TV or DVD player to.

Don't scrap the whole set-up. Speaker technology remains the same so all you need is a new amplifier. If you are worried about compatibility issues, take down the model number of your speakers, go to a shop and ask for help.

This article first appeared in The Straits Times Digital Life on Sep 10, 2008.

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