THE GIZMO: Gearing up for school.

In my day, back-to-school prep focused on buying spiral notebooks and maybe a bookbag. Today, the options are a lot more high-tech and interesting.

DESIGN YOUR DORM: The new Web site Design Your Dorm (www.designyourdorm.com) invites freshmen to view their dorm room in a 3-D format. Try shifting items around. Then drag in, install (and maybe buy from Amazon.com) virtual items.

Design Your Dorm's first official partner school, the University of Pennsylvania, also hooks up roommates to share decorating notions online.

Site developers Bryce Widelitz and Taylor Robinson have also floor-planned freshman dorms at Penn State, Rutgers New Brunswick, Purdue, the University of Toledo, the University of Arizona , Arizona State, Northern Arizona University and a mess of California schools.

LAPTOP VS. NETBOOK: There are some pretty fantastic deals for back-to-school computer shoppers. One hypermarket recently blew out a well-featured Compaq Presario laptop for a mere $298. But PCs priced around that figure are mostly those cute new "netbooks" running Windows XP on a 10-inch (or smaller) screen with a fairly tight keyboard/touch pad.

Great for classroom note-taking, these petite three-pounders often have a decent (160 GB) hard drive but require an external CD/DVD drive to download software, watch movies, burn music and the like.

One standout is the new Toshiba mini NB205 (about $350), which has a nine-hour-capacity (six-cell) battery, a shock-resistant hard drive and a USB port with "sleep and charge" functionality for connected devices.

Moving up to the $500-plus range, a shopper finds lots of name-brand laptops with full-size keyboards and 15.6-inch screens like the Acer AS5810-4657, a $547 Wal-Mart/Sam's Club special.

These workhorses have a faster processor, more memory, 320GB hard drive and CD/DVD reader/burner. Windows Vista is preinstalled (ugh!), but the latest models promise a free and easy upgrade to the much-improved Windows 7 come fall. (XP computers don't come with a free upgrade, and a Windows 7 install will entail moving files to an external hard drive.)

BITING THE APPLE: While MacBooks still start at a grand, back-to-school deals throw in an iPod, either a high-capacity traditional unit or a low-GB iPod touch that opens up the wonderful world of downloadable apps, free e-mailing and more in a Wi-Fi zone.

MUSIC TO YOUR EARS (AND THEIRS): Do your shy, retiring scholars put on earphones and listen to music on the school bus? Help them connect with others and make friends with ShareBuds MX earphones ($40-$50) that split the signal from a music player to two connected sets of stereo earphones.

Another, goofier conversation starter: iBlink earphones ($25 at www.jr.com). Lights on each ear bud and the line-mounted switch pulse in time to the music.

OTHER ABLE CLASS MATES: A Microsoft Wireless Mobile Mouse 6000 ($35-$50) lightens the work at a laptop or desktop computer. A tiny transceiver plugs into a PC or Mac USB port, while the small cordless mouse boasts advanced "Bluetrack" technology that functions on virtually any surface, even carpet.

Go old-school nerdy with a Yubz Talk Mobile retro handset ($45 at www.YUBZ.com) that plugs into a mobile phone. It reduces the radiation associated with cell phones by upward of 95 percent, claims the maker. An extra-cost adapter cable is required for some mobiles, including iPhone.

Flaunt your environmental correctness with a Samsung Reclaim from Sprint, the first mobile phone in the U.S. constructed from eco-friendly materials. Also messaging-friendly, it goes on sale Sunday at $50 (after rebates) with a service contract.

Everyone sends a student packing with a spike-protection power strip for plugging in dorm-room gear. But the kid should also have a multi-port Ethernet Switch for the room's high-speed Internet line. Five- and seven-port models from Dynex, Netgear, Linksys and Belkin go for as little as $20.

One such connectable device of merit is the Roku Digital Video Player ($99 from www.roku.com). This small, set-top box offers Netflix subscribers ($9 and up per month) instant Internet access to tens of thousands of movies and TV episodes.

Now go hit those books!

Send e-mail to takiffj@phillynews.com