There is no such thing as a low-tech college student.

High-tech devices are here to stay, and have become an absolute necessity for today’s college experience. Make sure you (or your student) have the most up-to-date devices so they can keep up in this high-tech world.

10. Recharging Hub

Everything these days is wireless, which means it all has to be recharged. When you’ve got your cell phone, wireless speakers, mp3 player, and camera all begging to be charged at once, it can be a nightmare to find enough USB ports to hook them all up to. But with a recharging hub you can recharge up to seven USB devices at once. May your student never have a low battery again.

9. MiFi

Wifi connections on campuses and in dorm rooms can be spotty at best. But, if you have your very own MiFi device, you can have access to wireless internet anywhere. These oh-so-portable network connections will work wherever you take them, making a research trip to the local library that much less frustrating.

8. Bluetooth Portable Speaker

When you’re in college, you gotta have your tunes. And sometimes you even want to share those tunes, but don’t necessarily have the space to set up a full sound system. This is where a great Bluetooth portable speaker comes in. You can take these compact workhorses anywhere – to the beach or park, in your car, or in your dorm – and they pack a bigger audio punch than you’d expect from something so small. You’ll wonder what you ever did without them.

7. Tablet

Tablets have become must-have devices in the tech world. Combination web-browser, media-streamer, and e-reader, a tablet will perform all of these functions with a bigger, more readable screen than your smart phone and more portability than your laptop.

6. Printer

There will come a day when your professor(s) will require you to print something off – probably many days. Having a compact printer in your room will save time, frustration, and the necessity of running off to the school library every time you need to create a hard copy. This is one device not to be overlooked.

5. Noise Cancelling Headphones

Dorm rooms, common areas, and study halls can get loud, making it hard to concentrate when trying to churn out a twelve page research paper. This makes noise cancelling headphones almost a necessity for any college student. Block out distracting sounds and listen to music, recorded class lectures, or even white noise. Anything to help you get the job done.

4. Cell Phone

Gone are the days when students relied on pay phones and busy dorm phones that seem to always have someone else on them. Your student has probably had a cell phone for years now, getting them through most of high school and maybe even middle school. But it’s nice to send them off with an upgrade so they can have access to all the latest bells and whistles these telephones-turned-handheld-computers have to offer.

3. Action Camera

College is a crazy, fun, memorable, milestone-setting time in anyone’s life. Even if you don’t have plans on becoming a videographer, chances are you’ll want to capture as many of these fleeting moments as you can. Action cameras are great for just this very thing. They are smaller than a cumbersome camcorder but with more functionality and video quality than your typical digital camera (and definitely better than your phone’s built-in camera).

2. Flash Drive

There is no way you’re getting through college without at least one flash drive. These essential file storage devices, like the floppy disks of old, enable you to save and transport documents from one computer to another. Get one with plenty of data capacity and, preferably, something you can put on a lanyard or keychain so you’re less likely to lose it.

1. Laptop

Even with all the devices out today, every college student’s primary device is still the trusty laptop. Sure, you can type term papers on the library’s computers, but they are often slow and always in high demand. It’s better to have your own laptop so you can work on documents wherever and whenever you need. Don’t take it for granted; that laptop is about to become your very best friend.

by Catalogs.com Info Guru Angela K. Van Winkle