Moving from US to UK - which electronics will work?

Hi there,

My husband and I are looking to move from the US to the UK, where there are different adapters, different currents, etc. I'm originally from the UK, and I brought a fantastic hairdryer with me to the US. It was powerful and really packed a punch, but once I'd put a converter plug thingy (whatever these are called) onto it, it was like having a bat breathe on my head.

We're wondering how we will know which of our electronics will work (for example, I have a set of iPod speakers which work perfectly with a converter) and which will end up like the hairdryer. Neither of us have a very good understanding of electronics and currents and wattages (I'm particularly clueless, as you may be able to tell) work, but if there's a way to look at the plug of something and read the wattage and figure it out that way, we could probably do that!

While I'm perfectly willing to figure it out myself once I know how, here's the list of things we're wondering about, if anyone would find that helpful:
- Colour baby video monitor (camera, and charger for handheld receiver)
- Washer
- Dryer
- Sewing machine
- Kitchen appliances: electric wine bottle opener; 'Baby Bullet' (a baby food maker, sort of a super-powerful blender)
- Printer
- Xbox 360 with Kinect (while we're at it, will our US-bought Xbox games work on a UK-bought Xbox?)
- Floor lamp
- Energy-saving lightbulbs - that may sound daft, but we just bought enough for the whole house and boy were they expensive!

Thanks, everyone!

 

Well, we're only really half-considering taking the washer (not the dryer, so much), and because it's less than a year old and it's a fantastic washer. In the UK you have to spend a lot to get a top-loader, and they're not as fast or efficient as what you get here. Still, if we can't take it it's no big deal; but because we had to change the plug to move into our current apartment (it's an old building), my husband thinks we might be able to do that. So, do you mean we'd need a stepdown transformer for the washer?

With regards to the Xbox games: how does that work? US DVDs, for example, don't work on my UK laptop no matter where I am in the world; but there's a sort of online DVR called BBC iPlayer which works on any laptop, but only in the UK. In other words, if we take our games, will we still be able to play them on our US Xbox?

Finally, and sorry this is such a dumb question, when you talk about a 110/220 switch, do you mean a literal switch?

Thanks!