Gadget Access

Posted Mar 3rd 2008 12:18PM by Thomas Ricker
Filed under: Features, Laptops We know you need it. Now you’ve got it. ASUS’ 7- and 9-inch Eee PCs lined up for a side by side comparison. The new 9-incher is clearly the bigger brother to the shorter original. Too bad too ’cause that chunky bezel on the 7-inch already offers plenty of room for screen-estate growth. You can also clearly see the bigger touchpad and beefier display hinge of the new 9-inch. Check the gallery to see all the hot 9- on 7-inch action.

Gallery: Hot 9-inch on 7-inch Eee PC action

Posted Mar 3rd 2008 11:00AM by Nilay Patel
Filed under: Features, Wireless, Storage
So we spent the weekend playing with Time Capsule and we’ve discovered some interesting answers to all your questions, as well as a few accompanying annoyances. Our main takeaway? It’s a solid product, but you shouldn’t expect it to do anything more than back up your files — and Apple really needs to step up and enable general NAS support for Time Machine. Read on!

Obviously the Time Capsule hardware itself isn’t all that interesting — after all, it’s basically just an Airport Extreme with a hard drive inside. It’s quiet, but definitely not silent. It does have a fan that vents out the bottom, but overall it gets and stays pretty warm — almost hot, even. Using Time Machine is just the same as if you were using a local drive, just a little slower depending on how fast your connection is. Over 802.11n WiFi the hit was only slightly noticeable while searching, and almost non-existent over Ethernet, large transfers excepted. There is one potentially troublesome issue, however: since OS X doesn’t appear to prioritize network activity out of the box, Time Machine absolutely slams your network interface when it starts up. Although browsing and other casual activities are relatively unaffected, there is definitely a noticeable impact. Just to isolate what we’re talking about, this is how fast our Ethernet-connected iMac was able to send data over the LAN when it was in the middle of its initial 10MB/s backup:

If you’re editing huge files all day long, that could be a problem since Time Machine kicks in every hour (unless you hack it to slow down). If not, though, you probably won’t even notice the switch from a local drive to Time Capsule — we didn’t experience any similar slowdowns after that initial backup. No, the big changes are in how Time Machine handles the Time Capsule drive, and the new, refined Airport Utility.

So what’s the big change in how Time Machine handles Time Capsule drives? Nothing, apart from the fact that it actually sees them. Just like the computer-connected shared drive we’ve been backing up to for months, Time Machine mounts a sparse disk image from the TC drive, backs up, and unmounts it — no secret sauce or voodoo involved, as far as we can tell.

Since both OS X and Windows see TC drives as regular shared drives, it’s even more frustrating that there’s no general NAS support in Time Machine — Airport Extreme owners, in particular, are likely very unhappy, especially since Time Capsule has no problem using external USB storage for backups. We asked Apple about it and got a non-answer; we hope they eventually do the right thing.

The just-a-drive nature of Time Capsule also means that it can’t do a lot of the things a lot of readers asked about: sure, you can put your iTunes library on it, but it’s not a media server, and pointing several computers to the same iTunes library is asking for trouble. Similarly, you can’t stream directly to an Apple TV or 360 or whatever — it just doesn’t show up.

The new Airport Utility is very slick, walking you through all kinds of network setups (including complicated dual-5GHz / 2.4GHz systems and WDS chains) and even providing semi-real-time diagnostics:

Disk management options are limited, however: you can erase the drive and change some access settings, and that’s about it. You certainly can’t partition it or change the formatting or anything. You can enable WAN access if you care to expose all your data to the outside world.

Overall, Time Capsule does exactly what Apple told us it would do: make it easier for the vast majority of users to start backing up regularly over their network. That’s to be commended, and if you’re a Mac user and you’ve got the coin, there’s no reason not to consider a Time Capsule when the time comes to replace your router — we’ve always found Airport devices to be rock-solid, and Time Capsule is no exception. But if you’re using a PC, it’s not like you need the Time Machine support — and if you own an Airport Extreme, you have every right to be peeved about the fact that what’s essentially the same hardware won’t let you back up to AirDisk. Let’s hope 10.5.3 makes Time Capsule a little easier to swallow.

Ask any homemaker what their biggest gripe about brooms are and they will tell you that it is the head that is not perfectly shaped and angled to clean just about any nook and cranny in the home. Enter the Quantum Reach - this unique broom is capable of doing what an ordinary broom can’t and more.

The secret of Quantum Reach is the articulating head and multiple surfaces. The head adjusts to any angle, allowing cleaning of any area: under beds or furniture, above art or overhangs, ceiling fans, HVAC vents, behind appliances, and even windows. Quantum Reach has bristles on one side of the head for sweeping and unique “T” hooks on the other side to attach Mircrofiber pads for sweeping, mopping and dusting. Quantum Reach also features a telescoping pole, which provides compact and easy storage for the consumer and lower shipping cost and reduced shelf space for the dealer. Quantum Reach provides the cleaning power of a broom, mop and duster in one easy-to-use and store tool. Quantum Reach is setting a new standard in the hard floor cleaning category.

I’m not sure if getting this as a gift for your other half is such a good idea. Still, if you’re a risk taker, the Quantum Reach broom retails for $19.99.

I’m not really a Bluetooth earpiece kind of man, but I do know people who wear them 24/7. It’s really hard to talk to these Bluetooth earpiece wearing people sometimes, because too often they are talking to someone else, even when they are looking me in the eye. Isn’t that just annoying?

However, maybe it would be better if the Bluetooth wireless headset users had some sort of visual cue, like a collar. Better yet, what if their collar was the wireless headset? Sure, it might not look good, but it has certain advantages.

For example, the microphone is connected next to your voice box, which means that most of the ambient noise can be filtered out. This is perfect for those who drive convertibles or ride motorcycles. No more “I’m sorry, could you speak louder, I can’t hear you” conversations.

Another advantage is that the Bluetooth Neckset, also known as the Roadrunner, has less ear slippings than the miniatures. It fits around your neck snugly to allow for 180 degree turns, which is good for all users who are part owl. The battery life is good for about 9 hours worth of talk time.

You should be able to purchase this at the Pro Idee site for about £39.50. Use it, and hopefully you won’t end up looking like this guy in the picture.

Product Page

Posted Mar 3rd 2008 6:50AM by Paul Miller
Filed under: Displays
While we found Samsung’s IT solutions emphasis here at CeBIT a bit of a yawn — when executive gets up and tells you that printers are his “personal passion,” you know you’re in for a wild ride — we are glad to see that the company is sticking some of its consumer design cues into its business products. Case in point, the T-series LCDs borrow from the “crystal” style elements of the Bordeaux series, but pack in some business-friendly specifications. The SyncMaster T260 is the flagship of the series, with 26-inches of real estate, 1920 x 1200 resolution, 20,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, 5ms response time and a DTV tuner option, while the similar T240 hits at 24-inches and brings 0.3 Watts standby power. Inputs include DVI and HDMI and D-sub. More basic displays start at 19-inches, multiple color accent options are available, and everything will be available globally in March.

Gallery: Samsung unveils T-series LCD lineup for the suits

I would say that many people who already own cell phones would probably have gone through a fair number of handsets in their entire lifetime. After all, I am already in my fifth cell phone today, changing one every couple of years or so. Well, what do you normally do with those old handsets and their batteries? Chances are you would have thrown it away without giving much though, and the stockpile of used and outdated electronic products are starting to clog up landfill sites, and those very sites get larger and larger each day. Should we continue to head in the same direction each day, the environment would definitely be under more stress than it can handle and it will buckle up one day, coming back to bite our children in the future. The Green Cell battery could be the solution that ends this dilemma, offering a single, standardized battery which is universal enough to fit just about any personal electronic device including cell phones.

The Green Cell concept has picked up third place in the Greener gadgets Competition which was held recently in New York City, designed by Theo Richardson with Charles Brill & Alex Williams of RBW. This unique battery is manufactured without the use of toxic chemicals, making it safe and environmentally friendly. In addition, it can be recharged or replaced at a local vending machine, making it a snap for you to juice up your device no matter where you are, as long as there is a vending machine nearby. While not as universal as solar-power, at least it is much more convenient than what we have today, where different phones have specific chargers.

I wonder when will this simple, eco-friendly and sustainable battery make its way to the manufacturing line. All I know is, it can’t come soon enough - will all those hardware companies out there co-operate and forget about proprietary batteries and chargers? After all, we only have one earth.

Source: Gizmag

Posted Mar 3rd 2008 4:42AM by Thomas Ricker
Filed under: cellphones, Portable Audio, Portable Video
So we hurried on over to the Meizu booth in sweaty-palmed anticipation of laying fleshy bits upon a working M8 MiniOne. It’s gotta be here, right? After all, Meizu CEO Jack Wong promised it his damn self. Nope. Oh sure, they did bring that siliconless, plastic mockup already seen kicking around the Nets for awhile and they offered to show us a laptop-based demo of the UI if we come back tomorrow. Although even the demo is feature incomplete. Nevertheless, Meizu is confident that it will begin shipping the M8 in China in the next “half year” while remaining coy for a rest-of-world launch. Guess reverse engineering the iphone isn’t so easy, eh Jackson?

Nokia labs have released the Nokia Location Tagger application, which automatically geotags your photos taken from GPS-equipped mobile phones, and embeds the latitude and longitude of where the pic was taken inside the EXIF fields of the JPEG file containing your pic. This neat trick, which, to be frank, should have been installed in all Nokia phones with GPS right from the beginning, means that you can now search for pictures not only by tag name or filename, but also by the location in which they were taken.

Why is this important? Well, as digital cameras enable us to take literally thousands of pictures, finding them again becomes an almost impossible task, particularly when the majority of people never rename the pictures, and so are left with the default number that the phone gave the picture.

Sorting pictures by date is one option, but much better is the ability to sort your pictures by date and location. It then becomes trivially easy to find your pictures from last Christmas, for example, when you simply sort your pics according to date, and then see which ones were taken at your parents’ house (or wherever you spent Christmas).

Better still, image hosting services such as Flickr let you search for images by location as well, as long as the information is contained within the image files, meaning Nokia’s new application will soon lead to millions of new pics being geotargeted and freely searchable. Just imagine what you can do with all this info, when you combine millions of geotargeted pics with mapping applications like Google Maps or Google Earth.

You can download the Nokia Location Tagger on your S60 equipped phone from Nokia’s Beta Labs.

Despite how glorious it sounds to work from home in your pajamas, blogging isn’t a very glamorous profession. Sure, there are exclusive press events and fancy cocktail parties every now and again, but for the most part, it’s just you . . . at home . . . in your pajamas. All day, every day.

It can get pretty mundane. That’s why I need this paparazzi play set. It comes with a velvet rope that I could set up beside my computer to keep those pesky 4-inch vinyl photographers, reporters, and autograph hounds at bay. Paris Hilton’s got nothing over me (except fame, wealth, and a prison record).

Available for £14.95 from I Want One of Those.

Via Coolest gadgets.

It looks like TiVo will be ending their current TiVo rewards program as of May 28, 2008 with the last day to earn any new reward points being one month earlier on April 30. As of May 28 the program will officially end and any remaining reward points that are unused will expire, make sure you take advantage of any that you may have before they go away.

As of a new program in the works, it seems foolish that TiVo would take this away and not have it replaced with something similar, or hopefully better for their loyal customers. Per the TiVo FAQ’s page they have stated that “The current program is ending on May 28th, 2008 but stay tuned for more news and announcements; sign up for The TiVo Newsletter.”

While it does not specifically mention any new program, it could lead one to believe this will be replaced.

Read [TiVo Rewards] Via [Zatz not Funny] Via [Gizmodo]

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