Digital Technology for Digital Living.
July 31, 2004
New Pokia Phone Accessory On eBay.
Yes, Pokia, not Nokia. Nicholas Roope, Creative Director at Poke, uses old phone handsets and rewires them so they work with the latest phones. It seems that this has become chic all of a sudden, with articles in Italian style magazine and the Home section of the New York Times. Yahoo! News in the UK has an article on the handsets. If you’re keen you can bid against Hollywood producers for his latest one on eBay. It works with Sony Ericsson handsets such as the t68i, t610 and the k700i. You’ve got 5 days, with current bidding at £29 (approximately $AU75). A recent one sold for about $AU285. Hey, it gets the chicks. “When you take it out in social situations, the first thing that happens is people say: ‘Does it work?’ And then inevitably you say: ‘Phone me on it.’ Then you have their number.”
Gadgetman | Comments (1) | Mobile Phone
July 30, 2004
Touchless Trashcan, Fun For The Kids.
Why everyone doesn’t have one of these we’re not sure. The touchless bin. That’s right, using “patented invisible harmless infrared technology” the bin knows, that’s right, it just knows, when you need the lid to open. “It creates a germ free, odor free, automated environment. It keeps your hands clean when cooking or touching your kid. It opens for you automatically when your hands or feet are occupied. Your kids will have fun to throw the trash for you. It just make sense! In fact, it outlasts most of the step-on and hand-touch trash cans. ‘You don’t touch it and you won’t break it!’ Tested opening 100,000 times in laboratory. If you open 20 times a day, it can last over 10 years. This can actually be the last trash can you will ever buy. It saves you money.” All for just $AU310 at myGadget.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Wireless
Motorised Bushpig.
This one isn’t new, but given we’re aussie, and so are the makers, we felt compelled to write a post. Now, in High School I wouldn’t have wanted to have a bushpig, but hell today, I’d love to get my hands on one. Wheelman have made a wheel without an axle, that just happens to operate like a motorised skateboard/snowboard/surfboard, at up to 30 Km/h. These smart little puppies have strapped a 43cc 2 stroke engine to a couple of these wheels and can ride off-road or on-road. Check out the video of it in operation, on the beach no less, at their site. One of the suckers will set you back about $AU2100-2200.
Gadgetman | Comments (1) | Motorised
Consumers Love A Knob More Than Anything.
Or at least that’s what Alpine Vice President of Brand Marketing and Communications Steve Witt thinks. They’ve just announced the KCA-420i, an interface for the iPod. The interface is a white box that sits between the iPod and an Alpine Ai-NET head unit, it can be installed anywhere in your car you see fit. Under the seat, in the boot, or mounted on the dash if you’re really showing off. The beauty of the unit is that it means you can control the iPod from an Alpine deck installed in your car. From the head you can view the artist, album, and song names during playback and search through your collection by playlist, artist, or album. You can also use the Alpine’s remote. If you really want to get fancy you can add their Mobile Media Stations and have a true multimedia display. The KCA-420i is compatible with any iPod and iPod mini with dock connector and iPod Update 2004-04-28.
MacCentral report that the idea first started when Apple approached Alpine at 2003 Consumer Electronics Show. It also seems that the two plan to do more in the future.
Here in Australia, Alpine have confirmed that we should expect it at about the same time, September, and their guess is the price will be around $AU300.
Gadgetman | Comments (1) | Music
4th Gen iPod May Have A Suprise.
Time has made the 4G iPod the Gadget of the Week. It makes sense, even if you just base the amount of news generated by the launch. In general it is a nice review, and gives people that haven’t read already an idea of what’s new. However, as mentioned by iPoding, the interesting bit of the article is near the end.
“These are all smallish issues, ones that probably shouldn’t plague you if you bought an iPod two weeks before this one came out. But you should know that internally the new iPod is a ground-up reconstruction, and its really compelling applications — the ones that very well might get the goat of anyone unable or unwilling to upgrade — are still secret. All that Apple is saying is that there’s more to this than what’s being publicized.”
Has Time been told something, or are Apple just trying to stir up more interest. Speculation is that a new software upgrade will offer some more excitement.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Music, Portable
July 29, 2004
Australia Has The Highest Internet Charges In The World.
An American has told us what we all know. Internet access in Australia is expensive. Not that I mind it being pointed out, especially when it makes the press. news.com.au reports that the “latest criticism of Australia’s internet traffic environment comes from Bill Norton, co-founder of US-based peering company Equinix and former chair of the North American Network Group, who is carrying out a study of peering in the Asia-Pacific region”. Here in Australia of course, we know the actual reason.
Gadgetman | Comments (5) | Broadband
New HP iPaqs.
There’s still no official word on the HP Australia web site, of course, but the last couple of days has seen news of the launch of the new HP iPAQ range. MTekk has news that they will land here in October.
It looks as though mobile phones and PDAs are going to meet somewhere in the middle, the specifications on the top of the range h6350 (the h6315 is not coming to Australia), are rumoured to include a quad band GSM/GPRS phone, Bluetooth and 802.11b support, built-in VGA camera, an SDIO supporting SD card slot and Windows Mobile 2003.
With specs that impressive, one can also expect an impressive price tag, no doubt. Even though there’s no word on official pricing, we’re not expecting the price to leave us much change from A$1200, if any.
Now that Sony has exited the handheld PC market, maybe we’ll see the two remaining major players (HP and PalmOne) turn up the heat on each other a little. Who will be able to pack more functionality into their devices?
Ben | Comments (0) | Mobile Phone, Portable, PDA
TV Networks React To PVRs.
Yesterday we mentioned Ice, a possible new PVR and service available in Australia. Today news.com.au has a follow up article that discusses the reaction from the TV networks, who in general seem to be putting on a brave face. One issue a Seven spokesman mentioned, and could suggest an underlying message, was their copyright ownership of the TV guides and that they “licensed him or any other set-top box manufacturer to use our information for this purpose”. Them’s be brave words, especially when Ice works around this issue by creating their own guide and using human operators to send signals via a digital radio signal, which prompts the set-top box when there are adverts or a change in programing.
(more…)
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | PVR, Video, Digital TV
Mobile Phone Cameras Outsell Digital Cameras 6 to 1.
Digital Connect News has an article on the rise of mobile phone cameras and its effect on the photo printing business. For anyone here in Australia who has bought the new Nokia 7610, they’ll find a voucher for use at any Fujifilm store to get some free prints. We did a little exploration and found that printing a standard 6×4 print would set you back $AU1.50 a print. The price varies depending on the number of prints you get, being as little as 60 cents when you print 50 or more. You can find Fujifilm locations here.
However, before you rush in, phone blasting a bluetooth signal ready to walk out in seconds with your print, our investigations found that many machines haven’t been upgraded to use the wireless standard yet, and they still require an hour processing time by their professional system.
Update : (August 9 2004) We’re starting to see some Bluetooth kiosks in the wild. First one spied in a Kodak store.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Mobile Phone, Wireless, Digital Camera
iRemote?
Ever wanted to use your iPod to replace a bunch of IR remotes? No, us either, but in a very cool article, Engadget tell you how to turn your iPod into a universal remote.
Whilst we can’t help but think that it looks like a lot of work, an extra remote around the house to replace the other 8 or 9 that we have can’t go astray, can it?
Ben | Comments (1) | Wireless, Portable, PDA
4G iPod Audio Problems?
iPod Lounge are reporting that the classy new 4G iPod’s have a problem with static on the headphone jack when the hard drive is being accessed. The problems don’t affect all new iPod hardware, but all the affected units seem to have been ordered directly from Apple, manufactured in China and shipped from Shanghai.
iPod Lounge are asking people to check their iPods using the Apple loseless encoder. Doing so should force the iPod to access the hard drive between tracks, which will make the problem easier to detect.
If any readers have noticed such a problem with their new iPod, leave a comment and let us know.
Ben | Comments (4) | Music, Portable
July 28, 2004
The ICE Age Comes To Australia.
CNet and Slashdot, with an old article from June at Sydney Morning Herald, are reporting that Australia is about to get its very first Tivo like service known as Ice, Intelligent Content Engine. Although the products depend on raising $AU6 million in capital, the article suggests we’ll see them in November. It sounds compelling, but it will only be available in Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong, and only for free to air digital TV. The rest of the country would have to wait up to another 18 months.
According to their website there would be three different hardware options, each with varying degrees of functionality. Screenpeace, their set top box will provide digital widescreen TV, an IceGuide which is an onscreen TV guide, IceHush for reducing the volume during commercials, IceAd for blanking the screen during commercials, a censoring mode to stop unsuitable programs and it can automatically change channels when adverts start. More compelling though is Quoll, a personal video recorder with a hard disk so you can record shows, time shift and automatically remove adverts. QuollDVD is a product still further down the line that will incorporate a DVD-R drive. The service will also attract a weekly fee of $AU2 or $AU3.
The most amazing part of the concept, and unlike Tivo, is the network it uses. Ordinarily Tivo-like services dial in to a server that provides updates and program guides. With ICE the network is wireless via a private digital radio network.
Time will tell us if it is just vapourware, or a true product.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | PVR, Video, Digital TV
iPod mini Sells Well in Oz.
According to an article on ARNnet, iPod mini fever causes stock shortages, the Australian launch of the iPod mini was very successful. There were limitations on the number available, but an Apple Centre director claimed that helped up-sell to the larger model. Gadget Lounge is still waiting for photos of the iPod mini or 4G iPod at Australian landmarks. Please send ‘em through.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Music
Skype Launches 1.0 For Windows.
Skype 1.0 for Windows has just been released. For those who aren’t aware, Skype is the same group of people that released KaZaA, and they have a peer-to-peer client that makes calls to other clients via Voice over IP (VoIP), and recently has added the ability to call to mobile phones and land lines through the same network, known as SkypeOut. This is where the service starts to get interesting.
Last night my wife wanted to call a friend in Dubai. Through Telstra this call would cost $AU1.14 per minute on their best plan. We use Encircle to make international calls, which offers VoIP from any phone in Australia. They charge 71 cents per minute. On todays exchange rate, Skype would charge 37 cents per minute (see their rates). So there are savings to be made. For 22 countries, of which Australia is included, they offer a rate of 3 cents per minute.
Worth a look for Windows, Linux and Pocket PC users.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Broadband, Software
July 27, 2004
Motorola Gets Good Press.
Motorola’s mobile phone devision has gone through some tough times in the last few years, losing market share and getting a reputation as a slow moving company that lacks innovation. When Ed Zander left Sun Microsystems and joined the company as CEO he had his work cut out for him. He’s been there for too short a time to say if he is making a difference, and the recent spate of press may have been set in motion long before he arrived, but there is certainly some buzz around the newly announced RAZR V3 and Apple iTunes collaboration.
The rumour is that the V3 is a V600 with a new case. Other than the anodised aluminum case and chemically etched keypad everything seems the same, MP3 ringtones (check Mobiledia for user experience of V600 MP3), MPEG 4 video, quad band, bluetooth, and digital camera. Our guess is there is a software update in there as well. So, with the new exterior, rather than measuring 24.5mm it is now 13.9mm deep (thin according to Motorola). The V600 currently retails for about $AU779 (less on a plan). I’d guess we’ll see the V3 in Australia just in time for Christmas, and for around $AU999 outright.
It makes sense for Motorola and Apple to collaborate. Ed, from his time at Sun, knows how important it is to partner with software companies. Apple wants its iTunes software, and more importantly its store to be as wide spread as Coke. Hopefully we’ll see an iTunes Music Store in Australia before the 2005 release of the new Motorola phones. The song capacity will vary depending on the phone memory, but initial speculation is it’ll be about a dozen.
According to the New York Times (registration required), Jobs said, “he called Motorola’s chief executive, Edward J. Zander, soon after Mr. Zander took over in January to suggest that the two companies work together on the project”.
Update : (July 27, 2004) Mobile-review.com already has a review of the V3.
Gadgetman | Comments (1) | Mobile Phone, Music
iPod Pinouts.
Player Blog points to some ingenious people that have reverse engineered the 3rd Generation iPod’s connector and provided Remote Protocol and Dock Pinout. This means that other ingenious people can then go and create their own additions to the device. Now that this is out, if they can take it to the next level and provide the protocol for what’s currently playing, then it would be great for someone to build Dan’s iPod mini projector.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Music
Grrl Geeks Fitness Coach.
We don’t normally cover games, but this one is a little different, and for the Grrl Geeks, since no respectable guy would buy this type of game, no we wouldn’t, would we. ResponDesign will be releasing Youself!Fitness for the PC and Xbox in November. Taking gaming from the kids room to the lounge room in the form of a fitness program, Yourself!Fitness gives a personalised training and meal planner. As you progress Maya, the virtual instructor, will adjust the training to meet your current level. If only I could do a virtual workout and achieve real results.
The “game” will help you assess your starting level, and continue to record your progress and will give you feedback on how you’re going in achieving the goals. The head reals at the possibility of plugging this into XBox Live and having fitness contests with your friends.
For the guys, if ResponDesign were to mix this with elements from BMX XXX, they’d have themselves a best seller.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Console
Olympics On Australian Digital TV.
Althought the Olympics will be broadcast in 4:3 aspect ratio, except for the opening and closing ceremonies, digital TV users in Australia will still be able to rejoice. According to today’s article in the Australian IT section, Seven gears up for the Games, channel 71 will use the extra space given by a 16:9 signal to provide extra information like news, results and a medal tally, all as they happen. Many digital users are used to sporting events being broadcast in the lower aspect ratio, which always comes down to the transmitting countries license with receiving countries. Since most nations haven’t adopted digital TV, the majority still require a standard signal. It’s good to see Seven taking the initiative and adding extra features. Bring it on.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Digital TV
July 26, 2004
Telstra Adds ADSL To Rural Exchanges.
Telstra has taken advantage of the Federal Government’s Higher Bandwidth Incentive Scheme (HiBIS) to lower the threshold for certain rural exchanges for ADSL.
Internet Service Providers, like Telstra Bigpond, require a certain number of people to connect to ADSL on a given exchange for it to be financially viable (and you thought economics was the same as home economics). So, in rural areas, Telstra have used the incentive payments to pump up the funds and so reduce the lower limit. In built up areas, like major suburbs, this isn’t as much of a factor, but for rural areas it can hamstring geeks who need their bandwidth.
So Telstra is using the financial incentive to lower the limit for a bunch of exchanges. With enough interest, to as little as 35 connections. 99 towns have now exceeded their new number, while another 150 are within reach. If you’re in one of the towns not on the list, get 30 people to register and they’ll set the “required interest” and get you on it.
If you’re rural, check the ADSL Demand Register because your exchange may be one of the 99, or even the other 150.
Telstra’s media release, which includes how you register interest is available here.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Broadband
Australian Telecom Magazine Awards 2004.
Australian Telecom Magazine has announced the finalists for the
5th Annual Australian Telecom Magazine Awards 2004 that will be held in Sydney on September 22. This year they’ve made voting available on the web by way of a form, so we guess that means anyone can vote, as long as you don’t mind the spam that will follow. Required fields include name, address and email. It’s an interesting mix, given that there is a “Best Network Hardware Supplier” in with a “Best ISP” and “Best Mobile Phone Retailer”. It is an industry magazine of course, so it’s not aimed at the home user. There are some obvious omissions, but a shorlist’ll do that every-time. We’ll keep you posted when results are announced in September.
Gadgetman | Comments (0) | Mobile Phone, Broadband
