The Mobile Gadgeteer

May 16th, 2008

Photo of rumored Palm Treo 800w appears

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 7:40 am

Categories: Windows Mobile, Palm, Smartphone, Rumors, Wireless carriers

Tags: Microsoft Windows Mobile, Palm Inc., Palm Treo, Photograph, Microsoft Windows, Palm OS, Keyboards, Operating Systems, Handhelds, Software

Back in the day when I had a Palm OS Treo I used to load up the custom ROMs created by Shadowmite since they took out a bunch of junk that was included by default and helped me recover some available memory. It seems he scored the first photos of the rumored upcoming Windows Mobile Palm Treo 800w. It seems his site is getting hit hard so check out Palm Infocenter for the photo and more rumored specs of this device. It look like a Palm OS Centro device with a couple more keys to activate the Windows Mobile soft keys.

Apparently, the device may be running Windows Mobile Professional 6.1 (touch screen) on a 320×320 resolution display. The CPU may be around 400 mHz, it may have 128MB RAM and 256MB ROM, have EV-DO Rev. A, integrated GPS receiver (a first for Palm), and integrated WiFi (another first for a Palm smartphone). With the EV-DO support it will come from Sprint or Verizon, but no availability is yet known. Sprint was the first to get the Centro so maybe they will get the 800w first as well.

I personally enjoyed using the Palm Centro device, but have moved on from the Palm OS so I did not buy one for myself. This Windows Mobile version is tempting, but at this time I would actually liked to have seen a non-touch screen device from Palm running Windows Mobile since I find the Standard/non-touch screen devices to be snappier and more stable while still having 90% of the functionality of the touch screen devices.

May 15th, 2008

Aliph releases new Jawbone that is 50% smaller than the original

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 7:09 am

Categories: Windows Mobile, Smartphone, On the road, Gadgets, Wireless carriers, Feature phones

Tags: Gram, Battery, AT&T Corp., Model, Aliph Jawbone, Battery Life, Engineering, Retail, Matthew Miller

IMHO, one of the best Bluetooth headsets you can buy (after getting the swing of putting it on and off) is the Aliph Jawbone. Today the announced a new model that has several improvements that look like they actually listened to what consumer wanted changed. There should be one at my house and a review will be coming shortly.

The new Jawbone is available today in AT&T retail stores or via AT&T and Aliph’s sites for US$129.99. It is 50% smaller than the current model and has a cooler design. Thay really tried to focus on making it look like a fashionable accessory so you don’t look like a dork wearing it around all day. AIt comes in gold, silver, and black. I think the new leather earstrap looks more comfortable and easy to attach so I look forward to trying it myself.

They use their NoiseAssassin technology (developed by DARPA and not to be confused with the Darma initiative) with Voice Activity Sensor and Digital Signal Processing to give you the experience where background noise is removed while your voice is clear.

The new Jawbone weighs 10 grams compared to the previous model at 14 grams. Battery life is stated to provide you with over 4 hours of talk time and over 8 days of standby, which both exceed the capacity of most of my phones.

May 15th, 2008

Mobius Seattle 2008; First impressions of the HTC Advantage X7510

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 6:38 am

Categories: Windows Mobile, On the road, Review, Microsoft, HTC

Tags: High Tech Computer Corp., Device, Mobius, Key, HTC Advantage 7510, Keyboards, Hardware, Peripherals, Matthew Miller

As I stated in my Mobius Seattle 2008 Day one post eric lin from HTC gave each one of the attendees the new HTC Advantage 7510 device. These may not come to the U.S. due to Qualcomm import issues, but you will be able to pick them up from U.S. importers in the next few months. My most popular post from 2007 was my full review of the HTC Advantage 7501 and to this day it remains one of my most used and functional devices. I think there is a user profile for a device like this and someone like me that commutes 2+ hours a day and travels is the perfect target market. The HTC Advantage 7510 builds on an already great device and I was ecstatic to receive one to evaluate.

Thanks to Judie at Gear Diary for taking and sharing this shot of me with 4 Advantage devices (3 new) and my REDFLY.

The most notable difference in the newer model is the new haptic feedback keyboard. The new keys are larger and flatter than the old keys, but the key makes a bloop sound and vibrates when pressed. I found a way to turn off the sound, but that seems to also turn off the vibration so I will have to look around a bit more for this setting. The new keyboard does sort of work on the old Advantage, but the keys are still mapped to the old keyboard where there was no dedicated number row like there is now so it really is not usable. unless you have an older Advantage sitting right next to you.

This device is also all black, unlike the silver 7510 I saw at Mobile World Congress from T-Mobile. I also noticed that the Read the rest of this entry »

May 15th, 2008

Mobius Seattle 2008: SE, MWg, and HTC show off their devices

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 2:01 am

Categories: Windows Mobile, HTC

Tags: High Tech Computer Corp., Device, Mobile, Mobius, XPERIA, SE, Panel Technology, Microsoft Windows, Advertising & Promotion, Operating Systems

I was very pleased to be invited to the first Mobius event of 2008, that is actually being held here in the Seattle area. Thus, I had no travel to get to Mobius and that may have made the decision to invite me to this event even easier for the organizers. I picked up my buddy Joel from Geek.com at the airport and then we headed over to Fry’s for a little shopping. I bought Mario Kart for the Wii and an extra steering wheel and then we raced each other for about 20 minutes. Lots of my Twitter buddies are sharing codes for the cool online game play functionality and I plan to play with friends all over the world this weekend.

Opening reception: The Mobius event kicked off as usual with an evening reception at the hotel library, Hotel 1000, where the event is being held in downtown Seattle.

Five of the 21 attendees at this event are new to the Mobius group. The attendees and their sites are listed below:

• Joel Evans, Geek.com
• Paul O’Brien, MoDaCo.com
• Arne Hess, The Unwired
• Ryan Block, Engadget
• Judie Lipsett, Gear Diary
• Rich Brome, PhoneScoop
• Jason Dunn, Thoughts Media
• Michael Oryl, Mobile Burn
• Lisa Gade, MobileTechReview
• Viroon Vichianwattanachai, Thai-G.com
• Ed Hardy, Brighthand
• Sascha Segan, Gear Log
• Tadd Rosenfield, MSMobiles
• Pressian Karakostov, Phonearena.com
• G-A Gay, Akihabara News
• Derrick Ngan, Pocket PC.com HK
• Lim Beng Sun, MyPDACafe
• Chiang , Mobile01.com
• Diego Magnani, Windows Mobile Italy
• Sacha Fuentes, Xataka.com
• Matt Miller, ZDNet Mobile Gadgeteer

It was great, as always, to meet new friends and talk with old friends at the reception. John gave a short welcome speech to all and then asked us who made the first flip phone in the U.S. The prize was a 4GB Zune and no one was getting the right answer so he said it is three letters, ends in E, and starts with G. Lots of folks then shouted out GTE and John threw the Zune my way, but I heard Rich Brome shout it before that and passed it back to him. Folks from the Microsoft hardware group gave each of us a wireless mouse and webcam on the way out the door. Several of us then went down to the hotel restaurant for a quick bite before retiring for the evening. I personally then drove the 45 miles home to sleep for a few hours before returning for the next full day.

Day One: The day kicked off with John Read the rest of this entry »

May 13th, 2008

Opera Mini 4.1 comes out of beta and earns a spot as my right soft key shortcut

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 12:48 pm

Categories: Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian, Mobile software, BlackBerry, Nokia, On the road, Feature phones, S60, Nseries

Tags: Opera Software, Channel Management, Internet, Telecom & Utilities, Marketing, Matthew Miller

It was only a month ago that I mentioned the release of Opera Mini 4.1 beta and today I received the announcement that the full release of Opera Mini 4.1 is now available to download and install for free. It is so good that it has now earned a place as the right soft key on all of my Nokia S60 devices, including the new Nokia N82 I just received to evaluate.

Opera Mini 4.1 had a very successful beta period and launches with web access being up to 50% faster, ability to search for text within a web page, easier URL entry with recognition based on bookmarks and browsing history, ability to upload and download files without kicking into your phone’s native browser, and ability to download pages for offline viewing (JSR-75 support needed).

My personal favorite feature that came out in Opera Mini 4 is the ability to sync my bookmarks. I can simply install Opera Mini 4.1 on every device and always have the same bookmarks up and running in a few seconds. I find Opera Mini 4.1 to be very fast, especially the page scrolling, and love the shortcut support that really makes browsing from a keypad-enabled phone very easy and intuitive. If you haven’t tried Opera Mini 4.1 on your device, then I highly recommend you get it now and surf the internet like it was meant to be surfed.

May 12th, 2008

Mobile software Monday: HanDBase 4.0 and Nokia Podcasting

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 9:36 am

Categories: Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian, Mobile software, Smartphone, Nokia, Review, S60, Nseries, Mobile software Monday

Tags: Application, Device, Nokia Corp., Mobile, Podcasting, S60, Nokia Podcasting Application, Submissions, Podcasts, Storage

My plan was to post software reviews here every Monday, but at times my schedule and life doesn’t allow me to give a full test of a software package and write up my thoughts so I missed last week. Thus, I am posting a double review this week on Mobile software Monday. The first application is HanDBase 4.0 from DDH Software and I tested it on Windows Mobile touch and non-touch screen devices. The second application is a free one for S60 devices that actually comes preloaded on some devices and it is call Nokia Podcasting. It is actually one of my most used applications so I wanted to share some thoughts with you on my experiences. You can view screenshots for both applications in my image gallery.

	Image Gallery: There are several screenshots of the HanDBase and Nokia Podcasting applications in my image gallery.

HanDBase 4.0: DDH Software has been selling its very popular HanDBase application now for 10 years and there are versions available for Windows Mobile, Palm, and S60 devices. This latest version, 4.0, has lots of new features, including new security features, sync improvements and improvements across all platforms. There are some differences in functionality in the different versions and the screenshots in my image gallery are from my T-Mobile Shadow (non-touch screen Windows Mobile device). On my T-Mobile Shadow, I cannot create new databases on the device while touch screen users can create new databases right from the device. This makes sense since people use non-touch screen devices more for simple, quick text entry rather than heavy text entry.

I have a few custom databases that I created for project tracking, paid time off tracking, prayer lists, and more. You can sync ODBC/Access databases from your desktop to your mobile devices using the desktop application to setup the sync options. If you want help getting started you can also visit the database gallery where there are over 2,000 HanDBase databases that people have created and elected to share with everyone to use and then customize for their own usage.

You can import data in .CSV (comma-seperated value) format using the HanDBase desktop client, but keep in mind there is a 30 fields per record limit and a maximum of 65,000 records in a database. Further down the File menu (below the Import option) you will find options to Import from Access to an existing database or a new database so there is a simple utility for getting your Access databases into HanDBase format. You can also Export to .CSV, .XLS, .DOC, .HTML, and .XML formats.

After you have created a database on your Read the rest of this entry »

May 12th, 2008

MobileTechRoundup show #133, REDFLY and Nokia N82 arrive, IdeaPad U110 is rocking

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 7:37 am

Categories: Windows Mobile, Ultra portable PC, Nokia, MoTR podcast, Nseries

Tags: MobileTechRoundup, Nokia Corp., James, Podcasts, Internet, Matthew Miller

Listen here (MP3, 32.1 MB, 35:00 minutes)

Subscribe to the show with this link (RSS)

James, Kevin, and I were up early Saturday morning to record MobileTechRoundup show #133 and as you may be able to tell, my head wasn’t that clear as I talked about the Nokia N82 that just arrived (it actually does have stereo speakers, but I didn’t realize at first they were both on the same side). My REDFLY also arrived and is proving to be an effective device. James is loving the Lenovo IdeaPad U110 and we may just see him pull the trigger on another mobile computer before too long. We also talked a bit about Vista power management schemes (thanks for the heads-up Hector) and WiMAX in the U.S.

If you enjoy listening to the MobileTechRoundup podcast, please vote for us at Podcast Alley. Also, please let me know if you have anything you would like us to cover and discuss on the show and I’ll try to work it into a future podcast.

May 12th, 2008

RIM officially announces the BlackBerry Bold and a $150 million development fund

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 12:13 am

Categories: Smartphone, BlackBerry, Wireless carriers

Tags: Research In Motion Ltd., Mobile, RIM BlackBerry, Display, Handhelds, Smart Phones, Hardware, Consumer Electronics, Personal Technology, Matthew Miller

There have been rumors of a new BlackBerry design, often labeled the BlackBerry 9000 series, and today RIM posted the official announcement of the BlackBerry Bold smartphone that will be coming this Summer to a carrier near you. RIM also announced a US$150 million mobile applications and services development fund similar to what Apple has done with its developer fund a few months ago. RIM is serious about the smartphone market and isn’t about to give up to Apple, Microsoft, or Nokia anytime soon.

The upcoming BlackBerry Bold smartphone (aka 9000 series) will support tri-band HSDPA networks and include integrated GPS, WiFi, and Bluetooth radios. This baby will run with a speedy 624MHz processor and include 128MB Flash and 1GB on-board storage capacity, along with a microSD slot. The display is 480×320 high resolution and is not a touch display as some rumors stated. A major weakness with BlackBerry devices has been the web browser, but the press release states that this new browswer will support full desktop-style HTML and also allow streaming via RTSP - real-time streaming protocol. The device features a 2 megapixel camera with integrated flash. 5x digitial zoom is also supported, but I pretty much write off digitial zooming so this number means very little to me.

There was no pricing, release dates (only this summer), or carriers stated in the press release, but The Boy Genius Report stated it will be coming to AT&T first with a 1700 MHz model for T-Mobile following after.

RIM also announced a US$150 million venture capital fund for mobile applications and services. As stated in the press release, the BlackBerry Partners Fund is being formed to focus on applications and services for the BlackBerry platform and other mobile platforms including mobile commerce (payments, advertising, retailing and banking), vertical and horizontal enterprise applications, communications, social networking, location-based applications and services (navigation and mapping), media and entertainment, and lifestyle and personal productivity applications. There isn’t much more information provided on the fund, but an email address/hyperlink is given on the site to recieve more information.

May 9th, 2008

Mowser purchased by dotMobi; is there a need for a .mobi domain?

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 12:27 pm

Categories: On the road, mobile services

Tags: Mobile, Domain, Web Browser, Advertising & Promotion, Web Browsers, Marketing, Internet, Matthew Miller

A couple of weeks ago, Russell Beattie announced that Mowser was at the end of its life. His post took on a life of its own into a discussion of the mobile web and approaches to the internet on mobile devices. I heard today that Mowser will continue to live on as the service has been purchased by dotMobi. You can check out the press release for details. I’m glad that things worked out for Russell and wish him all the best in the future.

Even though I browse all the time on my mobile devices, I have to admit I have never visited a site with the .mobi internet domain extension and am not sold on its usefulness. I understand that by visiting a site with a .mobi domain people are assured that the site will be optimized for their mobile device. However, most every site I visit as a mobile enthusiast already has a mobile-optimized version at their standard URL or maybe even at their m.xxx.com URL and there doesn’t appear to be a real need for .mobi. With the iPhone’s Safari browser, S60 browser, Opera Mini, and more web browsers out there handling standard websites that may not have optimized pages, I think the real innovation in the mobile space is the browser more than the website itself. I do prefer to visit sites that are optimized and tons of sites have even optimized for the iPhone to take advantage of the full power of the device’s browser.

Do you visit .mobi sites? Is there a need for a mobile-specific domain such as .mobi?

May 9th, 2008

Nokia kicks off strategy to focus more attention on the U.S. wireless market

Posted by Matthew Miller @ 10:49 am

Categories: Smartphone, Nokia, Wireless carriers, Feature phones, S60

Tags: U.S., Strategy, Phone, Device, Nokia Corp., N96, Telecom & Utilities, Smart Phones, Wi-Fi, Wireless

I have been enjoying the recent posts on the Nokia Conversations site and a couple that I found particularly interesting was the post about Nokia’s changes in the USA and the interview with the N96 and N78 creators. One is directly applicable to U.S. users of Nokia products, like myself, and the other is an enjoyable video about a couple of devices that should be good sellers for Nokia soon.

I remember several years back when it seems everyone had either a Motorola or a Nokia mobile phone that was free from their U.S. wireless carrier. There are still quite a few Nokia devices provided by U.S. wireless carriers, but we haven’t seen them actively involved in the mid to high end smartphone market. People in the U.S. who have wanted the Nseries or Eseries, or even the 6xxx series devices have had to buy them SIM-unlocked from Nokia or other U.S. importers. There has been a bit of headway with the 6xxx series as shown by the 6555 with AT&T. In the Nokia Conversations article Nokia representatives state that 300 product managers have been assigned to AT&T and Verizon to help tailor devices to their customers.

I understand that the U.S. market is different than Europe and other parts of the world since most U.S. mobile phone owners just want the cheapest (or free) phone they can get that lets them make calls. I hope that this changes a bit and that people start looking at their phone as more of tool to stay in touch with text messaging, email, and phone calls. I could never go back to a standard phone now that I know how much my phone can actually do for me. It will be interesting to see what kind of products Nokia comes up with tailored to the U.S. market, but I am afraid at this time it may still be something like the Nokia 3650.

There are a few of us who want the high end devices and I believe as people start to see how much the Apple iPhone can do they may start looking around for higher end Nokia devices. However, Nokia’s support for these high end devices will have to get much better before I can recommend people go out and spend US$500+ for a device optimized for U.S. 3G bands. Every other Nokia N95 has received a firmware upgrade, except for the N95-3 North American version that actually came out before some other devices. This apparent lack of support for loyal N95-3 buyers has left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth and this kind of treatment should not occur in the future if Nokia wants to reach U.S. customers.

According to the CTIA, there were something like 255+ million U.S. wireless subscribers in December 2007. I believe that China and then India are in first and second place above the U.S. Western Europe (includes several countries) has something on the order of 450+ million subscribers. As you can see, there is a significant potential in the U.S. market. Nokia leads all other manufacturers in global market share with something like 40% of the market (this includes feature and smart phones), but if they can make a stronger showing in the U.S. and North America then that number could rise significantly. There were others who also seem excited to hear that Nokia will start taking a more serious look at the U.S.

The interview video was made with Daniel Dhondt, N96 designer, and Joeske Schellen, N78 creator. After seeing and getting a bit of hands-on time with both of these devices at Mobile World Congress in Spain I am looking forward to their release, with hopes that US 3G support will be coming as well. The Nokia N73 still remains one of my all-time favorite Nseries devices and with the added functionality in the N78 I think this will be one hot device. The N96 is quite a powerhouse, but until the U.S. gets DVB-H I don’t see a compelling reason to upgrade from my N95-3. BTW, it would have been nice to have seen these videos posted on Share on Ovi as well as YouTube ;)