Thanks to intern Errol Pierre-Louis for this review!
Photographers, real estate people, graphic designers, and anyone else who works with large data files but doesn't want to purchase an expensive portable hard drive: The StarTech InfoSafe 2.5" USB 2.0 On-The-Go Drive Enclosure offers a secure way to take your files with you. It can turn any compatible 2.5-inch hard drive into a travel-size storage unit.
The On-The-Go Drive works without a PC: You can hook it up to a USB device, like you would a digital camera or MP3 player, and with one button, transfer all your files to the enclosed hard drive. It's hot-swappable, so you can connect and disconnect it while the computer is running, and you can power it with an included battery pack that requires 4 double-A batteries. I wouldn't call it pocket size, but it's slim and doesn't take up much space.
To use it, you need a hard drive formatted with FAT 32. You have to push in the side tabs holding it in place--harder than it sounds. The instruction manual suggests using a pen or a screwdriver. You then slide out a tray of clear plastic with an adhesive strip, fix your hard drive to the tray, pop it back in, and voila: You've got yourself a portable hard drive. The IDE enclosure we looked at costs $62.99, and the SATA version goes for $69.99
That should probably read, my Sanyo Katana review. I got some time to test Sprint's hot new RAZR clone, and it's quite pretty. It probably won't thrill the crazed feature-hounds who comment on Engadget threads, but it will do pretty well among voice-oriented consumers who are looking for something even more RAZR-ish than the Samsung MM-A900. And it comes in pink. I suspect the pink one is going to do quite well indeed.
One mystery: why does a low-to-midrange phone have a super-high-res 320x240 screen? That makes for some great Opera Mini Web surfing, but it seems out of place on a non Power Vision device with no streaming video or high-powered camera.
If you liked Herbie the Love Bug, then you'll love Volkswagen's self-driving VW Golf GTi '53 plus 1. The German auto-maker took the concept of the lovable car with a mind of its own off the silver screen and onto the streets with this new prototype, initially built to help VW engineers test out vehicles. It can steer, brake, and accelerate up to 150 mph without any human intervention.
The most salient point though, is how the GTi '53 finds its way. It isn't remote-controlled or preprogrammed: It uses grill-mounted radar and laser sensors to read the road and send back details to the car's computer, and a GPS navigation system can pinpoint the car's position to within an inch. To help convince naysayers, VW invited guests to put the car to the test by designing their own roadcone courses and watching the GTi zip through on its own.
With so many car elements going automatic, from cruise control to radar operated pre-crash systems, it may not be too long before we leave the driving to the car altogether.
Thanks to intern Errol Pierre-Louis for this review!
Need a device that that can turn your PC into a gaming/entertainment center? The Adaptec GameBridge 1400 ($69.99) and GameBridgeTV 1410($99.99) are adaptors that let you play and record console games on your PC; the GameBridgeTV also lets you watch and record TV shows on your computer.
Either Gamebridge works with the PS2, Xbox, Xbox 360, and GameCube. Setup and installation are simple. Once you have the device installed, just hook up your console to the 4-in-1 cable and hit Play. The interface is easy to figure out.
A feature I really enjoyed is Record: Instead of just gloating over a single in-game replay, you can really rub it in by sharing saved MPEGs of your gaming dominance. With the GameBridgeTV, the television connection works just as well. You can use your PC to do anything you already do on your TV, and also record TV content as a video file. You can even record VHS tapes and convert them to DVD disks.
You're definitely going to want more than the 1.3-Ghz processor and 256MB of RAM listed in the system requirements. I used the GameBridge on a 2-year-old laptop with a 2.66 Pentium 4 and 512MB of RAM, and the game lagged when I was recording or doing anything other than just playing a game. But with a souped-up gaming PC or laptop and the GameBridge, you might never want to play on your TV again.
Back in high school, everything seemed to occur outside my locker: breakups, fist fights, makeout sessions, last-minute studying sessions, and wannabe rappers trying to make a beat. Seems like only yesterday!
If you're still reminiscing those high school years, you don't have to give up your locker just yet. (I know, bad transition, right?) OASYS Mobile.com is adding to their portal of premium mobile media content, products and services with the "Virtual Locker".
How many times have you lost your cell phone or had it stolen? And how many times have you cursed at the sky for losing all of your contacts, games, and images? OASYS Mobile wants to alleviate your frustrations by offering its consumers to store their ring tones, games and wallpaper in cyberspace free of charge. For example, you purchase a ringtone from OASYSMobile.com and then accidentally delete it from your phone. No worries: everything in your locker can be resent to your phone. Even if you buy a new phone, you can transfer all of your stored mobile content to your new phone.
The Virtual Locker is password protected with the ability to communicate with friends through your own mobile blog to share camera photos and save text messages.
There are two plans to choose from. You can go the Basic Free route, where you can save up to 25 pieces of mobile content in your virtual locker. Or opt for the 3&3 Club for $7.99 a month, which gives you three ringtones and three wallpapers each month; three free TrueTones when you register; and the virtual locker where you can save an unlimited amount of content.
But does OASYS Mobile offer anything that's actually good? Sure. Choose from 92 games, 3000+ wallpapers, 4000+ ringtones, and premium channels such as Grateful Dead Mobile and Hooters Mobile Calendar.
[Thanks to PC Maggers Laarni and Kyle for the tip!]
Want to improve the cockpit ergonomics of new cars? Get rid all that stuff that's taking up valuable console space. You need the elbow room.
The ideal controller configuration lets you rest the underside of your wrist on a flat, padded surface for support while you're driving and making selections. But the controller has to be far enough forward so you're not bending your arm backward, and also close enough that you're not plunging your arm down at a sharp angle to reach a controller just a few inches in front of the armrest. The console represents valuable real estate that is often home to two cupholders, an ashtray, the shifter, a couple switches, the handbrake lever, a second 12-volt socket, and the cockpit controller.
The ashtray is the easiest to lose. Fewer than a fifth of Americans smoke (even fewer who drive higher-end cars), and smokers can always insert an ashtray in a cupholder. The shifter can be replaced by a dashboard shifter stub, as on the Toyota Prius, complemented by paddle shifters behind the wheel for sporty cars, though a manual transmission needs to remain on the console. And while a center console handbrake looks cool, step-on handbrakes work just as well. Now you've got plenty of room for the cockpit controller.
Having used all the automakers' controllers, I'm convinced the best solution is a big, easy-to-grip control knob with "hard" buttons (meaning one button does just one task) dedicated to the radio, CD/satellite, navigation, a moving map display, setup, and the car computer. Currently, Audi has the best solution, the MMI (for multimedia interface).
Ideally, the controller functions are duplicated by a good voice-recognition system and by console or dashboard buttons for most common tasks. You shouldn't need three separate movements of the cockpit controller to switch on audio or adjust the temperature.
Unless you have a smart controller with hard buttons, workable voice input, and redundant controls: you're not going to have a happy driver. And even then, note that the three cars that took the biggest declines in the most recent J.D. Power Survey on Initial Quality Satisfaction (BMW, Audi, Mercedes) are the three most in love with cockpit controllers.
Hot on the heels of the Nokia N80 comes the nation's second 3-megapixel cameraphone, the Samsung SCH-A990, released today by Verizon. The A990 is a $349 (with two-year contract) flip phone with a rotating screen that you can hold "camcorder-style" to take shots with the autofocus 3.2-megapixel camera. The camera has a flash, but no optical zoom; that's probably good given that Samsung's two optical-zoom cameraphones so far were a bit of a mess. You save your photos onto a MicroSD memory card.
The A990 also supports printing over Bluetooth, V CAST Music and streaming video, and business card scanning. I'll have to get one in here before I can say anything about the photo quality, but this seems to be more of a pure camera/phone compared to the N80, which is a do-everything smartphone. The A990's real competition will be Sony Ericsson's 3-megapixel K790, which promises superior photo quality and may be released on Cingular sometime before my baby daughter leaves home and starts a family of her own.
Buried in today's announcement that 10 New York City parks were getting free Wi-Fi by the end of this summer is an interesting Nokia angle. Nokia is helping to build the networks for the parks. Anyone with a laptop or other Wi-Fi device will be able to log on and get the usual Internet stuff. But if you're using a Wi-Fi Nokia device like the Nokia N80, N91 (shown at left) or Nokia 770 Internet Tablet, you'll get exclusive mobile sites with local information designed for use in the parks, according to Nokia spokeswoman Camilla Gragg. "Our aim is to have obviously to have access to additional, free content in the park when you are surfing the Wi-Fi network through a Nokia device," she said. Nokia is currently lining up content partners; one of them will be the free newspaper AMNewYork, that paper said today.
For a $500 phone, the Nokia N80s are apparently "selling like hotcakes" at the manufacturer's store in Chicago, Nokia spokesman Keith Nowak said. He was at the store on opening day, June 24th, and said geeks lined up to get the 3-megapixel, Wi-Fi-laden super-phones. Hmm, maybe someone at Cingular will finally notice there's a market for these things.
Sometimes it's good to be king. In celebration of his 60th birthday, President George Bush received a copy of Brain Age and a DS Lite from Nintendo. Here's an excerpt from the letter Nintendo sent to him:
Dear President Bush:
Happy Birthday!
Don't worry, turning 60 is an exciting milestone. As you know, you've joined millions of other baby boomers in an invigorating new decade of your life. And, like many boomers, you may be looking for ways to keep your mind sharp. That's where we come in.
Please accept our gift of a new Nintendo DS Lite system and a copy of Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day...It's obvious you don't have a lot of time to play games, which makes Brain Age such a great activity for you - just a few minutes a day with more than 15 daily training tests will help keep your mind sharp.
Apparently, White House reporter Helen Thomas asked the President his brain age. Instead, he uses his brain training for more important things, such as plotting the US foreign policy plan for Iran in Advance Wars: Dual Strike.
I love to go on picnics. Of course, my picnics are a little more relaxing than let's say, Mr. Bean's in the classic episode, "The Trouble with Mr. Bean". (He fights off a fly, shakes lettuce out with his dirty sock, pulls a fish out of his pocket--yeah, it's kinda gross!) To this day, I still don't have the right kind of tote to lug around my food and my important gadgets. That is, until I came across the Insulating Neoprene Lunch Tote.
This 1.5-pound tote is made of neoprene which helps to insulate your food or drink items for up to four hours. Or you can use it to carry around your PDA, cell phone, MP3 player, or portable media player.
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