Archive for the ‘Gadgets’ Category

3G iPhone Announced

Monday, June 9th, 2008

We all knew it was coming but now the 3G iPhone is official and here are a few of the new features:

  • It’s black with metal buttons, looks very similar to the fake shots that were floating around a  while ago
  • 3G (of course) will give faster data speeds than the current EDGE connections. Even faster than 3G on normal phones
  • Better battery life, 7 hours of video, 24 hours of audio and 5 hours 3G talk time.
  • A-GPS for location based computing as well as navigation
  • Enterprise support for Microsoft Exchange, Cisco VPN and MobileMe for the rest of us - Apple’s replacement for .mac
  • iPhone will be available in 70 Countries in the next few months. Rollout starts July 11th
  • MUCH cheaper, $199 for the 8GB version, that’s around £100 if it’s converted directly
  • 16 GB model will be $299 (around £150) and will have a white version

Have a look at Engadget’s live WWDC Coverage for more details
or of course The Apple Store lists it all too

Cheers,
Mitchel

First Impressions - Nokia 7500 Prism

Friday, May 23rd, 2008

Nokia 7500 PrismWoo, my first review here. So my shop has just started to get the Nokia 7500 Prism in stock. We were supposed to be getting them in way back in September and I’ve been looking forward to them for just as long. Anyway for reasons I don’t know, we have only started getting them now, and I’m slightly disappointed.
The funky look is what this phone is about and I have to admit it stands out, but it reminds me too much of an 80’s quilt cover to really impress me. I still like it though, it’s funkiness really draws me in and I just want to play with it more. I did however find the nipple (joystick, whatever you want to call it) a little bit annoying. It’s not quite as big as the ones I’m used to from Sony Ericsson phones, because of this, it’s a little fiddly to use, as are most of the buttons. It’s also a bit stiff. One annoyance which I could learn to easily live with is the placement of the menu keys. They are right to the edge of the handset and not directly under the menu text as they usually are.
As always, the software in the phone is familiar and easy to use. It’s similar to that of the 6300 or 6500 while still being slightly different, closer to the XpressMusic range perhaps.

All in all, a nice phone with easy to use software but not so easy to use buttons. Great if you want your phone to stand out, not so great if you want something you can instantly adapt to

Making the Plunge

Friday, April 11th, 2008

Despite how it may have seemed from my last few posts, I’m not an Apple fanboy. In fact, apart from an old Macintosh Classic I used to have at my grandparents’ in Ireland, my iPod is the first Apple product I have ever bought. I’m also quite operating system neutral. My primary machine boots both Windows XP and Ubuntu and although I always use windows for my web development and programming (ok, I admit I can’t get Apache to work properly in Linux and I don’t know how to use anything more advanced than Visual Basic) I love playing around in Ubuntu and getting a general feel for using Linux, especially playing with compiz-fusion.
I’ve always been curious about Macs. I’d heard great things about their usability and seen for myself how great they look. Eve the Apple Store in Regent Street had me fascinated with it’s huge glass staircases and tables littered with computers and iPods. I marveled over the iPhone when I got to play with one the day after its UK launch. Apple really are masters of design and really know how to keep their customers in suspense.
So anyway, just before I went away for easter I realized I would need a laptop if I wanted to carry on doing my coursework while I was in Ireland. I’d been looking at the Macbook Pro for a long time but couldn’t afford £1299 for a laptop. My attention turned to the bog-standard, 2.2Ghz Macbook instead which was still better than my current PC and a lot smaller which would make it a lot easier to bring on the plane. So I went to The Apple Store in Regent Street and they were really helpful. They helped me decide what setup I wanted (even though I just wanted the basic one), set up the finance plan for me (It was short notice, I didn’t have £699 just lying around) and I left with it that day.
So I’ve been using my new toy for a few weeks now and I love it. Even though I installed Windows on it, I only seem to use it when I’m programming now. OS X is just lovely. Really easy to navigate around and use, despite the lack of mouse buttons. It’s also pretty, but in a different way to the way I find Windows Vista pretty.

Pros

  • Great Looking
  • Easy to Use
  • Also runs windows - Everything I need
  • Most things seem to “Just Work”

Cons

  • Refuses to sync with my Mobile Phone (Sony Ericsson K850I)
  • Seems to pass viruses onto my Windows PC
  • The glossy screen fingerprints easy, as does everything Apple

So all in all, a lovely laptop, very pretty and easy to use

Cheers,
Mitchel

iPod Touch Jailbreak - Update

Friday, January 25th, 2008

Ok, so I’ve upgraded my iPod Touch to 1.1.3 now and it works! It does appear that you need to have a freshly jailbroken iPod though. I had to restore mine to 1.1.1 after the first time (it went into recovery mode) but it worked after I jailbroke that and installed oktoprep.

Some apps like Customize and Summerboard do not work properly but I imagine there will be a fix for them soon.

Screenshots will follow shortly

(Update - 11/4/08) Long overdue I know but here are the screenshots

Mobile Maps

Mobile Notes

Springboard

Mobile Scrobbler

Cheers,
Mitchel

iPhone 1.1.3 Jailbreak Released

Friday, January 25th, 2008

Ok, lets get stuck into my first real post on here.
I’m sure you read about the iPhone 1.1.3 Jailbreak that was discovered by the iPhone dev team a couple of weeks ago or that you at least know what Jailbreaking is. If not, Jailbreaking is a method used to install third party applications on your iPod Touch or iPhone.

The Iphone dev team have been Jailbreaking iPhones since the original 1.0.2 firmware so it was only logical that they would find a way to Jailbreak this one. Anyway, they came up with a Jailbreak for it and said that it would be released after Apple released the SDK in late February.

If you have a look on Nate True’s Blog, it appears that the Jailbreak has been released early (at least for the iPhone) and can be downloaded in the form of his iBrickr program.
This method is also rumored to work on the iPod touch (although it installs the iPhone firmware). I am currently in the process of Jailbreaking my iPod Touch so I’ll let you know if it works or not.

Also please remember, I cannot take any responsibility for any damage you cause to your iPod/iPhone/whatever else by trying this. It’s completely your responsibility.

Cheers,
Mitchel