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You are here: Home / Archives for gadgets

My Top 10 Gadgets for 2010

23-Dec-2010 by Jodie Miners

@ozdj has done a post on his top 10 gadgets for 2010 so I thought I’d join in.

  1. My HTC Desire Android Phone is definitely No. 1. After using 6 phones last year, this one is great.
  2. My Kindle (2nd Generation). This was a 2009 Xmas present, but I have used it extensively during the year and it has helped recover my love of books. I have read so much more.
  3. My Fujitsu Lifebook T5010 tablet laptop. I got this in January and I have used it almost every day as my main work PC – I love it, even though I don’t use the tablet much at all. It also has inbuilt 3G which I use quite a bit.
  4. My TiVo (This is a 2009 purchase but it is one of my top used gadgets for the year). I’ve also convinced a number of people to get one this year.
  5. Telstra T-Box – I don’t have Bigpond, so I don’t have one, but I love this device, and will strongly recommend it to anyone who does have Bigpond.
  6. My Xbox 360. Yes, I know I’m very late to the party with this one, and I don’t do games, but as a Media Extender for Windows 7 it works well (yes the TiVo is a Media Extender of sorts, but it is not so easy to use. This was a gift from Microsoft and Telstra from the #TelstraWP7 Social Review program, so it was a nice surprise addition to the gadget list for the year.
  7. My iPod Touch 32GB – after giving up the iPhone, having an iPod touch allows me to keep most of my apps, and I like having my music separate to my phone.
  8. My Sennheiser Ear Buds (currently lost). I used these a lot during my travels to and from Canberra. Now that I’ve lost them, I know how much I miss them. Must get a new pair.
  9. My Telstra MiFi device. This is a neat little device and it helped me get connection when Vodafone was having issues. (I’ve now swapped from Voda to Telstra).
  10. My Microsoft Arc Mouse – such a lovely little mouse to travel with.

Considering I travel with 6 of these gadgets (guess which 6), it is great to have some cool tech that is small and reliable.

Honourable Mentions (some of these may become 2011 gadgets):

  • Boxee Box – Would love to try one at least.
  • My Logitech Sqeezebox – love this! Stream music to the device from my PC over wireless and so cheap!
  • iPad – I don’t think I would buy one, (maybe when 2nd generation comes out), but if I had one I would use it.
  • My Canon MX860 Printer – now I know it’s a bit uncool to say that a printer is a cool gadget – but it has been the best printer I’ve ever had and it has not let me down once!
  • FitBit – not available in Australia, but hopefully coming soon – I would love to try it.
  • Samsung Series 9 LED TV – firstly I would need a new house to fit a 55″ TV, but I would love it just for the remote!

Dishonourable Mentions:

  • Samsung Galaxy Tab – meh – I expected so much more
  • Windows Phone 7 – not quite ready for prime time
  • Billion 7401VGP R3 Router – too complicated and keeps dropping WiFi connections

I can’t wait to see what new Gadgets 2011 will bring!

 

Filed Under: gadgets

Samsung Galaxy Tab Review

16-Nov-2010 by Jodie Miners

This week I have been lucky enough to have my hands on a Samsung Galaxy Tab to review. Thanks so much to MobiCity for providing me with the review unit, as it has enabled me to have a good play with it and decide if I would want to buy one myself. The short answer is No, not right now, but I will most likely get one eventually.

If you follow this blog, my twitter, or know me, you will know that I’m a bit of a gadget freak. I love to try out new gadgets and change my gadgets over frequently. (Last year I had 6 phones, including the iPhone, until I fell in love with my HTC Desire, which I’ve had for a few months now). I now know that I will never buy a gadget on a 2 year plan because I will never keep a gadget for more than a year at most.

There are many technical reviews of the Samsung Galaxy Tab out there on the Interwebz, so this review won’t be one of them. This is more about the look and feel of the device.

I really really wanted to love this device, I have high hopes for the slew of Android tablets that are on the horizon over the coming months. Since I love my HTC Desire so much, I thought that I would definitely love the Android in the tablet form factor.

Hardware and Form Factor

The 7″ screen size is interesting – smaller than an iPad and larger than a Phone. For a large male hand it would sit in the hand quite nicely, but I find it is a little big to hold in one hand, and it would be easy to mishandle and drop.

The screen, like most other gadgets of this sort, is a fingerprint magnet, and on a larger screen it is so much more noticeable, so keep your screen wipes handy.  The smooth white plastic back of the device is just as much of a fingerprint magnet as the glass front. As soon as a few greasy fingers have been near this device it is a very slippery sucker, and it will slip out of your hands and smash on the ground before you know it. (I was very careful with the review unit). Therefore a case will be necessary, but there are not a lot of accessories out there yet for this device.

One of the things I love about my HTC Desire is the hardware buttons. The Galaxy Tab, like the Galaxy phone and even the new HTC Desire HD all have “software buttons” or buttons that are integrated into the glass. Whilst the buttons on this device are backlit, they are not backlit all of the time, so in a dimly lit room, you have to fumble around to find a button to light up the buttons and find the right one. This is very annoying, especially when the home and menu buttons are in a different order on the Galaxy and the HTC devices.

Charging this device is a bit of a challenge. The new style PDMI cable is kinda cool, but difficult to get a hold of right now, so buy up a few when you buy the device. The device can not be charged via the PC or laptop, only when plugged in to the wall. Also, there is no LED on the device to tell you it is charging – surely this would be a useful thing to have. Once it is charged the battery life is pretty good and lasts longer than the phone.

No microphone input is a bit of a let down, as talking over Skype into the tiny Mic on the side of the device is strange. The call quality on the other end was not good. (I did try to get the front facing camera working with Skype but it did not work straight away so I did not bother trying to work out why).

ROM

I’m sorry to say, but the kiddy-like ROM on this device is just yuk compared to the beautiful lines and finesse of the HTC”s Sense UI. If I purchased this device, I would be putting a different ROM on there straight away (do this with caution though, if you are on a 2 year telco contract and want support on the device). At the moment, with no tablet specific Android ROM, this device is just a huge telephone.

Samsung, what were you thinking when you decided to put that ugly ugly home screen on what could be a beautiful device? If you want this thing to be compared to the iPad, it has to be at least as beautiful as the iPad. The hardware comes close, but the ROM, and specifically the default home screen lets it down, and it’s all about first impressions.

Another comparison to the iPad is the concept of “Instant On”. Yes, it’s instant on, if it’s already on, but booting up from scratch is quite slow, and slower than my Phone. So it’s not a device I will be taking out of my handbag to google something in a hurry. (Oh, and yes, it can fit in my handbag, where an iPad would not – my handbag is not that big).

Apps

I installed and set up the basic apps like Twitter, Gmail, Skype etc, plus some apps that I thought might work well for the larger form factor of the tablet like Tweetdeck.

The built in apps like Mail (which I would not use, as I would use Gmail) and Calendar take up the large screen nicely, but the Calendar is an ugly shade of brown, which makes it very difficult to enjoy using.

I connected to my Dropbox account and used the inbuilt Think Free office to edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents. This is something that I would not bother to do on my Phone as the screen is too small, and I’ve got my laptop with me most days. That worked kinda smoothly and would be something that I think I would use – for quick on the go edits before sending a document off via email (as long as it was not a heavily formatted document, as I would be worried that it would loose the formatting).

YouTube and Maps work very well on this size screen, and it is a beautiful screen, so the device is made for these types of apps. The browser is nice to use, and many sites benefit from the larger screen real estate. Some apps, like Tweetdeck and twitter, are actually harder to use on this size screen as there is much scrolling needed to get through the larger sized tweets. When someone comes up with a twitter app similar to the iPad app, that will be really cool.

It comes with a built in e-book reader, and of course, you can download the kindle app.  Having a lovely screen means that the e-books look great, but there is just something nice about the e-ink display on my kindle that would bring me back to the kindle for long term reading. It’s also a lot heavier than the kindle, so harder to read whilst lying on the couch.

Overall

It is a great lounge room or kitchen device, something that just hangs around the house, plugged in and connected to the Wifi, ready for casual browsing, recipes and tweeting whilst watching TV. Whilst I’m out and about, I would probably not use it that much. I did take it car shopping with me, and did get it out to look up some documents on PDF that I needed for the finance figures, so that was useful. Some people are using their iPad as device to take to conferences, and / or on short trips instead of their laptops. I’m not sure that this device would work for that purpose just yet, but it could grow on me.

So, would I buy a Samsung Galaxy right now. No, not for $999 – not when it is more expensive than the iPad. MobiCity has them outright for cheaper than the RRP at $989, and I’m sure the price will drop a bit more in the coming weeks. If it was pitched at the $599 mark then yes, I would definitely buy it. Then I would not worry so much about dropping it, scratching it, or modding the ROM.

If you are going to buy this device, I would strongly recommend buying it outright from MobiCity rather than on a Telco’s 2 year plan, because it is not a gadget that will last you 2 years – you will want to upgrade it to something new and better within the year, and give the old one to your Mum or something (well, that’s what I tend to do, anyway).

It’s interesting that I showed this device to at least 10 people in the week that I had it, and not one of them was enamoured with the device enough to even think about wanting to purchase one. If you had shown an iPad in the first few weeks of release to 10 people, I’m sure that at least half of them would be convinced that they needed or at least wanted one.

I personally will wait, until either a cheap enough generic android tablet is readily available, or I can get one of these for a few hundred dollars less in a few months time. As I’ve just spent all my money buying a new car, there are no more dollars for Xmas gadgets for me this year. So, for the ability to play with the device for a week, I am so grateful to MobiCity – they has allowed me to have my gadget fix, without the post-purchase regret.

Filed Under: Android, gadgets

Some Media Coverage

31-Jan-2010 by Jodie Miners

Just a quick post as I like to keep track on my blog of other places I am mentioned.

I recently had an interesting experience of having an article and photo shoot done of me and my new Kindle featured in The Australian IT section. It was interesting to have my pic show up on the front page of the Australian IT website for a day. The article was good and the photographer did a great job and the end result was a great photo of the kindle with me in the background.

See the full article here.

The second bit of coverage is a video that I was in, taken at a Girl Geek event late last year. The video is talking about mentoring tips for younger women entering IT. As usual, I find all video’s of me to be horrible but once you have gotten over the horror of seeing yourself on video the first time, it gets easier.

The video is on the blog of the wonderful Catherine Eibner and can be seen here. I’m at 4min 25 seconds, but it is worth watching the whole video.

Filed Under: gadgets, Me

Too Many Gadgets?

2-Jan-2010 by Jodie Miners

If you know me, you know that I love my gadgets… but can there ever be too many new gadgets? I think I may have surpassed even my quest for new gadgets over this Christmas / New Year period. This is just a quick list of the new (or new to me) gadgets that I have been playing with / setting up over the last few weeks and next few weeks.

It did not really occur to me that I had a gadget problem until the gadget to end all gadgets came to me on New Year’s Eve. A wonderful and completely unexpected gift of a Kindle from two very beautiful friends. I was floored and so touched that all I could do was cry (yep, still teary now whilst writing this). All I can say is WOW! Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!

So here is the list…

Work Gadgets

  • Dell Laptop – about 5 years old, and only 1GB of RAM, so it probably won’t last long… but lots of setup needed on it
  • Nokia E51 – a decent business phone. The data doesn’t yet work and I haven’t synced it so still lots more setup to do
  • Next week it will be setting up the new desk with extra monitor, docking station etc etc

Gadgets for Family (At least these were just set up and go, no further maintaining required)

  • New TiVo
  • New 24″ Widescreen Monitor
  • New wireless keyboard and mouse
  • New Kogan 10.4″ Digital Photo Frame
  • And re-located and re-set up Router / Modem (although I did not have to do much set up on this one), Set Top Box and Old TV.

Gadgets for Friends – Yet to be set up

  • Nokia 6120 – a good all round phone
  • Telstra wireless home phone / answering machine bundle
  • Skype Out (not technically a gadget, but something I need to set up)

Gadgets for me

  • 2nd Hand HTC Magic, Android phone – have had it for 3 weeks now and have not really even played with it yet (Having owned 4 phones in 2009, and tried at least another 3, I’m a bit over phones at the moment)
  • New Canon Pixma MX860 Printer
  • New Vodafone 3G Wireless
  • New Laptop (coming in 2 weeks time)
  • My current Eee PC (which had some issues so needed some TLC)
  • I’m still getting used to the iPhone which I’ve had for about 3 months and I still haven’t really set up my PC correctly since Windows 7 was installed
  • and the New Kindle!!!!!

So the moral to this story is, if I ever ever say again that I NEED a new gadget, or my life will not be complete unless I have the latest phone that comes out… please remind me to re-read this post.

However, having said that, I can’t wait for all the announcements to come out of CES in the next few weeks, and I’m sure the perfect phone device is just around the corner…

Ah, there is no hope for me…

Filed Under: gadgets, Me

Looking for a new Mobile Device

13-Dec-2008 by Jodie Miners

I’m after a new Mobile Device and a new Mobile plan… notice I didn’t say I’m after a new Mobile Phone, because I actually don’t make that many phone calls. I currently have a Nokia 6110 purchased in October 2007. I usually find that I either want or need a new device after 1 year. This time I need one as the 6110 is showing it’s age and not behaving well.

The most things I use a mobile device for, in order of use, are:

  • Clock and Alarm Clock – I don’t wear a watch
  • Calendar – to sync with my Google Calendar
  • Contacts – Including Syncing to my O-Sync account
  • Twitter
  • SMS
  • Gmail whilst out and about
  • Voicemail
  • Phone
  • Calculator
  • Maps
  • General Internet
  • To Do List
  • Notes
I very rarely use my mobile device for:
  • Music
  • Photos / Video
  • MMS
  • Voice Recording (only because you can’t attach them to reminders)
  • Video calling
  • Games
  • Reading office documents
  • Internet downloads
The additional features I want on my mobile device that I don’t have currently are
  • WiFi
  • Better Camera
  • Larger Screen
  • Less slippery, glossy buttons
  • Unlimited Internet usage
  • Push Gmail
I am currently on a Vodafone $79 cap. I love Vodafone 90% of the time. Their My Vodafone website sux, their new business plans are terrible, and their timed internet connection is not so great, but their network, service and billing is generally great.
For $79 I get $550 worth of calls and 100 free text messages a month. The $550 value includes all calls, national and international text messages (great for twitter) and internet charged at $1 per 5 mins. The $1 per 5 mins is the only part of that package that sux, because I hate restricting the time I’m online for. Thankfully however, the new Vodafone Internet Cap Plans are available and I can get 400mb included in my $79 cap plan. I think 400mb should be ok.
I recently tried a Palm Treo Pro for two weeks courtesy of the excellent promotion from Palm called Trial a Treo (I wish all manufacturers did this, because I want to trial a Blackberry Bold, a HTC Touch Pro and an N96 – even if it was for a few days only). The Treo for me was a love / hate relationship. There were things I loved about it and things I absolutely hated and the qwerty keyboard was one of the things I hated. The Treo is a Windows Mobile 6.1 device – now some of the things that I love and hate about it may be related to WinMo and some may be related to the device, but as it’s the first WinMo device I’ve trialled for any length of time, I just don’t know which is which, but here are some other things to love / hate about the Treo:
Love
  • The size and feel of the device
  • The touch screen (but I’m still not convinced I could go for a full touch screen like the iPhone, Omnia, or Blackberry Storm)
Hate
  • The Alarm – who’s stupid idea was it to have an alarm that beeps 3 times then turns off! My God! How is that ever going to wake anyone up! Thankfully I downloaded G-Alarm which does the job.
  • The phone just turning off in the middle of about 1/3rd of my calls.
  • When holding the phone up to my ear my face opens up multiple apps whilst being on the phone – yes you can disable the touch screen whilst being on a call, but then you can’t use the speakerphone at all – WTF! who’s brilliant idea was that?
  • The connection manager – the first day I had the Treo it connected to the internet and stayed connected for 2.5hrs before I realised. That is $30 pff my plan, and it only downloaded 2kb in that time! It also connected on it’s own at least 3 other times, even though I had turned off all auto connections. And it’s just too much of a pain to go into the connection manager to turn off the internet connection.
  • The keyboard – keys are too small and too slippery. I did try the other WinMo input methods but they are very slow. I tried using it with fingernails and thumb pad and either way didn’t work too well. The keys are too slipery for fingernails and too small for thumbs.
  • Wifi – as soon as the screen goes into sleep mode the Wifi turns off – again WTF! – can have an active Wifi connection without using it for a max of 1min!

Ok the hate list is getting too long and the love list is a bit light on. But when I got my old 6110 back again after using the Treo, it just felt right, and was easy to use, and did all the things I wanted it to do. So I guess I shall have to stick with a Nokia. I think my bad experience with the treo has turned me off WinMo devices for now.

I had a quick play with the blackberry bold and even though the keyboard was really nice to use, the trackball would drive me crazy. After just a few minutes of using it, I could feel that my wrist was not happy at all – damned RSI that flares up occasionally.

So I think the device of choice will be the Nokia N85. It has all the standard Nokia features that I love, most of the new things I want in a device and it’s around the same size as my Nokia 6110 (just a bit thinner). I was lucky to be able to test one out for a few minutes in Dubai. The main issues with the N85 are the following:

  • Very plasticy keys – worse than the 6110 – the N95 8GB has very good keys
  • OLED screen is aparently not good in bright sunlight
  • Some reported issues on the forums about call drop outs etc

The N85 is available in stores now, but unfortunately not with Vodafone yet. It’s in the Vodafone catalogue as “Coming Soon” but they can’t tell me when “Soon” is. Hopefully it will be before Xmas but it does not look likely at this stage.

However, I can’t talk mobile devices without mentioning the Jeebus phone and why I don’t want one. It’s mainly to do with the touch screen input, I just don’t like touch screens as the only input method. I *may* think about it for the next device when it has all the features that it’s currently missing, but the new Nokia N97 has been announced this week and depending on the reviews of that in the wild, it will be something to think about as the next device. And knowing how long Nokia devices take to get to us her in Australia, in store, it will be another 12 months anyway. So I think the N85 will be a good phone to have for the next 12 months.

All my old phones get recycled. The 6110 is going to my neice who wants a navigator phone, and will probably want a new phone within a few months. My previous 2 phones went to my mum. It’s good to be able to re-use them like this.

So Vodafone, please, get your act together and get the N85 in store this week! Please!

Filed Under: gadgets, phones

Mobile Phone Woes

20-Feb-2006 by Jodie Miners

A bit of a rant about my mobile. I have a Nokia 6230 which I’ve had for over 1 year now. I’m desperate to get a new one because it’s now not the latest and greatest gadget – it’s been superseded by the 6230i and everyone has one. I don’t feel like I’m ahead of the pack now…

So, a few months ago, upon listening to Richard Giles talking to Ignacio, the chief designer at Motorola on the Gadget Lounge (Podcast Link here), I fell in love with the PEBL and immediately got onto Ebay and bought an import (I still haven’t found it in the stores here). I thought it would be the best phone ever – so beautiful and functional, and a bit feminine – not a blokes phone at all. I thought I could handle the reduced functionality from my 6230 because I don’t use a lot of the features like the MP3 player etc. Boy, was I wrong…

Unfortunately I think coming from a Nokia, you’re stuck with a Nokia, and similarly with other brands. Once you are used to an operating system of a phone I think you’re stuck with it – good or bad. I just could not get used to the Motorola and even though I absolutely loved the look and feel of the PEBL, the operating system is a dog!! So, after two weeks of using it, I put it back in it’s box and went back to my old 6230 – maybe I will try and sell it again on eBay.

Here is a few things I loved* and hated about the PEBL

Loved

  • The beautiful shape – it felt great to hold it
  • The touchy feely cover
  • The active flip – it flips open with the touch of one finger
  • The size and weight
  • The outside screen

Hated

  • Not polyphonic ring tones – I didn’t think that would bother me but they were very ordinary
  • The Screen Quality
  • Difficult to get to the calendar – I’m so used to it on the Nokia that I could not get used to it on the Motorola and the Calendar is my most used feature of my phone – I don’t keep a diary other than in my phone.
  • Predictive Text Input hard to use – one of those things that you would probably like if you were a Motorola user, but I was far too slow with it.
  • Really bad battery life – I really had to charge it every day becuase it had a habit of cutting off calls if the battery was low

I could go on for ages listing the bad stuff… but it was a lesson for me. I will not buy another phone now until I can see something that is really vastly improved from my 6230 – and I can’t even see that the new Nokia’s have anything that fantastic in them. Of course I would love a HTC Wizard but they are a bit bulky and a bit blokey – I still like to have a phone with a bit of a girly touch (I have a diamante J attached to my 6230 to give it a bit more of the feminine touch).

Anyway, I would love some feedback – do you have a phone that you can suggest as the perfect phone – great looks, great to hold and fantastic functionality? Please let me know… I don’t know how long I can hold out before I have to have another gadget fix…

* You may notice in my rantings that I either “Love” or “Hate” – there is usually no middle ground on things that I am passionate about… unless of course I just don’t care…

Filed Under: gadgets, phones

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