The Gadgets Page

Treonauts has a funny conversation about his friend and the small problem of forgetting that you’re using a Bluetooth headset.

• Treonauts | Silent Conversations With A Blueetooth Headset

After not being able to get a hold of his friend, he finally sent him an instant message. The explanation was funny.

“Like most Treonauts he was using a Bluetooth headset but had answered the call on his Treo forgetting that his calls were being automatically routed to the BT headset instead of the smartphone… Thus no matter how loudly he would speak he couldn’t hear a word of what I was saying as my entire conversation was coming through loud and clear but to the headset on his desk instead…”

Although you can route the call back to the phone by selecting the option on the screen, you may lose your caller before you notice. It’s an interesting problem that doesn’t have a solution yet.

I have yet to jump on the BT headset bandwagon. When I was a real estate agent and on the phone constantly, I used a wired headset. It worked well for me and I used it constantly until it broke a few years later. Now, however, the only calls I receive are rare, so a headset is useless for me.

I’m actually very grateful that I’m not tied to my telephone anymore. It got to the point that the sound of the ring was an irritation to me. Now, my phone ring means something fun is going to happen. The life of a writer is far quieter than the life of a real estate agent, but it doesn’t pay as well. Of course, I don’t have to spend all that extra money I was earning on lock boxes, signs, advertising or BT headsets…

We looked at the PCMCIA card at the Sprint Store. I asked Mike,

“If we had that, we could be online everywhere?”

“Yep, but you have to pay 60 bucks a month for it and we’d only use it about once a month when we’re out of town.”

“Could we use it at home instead of the cable modem?”

“No. You’re not supposed to hook it up to a router like that. Plus, the cable modem is faster.”

Well, Sprint not only announced that it will be acceptable to hook your card up to a wireless router, they’ll gladly sell you one that is guaranteed to work.

• News from PC Magazine: Sprint To Introduce EV-DO/Wi-Fi Router

You put your PCMCIA card into the router (see at the top) and then you have a wireless local network that you can connect to with you home PC or laptop. Say goodbye to DSL. Say goodbye to dialup. Say goodbye to the cable company. All we need is Sprint.

Now, we just need to know whether it’s REALLY broadband speeds or if that’s just marketing hype. This could simplify our lives even more (as long as it really works).

Via: Sprint announces EV-DO router and USB dongle – Engadget

Treonauts has really gone the distance to check the battery life on Treos:

• Treonauts | Treo Battery Life Test

They found that under these circumstances, the Treo battery lasts a pretty long time:

• Battery life with music playback in background mode
  • 730 minutes / 12 hours and 10 minutes
• Battery life with movie playback in full screen mode
  • 260 minutes / 4 hours and 20 minutes
• Battery life with GPS Navigation in full screen mode + active Bluetooth
  • 230 minutes / 3 hours and 50 minutes

I have never run into problems with running my phone out of battery except when I forget to charge it for a couple days in a row. Of course, I don’t use a Bluetooth headset or run GPS programs. The most I do is watch movies or listen to music when I’m on a walk.

Many thanks to Lew S. who commented on a previous entry of mine:

re: Palm TREO 700w … “Just a warning, this is a Windows Mobile Palm device, so if you already have a Palm, none of your software will work on this cellphone”

Happily, this is no longer true

He linked to this excellent article about a Palm OS emulator for your Windows Mobile machines like the Treo 700W.

• mytreo.net | Treo software reviews : Review of StyleTap Running Palm OS Apps on the Treo 700w

Suddenly, I’m not so worried about Palm OS dying an untimely death. As long as my WWCalc program works, I’m happy.

This movie made me smile and laugh with it’s beautiful simplicity. Why aren’t they showing things like this at Sundance?

There are rumors flying around about a new widescreen video iPod with touchscreen controls. Here are a couple links to the rumors:

• More New iPod Video Pictures – The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

• Apple still at work on true video iPod? – Engadget

• Gear Live | Widescreen iPod Video Mock Up

I am hoping that Apple has raised their sites a little higher than just a larger screen for media playback. With a touchscreen, this new device could be the resurrection of the Newton Message Pad. When I first saw the Newton, it was at Comdex in the form of a plastic mockup under plexiglass while Douglas Adams talked on the big screen about writing everywhere. The next year, they had Newtons for us to play with. Chuck bought a Newton that year and chose his coats based on whether the Newton would fit in the inside breast pocket.

Today, Apple has the capability to bring back the Newton and wipe Palm and Windows Mobile off the face of the planet. It’s the only PDA that I would conceive of purchasing to replace my Treo. Apple has been very tightlipped about their “Tablet” patents. The widescreen video iPod could be so much more than merely a media playback device. If they add the capability of schedule, memos, book reader, and a to-do list, this device could be the return of the Apple Newton.

I eagerly await to see what will develop.

This is one of the Superbowl commercials that Motorola had for their PEBL phone. The design of the phone is amazingly smooth and tactilely pleasing. They had them at the Motorola booth at CES. Some were on pedestals where you could play with them, but they had many others that were with piles of rocks under glass on the floor.

The Motorola booth was huge, but I didn’t find anything there that I really wanted. They were promoting their RAZR in pink, you know, for girls. As a girl, I’m becoming more and more sick of the color pink. I’m beginning to think that they don’t really understand women and what we want.

I was more impressed with the Motorola Ski Jackets. The MP3 player snapped into the arm of the jacket and the headphones were in the hood. Of course, I would forget to remove the MP3 player and throw the jacket into the washing machine when it started smelling too much like February snow, so it’s not really a good choice for me.

The Motorola booth was impressive, with its dance floors, music playing apparel and phones that look like rocks. I don’t know why I didn’t take any pictures…

Update: 02-08-06: I lied. I had quite a few pictures from the Motorola booth and I just found them today. Here is a quick slideshow with them:

The Palm booth was packed with people. There were many affiliate companies demonstrating their products and the Palm people were showing off the new Treo 700w. It is the first Palm handheld that runs Windows Mobile instead of the Palm OS. There were so many people milling around that we didn’t get a chance to play with one. Microsoft had two Treo 700w PDAs at a kiosk at their booth, but both of them had dead batteries (unlikely since they were plugged in) or hard crashed.

Compared to the Treo 650, which is a Palm-based OS, they were very similar in size and design. I really have loved the design of the 650, so I’m glad they didn’t sacrifice that. It looks like a well-designed machine.

My only problem is the operating system. I have a lot of programs that are made for the Palm OS. It is such an ideal programming platform that there are literally thousands of programs that have been created for the Palm OS. All of those programs would become obsolete with the Windows Mobile edition of the Treo 700.

The Treo 700w has some great software built into the device, including the Microsoft Office Mobile Suite with Word, Excel and PowerPoint. It even has a few games: Bubble Breaker, Solitaire and Cubis. I have all of those games for my Palm, but what Windows Mobile does not have is what is going to keep me on the Palm OS.

As soon as they come up with a Weight Watchers Points Tracker for Windows Mobile, then I will think about switching over. Until then, there is no hope for a change from me, no matter how shiny and pretty the Treo 700w is.

This section of The NextGen Home Experience featured products from the following companies: Hewlett Packard, Klipsch Speakers, Vantage Lighting, Lafayette Window Shades, Intel VIIV and Centrino Duo Chips and Windows Media Center.

In reality, these two sections of the NextGen Home Experience really became “The Hewlett Packard Show.” That’s just fine with me. My home computer is an HP. I took it out of the box, loaded up my documents and started working. It was that easy, so I’m kind of a fan-girl.

Zone 12 & 13 – The Home Office

When we walked into the home office area, the HP printer was spewing out the “family” photos that the demonstrator in the living room had sent in our presentation. It was the most beautiful family you’ve ever seen and every photo was a masterpiece. I imagined what normal family photos usually look like and realized that if people bought this, they might be trying to buy that perfect family instead of an HP printer connected to an HP Media Center computer.

They showcased the HP printer, the computer, the Pocket PC, a camera with Instant Share, and a laptop sporting the new Intel Centrino Duo chip. I was pretty impressed with the laptop. The demonstrator was from Intel and he had many windows running and there seemed to be no slowdown. He said that this new chip has true multitasking and is more energy efficient, so your battery lasts longer. I would have regretting buying my laptop right before CES if I hadn’t used it so much on that trip.

Zone 14 – Mystery Zone

I remember nothing from this zone. There was no one there to demonstrate anything and I don’t even remember seeing anything. I suspect it was another Life|Touch Screen, because the house was full of them, but then again, it could have been anything. The picture of the sign is the only clue we have.

Zone 15 & 16 – Master Bedroom

What you see here is a prototype computer made by Intel to show the capabilities of their new VIIV chip. It is a tiny, but powerful computer that can be controlled with a remote control. They are hoping companies will make these sorts of computers to control houses (such as the electronic window shades, lighting and other functions around the NextGen House). Essentially, it doesn’t exist, but it could if companies would just make it. It was really the only thing in the house that wasn’t available for purchase today.

This entertainment PC from Hewlett Packard was also a prototype that should be coming soon. It could mostly be run with only the remote control. It had a removeable hard drive (see on the right). This unit was running the New Media Center for Windows Vista, so it was a little different than the Windows Media Center PCs that we had seen running things in the house before.

The hard drive was a hot swappable (you don’t have to turn off the computer to take it out) 300 gig USB hard drive. The demonstrator said he owned a system like this in his home and he had brought his own hard drive to this show. It had all of his movies on it, so he could watch whichever movie in his collection.

The demonstrator’s most quotable phrase was, “It brings the computer out of the office and into the living room.” He failed to notice the irony that we were supposed to be in the Master Bedroom.

Laura’s recent post about a unique use for your camera phone reminded me of a post from Merlin Mann’s 43 Folders a while back that lists lots more uses for camera phones:

• 43 Folders: How do you get creative with your phonecam?

I generally tell anyone who asks that camera phones are worthless, but this list has some ideas even I might use—like taking a picture of the sign to remember where you parked, or grabbing a photo to remember a store’s hours. Be sure to skim the comments too, as the readers had lots of ideas.