Phone New Update: April 2008

T-Mobile Shadow

There's no reason not to like T-Mobile's Shadow. But stick it into the currently strong T-Mobile lineup or put it up against the exciting array of smart phones that have hit U.S. shores in recent months, and the Shadow just doesn't stand out. Despite its brand new Windows Mobile interface, ultimately it's no more capable or stylish than the competition.

The device is simply another stab at a consumer smart phone a silvery, rectangular slider with a big, bright 320 by 240 pixel, 2.6 inch screen and a hybrid two letter per button keyboard like the BlackBerry Pearl's.

The Shadow runs Windows Mobile 6 Standard (without a touch screen), but T-Mobile decided to make the operating system friendlier by laying an animated interface over it.

The new interface uses the Shadow's hybrid scroll wheel or cursor pad to whirl through eight main icons, each on the left hand side of the screen : Home, Alerts, Message Center, Calendar, Internet, Music, Photos, and Settings.

Once you get to the selection you want, you click the right hand side of the wheel to get to your exact option.

For instance, Message Center offers Text Messages, Picture Messages, Voice Notes, and E-mail. The goal is never to expose users to the Windows Mobile program list, and it works.

You can even quit programs to free up memory without digging into the Windows Mobile start screens. Since the menu isn't user configurable, though, you'll have to hit the Start button to jump to add on programs like Sling Player Mobile.

Zipit Z2

The Zipit Z2 hand held hits two tech sweet spots. First, it's a budget instant messaging device for families with many teens and too few computers, and second, it's a fully hackable Linux hand held for geeks. Better still, the two functions work well together to create a very useful device.

Too big for a pocket, it's a hand held clamshell style device with a QWERTY keyboard fitted with hard, clicky, backlit keys and a dim 320 by 240 pixel color screen. On the front of the Z2 there's a mini-SD card slot for music and photos; my 4GB card worked just fine.

You'll also find a few ports that the company claims are there for future expansion.

Specifically, there's a wired remote control jack next to the headphone port, and a strange port on the back that will one day allow for some sort of USB and A/V connectivity.

Out of the box, the Z2 connects to Wi-Fi networks so that it can instant message on the AIM, MSN, and Yahoo! networks and accomplish text messaging through a Zipit provided gateway.

The Z2 is designed to be used at home or on a college campus, not while you're wandering around town, since there's no way to connect the gadget to a cellular network. That's okay by me, since it helps keep the Z2 cheap. Unless you send SMS text messages, there are no monthly fees. During testing, quite easily connected to both open and WPA2 protected 802.11g networks.

The included IM clients are basic but functional. They're text only and don't support viewing friends' profiles or away messages, but they do aggregate all your buddies into one convenient list and let you step through multiple conversations quickly.

MWg Atom Life

While smart phones continue to thrive, the standalone PDA market is suffering. According to a recent IDC reports. PDA sales have fallen 43.5 percent between Q3 2006 and Q3 2007. In fact, just under 730,000 PDA's were sold globally in that last quarter compared with 35 million smart phones sold during the same period.

Smart phones are handy for those who want their cell phones to serve double duty as contact managers and appointment schedulers.

But these devices will likely disappoint the kind of user who would choose a Dell Axim X51v solely for running sophisticated, CPU heavy mobile applications.

At 5.1 ounces, the Atom Life is lightweight for such a powerful device. Beneath the glossy black plastic Atom Life's touch screen are a five way control pad and six buttons two soft buttons for Windows Mobile, two larger Send and Hang up buttons, plus a Windows Menu and a Media key.

Along the bottom of the device you'll find a USB input jack and a 2.5mm headset jack. The left side holds flimsy feeling hardware volume buttons, while the right side sports the camera and the voice recorder keys. Finally, the top of the unit contains the power button and a mini-SD card slot. My Kingston 4GB mini SDHC card worked fine.

You'll find none of that stripped down Windows Mobile 6 Standard business here. The Atom Life runs the more robust Windows Mobile 6 Professional operating system and features a very bright 2.7 inch touch display and a nice metal stylus.

The screen, though, is the usual 320 by 240 pixel LCD. That's no different from those of most other Windows Mobile devices, but in a high end product like this it would have liked a higher resolution display. By contrast, the Axim X51v comes equipped with a 640 by 480 pixel display.

Samsung SPH-M520

When it comes to cell phones, sometimes "good enough" is actually pretty nice. For example, although the Samsung SPH-M520 is not a great mobile phone, it's fine for people who want to start dabbling in the wide world beyond voice but don't necessarily need all the capabilities of a smart phone. Still, there are better choices out there for folks interested primarily in talking or texting.

The M520 is a wide, silvery slider with comfortable, nicely spaced keys. At a slim 4 by 2 by 0.5 inches (HWD) and 2.3 ounces, it won't bulk you up or weigh you down.

The 2.2 inch, 176 by 220 pixel screen is unusually large and bright. Volume and camera buttons occupy the device's sides, along with a micro-SD card slot that accepts cards up to 4GB my 4GB SanDisk card just worked fine.

One attractive innovation is the phone's home screen.

Many people aren't aware of exactly how powerful today's feature phones are, so sprint pulled some of its best none calling features right to the top menu level, such as GPS navigation, music, streaming TV, and e-mail. It's a pleasant reminder of the things you can do apart from just talking.

As for audio quality, the M520 delivers faithful, well rounded sound. Transmission through the microphone sounded loud and clear, though background noise came through as well. The speaker phone also sounded fine.

Reception could have been much better, though the M520 performed poorly when connecting calls in weak signal areas. Battery life, at 3 hours 47 minutes of talk time, is acceptable.

Motorola Z9 (AT&T)

Another top notch, high end mobile phone from Motorola, the new Z9 scores high on all performance measures. It's the best feature phone AT&T has to offer.

On the outside, the Z9 feels chunky; it's long and wide (4.5 by 2.1 inches), but not very thick (0.5 inches), though it feels thicker than it is.

On the top half, there's a large, bright 320 by 240 pixel screen, just a smidgen larger than the display on the V9. Below the screen, there's a cursor pad that looks like a scroll wheel (it isn't, actually) and some action buttons.

Sliding the screen up reveals a keypad of large, flat number keys with finger guiding dots.

The keypad on our Z9 had a very minor build flaw wherein the plastic pulled away from the contacts slightly on the "5" key (it was minor and almost unnoticeable).

Like all of Motorola's RAZR2 line, the Z9 is very solidly built. There's a lot of metal in the body, and the slide is spring loaded and feels smooth. The display is covered with a thick but very clear layer of protective plastic.

If price is no object and you want crystal clear sound quality, the RAZR line is the way to go. The secret sauce is CrystalTalk, Motorola's built in noise canceling software, which tweaks calls to make them sound better in noisy environments. The quad band Z9 continues that tradition with excellent call quality.

Even in noisy situations, voices punch right through the din. The speaker phone, while not outrageously loud, is very clear, and there's no distortion. In testing, the Z9 worked well with a Samsung SBH500 stereo Bluetooth headset. Since the phone comes with an adapter, you can use its micro-USB charging port with a standard 2.5mm headset (3.5mm music headphones aren't supported out of the box).

Nuance's excellent VoiceSignal system provides voice dialing and other limited voice commands over a wired or Bluetooth headset. Battery life, which we tested in 2G mode, was fine, yielding 10 hours 21 minutes of talk time.

HP iPAQ 210

It's been nearly three years since we reviewed the Dell Axim X15v, the now discontinued high end PDA. HP's latest hand held, the iPAQ 210, has a spec sheet that's remarkably similar a Marvell 624 MHz processor, a 640 by 480 pixel VGA screen, built in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, and an SD card slot are among its features. Look more closely, however, and you'll see some real improvements.

The CPU is a next generation PXA310 instead of the more common PXA270, the iPAQ's Bluetooth spec is now 2.0, and the SD slot is SDIO compatible.

In fact, as it turns out, the iPAQ 210 is a significant leap from both the Axim X51v.

And HP's own three year old iPAQ hx2795 (even more so with the latter, since the hx2795 had only a 320 by 240 pixel screen and 64MB of RAM).

Despite some mixed performance results, for those who still need a standalone PDA particularly in the enterprise market the iPAQ 210 is tough to beat.

The iPAQ 210 is encased in black and gunmetal Grey plastic.

It measures 5.3 by 3 by 0.7 inches (HWD) and weighs 6.7 ounces with the battery installed. The reflective TFT screen, at 4 inches, is a bit bigger than the Axim's 3.7 inch LCD. There's a standard 3.5 mm headphone jack, a built in microphone, and a mini USB port.

On the front of the unit is a five way control pad, four programmable buttons, a voice recorder button, a power button, and a paper clip style Reset button.

RIM BlackBerry Pearl 8120

Hotspot at home is a great service, but it's been plagued with uninspired or buggy phones like the Nokia 6086, the Samsung T409 and the Samsung Katalyst. Ideally, should let you make unlimited calls for $10 per month from wherever you can get a Wi-Fi signal, using your T-Mobile phone number.

On our tests, though, non-Blacberry phones worked reliably only with a T-Mobile-supplied router, which is fine for making calls from home but not as much fun when you're out of the house. (Of course, all the phones use T-Mobile's cellular network when they can't get Wi-Fi.)

We're happy to say that the 8120 worked equally well with Apple, T-Mobile and Zyxel routers, adeptly handing off calls back and forth from T-Mobile's cell network without dropping them. Sound quality was very good on both Wi-Fi and cellular calls.

Like other recent BlackBerrys, the 8120 sounds loud and clear both coming and going, through the ear piece, the speaker phone, and headsets.

In noisy situations, the 8120's did transmit background noise, but we could hear the caller's voice over it well enough.

The 8120 has speaker independent voice dialing and works with both mono and stereo Bluetooth headsets. We got more than 8 hours of talk time in GSM mode, with Wi-Fi on. We've seen better, but this will be fine for most people.

The T-Mobile version of the 8120 may add Wi-Fi calling, but it's no larger than AT&T's Wi-Fi less pearl, and it's about the same size as the original pearl at 3.2 ounces and 4.2 by 2 by 0.6 inches (HWD). It features the same "hybrid" keyboard of somewhat slippery keys with just two letters on each.

All Pearls use predictive text software, and the Sure Type algorithm for guessing words while you type seems to have been improved with this model. On the sides of the phone are camera, volume, and push to talk buttons. Smack under the bright, sharp 2.2 inch, 240 by 260 pixel screen is the signature Pearl trackball.

Canon Powershot A580

The A580 includes an 8 mega pixel sensor, a 2.5 inch LCD, and face detection. And while it found this camera's features and image quality to be good, kept asking myself why anyone would purchase the A580 over the similarly priced, more feature rich, A590 IS.

There's nothing wrong with the A580, but the A590 IS is simply a better camera, while still being budget friendly at $179.99.

Sharing the same boring, bulky design as the A590 IS, the A580 is too large to fit in the average shirt pocket.

On the back of the camera, conveniently located next to the LCD, is the main control center, whose function button lets you change white balance, ISO modes, and resolution, among other settings.

The mode dial on the top right of the camera offers access to a multitude of shooting modes, as well as auto mode and five of the 12 scene modes (the other seven must be accessed through the LCD while in scene mode).

The shutter button and zoom lever also sit atop the camera and can be reached with your right forefinger, making it easy to hold the camera with one hand. The small 2.5 inch display leaves room for an optical viewfinder. Although the LCD is bright and clear for framing images, you'll need that viewfinder in bright, direct sunlight.

With its 4X optical zoom and 5.8mm to 23.2mm lens (35mm film equivalent: 35mm to 140mm), as well as f-stops ranging from f/2.6 to f5.5, the A580 provides a good overall package but again, this lens is also found on the A590 IS.

Face detection has been improved from the previous model, the A560. Previously, when a face was detected, white balance was calculated for the entire scene now it focuses on specific faces in the scene. With a more accurate white balance configuration, faces were more vivid and focused, and the lighting was better.

With face detection disabled, faces tended to be muted, and the color wasn't as accurate. As with the A590, low light shots displayed noise at about ISO 100 and higher, although it wasn't bad until about 400 or so. Though the ISO settings go all the way up to 1600, it would recommend staying at 400 or below.

Canon PowerShot SD870 IS

From the very first glance, the smooth shape and bold lines of the stylish PowerShot SD870 IS Digital ELPH signal that this is no ordinary camera.

With 8.0 mega pixels of resolution, an Optical Image Stabilizer and 3.8x optical zooming, the SD870 IS Digital ELPH boasts impressive specs as well as a host of convenient features.

Face Detection Technology is used for worry free people shots. A large 3.0 inch LCD gives you a perfect view of your scene. The Auto ISO Shift and ISO 1600 deliver brilliant images in challenging lighting.

HP Compaq 8710p Strong Business Notebook

Hewlett-Packard has been release a new HP Compaq 8710p for premiere business class notebook. Feature with massive 17 inch display screen, Intel Santa Rosa platform Core 2 Duo T7300 (2.0GHz, 4MB L2 Cache, 800MHz FSB), I think it�s little bit hard to beat this notebook because also using top notch DX10 graphic card nVIDIA Quadro NVS 320M GPU.

The 8710p starts out at a relatively low $1499, but the price can quickly ramp up by choosing more powerful technology such as a faster processor or a BluRay drive. The notebook shell is built mostly from hard plastic, but within that shell resides a magnesium alloy support structure that is common to almost all the HP Compaq business notebooks. The number pad of the keyboard has some flex to it, as underneath there is about 1-2mm of open space between the keyboard base and the optical drive underneath.

the laptop also ships with HP 3D DriveGuard technology. That is just a fancy term for hard disk shock protection. his particular model of the 8710p comes equipped with a 17.1� BrightView WSXGA+ display. The platform also has support for 802.11a/b/g/n Intel WiFi cards and Intel Turbocache memory.

HP Compaq 8710p is a strong notebook for business class frame with latest CPU and strong DirectX 10 video card for overall gaming performance. The hard drive have drive shock protection with DriveGuard Technology with improvement cooling design. The large array ports is available including 6 USB ports with long life battery.

HP Compaq 8710p specification:
* Intel Core 2 Duo T7300 Processor (Santa Rosa, 2.0GHz, 4MB L2 Cache, 800MHz FSB)
* Microsoft Genuine Windows Vista Business
* 17.0� WSXGA+ Display (1680 x 1050)
* 512MB (256MB Dedicated) nVidia Quadro NVS 320M GPU
* 2GB DDR2 667MHz RAM (1�2GB Configuration and quickly upgraded to 4GB)
* 160GB 5400RPM Fujitsu 2.5� HDD
* DVD+/-RW Optical Drive
* 802.11a/b/g WiFi, Ethernet, Modem, and Bluetooth Connectivity
* 8-Cell 73Whr Battery
* 3 Year On-site Warranty
* Dimensions: 15.5� x 10.8� x 1.3� (at front)
* Weight: 7.7 lbs (Actual Measurement)

Swarovski MacBook Air With Gold Crystals

Did you still remember of the MacBook Air which is already launch several weeks ago? Now Bling-My-Thing.com has been modify it with Crystal Gold on the Mac Air body.

On CeBIT 2008, the MacBook Air with Swarovski PC case Golden Age come with 11,000 24k gold crystals. The Golden Age value is 26,000 Euro. So do you want to buy it as your collection?

Sony PlayStation 3 Firmware Version 2.20

Sony announced that the next PlayStation3 firmware Ver 2.20 should arrive later this month.

Version 2.20 will add support for BD-Live (Profile 2.0) features such as the ability to download content such as additional bonus scenes, bells and subtitles. Blu-Ray Live also allows interactive movie-based games to communicate on the Internet.

In addition, it supports� Resume play of the function which allows the PS3 to start playing a DVD video and BD to the point where he was arrested, even though the disc was removed.

Extra Ordinary Colors Sony VAIO CR Series

Sony has been released the VAIO branded CR-Series notebook PC in Korea market which adopt Intel Centrino Duo processor with 4 different luminance color including luxury pink, pure white, blazing red and indigo blue.

The silver frame and luminous trim is the CR power design notebook with feature pulsating LED which reflected what the notebook is doing, glow and fades simultaneously. Sony VAIO CR Series also offer InstantOn function with built-in speaker and 1.3 mega pixel camera on the top of display. It�s also provided 3 USB slots, SD card reader, S video port and cooling system.

Sony Bravia V1 Series

Sony Corporation will expects to launch their full HD TV Sony BRAVIA V1 Series with 120Hz MotionFlow technology in Japan market.

Equipped with Bravia Engine, the Bravia V1 Series supports 3,000:1 contrast ratio, 1,920 x 1,080 resolution and 24p True Cinema for viewing in accurate cinema experience. Adopting two HDMI ports it comes with three different sizes including 52-,46-,40-inch. It is expected to be available on April 25th but there�s no price available yet.

Sony Black Roly Portable Audio

Sony expects the opening of its black Rolly (model: SEP-10BT), and a form of the egg portable audio player in the Japanese market.

Rolly can move forward and backward, left to right, and even two-wheel rubber. Measuring 65 x104mm to 300g, it is easy to take anywhere you go. With a memory of 1 GB, it can play Sony�s exclusive file formats, such as ATRAC3, ATRAC3plus and MP3 and AAC.

Despite its compact dimensions, it offers clear, noise, Bluetooth capability and an intuitive user interface, without the need for a screen. Powered by Lithum Battery 1560mAh, they can play a maximum of 5 hours. It is expected that on April 19 for 40,000 Yen Japan.

Sony Ericsson T303 Compact Slider Phone

The Sony Ericsson T303 is a basic 128 x 160 pixels, the TFT screen 1.3-megapixel camera, Bluetooth technology and an FM radio. Overall, the size is 83 x 47 x 15mm and weighs 93 grams T303.

The Sony Ericsson T303 comes with a media player, but only 8 megabytes of memory non-extensible. Yes, we did not say megabytes and gigabytes. Enough for about a single song, and no longer, so really the Media Player will be useful in the management of MP3 ringtones. More sense, the FM radio with TrackID has determined that the song is played.

Duration of the conversation is an impressive 9 hours, up to 16 days of standby time is much better than the big fellow Nokia 6111st There are three variations, the T303a is a 850 / 1800 / 1900 MHz GSM variant of America North, which is T303c a 900 / 1800 / 1900 MHz version of China and the T303 is a 900 / 1800 / 1900 MHz version for the rest of the planet (in the latest Sony Ericsson Naming Conventions, it would be the T303i) .

Sony Ericsson did not say how much the T303 is consulted on the costs, but it looks like a little over � 70 / � 100 / $ 140 or SIM free would be too costly. The T303 will be available from mid-2008.

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