I love the idea the tablet form factor.  I like the idea of a device that I can interact with via a stylus or my finger, offering me all the functions of the device that I happen to be holding.

I loved my Toshiba Portege 3500, complete with Windows XP Tablet Edition.  With its swivel out screen, allowing me to use it as a regular laptop, it was the best of both worlds…. except battery life was shocking and the device felt quite heavy (1.3kg, I seem to recall) when held as in its tablet form for any more than a few minutes at a time.  Other than that, I could see a bright future for these devices, even when others scoffed and told me that they’d never catch on.

Inevitably, the love-in went away and the Tablet PC was, once again, relegated to the category of almost-ran.

Before that, my love of stylus driven devices was in the form of PDAs such as the Psion 5 (still amongst my favourite devices), my Toshiba e570 Windows CE PDA, my Palm III (which I still have somewhere) and a couple of other models that I can’t quite recall.

So, I’m quite excited that this new wave of tablets, with energy efficient CPUs and battery capacities that would put some laptops to shame, have started to appear en masse.  It’s like a new opportunity for users to experience, following the success of touchscreen phones, technology that sheers away from the ‘keyboard and mouse’ into something that should be, in its own way, more intuitive.

Obviously, the must-have device at the moment appears to be the iPad.   It’s selling at a phenomenal rate despite mixed feedback.  It was always going to be so thanks to Apple’s way of creating a cultural phenomenon.  It’s like the iPhone all over again.

However, there’s many other devices on the horizon - the JooJoo offers features that should stomp all over the iPad, but lacks the recognition of brand power and, by extension, the ‘coolness’ offered by an instantly recognisable gadget.  Asus will be releasing their own product, the Eee Pad, standing a big chance of biting into Apple’s product dominance thanks to the brand recognition that Asus’ range of netbooks possesses.  Obviously, large manufacturers will appear with their own products, ready to eat away at the Apple’s… apple.

Dell, for example, have released their Streak, exclusively on o2 in the UK. Okay, it’s not a Tablet in the same way as the iPad, sporting a 5″ screen and smartphone capabilities, but it’s definitely an interesting proposition and something that I’ll be looking at closely in the near future.

HP will unveil their Web OS based model sometime in the near future, following their acquisition of Palm.  I was a bit disappointed that the whole Courier project didn’t evolve into anything more than a form of blue sky thinking and was officially killed by Microsoft, despite never being announced in the first place.  However, I’m sure that HP will do what it can to come up with an interesting foray into this new, interesting market space.

Suffice to say, there are interesting times ahead.  It would be nice to think that this will revitalise the portable computing market in the same way that netbooks did; after all, many IT professionals that I encountered claimed that there wasn’t a market for such devices!

 Okay, so I’m not suggesting that everyone will suddenly abandon Firefox because it can’t (at present) access the HTML5 version of Youtube, but surely it’s going to be a crimp in the usage of the browser!

You see, for most ‘regular’ users, they don’t get the difference between browsers - a browser should let them browse any website they want to - or website technologies - they don’t mind how their content is presented as long as they can view it.  Therefore, if it came to “You can’t use this website because it’s incompatible.  You need this browser instead” they’ll change browser.  The content, you see, is king.

So, what was I doing when I had this moment?  I was trying to access the HTML5 beta of Youtube and found that Firefox isn’t supported (at the moment.)

Reading this very short Youtube page on HTML5, we find that IE (with Chrome Framework), Chrome and Safari are supported.  At first, I was surprised.  I expected Chrome to be on the list, obviously, but Firefox… where’s Firefox?

It turns out that whilst Firefox does support HTML5, it isn’t HTML5 that’s the problem.  According to the Mozilla FAQ on the matter, the problem lies in the use of the h.264 codec, which needs licensing in order for it to be used and, therefore, isn’t likely to be licenced by an organisation without the sheer volume of cash as Google, Microsoft or Apple.

So, if Youtube continue down this path and, potentially, abandon their reliance on the Flash wrapper, could we see Firefox users left out of the Youtube generation?  Or will, more likely, someone come up with a nifty add-on for the benefit of the community?

The original PS3 was a piece of kit!  Seriously, it was massive and looked like a sleek, oversized George Foreman grill.  However, it was pretty funky with its Blu-Ray drive, replaceable 2.5″ SATA hard drive and myriad home entertainment features.  A lesser exploited feature, however, was the ability to install an ‘alternative’ OS… in this case, Linux.

Now, Sony recently decided to remove that feature - http://bit.ly/bgcUiU - as part of the 3.21 firmware update.

It was a bit of a geek feature, really.  It was probably never high up in the majority of average users minds - they bought the PS3 to play games and Blu Ray films, not use it as a computer.  However, this doesn’t take away from the fact that some people obviously did install Linux and, as a result, have lost their installations under the draconian firmware attitude that Sony employ - if you don’t upgrade, you can’t do stuff!

Arguably, the reason for this decision was to control hardware exploitation, piracy (there it is!) and other nefarious activities. But, if they’re willing to provide the facility in the first place, on their own console… not through add-ons… surely they’d should have thought about this earlier on… perhaps in the “What other features should the PS3 have?” stage.  It shouldn’t be this late in the life cycle of the hardware!

Why is it an issue?  Well, imagine if Sony suddenly decided to remove other functionality… backwards compatibility with PS2, 802.11 A/B, support for selected USB devices (only Sony keyboards, or flash drives.)  It wouldn’t be so bad if it had been cycled out, as it was when they introduced the thinner consoles (they can’t do Linux as far as I’m aware, nor do they support memory cards.)  At least, this way, it would mean that original console owners (who were early adopters anyway) could still do what they wanted.

Of course, this would have meant developing two standards of firmware - one aware of Linux, the other not - but that can’t be that difficult for Sony, surely.  Would it even have required two versions?  I doubt it.

Suffice to say, there’s been a backlash online, with some blogs suggesting legal action.  I wonder if Sony will backtrack the decision.  Moreover, I wonder if, if they do, it will be too late.

Soooo, ages ago I got rid of my (quite frankly awesome, but underused) Asus eeePC 900 series netbook.  I really did like it, but didn’t use it.  I sold it on eBay, for a disappointingly low amount… then I missed it immensely… regretted it… thought about getting a new one… never did.  I then got an opportunity to buy a really cheap Acer Aspire One a110, with 8GB SSD and 512MB RAM… a netbook is a netbook, right?

No… it isn’t!  The eeePC was a fantastic bit of kit: easy to access for RAM and SSD upgrading, fantastic keyboard, looked swish.  The Acer a110 seems to have been designed by: someone who didn’t know where to put mouse buttons; someone who chose to have a RAM slot only accessible by removing the whole motherboard (even though the RAM slot is underneath); someone who seemed to think that the best solution was the world’s slowest SSD fitted with a ZIF cable, making upgrading prohibitively expensive compared to Mini PCI-e (oh, and let’s not connect the PCI-e connector.)

First thing I did… occupy the spare memory slot with a 1GB memory stick that I happened to have lying around.  It was a challenge.  I followed a video on tnkgrl’s blog (http://bit.ly/bIBs1I), which also covers installed internal Bluetooth, eSata and a hard drive and, after a good 40 minutes of swearing, I reconnected absolutely everything booted the machine and breathed a sigh of relief… 1.5GB of RAM, and a machine that still detected all the stuff I’d had to reconnect.

Recently, I finally admitted that the 8GB SSD wasn’t enough and plumped for a 60GB 1.8″ ZIF hard drive.  This was the one that panicked me.  The fit, according to tnkgrl, is going to be a snug one and it couldn’t be as easy as she (and other websites suggested.)  By heck, it wasn’t!  I ended up having to sand (with fine paper) the blue plastic of the connnector down so that it would fit into the ZIF slot of the hard drive, so I could then lock it in place!  So, two hours of frustration and annoyance later… I was done… I had a hard drive that was recognised, but no OS.  Time for a full Ubuntu install, instead of the Netbook Remix version.

All’s good, thus far.  I’m happier using the full Ubuntu front end.  I’m happy with the space on the netbook.  My overly large Cameron Sino battery is now coming into it’s own.

But, what next?  Bluetooth?  That looks fun.  eSata… I’ve got nothing to use it with!  However, something that I’m sorely tempted to try…. A touchscreen  (http://bit.ly/chF747) Anyone fancy buying me it?

So, I’ve had a bit of money trouble this month and I thought I’d give my bank a try to sort it out.  Now, my local branch couldn’t help me (they did, however, help me identify that some money that should have gone into the account actually hadn’t (that bit isn’t the banks fault)) and advised me that I should try telephone banking to see if they could help with a bank charge.  This is what HSBC, I’m guessing, call ‘personal service.’

Soooo, I speak to Telephone Banking and here’s where it gets weird.   Basically, the bank charge will come out on the 24th and there’s no way on Earth that that can be changed because it’s all based on when I opened my account (13 years ago.)  There’s no way to change it because, if there were, it would be allowed to be changed for not only me, but for every other customer!  It’s not just a case of changing a date by, say, 24 hours (24th to the 25th), it’d be a complete reprogramming of the system and, even if there were a way to make that request, there’s no way it could be done between now and the end of the month.  I wasn’t asking for a recoding of what I’m sure is a very complex system.  I was asking for a charge to be delayed!

So, here we are in an era of enlightenment where banks aren’t run by people, they are constrained by the awe inspiring power and authority of the computer overlords.  The computer, you see, has calculated all of my payment and charge dates based on the date that I opened my account.  These dates are fixed points in time that cannot be altered, because they’re set by the computer.  I was even advised that the staff don’t print out everyone’s statements (seriously!  No! I thought you did.  Next I’ll be told that the signature on the end of the letters is printed too!)

I, of course, am not surprised.  Oddly, I wasn’t asking for the bank charge to be refunded.  I was asking for it to be delayed by 24 hours.  I even asked if it could be split into two separate payments, but apparently that is impossible too.  The computer isn’t capable of achieving this because the computer has express command over the users.  And, as it was explained to me, if it could be done for me, it could be done for other people… yes, given the circumstances (I was asking for something that would cost the bank nothing, it’s a move of 24 hours, the bank would still get its money), I’d call that customer service!

This is how I describe me at the moment.

It seems, you see, that I’m suddenly quite obsessed with the bit.ly address shortening service.

It’s not new and I think my obsession may have to do with my Twittering/Tweeting and posting links in there, but I’ve recently found myself shortening links all over the shop! Social networking, instant messaging, emails… all have felt my obsession with address shortening.

Most of the time, it’s been a boon.  No more do I have a single line of whatever occupied by a single web address.  Now, I can fit it into a tiny, tiny space and make my communications look smart.

It’s probably a phase.  I’ll probably find something else next week… I’ve been looking at stickr.com for some reason (I didn’t bit.ly it as that would have made it longer!)

According to the BBC News website - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8488751.stm  - Google has decided to phase out support for IE6 in some of its ‘applications,’ including Google Docs and Google Sites.

Amazingly, the article states that 20% of web users still use the browser that was first launched in 2001, probably despite Windows incessant desire to update everything all the time.  This statistic includes government departments - hardly a badge of honour given how they handle IT.

Developers, it turns out, want the browser phased out so that they can develop stuff for newer browsing technologies.  Let’s face it, what type of developer wants to develop for something that they’d have hoped people would have given up on long ago (especially as there have been two versions since then!)  We don’t see many websites created for lower resolutions, nor do we see people trying to create WAP versions of websites, so why should we see developers spend their time creating feature-rich websites for IE6!  Eventually, we all have to move with the times.

Governments in other countries have recommended users switch browser completely, following a series of security flaws being discovered in the ever popular Microsoft product which, amongst other things, allowed the Chinese government to hack Google Mail accounts.  It’s hardly a glowing recommendation for a product, especially when it took Microsoft so long to repair the flaw.

I’m not a fan of IE.  I prefer Firefox.  This isn’t to say that I don’t use IE at all, ever.  I do… at work… but at home, unless I really, really have to, I prefer the Firefox experience.

Should users stick with IE (in any of its last three incarnations)?  Will Firefox continue its slow rise to the top?  Is Chrome ever going to be a contender?  For most home users, chances are they’ll stick with IE because it’s the browser that shipped with the OS and they’re not looking elsewhere.  Most businesses, I’m guessing, will also choose to stick with IE… after all, its a Microsoft product and, as a result, is reliable… they’ll decide.  As for Chrome… time will tell… I’m not convinced by arguments that “It’s Google… therefore it’s gotta be good.”  I could be wrong, though, I am sometimes am.

Digital Spy recently reported that Sony has accidentally released a film currently playing in US cinemas on their Playstation Network (available through PSP and PS3 games consoles.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/gaming/news/a193347/sony-makes-psn-movie-blunder.html

Okay, if I’m honest I’m not going to rush to see this at the cinema.  In fact, as a film fan, I was hadn’t even heard of it until I read this article.

The problem was spotted and the film removed from the service within five hours.  Not bad going, I guess, though there are no facts about the number of downloads.

This got me thinking, of course.

As the report says, Sony Pictures had obviously made the film available to their Sony Computer Entertainment arm.  It’s not like SCE had peddled an illegal version to the service.  It also means that the digital media was already available for distribution at some point in the near future.

Could this be a way of distributing limited releases?  Art house films?  Indie films?  Low budget films?  The type of thing that the cineplex doesn’t show?  The city in which I live, Hull, has at least three big cinemas - Vue, Reel and Odeon - however this doesn’t give us more choice as they typically show the same films, just at different times.  If I had wanted to see something like Moon or Rudi Y Cursi, I have to go to Leeds, Bradford or another nearby city; hardly the type of thing you can do on a night out.

If these films were made available on a service like Netflix, PSN or any of the legal film streaming sites, it would mean that a broader audience has the potential to see them without the impact of theatrical distribution.  Being available for streaming, whilst it isn’t cost-free, has to be more effective than showing a film in a screen with only two or three people watching it.  Not only that, at the cost of streaming movies, you’re more likely to try something new and unusual on a whim than if you were to go to the cinema - mainly because most people (not all) go to see a specific film and spend vast amounts of soft drinks and sweets!

So, perhaps it’s not all bad that Sony have done this; albeit accidentally, it would seem.  Perhaps we’ll see more ’smaller’ releases popping up at the same time as their cinema releases - it’s never going to be Avatar 2 or Indiana Jones 12, but there’s got to be a market there… surely!

I love my Nokia n97.  It’s a perfect replacement for the awesome n95.

I hate my Nokia n97.  Why did I replace my n95?

This isn’t a review, so much as a series of ramblings.  I’ll keep coming back to tell you more, until I find something else to talk about!

The n97, flagship of the Nokia N-Series range, was a phone I’d wanted since seeing early reports of it.  I liked the idea of a touchscreen and keyboard, the widescreen display, 32GB of storage coupled with a MicroSD slot, 5 megapixel camera, standard 3.5mm jack for headphones, bluetooth and wifi.  The features list seemed endless - a bit of a geeky dream.

As the phone become more prevalent, I read the reports of issues with the phone with interest.  I knew it wasn’t going to be an iPhone nor a Blackberry, but I was confident it’d do the job I wanted it for.  I didn’t mind if it locked up sometimes - I’ve not had a phone that worked perfectly all the time since my last dumbphone!  I was also used to the limits of s60 as an OS… I know we shouldn’t be complacent with equipment that locks up, but I’ve used software for long enough to know what to expect.

Is the n97 worth it?  Almost.  There’s a lot that it doesn’t do that it should do - it’d be nice to have nlock’s iPhone style unlocking built in.  Occasionally, it locks up or just reboots (both issues with the n95 implementation and, thinking about it, the n91 implementation too!)  On the flip side, it’s handling of connections is far superior to previous s60 versions - it cycles through the available ones, using a priority list that you can modify, instead of you having to select the connection and keep your fingers crossed.  The widget based desktop is easy to manage, however it is a bit of a letdown that more widgets aren’t available, or more pages for widgets.

The touch implementation, whilst far from iPhone ease, lacks multitouch, but works well, mostly.  Many have said that they’ve had to resort to using the odd little stylus thing; I’ve not had to, though sometimes the virtual keyboard misinterprets what I am pressing… is it always?  No… just sometimes. Overall, though, touchscreen navigation isn’t up there with the iPhone, but is definitely better than some systems I’ve seen.

It would be nice if the phone had more RAM as, occasionally, it’s struggled when I’m running four or five apps - I had to uninstall Opera Mini 10 beta and revert to the Java-based Opera Mini 5 as it seems more RAM friendly.  When you consider that the phone has storage coming out of it’s bottom, you’d think they’d have tackled this!

There are plenty of interesting applications for it to be used for social networking - Nimbuzz connects you to most popular networks and IM systems and Tweets60 is great for Twitter, so you can be in touch with your friends all the time, especially with the more than adequate battery life - I’ve done a couple of hours of web browsing a day and managed to not recharge until the third day!  There’s also Windows Live Messenger available from Microsoft.  It’s worth not limiting yourself to the understocked and poorly organised Ovi Store, hopefully this will improve over time but that’s a matter for another blog.

The slideout keyboard is great.  Well, for me it is.  Okay, you can’t touch type on it, and the @ symbol is awkwardly placed for using both thumbs to type, but it still works better than some I’ve seen.  I can now type at a fair rate of knots.

I bought QuickOffice for the phone, an application I thought was great on the n95.  Whilst I’m not producing tons of business related documents, it is nice to have the option, especially when it comes to wanting to take quick notes.  The benefit of the keyboard is you can keep your train of thought going, instead of having to correct the word that predictive text chose!

I’ve read reports it locks up during calls.  Not had that one happen.  Nor does it seem to lock up during text messages, which occasionally happened with s60 3rd edition.

Video is fantastic.  Using Handbrake, I’ve encoded a number of things to the phone and, I’ve got to say, the screen looks fantastic when playing back video.  The inbuilt video playback software isn’t dreadful, it just has limited support for formats.  It’ll be nice when Divx Mobile comes to the phone in a 5th edition version (if it ever does!) BBC iPlayer is available as a free download and is a great way to catch up on the move (with live streaming on some networks.)  Sky Player is also available, but is a paid-for application.

So, it’s a mixed bag.  It’s far from perfect, but definitely not as restricted as some people would make out.  It shouldn’t be this way and here’s to hoping that Nokia can rescue this puppy before they put it down…. I hope so, because I’m in a long contract with this one!

Sooooo, if you’re lucky enough to own an n97, Nokia’s latest flagship N series phone, you can’t have helped but notice that Nokia have released the much anticipated v20 firm which, hopefully, will lead to many of the issues that have plagued the phone being resolved.

If you’re on Vodafone, you’ll probably notice that the firmware isn’t yet available on the Nokia Software Update (NSU.)

If you’re a user of the Vodafone eforums (or many n97 forums), you’ve probably read many a post about this.

Now, there appears to be two sides to the argument here:

1 - Some users want Vodafone to announce a release date or month for the release.

2 - Vodafone don’t know (or won’t commit to) a release date and won’t even take a wild stab at the dark at one.

Thus, we’ve got disgruntled n97 users claiming that Vodafone don’t care about their customers and we’ve got Vodafone trying to point out that they aren’t commiting to a release date as they never commit to release dates until the release is closer to… release.

So, who is in the right?

Surely, it’s wiser for Vodafone, who have acknowledge the existence of an update, to not commit until closer to a release date than for them to say “November 29th” and then miss it, or “December” and then miss it and cop even more flack.

But, do the end users deserve better?  Should they expect faster turn around on firmware releases? Should comms companies stop customising their firmware, or is it a necessary evil?