I shall tell the tale of a new gadget in the household of geek, Last week whilst away on business (that’s right – check me out going away on business!) my phone (e65) decided that it didn’t want to let anyone else hear my voice and the microphone stopped working, the day after it still wasn’t working but then decided in the evening to revive itself and come back to life, however after that I thought that I couldn’t really trust it as a microphone is a rather vital part of a mobile phone in emergencies.

Therefore I purchased a Nokia N95 8gb which is a bit of a large expenditure I agree but I’d like to be safe in the knowledge that my phone works but also I loved the gadgety goodness of the phone – the accelerometer in it is awesome with the availability of so many applications that make the most of it – the LightSabre app which does what it says on the tin, Moving ball app which is just a ball that moves depending on the rotation of the device and Waterbox which just simulates water when the phone is moved – all very simple yet fun applications which add to the novelty of the phone.

I’ve found it so much faster to use than my e65, writing messages, going to the phone book and so on is just much better on it – and it can handle more applications running at the same time due to more ram and also the way it handles the applications to make sure that there is always ram available.

I’m looking forward to the ‘bysamir’ and ‘Aikonlab’ websites being available again soon hopefully as at the moment they’re offline or being modified and have a goldmine of great applications so I’m sure I’ll update you on those soon.

I’ve set my new monitor up next to my old 17” Dell as a dual monitor set-up and its brilliant, having mail and media on the smaller and browsing/working on the mahoosive one is just a joy. My new monitor is made by ‘Belnea’ who I must admit I’ve never heard of!, but it was cheaper than others that I saw in other IT shops in the area at £139.99.

I shall try to resume usual service and bring some great news about developing tech soon! (I’m keeping an eye on Googles ‘Android’ Mobile phone open source operating system)

Like I say the games run rather well on the device and don’t seem to run sluggishly. Typing on the thumb board is relatively good – I’ve more than managed to have many conversations on live messenger using it comfortably and so I’m happy that it can be a good sofa surfing device for me.

I should also be fair and note a couple of downsides I’ve noticed – the heat, yes as my initial research showed from surfing the internet and reading forums, the device does get rather hot, which isn’t ideal but I think I could cope with it, its not going to burn the skin off my hands but it just gets a bit hot is all. Secondly the noise, it doesn’t annoy me so much as it just makes my mum say ‘is that thing going to take off?!’ which is a fair point, it does make a bit of noise – or rather the fan does. But I’m ok with that – it is a full computer in the size of a couple of phones tagged together.

I am really liking my OQO and will soon have my Nokia 770 up on the mighty ebay I think.

Chrome

I’d also like to talk about this small bit of news, as soon as I heard ‘Chrome’ – the Google Browser was out I instantly downloaded it. I was rather impressed – it loaded quickly and seemed to have some great functionality, the home screen with your most used websites was fantastic, however, I found that part of the comment system used by Facebook didn’t work on it (specifically the ability to comment on someone’s status – this has been adjusted by the looks of it and now works). More importantly on my OQO I found that it crashed the whole device on a number of occasions, sadly I just can’t be having that so it therefore found its way back off the device, its still on my pc and laptop to keep trying though. For the first incarnation of the browser I think it’s been very successful and could be giving other browsers a run for their money.

Its got 512 mb of Ram a 1Ghz Processor and a 30Gb harddrive all of which are a bit outdated but for the price (£300) its not too bad for the size - just a bit bigger than the Nokia 770 internet tablet that it’ll be replacing for me. I think its going to be a great icebreaker type device with people asking what the hell it is due to its small form factor and appearance of full xp which is brilliant and fun to use. Its surprisingly snappy too (that is until I get all my applications onto it knowing my luck)

The pro’s definately include using VNC with it - controlling my media centre tv / pc combination was brilliant and will make controlling it a lot easier, and checking on the status of the upstairs computers whilst downstairs a lot easier and fun. Browsing the internet on it is fun too - its able to run flash etc (however youtube videos have a bit of lag which I’m sure wouldnt affect watching small clips too much) this means its got the full internet (none of that reduced rubbish I had to put up with on the internet tablet) and as its xp it’ll have pleanty of available applications for it along with normal office suites.

In conclusion - I love it!

Any questions?

I know that you can already get the system which parks for you but does this mean we are not that far from a completely automatic car? – just imagine it – potentially less traffic jams due to cars being smart enough to figure out where to go and avoid them, faster safe speeds and perhaps less accidents – if any at all?

Either way it would be a bit easier for me if cars drove on their own.

And … I’m amazed! – it seems to run much quicker and crash less now, every time I’d go into my phonebook previously I had to exit out of it again after going into a contacts details as the contacts just froze, This problem seems to have gone now. The main menu also appears to load faster.

Whilst upgrading firmware normally doesn’t worry me, it did on this occasion but not anymore, I’m pleased I did it though as its great. Now I’ve just got to get a modern phone so that I’m not installing firmware updates that are months and months old. Once I start my full time apprenticeship I’ll get a contract and therefore a nice new shiny phone (I’m thinking of the N65 8gb, E66 or E71 depending on cost)

Source: http://www.techdigest.tv/2008/07/uk_visits_to_bl.html

Now of course this increase in blog readership could mean there is even more great information for people to look at and research into, however on the other hand it could just mean that silly, funny and entertaining blogs like http://icanhascheezburger.com/ and http://ihasahotdog.com/ are on the up.

Some people are quite worried about this increase in the number of people able to express their opinions so widely so quickly however I think its great! – whilst I understand that a real social life is important just think of the increased socialisation that now occurs thanks to blogs and forums with people being united through a particular interest for example.

Heres something little to keep you entertained however  I will warn you that it is addictive and may have you playing it for about an hour or more:
Fantastic Contraption

Whats the maximum you’d pay for some gadgetry? which to be honest shouldnt cost that much - you can get keyboards for under a fiver in some places.

Do you find that if you step out of the internet bubble for a little while, it misses you so much?