New Sony Reader PRS-300 Pocket Edition & PRS-600 Touch Edition

Electronic books or "e-books" have become one of the latest trends in technology and Sony is just one company that is profiting from the idea. The Sony Reader not only allows users to purchase and read books from the Sony Connect eBook store, but it can display Adobe PDFs, ePub format, personal documents, blogs, JPEG files, RSS newsfeeds, and Sony's BroadBand eBooks, as well as playing MP3 and unencrypted AAC audio files. It is viewable in direct sunlight and requires no power to keep a static image. While the Sony Reader has been available since 2006, on August 5th, 2009, Sony announced two new versions of the reader, the PRS-300 Pocket Edition and the PRS-600 Touch Edition.

PRS-300 or the "Pocket Edition":

The PRS-300 or the "Pocket Edition" has been put on the market to replace the now discontinued PRS-505. Priced very competitively at $199, it has a smaller display screen than the larger version (five inches) and a resolution of 800 x 600 pixels, with three adjustable font sizes. It features 512 MB of internal memory with 440 MB of it accessible. The battery is said to last up to two weeks on a single charge. It is available in navy blue, rose pink and silver.

PRS-600 or the "Touch Edition":

The PRS-600 or the "Touch Edition" is meant to replace the PRS-700 model that is no longer offered. It's the high-scale version of the Sony Reader and boasts a touch screen. The PRS-600 features six inch display screen with a resolution of 800 x 600 pixels and has 512 MB or memory with 380 MB accessible. It does, however, support the Sony Memory Stick Pro DUO and SDHC for expanded memory purposes. Like the PRS-300, a fully charged battery is said to last up two weeks but this edition is priced higher at $299. The PRS-600 is available in black, silver and red.

New Smart Phones Coming this Fall

Word has been out about Verizon's upcoming HTC Whitestone for some time now but now we finally have some specs and images to put with the name. Some other news that leaked was about Verizon's HTC Mega and some more news on the Tachi.

The Verizon Diamond 2, or "Whitestone" as it is being called, is trying for a September/October release date so we could see this in our hands i in the near feature. The specs for the Diamond 2 are pretty impressive, especially considering that this isn't a keyboard phone. The Diamond 2 has WM6.1, 512MB ROM/256MB RAM, 5-megapixel autofocus camera with anti-handshaking, GSM/CDMA World Phone, Qualcomm 7600 at 528MHz, 3.6" WVGA touchscreen and gpsOne (aGPS and full GPS). One thing it doesn't have that some people may have been expecting is WM6.5 on launch.

The next piece of leaked intel comes in for the Verizon HTC Mega. Until recently, we haven't known a whole lot about the HTC Mega. We knew it had new TouchFlo 2D and some other low-range specs but that's about it. But now we have some new information and it comes as follows. The HTC Mega will have WM6.5, 256MB ROM/256MB RAM, GSM/GPRS Edge/HDSPA, gpsOne, Qualcomm 7225 at 528MHz and a 3-megapixel fixed-focus camera. As you can see, the HTC Mega isn't the greatest thing to come out, but it is obvious that it is geared more towards the low-end of the market, and even so it isn't bad for that group.

The only new news on the Tachi is this picture of it's design. The biggest noticeable difference is that the d-pad doesn't have as much chrome on it. But that is basically it so far. One thing we can almost be sure of is that the Tachi will more than likely not be available in the U.S and instead will be available in China.

Well it sure is good to finally put a face to the name with the Diamond 2 and the HTC Mega and I guess it is even a good thing that we saw the latest Tachi version. It will be good to see how these devices when they hit store shelves and we can finally get them in our hands.

The Ins and Outs, Ups and Downs of the New 3GS iPhone

Technology today is seeing amazing heights, and Apple is at the top of those heights, with the creation of iTunes, the iPod, Mac book and now the iPhone. The 3gS iPhone is one of the most innovative pieces of technology of our time, with the ability to read maps, make movies, edit photos and movies, and voice recognition. With touch screen functionality you can navigate with just a touch of a finger between applications, pictures, messages, and phone numbers. The iPhone has become even more affordable with a price of $199 with a two year contract from AT&T.
The easy to recognize face that is identical to the original iPhone with the exception of the bright, high quality, high resolution 480 x 320 3.5-inch display is easy to hold in your hand with the slightly curved back. However they haven’t found a way to cut down on smudges and fingerprints, But alas, the smudge loving plastic cover is needed now that the iPhone has so many technologies like GSM, EDGE, HSDPA, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS. One of the down sides to the new body shape is it will not fit in the original iPhone docking station, and it is sold separately for about $30.00.

The Apple 3G S iPhone has improved on the call quality that may not be noticeable when you upgrade but in a side by side comparison there was an obvious difference. Apple has also had to lengthen the life of the battery because 3g does require more power, not to mention the support of all the cool new applications and music, video and pictures. If you are in an area where 3G isn’t a necessity you can dig down into the menu and turn that feature off.

You’ll notice that the camera is the same as on the original iPhone although images were a little crisper and sharper. The camera will now ask permission to use GPS to geotag photos with your current location. Geotags allow you to have an image tagged to a map position so you can have landmarks to refer to and make maps a little friendlier.

Outside of the cool features I think it is important to mention a few pros and cons of the programs.

- Power Point documents can now be seen on the new iPhone but to save any files you still have to email them to yourself.
- If you sync MobileMe calandars your calendar subscriptions like iCal or Gcal will be disabled
- However, even though the full Exchange Suite is not available the core elements work really well, like email, calendar and contacts. Unfortunately, enterprise contacts and calendars coexist on the same device with personal contacts and calendars.

Over all the new 3GS iPhone has all the bells and whistles any tech loving on the go person could want and outside of renting laptops for business trips it really can keep you in touch with your office and fits nicely in your pocket. However, if you are going to pay around $170.00 a month in cell services I do advise doing your homework as some of the application conflicts just might be a deal breaker.

David Letterman Just Doesn't Get it

I think I can safely say that most Twitter users understand the shear coolness of spreading the latest news around,but David Letterman had a little difficulty grasping the concept...

Verizon's Tethered Internet - Good, Not Great

On a recent vacation to Put-In-Bay, Ohio, a small town on South Bass Island in the south west of Lake Erie, I was pressed to find a solution that would allow me to stay connected to my office while still being 250 miles away. I, of course, always use remote desktop for working in the evenings and on other trips I’ve taken, the problem with this vacation was the location. It wasn’t exactly in a metropolis where WiFi connections are abundant. The solution was tethered internet access through my BlackBerry Storm.

I looked on Verizon’s website and found the service, and choked at the price of $60/month; but knowing I couldn’t go a week without the internet, I called Verizon to get the service. I was pleasantly surprised to hear that: not only did I get tethering for half price because I owned a BlackBerry (now making the service only $30/month), but I also could turn the service off and on for only the days I wanted it, I didn’t actually have to have it for an entire month. I had the service activated for a period of 8 days, for a grand total of $8.

$8 for internet access anywhere I had cell phone service. Now that’s a value… sort of. Upon arrival to the island I settling in to our cabin I hopped online. The internet was slow, but faster than I expected honestly. I was able to check my email, look up some local restaurants and reviews, get weather reports and maps for fishing; but when I tried to remote desktop back to my office… nothing. There simply was not enough bandwidth to get back home.

Several times throughout my trip I tried to connected, and several times I needed to connect, but I never could. I was able to check my email via a web interface, but that was the extent of my access to my office. This doesn’t mean it wouldn’t work for remote desktops in other locations, but… the fact that I had good signal strength and still couldn’t get connected makes me skeptical to rely on it for mission critical business.

I’m not saying that Verizon’s tethered internet wasn’t nice. It was. It was great to have. But… if you’re looking for a sure-fire way to work when you’re away from the office, I simply cannot recommend it. If you’re looking to just check email, do basic browsing, etc. then it is probably more than sufficient; especially if you’re only paying $1 for access.

iPhone 3.0: 10 Hidden Features in Latest Update

With the recent release of the iPhone 3.0 software update there are many hidden and undocumented features popping up now that people have had time to play around with the new iPhone OS. Here is a compiled list from PC World of the top 10 unknown features of the new operating system and some of my thoughts.

Adjustable Song Scrolling Speed

When previously listening to a song on your iPhone, there was just a simple dot on the song bar to rewind or fast forward your music. However, in the new 3.0 software update, you can now scroll through songs at various speeds by using different movements with your finger. Normally, if you drag your finger left or right on the song bar, you will scroll through a song at "high speed". But, if you do this movement while dragging your finger down the screen, then the speed will decrease to "half speed," "quarter speed," or "fine scrubbing." While its unclear at this moment if this feature works with movies I still have to say the adjustable scrolling speed is a great addition to the iPhone, especially for music lovers.

Special Characters In Messaging

The 3.0 keyboard has a few new features such as special characters and a quick punctuation feature while typing in letter mode. Some of the new special characters are activated when holding down certain keys and signs. For example, if you hold down the "." you also get an option to choose "...". The dash"-" also displays an em-dash "-" while the quotations and apostrophes display "<<" and ">>" respectively. While I'm all for making typing quicker and easier, is there really any use in providing functionality for the ">>" and "<<" symbols?

More Ways to Access Spotlight

Spotlight, the search function that lets you look through your e-mail, contacts, appointments, and notes can now be accessed and opened in many different ways. Your Mail and Contacts screen now how a search bar at the top of the list for spotlight and spotlight can even be accessed quickly from the home screen by swiping towards the right side of the screen. To me, it seems that the spotlight function being added to the contacts and e-mail sections of the iPhone should of been a no-brainer in previous operating systems but its great to finally see them implemented.

Quote Fragment Within Reply in Mail

The Mail app in the iPhone 3.0 update can now reply with a quote from the original e-mail. In order to do so, you need to tap and hold while viewing an e-mail (just like with copy/paste) and select the portion of the text that you want to quote. Then simply hit the reply button and the selected text will be appended to the end of your e-mail under your signature. This seems to be an easy way to reply to specific parts of an e-mail without confusing the other reader.

Remove Individual Texts from A Conversation

One of the biggest annoyances in the iPhone 2.X software was that you had to remove an entire conversation of text messages instead of deleting parts. In the new 3.0 update, there is an Edit button which allows you to select and remove individual text messages from a certain tree, similar to the way it is done in the mail app. In this way, you can also select a text to forward instead of copy and pasting the text itself. This is a great way to keep track of important texts for later reference without having to keep all the extra junk attached.

Open Link In New Tab In Safari

Safari now uses tabbed browsing just like explorers on a desktop. When browsing all you have to do is tap and hold on a hyperlink and you will be prompted with dialog to open this link, copy it, or open it in a new tab, just like Firefox or IE. This is a great step forward in multi-tasking on the iPhone.

Force Quit Unresponsive Apps

Due to the many functionalities of the Home button on the iPhone, this key will no longer force quit unresponsive apps like it did in the previous version. To force quit an application in 3.0, you will now have to hold the sleep/wake button at the top until the red power off slider appears. You will then have to hold down the home button to quit the unresponsive application. While this will probably seem like a hassle at first since you will be accustomed to the old way of quitting applications, it seems that it was a necessary change to due the many functions already associated with the home key.

Change App Store Account On The Fly

In the old days you were stuck changing your iTunes account from your computer and then syncing back up with the iPhone. In the 3.0 software you can now change your account two different ways. The first by going to Settings/Store and logging out and then back in with a different account. The second way of changing your iTunes account is by going straight within the App Store application. At the bottom of each search page your account will be displayed and if you tap on it you will be able to view your account information and even change it.

Unlimited Number of Apps Installed

In the 3.0 software update you can now install an unlimited number of applications on your iPhone with space permitting. The number of application pages themselves has increased from nine to eleven and should applications be installed above the 176 mark, (i.e. they can't fit on the applications page), then these applications can be accessed through spotlight. Its great that iPhones can now have unlimited applications but what I don't get is why they couldn't just make an unlimited amount of application pages with the option to access any of them through spotlight.

iPhone 3G S making waves, and not the good kind

On Tuesday June 9th, Apple made the much anticipated announcement of the new iPhone, the iPhone 3G S. The excitement was building to a level I had not seen before, and especially being kind of "non-techy" it nearly shocked me to see grown men and women acting like children on Christmas eve. Actually, I really think it may have been bigger than that, I think I'm going to go so far as to say the the behavior I saw in friends and across the Internet was more closely related to the fanaticism you see when you look at a pre-teen who is just about to meet her favorite Jonas brother.

Normally I wouldn't follow such a thing, an iPhone is just another cool phone to me. And in full disclosure, I don't own one, I have a BlackBerry. Perhaps that was my problem. That being said, I was interested in what the new iPhone would be like, what new features it would have, and how much it would make the old iPhone look like a 1985 Macintosh. So I watched, read, checked out the twitter trending topic. The second Steve Jobs spoke, his words literally flooded my computer screen at an amazing pace. I got all the info I needed, it wasn't much of a difference. You get a compass and a few features AT&T won't allow the iPhone users to access, at least not until the end of the year anyway. So, that lead me to think, "What are the iPhone junkies thinking now? That's got to be a let down, a huge let down." I was wrong. The excitement grew as the release date was announced and iPhone junkies were ecstatic, until they read the fine print.

According to the AT&T website, the iPhone 3G S pre-orders will start to show up on doorsteps June 19th. But before that can happen, current iPhone users looking for an upgrade need to make a huge decision. Right now (Thursday June 11th 10PM CST) current users have three options to purchase a new iphone, the first: pay to upgrade. This would be anywhere from $399 (16GB) - $499 (32GB) just for the phone. This isn't including the $18 upgrade fee, the additional $18 "one-time AT&T upgrade fee" or the extra $30 per month mandatory data plan. The second option: cancel your contract. Yep. You heard it right. AT&T customer service reps are actually telling irrate iPhone users that if they don't want to pay the full price to upgrade their phone they can cancel their contracts and start over as a "new" customer. But its going to cost you. The early termination fee is $175. I bet you're thinking, "Great, I'll take it!" But there's a catch. You then have to wait 90 days (after losing your phone number) to get a new contract with AT&T. And you'll still be paying $199 or $299 for your phone. The third option: wait until your contract is up and you can upgrade without all the hoops and extra cost. I'm sure by then a new iPhone will be released and you can, once again, be back up to speed with the rest of civilization.

So aside from the obvious bind this puts most "tech junkies" in, it also creates some moral questions. Especially since you, the customer, signed a contract with a company stating that you will be a customer for 2 years in exchange for the subsidized price on the iPhone you purchased last year. So based on my course work in the subject of "Life" and contracts, one would only assume that you are not entitled to a "discount" upgrade in the middle of your contract since you haven't totally fulfilled your part of the agreement. Sure, you can pay the $175 and you're all square, AT&T gets its subsidized money back and you are now free from your contract and the proud owner of an outdated iPhone that you can't use. Seems fair to me. According to a few blogs I've read this week pertaining to this issue, many customers have been loyal to AT&T and the iPhone brand and now they feel betrayed. From a business standpoint, you want a $500 phone for $250, I (as the business owner) will give you the phone for $250 in exchange for you signing a contract that you will be my customer for 2 years, I'll even give you a discounted upgrade at the end of those two years for staying loyal to me. Seems fair to me, and one heck of a deal.

I guess we will all just have to wait and see what Apple and AT&T do next. Perhaps Apple will issue everyone who upgrades and pays full price for the iPhone 3G S a $50 iTunes credit or an Apple store discount for life. Who knows. But all that I'm seeing now is a bunch of grown men and women literally crying over this piece of metal and plastic. Its a phone. Yes, its an iPhone. But its still JUST a phone. If you want it bad enough I guess you're just going to have to do what you need to do to get it. And for some, no price is too high to be the first to own something that everyone will have soon enough.