02:56 PM by Brian in E-Book General | News

Here's another device to add to the growing list of recently announced products using E Ink displays. In case you're keeping score, the Sony Reader, iRex Iliad, Jinke Hanlin, and Lexar JumpDrive Mercury all use the MIT Media Lab spinout's electronic paper in their products.

Now Ambient Devices, another MIT spinout, have announced the Weather Wizard, a wireless weather station that displays a five day forecast using an E Ink display. The device gets weather information wirelessly over the Ambient Information Network, which covers over 90% of the U.S. population.

Unlike Xerox's e-paper spin-out Gyricon, who recently pulled the plug on e-paper, E Ink has found several manufacturers to utilize their electronic paper display technologies in consumer-oriented devices.

Full press release here.

09:57 AM by Brian in E-Book Readers | Sony Reader

The Sony Reader received quite a bit of coverage at this year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES), with the likes of Engadget, Gizmodo, and Tablet PC Review Spot.com posting hands-on reports that include some really good photos of the device. During Sir Howard Stringer's keynote address where he publicly unveiled the Reader, Sony's CEO even invited The Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown on stage to pitch e-books. In addition to numerous articles and blogs spreading the buzz about the Sony Reader and E Ink, the Reader has also been discussed in a number of videocasts and podcasts.

Here's an audio & video roundup for those of you who can't get enough Sony Reader goodness, thanks to Podzinger:

TWiT 37:CES Podcast @ 16mins, 35secs
Buzz Out Loud from CNET 01/06/06 Podcast @ 2mins, 25sec
DigitalLifeTV: DL.TV's Thursday CES Special
Videocast (clip link on bottom right), Audio Only @ 31mins, 24secs
The New York Times tech columnist David Pogue at CES "Navigating the Gadgets" @ 1min 20secs

If you want to see a video of the Reader in use, including the pages being "turned", check out the DLTV videocast. In Patrick Norton's hands, the Reader looks a lot smaller and thinner than some of the photos might suggest.

09:37 AM by Bob Russell in Miscellaneous | Lounge

It's something that the tech geek has known for many years now. You can carry music, video, ebooks, email, games and much more with you wherever you go. But has it ever occurred to you that, in fact, we might have pretty much come to the end of boredom? Almost true.

Mark Cuban writes effectively about this topic in his very popular BlogMaverick. He says that mobile technology has filled all those downtime minutes on the train, or in waiting line or even just sitting around. It used to be that these were often boring times with nothing to do. Now mobile devices give us an abundance of distractions and entertainment that awaits us every time we can find a spare moment.

As expressed in his blog, Mark has hit the mark as usual. He always has a way of writing something that makes you stop and think about something in a new and interesting way.

But if we think it through a bit, we may find that it's a great point, but not the whole story. Boredom is always going to be part of the human equation. It can be reduced, but will never go away. No matter how many games and books and movies we carry with us, we'll still be bored. There are times when it just seems like entertainment is the same old thing over and over and we get tired of it. It often just doesn't seem meaningful. So, sometimes we feel like we're just not in the mood to pick up another frivolous book or watch another movie. And at times it just feels like too much work to attack a book that's profitable and useful to read. So despite the increased options, we again find ourselves bored.

Isn't it only when we fill our life with meaningful pursuits and activities to the brim that we discover the nooks and crannies of spare moments are delightfully filled with frivolous pursuits?

So, whether it's due to an overabundance of leisure, or just because there's something more important on your mind, simple forms of entertainment will not always be engaging. We'll still have moments of boredom.

On the other hand, having said that, I can confidently say that I'm looking very much forward to my lunch break today when I'll watch an episode of a very exciting spy series on my Treo. I'm definitely not going to be bored!

05:54 PM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Not exactly the kind of device that comes to your mind when you think of gadgets, the Celestron SkyScout has managed to become Scobleizer's coolest gadget on this year's CES. It's a remarkably little device allowing you to explore the night's sky and to instantly identify over 6,000 unique celestial objects. Among its features is a "must-see list" which will tell you the ten "coolest things" to look at in the sky (using an internal GPS to determine your location); a lesson system that will give you more details and information on the star (system) that you're currently looking at; a USB port to allow for period updates; and a SD card slot for additional content offerings.

It'll cost you around USD $400 (preorder from Amazon), but who is counting when you can impress your lady on the next starry night?

04:51 PM by Alexander Turcic in E-Book Readers | Sony Reader

The Sony Portable Reader PRS-500 has dominated our headlines lately and made everyone want to kick out some cash for one of the most promising e-book reader devices. Unfortunately it won't hit the market before this coming spring. Upon visiting its product page today, I noticed that Sony has revealed the final pricing for the reader: USD $349.99. That's exactly between the price range of $300-400 which was cited earlier by various sources.

If you like Sony to notify you by e-mail when the Portable Reader becomes available, click here.

Related:
Gizmodo hands on with the Sony Reader
Will Sony help the e-book market to grow?
Sony's new e-book reader officially announced
Sony Reader vs. iRex Iliad e-book reader

07:14 AM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

When I think of calculators, I still think of the basic functions. I haven't really used any of the newer and more sophisticated models. And I haven't programmed on one since my TI-56 and TI-59 days in the late 70's.

But calculators have come a long way, and one almost has to admit that in the realm of mobile computing they are a legitimate member of the family. I'm even more convinced of this after seeing some of the thousands of programs available for the TI-83/84 Plus models.

The web site TIcalc.org has some impressive archives of programs, and for many TI calculator models there are games, utilities and PIM programs. You can even play chess on a calculator. It's really amazing. You can find an alternate OS, or play baseball or do many other things I would never have expected on a calculator. Programs are written in BASIC, assembler and even Flash (although I have to wonder if this is the same Flash we think of on the web).

If you have one of the more sophisticated TI calculators, or are thinking of getting one and want some information, be sure to check out the site.

07:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Week in Review

Missed some of our big mobile stories this week? Time to catch up:

Announcements
Mobileread wins "Best Technology Web Site" award
PA 2005 Reader Award - last chance to vote

Browsers
AvantGo 6.0 adds Windows Mobile 5.0 support

Current E-Books Trends
Poll: Which e-reader would you choose?
Poll: Will Sony help the e-book market to grow?
Sony's new e-book reader officially announced [Update]
The Da Vinci Code author talks about e-books at CES

E-Book Readers
Gizmodo hands on with the Sony Reader
Sony Reader vs. iRex Iliad e-book reader

General Chat
Get the Google Pack for Windows XP
Google Local for mobile now available on select phones
Television scripts for your handheld
WebXCope mobile Web proxy
Yahoo! Go Mobile for Nokia Series 60 phones

Link Swap
Portable Gaim 1.5b2 for Windows

Other E-Book Resources
O'Reilly Asterisk free e-book download
Portable Harvard Classics Volume 8 is available
Syriana screenplay released for free

Other Gadgets
A-Data SD cards with storage capacity meter
Didigo SmartDrive DD01 with BCD screen
Lexar JumpDrive Mercury uses E Ink technology
Nokia 770 doing surprisingly well
Pepper Pad receives a Plus upgrade
Tiny 500gig Quantum Disk storage - Too good to be true?
X50v.it takes apart the Sony PSP

Palm
FontSmoother 1.65 released
Is it time to overhaul the Palm interface?
Mossberg advises sticking with Palm-based Treos
Palm 700w coverage at Palm Addict
PalmAddict's Sammy reviews the Palm Treo 650
Palm CEO live on Bloomberg TV - transcript
Palm Treo 700w is here
Podcasts: PalmAddict 28 and 1src 57
Run Fitaly on a Palm T|X!
Sign the NetFront for Palm OS petition
Slow season could hurt Palm despite Treo 700w
TipTop puzzle game $4.95! (thanks to Astraware's Annual Hogmanay Party)
Treo 700w available in Europe already in spring 2006 (rumor)

Pocket PC
Acer n310 VGA Pocket PC spotted on German site
Card Export II USB Mass Storage for WM 5.0
Dell Axim X51v A06 ROM upgrade released
GSPlayer V2.24 released
Opera Mobile 8.5 for WM 5.0 leaked

09:43 PM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

It seems that Alexander Pruss has accomplished the adaption of Fitaly to the Palm T|X, something that has has been missed by many T|X users who are fans of the Fitaly virtual keyboard as an input method. Fitaly has been a very popular input method for both Palm and Windows Mobile, but is no longer supported for new PalmOS devices due to the amount of effort required to adapt it for each new model.

Alexander is also the author of FontSmoother. He is releasing the required Fitaly skin loader for the Tungsten X in conjunction with Jean Ichbiah, who I believe is the developer of Fitaly.

This is provided as-is with no guarantees or support, but I think that it will still be welcomed warmly by a many users. I am not too familiar with the topic, so you'll want to check out details for yourself. You can find more information here, and you may want to read through the information to ensure that it is what you want.

This is just one more nice example of the great developer community we have in the mobile device world, and for PalmOS in particular.

And, of course, be sure to do a backup just in case. In fact, that's a good practice whenever you add new software.