Author: James Kendrick

Reports of the death of wireless USB are premature, as the Warpia Easy Dock proves. The Easy Dock is a way to hook either Windows notebooks or MacBooks up to a full desktop configuration, wirelessly. A keyboard, mouse, monitor and other peripherals are connected to the Easy Dock, which then connects to the notebook wirelessly using a simply USB dongle.

The dongle method makes sense for the Easy Dock as it makes it simple to switch multiple notebooks into the desktop configuration by moving the dongle from one notebook to another. The dock uses wireless USB technology from Wisair, and can wirelessly transmit screens up to 1400×1050 without loss of fidelity.

The Warpia Easy Dock is $149.99 and fully plug and play. Just plug in the USB dongle and the notebook is instantly connected to all of the peripherals on the dock. This might be a great way to use that netbook at home, as the Easy Dock is compatible with Windows 7, Vista, XP, Mac OS X Leopard, and Snow Leopard.

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Cool, Calm and Connected: 3 Design Principles for Connected Objects

The past two years have seen the public’s interest in e-books reach dizzying heights. The Kindle and other readers have pushed the e-book phenomenon in front of mainstream consumers. The imminent appearance of the iPad and the iBookstore have renewed that interest, and folks previously untouched by the e-book craze are now getting drawn in. One of the features of readers often touted is the ability to take notes in the digital versions of books. The intent is to make sure those consumers who like to scribble notes in the margins of books can do so in the electronic versions. While this sounds good on the surface, it brings to mind a question that no one is answering — who owns the notes you “write” in digital books?

The question is pertinent given the lack of ownership of digital content. We may think we are “buying” an e-book, but we are really just licensing the right to read it. That is often fuel in the “paper vs e-book” debate. You buy a paper book and you physically own it. The same is not true of the e-book; the seller can revoke your “ownership” given a violation of set conditions. Even worse, a company can choose to stop handling a given reader, putting all of the content that has been “purchased” in a legal limbo.

These worst-case scenarios are not likely to happen with the big companies, say Amazon and Barnes & Noble, but the fact is these things can happen. While it would be bad enough to lose the right to read the books you have purchased, what if you’ve taken notes in the books you can no longer access? Your notes are gone due to the same circumstance that removed your ability to access the e-book. In that regard your notes don’t really belong to you, if you can’t refer to them.

Last year Amazon pulled a bone-headed move when they remotely deleted some e-books they sold but shouldn’t have. There was a big online outcry when that happened, as e-book “owners” had the books physically removed from their Kindles. This was bad enough, but making it worse, book owners who had taken notes in the deleted books lost all of their notes too. This had a big impact on some students who were taking notes in the e-book for classwork. The notes were there and then “poof”, they were gone. Amazon has promised they will never do that again but is it worth trusting your own notes to that promise?

The fact is that in most readers, notes added by the user are attached to the digital book. If access to the book is eliminated for whatever reason, the user’s own notes are gone too. That’s a sobering thought, that notes you create can be gone in the blink of an eye.

I read a lot of e-books, but I don’t take notes in the books. Yet I hear from a lot of folks who do so, and they are concerned about their notes. Some folks carry technical books in their readers, specifically to refer to their added notes along with the book’s content. This is a significant part of their jobs, and the fact their notes can disappear, even mistakenly, is a worry.

Students are using e-textbooks in rising numbers, and often take copious notes in them. Textbooks are even more of a concern from the notes standpoint, as this content is often used through a subscription for a limited period. When the subscription runs out, access to personal notes goes away.

The safe thing for e-book readers to do is obviously to take notes outside the book itself. If continued access to personal notes is crucial, then it’s best to not have them tied to a digital file that can go away. I am interested to hear from those who take lots of notes in e-books. How do you do it, and how do you insure continued access to your own notes?

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The Price of E-Book Progress

It’s definitely iPad Mania, with information about the new slate from Apple everywhere you turn. It was even big news at the Oscars, with more people online pointing to the iPad commercial that aired during the Oscars than those listing who won awards. That’s the way it felt, anyway. Also big news in the iPad space is how Steve Jobs killed the dreams of millions with a single word. When asked if the iPad could be tethered to the iPhone, his Jobsness answered a curt “no” in response, thus dashing the hopes of future iPad owners hoping to get by with a Wi-Fi version of the slate. While Jobs may be telling the truth about tethering to the iPhone, it’s not the only game in town. I plan on tethering my Wi-Fi-only iPad from day one, and so can you.

I’m no Steve Jobs but when asked if I can tether the iPad, I have a one word answer too. “MiFi“. Yes, I will be tethering the 3G-less iPad to my MiFi from the unboxing. While Apple may have the intention of preventing iPad owners who don’t spring for the pricier (and one month delayed) 3G version of the slate from using a 3G connection, they can’t stop us. Since the MiFi shares the 3G love over Wi-Fi, the iPad cannot prevent it. The 3G connection will just look like any other Wi-Fi hotspot, even though of my own making.

Apple may take active steps to prevent tethering the iPad to a phone using a Bluetooth connection. That wouldn’t surprise me as they try to protect sales of the 3G models, along with the data plan from AT&T. No matter how hard they try they can’t stop tethering over Wi-Fi without limiting the usefulness of the iPad. We have Apple right where we want them. Sure we do.

Those who don’t have a MiFi or Sprint Overdrive needn’t fret. Many phones — the U.S. model of the iPhone currently excluded — have utilities that allow tethering the 3G connection over Wi-Fi, just like the MiFi. Again, the iPad will see a Wi-Fi hotspot, not an evil tethered connection. Sorry Jobs, but we gotta have some 3G on the iPad. Even without your help.

Image courtesy of Apple

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Last week I detailed my foray into the world of cloud backup and syncing to multiple devices. The gist was that Dropbox didn’t work quite the way I wanted, and a number of you smart folks suggested I look at SugarSync. Always one to take you up on good advice, Friday afternoon I signed up for SugarSync and got started using its cloud service. It’s worth sharing how easy it was to get going with SugarSync, and to pass on some observations about the process.

I first looked into SugarSync years ago, and while it looked pretty good I never got around to seriously use the service. It just didn’t click at the time. A quick look around last week showed it has grown up nicely, and has a lot of features for someone like me who uses multiple computers/ gadgets.

I use my MacBook as my desktop system, and as such it has all of my documents, music and the like. The Documents folder on the MacBook is 25 GB currently, and the Music folder is 19 GB. Based on that volume, I signed up for a 60 GB account on SugarSync for $9.99 per month. There is an annual option for $99.99 to save some bucks, but I went monthly until I am sure it fits my needs.

Once I signed up I installed the SugarSync File Manager application on the MacBook. The service allows full web access through any web browser, but the convenience of a dedicated app is also a good thing. The next thing on the agenda was selecting the folders on the MacBook I wanted to sync with the SugarSync cloud. I selected all of my personal folders, Documents, Music, Pictures and Videos, and SugarSync started uploading them right away.

This initial sync is the important one, as SugarSync has to get all of the host files to the cloud. Once the files are all there, then any computer can be set to sync with the cloud, giving full access to the information from the other computer. This initial sync takes days if there are a lot of files. SugarSync estimates 2 – 3 GB per day, which is awfully slow on a fast connection. I started my 40 GB upload on Friday afternoon, and almost three days later it is still in progress. I estimate another day, two maximum, and it will finally be finished. Bear this in mind when you get started with a service like this.

If you don’t want to let this massive upload tap your network too hard, you can throttle it back in the preferences. I decided to let it have the maximum allowed to get this process over as quickly as possible. It does hit the network pretty hard.

After the first day I decided that enough of my files had been uploaded to the cloud, so I set up SugarSync on the Microsoft Windows PC where I wanted access to my files. I installed the Windows version of the File Manager, which looks much like the Mac version. Setting up the folders to sync with the cloud, and thus the MacBook, couldn’t have been easier. SugarSync is smart enough to know that the My Documents folder on the Windows PC corresponds to the Documents folder on the Mac, so it presented a graphical confirmation that these two folders would be kept in sync. The same was done for the other folders on the MacBook, so I was all set.

Since SugarSync was downloading the files from the cloud to the Windows PC, this was at a higher speed than the upload from the Mac; my ISP provides faster downloads than uploads. After just a day the Windows side of things was all caught up to the queued Mac uploads so now as soon as a file completes uploading to the cloud, it will download to the Windows PC.

One caveat I should pass on, and it affects this initial sync runtime, is to think about the programs you run on the host (initial) computer to sync with SugarSync. I run virtual machines on the MacBook through Parallels, and this creates some huge hidden files in the Documents folder tree on the MacBook. These files queue up to be copied just like any other, even though in this case I can never use them anywhere else. Once the initial sync starts, there is no easy way to tell it to not copy these files. They are not user accessible normally, and they are not accessible through SugarSync’s File Manager either.

There are about 10 GB of these files, so it will take quite a while for them to get uploaded to the cloud, and then downloaded to the Windows PC. If I had known about these hidden files, I would have done something to prevent this from happening in SugarSync.

Once the initial sync completes, SugarSync will keep these two computers (in this example) in sync in the background. Any file changes, additions or deletions on either of these systems will be immediately reflected in the cloud, and thus on the other system. It’s a beautiful system, as it turns your stuff into one big cloud storage. The files are locally stored, but with the advantage of being backed up in the cloud.

One thought to consider, given this huge initial sync, is how it might impact your ISP. In my simple two system example, the 40 GB of files are uploaded to the cloud, and downloaded to the other PC. That is a total of 80 GB of data transmission in just a few days, far more than normal. If your ISP keeps an eye out for that, especially if you pay on a tiered scheme, than this will trip flags for sure. I certainly wouldn’t want to take either of these computers out to work using my 3G connection while this initial sync is in progress, as the syncing would be eating up my monthly data cap quickly. Normal daily syncing will be no problem, as it will only be moving single files.

The cool thing about SugarSync is there are versions of it available for most smartphones. I haven’t done this yet as my initial sync is not finished and I don’t want to rock the boat, but I will install the iPhone version for sure. It will be cool to have access to my entire document library on the phone.

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Microsoft first introduced the Tablet PC in the early 2000’s, but it is only in the past year has the concept of a slate computer caught the public’s fancy. Apple stoked the fire with the long rumored iPad, and last year tablet computers started to appear in all sizes. Many companies are currently working to produce slate devices, and one thing they all have in common is the touchscreen. Slate devices provide a natural use for operation by touch, so this is only logical. But there are a lot of misconceptions about touchscreens that are important to address, as not all slates will be as useful as many think they will.

The term touchscreen has become distorted to the point that it is often misused. Tablet PCs as introduced by Microsoft require a special digitizer and pen to operate; they do not work by touch normally. These Tablet PCs often are thought to have touchscreens, even though that is not the case. There are three types of “touchscreens” or digitizers in common use currently, and each has specific uses.

Active digitizer. This is the screen type used in the Microsoft Tablet PC. Active screens do not recognize touch at all, and only hovering or contact with the special pen that is supplied registers interaction with the screen. While these are not touchscreens, the proliferation of the other two types of digitizers have created a huge misconception about active digitizers. These are the only type of digitizer that have been successfully leveraged for handwriting on the computer screen.

Resistive digitizer. These screens have been around since the early PDA days, and were specifically developed to be used with a plastic stylus. A precise tap on the screen is required for accurate sensing by the digitizer, thus the stylus requirement. Touching such screens with a finger nail is also precise enough, enabling touch without a stylus.

Recently, light touch versions of the resistive digitizer have been incorporated in screens that have more sensitive response to touch. These do not interpret handwriting on the screen well like the active digitizer, due to the lower precision of the sensing and the inability to rest the hand on the screen. Resting the hand on the screen for writing on a device with a resistive digitizer results in an effect called “vectoring”, as any touch on these screens is interpreted as a deliberate action. This inability to rest the hand on the screen is the reason that most Microsoft Tablet PCs do not use resistive digitizers. UMPCs designed primarily for touch control aside, only one Fujitsu Tablete PC model line incorporated a resistive digitizer, the P16xx series. This required special “palm rejection” technology to ignore the hand resting on the screen while handwriting with a plastic stylus.

Capacitive digitizer. When we think of touchscreens currently, the capacitive screen is what commonly comes to mind. This is the type of touchscreen brought into the mainstream by the iPhone, and is by nature the only type in use capable of multitouch. The “pinch and zoom” feature of the iPhone is made possible due to the capacitive digitizer. This is the type of touchscreen in the iPad.

Capacitive digitizers work by sensing skin contact by the touching action. They do not work with pressure as the other two types; they require actual touch to register an action. This prevents the use of these touchscreens for handwriting on the screen, unless a special stylus is employed that fools the digitizer into thinking it has been touched by skin.

What does this mean in the real world?

Currently only Tablet PCs with active digitizers can effectively be used for “inking”, or handwriting on the computer screen. Attempts to produce tablets capable of properly allowing handwriting using resistive digitizers have not been successful, with the one exception by Fujitsu noted. Even that was not a complete success, as the inking on the screen was prone to skips due to the palm rejection technology.

Resistive digitizers have largely fallen by the wayside since the appearance of the capacitive type. The resistive type of touchscreen is still being used in many tablets being produced today, from those based on Android to many running Windows. These tablets cannot be used for handwriting on the screen in a productive environment. This is a big misconception that some have about tablets in general, that they can all be used for handwriting on the screen. There will be many people unhappy when they buy a slate using a resistive screen only to discover they cannot write on the display.

Capacitive digitizers can be used for handwriting if software is designed to handle the special stylus required. There are such apps on the iPhone, and when coupled with the stylus (also available through third parties) it is possible to write ink notes on the screen. This is not widely used nor has the capability been developed to the point of providing a full inking experience. Capacitive digitizers are more expensive than resistive types, and prior to the iPad no manufacturer has used one in a device larger than a phone. The true multitouch screen has been relegated to phone devices as a result, with the exception of expensive Tablet PCs that use two digitizers.

Dual digitizer systems incorporate both an active and a capacitive digitizer to provide the best of inking and touch. These require special technology that turns off the touch digitizer when the active pen gets close to the screen for inking, to prevent the erroneous sensing of the hand that results in vectoring. Touch the pen to the screen, and touch is totally turned off until the pen raises from the screen. This works well in Tablet PCs like the ThinkPad x200 I am evaluating, but it is not cheap to implement.

So what does this mean to you, the consumer interested in the tablets flooding the market? With just a few exceptions, virtually every tablet you see running Android or Windows is likely running a resistive digitizer capable of “light touch” sensing. These are good touch tablets, but do not expect these tablets to handle writing on the screen. The technology just can’t handle it.

The iPad is upping the touchscreen game by using a large capacitive digitizer. The multitouch experience is likely to be superb, but the OS used on the iPad is not designed to handle inking, even with a special stylus capable of it. There will need to be third party apps written to capitalize on this unintended capability, so it will not handle it out of the box.

Tablet PCs that run Windows 7 and have dual digitizers are the only devices currently available that can handle both touch (multitouch, too) and handwriting on the screen. These devices are much more expensive than the cheap tablets garnering a lot of attention recently, but you get what you pay for. The important thing to remember is if handwriting on the screen is vital to your needs, the cheap tablets are not going to handle it well, if at all.

To provide a full handwriting on the screen experience, the platform must natively handle it properly. Currently, only Windows 7 and Windows Vista have the capability. Microsoft doesn’t offer Windows XP Tablet Edition any longer, so any tablet with XP will not handle inking at all. Android is starting to appear on slates this year, but it has no native ability to handle handwriting on the screen. It will have to be developed by either Google or third parties to leverage that ability fully. The iPad doesn’t have the ability to handle handwriting either, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see companies produce solutions down the road.

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Hot Topic: Apple’s iPad

Android news this week was dominated by Apple — in the form of a lawsuit Cupertino filed against Android phone maker HTC alleging that it infringes on 20 patents that Apple holds “related to the iPhone’s user interface, underlying architecture and hardware.” The move is clearly a shot at Google as Android is at the heart of all of the HTC phones named in the suit. I believe Apple is also running scared ahead of the Chrome OS release due out later this year.

In the meantime, I had a chance to do a full review of Motorola’s latest Android phone, the Devour. The Devour is one of the heaviest smartphones I’ve tried, with a sleek industrial design that’s pleasing to the eye. It runs Android 1.6, not the latest and greatest version of the OS, but it handles it without any laggy performance. And of course, it comes  with the social networking aggregating MotoBlur technology.

And it is now possible to search for information stored on Android phones by writing on the screen using just a fingertip, with Gesture Search. A Gesture Search icon sits at the bottom of the Android screen; once tapped, the user simply starts spelling the desired search term on the screen, one letter at a time. Gesture Search will search all information on the phone, including music and contacts. It learns as it is used so frequently accessed information on the phone will appear at the top of results for searches.

You asked for it, and now you’ve got it! The Motorola Devour is the latest Android phone appearing on the Verizon network in the U.S. The Devour has a sliding QWERTY keyboard and a side-mounting battery. Motorola includes its Motoblur technology, a unique social network aggregator, on the phone as well.

The phone owner’s social networks are easily configured for Motoblur, and once that is done, all status updates appear on the home screen in real time. In the video I show how my friend’s Facebook and Twitter updates all pop onto the home screen as they occur. I also show how well the phone performs with all of this activity.

Our in-depth review contains the details and lots of photos of the Devour.

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Mobile OSs Are No Longer Just About Mobile

The end of the week is here bringing another chance to share the happenings in my world. That world is Mobile Tech Manor, my home office, and it’s a happening place with a revolving door for cool gadgets and technology. This week the gadgets were small, and when I wasn’t playing with them I was experimenting with a cloud file storage method. In between the gadget sessions I had some amazing personal experiences, including what felt to me like a modern miracle.

Playing in the cloud

I am a firm believer in living in the cloud and having all of my “stuff”, files, documents and the like, available 24/7. I play with work with too many notebooks and other cool gadgets, so moving this stuff around when I switch devices is not practical. Storing the stuff in the cloud makes sense, as it is then accessible from any device I use, if it is a good service.

I have been playing with the free version of Dropbox for a long time. Dropbox lets you upload files to your account in the cloud, and then keep any device of your choosing synced in real time. The free account is a generous 5 GB of storage, but to get serious about putting all of my stuff there I needed to upgrade to a bigger account. The Pro account is $9.99 per month ($99 per year) and bumps your limit up to 50 GB. There are bigger account options but I decided to go to 50 GB and see if that was enough. I can always upgrade to a bigger limit if needed.

My past use of Dropbox was limited to just copying certain files to the cloud for remote access. What I wanted to do now was more substantial, I wanted to have all of my documents available through Dropbox. I have 25 GB of documents on my main desktop system, the MacBook, and I have 19 GB of music files on top of that. What I wanted to do was leave the files on the MacBook, but also have them in the Dropbox storage for access from other devices. It would also serve as a back up of the files with this method.

With this goal in mind I copied the documents to the Dropbox storage. This took a good while as expected, but was faster than I thought it would be. When you install Dropbox on a system, it creates a Dropbox folder (Mac or Windows) that can be accessed just like a local folder. The documents began appearing during the copy procedure, and I was getting excited by how easy this was happening.

Once the documents were finished copying I intended to copy my music files the same way. Unfortunately that was not to be. My MacBook had 42 GB free on the hard drive when I started this process. That free space included the documents and music files already stored on the local drive. Much to my surprise when the 25 GB of files were finished copying, my local hard drive only had 17 GB of free space.

I investigated the space issue and now I know what happened. While the Dropbox folder on my local hard drive represents the cloud storage, it is also a local copy of the files. Dropbox syncs the cloud storage with the local Dropbox folder, so in this case there were two physical copies of the files. I had created a copy of everything, when I only wanted to copy them to the cloud. If I continued on with the music files the same way, I would have almost no free space left on my local hard drive. That wouldn’t work at all.

I realize now that if I had moved all of the files in my Documents folder to the Dropbox folder, then I would only have the one local copy of them which is what I want. This would work fine except I wanted to keep my existing Documents folder tree intact, as that is where programs look for them. I can probably still do this with some sort of symlinks back to the original Documents folder tree, but I haven’t had time to explore this fully.

I will be futzing around with this for a while to see what works best for me. I’d like to keep my original file tree in place as I’ve indicated, yet have it synced with the Dropbox storage. I have to figure out the best way to get around the fact that Dropbox automatically copies files in the cloud to the local Dropbox folder on every device it is installed. This is a lot of different devices for me, and I don’t really want many copies of the same files all over the place. If you know of an easy way to accomplish what I want, please drop a comment explaining it.

Gadgets

This week I continued to play with the UMID mbook bz and found myself constantly impressed with how useful the little gadget is. While I normally don’t care for devices with keyboards too small to permit touch typing, I found lots of times when the UMID was sufficient to get things done anyway. It is so easy to bring along for any kind of outing, yet have a full WinXP computer at hand.

I love to read e-books while out for lunch during the week, and the UMID has turned into a surprisingly good e-book reader. I can fire up eReader on the UMID and read my book while eating. What makes the UMID so good at this simple task is the clamshell notebook form. It is in effect a book that can prop itself up at a good reading angle. I can read hands-free while eating at the same time, pressing the arrow key in the lower right of the keyboard to turn the page. It works great for this.

I’m not saying that it’s worth running out and buying a gadget just for hands-free reading. I wouldn’t do that and neither should you. But it’s an unexpected use for such a device, and a pleasant one at that.

The Motorola Devour just showed up yesterday and I’ve been banging on it for hours now. I am surprised how much I am liking this phone. I didn’t think I’d like it before it arrived, but I am enjoying using the phone. The performance is impressive, it is as good as any Android phone I have tested. The Motoblur technology is better than I thought it would be, and it runs with no impact on the system performance. I’ll be shooting a video of the Devour to share, perhaps later today.

Police come to Mobile Tech Manor

The week got off to a scary start as the police came calling at 1 am last Saturday morning. It was a raucous event with flashing lights (to the joy of my neighbors). It seems that my stepson, who was staying overnight at a friend’s house, got picked up by the police for breaking curfew. Houston has a 11 pm curfew for teenagers, and the two teenagers snuck out at midnight to go to a fast-food restaurant to get something to eat. They were sitting in his car when the police noticed they were kids.

The cop was a good one, and decided to scare the boys so they wouldn’t do this again. He brought them to our house and came inside to give them a lecture. He explained that he could tell from talking to them that they were both good kids. He also explained that the curfew was not in place to restrict their freedom, it was there to protect them. In a big city like Houston there are a lot of very bad people out after midnight, and that’s why teenagers had a curfew. It is protective in nature, not restrictive.

He went on to explain that the week before the police had a shootout with two rough individuals at the fast-food place where he picked up the boys. Both of the bad guys were shot by the cops. Had something like that happened when they were there it would not have been good. He made a great impression on the boys, by carefully explaining why he picked them up. We were glad he brought them home to explain it to us with the care that he used. I don’t think there will be any sneaking out again.

It’s a miracle

I am a person who depends on my hearing a lot. As a former musician, my love for listening to music is the light of my life. One of my biggest fears is to lose my ability to hear music, and that fear was realized. I noticed a couple of months ago that I was losing the hearing in my left ear. The right ear seemed fine, but the left one started losing it. Over the past two months it got progressively worse until it reached the point that I couldn’t hear at all in my left ear.

I discussed it with my doctor and after a brief exam she referred me to an ENT specialist. Her feeling was that it was likely a permanent hearing loss, with my early music career a negative factor for which I was now paying a hefty price.

Monday I headed to see the specialist. Upon checking in they sent me first to the audiologist for a complete hearing test. I was seated in a sound-proof booth and subjected to a 20 minute exam to define the hearing capability on both ears. On a cool note the audiologist was running the test from a HP 2710p Tablet PC.

After the hearing test I was sent to another room to wait for the doctor. When he arrived I was surprised to see him carrying a Motion LE1600 slate Tablet PC. I was already liking this doctor and his tablet-friendly medical practice.

He used the slate to show me the results of the hearing test. I wasn’t aware of how hearing worked, but he showed me on the slate that there are two types of hearing: the nerve hearing and the physical hearing. The physical hearing is comprised of the inner ear and the ear drum working together to gather the sound. The nerve hearing is how the brain receives the sound.

The good news he had for me was that the nerve hearing in the left ear was working perfectly. The problem was thus in the physical hearing, and that meant that something in the inner ear was preventing the ear drum from doing its job. He confirmed that my physical hearing was zero in this ear, meaning I was totally deaf. He stressed that this was great news, and he guaranteed me I would have my hearing back when I left his office.

The most likely cause of my hearing loss was fluid in the inner ear that was exerting so much pressure on the eardrum it could not move at all. He did some checking and confirmed that was the case. The fluid was either the result of a deep-seated, undetected ear infection, or a side effect of the stroke I had two years ago. The fluid should drain from the inner ear via the Eustachian tube, but it wasn’t happening.

He had to first rule out a blockage of the Eustachian tube, so he sprayed Lidocaine up my nose and ran a scope up there. Yuck. He showed me on the monitor that both Eustachian tubes were open and unobstructed, so the next step was to get the fluid out of the inner ear.

That involved poking a hole through the ear drum, and then suctioning out the fluid. This turned out to be harder than expected, as he said I had what they called “gluey ear”, meaning the fluid was very thick. It took 20 very painful minutes to suction all of the fluid out of the inner ear. He then put a tiny tube in the eardrum to allow it to drain further. This was the same type of tube they put in kid’s ears when they get a lot of ear infections.

The doctor wasn’t kidding, when I left his office roughly 2 hours after arriving, I had regained my hearing. I went from totally deaf in one ear, to 100% hearing. I literally skipped out of the building, it was a miracle for me. I had not been able to mentally adapt to being deaf in the ear, no matter how hard I tried. Listening to music is a great joy in my life, and it had been ripped from it. No more. I can hear you fine. To the nice lady in the parking lot, thanks for your concern but they were tears of joy.

e-Book of the week

I am happily engaged with another of David Hewson’s Nic Costa books this week. I finished The Seventh Sacrament I was reading last week, a great book, and immediately started Dante’s Numbers. This is just as good as the earlier books in the series, and particularly interesting for me as the scene has switched from Rome to San Francisco. Hewson does a great job invoking a mental image with his writing, and it’s great “seeing” events unfold in places I have visited. Highly recommended.

Wrap-up

That’s my week as it happened. A week of gadgets, cops and miracles. How much better could it be? Until next week, be safe.

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Motorola is the phone maker that has not rested since jumping on the Android train. It is almost as if they want to keep up with the frantic pace that Google is setting with Android development. Motorola’s latest member of the Verizon Android family is the Devour, a big smartphone with the MotoBlur feature. Will this phone devour the competition?

Hardware

The Devour puts a 3.1-inch touch screen (320×480) on a body that houses a sliding QWERTY keyboard. The phone is just over a half inch thick, which is much bigger than phones without the keyboard. The Devour fits comfortably in the hand, but it feels extremely heavy even though the actual weight is just under six ounces. Since first picking up the phone, I have not gotten used to the weight, which doesn’t bode well for long term use.

The only physical control on the front of the Devour is a small touch trackpad used for navigating around the screen. It is also a button for executing tasks in one smooth motion. There are three touch-sensitive (not physical) buttons under the screen: Menu, Home and Back. To the left of these three buttons is a tiny blue LED activity indicator. There is a large black Motorola logo on the upper left of the handset which looks like it should be a button, but isn’t.

On the top of the Devour (in portrait orientation) is the power button and a 3.5 mm headphone jack. The power button sits flush with the phone body, and is hard to find without looking.

The right side of the handset has four buttons from top to bottom: Volume up, volume down, voice dial and camera button. The camera button fires up the 3 MP camera and serves as a shutter button when active.

On the left side is the microUSB slot for charging and connecting to a PC, and a sliding door the length of the phone that houses the 1400 mAh battery and an 8 GB microSD card. The door is a bit hard to put back once opened.

There is nothing on the bottom nor the back of the phone. The phone is very sleek with a spartan, somewhat industrial look to it. I find it is an attractive handset, more so than its big brother the Droid.

The best hardware feature on the Devour is the sliding QWERTY keyboard. The screen slides up to expose the keyboard sitting between the two rails that supports the screen. The keys are small black bubbles of plastic with a decent amount of space separating them. All 42 keys are the same size with the exception of the space bar, which is a decent size. The top row of keys contains the number keys and the backspace key. It is very useful having the number keys accessible without having to hit another key as on some other phones. The keys have very little travel which caused me trouble at first, but I quickly adjusted to it. I find it a very good keyboard for knocking out text.

Software

The Devour is an Android phone, but disappointingly, Motorola used version 1.6. There are two major versions more recent than 1.6, and I wonder if Motorola has gotten MotoBlur to run on anything newer than 1.6. It’s a shame that a new phone like the Devour didn’t come with at least Android 2.0 onboard.

The interface is typical for Android with the addition of the MotoBlur home screen. MotoBlur is the aggregator for all social networks the user configures, to pull all updates that contacts make on any of the networks. MotoBlur can be configured for Twitter, Facebook, Google (Gmail), MySpace, Picasa, Exchange, POP email and Yahoo! Mail.

Updates appear on the MotoBlur homescreen in real time, through three different widgets. One handles the user’s own latest message (Twitter, etc.), one has contacts’ lastest update on any of the configured networks, and one handles direct messages (SMS, etc.) that have arrived. Any of these widgets can be removed like any other Android widget, or moved around to suit the user.

Tapping on any update that appears on the home screen takes you to a full screen app for viewing the updates. Swiping left and right make it easy to spin through all the updates that have been received. It is a pleasant way to kill some time by checking Twitter and Facebook updates.

There are five home screens that can be customized with widgets and program shortcuts. They are traversed by swiping left and right to spin through them. Motorola gets kudos for including a couple of widgets that display a slick “getting started” guide and a “Tips and Tricks” guide, both using the MotoBlur reader. These guides are very useful and should be appreciated by new owners.

I am loving Android on the Devour, especially with all of the useful free widgets in the Market. There are widgets that do just about anything you could want, and it’s great having five home screens to customize.

Using the Devour

Motorola has done a good job with the out of box experience on the Devour. Just five minutes after powering it on the first time all of my social network and email accounts were up and running. It was the smoothest and fastest new phone start up I have seen.

I was concerned that the performance of the Devour would not be great, but that is not the case. It runs as snappily as any Android phone I have tested, and it is a joy to use. Things happen instantly as desired, and I have not seen any lag yet. That is impressive because I have been banging on it pretty hard as I always do with a new phone.

The phone feels heavy in the hand, but I hope I can get used to that. It is a fairly large phone, without being so big to be awkard to use. The screen is a decent size for working by hand, and the keyboard is nice to use.

The web browser is the Android version that ships on all Android phones. There is no multitouch in the browser, as is the also case of the Droid. It’s not a deal breaker, but would be nice to have. Multiple windows are handled nicely in the browser, with no loss of performance. The onscreen keyboard pops up when needed when the physical keyboard is not exposed. I find typing on the screen to be a passable experience, and it’s nice to have the big sliding keyboard when needed.

The optical trackpad on the front of the phone is a nice interface design. I am finding it more useful as time progresses with the phone. It is easy to move the cursor around on the screen by sliding the thumb over the little trackpad, and then clicking it to push the button. It becomes very natural quickly, the mark of a good interface control. It is great for moving around in the browser.

Summary

Motorola has continued to refine the Android phone line with the Devour for Verizon. The phone is aimed at those who need a physical keyboard, but who still want a big touch screen display. The performance of the phone is fast with no noticeable lag, and while an older version of Android was used the phone handles it nicely. I have only been playing with the Devour for a few hours, but I already like it a lot. The Devour is not showing up on Verizon’s web site yet, so no pricing information is available at this time.

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As Windows Mobile Stumbles, Which Smartphone OS Will Seize the Lead?

You have likely heard about the lawsuit Apple has filed against HTC claiming patent infringement. Kevin offered a good analysis of the suit and how it claims HTC is using Apple technology from the iPhone. Basically Apple doesn’t like what HTC is doing with Android on the phones it is selling in the U.S., as they claim it uses various technology developed in Cupertino for the iPhone. Much has been said that the real target of Apple’s suit is Google Android, as the smartphone OS is growing at a fast clip. I suspect that is true, but I think Apple’s fears go even deeper. I think the scheduled appearance of the Chrome OS later this year has Apple tied up in knots.

Chrome OS is the operating system based on the Chrome browser that has generated a lot of interest from both enthusiasts and companies producing hardware since the Chrome OS announcement. It is intended to be an alternative OS for cheap netbook-like devices, and is aimed squarely at the mainstream consumer. Google expects to capitalize on its familiar brand, and use the Chrome OS to push its online services into the device category.

The Chrome browser is already available on Macs, and getting good reviews from enthusiasts. Apple’s core customer base is already exposed to Chrome, and liking it. Since the Chrome OS is the Chrome browser on steroids, it may appeal to loyal Mac customers, too. That’s a direct threat to Apple.

The impending launch of Chrome OS probably has Apple a bit concerned, but I suspect Google’s desire to see a Chrome OS Tablet hit the market ratchets that concern up to a decent level. A Chrome OS Tablet will compete directly with the Apple iPad, and Apple has a lot riding on the iPad. A Google Tablet would compare feature-wise with the iPad, and possibly surpass it given the full OS nature of Chrome OS. It’s not just the iPhone OS grown up, it will be a full OS built on a real desktop browser. That’s got to cause Apple some discomfort.

So what does Chrome OS have to do with the HTC lawsuit? It is logical that Apple is suing HTC because they are the biggest maker of Android smartphones. HTC is the maker of Google’s own Nexus One. But the real target of the suit is the Android platform, as that is what is the basis of HTC’s features that are allegedly “infringing” on Apple’s patents. Google has already stated that Android and Chrome OS would likely merge in the future to form one platform, one that can run full computers and smartphones. That’s got to tie Apple’s undies in a knot.

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With the iPad, Apple Takes Google to the Mat

Laptops are the top selling computers, and have been for a while. They have gotten easier to carry and cheaper, both factors making them the PC of choice for many. A lot of people leave the laptop plugged into the wall all the time, as they seldom venture out into the wild. Others are highly mobile by nature, and those folks know that sometimes squeezing the most out of the laptop battery is extremely important. Business travelers are often confronted with long trips where power outlets are few and far between. Keeping the laptop running on battery power is the top order of the day at such times. Here are 5 ways to squeeze the most out of laptop batteries. This article is focused on Microsoft Windows 7, but the concepts are applicable to any laptop.

Dim the screen and keyboard. It may be obvious that the laptop screen is a power-sucking component, but I often see travelers using laptops with the screen at full brightness. Nothing will drain the battery faster than a fully lit display. Turn the screen brightness all the way down, and then gradually bump it up until it is just barely viewable. This will extend your battery life tremendously, in some cases, for hours. If your laptop has a backlit keyboard, turn that off entirely. It’s not a big battery drain but all of the little things together add up to mean less time at the keyboard.

Kill the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. If you don’t need to get connected to a hotspot, kill the Wi-Fi. Many laptops have switches to do so easily, but for those that don’t there is usually a utility to turn the radios off. Even if you need the Wi-Fi you should definitely turn the Bluetooth off. This uses a radio and that means it needs power to function. You shouldn’t need Bluetooth at all while mobile. If you use a Bluetooth mouse, consider leaving it turned off so you can kill the radio. It may keep you running for a few more minutes before the laptop dies.

Put movies on a USB flash drive. If you normally watch DVDs on trips, consider ripping them to a USB flash drive. Spinning optical drives drain the battery rapidly, where USB drives take tiny sips. This can make a big difference when watching a movie on the plane. The same can be said for any content that is usually accessed through the optical drive. There are many utilities on the web that can get content from optical drives to a USB flash drive.

Turn off extraneous hardware. Every component on the laptop requires power, even when it is not being used. Most things on today’s systems don’t use a lot of power, but in critical situations where maximum runtime is vital it may be worthwhile to turn unused components off. These include Ethernet ports, fingerprint readers, optical drives, modems and various ports. Many laptops have utilities pre-installed to help turn these off, but even if yours doesn’t it can be done in the Device Manager. On Windows 7 laptops, this can be accessed by right-clicking on the Computer icon and then selecting the Device Manager link. Select the port or device you want to turn off and on the Driver tab click the Disable button. Don’t forget to turn it back on before needing it again.

Background/ unneeded programs. This one is only for those who must squeeze as much runtime out of the laptop battery as possible. Every system has a lot of programs running in the background, and these programs hit the CPU for processing power. This results in a power hit, and while it is very small everything has an impact. If it’s vital to get maximum runtime, turn off any background apps that are not actively needed for the work session. If there are programs you have installed that run in the background, such as desktop widgets, turn them off manually for the session. You should be able to do this safely for anything on a temporary basis, and save power by doing so.

These methods will go a long way to extending the amount of time that can be spent working on battery power. Hours of runtime can be added by aggressive power management obtained by these 5 steps. Some laptops, ThinkPads in particular, have a Battery Stretch setting which should also be used. This monitors the system aggressively when running on the battery, and when the battery starts getting low the system starts shutting down components to “stretch” more runtime. This utility is user configurable and should certainly be used for those extended times away from an outlet.

I also advocate getting a second battery for laptops, especially those who travel a lot. The cost can be significant, with some laptop batteries costing up to $200, but it is an instant doubling of run time.

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Better Battery Life Motivates Mobile Chipmakers

Smartphones are so much more than phones, they are now full-blown computers. They make phone calls and do texting, but that’s just a small piece of the feature set on today’s phones. While the smartphone is rapidly changing the mobile habits of society, when things go wrong it can be a frustrating experience. It is not always clear where to go when things don’t work the way they should.

It should be a straightforward process to get help when the phone stops working properly, but it can be a frustrating process. There are two entities involved in bringing you the smartphone, and it is often not clear where you should turn for help. The first tier is the phone carrier; they are usually the one that sold you the phone, and they are responsible for making sure you are happy with it. Then there is the phone manufacturer who made the failing phone. They have a stake in wanting to make sure you are happy with the phone, too.

Technically, most carrier contracts spell out how they, and they alone are responsible for supporting the phone that is no longer working. It makes sense that if a product fails, the easiest solution is to drop by the carrier’s store and get it taken care of. Anyone who has tried to do that will quickly point out the folly in such an effort. Phone carriers handle a lot of different phones, and it is rare to find someone in the store you visit that has even touched the type of phone you are bringing in. They are usually the worst at addressing your particular problem, and as this account on TechBlog points out, they may have an internal incentive to get you to switch to a different phone even if you don’t wish to do so:

My original salesperson, upon hearing me say I was there for the Palm Pre, immediately mentioned that they were running a special on the Droid.  I said terrific but I’m here for the Pre. The salesman finally got one out for me but no one at Verizon had any idea how it worked, how to set it up, or even how the screen functioned.  It took Verizon over 3 hours just to [get] the Pre “set up”, apparently because “the guy” who knew about the Pre was not there.

If the phone carrier isn’t a good place to get smartphone problems addressed, then there is the manufacturer. Surely they are familiar with their own product and can quickly supply a solution to your problem. Unfortunately, the reality is not always what logic dictates. The first problem you encounter working with the phone maker directly is one of speed. They are not built to get your phone problem rectified right away, which is what you need. Even the companies making a concerted effort to help customers need time to assess your problem, research internally to see if others are having the same issue, and assessing whether your phone is defective or some other solution is sufficient.

That last part is the sticking point, because if they determine your phone is defective and needs replacing, odds are they have to send you to your carrier. That starts the process all over again, but with folks who don’t really know anything about your phone as demonstrated. And they aren’t going to take the word of the phone’s manufacturer that they should just replace your phone. They have processes in place that have to be followed like a script, and as anyone who’s gone through them will tell you, they cannot be rushed.

So what’s an owner with a problem phone supposed to do? Usually the best thing to do first is to go online and find out if others with your phone are having the same problem you are experiencing. Start off with a specific search on Google or other search engine. It’s amazing how often something like “Palm Pre with blanking screen” can return a specific solution to your problem. If nothing else, it can usually tell you if it is a known problem, and if there is a fix for it.

Smartphones are complicated gadgets, and it is not that unusual to find out that a known problem has no fix by the manufacturer. That limits your next action, which is likely to go back to the carrier and make them switch you to another phone. Sometimes your online search will point to a defective handset as the problem, so demand a new unit from your carrier. Their ultimate goal is to make you happy, just be prepared to make a fuss if required to get a new unit.

There are enthusiast web sites for every smartphone ever made, and these are often good places to find out if your problem is a common one. Many times you will find that other owners are experiencing the problem that is frustrating you, and they have experimented and found a solution. This might just be a temporary solution until the manufacturer addresses a better fix, but the fact is you don’t care if it gets you back in business. These online communities are wonderful for these types of solutions.

One of the first places I turn when faced with a smartphone problem is Howard Forums. Their online community is massive, and there is no phone that is not represented somewhere in the various forums. It is not always easy to find solutions in this massive resource, but persistence often yields results. Other communities of note for different phones that should be at the top of the list of searches:

• Palm phones — PreCentral
• Android phones — Android Forums
• Windows Mobile phones — Windows Phone Thoughts
• BlackBerry phones — CrackBerry
• iPhones– Apple iPhone Forums
• Symbian phones — All About Symbian

These are not all of the online communities that have a wealth of information about phones by any means, but they are the first places I turn when I have a problem. The major phone carriers all have user forums too, and those can be a good place to get information quickly.

The important thing to remember when faced with a phone that is not working properly, is to be persistent. Having multiple companies involved in the support equation can result in finger pointing, which doesn’t do you any good. You are a customer and should be happy. Make sure they are certain you will not be satisfied with things the way they are.

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Skype may no longer be available for Windows Mobile but the Symbian crowd should take note that the VoIP app has left the beta stage and is now available in the Ovi Store. You can’t make video calls but otherwise Skype for Symbian has all of the features you expect from your VoIP client:

• make free Skype-to-Skype calls to other Skype users anywhere in the world
• send and receive instant messages to and from individuals or groups
• share pictures, videos and other files
• receive calls to your online number
• see when Skype contacts are online and available to call or IM
• easily import names and numbers from the phone’s address book

It is refreshing to hear that Skype for Symbian can be used over Wi-Fi and 3G connections for maximum usefulness. Phone carriers can be downright paranoid over the use of VoIP over 3G so we’ll have to see how this plays out globally. The app can be downloaded directly or obtained through the Ovi Store. Skype for Symbian will work on the following handsets, per Skype:

Nokia N97, Nokia N97 mini, Nokia X6, Nokia 5800 XpressMusic and Nokia 5530 and the following non-touch devices: Nokia E72, Nokia E71, Nokia E90, Nokia E63, Nokia E66, Nokia E51, Nokia N96, Nokia N95, Nokia N95 8Gb, Nokia N85, Nokia N82, Nokia N81, Nokia N81 8 Gb, Nokia N79, Nokia N78, Nokia 6220 classic, Nokia 6210 Navigator, Nokia 5320.

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AT&T, Verizon Grudgingly Move Towards Openness

The CeBIT show is underway in Germany and new product announcements are shooting across the pond. Intel is making one announcement, with the introduction of its latest generation Classmate PC. The Classmate is Intel’s reference netbook design aimed at children of all ages. The netbook is optimized for touch operation, and uses a special interface designed to be easy for kids to operate.

The new Classmate PC has a larger 10-inch screen in place of the 8.9-inch of the previous generation. Intel has also put a rubberized surface on the device to make it easier for small hands to handle. The screen is still available with a swivel hinge that can be rotated into a slate form.

PC World has a video of the new Classmate PC, and if you want to compare it to the older version check out the video shot here in Mobile Tech Manor last year.

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Better Battery Life Motivates Mobile Chipmakers

I am a fiddler. No, not the kind with strings, I fiddle with my work setup constantly. Maybe it’s the inner geek in me, or maybe just the desire to maximize my working methods. Whatever is behind it I know it’s an obsession, and not usually a productive one.

I work at my computer over 8 hours a day, and I am constantly fiddling with my setup to make it “just a little more productive.” I swap the screen layout around, reconfigure core apps to display things a little bit differently. I try new utilities and programs as soon as I hear about them just in case one is that “killer app.”

My infidelity to a given web browser is legendary, as I swap them around with abandon. I may use Firefox one day, followed by Safari the next, and Google Chrome after the others. I usually use a different browser on OS X than I do on Windows. It’s a tinkerer’s heaven.

Being platform agnostic has a lot of benefits, not the least of which is it provides me with multiple operating systems to tinker around with. If I ever perfected one of my setups to the point it could not be further improved, I’d still have one or more OSes to fiddle with. It’s a rather brilliant strategy for an obsessive-compulsive fiddler.

The truth is — what is really productive is to leave everything alone. My system at any given time is pretty darn efficient, and I almost always spend more time with the fiddling than I gain by any improvements. I can honestly state that those weeks I just do the work at hand and don’t fiddle with my arrangements are generally my most productive weeks. They are definitely my most peaceful ones. Sometimes it makes more sense to just get to work, not try to make it better.

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NewNet Winners and Losers of 2009

When it comes to netbooks there is no such thing as too thin nor too light, and the new Averatec N1200 is certainly both. The 10-inch netbook weighs in at a svelte 2.2 pounds, in a case that is less than an inch thick. There are three different models of the N1200, all of them running on Intel’s Atom N450 (1.66 GHz) processor. Equally impressive as the small size is the small price, with the N1200 starting at $329.

The cheapest model has 1 GB of memory and a 160 GB hard drive to round out the typical netbook guts. The most expensive model comes in at $379 and throws in a 250 GB hard drive and Windows 7 Starter. This top dollar model also comes with an extended battery rated at 6 hours; the other two models have a 3 hour battery.

The full specs for the $329 model look pretty decent:

• Battery (hrs): Up to 3hrs
• Screen Size: 10.1” Wide LED LCD (16:9) (1024 x 600)
• Processor: ATOM N450 (1.66GHz)
• Chipset: Intel NM10
• Memory: 1GB DDR2
• Hard Drive: 160GB HDD
• Optical: N/A
• WLAN: 802.11N
• LAN: 10/100 LAN
• Bluetooth: None
• Video Solution: Intel Integrated
• Webcam: 1.3 megapixel
• Operating System: Windows XP Home
• Audio: High Def. Audio
• Weight/Dimensions:2.2lbs/10.7”x6.5”x.9”(without the feet)
• MSRP: $329.99

The N1200 is available this month from Best Buy, Tiger Direct and OfficeMax.

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I see so many different gadgets that you’d think I’d seen it all, but once in a while something different passes into Mobile Tech Manor. Such is the case with the UMID mbook bz, a tiny clamshell that has a number of features designed to yield a solid mobile work experience. I have been using the UMID for a couple of weeks, and I am still delighted to find new things it can do.

What is the UMID?

Ultra-mobile PCs (UMPCs) take different forms, and the mbook bz is basically an itty-bitty netbook. The hardware components are those of many netbooks, and the clamshell form leaves no doubt it is a close cousin to larger notebooks. The full QWERTY keyboard is not big enough for touch typing, but it has the full complement of keys you will find on the bigger keyboards. The UMID has just the right compromises to make this the most mobile notebook I have used, without creating undue hardships during that use.

What’s in the Box?

The mbook bz ships in a box as small as you’d expect, but they’ve packed quite a bit in the small package. Inside is the mbook device, the battery, wired headset, Quick Guide, VGA dongle, power adapter and the Miccrosoft Windows XP Home Edition CD. A neoprene case from UMID was also in the box but I am not sure if the base package includes it. The packaging is well designed, and impart attention to detail that good things are about to unfold.

Hardware

The UMID mbook bz has I am reviewing is configured with typical first generation netbook components:

• CPU: Intel Atom Z515 (1.2 GHz)
• Memory: 512 MB (DDR2)
• Storage: 16 GB Solid State Disk (SSD)
• Display: 4.8-inch resistive touch screen (1024×600)
• Radios: Wi-Fi (802.11 b/g), Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
• Webcam: 1.3 MP
• Ports: USB, 3.5mm headphone, 10-pin VGA (dongle included), microSD
• Battery: Li-Ion, 7.4v, 2600 mAh
• Dimensions: 6.33 x 3.79 x 0.75 inches
• Weight: 0.8 lbs.

The unit feels very solid in the hand, with no loose parts. The display hinge is nice and tight, and stays solidly closed without a latch. Opening the screen exposes the 4.8-inch touch screen with a large bezel to accommodate various controls. On the left of the screen is a mono-speaker and the two tiny mouse buttons. On the right of the screen is the 1.3 megapixel web cam, with the optical touch pad below.

The touchpad is an interesting feature for such a small laptop, and with practice serves well. It is hyper-sensitive until adjusted to preference in the control panel, and I find I usually reach for this tiny touchpad before touching the screen to move the cursor. The mouse buttons are too small, making them very hard to hit in a hurry. They must be pushed very deliberately to make sure the click is registered.

Moving down to the keyboard finds 56 keys, with a few keys not positioned where expected due to space constraints. The keyboard is too small for touch typing with even the smallest hands, so it’s a matter of practicing the hunt and peck technique to get used to the key placement. There is a Windows key as expected, and four arrow keys.

Almost every key on the keyboard has an alternate function triggered by holding the blue Fn key. There are the standard functions for F1 – F12, Caps Lock, PgUp/Dn, Ins, Del, Home and PrtScr. UMID has also included controls for the device with Fn key triggers: Brightness Up/Down, Volume Up/Down/Mute, Standby, Battery Status, Web Cam On/Off and a browser home key. There is also a Fn key that fires up the AudioRecorder for recording quick voice notes.

Above the keyboard there is a touch control that fires up a system control panel when touched while holding the Fn key. This control panel gives touch access to change screen resolution on the fly, and even allow for saving of profiles for two different users. You may not want to share your mbook, but you can.

There are two buttons just above the keyboard: Radio On/Off and Power button. To the right of that are two LED indicators: Power and HDD activity. Below the keyboard is one big LED that indicates radio activity (Bluetooth and Wi-Fi).

Included Software

UMID is trying to create a productive device right out of the box, as indicated by the preinstalled software on the mbook.

• ThinkFree Mobile (office suite)
• LogMeIn Ignition
• ThePot (mbook touch interface)
• Bluetooth Soleil (control software)
• USBC Client Utility (mount mbook as USB drive to other computers)
• Touchside (touch screen settings)

ThinkFree Mobile provides word processor, spreadsheet and presentation programs that are compatible with Microsoft Office 2007. The programs are easy to use and work well on the mbook for document creation and editing. The inclusion of ThinkFree goes a long way to making the UMID productive from the first power on.

I am a frequent user of LogMeIn for remote access to my various computers, and the LogMeIn Ignition included on the mbook is a wonderful tool. I have used it to run my MacBook from the little mbook, and the speed is simply amazing. LogMeIn Ignition is optimized to make working with larger screened computers easy to do on the little mbook. This program on the portable UMID makes for a powerful support tool for the IT professional.

ThePot is a special interface included on the mbook to provide touch-friendly control over the system and various functions. There are buttons for playing media, changing settings and accessing the web. The interface can be minimized to an icon on the screen for doing normal work, although the icon always stays on top of other windows negating the usefulness of doing so. The interface has controls for the media player on the bottom of the screen, and user programs can be added to the launcher.

The Bluetooth Soleil is an interface for working with the Bluetooth, facilitating finding new device for pairing. It is a bloated piece of software and I never use it.

The USBC Client Utility is designed to facilitate connecting the mbook to another computer via a USB cable. Files can be copied back and forth, and folders can be synced when connected. I have not used this so can’t comment on the features.

Hands-on Impressions

When I first heard about the UMID mbook bz, my reaction was “why would anyone want a little notebook?” I still had that impression when the evaluation unit arrived, but I admit it has grown on me quite a bit.

I frequently head out the door for short trips, and while I don’t want to bring a laptop along (and the gear bag it requires), I like to have a fall-back position should some unexpected free time present itself. The smartphone is not quite enough for these moments, yet a notebook is overkill. These trips are perfect for the UMID.

The mbook nestled in its form-fitting neoprene case is not much bigger than a phone and it’s great for these outings. I can grab it on the way out the door, and rest easy knowing if I am confronted with time to kill, I can do so with a full computer in my hands. The case has a little pocket on the front just perfect for my Verizon MiFi so I can get online no matter where I am.

The little keyboard on the mbook precludes a lot of text entry; I wouldn’t even consider doing this review on it. But it’s a good way for inputting a modest amount of entry, far more than I’m comfortable doing on a phone, and in a pinch I can do anything on the UMID that I can do on a bigger laptop. That’s pretty liberating for something that fits in a jacket pocket.

I find the performance of the mbook to be as good as most netbooks I have tried, not surprising given the same components are on board. The 16 GB SSD is not very big but it is pretty fast, so things move right along. The screen is very easy to read in most lighting conditions, and the touch screen is nice to have when needed.

I often wish the screen would swivel around into a true slate configuration. I think UMID missed the boat in this one area. The device is the perfect size to use as a slate in the hand, yet it’s stuck with that clamshell form. The screen does go almost all the way back to a flat form, but it’s not the same.

Pros and Cons

Mobile devices are highly personal in nature, and no two people will usually have the same impressions of a given device. With that in mind here are my pros and cons of the UMID mbook bz:

Pros

• Highly portable
• Good performance
• Outstanding remote access via LogMeIn Ignition
• Good software selection included

Cons

• No swivel screen
• Touch screen is too small for easy finger control (stylus is fine)
• Price- the mbook is only available through importers such as Dynamism and is $549.

Thanks to the folks at Dynamism for supplying this loaner device for the evaluation.

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The State of the Smartbook

AT&T is constantly getting bashed about its network coverage and how it gets around anticipated shortages. The carrier’s network has been that of the iPhone in the U.S., and perhaps its relationship with Apple played a role in AT&T waiting longer than other carriers to get into the Android game. That is set to be rectified with its introduction of the Motorola Backflip, its first Android-based phone. The first AT&T Backflips are hitting reviewer’s hands, and a mind-boggling function of the “Google” phone has come to light. AT&T has removed Google search from this Android phone, and replaced it with Yahoo search. As noted by engadget:

Yahoo has replaced Google as the default search provider throughout the phone. It’s crazy: the home screen widget, the browser, everything’s been programmed to use Yahoo.

It’s not unusual for carriers to work deals for specific software on its handsets. They take money wherever they can get it. But this deal is sure to confuse the customer, as Android phones are commonly called “Google phones.” Let’s face it, Google makes Android, and one of its strengths is the tight integration with the company’s online services. And search is certainly one of Google’s big services, but not on the AT&T Backflip.

This is the equivalent of a Windows PC hitting the market that has Internet Explorer removed and Safari as the only browser. Some customers might be happy by that but most would be confused. Then to make matter worse, imagine that Internet Explorer couldn’t be installed by the user to get around this major change. That seems to be the case with the AT&T Backflip, as early testers are reporting the inability to get Google search working in any of the Android programs.

There has been enough complaining about fragmentation in the Android space, so I won’t rehash that topic. But there is something so fundamentally wrong when an Android phone has Google search removed. And replaced by Yahoo search? I guess this makes the Backflip the Yahoo Phone.

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We started hearing rumblings that magazine publishers were looking to get content on the iPad, even before Apple officially admitted there was such a thing. It was almost sad, as it seemed the magazine industry was in such bad shape that it was looking for a savior. On the surface it seems that a hot slate device would be the perfect medium for magazines. What could be a better fit than a device with a nice size color display, interaction via touch; the iPad is tailor-made for digital magazines, right? I’m not so sure.

I’ve been reading magazines on slate devices for years. The Zinio system works well and comes as close to duplicating the glossy magazine reading experience as anything can. The pages are exact duplicates of the print versions, and even the ads are links to online advertisements. It sounds like a match made in heaven, but the reality is it falls a bit short.

I may not be the typical magazine reader, but I rarely read a print mag from cover to cover in the order it is published. There’s something about the ability to jump around, grabbing a stack of pages and skipping a bunch of stuff, that makes for a fun reading experience. That is not easy to do with a digital magazine. Sure you can jump around with a navigation bar of some kind, but finding your way back later is not easy. There’s just no way to fold the corner of the page of a digital magazine to mark your place for later.

Publishers of digital magazines are going to quickly run into a major obstacle — the lack of store checkout counters. Why do stores often have racks of magazines there at the checkout spot? Because people buy issues on impulse when they see the cover. Where are they going to do the same with digital magazines? Where can publishers display the flashy digital magazines so folks will see them when they are likely to buy them? Sure, they’d rather sell subscriptions, but that’s not always the way consumers buy magazines and it’s not likely to change.

Electronic magazine readers are going to be susceptible to one problem that hasn’t occurred to anyone yet. The wet screen syndrome. How many people are going to call the support line after constantly licking the finger to turn the page on the digital magazine? It’s habit, after all, and not likely to change just because the page is now electronic. I see major failures on the horizon due to the wet screens.

OK, I was just having fun with that last bit. But there is a real benefit to paper magazines that can never be had with the digital versions. How many times have you thrown a magazine or two in a bag pocket when heading out the door. I often fold up a magazine and toss it in the bag for reading on the plane when traveling. The digital magazine means I have to bring the reader with me, even if I hadn’t planned to do so. And there’s no way to read a digital magazine on the plane during those times when you must “power off all electronic devices.” Can’t say that about old school paper magazines.

Don’t get me wrong, I love gadgets and I’m usually first in line to use them. I’ve been reading e-books for a decade, long before we had fancy readers. But I’m not your typical consumer; you don’t have to sell me on a new concept where a gadget is involved. You do most folks though, and therein lies the rub.

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The capabilities of smartphones have grown astronomically over the past few years, to the point they are full handheld mobile computers. Phones can access the web, interact with social networks, check the news and even function as GPS navigation devices. These little gadgets can do almost everything one could want. This is a good thing, but every time I am heading out the door for an appointment, I need to ask myself if this is good enough, or should I bring a computer with me?

This is not always easy to answer, as I have long brought a computer with me on every trip out the door. I am a firm believer in having the right tool in hand should the need arise, and that’s a hard habit to break. I am fortunate in that I often have all sorts of computers at hand to take on short outings. There are always little laptops, UMPCs, slates, well you get the picture. I can usually grab a small, light package to take with me.

The fact of the matter is — today’s smartphones are almost always capable enough to meet the challenges of these outings. I am finding that more and more I bring a computer in the bag, but the phone is what gets used. I can do everything I need, with the exception of blogging, and that’s where my dilemma lies. If I don’t bring a computer, and find myself stuck with a bunch of free time, then I can’t get any “real” work done. Sure, I can surf the web, tweet to the masses, check my RSS feeds and just about everything else. But it’s that inability to blog that leaves me wishing I had a computer.

How about you? Do you always bring a computer with you for short outings, or is the phone enough? If you just bring the phone with you, do you ever regret not having the computer? Maybe it’s just me, but I’d like to hear if others have the same dilemma when heading out the door.

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