WM6 for iPAQ hx4700

Custom WM6 ROM scene is flourishing, and thanks to several russian developers, most notably kozhura at 4pda.ru, this goodness have reached owners of ipaq hx4700. At this moment the ROM is too buggy, but if previous experience with WM5 AKU 3.5.2 is any indication of debugging speed, then we shall see a good quality ROM in 4-6 weeks time.

HP iPAQ 200, the long needed successor to hx4700

The long awaited successor to hx4700 is on the horizon.

http://www.engadget.com/2007/09/06/hp-unleashes-ipaq-series-100-and-200-pdas/

Judging its technical specs, it looks as a marginal improvement over it, not a revolutionary one. But it has a potential of making this the most powerful PDA ever. (And the last ever?)

1. OS upgraded from WM5 to WM6. However, custom WM6 ROMs are already circulating at xda-developers (orginally made by kozhura @ 4pda.ru forums).
2. Display is the same.
3. SD slot will support SDHC.
4. Physical d-pad is back. A definite improvement.
5. Bluetooth is 2.0+EDR (3 times faster and, presumably, more energy efficient. The previous implementation of Bluetooth in hx4700 was all but efficient. Energy consumption tested by Menneisyys was a disaster, gobbling mAh even at idle rpms.
6. WiFi g in addition to b. This means that watching VGA (DVD quality) movies from remote server over WIFI will be a smooth experience.
7. More efficient VGA acceleration whatever this means.
8. Increased RAM 128Mb (or not really increased? there is mixed information in HP PR materials, with 128 seeming a prevailing number). It would be a shame to not have 128MB in this PDA, as long and painful experience with hx4700 proved that 64MB is not enough for keeping several important applications (like navigation, browser, office programs, etc.) open at the same time and thus, quickly available at any second.

However, it is too early to state that the device will be more useful than its predecessor, before we get results of READ-WRITE benchmarks of production units. Hx4700 had a notoriously slow SD,CF slots and built in Flash read/write times, that were crippling its performance to a halt at times under WM5.

I would love to get my hands on this device for a more in-depth review.

Mobile month in Ukraine, with Nokia 6120 Classic

I am back from Ukraine, having spent 4 weeks there with nohting more than Nokia 6120 Classic. http://europe.nokia.com/A4399010

Strangely enough, all my plans previously outlined, have materialised.

I got a full month internet access from Life:) for just 60 Hrivnas (12$) per 1GB http://www.life.com.ua/index.php?area=lifebox&lng=uk&page=15-33

The best thing is that this deal is available also to the prepaid card users. As far as I know, it is the only Ukrainian operator giving such good prices to prepaid customers. Others give good price only to subscribed customers.

I have used phone to keep track of 5 mailboxes, Googlereading, photo blogging and GPS navigation (also internet based as in MGmaps and Yandex Maps). During 4 weeks I have used rougly 500Mb, so I think I have got a good deal there.

As promised, during this time Fring has issued a version 3.23 http://www.fring.com/ which now supports this handset. I have successfully used it on Life:) EDGE network. Some lag was there, but overall it was a bearable experience. Fring supports mobile VOIP over EDGE, 3G, WIFI networks on selected Nokia, Sony Ericcsson and Windows Mobile smart phones. Gtalk, ICQ, MSN, Twitter, Skype and SIP are currently supported.

Another surprise was cheap cost of mobile calls (1hrivna/minute to any country) as outlined here (Ukrainian)

http://www.life.com.ua/index.php?area=mylife&lng=uk&page=3-57

Overall, I am very satisfied with the quality and costs of mobile communications in Ukraine.

Mobile month in Ukraine

I am off to Ukraine for a month from Aug 12 to Sep 6th. I plan to get local GSM mobile number with the 1Gb data plan from LIFE and to keep blogging from my Nokia 6120 Classic to this blog (on the topic of issues facing a mobile blogger in Ukraine) and to my personal blog, letting my relatives see new pictures of relatives and nostalgic towns and villages as I travel.

During one month I will visit Kiev, Kherson, Zalizny Port (Metal Port?), Crimea (Simferopol, Evpatorija, Kazantip dance festival) and Odeassa region. Most of the time will be spent by the Black Sea. I really hope to come back as black as possible.

On the mobile side, I count that I will be regularly checking my 5 mailboxes, and keep working from far away on the development on of my web store (will use Quickoffice and OfficeSuite to open any attachment that come my way).

For browsing I will have Opera Mobile, Opera Mini 2 Russian mod, Opera 4 beta and Nokia S60 built in browser.

For IM and VOIP I will use IM+ (solnyshok (a) gmail.com, solnyshok (a) hotmail.com ) and IM+ for Skype. I do hope that during this month Fring will issue a version supporting Nokia 6120 Classic as they promised in their support forums. That would instantly enable my phone for Skype and Gtalk voice communications. I know that it would work reasonably well even over EDGE network that is currently the best you can get in Ukraine.

For Navigation I have Nokia Maps, Google Maps, MGMaps, TomTom6 and SmartComGPS. The problem is that none of the above have any good maps of Odessa, Kherson and Simferopol. For those, I just use maps from OzyExplorer converted for SmartComGPS. Those do not have street names though. For Kiev, I have quite good TomTom map (EasterEurope v608 beta). NokiaMaps and GMaps are pretty useless in Ukraine. Mgmaps (using MSN Roadmaps) are a bit better, but require constant data connection and do not have street names in the abovementioned southern Ukrainian cities.

I have studied mobile offers from UMS, Kyievstar, Beeline, and Life and came to conclusion that Life will suit me better, because I need not a prepaid, but a contract, and unlike others, Life allows me to use all of signup fee towards communications and data plan. Others just make signup fee (about 200 hrivnas) an entrance ticket. And the cost of data plan wih Life is 60 vs. 200+ with other operators. Of course, all of this is only my understanding, after studying operator websites, I will see if I am right in couple of days.

I am in Kiev Aug12-15, in Kherson Aug 16-18, Kazantip Aug 19-25, Odessa Auf 26-Sep6.

So, I am done with the last post on the proper keyboard for the next 4 weeks. Wish me luck, good weather, and stable network out there in Ukrainian prairies.

This is a test post using email-to-post and profimail on Nokia 6120 classic

Some text here

Multiple Gmail apps on Nokia

The same .jar files that I prepared for Sony Ericsson couple of weeks ago, also works on my new Nokia 6120 Classic.

RIP ipaq hx4700

My ipaq sank in bathtub during my recent trip to Stockholm couple of days ago. Even after drying it for the last 2 days, I could not reanimate it. Tought luck.

This iPaq hx4700 has properly served me for 2 years, going with me through upgrades from WM2003 onto WM5, it survived memory expanding surgery at PPCTECHs and came back with 128M RAM. Then thanks to Mamaich, I figured out how to increased pagepool and it became even faster than ever. And just a month ago, I upgraded it to excellent WM5 AkU3.5.2. It has seen GPRS, EDGE, UMTS and HSDPA connections, and I had to tweak its bluetooth speed limits to keep in line with faster mobile networks. It has been a great book reader for my trips to Turkey and Egypt. Its 8GB Compact Flash card has kept lots of cartoons and movies for my 3 kids who got accostumed to falling asleep holding it in their hands. With GPS and TomTom navigation software it is been a trusty guide to driving on the wrong side of the road in UK, and to driving through 2M wide city streets in Sicily. And I even used it for having a mobile Skype and Gtalk while driving around Riga, thanks to an unlimited HSDPA connection in his little brother, Nokia 6120.

Did I mention games? Skyforce, Warfare Inc, Bejewelled?

And last, but the most important, it has become my window on a world during last 2 years. I got so much used to reading from my palms, that even laptops and nice desktop computers could not compete with this experience.

R.I.P, old friend

Mobile Gmail app, v1.1.1 MIDP - 2nd and 3rd instance

If you have several gmail accounts, and wanted to run several mobile gmail apps on your java enabled mobile phone, you probably ran into trouble when trying to install more than one gmail.jar into your phone. Java doesn't allow multiple instances of the same program on Sony Ericsson phones. I edited program name in java manifesto to circumvent this restriction.

You can find v1.1.1 (generic MIDP2) gmail2 and gmail3 here http://rapidshare.com/files/40491513/gmail23.zip.html

I tested it on SE K610. Please comment how it works for you.

AKU352 for iPaq hx4700, with A2DP now

Good times keep rolling! In development for some 3 weeks now, AKU352 for iPaq hx4700, have reached the stage that it is finally perfectly usable, and even A2DP support has been fixed. Now there is no reason not to update. The main plague of previous versions, namely filesys compaction thread and overall slow performance of the system, have been solved. Compared to earlier firmwares, unit is much more responsive. ActiveSync scheduling problem is gone. Still you need to apply Navpoint tweak. And I highly recommend increasing page pool values to 16 MB on devices with extended RAM (128 MB).

More information is available on xda-developers forums. Original thread (in Russian) can be found at 4pda.ru forums.



---- 
Sent using a Sony Ericsson mobile phone

Fring on Windows Mobile, it works now

Excellent application for mobile VOIP, Skype, GoogleTalk and MSN Messenger have been released for WM5 and WM6 devices, also for non GSM PDAs. Initially in beta, it didn't support all devices, but couple of days ago, since version 3.20.6, it started to work also on my iPaq hx4700.

It works as promised. I used it on wifi and 3g. Highly recommended. Especially with unlimited data plan.



---- 
Sent using a Sony Ericsson mobile phone