Wi-Fi speed analysis of Nokia smartphones

http://www.telexy.com/Support/Publications.aspx?PublicationId=6

... Nokia phones tested in this research (E60, N91 and N91 8G) operate in a close to "B" mode in terms of Wi-Fi technology. "Maximal" speed of B-mode is 11 Mbps which is ~ 1.35 M/s. It is valid to expect that this conclusion holds with other phones of E- and N-series. Factual speed shown by Nokia phones in ideal conditions is ~ 450 K/s ...

QTTabBar adds tabs to File Explorer in Vista and XP

QTTabBar from QuizoApps is the best little software surprise this year for me. It adds tabs to Vista and (!) XP folders. It adds customized buttons to the toolbar. It is a huge usability boost to file management. And it is free. recommend it for everybody.

But wait, it is not over, QTAddressBar adds Vista style Folder path navigation to XP machines. Since I still have XP on my UMPC and corporate laptop, this is a very welcome extra too.

Here are some screen shots of other useful features that it adds.

1) Folder preview tip in file pane and 2) on tab bar and 3) the highlighted gridlines in details view.

 

Air vs Eee

 

RegHardware pits MacBook Air vs. Asus Eee

This is one nice review, and I do share conclusions of the author. This is a fight is between an elephant (Air) and crowd of ants (you can buy 5-8 Eee's for the price of a single McAir) and I think that ants will prevail.

UMPC cannot replace my laptop yet.

The key limitation of course still being the physical display size and keyboard for fast typing.

Some time ago I said bye-bye to my POCKET PC, because my smartphone took over most things I would usually use PPC for. Back then, purchasing the UMPC (Raon Everun with 4.8" display and builtin keyboard), I thought that I might be able to get rid of laptop as well. I was wrong. While UMPC indeed runs any software I need, and if perfect for email on the road and relaxed reading, and browsing at home and while travelling, it just cannot replace the "typewriter" function of my laptop. Here is how my gadget usage patterns evolved since the UMPC came into my toolbox.

I still use phone for most of my communications, (GSM, Skype, Gtalk/Gmail, ICQ), PIM, RSS and GPS navigation. I keep several cartoons on memory card for the kids for the moments when I want to distract them.

Desktop is my multimedia and backup server. Torrented movies and Crysis on 1080p 40" screen.

Laptop is a typewriter for office and blogging.

UMPC is my computer on the go. Surprisingly, I came to the conclusion that it is size is not as imporant as weight. Most of the time that I am on the road, I still carry around a bag that fits A4 paper documents, and has no problem accomodating even a 12" Thinkpad X60. However, I do not like the added weight that Thinkpad brings, since papers are already heavy enough. Therefore, I would keep UMPC in this role in future as well, but I might upgrade to some 6-7" machine in future, when I see a model that goes for 8 hours and weighs around 600g.

I still use Pocket PC for book reading (excellent scrolling mode in Alreader2) and occasional Fring chat or skype call. It is mostly switched off these days.

Techbubble

I liked that one. Funny and strangely cute video from http://kara.allthingsd.com/20071204/here-comes-another-bubble/

or just watch it here

Snapdragon. New UMPC chipset from Qualcomm?

Qualcomm unveiled new mobile chipset on Nov-14. While nothing have been said about UMPCs, the specs seem an overkill for a smartphone or communicators. See, the specs

"... supports HSPA data rates of up to 7.2 Mbps on the downlink and 5.76 on the uplink, with full backward compatibility. The dual-mode QSD8650 supports HSPA, as well as CDMA2000® 1xEV-DO Rev. B, with full backward compatibility. The two solutions feature a custom gigahertz microprocessor core paired with Qualcomm's sixth-generation DSP core running at 600 MHz for unsurpassed mobile performance delivering an instant-on and always-connected user experience. Snapdragon's support for HD video decode, 12 megapixel camera, GPS, broadcast TV (using MediaFLO, DVBH-H and/or ISDB-T), Wi-Fi and Bluetooth deliver even greater opportunities for device manufacturers to design compelling mobile products that make the promise of constant, seamless connectivity in an extremely thin and small form-factor a reality. "

This setup should be able to run not only Windows Mobile but also some serios Linux or XP setup, as was indirectly confirmed by this quote "The Company will be demonstrating the Snapdragon platform running both Windows Mobile and Linux to deliver productivity applications, entertainment applications and advanced user experiences at Qualcomm's New York Analyst Meeting. "

Hope we will see new UMPCs from their launch partner HTC sooner than later.

Where is my UMPC, dude? Dude?? Aargh... Halloween ate my UMPC!

Where is my Everun?

Here for you some ways to have fun with your UMPC on Halloween...

Carve on your UMPC with stylus, save pumpkins...


Some carving designs to get you started.

And finally, the working prototype.

How to: run 2 mobile gmail apps on the same phone

Do You have more than one Gmail account and java enabled mobile phone (probably 99% of phones on the market now), and you would like to conveniently access both (or more) accounts without having to logoff/login between them all the time?

There is a simple way to do it, you can have several gmail clients installed on your phone, each configured with different mailbox name and password. On phones that allow more than one java program running at the same time (89% of them do...) you can even keep several mailboxes open.

The only problem that keeps you from doing so, is the fact that most phones will not let you to install more than one instance of any java app. To overcome this, we need to edit java midlet name. While at it, you can also customize application icon, for example, to coincide with your avatar for that mailbox.

Ok, first, we need to get the .jar file, which is the actual body of the program. If you go to gmail.com/app using non-mobile browser, you will not get a download link for your phone model. I used Firefox addon, called " User Agent Switcher" to create simple UA filled with "x" in each field. This tricks google into thinking that we connect from unknown mobile browser and giving us a download link for a generic java app (not optimized for your specific phone). If you want to find app exactly for your phone model, then you need to find your phone's precise UA string. (Google for it?)

Now, download .jad - the java declaration file, from given link.

Use Notepad to open .jad file. It contains path to .jar.

Now, download .jar file. Back it up. Unpack with RAR, 7Zip or any other program that works wth .rar files. Inside, find META-INF\MANIFEST.MF. Change midlet name - this allows to install several identic apps under different names. Then change text after mdlet-1: this will be the name that will appear under icon of installed app. And last, I changed icon to my avatar. For this, save your avatar as 32x32 or 64x64 .png file.

Now, it's time to put the changed manifest back into jar :). You can do it by opening original .jar and drag-n-drop new manifest overwriting the old one. If you changed icon, drop it in the .jar root, nearby or instead of GmailIcon.png.

Now, send your .jar to the phone, install, login, enjoy.

You can switch Firefox back to original UA profile.

why I abandon ... part 1: PDAs

After 3 months of mourning for my ipaq hx4700, I have purchased an UMPC to replace it. With ipaq, I got used to long battery life (extended 5000 mAh), some 12-14 hours of heavy usage like browsing with WIFI. I also came to understand the limits of pocket pc and windows mobile software. The main drawback of any wm device is that even the most powerful of them, such as HTC Advantage, or my upgraded ipaq hx4700 with 128 mb of RAM, and even the upcoming ipaq 200 series, are not able to deliver FIE (as in Full Internet Experience). Sadly, it is not a hardware limitation, but a platform and software problem. Same devices would provide FIE under some flavour of mobile linux, like upcoming MID. But, MID are not on the market yet.

As to the rest of functionality that my pocket pc used to provide, it is all performed very well by my symbian s60 v3 smartphone NOKIA 6120 classic in a sleek 90g package.

There I have 5 mailboxes (hotmail, gmail), calendar, opera mobile that takes case of 90% of my browsing and RSS reading, bluetooth stereo music player and radio, and to rule them all - the magnificient FRING, that gives me mobile access to Skype, Gtalk, MSNmessenger, ICQ and twitter. I also have there a bunch of navigation programs like TomTom6, Nokia maps, gmaps, mgmaps, yandex maps, smartcomGPS. I also blog and photoblog on a phone. Even this article is written during my daily 10 km walk along Baltic beach. All of this is backed by unlimited internet package that costs only 30 euro per month.

I guess that 90% of my mobile computing needs are covered by smartphone. And those 10% left will not be done by windows mobile device despite its bigger screen or keyboard. That is, I say good bye to PDAs, you have been replaced by smart and miniature candybars.

Next, I will tell why umpc will replace a notebook too.

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.