The diverse (and often pointless) face of mobile computing...

I'm a pretty big fan of mobile computing and technology. It always seems better to be able to keep doing "stuff" without having to be tethered to your house. And so, i watch mobile computing trends come and go with eager interest. Okay, so i'm not an eager kind of person, but i pay some idle interest, which is a departure from the norm.

At the moment, it seems like there are a couple of different ways into the mobile computing brand:

1. The JTIO mob. (The Just Tack It On Mob). Their ideology is simple. Find a device. Put internet on it. Everything from camcorders to e-book readers. Generally a useless waste of perfectly good internet.

2. The BIFTG mob. (The Build it From the Ground mob). Not so simple. Biggest example is the netbook, which was built as a laptop, but the makers were too lazy to do it properly, so they just ripped some stuff off the internet and made it seem local, and BANG! The netbook is born.
(This whole category is made worse by the fact that whenever you take it away from the Internet, it becomes a useless pile of crap. I've seen bricks with more functionality.)

3. The RATPFMS mob. (The Re-Align the Product for More Sales mob). This is where we have a perfectly good product, but for the sakes of making it better, they suddenly add a whole new dimension, and feature set, just cos its useful. Generally, results in some of the most useful stuff around. Anything from PlayStations to TV's have had this treatment, and all have come out the better for it.

However you want to do it, everyone can see it coming. Some want to embrace it, some won't touch it with a barge pole. But everyone knows it's going to happen. Everything will be connected. The future is with the Internet as the centrepiece of a connected society, or to steal Cisco's ad slogan a "human network".

Me, I'm looking forward to it!

The (Apple) Empire Strikes Back...

Apple has had their developer conference, and has delivered what everyone was expecting (which was a fair bit), plus a bit more to compensate for the over-zealous early advertising.

And so, i hear you ask, (No, I'm not standing at your door, listening to you mutter to yourself because you think this particular ferret may have finally 'lost it'. I'm just guessing. Legal Note: You may not in fact actually ask this question at all. The Publisher waives all liability to any losses, physical or otherwise that may have occurred due to misinterpretation of the abovementioned statement.) (to continue from above) what happened?

In a few short words, quite a lot. Just not all of it would be particularly interesting to you. The biggest thing that everyone was looking for was the new June 26 iPhone 3GS. It is not quite an overhaul, but more an answer to what users have been demanding for ages. Things like:

• Autofocus camera
• At last, real photos, kind of. It's now also 3 megapixel
• Video Recording
• Also useful, and something my old Motorazr V6 has been doing for a long time...
• It's faster
• Useful. As always, there is no such thing as a too fast processor. And the iPhone's was getting pretty far from that imaginary boundary, if you get my drift
• It's battery lasts longer
• Not just useful, it's about bloody time. The battery wasn't pathetic, but as with everything else about the iPhone, it wasn't as good as some of it's competitors
• Voice Control
• Useful. Sort of. I've never run into a situation when i thought "I wish i had set up Voice Control". And i don't think i'm going to yet. Still, the voice control even extends into the iPod functions and everything. Cool.
• A Compass
• A Compass? You mean one of those spinny things. Yes, the iPhone has a compass, but it's not just about telling which way north is, (which you can do with any analog watch), but enabling far better Google Maps, and thanks to TomTom, turn-by-turn satnav. Yay!
• Lower prices
• Always good, especially when they cut old model prices too!

As always, there is still a considerable list of stuff that isn't there. Anything from user-replaceable batteries (when Hell freezes over) to USB Storage support is still missing. Oh well, it's still good.


Now to less important news, and because i'm lazy i'm going to let my good friends over at Crave do the work for this bit:

• MacBook range revamped
• iPhone 3.0 software
• OS X update
• Safari 4
• and some other useless stuff
• see here: http://tinyurl.com/Crave-WWDC

Anyway, that's it for my WWDC coverage, but have a look around Crave for more info (they are disturbingly interested in the WWDC coverage game)...

E3 continues...

Having had Nintendo and Sony present their anticipated press conferences, it thought it apt to refresh my E3 coverage. They had big targets to meet after the Microsoft bombshell, and they were impressive, but was it enough...

We'll start with the Sony camp. One of the biggest unveilings (and the worst kept secret) was the PSP Go! Official details were released which was pretty much the same as the pre-release specs. Lighter, smaller, no UMD, now with Bluetooth, slide-out controls, and still no second analog stick. Also interesting was the online-style features. A partnership with eMusic for PSP-based music on the go, PS3 inter-operability, and a couple of other nice bits, apart from the obvious DLC-only gaming.
The PS3 has also been hit with a possible future revolution, with Tretton premiering not just an incredible volume of new games, but also a motion senitive controller, that is even capable of doing soft touches, such as knocking over dominoes. Impressive, and definitely a Wii-hunting move.

Now with Micorsoft and Sony going Wii-hunting, what would Nintendo's response be?
Pretty much nothing as it turns out! Their biggest announcement was a couple of DLC titles for the DS platform and the improved Wii Motion Plus. Yawn!

So that's it for the big three for this year. Let's hear it, who do you think won it? Who was most impressive? Who was an absloute dud?

UPDATE: I almost forgot. Nintendo released a heart-rate monitor for the Wii! Yes, i know it's pretty weird, but they were struggling...

E3 is here!

E3 2009 has started, and some of the big guns have already thrown in bombshells on the first day!

Biggest news of the day was, of course, Microsoft's big press conference. They were starting to look a touch like the lame duck of the console business, but they've just delivered a whopping great slap to the Wii! The next Xbox 360 add-on is based on the idea of your body controlling the game. Details are still a little on the sketchier side, but it seems that rather than having something like a Wiimote, the Xbox 360 add-on, codenamed Project Natal, uses a bar setup with camera, motion, sound, and even suggestions of 3D perceptions. If it works as well as they claim, it should be really impressive. But it still has no name, no price, no release date, no specs, no (or barely any) compatible games, and not really anything concrete at all. Crave even thinks that it won't be ready for E3 2010! My bet? When the Xbox 360 gets replaced, Natal will be ready and waiting.
Microsoft also announced a swag of new games for their soon-to-be-reborn console. Not too many gorundbreaking titles, but interesting nonetheless. Many sequels. Rock Band, Tony Hawk, Final Fantasy, Crackdown, Left4Dead, Splinter Cell, Forza Motorsport, and Halo (two of them) are all current franchises about to be given a boost. In fact, there was really only two new games, and one of those was a lightweight online-only game...

Yet more suprising Microsoft news :  Facebook and Twitter are coming to Xbox Live. Now i've always thought that Sony would throw in a port of either Facebook or MySpace (or new kid Twitter) into the PS3's PSN capabilities. But i've stopped waiting. And now Microsoft has jumped in and is (to be brutally frank) holding Nintendo and Sony by the balls. Only sign of light on the horizon is the Facebook Connect Standard which may yet make the jump to the PlayStation family. Wouldn't it be awesome to have Twitter on a PSP!

There are some other nice games from the likes of Ubisoft, but none seem earth-shatteringly new or particularly attention-grabbing, so i won't waste your time now.

Keep your ears (and/or eyes, unless you are somehow text-to-speeching my blog which is just weird) peeled as i try to keep you updated as Nintendo and Sony hit back tomorrow at 9:00 and 11:00 respectively (American time)...

The future of Computing?

I've been having a bit of a think, which is always dangerous, and as i see it, the current model of computing can't last the next decade. My vision: Distributed cloud computing.

to the first part of my divine epiphany: Distributed computing. I think this is definitely going to happen, for two reasons. One, PS3's have got it. PS3's know everything before it happens. Reason Two, Quad-core processors. As most of my readership would probably know, quad-core processors are everywhere. On a more technical side, quad-core processors have no real increase in actual CPU speed. But, can they multi-task or what? They can do everything,at once. They can run multiple different games of Unreal Tournament. They can be editing twenty-five PowerPoints at once. They can even run mutiple OS's (Macintosh, yay!). And yet, nobody actually uses four processors worth of power at any one time. So what are the other three cores doing. Jack all. Why not, in this ultra-connected world, let the freakin huge network that is the rest of the world, have a bit of your processor. This way, if any computer slows down for a little bit, it nicks a bit of power off someone else who's not using it and KA-BOOM everyone's computer goes way faster.

And if everyone's connected up anyway, why store anything locally? Or on a USB disk. Or on a Portable HDD, or even on an iPod (i've seen it happen waaay too many times). Why not just store it on the biggest cloud in the entire blue sky (i'm pretty sure it's the biggest): the InterWeb. What a great place to store it. Drop it off at one place, pick it up again three continents later and it's still good. You don't need software, there aren't any file types. Everything, just, works. So my opinion might be a little skewed by the fact that 80% of the computers i use won't remember me or anything i save on them after i log out, and the other 20% have no veritable means of connecting with the 80% except for a tired old USB key that tends to randomly disconnect and connect again. Not fun. Whereas, the internet can hold anything, anywhere. There is already a bit of work on this front, especially with online documents. Some are brilliant (Google Docs), some nothing short of dismal (Windows Live Workspaces), but there is still a lot of untapped potential there.

I think if tech keeps advancing at the veritably rapid pace it is at the moment, it can only go closer toward the internet...

It's not that my guess is any better than yours, but i've got the blog...

Portable World : Part 1

Announcing a new (and hopefully recurring) segment to FerretTech : Portable World
I will (somewhat) regularly report on what's happening in Portable Gaming, Computing and Communications.

First up is today's topic: Portable Gaming.

Portable Gaming has positively exploded in a few short years. With the release of ever better and smaller GameBoys, then the DS, Apple's App Attack, and of course, Sony's heavenly PSP.

It is no secret that I think the PSP is the best by far, especially in its latest PSP-3000 guise. Nintendo has also been improving on their success with the new DSi (which has controversially dumped the old Gameboy cartridge slot!)

But there is one thing i want to focus on and that is the Apple products : The iPod touch and iPhone (which i can't be bothered typing out twenty times, so if you see iPhone, chances are i'm talking about both...)

Everyone has been talking about how it is the new king of portable gaming. But, as i see it, it's not even part of portable gaming. About as advanced as gaming gets on the iPhone is Air Traffic Control (legendary!), as opposed to the PSP's headliners like Resistance:Retribution (even more legendary!) and MGS Portable Ops etc etc.
Sure, an iPhone is a good enough all-rounder when it comes to portable gaming, communications, connectivity etc. But saying it is a good Gaming machine is absolute crap. A PSP is a gaming machine, a DSi is a gaming machine, but an iPhone is not!

And that brings my first Portable World post to an end.

Now that is out of the way, let me explain why a PSP will always be better than anything Nintendo can throw at the DS.
1. PSP's are powerful. 333MHz in a device that fits in your pocket! That's pretty impressive. Up until recently, most PSP games (which are technological masterpieces in their own way) have only usually used 222 MHz. I don't actually know the exact figure for a DS, but i know it is less.

2. PSP's can do anything. They play video, they play music, they show photos, they play games, they browse the internet, and given some eggs, and a whisk, i'm sure they could whip up a damn fine omelette, too!
Yes, there are better ways of watching videos, there are better ways of listening to music, there are (probably) better ways of looking at photos (someone once described the PSP as the modern-day 6x4 print), but there is nothing else that can do all of these, and definitely nothing that can do all of these as well as the PSP...

3. PSP's are supported. Apart from Sony's brilliant team sitting in a dungeon somewhere constantly making little tiny variations to improve the PSP, third parties everywhere are jumping on the PSP. From hacking and downgrading to themes and downloadable wallpapers, you can make a PSP do whatever you feel like with a little digging on the Net, which you can do straight from the PSP.

There are plenty of other reasons, but that would run the risk of RSI from the furious rage-typing so i'm gonna leave it at that...

Hurrah! HTC second gen arrives

Yay!

HTC's much beloved Touch range of smartphones has been revitalised with the arrival of three new phones.

HTC Touch HD
Hailed as the next messiah when it was announced, it took forever to get here, but still looks pretty good. HD screen on a smartphone, of course it makes sense.

HTC Touch Pro2
HTC's business smartphone has been re-released and against my gut feelings, has in fact become more business-oriented. Now with god-knows-how-many productivity tools and a neat keyboard, it is an attractive proposition indeed for any savvy business person.

HTC Touch Diamond2

Now getting into the business end of said HTC Range, the much-loved Touch Diamond has also been refreshed with a new face, new design and new gizzards. And it's gotten bigger (probably not a bad thing)

Interestingly, however, it was released with an old OS. Yes, the HTC range is still running Windows Mobile 6.1. Maybe they were too late to the market to get WinMob 6.5, but my bet is on the other explanation: HTC's version of 6.1 (with TouchFlo, and other mods) was better than 6.5 anyway! I have always thought that HTC made such an awesome version of 6.1 that even Windows would struggle to improve on. I have always thought that HTC's WinMob was better than Symbian, better than, say, Samsung's negligible improvements and, my god, for someone who grew up with a Windows CE PDA (got the Jornada 450!), it's better than any previous iteration of Windows Mobile. Not that that's real difficult...

Kindle 2? What were they thinking!

My opinion of the intelligence of our collective human race has taken a step down since the release of Amazon's latest baby, the Kindle 2.

For those of you not so up-to-date as Yours Truly, Amazon.com, book retailers of the Interweb released a fair while ago, a device by the name of the Amazon Kindle, a portable book reader made for use with Amazon's extensive collection. Now, they've released its successor, the imaginatively-named Kindle 2. It has grown in size, functionality and tech appeal, as has Amazon's Kindle-friendly catalogue. But there is really only one question that comes to mind with this little gadget: Why?

If people want to read a book while sitting around at home, they will probably read a book, available for a much smaller price than Amazon's eye-watering $360 dollar tag.

If they want to read a book while they are out and about, they will probably want to get themselves a decent PDA, a smartphone, or even an iPhone will do it. And if you know the right places *nudge nudge* *wink wink*, you can get the books for free, and in nice .pdb or .lit files, not stupid proprietary type...

If they want something bigger, that they can annotate on, or do things like shop on the go with a full QWERTY keyboard, they can get a netbook, like one of the mini Dell Netbooks (especially the one with Wireless Broadband built in. Hurrah!). Something they can do all kinds of things on... (Waaaaaaaayyyyy!)

Okay, so maybe some of you want something to do all of these things, and only these things. Then you should consider dropping the $360 for a Kindle 2, which in all other regards, does its job very well, even if it is a bit big.

But this all returns to the age-old question: A bunch of devices to do lots of little specialised things well, or just the one to do all of them, but not quite as well?

Is anyone going to dispute the value of, say, a nice Palm TX, or a mini Toshiba netbook with a wireless Broadband card? (cue Godlike choral singing as the clouds open and light floods down upon these pinnacles of technology.)

Judging by the explosion in the smartphone industry (some freaky numbers floating around!), the consumers have decided on the latter, and this particular technophile agrees.

WuW, Teleportation, and Invisbility Cloaks

Now not many of you will have heard of this, but WuW is a new technology from some geeky dudes in a basement who need to get themselves a girlfriend, or a hobby...

Yep, those freaks at MIT have come up with Wear Ur World (hence WuW) in a freaky sci-fi move towards the future. It enables you to project a screen similar to Microsoft's Surface, but onto anything and then allows you to manipulate it, with your hands. but unlike the Surface, you don't have to carry around a 3 metre wide table, a large projector and some special paint. They have made it with simple stuff like a webcam, a mobile projector and a mobile phone. How cool is that? You can draw a circle on your wrist and it projects a clock. Bugger watches, i thought the belt-driven Tag Watch was geeky...

Second in our future-themed post is teleportation. This one i'm not so sure what actually happened cos it was all a bit too scientific for me. You should see these formulae. But i think they managed to like move an alpha particle in one piece or something without it looking like a charcoal-grilled turnip. Yay, i guess???

Last up, invisibility. No, i am not getting all Harry Potter on you. Someone rather actually manged to make a mirror with a lump in the middle, and then blast it with all kinds of freaky lights and rays, and it looked like it was flat. Awesome, now the world will be so much better now that we can make all those bloody bumpy mirrors look flat again. Hmmmmm...

Now wouldn't that be a new level of geekdom. Drawing pictures of bumpy mirrors on thin air, then teleporting them to the Bahamas...

If you are wondering why i used the Bahamas, its because i have just found out that i have visitors from the Bahamas!

Dude, where's my Netbook?

Asus has unveiled their new Eee PC (Yes, another one), and this one is actually worth the effort of looking at.

Asus has crammed the gizzards of an Eee Netbook (including what is thought to be a full Atom chipset) into a keyboard and then put a little 5-inch touchscreen on the right-hand side. Oh yeah...

People walk into the room and wonder what the f*** you're doing typing into a keyboard with no computer attached. And if you were really dedicated, you could even buy yourself a nice 22-inch wireless LCD monitor and confuse your mates more, while attracting the green-faced envy of every geek who's sure that the cables surrounding his desk are actually breeding...

This is one of those really great ideas, that probably won't catch on, cos nobody could be bothered. Anyone remember the laser projector keyboard? The little thingy that made a picture of a keyboard on a desk and somehow worked out when you were 'typing', what keys you were hitting, and then folding into a package the size of a small ballpoint pen... Way cool, yes. Popular, not so much...

PlayStation Three Ups and Downs

Ups:

1. Frankly incredible graphics

It is just disturbing sometimes, gaming shouldn't be this real

2. PSP Inter-operability

Every PSP Owners dream. Jack into his PS3 (now wirelessly) and do stuff. Whether its unlock gaming stuff on either console, be able to play media off the PS3 on the PSP, or just operate the Three with the P through Remote Play. Genius!

3. DualShock 3

The new controller is f***in awesome. Vibrations are now more in-depth, rather than on-off. Motion sensors allow new levels of control, the PS button makes everything easier and wireless controllers mean you can play things from the next room. Goodie!

4. XMB

The Cross Media Bar (XMB) Firmware is uncannily familiar to any PSP owner and it works just so well

5. Finish

Gloss black, curved frontplate, with touch controls, and a finish that makes it the gaming equivalent of Jessica Alba is awesome.

Downs:

1. Finish

It's freakin huge! Heavy too...

2. Cost

It's expensive, and games are up to $120 each. Thank God for Christmas presents...

3. uuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Can't think of anything else. It's just awesome...

CES 2009 hits off!

CES 2009 has finished and is looking very good indeed...

Suitcases that climb stairs, taps with gearshifters, a new Palm phone, and Wi-Fi on freakin everything...

And here is my list of the best hits: (Many thatnks to Crave for their comprehensive coverage)

1. Motorola finally releases a smartphone. Yay! It's Windows Mobile. Booo!

2. A Mad Catz joystick that not only looked like the Terminator had dropped his pants, but also has 11 programmable buttons...

3. PLenty of manufacturers announcing Tablet-style Netbooks. Oooooooooh...

4. 300,000 dollar stereos and 1,400 dollar headphones. Lotto, here i come!

5. Wi-Fi Blu-Ray players with Profile 2.0 Compatability, stream functions and connections to Netflix.

6. Wireless Laptop Monitors. About Time

7. Camcorders with Wi-Fi and even a web browser. Who said you couldn't do it, and who said you didn't need it? Of course you need the Net on your camcorder

8. Sony's little tiny little small, miniature little tiny little Vaio. How small can we get? Still no match for Sony's original mini-Tablet sliding Vaio...

9. Keyboards that have little robotic thingummies on them so they move around while you type. Cool. Sort of.

Number one hit, which also happens to be number one Gimmick:

The LG Watch Phone

1.43 inch touch screen, stereo bluetooth, text-to-speech, and everyone who uses one think they are a spy but is actually an absolute dickhead...

Digirtal Cameras, Cars and Cash

Now what would you expect to pay for a digital camera? You can get your dirty mitts on a real nice compact from Nikon (but who would buy a Nikon) with 14 megapixels for a cool 509 dollars, but then what if one wants to take it to the next level with an entry-level Digital SLR...Canon is the obvious place to look and they'll sell you a (not that old) 1000D with a lens for 950-odd bucks. I bet at this point you're wondering 'Where the F*** is he going with this?', but hang in there. My point is that a 1000D is a very potent weapon, and it only costs about a thousand bucks, so why on earth are they also selling 1D's for, sit down, 6,500 dollars, a neat 5 and a half grand more than a 1000d. But one might say, but one of them is the top and the other is the bottom, but they have another 5 cameras, as well as innumerable lens kits (actually 28 different combos to be vaguely accurate), spanning every possible price range.

I'm not saying any of this is bad. All of those cameras are still great bits of photographic machinery, and having a camera for every budget and every whim is a great business move, but...There still remains the problem that there must actually be people in our society blowing 6 and a half thousand dollars on a single camera body, i mean you could get a car with that kind of dough. But it actually gets worse, because Canon also has their Canon 1Ds MArk III (that's a mouthful),for the serious stalker. But you pay a smallish premium for that 's' on the end. Small, as in $5,500, bringing the 1Ds to a neat total of 12,000 dollars.

HOLY SH**!!

You can check my maths at http://www.canon.com.au/products/cameras/digital_slr.html

Part 2: The reasonFor those of you not even vaguely interested in Digital Photography, skip to the next post now!The biggest difference between the 1D and the 50D for example is in the sensor. In the 1D, it captures the scene in fornt of it exactly as it looks, with all the zoom, and effects coming from aperture, exposure and ISO settings and obviously your lens. However, the 50D (and everything below or before it) does not. It actually has a built in zoom factor of 1.6x. This is not going to seem like much except for when you take the fact that this occurs behind the lens. So when you start using 200mm telephoto lenses, you get the effect of using a 320mm lens, and that is noticeable.

There are obviously other things for 11 grand, like much faster start-ups, incredibly fast shutter speeds, better lenses, more settings, features and modes etc etc, but the 1:1 zoom is one of the big drawcards, and i'm not sure Nikon even has that at all, so its an achievement...

New Macbook Displays...

Has anyone seen the new Macbook Range? Not only are the laptops themselves incredibly good-looking and look pretty fast, at least on paper. But of slightly more interest are the new accessories, in particular, the new LED Cinema Displays. LED?? I don't know, it could be LCD's but i somehow think Apple would have run it through for spelling errors, and it appears multiple times over the page. Everyone is very confused, but i honestly couldn't care less about the acronyms, it's a semi-HD display made for a MacBook, and for god's sake it's 24 Inches! Hello, how can you not love a screen that's f***ing huge and still looks awesome. Apple has cemented their reputation for sweet hardware...

Better than that useless HP crap. There is only one thing that;s useful for, and that's flushing down the toilet...