Verizon adds multiroom DVR

The new multiroom DVR, made by Motorola, lets customers view recorded programs on up to three TVs at once. The media hub, called the Home Media DVR, also functions as a dual-tuner DVR, which allows customers to watch one program while recording another. Customers using the multiroom DVR will pay $19.95 per month, plus $3.95-per-month for each standard-definition set-top box that will be used to receive recorded video from the DVR.

Verizon has bundled the recording function with software it calls Media Manager, a new feature that lets customers access photos and music stored on their personal computer and play them on their TVs. Currently, copyright-protected content, such as movies and music, will not be accessible through the Home Media DVR.

But Verizon expects in future releases to add playback of protected content. Verizon also plans to increase the number of set-top boxes that can simultaneously access the Home Media DVR to watch recorded programs and to permit playback of home videos stored on PCs. [News.com]

This sounds like a great deal – though the actual DVR cost seems high. If nothing else, I hope it pushes Cablevision to finally release the 8300MR which would enable the same function. I like the way FiOs sounds, but think in the end my cable connection will continue to offer a higher speed and lower cost internet connection and a more robust HDTV option.

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30Boxes Mobile nice – but iCal mobile would be the real killer

Om Malik notes and is please by the release of 30 Boxes mobile interface which is cool, but what we mac users really want is the true .Mac mobile experience. Apple already rocks the sync thing and offers IMAP/ POP mail, but the only way to get your calendar on your device is through an initiated sync. OTA is the true Nirvanna and I’d bet that the eventual Apple iPhone will include this. Apple will surely make it easy for the rest of us.

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eLens

The eLens system sounds and looks very cool, but has to be actually integrated into the device in order to get some real traction.

The eLens matches electronic information with the physical environment in an innovative way. For example, eLens users can post lasting messages in physical locations, tag buildings and places, or create social networks based on interest and social affinities. eLens interactions combine the physical environment with formal and institutional information and the annotations from users’ personal experiences.

Ultimately the eLens enhances the value of the city for its citizens by making their environments more accessible, more culturally vibrant, more socially just. The eLens fosters communication among people and between institutions; as a result citizens are now better able to navigate the social, institutional and physical urban space.“ [picturephoning.com]

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Verizon’s EVDO ExpressCard For MacBook Pro

Bring it on! This is great news for Mac users seeking reliable WLAN access.

“This is the way things are supposed to work. I took Verizon Wireless’ new V640 EVDO ExpressCard down to the Apple Store in SoHo, installed the drivers from the included CD, and popped it into a MacBook Pro. Within a few seconds, I had high-speed, go-anywhere Internet access, completely integrated into Mac OS 10.4.7 – check out the photo at left. (Click on it for a bigger image.) A reception indicator appears in the MacBook Pro’s task bar; you pop a menu down to connect, and then you’re online. It couldn’t be easier.” [

Gearlog ]

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Nokia Eseries Flash Site

Nokia Eseries Flash Site: “Nokia has designed a new Flash-based site for their Eseries trio of E60, E61 and E70 smartphones. ” [Darla Mack]

I just saw the E61 live and briefly got to play with it via a fellow commuter. It’s VERY slick. I’d love to swap my blackberry for this device – now only if IT would support it… The form factor is excellent, build quality was firm and the keyboard seemed like it would work well for regular use.

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Michael Gartenberg – leaks the iPhone(s)?

Just reading Michael Gartenberg’s post on returning to NY from WWDC and caught this:

“Today was a pretty amazing day, not just weather wise, but sadly it was full of meetings that I can’t talk about for the moment and in some cases, can’t talk about until 2008 :). I do, however, know now with some certainty what I think my phone (s) of the year are going to be come December.” [Michael Gartenberg]

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Nokia to buy Loudeye

News.com reports on Nokia’s plan to acquire Loudeye.

“By acquiring Loudeye, Nokia can offer consumers a comprehensive mobile music experience, including devices, applications and the ability to purchase digital music,” Nokia said in a statement.

Seems that the momentum around enhanced multimedia is strong within Nokia and they are assuring that they can extend their current success with devices like the N91 and 3250 through the existing ecosystem Loudeye has established. Sounds quite a bit like an iPod / iTunes model actually and one that makes a lot of sense to me.

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Macworld: ‘Cider’ makes Windows games run on Intel Macs

Coming soon: Windows games that will run on Intel Macs thanks to TransGaming’s new Cider software. There’s no rebooting involved and no separate Windows partition to be installed. It all happens transparently. [Macworld]

If this really works a whole new world of opportunity for Mac marketshare will become available — not too mention fun! When the new systems eventually roll out powered by Intel’s latest Core2Duo, the Apple platform will be incredibly robust!

MIghty Mouse in the house

Wireless Mighty Mouse

I ordered the WirelessMighty Mouse when it was announced yesterday and I love it. I’ve usedother wireless bluetooth mice, but this is a keeper. It’s very simple (Apple style) and yet has a great deal of functionality baked in. The stealth second button is pressure sensitive and it magically just works when you click down on the right side. The scroll ball is very slick. Imagine a scroll wheel that clicks, spins and slides any direction you need it, plus provides another button for launching apps – the default is for Expose.

As you can see from the control panel, there are quite a few options for making this more personal.  I know this is nothing new for users ofmore advanced pointing devices, but it’s great to see from Apple and again, it’s a really nice mouse.  The laser tracking actually enabled me to use it without mouse pad on my marble kitchen island. This has been impossible with every other device I’ve tried.

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Nokia BH-800: Small is beautiful

I received my new Nokia BH-800 headset last night and man is this thing small. In addition to the diminutive scale, the build quality is excellent and most importantly the sound quality is very strong. I have not been able to test outdoors (the usual killer for headsets) but thus far my calls have been very clear for both me and the other party.

As you can see in this lovely phonecam shot, it’s very small…

I’ve paired the headset with my N70 (N91 in for repair) and it works very well – reconnecting even if you walk from the room and return while it’s in your pocket. The device itself supports Bluetooth 2.0 which is more future-proofing at this point as I don’t think I have any other 2.0 devices that I am aware of… My MacBookPro seems to like it and I’ve made a call through Skype as a test.

In the box was a necklace that allows the headset to clip-in for easy carrying, but when I put it on I got the “What the hell” is that reaction from my wife, so Nokia fails the WAF (wife approval factor) test on their fashion accessories. There was also a suede pouch for said necklace and headset as well as a small travel charger which as you would hope also works for the phone.

I’m very pleased with this purchase as I continue down the road of my full Nokia conversion.

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Google Mobilizing

Google Mobile is starting to come together…

They currently reformat pages automatically when you simply type in Google which is handy for Search on the go, but had not enabled the Personalized portal until today.

You can login through the same URL (http://www.google.com/ig) you use on the desktop and if you’ve logged in on the desktop today, you may have noticed the invitation to personalize your mobile site. I find the experience pretty lukewarm to be honest. It’s nothing compared to way in which Yahoo has grasped mobile content (not even counting the actual applications!) and I really don’t like having to see all the “Add This” BS at the top of my screen. When I am using a mobile device, I want information as quickly as possible and well formatting for the screen. Google gets a B – I’d give Yahoo an A for their http://mobile.yahoo.com (better URL strategy as well)

What Google has done a great job with is mobilizing their Maps application which can be accessed with a click to http://www.google.com/gmm. Today’s update (need to download again) includes real-time traffic information to locations or routes if you choose. This is a great tool and works quite well on my phone. My only real ask here is for GPS integration so the routes can be recalculated as you go. It’s not very handy to manually step through directions as you need to drive. B+

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Nokia N93 – whoa!

The N93 is the successor to the N90 and whoa has it got the goods! I’d love to check it out and can only hope the Nokia Blogger Program hooks it up…

N93

The N93 is Nokia’s top of the range convergence device boasting a 3.2 megapixel camera (with Carl Zeiss optics, auto focus and 3x optical zoom), MP3/AAC/WMA media player, multiple connectivity options (GSM, WCDMA, WLAN, USB, Bluetooth, TV Out, UPnP and Infrared), and the S60 3rd Edition software platform running on Symbian OS 9.1

[All About Symbian]

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Birdstep – SmartRoaming for Smart Devices

One of the things I’ve been looking for since I started using the N91 was a location manager and this seems to fit the bill EXACTLY as I would like to see. According to the release (quoted below), you can easily connect based on location or even application to the network type of your preference. This not only skips the what type of network question every online app asks, but it makes mobility that much more practical and easier for the average user.

I have yet to try this as my N91 is in a state of hurt at the moment, but I am very much looking forward to trying it out anyway. The demo is good for 30 days and then the price is 30 Euro for a year subscription. N and E Series devices are supported.

Birdstep has created a hosted roaming service allowing Nokia E-Series users to enjoy seamless mobile connectivity across Wireless LAN and GSM/GPRS/UMTS networks, independent of operator or subscription type. The SmartRoaming Client ensures secure and automatic network identification, user authentication and continuous network connection without application downtime or the user needing to know what network is available, how to connect or worrying about security risks. Through setting SmartRoaming profiles the enterprise or individual user can define network preferences based on policies that make sense for work efficiency and cost management.

With the help of the SmartRoaming service and the Birdstep SmartRoaming Client you can browse the Internet, send and receive email or access your net bank securely and easily, wherever you are. Your network connection may be provided by your home Wireless LAN, a secure wireless LAN at your place of work, a GPRS operator service while traveling or a wireless hot-spot in an airport, coffee shop, and hotel or conference area. As a SmartRoaming user, however, you won’t need to know or care how your device is connected: the SmartRoaming service will take care of it all for you. The client on your device always chooses the best connection for you and ensures that your applications stay connected.

S60.com

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N91 Rendered Useless

I am not really sure what’s wrong, but my N91 is no longer functioning in a way that enables me to use it. This is seriously disappointing as it is my favorite N-Series unit to date. The N70 has been called back into action from the sidelines…

The N91 seems to be buggy around the notion of multi-tasking which is supposed to be one of the key strengths of the Symbian platform. What I experience is that my phone starts up, connects my email in the background and seems to be working fine otherwise. If I pick something to do though the screen does not properly refresh most of the time (locking me from that next action) or it will allow my choice to be made, but then fails to complete the action. Here’s an example — I’m sitting in my Kitchen at the moment and a family of deer strolled in. There were two adolescent and two very small deer which I thought would be cool to get some images or even some video for my daughter. As the N91 started to record the video it simply froze up.

I’m not sure what short of a firmware flash is going to rescue things here…

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N91 – Bug or Feature?

I decided recently to use the 4GB drive to store my email as opposed to the (other) internal device memory as I felt it might be best to leave the device RAM open as much as possible…

Today, I tried for the first time in a while to connect the N91 via USB to transfer a few files and found that I can’t because my Messaging application is using the drive. The N91 suggested I switch the memory store back to the phone… I don’t understand why even after I disconnect my mailbox the drive is unable to be accessed. Seems like a form of protection – though I can’t figure out from what. When I tried to switch the storage for Messaging back to internal, I was told I was out of memory. Lovely.

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Widsets

WidSets is a pretty interesting java application for mobiles that lets you use and create syndicated access to sites you like. As you can see from the sample I’ve got loaded below, there’s a mix of blog, news and pretty much any RSS capable info you might like.

The application syncs in real-time to your web browser on the desktop if you are making changes which is pretty cool. I don’t know how truly useful this will end up being but it’s pretty interesting regardless. The phone’s layout is exactly like what the image from your browser is like. You basically fly around the space (based on the screen size of your device) and select what you want to view.

Widset

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Rentglass.com

Photodoto Review: Rentglass.com lens rental service John Watson offers up a review of Rentglass.com’s new service which is offering the amateur and pro photographer the ability to rent high end lenses pretty cheaply. Right now they are just renting lenses for Canon digital SLRs, but will begin offering Nikon lenses later this month. [Thomas Hawk’s Digital Connection]

This rocks Thomas – Thanks for the pointer! I can’t wait to try this when the Nikon supply comes online…

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Mapping on the go

I’ve been playing a bit with some map and navigation applications on the N91 and think it has some pretty slick applications for on the go navigation as well as just cool info.

WayFinder Navigator is the most comprehensive application I’ve found to date but in order to get the most from it, you’ll want to pair your system with a bluetooth GPS like the Nokia LD-1W which actually arrived with a previous NSeries phone I was using. Wayfinder Navigator is a full featured navigation system that enables you to be located (of course) and chart courses to new locations. This is perfect for driving or walking in new places. I found that with my bluetooth headset attached, the directions I needed to follow were spoken discretely in my ear as I went along which is nice as the screen on the N91 is great for a phone, but a touch small to really be watching while driving.

Another cool app is Google Maps Mobile. It’s exactly what you know, but on your phone. No GPS integration (which would make this amazing) but it’s amazingly responsive and worth a download.

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