End User

The More You Know: Blu-Ray Godfather, Amazon OLPC, and Finnish Broadband

I thought I'd try something new with posting an occasional drive-by link-dump of tidbits that I've run across while stumbling through the hundreds of RSS feeds I monitor--items that pique my curiosity but aren't enough for a fuller blog post.

• If you've been thinking about investing in a Blu-ray Disc player, Slate offers up a dangling carrot in the just-released The Godfather Trilogy:

  The restoration is available on Blu-ray and regular DVD discs. Do you need the Blu-ray? The restored DVD is extremely good, too, and if you don't have a high-def TV with the highest resolution, there's no point in owning a Blu-ray player at all. (For specifics on this and other technical points, click here.) But if you have the right TV and have been thinking about investing in a Blu-ray player, you now have the perfect excuse. Think of digital images as a dot-to-dot drawing, with pixels as dots. The more dots there are—the closer the dots are to one another—the more detailed the picture will be. Blu-ray has five times as many pixels—five times as many dots—as DVD.

• The OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) XO laptop is coming to Amazon with its second annual Give One, Get One program (launching November 17 at this space), and we get details from Digital Trends:

  Although OLPC has been exploring using Windows XP on the XO laptop, systems offered through the Give One Get One program will run OLPC's customized Linux OS with the Sugar interface, although it's not known if the XO's offered through the program could be configured to dual-boot. This time around, Amazon will handle distributing the laptops, as well as handle all payment and fulfillment.

• Now this is a 21st century infrastructure plan we can believe in (via Podcasting News):

  The Finnish government has announced plans for universal broadband access across Finland assuring that no person will be further than a mile and a half away from a broadband Internet connection of at least 100 megabits per second (Mbps). 

• If you're really serious about finding the perfect printer, check out the Printerville blog run by Rick LePage (former Macworld editor-in-chief and continuing contributor)--check out this mind bogglingly detailed review of the Epson Stylus Photo R2880 for a sample (hat tip to Jeff Carlson)

--Agen G.N. Schmitz

Samsung Announces 8-megapixel Cell Phone, More Mobile Megapixels to Come

One reason that point-and-shoot cameras were neglected at this year's Photokina trade show (see previous post) is that more and more people are using their phones as their main out-and-about camera. The UK's Pocket-Lint blog got to sit down with electronics giant LG recently, and they hinted that a 10-megapixel camera with HD video capture capabilities could come as soon as next year. And today Samsung made an official announcement of its new 8-megapixel camera phone: the Pixon. According to Phone Scoop:

The Pixon's primary feature is an 8 megapixel camera with auto-focus, fast-shutter, face detection, geo-tagging and LED flash. It features a photo browser that interacts with the accelerometer to flip through photo albums. The video camera can shoot at 30 and 120 frames per second, allowing for slow motion playback. It also has a feature that creates a virtual 5.1 channel surround sound audio mix of what you record.

Aside from the imaging features, the Pixon also offers a 3.2-inch touchscreen, digital audio player with FM radio, quad-band GSM, HSDPA 3G connectivity (via the 2100 MHz band used in Asia and Europe; not sure if it's compatible with T-Mobile USA, the sole provider in the states with a 2100 MHz 3G network), and up to 3.7 hours of talk time. SlashPhone notes it will be available first in France in mid-October with other European and Asian territories soon after that.

--Agen G.N. Schmitz

Rounding Up Photokina 2008: New Compact Cameras

While the announcements from last week's Photokina trade show in Germany were heavily tilted toward DSLRs and new digital sensor/lens systems (such as Four Thirds and Fuji's Real 3D System), there was a small gaggle (or would that be a clowder) of compact cameras that got unleashed to the world. But they weren't all that awe-inspiring, as DPReview notes in its show summary:

There's no doubt in our minds that the compact camera market needs a serious kick up the card slot, and the stagnation is obvious when you look at just how few compacts were launched this year at Photokina. This is in part due to ever shorter product cycles (which make waiting for trade shows commercially impossible), but we suspect it's also because there's really very little about the steady stream of 'me too' models that the manufacturers really want to shout about at an international trade show.

This sentiment is exemplified by GE (not necessarily a consumer imaging powerhouse) jumping into the digital point-and-shoot arena with a trio of cameras with 10-megapixel resolutions (and one of them shooting 720p video). But a few of the bigger names came out with some models with notable specs. Kodak introduced the Z1485 (seen at right), which offers a 14-megapixel resolution with a 5x optical zoom and digital image stabilization. Geoff Duncan at Digital Trends sums up the rest of the features, including:

...a Smart Capture feature that automatically adjusts the camera's settings for good shots in a variety of environments with intelligent scene selection, focus and exposure ontrol, and image processing. [...] The camera also integrates face detection technology, and offer three battery options (AA, CRV3, and Li-Ion rechargeables) for flexibility. The camera will also shoot QuickTime and MPEG-4 video at up to 30 fps at 1,280 by 720 resolution.

And it comes in three colors (pink and blue in addition to standard black). A bit more on the compact side is the Samsung HZ1, which offers the usual round-up of spec suspects (10-megapixels, optical image stabilization, face detection, 720P HD video recording) but adds an intriguing 10x optical zoom (via Electronista and CNet Asia). The full specs and release date, however, have yet to be confirmed.

Finally, don't forget the SD880IS and SD990IS Powershot point-and-shoots released by Canon a couple of weeks before the Photokina event (check out more details at DPReview).

--Agen G.N. Schmitz

Will the New DS Break Into the PSP and iPhone's Marketshare?

Over the past weekend Japanese business news source Nikkei.net reported that by year's end Nintendo will release a new version of the Nintendo DS in Japan that incorporates the added features of a built-in digital camera, MP3 music playback and improved wireless functionality. This rumor has yet to be confirmed or convincingly denied by Nintendo. Their official response to the rumor has been:

"We are always developing new products. However, since nothing has been announced officially, we are unable to comment at this time."

To me this reads as yes, there will probably be a new piece of DS hardware released soon, especially when you take into consideration that there were rumblings earlier in the year that an announcement would be made at this year's E3 of a new DS. That didn't happen, but with the once untouchable status of the DS Lite in the handheld market increasing being challenged by the PlayStation portable--it outsold the PSP in Japan only once in the last six months--and news that development of games on the iPhone/iTouch will continue to be a priority for Apple, all the signs are all there that a change in Nintendo's strategy may be at hand. But this doesn't necessarily equate to a shakeup of the handheld gaming market.

For a long time gamers, as well as industry observers have known that although there is some crossover among users, the DS and the PSP don't actually compete. The DS is of course widely popular across the whole of the handheld gamer demographic, but probably tracks heaviest with children and gamers least heavily invested in advanced gaming technology. This has allowed the unit to take advantage of a huge library of playable games aimed at the 'E-For Everyone' crowd, made up of both Nintendo DS cards and GameBoy Advance cartridges, but has also stymied any need for innovation in the DS' hardware. To date, since the introduction of the DS Lite in early 2006, replacing the original DS model, there have been little to no improvements to the the unit's base functionality, including its limited storage capacity and lack of included web browsing functionality, although the latter can be added via an additional card. The only changes have been additional color options, which though driving quite consistent and significant sales, do not address the wants/needs of the tech savvy crowd drawn to the functionality of the PSP and Apple's new offerings.

So, does the camera, music and additional wireless capabilities supposedly coming with this rumored model change that? Not likely. Assuming that these features are coming, which means that the storage issue of the DS must be addressed to accommodate this content, I'll wager they are just designed as new toys to placate a loyal customer base that might otherwise be tempted upgrade to machines like the PSP and iPhone/iTouch that have uses far beyond gaming.

--Tom Milnes

How Windows Can Save Itself: Three Things We Want to See in Windows 7

With everyone calling out Windows' imminent doom from the rooftops, it's easy (though incorrect) to believe that the OS doesn't have much longer to live as a platform.  While it's premature to say that we're looking at the twilight of Microsoft, it is fair to say that the trend of Microsoft's slowly-but-steadily declining market share will continue unless they make a radical change in their software design.

Since Microsoft makes a point of attempting to support legacy software and hardware, seeing them undergo the kind of sea-change that Apple underwent in releasing OS X is unlikely.  But the case for it is there: Apple took a huge risk in releasing OS X, since doing so meant that it required nearly their entire user base to re-buy software and hardware or face immediate obsolescence.  But Apple went through because they had no choice; with their stock tanked and the company losing money, it was either rethink their design philosophy or file bankruptcy. 

Microsoft, with its dominant 90%+ of market share, doesn't feel the need to make such a leap.  And despite what a lot of pundits are saying, they really can't afford to.  Apple was able to introduce OS X in an environment where they had no significant market share, and then grow the user base comfortably over time.  It's one thing to take the risk of asking 3% of the market to repurchase all of their software and peripherals-- quite a different thing to ask 91% of the market to do the same.

Windows Vista was Microsoft's attempt at bridging that gap between presenting a new kernel design philosophy and still offering legacy support.  It didn't really work.  Apple's kernel redesigning gamble paid off because it offered a suite of new features, functionality, and stability over previous versions.  Vista's half-hearted attempt orphaned too many programs and peripherals to offset its few improvements.

The new "I'm a PC" ad campaign is a step in the right direction for realigning Windows' perception in the marketplace, but PR isn't really the main issue Microsoft needs to address--it's their sprawling, unaligned design philosophy that causes them to rush half-finished products to market.

Microsoft needs to innovate in order to remain competitive, and hopefully Windows 7 will show the innovation that Microsoft is capable of when it doesn't get in its own way.  Not much information has been leaked about Windows 7 yet except that it may hit the market as early as next year and that it will support multitouch.  Multitouch support is a good start because it argues for a stronger embedded device presence.  In that vein, here are three more things I want to see in Windows 7 that I think would strengthen the platform and even bring me back from the Ubuntu fold.

1) Boot into multiple environments, and virtualize between them.  Let's face it, Microsoft has been trying to have it both ways with legacy support vs. kernel design and it hasn't really been working.  So split the difference: at logon, give the user the option to boot into either the latest version of Windows, or a legacy kernel that supports pre-Vista software and hardware.  (My admittedly shabby "artist's rendition" of this is below.)  This gives all the latitude needed for more innovative design in the new kernel, because it wouldn't be hobbled by attempts at legacy support, and eliminates the need for the disastrous "upgrading to a older version" that crippled Vista adoption.  You could even get more specific with microkernels: for example, give the user options between environments optimized for certain tasks like gaming, or functioning as a media center or a server.  Also, allow the environments to virtualize each other, so that you can run an older program under Windows 7 for example without having to log out and log back in under a different environment.  One thing Mac and Linux have all over Windows is the ability for casual users to virtualize other environments--technically speaking it's nothing Windows can't do, and it should.

Easiest Hack Ever: Revive Your MP3 Player with Rockbox

Still saving up to upgrade your aging MP3 player?  Or want the functionality of a higher-end player but can't yet justify the expense?  The recently-released Rockbox 3.0 is here to give new life to your player, and it supports more models than ever before--including many iPods.

What is Rockbox?  It's an open-source firmware/software package that completely replaces your current player's software.  It's not just a GUI replacement--it adds drag-and-drop file functionality to players, it adds playback support for most audio codecs including OGG and FLAC as well as MPEG video, and even adds support for games (Doom!) and small applications.  Most users report extended battery life as well.

Installation is easy with any supported, USB-connected player.  Simply download the Rockbox installer, run it, and follow the on-screen instructions.  A few clicks and your dusty old player will have a brand new pair of shoes in no time.  Here's a list of the currently supported players:

• Apple: 1st through 5.5th generation iPod, iPod Mini and 1st generation iPod Nano
  (not the Shuffle, 2nd/3rd gen Nano, Classic or Touch)
• Archos: Jukebox 5000, 6000, Studio, Recorder, FM Recorder, Recorder V2 and Ondio
• Cowon: iAudio X5, X5V, X5L, M5, M5L, M3 and M3L
• iriver: H100, H300 and H10 series
• Olympus: M:Robe 100
• SanDisk: Sansa c200, e200 and e200R series (not the v2 models)
• Toshiba: Gigabeat X and F series (not the S series)

Rockbox will build a database of your music with ID3 tag support, or you can browse by filetree.  It adds video capability (with support for multiple file types) on players that don't normally do video such as a 1st gen iPod nano, provided your player's CPU is fast enough.  You can read text files and browse photos.  Features like file renaming and deleting on the device, on-the-fly playlists, a 5-band equalizer, and user-created themes mean you can fully customize the sound and the look of your music. 

Note that while none of these features are groundbreaking in and of themselves, the point is that it adds this functionality to players that normally don't have it.  That means you can watch video on a "pre-fatty" nano, or play Asteroids on your Sansa E series.  Besides entertainment, there are small productivity plugins like currency converters, calculators, and a dictionary to give your player a more PDA-like quality.

In short, if you balk at the expense of products like the iPhone but wish your current player could carry its weight a little better, check out Rockbox.

--Aric A.

[Ed. Note: The site has been seeing a ton of traffic since the release of 3.0, so if the Rockbox site doesn't load for you at first, refresh or try again in a few minutes.]

Photokina 2008: The Four-Thirds Solution

Way back in the mists of time, I used to be the lead editor for Amazon's Photo store (when 4-megapixel point-and-shoots were the top of the line and priced at about $600), but I've taken my eye of the category in recent years as I've focused on other areas. Thusly, after being asked to cover Photokina for EndUser this week, I had to do a bit of cramming after seeing a slew of announcements regarding this new and emerging standard.

If you're not familiar with it, Four Thirds will essentially standardize lens mounts, sensor size, and communication protocols between lens and camera and allow digital cameras from multiple manufacturers to use the same interchangeable lenses, which are designed specifically for use with digital cameras. And with smaller CCD sensors, lenses can also be made smaller, enabling more compact cameras to be able to utilize interchangeable lenses as more bulkier DSLRs currently do.

One of the most intriguing items from the week was the Olympus announcement that it's developing its first Micro Four Thirds cameras along with the unveiling of its cooly hip'n'retro prototype (via DCResource):

Additionally, Olympus said that will also be developing a Four Thirds DSLR that, according to CNet's Crave, will "inherit the 11-point twin-cross sensor AF system and flip-and-twist LCD from the E-3, though the body will be smaller, and Olympus claims the sensor-shift image stabilizer will correct up to 5 stops. It will also have improved weather sealing and a maximum shutter speed of 1/8,000 second."

And while it was initially unveiled via press release before Photokina, Panasonic's more SLR-like/Four Thirds-based G1 got officially priced at $800 with a bundled 14-45mm lens. The Consumer Reports Electronics blog has a good rundown of its features, including this tidbit:

To make this camera as versatile as an SLR, Panasonic will offer a system of interchangeable lenses. There will also be a lens mount adapter that lets you tap into the array of existing Four Thirds lenses designed for SLRs like the Olympus E-420 or Panasonic Lumix L10. The Lumix G1 will also offer a myriad of features and functions found on SLRs, such as RAW-file capture, complete manual settings, custom white balance settings and others.

Electronista also reported that an HD video version that was demonstrated at Photokina will ship next spring, and it "will ship along with a special lens just for video capture; the lens motor will be quieted to avoid affecting video capture and will also have its own controls."

--Agen G.N. Schmitz

Speak To Me: iPod Nano Voice Over

Even after all the attention it's gotten over the past couple of weeks, the new 4th-gen Nano still continues to impress us.  One of its more unsung features is Voice Over functionality.  When activated, the Nano will speak song information and menu items out loud as you scroll through them.  At first glance this seems more like a nice touch than a full-blown feature, but it has some really useful real world applications.

First and most obviously, it makes the Nano far more accessible to blind and seeing-impaired users.  If you're like me and like to listen to music while falling asleep, I can tell you that the ability to browse through the Nano without reaching for my glasses is a nice one indeed.  Voice Over can also be a boon to those who take their Nano along while driving.  Peering at an iPod and piloting a car down a busy highway isn't exactly safe.  Voice Over alone won't keep both hands at 10 and 2, but at least it can help our eyes stay on the road.  It's even pretty handy while running and working out.  If you've picked up one of the new Nanos, definitely give Voice Over a shot.

--Jon D.

Bites from the Apple: The Shape of Things to Come

While Apple has served up an hors d'oeurves of this year's iPods, we're still hankering for a big Mac attack--in particular the long-awaited refresh of the MacBook/MacBook Pro line. A photo's been running 'round the gadgetosphere this week that purports to show the new casing, which combines some of the curved look of the MacBook Air with the black LCD bezel and the glass multi-touch trackpad that have also been grinding through the rumor mill. Jason O'Grady, among others, calls it a fake (just take a look at the mirrored Mac OS X dock on the trackpad... which doesn't even appear on the screen), and adds that he's heard that the new MacBooks will stick with their traditional boxier design, will have a black "flat top" keyboard like the Air's (seen at right), and will get full multi-touch capabilities. AppleInsider reports that all MacBooks (JV 13-inchers and Pro 15/17-inch models) will sport aluminum enclosures and will shed some connectors--going with a backward-compatible FireWire 800 port and replacing the bulkier DVI video port with the mini-DVI port now found on the standard MacBooks. We should be seeing new models get the royal Jobs-ian announcement come the middle of October. Now for more Apple-y goodness from the week that was:

• Well, maybe not all goodness. There's been quite the storm arising from the Apple wing of the gadgetosphere about Apple's iPhone App Store, and in particular how Apple's non-disclosure agreement (NDA) is preventing developers from collaborating (as well as causing a publisher to shelve a title on iPhone development) and how some apps are rejected without a full understanding why they got the boot. And this week it was revealed that developers who have apps rejected can't even talk about the rejection due to NDA enforcement. If you think this is all just a bunch of wonky inside baseball, Jason Snell of Macworld lays it out in real-world terms:

  If developers are afraid to write programs for the iPhone that aren’t games, to-do lists, and tip calculators, for fear that all their hard work will be wasted by a malicious or capricious Apple rejection notice, they will stop writing programs for the platform. And the well of innovative, interesting iPhone software will dry up.

  Glenn Fleishman echoes those sentiments at TidBITS and then sums up:

  Apple needs to get its act together, and be specific about what is and isn't acceptable to avoid uncertainly. Remember FUD? Fear, uncertainty, doubt. It was what once made Microsoft great and terrible: they sowed FUD to keep their competitors from gaining a toehold.

  But Apple's FUD is against themselves. They need to unFUD themselves, and fast.

• Charlie Sorrel over at Wired's Gadget Lab has a screen grab of the iPhone's Safari browser from the upcoming iPhone OS 2.2 update, and there's been a subtle tweak replacing the search magnifying glass (seen in the screen grab on the left) with a search bar (on the grab on the right) that emulates the search bar found on the desktop version of Safari.

  

  He also ponders the MIA copy-and-paste functionality and wonders if Apple is reinventing it:

  Imagine a system-wide menu added to all applications which, instead of shuffling items off to a clipboard, lists all the places you can send that file (or text string). This would be like the existing "Open with" option available in the Mac's right-click menu -- each application effectively reports to the OS exactly what kind of files it can handle and the OS remembers this. Thus a picture could be sent to not only the Photo app, but to any other photo program. Text could be sent directly to any open dialog box in, say, Safari.

  Technically, this still uses a "clipboard" stack to store items temporarily, but the user experience changes to fit the iPhone's one-open-app-at-a-time paradigm.

• RIM may be bringing native software to the Mac that enables syncing with Blackberries (via Ars Technica).

• If you're an iPhone owner who's also a Delicious social bookmarking user, you might be interested in the Red Delicious iPhone app, which lets you see your recently-added bookmarks as well as browse your bundles and tags (via Macworld).

• Tweet of the week from Macworld editor Dan Frakes: "Apple's current MobileMe status: "Some MobileMe members may be temporarily unable to see" Great, now it induces blindness."

• Still no Apple TV update that allows direct purchase of HD TV shows, but Apple TV Junkie is hopeful that one is coming soon.

• And finally, via TUAW, a bit of electronica as composed from the Mac's alert sounds (and displayed in GarageBand):

--Agen G.N. Schmitz

Photokina 2008: Leica Unleashes 37.5-Megapixel Beast

The Leica S2 is the new monster of the megapixels with a whopping 37.5 MP resolution. It's outfitted with a 3:2 aspect ratio Kodak KAF-37500 CCD image sensor that produces an intriguing hybrid of an SLR and medium-format camera. Michael Tompkins at Image Resource explains:

Dubbed "Leica Pro Format" by the company, the S2's imager has 56% greater surface area than that of a 35mm full-frame image sensor, but about 22% less than the 36 x 48mm imagers used in certain other medium format DSLR products from the likes of Leaf and Hasselblad. The sensor communicates with a Maestro-branded image processor that Leica says offers reduced power consumption and "twice the speed of comparable medium-format backs".

Additionally, Wired's Gadget Lab notes the camera's unique shutter system:

The body contains a standard focal plane shutter, but the new lenses also have leaf shutters. Leaf shutters are notable because they act like the aperture leaves in the lens and, unlike the focal plane shutter, they open to their full extent whatever shutter speed is selected, meaning that very high flash sync speeds can be achieved.

Focal plane shutters only open fully up to a certain speed (usually 1/250th or 1/500 sec max). After that, the second curtain fires before the first one has reached the other side of the frame, resulting in a slit that travels across the sensor. If your flash fires, that's what you'll see: a dark frame with a small illuminated strip.

In other DSLR news, Olympus announced that it will be developing a DSLR based on the Four Thirds system (Pocket-Lint captured a photo of the prototype at the Olympus booth; we'll also have more on Four-Thirds systems a little later today). And if you want a blinged-out DSLR, check out the Swarovski crystal-encrusted Pentax K2000 over at Engadget (covered here earlier this week).

--Agen G.N. Schmitz