November 2004 Archives

Happy 5th Anniversary MaPalad! Click here for lots and lots of pictures from the MaPalad 5th Anniversary Celebration last November 27 at Gilligan's Island, Makati.

Would you buy this if it comes with a built in 20GB hard drive? Would you even buy this if it syncs with iTunes? But it doesn't! Meet the new (concept?!) Nokia Neo, with built-in camera, 7MB of internal memory and SD/MMC expansion. Oh, and ditch the keypad for the iPod-like trackwheel! To think the circle keypad was enough! Now, there's no keypad - just the circle! Perfect for those who want to follow an iPod theme -- iPod wheel, car steering wheel, and now even your phone has a wheel!

With predictive text turned off, time yourself typing this phrase, "The razor-toothed piranhas of the genera Serrasalmus and Pygocentrus are the most ferocious freshwater fish in the world. In reality they seldom attack a human." If you can do this under 57.75 seconds, then you can call The Guinness Book of World Records and inform them that you have beaten the record for the fastest texter in the world using a standard phone keypad. Officially the currenty record listed by Guiness is 67 seconds, held by James Trusler of Britain, who posted the time in September 2003 during a live TV show. The new 57.75 second record (not yet official) is held by high school student Ben Cook. UPDATE: A Singaporean woman also claims that she beat the record in just under 44 seconds. I have high hopes here. The Philippines is the world's texting capital! To add to the flare - try doing this with a Siemens SX1. Hehe.

m|ph talk is a weekly interview with interesting people in the mobile tech industry. This week's interview features Juan magdaraog of Innov8. You may already know Juan Benedicto “Dickoy

Finally! They're here! HP Philippines launched their new line of iPAQ handheld devices last November 11 2004 at the Makati Shangri-La Hotel. An intimate press crowd, a bedazzling magic act by Erick Mana, and great food was just icing on top of the cake for the real eye candy: the fab five of the geek world! The new line of HP's iPAQs were unveiled that afternoon, namely the entry level rz 1710, the multimedia packed rx 3400 /3700, the enterprise level hx 4700 and HP's first PDA-phone, the h6300.

The rz 1700 is HP's entry level PDA, very much like the previous iPAQ 1930. It runs on the new Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition and has a 203MHz Samsung processor. It is the most affordable QVGA Windows Mobile 2003 SE device in the market. The rz 1700 is built with only 25MB of user-available memory (includes 10MB for iPAQ File Store). It has an SDIO slot and IrDA connectivity. The 1700 series will have a SRP of P15,950.00.Note: The rz 1717 has 35MB of user memory with 21MB of iPAQ File Store space available.

The rx 3400 and 3700 are HP's multimedia and wireless powerhouse devices. The main difference between the two is that the 3400 sports 77MB of user memory while the 3700 has a whopping 152MB. In terms of battery life, the 3400 has a user removable 920 mAh li-ion battery. The 3700 has a higher 1440 mAh user removable li-ion battery. Both sport a 1.2MP digital camera (4x digital zoom) at the back of the unit. They both have integrated 802.11b wireless LAN and Bluetooth. SRP for the rx 3400 is P24,950.00 while the rx 3700 is pegged at P30,950.00

A PDA with a mouse? That's enterprise level hx 4700! It's the very first device made available here with a 4.0 inch VGA screen. It is powered by a 624MHz Intel processor and comes with 192MB of user memory. Yes to Bluetooth and yes to built in Wi-Fi! (wow!!) SRP of the hx 4700 is P39,950.00 Last but not least is the h6300, the one and only iPAQ that has quadrouple-wireless features: GSM/ GPRS, Bluetooth and wireless 802.11b LAN. Treo 650 killer? We shall see ... This gadget has an SRP of P39,950.00 HP was represented by the energetic Mr. Wowie Wong, the Market Development Manager of HP in the Philippines. HP also announced their partnership with Microwarehouse Inc. as the exclusive distributor of the iPAQ line in the Philippines. For full press release, more images and specs, click here! Now if only Erick the magician had pulled an iPAQ out of his hat ...

Pesos & sense is a weekly feature about gadgets or applications that we feel are worth spending our own hard-earned money on. While we enjoy playing around with several new gadgets on a weekly basis, there are some that really catch our attention and we thought it would be good to point them out to our readers. The lust goes on: after that new consumer digital camera, you'll want to spend a whee bit more for your high capacity memory card. It doesn't end there, for you'll start buying rechargeable batteries and eventually - a tripod! Why would a cam whore want one of these? Well, unless your fingers are as brazened as a lab chemist, you'll eventually end up with blurry close-ups shots (ayiee!!) and hazy night shots (arrgh!!) at slow shutter speeds. Besides, this tripod from Vivitar is cool. It was a birthday gift; found for only P133.00 in the AGFA store in Megamall beside the department store entrance. It's made of a strong but malleable alloy from the planet Krypton. When I'm bored, it becomes my toy: I mold it into the shapes of a squid, a sentry gun and the sentinel arms from The Matrix. For P133.00, it is well worth the price: other table tripods cost P800.00 - P2,000.00. But the Pocket 35 has bendable feet so you can "mount and shoot" from several creative angles - not just straight. Stretched out, it doesn't "bend back" to its original shape which means that your camera lens will behave. This model also has a clip you so can latch it onto your pocket when travelling.

To celebrate Bush's re-election, Nokia Philippines gives us this scoop on the much awaited 7710 touch-screen mobile media phone. It will retail for a billion dollars! Just kidding. Although first impressions make me want to get my hands on this data pad, there was one thing I overlooked, or rather Nokia might have overlooked if they studied the local tech lifestyle: Pinoys love surfing through Wi-Fi, and not EDGE (which is already under implementation, sans major public marketing) . Of course I may be wrong here, because Nokia seems to release even the kitchen sink and someone still ends up buying it. But seriously, the design is kick-ass. Oh, and being a Trekkie, my theory on mobile gadgets is that design will inevitably lead to the Star Trek Communicator, Datapad and Tricorder. In this case it's the datapad. Mobile Media Phone with the following resources: Display : Widescreen 640 x 320 pixel, Bright 65,536 Color Display Audio : Handsfree Speaker, FM Radio, Digital Music Player (AAC, MP3, True Tone, etc). Video : Built-in 1 Megapixel Camera, QCIF Camcorder, Real One Mobile Player Data Input : Touch Screen, Pen Input with Virtual Keymat and Handwriting Recog! Memory : 80 MByte Internal with expandable MMC Slot (128 MB MMC incl. in package) Technology Platform : Series 90 GUI, Symbian 7 OS with MIDP Java 2 Support Mobile Enablers : Triband EGSM 900/1800/1900, EGPRS, HSCSD, AMR/EFR/FR/HR, SMS, USSD Connectivity : USB Cable (Pop Port DKU-2 port incl.) and Bluetooth. Messaging : SMS/MMS/E-mail Browsers : WAP and WWW (Opera with Flash and Java and Streaming Support) Note-able Preloaded Apps : Sketch, , Games, Themes, etc.... Productivity Enablers : Contacts (V card format), Calendar, To Do List, Synch with PC PIMs, MS Office Viewers Other Notables : Flight Mode & Mobile TV Transceiver Accessory Its a real heavyweight (189g/ 143 cc >> 69.5 x 128 x 19.5 mm) with talktime of 10 hours (dont worry its front talking) and stanbdy time exceeding 10 days. Stay tuned for a full review in our next issue of m|ph

In the role of a detective, you have to solve an intriguing case posed by a sinister stranger. In the course of the investigation, people in different places will need to be questioned. However, it's no longer enough to just click somewhere in the game to get from here to there - now *you* have to move to progress the story.

A really interesting S60 game concept amidst a noir-inspired plot of long nights, mysterious strangers and stolen identities. The game seems to remember the physical places where you activated the location markers. In my case, since I was at the Alabang Town Center, Datablitz on the third floor was the detective's office, the food court which was a floor below was the warehouse and the parking lot was the bar. At one point my trusty sidekick even told me I was going the wrong way. Definitely a game for those who have a lot of spare time. Not for those who are stuck in a 3x3 office cubicle the whole day. Get The Journey here. It's free and it's open source!

Hangout is a new weekly section in which we talk about the sites we tend to hang out in. A must-read for us Geek Squad members. One nice thing about being a tech writer is that you can surf the Web all day and call it work. And one nice site that makes our jobs easier is Engadget, which is probably the site for mobile gadgets. Peter Rojas, formerly of Gizmodo, and his team of editors, contributors, and columnists together cover the gadget world like no other site does. The thoroughness and wit with which they approach their job makes Engadget a standout. I might forget to take my daily vitamins every now and then but I never miss a daily visit to Engadget.

Pesos & sense is a new, weekly feature about gadgets or applications that we feel are worth spending our own hard-earned money on. While we enjoy playing around with several new gadgets on a weekly basis, there are some that really catch our attention and we thought it would be good to point them out to our readers.

I love Bluetooth products. The fact that the technology will most probably be eclipsed in a couple of years by something else that works at higher speeds but is just as frugal in using battery power (see wireless Firewire, for example) hasn't stopped me from building up a small collection of Bluetooth devices that I use in a personal area network: an Apple PowerBook , a Palm Tungsten |T2, an SE T68i, and a BAFO headset. I had long wanted to get a Bluetooth mouse to use with my laptop. The logical choice was the Apple Bluetooth Mouse but I was turned off by the large size and the lack of a second button and a scroll wheel. So, when the RadTech BT500 turned up in local stores, I rushed out to get one (P3,500 at Games&Gadgets at Greenhills Theater Mall). I've been using it for a couple of months now, and am very happy with it. It's the perfect travel companion, and works as advertised. The scroll wheel feels a little sluggish compared to my wired Logitech Mouseman Traveler, but I really have no major complaints. Some caveats though, for potential buyers: - The mouse is small, and may be uncomfortable to use for people with really big hands - The bottom part of the mouse has a rubberized coating, and after a couple of weeks of use, it was dirty (madungis) - Battery life is short (about a week's worth of use). I ended up getting two sets of rechargeable batteries after computing that six months worth of AAA alkaline batteries would cost me as much a two sets of rechargeables and the charger.