Thursday, December 30, 2010

Gadget Flashback 2010

The year 2010 has many new gadgets are popping and add a row of new gadgets that enliven the world of technology, such as Apple who gave birth to a tablet computer, iPad issued in April 2010.

iPad also trigger the emergence of competitors to launch similar products, Here are some gadgets that emerged in 2010.

Apple Launches iPad

iPad crowned as the most popular computer by gadget site Pocket Lint. IPAD is a tablet computer designed and developed by Apple. He was marketed as a platform for audio and visual media such as books, magazines, movies, music, games, and web content. Weighing about 680 grams, size and weight between smart phones and laptops. Apple iPad released in April 2010.

Like the iPhone and iPod Touch, IPAD is controlled with a multitouch screen - a breakthrough earlier than most tablet computers that use a pen is pressed. IPAD uses Wi-Fi data connection to surf the Internet, run the media, and install the software. Some models also have a 3G wireless data connection.

The second tablet from Apple

IPad Apple so it snaps so that almost every electronics company is rumored to be making their own tablets. Besides Samsung Galaxy Tab, there is no serious competitor to Apple iPad this year. Of course, many companies have announced that they will release tablets in 2011.

iPhone 4

Apple's reputation in maintaining confidentiality when faced with a big splashy iPhone4 leaked in April, two months before the official launch. When I first saw it, the design of the new iPhone makes people crazy. Once released, the designs back in the news, but this time for "Antennagate."

Apple's App Store

With the iPhone and iPod Touch devices that continue to flood the market - and now consumers have the iPad - sales and offerings in the App Store has grown exponentially. Until October 20 this year, more than 300 thousand applications in the store has been downloaded more than seven billion times. In October, Apple announced the development of the Mac App Store for Mac computer applications.

E-Reader

Kindle itself became the most popular device in 2010 according to the gadget site Pocket Lint. Applications Kindle popular because it allows users to synchronize between their virtual book list to various devices like the iPhone or home computer.

Innovation Kinect

Developed over many years by Microsoft, Kinect, webcam based game system, sold out faster than iPad after it was released in early November.

Monday, December 27, 2010

IPod Touch

The iPod Touch is the iPhone without the phone and GPS features--no cellular voice calls, no texting, and no EDGE or 3G wireless service. The remaining features that the two have in common are often the criteria on which the Touch is judged. In the case of the fourth-generation Touch--available in 8GB, 32GB, and 64GB capacities--the two come closer to feature parity than ever before.

The 4G iPod Touch is thinner still--two sandwiched 4G Touches come very close to the thickness of the iPhone 4. It's also a little less wide and lighter than the third-generation iPod Touch that preceded it. Its edges are also more angled. This angling is sharp enough that owners of iPhones and previous iPod Touches will have to train themselves to search for the volume and Sleep/Wake buttons near the back edge of the iPod rather than the side and top, respectively.

The 4G version lacks the small black plastic patch on the back's top-left corner that covered the Wi-Fi antenna. That corner now holds the iPod's built-in omnidirectional microphone and its high-definition rear-facing camera.

Voice Control works only for playing music, however. You can't use it to initiate a FaceTime call.

With the new Touch you can make such calls without a headset. Even though the mic is on the back of the iPod, it's sensitive enough to pick up your voice. And the speaker is audible enough to carry on a conversation.

The iPod's camera is more zoomed in, hinting at a smaller sensor. Also, iPhone 4's camera captures stills at 1936 by 2592 pixels, while the iPod Touch's rear-facing camera shoots at 720 by 960 pixels. That's 5 megapixels on the iPhone 4 versus less than 1 megapixel on the Touch.

Given the lower resolution and lack of a flash, it shouldn't be surprising that the 4G Touch's still pictures don't measure up to the iPhone 4's. The images it produces are far less detailed and the camera's more susceptible to being blown out when capturing bright images--vibrant yellows, pinks, and reds, for example. Inside, in under-lit conditions, the Touch's camera pushes very hard to get the image, but in the process can produce grainy and washed out results.

The iPod Touch is an extremely versatile device--media player; pocket gaming machine; productivity tool; Internet communication device; and, with this latest update, pocket camcorder, still camera, handheld recorder, and FaceTime video phone.

Get your posts right before you publish them to your RSS feed

This article is about the relationship between your RSS feed and the Publish button, and ways of using Blogger to reduce the chances of readers seeing something that you didn't want to publish yet.

Your RSS feed and the Publish button

I've previously described why RSS is important for bloggers who care about building an audience.

But it's also important to realise that:

Some of your RSS subscribers only see the first version of each post that you publish, not the most recently edited one.

Even if you delete a post from your blog shortly after publishing it, the published version is still in your RSS feed and will be seen by people who read it.
(I've heard that some feed-aggregator / reader tools do delete items, however some eg Google Reader, don't.)

Personally, I took a long time to understand the consequences of this: When I started blogging, I Published early-and-often while I was writing each post, so I could see what it "felt" like. (The Preview button, because it shows you the "look" but not the latest content, and editing the content was important to me.) This meant that subscribers saw very early, drafty versions of my posts, so many of them decided to unsubscribe pretty quickly.

Even after I understood, I still occasionally hit Publish by accident. And my writing wasn't good, because I find it hard to proof-read properly in the post-editor.

So far I've found two ways of using Blogger that can address this problem.

Option 1: Turn the blog-feed off, except when you publish the final version

Posts are only sent out in your blog's feed if the feed is turned on. So every time you want to work on a post:

Turn the feed off (Settings > Site Feed > Allow Blog Feeds = None)
Work on your post, Publishing it as you like
Save the Post as Draft (so it's status is back to draft again)
Turn the feed on (Settings > Site Feed > Allow Blog Feeds = anything except None)

Or you could keep Allow Blog Feeds = None, turn it on every time you publish a post for the first time, and turn it off again afterwards.

This is particularly good approach if you have a lot of email subscribers via Feedburner - because that tool is currently (Dec 2010) sending out an update every time a post is published or updated, instead of just for every "new" publication (ie one that changes the post-status from Draft to Published).

However it's very manual, and there's always a risk that you might forget to turn the feed on or off at the right moment.

Option 2: Prepare posts in a separate blog

This is my preferred approach, and now there are at least three different "blogs" for each blog I that run:

The blog (what IT professionals call "production")
A documentation blog, where I keep my notes about how it's put together
A pre-publication blog, when I keep posts that are being worked on.

The blog itself is set to public (or restricted to a limited audience if that's appropriate). The others are set to:

Private (Settings > Permissions > Blog readers = Only Blog Authors)
Not listed (Settings > Basic > Add your blog to our listings = No)
Not indexed (Settings > Basic > Let search engines find your blog = No)
Not listed on my Blogger Profile (Dashboard > Edit Blogger Profile > Select blogs to display)

At various times, if I'm preparing for template changes or adding new features, I may also have test-blogs. These are always set to Private too.

When I'm preparing a post, I work on it in the "pre-production" blog, and can Publish it as many times as I like. Then when it's complete, I simply copy the post from the pre-prod blog to the real one, and publish it once.

A big benefit is that if I get an idea about a potential post, I can just go to the pre-publication blog and make a very quick note about it: the writing and research quality doesn't matter, because I'm the only person who sees it.

The one thing I need to do is to always check and re-check the blog I'm about to post in, every time I hit "Publish": the day after I first released this post was the first time in ages that I accidentally published a draft post to this blog (subscribers will have seen it come through the feel) .... very embarrassing indeed!

Have you found other ways to avoid problems like this?

I'd love to hear about what works for you.

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 one of the best fixed-lens cameras on the market today. The 10 megapixel Lumix LX5, which offers a large 1/1.63-inch CCD sensor for a point and shoot camera.

The LX5 backs up its F2.0 ultra-wide-angle zoom lens (3.8X optical zoom, 24mm to 95mm) with manual controls for both stills and video, RAW shooting, an unbelievable macro mode that lets you practically touch the lens to your subject, fast and fine-tunable focus controls, and a button layout that offers easy access to in-camera settings. On the back is a 3-inch LCD screen for framing your shots, but no optical viewfinder; instead, a proprietary hot-shoe connection allows you to connect the same eye-level electronic viewfinder (EVF) that's compatible with Panasonic's G-series interchangeable-lens cameras.

It resembles a miniaturized, fixed-lens version of Panasonic's interchangeable-lens Lumix GF1, right down to the boxy, classic-looking frame, pop-up flash, and stand-alone lens cap. Although it's quite a bit smaller than the Micro Four-Thirds GF1, it's bigger than your average point-and-shoot camera.

You can also opt to set the LX5 to a step zoom setting, which lets you jump to six predefined focal lengths (24mm, 28mm, 35mm, 50mm, 70mm, and 90mm) by tapping the zoom control, and the camera's autofocus reacts immediately.

For more details, please see the specification of Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 below

Type advanced

Image Processor
Effective Megapixels 10 megapixels
Image sensor CCD
Image sensor size 0.613 inches
Image format JPEG, RAW
White balance Auto, Bracketing, Manual
Image stabilization Hardware

Lens Features
Lens Model Leica DC Vario-summicron
Maximum Optical Zoom 3.8 X
Maximum Wide Angle 24 mm
Maximum Telephoto 90 mm
Minimum aperture 18
Maximum aperture 2
Focus features Manual Focus, Spot Focus

Viewfinder and LCD section
LCD screen size 3 inches
Has touchscreen No
Viewfinder Electronic

Exposure Controls
Maximum shutter speed 60
Minimum shutter speed 0.00025
ISO Low 80
ISO High 12800
Exposure settings Aperture Priority, Exposure Bracketing, Manual Exposure, Shutter Priority

Storage
Memory type SD Memory Card, SDHC Memory Card, SDXC Memory Card
Installed memory 40 MB

Flash
Flash characteristics Accessory Shoe, Built-in Auto Flash, Flash Slow Sync, Red-Eye Reduction

Video
Maximum video capture resolution 1280 x 720 pixels
Maximum frame rate 30
Video capture format AVCHD, MPEG

Connectivity
Interface connection A/V Output, HDMI, USB
Has Geotagging No

Power
Battery Type Lithium Ion Battery
Rechargeable Yes
Shots per charge (CIPA standard) 400

Dimensions
Width 4.32 inches
Height 2.58 inches
Depth 1.69 inches
Weight 9.76 ounces

Samsung Nexus S

The first phone to ship with Android 2.3 also known as "Gingerbread" as the well as the follow-up to last January's Nexus One, the Nexus S is a joint effort between Samsung and Google with some impressive features. The hardware is gorgeous, and Android 2.3 delivers some useful enhancements.

The Nexus S's design the glossy, all-black Nexus S is a lot more attractive than the Nexus One. In construction a lot flimsier and more plasticky than its HTC counterpart. Measuring 4.9-by-2.5-by-0.43 inches thick, the phone is a bit larger than the Nexus One. Weighing 4.5 ounces, the Nexus S is lighter than its sibling.

The Nexus S a 4-inch Super AMOLED display. The display is also curved so as to fit more comfortably next to your face.

Google apps like Latitude, YouTube, Gmail, Places, Google Maps with Navigation, Search (with voice), Car Home, Google Talk, and Google Voice.

The music player remains the same as the one in Froyo--boring but easy enough to use. Videos downloaded to the phone played back smoothly and looked great on the Super AMOLED display. One of the nice things about Super AMOLED is that it remains pretty visible in bright, outdoor sunlight. If you like catching up on TV shows during your lunch break, this is a useful quality in a phone.

The Nexus S has a 5-megapixel camera with a flash and the same resolution as the rest of the Galaxy S pack.

It has autofocus, macro and infinity modes, four resolutions to choose from, nine scene settings, three color modes, three quality modes, and exposure metering.

Can shoot video as high as 720-by-480-pixels at 30 frames per second. The device has 512MB of RAM and is capped at 16GB of internal memory. And unlike the iPhone, there's no 32GB model available.

Powered by Samsung's 1GHz Hummingbird processor, the Nexus S is quite speedy. Scrolling through Web pages was fluid, applications opened quickly, and navigating around the menus was smooth and fluid. Call quality over T-Mobile was very good. Calls sounded crisp and natural with an ample amount of volume and no static.

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Haier HV18A-4G Video MP3 Player

The HV18A-4G measures 3.5 by 1.5 by 0.25 inches and has a 1.8-inch, full-color TFT LCD, as well as a nifty touch-panel keypad. Featuring an audio-playback time of 30 hours, this sleek MP3 player also plays videos, offers an FM transmitter, and provides a voice recorder. The power/lock switch is on the side, while the volume buttons, fast-forward/rewind controls, and OK and Menu buttons are on the touch panel.

Video playback is decent, considering that the screen is just 1.8 inches. The player comes with ArcSoft Media Converter 3 for turning regular video files into the supported .smv format. The ArcSoft program, which took about 25 minutes to convert a 30MB file.

You can add music and pictures to the player by dragging and dropping the files in Windows Explorer or by synchronizing through Windows Media Player. Supported formats include MP3, WMA, and OGG for audio, and JPEG and BMP for pictures. You can't sync playlists from Windows Media Player,

In addition to the earbuds and the ArcSoft Media Converter 3 software, the HV18A-4G comes with a USB 2.0 cable.

The touch panel is just a bit hypersensitive (luckily, the device has a hold button), but otherwise the affordable Haier HV18A-4G is a decent little MP3 player with great battery life. The main thing that holds this device back is its small capacity--it's available only in 4GB and 8GB versions, neither of which is enough space for most people's music and video libraries.

Sony DSC-HX5V Cyber-shot

Sony DSC-HX5V With its in-camera GPS, digital compass, wireless image and video sharing via TransferJet, accelerometer-driven panorama mode, and 1080i high-definition video capture in AVCHD format, the 10-megapixel, 10X optical zoom (25mm to 250mm)

The following specifications Sony DSC-HX5V Cyber-shot

Type point-and-shoot

Image Processor
Effective Megapixels 10 megapixels
Image sensor CMOS
Image sensor size 0.417 inches
Image format JPEG, MPEG
White balance Auto Preset Modes
Image stabilization Optical

Lens Features
Maximum Optical Zoom 10 X
Maximum Wide Angle 25 mm
Maximum Telephoto 250 mm
Minimum aperture 3.5
Maximum aperture 8
Lens mount Fixed
Focus features Auto Focus, Multiple Point Focusing, Spot Focus

Viewfinder and LCD section
LCD screen size 3 inches
Has touchscreen No
Viewfinder None

Exposure Controls
Maximum shutter speed 1600
Minimum shutter speed 30
Exposure settings Auto Exposure, Manual Exposure, Multiple Program Modes

Storage
Memory type Memory Stick Duo, Memory Stick PRO Duo
Installed memory 45 MB

Flash
Flash characteristics Auto Flash, Flash ON, Flash OFF , Red-eye Reduction

Video
Maximum video capture resolution 1920 x 1080 pixels
Maximum frame rate 60
Video capture format MPEG-4

Connectivity
Interface connection, A/V Output, HDMI, USB
Has Geotagging Yes

Dimensions
Width 4.125 inches
Height 2.375 inches
Depth 1 inches
Weight 7.1 ounces