One of our clients is always using his Nokia 9300 with an external Bluetooth-connected GPS receiver and installed TomTom navigation software. Since it worked quite well, I also decided to do it and had to upgrade my Nokia 9300 with an appropriate 2GB flash memory card as well as buy an external Bluetooth GPS receiver. Here I settled for an only 40 £ cheap no-name from a UK online reseller. Today I brought it all up and tested it. To my surprise the whole thing worked out of the box, no problems at all and it is also quite fast at finding satellites. I can only recommend this solution. Only thing I need to find now is a way to mount the Nokia 9300 in the car so that I can see the display. Of course the spoken directions also let you simply place it next to you and you are fine that way, too.

If you have a file that looks suspicious and want to be sure that your virus scanner did not leave it undetected then there is a free service on the web called Virus Total that checks the uploaded file against more than 30 virus scanners.

Not just because of the recent headlines that Apple has been able to get but for a long time before that I have been thinking that maybe we should switch to Apple laptops for Nice Ventures.

There were a few things though that make me decide to continue to stay in the Wintel camp so far but these reasons seem to also have evaporated now.

Reason 1: Application software is cheaper and also much more is available for Windows.

Ever since Apple moved to Intel hardware platform about a year ago this argument seems to have come to an end. What you can do now is install native Windows as well and then still be able to run those few programs that you might need. Also some of our Linux freaks could install their beloved environment next to Apple’s operating system. Of course what we work with 98% of the time mostly with is now readily available for the Apple as well. Office, browser, e-mail program, and the ASP-hosted software we use anyway…

Reason 2: The cost for an Apple laptop is much higher.

I went to an Apple store yesterday just to get an update and what I was told there was very surprising. A 13.3 inch MacBook (in white or black) costs with a 120 GB hard drive, 2GB of RAM and a 2GHz CPU just 2′300 CHF incl. VAT with a full one year warranty (all hardware and labour). And for just 170 CHF extra you get a warranty extension to 3 years. Students and teachers get a small discount (big one for SW) - clever move I thought - although it won’t apply to us. The user interface and speed are outstanding, I checked that myself and if I compare that with my 2′500 CHF Lenovo (IBM) Windows laptop much better for sure.

I guess you can see what I am tempted to do next time we are out in buying mode…

This year’s CeBIT opened today and some of the best gadgets, according to Focus Magazine (March 12), are listed below. Probably a good starting point for your own research if you are in the market for one these products:

LCD TV

• JVC LT46-Z70
• PANASONIC TX-32LX600F
• PHILIPS CINEOS 37PF9731D
• SHARP AQUOS LC-46XD1E
• TOSHIBA 32C3030D

Universal Remote Control

• PHILIPS PRESTIGO SRU 9600

Living Room PC

• HP TOUCHSMART-PC
• ACER ASPIRE IDEA 510

Video Games

• VIVA PINATA
• GUITAR HERO II
• RAYMAN
• The SIMS
• TRACKMANIA UNITED
• VIRTUA TENNIS 3

Video Gaming Consoles

• NINTENDO Wii

Digital Cameras

• PENTAX K10D
• FUJIFILM FINEPIX F40FD
• PANASONIC LUMIX TZ2
• OLYMPUS SP-550 UZ

Camera Cell Phones

• NOKIA N93I
• SAMSUNG SGH-F500

Digital Video Cameras

• SONY HDR-UX1
• PANASONIC HDC-DX1
• PANASONIC HDC-SD1
• SONY HDR-SR1
• PANASONIC SDR-H250EG-S

MP3 Players

• SAMSUNG YP-KR
• ARCHOS 604 WIFI
• COWDON D2
• MAXFIELD MAX-IVY
• PHILIPS SA9200
• TREKSTOR VIBEZ

Navigation Systems

• MAGELLAN CROSSOVER GPS
• FALK NAVIGATOR P300
• GARMIN NÜVI 660

Notebooks

• ASUS W5FE
• ACER FERRARI 1005 WTMI
• PANASONIC TOUGHBOOK CF-W5
• SONY VAIO VGN-SZ4MN/B
• FUJITSU-SIEMENS LIFEBOOK P7230
• TOSHIBA PORTEGE R400
• APPLE MACBOOK PRO 17″
• SAMSUNG X60 PRO
• LG W1 PRO JDGBG

Gadgets don’t have to be big to be true gadgets. The ultimate ears super.fi 5Pro is what one might expect for an earphone, it is small, and most importantly it is very comfortable and great for entertaining you through a long transatlantic flight and the endless check-in and check-out procedures. The sound quality of course is what equally counts and ultimate ears really lives up to its great company name, offering professional sound without having to put on a whole headset and look like a guy on its way to cold Siberia.

What is small one would also expect to come with a small price tag. Not so here, though. The super.fi 5Pro will set you back a steep $250. Reviews make it sound as if it is worth the money, though, to get the ideal companion to your iPod e.g.

This week’s gadgets are the e-ink based readers from iRex and Sony respectively. These devices promise to be the prototypes for a whole series of electronic books that, their developers hope, will do to books what the iPod did to music.

Both gadgets are based on the same underlying technology from a start-up called E-ink, both are currently pricy (€650 for the iRex iLiad, $350 for the Sony reader) and neither seems perfect. However they do seem to be available (or if not on sale soon in the Sony case) and they do promise significantly longer battery life than LCD based readers - a key advantage.

Given the price difference it would seem logical to buy the Sony reader rather than the iLiad, but Sony seem enamoured with their proprietary reader format, and, although they also support PDF and both rich and plain text formats, for some reason they omit HTML and open eBook formats. Likewise the iLiad supports a wider range of connectivity options including both WiFi and Ethernet whereas the reader only supports USB and flash memory options.

This week the gadgets of the week are two versions of the Trolltech Linux Mobile Phone.

The first is the Trolltech reference design - the greenphone - which looks remarkably cool and seems to make the job of being a phone developer almost irrelevant. The second is the Nokia Communicator competitor produced by German company Road which is apparently based on the same Trolltech platform

This week’s news from the Silicon Valley based organization Green Wifi got me thinking if such projects/gadgets really make sense. The definition of what a gadget is is totally subjective and largely depends on living standard. While for Steve Jobs a gadget thing would be (and for all of us) an outerspace flight on board a space shuttle, for the average high-tech person this might start with e.g. a Breitling watch or a sports car. Now for someone living in rural India e.g. a gadget starts much lower priced and could entail eating enough or simply having access to clean water. The proponents of organizations like Green Wifi or the more famous One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) initiative that proposes a $100 laptop seem to me a bit off their - certainly well meant - goals. As the Indian education minister just recently commented on the $100 project:

“We need classrooms and teachers more urgently than fancy tools.”

This is a view held by a number of government agencies and nongovernmental organizations (NGO) who hold that the focus on taking technology to India’s poor overlooks other key requirements like water, food, and basic education of the country’s deprived sections.

The above statement makes sense and lets projects like the mentioned two look a bit like theoretical patchworks from some high-tech industry people who have worked themself their entire lives in high-tech and now feel for whatever reason responsible for doing something for the much less fortunate in the poor areas of the world.

I would also like to add one other point. First of all setting the right priorities seems mandatory; someone having no education or access to sufficient food and drinking sources will not sit under a shady tree with a limited $100 PC (I assume that laptop does actually not even have wireless connectivity) and connect to a solar powered access point in reach. Secondly, I question if those initiatives are not even enlarging the digital divide if they provide such nations with “second class, very limited” Internet access and $100 PCs? I am sure people in Bangalore only have top-notch IT infrastructure to be able to offer services that are practically identical to what the guys in Silicon Valley or elsewhere do. Only if someone has a chance to move up to such a group do PC and Internet savviness make any sense to me. Solar-powered Wifi access points and $100 PCs seem a bit far away from this.

So to sum things up. I think what all those organizations should really do is work very closely with the folks in those countries who are working on helping the less fortunate poor day-to-day. When basic things are provided then Internet access with good performance PCs in PC /Internet equipped schools could be a next step - but not the first. Until then any money should be spent for what the Indian minister mentioned, I think, and often probably for even more basic things. If you don’t know how to read/write, or struggle to feed yourself, Internet surfing is not that cool a gadget.

• Toshiba brings its first HD-DVD player to the US market. Europe has to wait until further notice. http://www.tacp.toshiba.com/hddvd/

• The SONY VAIO VGN-TX2XP laptop uses power-saving LEDs for background illumination providing more than 7 hours of runtime on one battery pack. DVD and CDs can be played without having to start Windows, and music CDs can be played without even opening the screen.

• BENQ-Siemens EF91 is a bit ahead of the innovation curve through already supporting HSDPA. Unfortunately the users have to wait 6-12 months before they can connect to a HSDPA infrastructure. With a lifecycle for mobile phones in the 12-18 month range this seems indeed a bit over-engineered. www.benqsiemens.de

• GRUNDIG Mobile X500. If you intend to use your mobile phone for taking pictures instead of doing calls or datacommunications then this camcorder phone is for you. Grundig Mobile (located in Spain) is back in this market. At 6 megapixels it appears to have the by far best built-in camera. www.grundigmobile.de

• LG V900. Also a bit ahead of its time is this DMB standard mobile TV phone.

• Samsung SGH-1320 is a Blackberry-like smartphone but based on Microsoft’s Mobile 5 OS. www.samsung.com

  The Samsung SGH-P900 is another TV phone that supports the DMB standard.

• Sony Ericsson W950i has 4Gb of flash for music playing (like the iPOD NANO) and a very large touchsreen display. OS is Symbian 9.1 It looks quite nice too. www.sonyericsson.com

• NOKIA is improving its 2005 bestseller (in Germany), the 6230i model, and bringing out the NOKIA 6233, which supports UMTS for an attractive price.

The CES show has of course produced countless gadgets and product annoucements. In addition to the bits of Skype hype noted below other devices also claimed Skype compatibility such as this US Robotics USB speakerphone.

Although US Robotics was not tying itself exclusively to the Skype bandwagon with a couple of non-Skype VOIP announcements as well.

Belkin announced probably the first UWB product: a remote USB hub that allows laptops (for example) to connect to USB peripherals connected to a remote USB hub nearby

Another USB product was the Pretec 4GB i-Disk Touch

described as the “Largest Capacity Fingerprint USB Flash Drive in the World”. I would have thought it was the ONLY fingerprint USB drive but perhaps there are others. Defintely a niche product, if a useful one, anyway.

The other buzz item seems to be Sony’s Reader, which was one of a number of products in the eBook space that have been announced recently. The Sony reader is based on its LIBRie product that was only available in Japan and it will be interesting to see whether it fixes some of the complaints about that product. From the specification though it seems like the main complaint - the DRM limitations of Sony’s eBook spec (BBeB) - have not been addressed.