all pictures are thumbnails; click them to enlarge Right before I finished up the HP Pavilion dv2 laptop review, I was sent a couple of boxes containing an HP Pavilion dv6z-1299lx and an HP Mini 110-1036NR. Even though I knew the purpose of the experiment which was about to happen, I couldn’t help but wonder why anyone in the world would need two laptops? The answer to that question is actually quite simple…
The single biggest problem my wife and other family members have is making sure that their data is backed up. The HP Mediasmart LX195 will help you make sure that data is safe and a while lot more. This server is based on Microsoft’s Windows Home Server. It’s not my normal operating system of choice, but I think that Microsoft and HP have done a good thing here. They have done something that is difficult with Linux. They have made it extremely easy to setup a media server and a backup server all in the same tidy package. Try as…
Time to take a look at another game for the Palm Pre, Blackout. Sadly, this is number four of five. Like many of the other games available for the Pre, it is a good concept, but an underwhelming exhibition of what this platform can do.
We have taken a look at SplashID several times before. This is one of the great apps coming out of SplashData, who seems to have now come full circle. They started out developing for PalmOS, moved on to Windows Mobile, iPhone, Nokia, and even several desktop platforms. Well, now they have come back to their roots with Palm and their WebOS. This is SplashData’s second app on the Palm Pre, following Infopedia. Now, some of you may recall that last week I briefly mentioned how I had tested SplashID and found it to be terribly buggy. Heck, it would not…
I had other plans for this article tonight, but as I mentioned earlier, there were a few new releases this weekend, rounding the App Catalog off to an even 35. So, I thought it would make sense to take a look at one of these new apps.
I have to admit that I am not terribly interested in social networking. Email is usually enough for me, though there are a few sites which I do find to be particularly enjoyable or useful. One of those sites is LinkedIn, a social networking site for business connections. As much as I enjoy LinkedIn however, I have always found their mobile versions to be a bit lacking.
Open Table is pretty similar to Good Food, which we looked at yesterday. Like Good Food, just enter your current location (either by city name or using the GPS). Open Table will then pinpoint affiliated restaurants in your area, which you can view either on a map, or in a list view.
We are going to quickly tackle two apps in one tonight. I was planning to bring you a look at SplashData’s SplashID, the only secure information manager available for the Palm Pre. Unfortunately, I had terrible problems with SplashID on the Palm Pre and could not get it to load at all. Every time opened it, it froze. I know others have had much more success with this program, and I have enjoyed it on other platforms, but it just would not work on my Palm Pre. So, that is all I have to say about this one. If you…
One of the complaints I heard (and voiced) about the Palm Pre before its release was the lack of support for PalmOS apps and games. It felt like Palm was missing an opportunity to feature an enormous, ready-made library of apps. Additionally, with the large (but admittedly shrinking) army of devoted Palm users, it seemed like there was an almost built in path to an automatic upgrade. By not supporting those apps, it seemed as though many users might choose to stick with their current devices rather than risk giving up significant functionality with an unknown operating system. Apparently, Palm…
I think it is no secret around here that I am a pretty big fan of Sudoku. I have explored many Sudoku options for various mobile platforms, and even a number of alternate variations on the theme. For those of you who are new here, Sudoku is a classic Japanese puzzle game, in which you are faced with a grid of 81 squares arranged in nine rows of nine blocks each. Scattered across the grid are numbers from 1-9. Your job is to fill in the remainder of the grid by placing each number, 1-9, into each row, column, and…
Do you Twitter? Are you a Twit with your Tweets? I’ll be honest here and tell you that I really don’t Twitter. Sure, I have an account, and have tried to understand it, but it just never did much for me. That being said, I do understand that millions of people out there send what must be billions and billions (sorry, Carl Sagan) of Tweets on Twitter every day (does this make anyone else think of a little yellow canary from Looney Tunes?)
Yesterday, we started our two part look at movie listing apps on the Palm Pre with Fandango. Today, we will wrap that up with a look at Flixster. To be honest, Flixster and Fandango are pretty similar apps, with one giant difference. With Fandango, you can actually purchase tickets straight from your phone. Flixster does not have that option, it only allows you to view information about the movies and listings.
I bought my first modern Mac in February, 2008, a 15″ MacBook Pro. At the time I was frustrated with the laptop I owned – a 17″ Toshiba X205 – which was running Windows Vista Ultimate in what seemed like a most underpowered way. I was tired of being told that there were no drivers yet available for my gear, I was tired of seeing notifications pop up asking me constantly if I was sure that I wanted to do something, and I was basically ready for a change. It didn’t help that I had already seen Mitchell and Vincent‘s…
photos by Kevin As many of you know, two different MacBook Airs in a row have performed as my main computer for over a year. I can get away with using what others have called an “oversized netbook” because I don’t do a lot of processor-intensive computing beyond basic video and photo editing, and much of what I do can be done “in the cloud.” I would be lying if I didn’t say that part of the Mac’s attraction for me has always been hardware based. From the first time I laid eyes on Mitchell’s MacBook Pro, I knew it…
First impressions are important – and the Palm Pre makes a great first impression. It’s small, light and fits nicely in the palm of your hand. The screen is bright and easy to read in nearly all lighting conditions. Data downloads on the Sprint network were fast and my Gmail account delivered email nearly instantly – at least as fast (or faster) than either of my BlackBerry devices. So why was I left with the feeling that the looks of the Palm Pre faded quickly once I began to peer beneath the surface of Palm’s new flagship phone?
HP and Microsoft sent me an HP Pavilion dv2-1199us Entertainment PC to try out. Once I got past the fact that the model number is a mouthful, I couldn’t help but notice how lovely this moonlight white computer is – both in appearance and specifications. The exterior is described as a “magnesium-aluminum-alloy case in a white imprint finish,” but that barely describes it; the look is stunning. The touch pad is a mirrored surface, and it runs Windows Vista Home Premium with Service Pack 1 (64-bit). The dv2 has a bunch of bells and whistles…both in the hardware and in…
This week I started back at uni, and I was instantly feeling the two problems I have with my MacBook Pro: it’s not overly light for lugging around, and the battery is gooooone. Basically this left me with a choice of either buying a replacement battery or finally getting myself a decent “netbook”. Carrying around the Shift showed me how nice it is to carry around a small and light notebook, so I decided on the latter, and today picked up an HP Mini 1001TU. This model has the 1.6Ghz Atom CPU, 60GB HDD, 1GB RAM and Bluetooth. I paid…
I’ve been enjoying using the HP 2140 Mini Note. It’s small, light, and quite easy to use thanks to its near full size keyboard. My unit came with a three cell battery which allows the unit to maintain its low profile.
On February 18th and 19th, I was part of a group of mostly female bloggers who were brought to New York to meet Vivienne Tam and learn more about the HP / Vivienne Tam Mini Note collaboration. Our first day consisted of a whirlwind New York City tour… That night we were invited to the Vivienne Tam fashion show and cocktail party, where her Fall 2009 collection was revealed. Since I am new to the behind-the-scenes world of high fashion, I was a little bit surprised that what we were being shown was for Fall 2009 instead of Spring. I…
One of the things that has been most significant since I made the move to using Apple’s products almost exclusively, is the fact that I have become very spoiled. I now want and expect electronics that not only work well, but also have a high degree of polished aesthetics, so that when I use the devices, they not only function well; but they also look and feel great while I use them. This is certainly the case with my iPhone and iPod Touch which continually amaze me; to a slightly lesser, but no less profound degree, this is also the…
Chris and I have been having quite a good time tweaking our MSI Wind netbooks. Both of us have run Mac OSX and Chris, who’s been a bit more aggressive in his hacking, now has his device booting with three different operating systems. Why then, you might ask, is my MSI Wind now in the Philippines with one of my writers from What’s On iPhone? It’s a long story that reflects my technology — fickleness.