Full FeedRedfly now turns BlackBerry’s into netbooks, kinda
Redfly makes a small, instant on netbook-size device that brings your small phone screen to a bigger screen complete with larger keyboard. Redfly has worked with Windows Mobile phones for some time and now the company announces BlackBerry support. For users that needs more than the small keyboard and screen a phone offers, this could be a life-saver.
Available in both 7” and 8” models, the Redfly connects to your WinMo or BB smartphone allowing you to bang out emails even faster. Browsing the web is also possible, though reviewers were not so happy with the results. Redfly can be used with the BlackBerry Bold 9000, BlackBerry Curve 8900 and BlackBerry Tour 9630.
We’d suggest this device for those who travel often and could use just a little more space. We’d love the device to be a lot thinner (think Macbook Air thin) a bigger keyboard and a bit more upscale look. If you are going after business class, you can’t look like economy. That’s just my opinion though.
There is a contingent that believes this is the wave of the future. Palm thought this but was ahead of the curve and pulled the program before launching. As our phones become more powerful and capable, connecting to them seems logical. To get on the wave, you’ll need $200 or $250 for the 7” and 8” respectively. Or you can try to win one from Crackberry here.
Read: [Brighthand]
Image credit: Brighthand
RelatedYou didn’t listen: Conficker worm now infects 7 million computers - one year later
Back in November 2008, security experts became aware of Conficker, a worm that adds as many computers to its botnet as possible. Then in April of 2009 fear spread that April Fools Day, 4/1/09 would be dooms day, but it never came. Instead, the worm has built a ring of 7 million machines around the world that only wait instructions on what to do next. The only thing is, those instructions haven’t come.
Although Conficker is probably the computer worm most known about, PCs continue to get infected by it, said Andre DiMino, co-founder of The Shadowserver Foundation. “The trend is definitely increasing and breaking 7 million is pretty much of a landmark event,” he said.
But why no instructions?
Researchers have a couple of theories. One is who ever built this thing is scared to do anything with it. The clever code is adept at re-infecting systems even after it was removed. Companies have spent time and money dealing with this potential threat and if caught the developer could be looking at a lot of time with the boys in blue.
The fear is with a botnet of 7 million and growing, the army could weaponize and have affect on a great many of us. To be clear, it doesn’t seem this is the case today, but it is always a possibility. The most common symptom of Conficker is a machine that cannot be logged onto. The worm will attempt to gain access to other machines on the network by guessing passwords and in doing so will get locked out.
Do you have it? Get tested
A simple test, called an Eye Chart is found at the Conficker Working Group that was set up to deal and track these issues. It is a simple load and see if your machine loads images. If so, you are clean if not, you can find which variant of the the worm you’ve got and how to expel it.
Read: [NetworkWorld]
Related
World’s first AMOLED screen with slide-out keyboard Android phone released by Sprint
The Samsung Moment, the world’s first AMOLED screen with slide-out keyboard phone featuring Android is now available from Sprint at $179 after rebates and another 2-year commitment to the carrier. The phone definitely has some muscle under the hood but does it make up for having Android 1.5? Read on to find out.
The Moment features a 800MHz processor that drives the phone faster. Faster than, say, the Motorola Cliq - Engadget found the boot times to be 41 seconds for the Moment and 1:22 for the Cliq, ouch. A lot of that has to do with the processor and the lack of a skin on the Moment. The Cliq features a skin on top of the OS called Blur that will add some time to load in. In other tasks, the faster processor was noticeable making transitions faster and movement through menus faster
The AMOLED or active matrix organic light emitting diode, is inherently rugged, very thin and lightweight and is intended to have lower power consumption rates. These all add up to a win in the mobile phone market. In the smartphone wars, every battery-saving advance is a big plus.
Should you buy the Moment?
Sprint recently began selling two Android phones, the Moment which is launching today and the HTC Hero, launched a couple of weeks ago. The Hero is a physical keyboardless phone running HTC UI skin over the top to give a very specific user experience. The Hero runs Android 1.5 and it is not clear if an upgrade to 2.0 will be supported (though, we believe it will).
The Moment runs Android 1.5 and again the same upgrade questions abound. If you need a qwerty keyboard that will fit big hands, the Moment might just be up your alley. Be warned though, they keyboard is a little on the awkward side: the “z” key extends past the “a” key instead of the other way around. A nice feature is a row of dedicated number keys. Keyboard action is good with positive clicks keeping the action familiar.
With just the Cupcake update to the Android system, users will miss out on the updated Android Market, Google Navigation and the goodness that built into 2.0. Sprint ought to be upfront with potential buyers on the upgrade possibility for this phone. The phone is capable of over-the-air updates, so upgrading is a real possibility.
My call: hold off until either Sprint makes it clear on upgrades or you get some time on the new Verizon Droid (a 2.0 device) so you can decide if you need the latest. Nobody likes walking out of a store with last years software and at $179 and two years commitment, you shouldn’t have to.
Product Page: [Sprint]
RelatedBlackBerry admitting it is losing the browsing war?
I am loathe to use job posting info on what a company is thinking but it is worth mentioning that RIM is looking for a webkit developer presumably to help out with Blackberry’s browser. In addition to their recent Torch Mobile purchase it seems clear RIM is owning up to the fact that their browser needs some love. Somebody wise once said, “knowing is half the battle” though that could have been G.I.Joe.
From CNET on the BlackBerry Storm 2 browser:
“We thought that the BlackBerry browser was slightly faster and easier to navigate than previous versions, but it still needs a lot of work to catch up to the browsers on the iPhone, the Palm Pre, and the HTC Hero. “
Yesterday, Robert Scoble wrote a post on which mobile phone OS developers though was best. He asked Tim Westergren, founder of Pandora on download numbers for the top three OS for the wildly popular Pandora app. The results might not surprise you, but Roberts comments caught me off guard. While the iPhone claimed top honors, BlackBerry was in the #2 slot and Android was #3. What caught me off guard were comments about which two OS developers were looking at to develop for:
Westergren told me if he were starting development today he’d build for the above three platforms and is seeing more growth in Android than the others, so he’d bias to iPhone and Android, if he had to make a choice of only two platforms to develop on. This is also what I’m hearing from many other developers.
So if developers are looking elsewhere, the browser isn’t a game winner, is the Storm relegated to just an option for BB owners? Essentially RIM has spent a lot of money on R&D to simply fracture their customers.
Not a good scenario all the way around.
Read [careerbeacon] via [Engadget ]
Related
Bing Mobile is better than Google Mobile?
Mobile search isn’t anything new, Google’s had m.google.com for years now and it works well on mobile devices that need info fast without all the glamor of the standard Google site (sarcasm). Bing has been rising in the charts but needs to find a way to continue to grow; its answer: mobile Bing.
I have to keep reminding myself this is a Microsoft product because the Bing team keeps offering something new for users. For example, in making Bing mobile, they added some mobile-specific features that will perk your interest. The first is flight info, simply go to Bing and enter in your flight number and you’ll be given gate info, departure and arrival info. That is super handy for mobile users that actually are mobile as they dash across the airport.
Another new feature is what Bing calls the NFL Feature. Simply enter the name of your team or player and you’ll receive info on schedule, standings, and while the game is on you’ll get real-time stats. Super handy for data freaks and fantasy leaguers.
Bing has added a special version for mobile touchscreen devices such as iPhone, Zune HD, T-Mobile G1, Verizon Imagio, or Samsung Omnia. Not a big list but the Bing team will be adding support for more devices in the near future.
I used the touchscreen version of Bing mobile to search for movies and compared to the same search on Google, the Bing Mobile search was much better looking, more complete and offered trailers without any extra work from me. It is worth checking out and with clear, concise data you may find you don’t need a full featured browser on your mobile device. Bing Mobile might even look good on a Windows Mobile device. Yikes.
You can find Bing Mobile at m.bing.com
Read: [Bing Blog]
RelatedWho’s on Crack in Tech: 10.30.09
This week stands out for me and my mobile phone addiction. Big announcements in the tech world get us all excited until we stop to ask some questions. Then we get kind of pissed off and start turning on the hype. Behold the gems I turned up this week: Sears says deals won’t wait for Black Friday, Microsoft has trust issues, Barnes and Noble doesn’t want to start fist fights and HTC brags about being smart.
Is Google trying to kill us by screen-only navigation?
With all the hype around Google’s big announcement yesterday that they would be providing Android devices with free turn-by-turn directions, you’d think stand alone GPS companies should call it a day and pack up the office. But we are missing something: nowhere does Google say anything about spoken turn-by-turn directions.
Turn left in 1.3 miles
One of the best features in a GPS navigation system, in my book at least, is audible instructions so I don’t have to take my eyes off the road. TeleNav, which I use, even speaks the road names I should be turning on to. How can a GPS navigation system be viable without spoken instructions? Isn’t this traffic safety week or something?
Rerouting?
I’ve been thinking since the announcement that I must have overlooked it. I twittered my question to bloggers and got no responses. I combed Google’s Navigation site and watched videos. The closest I came to any kind of confirmation was a mute button. Not very convincing, right?
There is nothing better than connected GPS (IMO) and Google brings this. I really dig the street view, another great thing Google brings. But without spoken navigation instructions, what’s the point? It will be just a step above the Google Maps route info on the iPhone. At best, we can hope to get pulled over by all these no texting laws for this, at worst we take our eyes off the road and miss who knows what. Surely Google isn’t trying to kill us, right?
I’ll continue searching. If you find something on this, post it in the comments. We’ll get to the bottom of this, hopefully before the phone launches.
Read: [Google Navigation]
Related
How to tell Verizon’s Droids apart: a practical guide
Word is that Verizon will launch not one Droid phone in early November, but two. You know one, the Motorola Droid, the other looks to be the HTC Eris and is quite unlike the Motorola’s version. The two will run Android but that is about all that keeps them similar.
OS
The Motorola phone features the hot-off-the-presses Android 2.0 and offers unfettered access to the Android operating system. HTC, on the other hand, features Android 1.5 with the sense UI from HTC. The sense UI acts as a skin to provide users a different feel than just Android. The experience is intended to be simpler for common tasks; HTC is regarded as top dog in the skins world. It is unclear if HTC will upgrade its sense UI to 2.0 and if so, will the HTC Eris be supported for this upgrade.
Form factor
The Motorola Droid features a slide out QWERTY keypad that is getting mixed reviews. The trade off for being oh-so-slim is very short key action and the result seems to be a less than stellar typing experience. As with anything, the more you use it, but better it feels.
The HTC Eris is a true touchscreen phone. The soft keyboard has more in common with the iPhone than Motorola’s version. This makes choosing a Droid phone very easy: how do you like your keyboards: hard or soft?
Processors
This is an oft debated aspect, but for what it worth the Motorola has a 585MHz processor while the Eris has a 528MHz
Price
Yesterday, Verizon and Motorola announced their phone would be $199 after appropriate contracts, rebates, spiffs, and insults were done. The HTC Eris in contrast is rumored to be the working-man’s phone at just $99.
Marketing
So far, Verizon’s only talked freely about the Motorola version. Pricing the HTC touchscreen version at the iPhone price seems to suggest the Motorola version is more of an upgrade in buyers’ eyes. Verizon knows phone folks are going to gravitate to the up-speced version, the Motorola Droid. Word is the $99 Eris will be just fine for most folks looking to get some of that soft keyboard touchscreen love.
Read: [BoyGeniusReports] and [Phandroid]
RelatedWhat’s a ZAGG box and what did $35 million in R&D get them?
ZAGG is perhaps best known for their gadget skin protection that used to be on edges of helicopter blades. Today, the company through us a bit of curve ball: they started talking about a product the company will unveil at CES in January, the ZAGG box. As catchy as that name is, we still ask, “what’s a ZAGG box?”
Described by the company as “major technology”, the ZAGG box is the culmination of 6 years and $35 million. At this point, it seems tough to classify exactly what this thing does: it is a media aggregator, will record, store and stream your media in multiple formats so you can watch on TV or on your iPhone (or other mobile device), and don’t forget home automation: it can hook into your HVAC, lighting or even door locks and control them. Good luck figuring out what aisle to put this thing in at Best Buy.
“We are introducing a game-changing technology with the ZAGGbox which will appeal to everyone from geeks to grandmas,” said Brian Packer, VP of Marketing of ZAGG. “It is a very powerful system, and very simple to use.”
The ZAGG dream machine is said to cost “under $999” and should be formally launched in January 2010 shipping late Q1. The unit was announced a finalist in the I-Stage event put on by the CEA, (Producers of Consumer Electronics Show -CES).
Press release [ZAGG]
Related3 surprises with Verizon’s new Droid
Verizon, today, made Droid official. They’ve been teasing us with the “Droid does” and “idon’t” ads that poked good fun at the iPhone. Now that it’s here, priced, and dated, we’ve got three surprises they’ve been holding back on. Each one is a potential game changer.
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Palm Pre Information & Updates
Palm just introduced their next-gen smartphone, the Palm Pre, and next-gen operating system, Palm webOS. Gadgetell's got the latest Pre and webOS information and news for you right here.
