Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

Welcome to this week’s Who’s on Crack.  This week we look at some of the stuff they tried to pull over our eyes yet again and who is headed for a month program “upstate.”  Here we go:

Nokia to buy Palm?

One analyst thinks so.  I think Nokia is doing just fine in the U.S., growing by leaps and bounds this year.  Do they have an OS that can compete against the $99 iPhone?  Could webOS bring them enough to make a purchase worthwhile?  I dont’ know, even for me a guy who loves conspiracy theories, I just don’t see it. 

Palm’s got a lot of potential and a lot of it rests on the SDK and multiple carrier roll-out.  Could a webOS Centro save them?  A $99 webOS phone on Verizon and AT&T would kick this party into high gear.  It is the phone equivalent of Bacardi 151.  Probably just as flammable too.

Nokia is the big dog in most of the world.  I have a hard time believing they’ve the ego to say,  “We need help in the US market” or “Palm is smarter than our team of smarty-pantsers.” 

Verdict: beady eyes looking for the next fix.

Android splinters

HTC showed off the Hero in NYC this week and our man-about-town Iyaz got to play with it some.  Iyaz gushed over it:

There is a nice degree of customization on the HTC Hero.  The device was very responsive and it looks like HTC has a winner with this one. 

Only, something interesting popped up.  The stuff HTC is using may not be able to be used on devices that say “Google” on them for licensing reasons.  Lame right?  We think so too. Gizmodo’s got the the rumor and it looks to make some sense based on past quotes.  I am sure they can work this out.  Leave it to HTC to make Android look good.  Let’s hope this works out.

Flash: everywhere but the iPhone?

Gadgetell’s own Shawn Ingram says: Starting in October, Flash Player 10 for smartphones will be released to developers by Adobe thanks to its “Open Screen” project.  It will be available for Android, webOS, Windows Mobile, and Symbian S60.  Major chip manufacturers like Intel, Qualcomm, ARM and the like will be optimizing builds for their chipsets.  The iPhone and BlackBerry lines are the two glaring omissions there.

Really, Adobe?  Can this rift be avoided?  Can anyone imaging overhearing this at the AT&T store, “Yeah, but does it play Flash?”  No you can’t.  Most devices have some workaround for YouTube and maybe that is enough.  Maybe Flash will get dropped in favor of changes in HTML.  Maybe monkeys will perform the videos.  I don’t see Flash mattering too much for too much longer.  How about you?  Adobe’s trying to hang on here, but I am not sure if anyone cares.

I’ll let Shawn end this one: “...most uses for Flash seem like things that we’d want to get rid of on the web anyway, like those silly interactive ads.”  Well done.

Sony Snooz-Ray Laptops

Sony believes the problem with Blue-ray adoption is cost.  To remedy that, they are introducing a new line of budget notebooks.  Woohoo!  Or not.  Seems Sony believes you want Blue-ray but not in its max resolution.  Huh?

Our Merlyn Akhtar says,  “the notebook’s native display is only 720p, which is not the full resolution for Blu-ray, so you’re not even getting a true Blu-ray experience on the go. “

I don’t get it.  I figure that is mostly because I have zero interest in a Blu-ray player in the first place.  I am much, much more excited by different ways I can access content.  I love the idea of Netflix’s instant queue via my TiVo HD.  I even love the quality (I can live with it).  I will focus my dollars on that wave rather than old school discs my kids are 100% guaranteed to scratch.  So, I figure it is my disinterest that makes this yet another bonehead Sony move larger than it really is.

I am sure our Adam Berger will disagree, as he is a big Sony fan.  To me this is another misstep like the Mylo, Walkman brand and the Vaio P.  Neat ideas, wrong execution.  The last Sony move I loved was having Tom Hanks speak at CES, what a hoot!