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* Posts by Richard Kilpatrick

111 publicly visible posts • joined 11 May 2007

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FlipStart halves handheld PC price

Richard Kilpatrick

Re: Jason

Have you used a FlipStart? Have you actually read any in-depth reviews of the system?

It has a lot to offer over an Eee, for a start - it's got 1024 x 600 display, 30GB storage, Bluetooth, a decent CPU, wired ethernet via the port expander (which also provides 2 USB ports), seemingly an easy way to add internal HSDPA (haven't verified this), it's actually considerably smaller.

As for comparing it to the MacBook Air, I swear that is pure search engine hit seeking - what possible relationship is there between an as yet unavailable (give it a month), 13", $1799 Apple laptop and a 5.6", $699 handheld that has been out for a year? They aren't even remotely comparable.

I've used an Eee. It's okay. I think it's inefficient use of screen space, cramped yet unspaced keyboard, and woeful lack of storage makes it little more than a toy or a half-decent electronic Filofax. I still want one because it's so cheap, but the FlipStart does real work - I've used it for Lighroom previews, it runs InDesign CS3 FFS! Slowly, but it runs well enough that I could, if need be, prepare an article on the road and send a PDF. Hooked into an external display and with a bluetooth mouse and keyboard for longer periods of work, it's perfectly functional - whereas the Eee wouldn't stand a chance of handling these tasks even with a larger HD attached.

It's worth a trip to the US to grab one, IMO - unless some miracle happens and the UK pricing follows suit.

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Richard Kilpatrick

Just crossed my mind...

In the great wide world of the internets, only a few tech bloggers in the USA seem to have anything to say about the FlipStart besides me.

Am I the only person who has actually used one of these things for any length of time?! Surely there must be another Register reader with FlipStart experience/with a FlipStart...

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Richard Kilpatrick

Re: B

It depends on what you would like from it. The Eee feels more... I don't know - chuckable? Like a book compared to a brick, if that makes sense. The FlipStart is far from fragile, it's a very strong little device indeed, but it's not something you'd toss onto a couch.

The 220dpi screen is very sharp, very precise, and delivers enough pixel real estate for most webpages and dialog boxes. It also has a very intuitive zoom function - mouse over a window, hit zoom - the window is expanded, and you can scroll or change zoom amount using the jog wheel.

The InfoPane only works with Office 2003 and is a little limited but does do what it claims to - standby the machine with the right settings and available connectivity, and it will wake, check email, sync the infopane, then sleep again - allowing you to read the emails on the smaller external display.

Some people might focus on the solid/thick construction. It's ironic that the Series 5 is held as an example here - the FlipStart has Psion DNA, visible to the end user as certain fonts and approaches in design and the spaced-out thumboard. Particularly familiar is the 'cupped hands, type with thumbs' feel of it - very similar (although with a lot more bulk) to the Series 3.

Performance is adequate; faster (by some margin) than the OQO Model 2 that I tested, much faster than the Ubiquio 711 (but it's a different class of device to that lump). The HD is 5mm 1.8" CE-ATA from memory; an iPod 80GB model from Toshiba may fit to upgrade it if they release them for sale to end users/builders. RAM is not upgradable; under XP I found this not an issue. It even handled playing Warcraft on it, though I used it mostly for LightRoom (at which it was quite useful, though slow on larger files due to the RAM limitations).

It does fit my jeans pocket with the slimline (optional and short-lived) battery. It is much smaller than an Eee! I had a picture of it beside my XPS M2010, which demonstrated two extremes of Windows laptops nicely...

For £350 it's a bargain, though I don't expect Blazepoint to be updating their pricing in any big rush.

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Richard Kilpatrick
Black Helicopters

Bargain!

Oh, if ONLY The Register had been given some sort of independent freelance review of this device so the readers knew what it was about! It's a device which has been notable by its absence around these parts.

It's a bargain at that. £350? I'll take two, please.

This doesn't bode well, however... I hope we're not seeing the end of FlipStart.

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Richard Kilpatrick

Pricing

Oh, and it was $1999 when launched in March 2007. The $1499 price drop came in September 2007, with a corresponding drop in the UK to £999 from £1437 (UK Prices excluding VAT, inevitably).

Readers may wish to grab a cheap one and get googling - there's a SIM slot in the lid, a Mini-PCI-E slot inside the screen half, and antenna connections. Internal HSDPA, and easier than an OQO, should be feasible.

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T-Mobile bundles Wi-Fi with Web 'n Walk

Richard Kilpatrick

Max = VoIP

As far as I'm aware, W'n'W Max does allow VoIP - it's one of the few truly unrestricted mobile data plans available. I'd assume this would extend to the WiFi service too, if they can differentiate between users.

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Samsung enhances Q1 Ultra UMPC performance

Richard Kilpatrick

Meh

Still not as useful as the FlipStart's layout.

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Intel walks out of OLPC project

Richard Kilpatrick

Sweatshops

I wish people would stop referring to SE Asian manufacturing plants as "sweatshops". They aren't sweatshops. Do some research. I love the way the "western world" wants to "level the playing field" now we're developed to a certain level.

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Thom Yorke dismisses net-only album paradigm

Richard Kilpatrick

I bought the special edition thingy...

I bought the online album, for £3.52. I liked it, though I thought it was a bit "meandering" as Radiohead's style seems to have become. I thought about it, and decided the double LP box was worth the money, as a "collectable" version of the music.

I don't think it's going to be worth anything in the future, but I like having LPs. Try burning your own vinyl :D

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The Electric Car Conspiracy ... that never was

Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Up

Lowbrow

A well-written article, I thought. However, my take on it is simple:

In 2003, I owned alongside a couple of others, a 1990 Golf GTi 8v 5 door. A practical, compact, reasonably quick car with no catalytic convertor, no airbags (but still considered a safe car by 1984 standards, when it was released). It returned a consistent 44mpg, returning 52mpg on one 20 mile run where I drove to get the best returns. I ran it on Shell Optimax, since the knock-sensor equipped GTi was designed in an era of choice between leaded and unleaded and would happily use the higher octane fuel.

In 2004, I got a VW Beetle Cabriolet. A 1.6i model, it did 30mpg. I considered this dreadful for the size of car.

However, look at the new car costs as well as weight. The 1990 Golf GTi Cabriolet, a 1.8, fuel injected compact convertible cost £13,995. The 2004 Beetle equivalent cost £15,495, despite inflation, increases in earnings, housing costs, the supposed "environmental concerns" of car ownership, and much, much more material used and equipment provided.

How can the car manufacturers possibly hope to innovate? They are charging a relative pittance for their products. The 1990s saw a mini-Malaise era for Europe, with astoundingly directionless designs (the original Renault Laguna, the 1988 Passat, Saab's 900/9-3) and some truly awful cars. Cars like the Honda Jazz and Mercedes A-Class, offering real innovation in the marketplace, are naturally quite expensive.

However, for 2003 driving conditions, my little Golf was perfect. The reasons to not keep on driving it were largely based around it being a 14 year old CAR, not a 19 year old DESIGN. If I could have bought a brand new one, I would have done (not counting the CIti Golf).

To save the planet from car users, we need to:

Make new cars considerably more expensive, either via taxation or natural market forces (pay the workers what they need, accept that shipping cars for a US market from a US marque from Korea should not be required when that US marque is laying off workers in US plants - the same theory as "food movement" applies; environmentally it is better to make products for local consumption locally and cut out that stage of travel and energy consumption).

Change working habits. Work from home or provide smaller, local offices.

Provide viable alternatives. I know the US is even worse than the UK for public transport; Europe and Eastern Europe often show genuinely workable alternatives.

And finally:

Accept that cars are dangerous. Stop making the body in white twice as heavy to try and save the occupants if they screw up. Train drivers correctly, accept that sometimes car driving will cause death, and make the cars smaller, more efficient and space-efficient.

These aren't magical fixes, but I think that making new cars more expensive would have a knock-on effect of increasing used-car values, and making maintaining used cars viable. For many US/Canadian readers, for whom the social norm would be to find cars up to 7 years old utterly respectable, and in the latter case may indeed have financed their new car over that period, the attitude of British car owners would probably be horrifying.

Oh, and if you can, drive a Japanese import. IMO, the decision to drive a perfectly good (often far, far better than a UK example of the same sort of car at the same age) car which is deemed almost worthless in Japan is very environmentally friendly, despite the shipping to the UK. It means that the car will almost certainly last another 5-10 years if correctly maintained, rather than perhaps being scrapped in a year or two in Japan.

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Kid's 'new' MP3 player was preloaded with smut

Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Down

ASDA/Walmart...

Heh. Oddly enough, we bought the last of a certain DVD player in the local Asda, and it seemed poorly packed when opened, despite being sold as new. And contained a DVD.

Not of smut, though. I feel shortchanged.

(It was a presentation for a contracting firm).

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Now RIAA says copying your own CDs is illegal

Richard Kilpatrick
Jobs Horns

WTF!

Er, wouldn't this make using iPods and similar devices completely impossible from a legal standpoint? The very act of ripping music to transfer to the media player creates a copy on the local computer!

I don't listen to CDs except in the car. I buy them, rip them, and use the iPod or computer. The CDs are stored in their cases and my files aren't shared... surely they cannot claim that this previously accepted/expected use is now illegal...

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How to be a failure at Guitar Hero III

Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Up

And a follow-up!

Rather than wittering on about Chinese guitars and antique MIDI tech...

I would like to THANK the reviewer. Because of this, I looked with renewed interest (and after a happy evening of playing Singstar with friends - who are in REAL bands) at the Guitar Hero III PS3 box in Asda. And bought it.

And it's bloody brilliant. Great fun. The controller is alright for what one can assume is another £20-30 on top of a fun PS3 game, and it's a logical, easy control system. Some of the co-ordination is very good (though 30 minutes of play leaves me still mucking about in easy mode) and it's frustrating to "strum" at the wrong points. But it's a fantastic game, I'm really enjoying it and can't wait for people to pop over so I can share it!

Downside is that I'm getting occasional lockups; the PS3 has just updated to 2.10 so I wonder if that's the culprit. And of course, YET MORE THINGS to plug into the USB ports (EyeToy, adaptor for the guitar, SingStar).

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Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Down

Slave Labour

What a pathetic little dig at China. Would sir prefer a nice Jackson or Kramer? - ASSEMBLED in America during their heyday, but from wood sourced in developing countries and shaped and produced in Japan and Korea.

China rarely employs slave labour. China almost never employs slave labour in association with western companies, and Chinese woodworkers can be as good or better than any "western" craftsmen or manufacturers.

Epiphone's guitars are crap and built to a price; pay more and you get a better model, but personally I can't stand the size of the neck on Gibsons or Epiphones. I have a Chinese-made Lamaq, which is rather good (the designer is a reasonably well-known luthier and player, and designed but did not manufacture the guitar).

Differing local economy does NOT equal slave labour. If you look at the figures for iPod "slave labour" the workers are paid "relatively" on a similar level to people doing the same work in Western economies.

Adnim: The GR 707 is perfectly playable, and if you kicked it into electric mode there's no delay. Whilst you may have found it impossible, you'll find people like Andy Summers had no problems! It was, after all, a real guitar and very well designed. Many, many skilled guitarists have mucked about with mine (now sold) and been utterly impressed with the instrument as an electric guitar, if not the synth system. Also, the GR 707/GR700 wasn't available in 1983 so if you saw one then it was almost certainly not a "finished product".

For unplayable "guitar controllers" the horrible, plastic DG-20 and DG-10 (MIDIless) Casio, which used plastic strings and sensors on the fretboard, demonstrated a genuine attempt to much with the guitar paradigm. And also would be far more suited to an educational, updated Guitar-Hero type package, with tab appearing at the bottom of the screen and sounds depending on correct string/finger placement and timing.

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Man uses mobe as modem, rings up £27k phone bill

Richard Kilpatrick
Unhappy

T-Mobile

As mentioned above, T-Mobile seem to be the best guys here:

£7.50/month 1GB Fair Use - three slaps on the wrist effectively, then they ask you to upgrade or restrict your service. Then £12.50 or so for 3GB, then £22 for 10GB.

They don't seem to restrict usage particularly, but 1GB is no use as modem or VoIP (modem use is hard for them to pin down really), 3GB is no VoIP, and 10GB even allows VoIP.

O2 are the total bastards, with their "Unlimited" package being 200MB (now, after much yelling by customers), but exceed that and it's £1.80 per MB, no warning, and all apart from web traffic is disallowed. I cancelled my O2 contract purely because of their awful data rates and service, turning down a free E90 and cashback in the process.

The ASA should be preventing the marketing of capped (i.e. no warnings, but instant charging) services as "Unlimited".

Points re: modem use - covered. Christ, what the hell IS mobile data for if not for modem use? If we just wanted mobile web pages and WAP, we'd still be on GPRS.

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Wii buyers follow French Connection for consoles

Richard Kilpatrick
Paris Hilton

It's the same with the DS

I don't understand why people are so astoundingly stupid. Whilst the lure of new technology for Christmas must be strong, surely the misguided, (and frankly) idiotic parents forking out more than twice the retail price for these devices would be better off telling their kids that "they'll get the Wii when they're back in stock - with a huge selection of games, too", It's not as if Nintendo have stopped making these devices.

Can't really blame the sellers for making an additional profit, but anyone paying more than retail for a mass producing and still current device really needs to have their priorities, finances and head examined - I'm sure that the same people paying £352 for a Wii are the ones that complain about "Rip Off Britain", the dollar-pound exchange rate, and the high cost of fuel (probably whilst driving their kids 1 1/2 miles to school every day in a modern, heavy, cat-equipped car (random footnote - the catalytic converter is useless when the car is cold, and in fact the cars so equipped create significantly more emissions for the first few miles than non-cat, lean-burn injection engines)).

I'm surely tempted to box up and sell my own Wii. I'll probably get > new price for it over a period when I'm too busy to play Wii games anyway, then buy a new one with a new warranty in the New Year for the rrp.

Sony must be gutted. I see the PSP and PS3 are in ample supply everywhere...

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Transformers director blames MS for HD DVD/Blu-ray format war

Richard Kilpatrick
Unhappy

Meh

If he's going to make a fuss, he could at least make a fuss that results in the movie being on Blu-ray. Whilst it isn't exactly a significant issue in life, I have attempted to get any movies I fancied seeing and missed in the cinema on the best format I can play. You can get the old movie on Blu-ray.

Elite's built in HD (technically it's a bundled accessory anyone can buy for any X360 anyway), and the speed of Xbox marketplace download, really would put me off trying to "rent" HD content via that route. Elite should have come with built in HD-DVD at a higher cost (but lower than PS3 or X360+external drive). Even then, I don't want to watch movies via X360. I quite like to be able to hear them without having to try and drown out the playback device.

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Poll confirms Brits believe Jesus Phone salvation too costly

Richard Kilpatrick

@Fiona

Not only is your (ab)use of English going to come under scrutiny...

"My problem is that with the iphone the UK is an afterthought. Not only does every big manufacturer rip us off by just sticking a £ sign in to replace the $ sign (at a current exchange rate of roughly $2 to £1), but Apple either didn't bother to research the UK market or just decided not to care."

Um.

The iPhone in the US costs $399. It costs £269 here. Now, some quick calculations indicate that the iPhone should be £200 + tax. So £235. Excluding any additional costs of shipping, UK operating costs... it's hardly a striking markup.

Also, much as I hate to admit it, O2's contracts are not the worst value out of the iPhone contracts. We're only tied into 18 month, instead of 2 year deals, and Germans pay more for less.

This isn't to say the contracts are great value. They aren't in comparison to other deals. But the UK market has been researched and handled surprisingly well IMO - I personally feel it could have been handled better if Apple just wanted to shift iPhones, but they don't. iPhone is a gateway into Apple's media distribution system. This is a long-term GAME (you just lost it, btw) and it has to be said that they show every sign of pulling it off.

Also: MS Exchange sync? On a consumer market phone? I have no need for such novelties. Even so, it can be faked using iMapIdle, and from experience it is buggy as hell on most devices even when they do support it. Part of the wonder of working out of the office is NOT having to deal with an email the instant it arrives ;)

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Richard Kilpatrick
Paris Hilton

Some comparisons.

I've used Ameo and iPhone (and loads of others, to be fair, I also regularly use a Nokia N73, HTC Universal and a Motorola International 3300 - the second revision of the first GSM handset, if memory serves, and certainly a very early GSM phone!).

As a direct comparison:

Data services - 3G, use as a modem (backed up by T-Mobile contract) - flexible email client with ability to accept attachments. Advantage (har har) HTC. 1/0.

User interface - stylus and VGA screen vs. touch and odd size. UI is subjective but as a user with experience of everything from BeBox to OS X and Windows - iPhone wins clearly. 1/1

Phone function. As part of this, I feel considering the physical handset size is important. iPhone has a clear advantage here, with one serious flaw. The iPhone, unlike the Ameo, can be used as a handset, fits a pocket, etc. The Ameo needs a headset (I use the LG Style-i), but offers voice control (either via Cyberon Voice Command which requires tags, or the vastly superior MS Voice Command 1.6 which can handle commands like "Dial [number]", or "What missed calls do I have" [says name] "Call back". Point each, IMO. 2/2

PDA fuctions. Clear advantage to the Ameo due to the flexibility of the software and ability of WM to have third party apps without hacking. Mac users will love having the iPhone, but for Windows users... 3/2

GPS. iPhone has none, but you know what? The Ameo takes 10 minutes plus to get a fix. I get so sick of trying to use it, that I just use a TomTom anyway. No score.

Keyboard. Ameo keyboard is hardware, but fiddly. iPhone keyboard is touch screen and excellent for most users, and it does learn. The screen keyboard on the Ameo cannot be used with fingers. 3/3.

Music player. Windows Media is slow, inefficient, speakers are quite good for the handset. Voice command works with it in a fairly decent way. Bluetooth headphones work on the Ameo. However, iTunes and the iPhone work brilliantly, the music player is fast, and iPhone supports all the iPod accessories like direct car connection. If music is important, then advantage iPhone. They both offer 8GB storage, Ameo can be expanded with MiniSD, iPhone Flash is very quick. 3/4

Messaging. iPhone doesn't support MMS. 4/4. iPhone's messaging UI is better, but officially it's sold on contracts which are such poor value, you won't want to use the SMS feature.

Camera - both rubbish. Ameo is unreliable, slow and produces orange results half the time. iPhone is just blurry and lacks flash. Slight advantage to iPhone in that it syncs images with iPhoto.

Value: Ameo costs £600ish off contract, £229 on a contract which costs £42.50 a month to supply unlimited data, with plenty of minutes and SMS. Can be cheaper with more expensive contracts. Hard to call, but I'd say that it certainly provides some balance to the iPhone costs - that the iPhone IS a premium product, but is much better as a phone if actually making calls is important. As a device the Ameo is clearly better value as a geektoy.

Conclusion: Mac users should have the iPhone, as it really does integrate well with the system. But Jailbreak it, or wait until the software SDKthird party app support is official. Geeks should get the Ameo, as it has massive potential. The primary difference being that the iPhone has a lot of undelivered potential - the UI would be fantastic at handling the sort of features devices like the Ameo try to deliver, and end up flawed.

Everyone else should probably get something else. I hear those N95s are quite popular and very cheap (and FWIW, some Nokias are perfectly happy with iSync and work okay with Macs, just not quite as smoothly as the iPhone).

Paris would use the iPhone. The Ameo would probably annoy her too much with the requirement to think.

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Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Up

I'm sure I'm not the only one...

When they showed the UK model, I thought "That's not going to work. Make it £399 and sell it unlocked as an iPod with phone features". If you work out the "subsidy" Apple are getting from the networks, they realise (including taxes and so forth - as in "what the entire chain gets from the buyer" rather than what Apple gets) approximately £360 per unit assuming the 30% of revenue applies to the lowest tariff and isn't worked out after paying The Cloud.

People would be happy to pay that, and networks and resellers would be happy to subsidise the handset as an incentive for customers. I've seen retailers offering Wiis, iPods, PS3s/Xbox 360s as incentives - there's no reason the iPhone wouldn't have been a complete success this way.

And I don't think anyone would complain (well, some would of course) if the iPhone were sold purely unlocked for £359 for example. Jailbroken especially, it's a very good PDA and the first that really works well with a Mac for decades. There aren't many PDA/phones competing in that price bracket, certainly none as easy to use or with that sort of storage capacity.

I'm fairly sure I've figured out why Apple are doing what they are with the networks, but I don't necessarily think that it's the right approach for the UK where our network providers are quite advanced in many ways. In the US, for the model of iTunes content delivery to work, they needed to whip a carrier into shape (and I still think the lack of 3G is as much to do with the Qualcomm injunction as it is battery life) - in the UK you can pretty much guarantee decent web-based access from any carrier. They clamoured for the iPhone exclusive - I dare say they would all have been prepared to up their data packages and support visual voicemail even without the exclusive just to attract the inevitable new users with iPhones.

I do have a jailbroken, activated iPhone. It was bought purely to see what the fuss was about and because it's a shiny new toy and I think, an industry-changing new user interface. However, I would have bought one to use in an instant if I could have simply wandered into an Apple store, bought it, popped my Vodafone or T-Mobile SIM in and used it right away. Whilst on paper it isn't up to the HTC Advantage-based Ameo, in real world use, I would choose the iPhone every time.

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T-Mobile iPhones unlocked post-purchase by iTunes

Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Up

Research, people

Ah, yet more comments based on speculation.

Facts from German and English-language forums, and of course, usage of the iPhone myself.

First: You need to activate it ONCE. This is in iTunes. If, like me, you choose to jailbreak it, the only reason to use iTunes is to sync or update the firmware; I cannot verify how updated firmware behaves regarding activation, but I have removed and replaced the O2 PayG SIM in mine with no issues, and the only difference is a patched lockdownd.

Second: The unlocked phones can have SIMs changed freely according to reports from users.

iPhone is not terrible value - you do, after all, need to pay for your calls and data use somehow. It simply isn't the best deal available and that is irritating, because it is an excellent device - very easy to use, very powerful and responsive for something so simplified. Compared to a WM6 phone it is exceptionally quick to use, even if it drops some features.

Anyone paying 999 Euro for it is an idiot. Pure and simple. However, in Germany the sales model differs yet again; so I'll do a quick outline:

USA - AT&T, phone is bought in AT&T or Apple stores without a contract. 2 year contracts, start price for contract is $59/month, handset cost $399 - 450 minutes, 200 texts, unlimited data.

UK - O2, phone is bought in O2, Carphone Warehouse or Apple stores. CPW make you sign a 'contract' which is utterly meaningless. 18 month contracts. Handset costs £269, £35/month 200 min/200 text, unlimited data, free WiFi access with The Cloud.

Germany - T-Mobile, phone is bought through T-Mobile with contract handled in store (as far as I can tell without going through the process myself). 2 year contract, entry level is 49 Euro/month, 100 minutes, 40 texts. Data may be subject to fair-use limits. Free WiFi access with T-Mobile.

Germans cannot easily buy a local-market phone and take it home, jailbreak and "hacktivate" it. They also get scalped horribly on the handset cost and the contract.

Apple's iPhone agenda ends with them marketing an Apple-branded network based on capacity and services purchased from existing carriers, billed and paid via iTunes, and significantly cheaper than existing deals. I'd put money on it, if I had any left after buying an iPhone...

Already this exclusivity

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Richard Kilpatrick

News?

Whilst the iTunes activation angle is valuable information, it's hardly new information - the iPhone's chipset is well known and the unlock procedure differs only in that iTunes can deliver the code directly to the handset, rather than the database (key generation from IMEI?) being checked then a code provided to the operator or user.

Will sufficient people be able to monitor what iTunes actually does during this process and replicate it somehow?

I don't believe the 600 Euro represents any realistic charge and is only a placeholder whilst the legal process meanders along; as such anyone taking that option must be completely mad.

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Telling lies to a computer is still lying, rules High Court

Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Down

Healthy discounts...

£3271 and some pennies per car. Given that the only Renaults worth buying are the very cheapest ones, does this mean people were getting Clios for £3K?

Still too expensive IMO.

(Of course, this could be £3,000 per car off the Avantime, and would account for all of the examples sold in the UK. Someone had to buy them[1])

[1] I wanted one, but they stopped making them before I was due to change cars.

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T-Mobile unlocks iPhone, charges €999

Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Up

Re: How Much?

Thankyou! The endless "it costs the cost of the contract too" statements are bloody irritating.

However, I unlocked mine - it is on PayG O2 due to the SIM lock still being unhacked, but it cost £269 and 1/2 hour messing. EDGE works, and scarily I get an E logo in the Borders, where I don't get a 3G T-Mobile signal.

It's a perfectly good handset, and "performs" is a variable measure - I'm finding battery life and user interface to be vastly better than my previous phones. It has many flaws, not least of which is the inability to act as a modem, but it seems to attract a lot more criticism from people that have not used it and have formed an Opinion...

Apple's marketing promises change. With computers, with music players, with phones. The whole idea is that This Is Better. And like it or not, Apple's OS is the best available to the consumer (some may find software lacking if they haven't looked, or complain about the hardware it needs - after all, price-comparison shopping with the sort of PCs consumers, rather than "enthusiasts" buy always shows Apple to be the expensive option, like iMac vs. XPS One for example). The iPod is the best MUSIC player - it may not be as good for video as an Archos, or double up as a goat-shaving device, but in terms of user-interface (again), capacity, speed of operation and audio quality, it manages the comprises of "quality" and "price" very well indeed.

So naturally we expect big things of iPhone too - but Apple isn't really interested in changing the world of the phone. It has 12 buttons. You speak into it and hear voices. What, really, can you do to change that. iPhone is about content delivery and bringing everything the consumer does into one place without the WIndows Mobile trick of basically being a tiny computer. And it works. The immediacy of the OS hides the fact that this is a computer - likewise the touch interface. For most WM devices (and I'm a fan of these), you need a stylus. You see start menus, and spinning "wait" things, and some things just don't work right. There's no consistency to the way things behave, and it runs out of memory.

There's also a lot of software that can perform badly or well, something Apple seeks to control on iPhone.

I personally think they have succeeded in their aims, even if I'd LIKE more out of the device. I think it will come, and I'll be confident that when they do add 3G and modem use, I will want - and be satisfied with - the iPhone. Oh, and more capacity. Although it would need to be 64GB to replace my iPod.

(As an iPod, I've noticed the flash based iPhone is faster than my HD-based one when connected to a compatible headunit. This is actually pretty handy, and it handles calls when being a media storage unit for my car quite well, pausing the music and still providing good call quality. This is the sort of thing that makes iPhone different).

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Richard Kilpatrick
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Whoops...

As I've said elsewhere, Apple's "greed" isn't a significant issue - based on features and build I'd certainly expect the iPhone to cost about £399/599 Euro, but not 999 Euro - this is T-Mobile not just demanding an "Apple" price for the iPhone, but compensation from their customers for being denied the business.

Apple's intend is, I am sure, to bring down the cost of contracts and ensure solid data connectivity so that they can resell network under their own brand (at lower cost) whilst ensuring an always-accessible, spontaneous purchase model for iTMS.

Apple really, really need to step in and tell T-Mobile to get lost at this stage, because this is going to do them serious harm from a PR/Marketing point of view. Apple do not get 999 Euro from the contract + phone.

Looking at the UK model and taking the heaviest subsidy model + cheapest tariff, which is how I expect it to work, even assuming Apple are paid 30% of the TOTAL revenue, rather than the actual revenue less costs for The Cloud and so forth - then Apple's income from each iPhone would be £269 + £189. And remember that you're paying VAT on that too.

Apple are being greedy to an extent in that I am sure that they COULD have sold the iPhone to customers for £269 or £299 or whatever outright. The revenue stream and lock-in to a specific network allows Apple to control what they are best at - overall customer experience. Selling the iPhone unlocked would be a disaster in many ways as everyone would have different levels of functionality - no Visual Voicemail, no EDGE... you get the idea.

Of course, ultimately we'd rather they just got all the networks to provide the facilities to support the handset, and decent data, and upgraded to 3G to avoid the EDGE issue.

Where do Apple go with this? Operators were asked to provide new infrastructure and compete to get the contract - Vodafone lost out. They'd never have received the support required had they just been going to sell unlocked iPhones and their model for iTMS purchases (and the YouTube facility, and Visual Voicemail) would have fallen down. They're caught between a rock and another, slightly harder rock. They have a contractual agreement with T-Mobile, and now a third-party is messing with that; getting OUT of that agreement will no doubt be extremely damaging too.

I cannot believe Apple were not prepared for this, however. EU is EU, and they've had the Orange/France stuff in hand. Either the unlocked device will cost a fortune in France and be a disaster, or people from Germany will just go to France to buy iPhones and T-Mobile will lose customers rapidly.

(And if you think O2 give us Brits a bad deal - especially when T-Mobile are so good here - you really need to look at the 2 Year contracts T-Mobile is offering in Germany. Those are terrifyingly poor value).

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Vodafone CEO sticks head in sand, goes 'La la la'

Richard Kilpatrick
Go

@Anon

Ameo = good value on T-Mobile, ignore the on-site prices and get one in store, there are discounts for Web 'n' Walk plans and taking the insurance (which if you have suitable home insurance, you then cancel right away). It's the sort of device which simultaneously makes a case for and against iPhone, being powerful, cheap on contract, and also quite inconvenient in many situations. My own choice of phone and one that made me get a new contract without complaining at all!

iPhone = had to. I only have the handset, no contract (it is on PayG O2 and Jailbroken, was very easy to implement but the data connection is crap - that's O2 all over, though), but that's enough for me to be able to write about it. My opinion of it has changed as I work with it - initially I thought it was totally pointless and very poor value, but the more I mess with it, the more I think that as a jailbroken device I'd probably be happier with it than the Ameo for most things. It fits in a pocket and doesn't need a headset for starters!

0 0
Richard Kilpatrick
Jobs Halo

A market shift?

Currently we still buy contracts and service from the operators of the networks - a bit like buying gas directly from Transco, except we have more choice than that. They do, however, have roaming facilities to extend coverage, and billing mechanisms so other "operators" like Carphone Warehouse, Tesco, Virgin et al can piggyback/offer alternative deals.

Vodafone and O2 will, eventually, have to compete on data as Three realised, and T-Mobile pretty much dominate. But what is interesting with the iPhone is Apple's relationship with the operators.

Apple gets a revenue share - reported on El Reg indeed as being around/up to 30%. Remember the rumours that Apple were going to set up their own network to support the iPhone infrastructure, since the iPhone is itself a vital tool for Apple's media presence. Instead of setting their own network, establish a relationship and stable infrastructure with a dominant network (notice that they have chosen O2, formerly BT Cellnet, for the UK - and T-Mobile, which I believe was Germany's "national" network for that territory. Choosing Orange for France basically covers the main ones whilst ignoring both Vodafone and Three - curiously operators that have expressed some interest in media distibution themselves) then eventually market the iPhone with a dedicated "Apple" tariff, perhaps tied in with the useful .Mac services (backup your iPhone to .Mac? Stolen phone, but don't lose your purchased content?).

iTMS works brilliantly on the iPhone. A few years ago, when iPod connectivity in cars was "a power cable and a tape adaptor", I wondered about the possibility of replacing the stand of overpriced, limited music and audiobooks in service stations with an "iTunes Terminal". Log in, plug in your iPod with a secondary sync mechanism (iPhone has this - it puts purchased music BACK on your Mac), buy. Apple could pay for the terminals to be present or offer value added services such as net browsing with revenue for the service area operator.

Anyway, that idea obviously wasn't well developed in my head, but Apple have leafrogged it. I've got my terminal RIGHT HERE. It's the same device that plugs into the car radio and is controlled by the touchscreen on my cheap Halfords head unit, and is also my in-car phone (okay, that's a lie, the lack of voice dial means I can take a call when driving, but my trusty Ameo with MS Voice Command does the call initiation).

YouTube? Free? It's the best way to trial distribution of video to the handset. How are people liking the quality and speed? Need more? How can we deliver? Maybe iPhone 2.0 will have 16GB, and 3G... and online TV-show purchases. It has video output - it is as functional as any iPod in that regard. Does the connection remain stable enough to deliver Apple's "quality" of product?

The networks might move faster. WM devices can do this stuff with the right applications, though I hesitate to suggest they will manage to do it as well - for all the power the Ameo offers, it's a buggy, unreliable thing where camera, video and general media behaviour is concerned.

Apple just works. I expect that will extend to Apple's remarketed telecommunications network in 2013 as much as it applies to everything else they do.

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Dell prices up all-on-one XPS desktop

Richard Kilpatrick
IT Angle

Two bits of bad news?

First - I've got this horrible suspicion that the existence of this system is why the exquisite XPS M2010 (yes, I do have one, and yes, it is wonderful - not in a "this is a great laptop" way, but in a "this is a great computer for pretty much everything I do" way) hasn't been updated to Santa Rosa architecture, but is still on sale with the older chipset.

Second - what was that about Apples being expensive? In the Real World, most computer consumers (i.e. not businesses with IT professionals wanting to fix/tinker, or nerds building their systems, or hardcore gamers) never crack open their PC. In fact, many are afraid to do so. The iMac is a very strong seller - perhaps if Dell have got this right (it LOOKS better than the All-in-one Vaios, but how thick is it? Does it bulge like they do?) then this willl be a credible and more comparable system to the iMac, though it does cost more.

The new shape iMacs are incredibly nice. I have the older one, and I'm very envious of the new aluminium case/glass screen design - I missed it by three months and needed a machine RIGHT NOW. The better chipset doesn't bother me so much, as I'll have that in my MacBook Pro.

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Tumbleweeds outnumber punters, as iPhone's First Night flops

Richard Kilpatrick
Go

And, it's sorta unlocked!

If you already have an O2 SIM or just want to pop a PayG one in, it's now possible to Jailbreak, upgrade to 1.1.2 (proper) firmware in iTunes, and "activate" (or rather, patch so the phone appears to be activated) so it will work on the network it is locked to - O2 for the UK. Unlike previous (i.e. 2 days ago), this patch process allows full sync/iTunes and is reboot-resilient.

Which brings me to another point about the iPhone, as everyone bleats about "it costs £900!" and what it doesn't have. I am no less irritated by Apple's official route of sales and operation, but when you DO use it, and look at how it behaves, it's a bargain for £269 - especially if you are a Mac user waiting for a workable PDA.

You would struggle to get a PDA with 128MB RAM, 400MHz CPU, 8GB storage, WiFi AND Bluetooth (albeit useless, feature-crippled Bluetooth) for £269. And it would be practically impossible to get it with exceptionally good build quality, the fantastic touch screen, pretty good audio quality (teenagers will love annoying people with the volume it puts out). Added to that, you get a phone built in too!

Industry supply people have estimated the build cost at a couple of hundred dollars in terms of component price. It should, with R&D, taxes and so forth - and profit - taken into accout, be a £399 product - at which stage it would be rather akin to the old HP HX4700 but nowhere near as clunky. And fully Mac compatible.

3G is important; I use it a lot. I think it's meaningless on the iPhone since the iPhone cannot act as a modem or create sufficient content to require that bandwidth to upload it. At least, not yet. The third party apps are Palm-esque in appearance, not the heavyweight Windows Mobile "Pocket Artist" class.

Call quality is good, too. It's actually quite a nice phone.

Essentially the complaints must stem from people who are merely sick of the hype and want to make noise, and people who actually really WANT the iPhone, but cannot justify (and it is very hard to do so) the costs of terminating a contract, taking a mediocre deal from O2, and can see that certain key points in the spec are missing (like 3G) without taking into account that the phone itself is not overpriced per se - it's just that the subsidy model is the wrong way around.

That N95 everyone loves actually costs £364 (street price, retail is higher) and you can add £60 to that to get the 8GB storage. For that you get a lower-resolution screen (smaller, too), arguably lower build quality (and certainly a less pleasant interface), but critically, you get the ability to choose your network and add third-party applications.

If Apple were to make the iPhone "open" and unlocked, you'd still need to buy a contract to get good value data and phone use, so to say the iPhone costs £900 is a bit incorrect unless you intended to use it without any phone functions yet signed up regardless - for which the iPod Touch is a great alternative (and can be hacked to have the better iPhone software with editable contacts and calendars, making it a PDA). What is frustrating is that a clearly excellent device is hamstrung, rather than Apple having produced a poor device in the first place.

If you're prepared to spend 15 minutes or so (plus 1/2 hour of digging around for files and utilities) then the iPhone is a bargain £269 Mac friendly PDA which also conveniently integrates a phone, admittedly still tied to O2 but perfectly able to use a PayG SIM and GPRS data (if you get the cheap O2 contract with the "Web" package, it will use EDGE if available; PayG data is more of a hassle).

And it runs OS X, with all the proper unixy bits underneath. What's not to like? Your phone not only has a shell, it has a keyboard that works well enough to use it!

(Strangely enough, it also works VERY well in the car connected to an iPod-friendly head unit - the smaller memory, or perhaps Flash memory, makes it a lot more responsive than my 80GB iPod on the same device, and if I have a bluetooth headset and don't want to initiate calls, I can leave it in the glovebox and forget it - when a call comes in it pauses the music with a typically Apple "soft" fade instead of a hard pause, and resumes when the call is ended. Again, good call quality, too. And video playback on the device is very good; I've got a couple of converted music videos in iTunes which stutter when played unconverted on my Ameo, yet the iPhone plays them back perfectly).

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Richard Kilpatrick
Thumb Down

Apple's "misunderstanding" of the iPod generation

I have one of these UK iPhones in my hands right now; it's a very pretty paperweight because I'm patiently waiting for the hackers to defeat the new revision of baseband firmware.

I've indulged in a "downgrade" to 1.1.1 firmware and applied the jailbreak, played with some of the "poor quality and best kept away from consumers" third-party applications (many of which are stunning and better than the paid-for rubbish I've seen on Windows Mobile devices). What I will not do until I am sure I have no choice, is activate it on O2.

I don't condemn O2's contracts as strongly as some; I view the integrated "The Cloud" WiFi access as having some value. However, I am fully aware that in March I signed up to T-Mobile and got a £700 (unlocked) handset for £120, on a £37.50/month contract that includes unlimited 3G data and 900 minutes or 1800 texts. O2's contract is poor value.

The crime here is not the poor value contract, but Apple's failure to grasp what has driven iPod sales. We KNOW that there will be a new iPhone and it will probably be out around March to June next year in the US at least. We know it will be better. We also know that if we sign up now, we're stuck with that contract for 18 months and Apple aren't going to let us activate our Mk II iPhone on the existing contract, because they (in some bizarre situation which I cannot quite believe has happened) want their revenue from the networks.

The reason the iPod has sold so many is partly driven by the desire for the latest model - Apple often add significant increases in feature set or capacity - and no reason not to just get the newest one as soon as it launches. They're rarely heavily discounted, they're familiar and they're good players. With every iPhone user locked into 18 months with the device, they're not going to consume as many - and as such they're not going to be convinced by such a limited feature set compared to flexible, cheaper Windows Mobile devices.

The iPhone should be sold unlocked in Europe for £399 if Apple want that extra profit so badly. Then let the networks and brokers argue about subsidising the handset price from their kickbacks - if you can buy a contract with a free PS3, or Xbox, because the reseller is using their "profit" to give you a rubbish handset and a gimmick incentive, then the iPhone would fly off the shelves, whilst other people pony up the £400 to have an excellent UI and reasonably attractive handset.

As it is the iPhone is an expensive, and not particularly good, distraction. It's priced as a smartphone, but without the ability to legitimately run third-party apps it's woefully lacking as such (and the developers have shown, with limited resources, that it can do so very very well). If you don't have a phone at all, then it's worth looking at if you wanted an iPod Touch. For anyone with an existing contract, the iPhone is nowhere near compelling enough to change providers, and neither is O2's contract.

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Microsoft opens Xbox 360 Arcade

Richard Kilpatrick

*Yawn*

Repeat after me and everyone else commenting no doubt:

US prices exclude sales taxes

US prices usually include a 90-day, not 1 year, warranty (how this applies to the 360 post "ring of death" I'm unsure of, as I thought they had a 3 year warranty for that issue alone).

Actual comparison?

£164.50.

So £35 more for possibly an implied warranty extension, and variations in local costs. And of course room for reseller discounts where applicable.

What I find more intriguing is the price <i>increase</i>. The Core was pitched directly against the Wii at £179 following recent price drops; the Arcade merely matches the Wii's inclusion of a Wireless controller and some memory for downloaded games/content (Wii has 512MB built in IIRC, still not enough for the vast range of titles available which cannot be played from SD card).

Now the Xbox is at the (presumably) £199 point and no longer competes directly. Seems like a needless stage in the reshuffle, I think think they need to align thus:

Good: 360 with 20GB HD and Wired controller - £179

Better: 360 with 120GB HD and Wireless controller - £279

Best: 360 with 120GB HD, HD-DVD internal driver, and Wireless controller - £329 (or £349 with bundled WiFi adaptor, hitting the PS3 square in the crossover HD-media player and console market position).

I think the HD is vital for pushing their Live! service and purchased downloadable content.

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ARM to bash 'non-issue' Intel with multi-core chip

Richard Kilpatrick

@Scruffy

The DSPs are cheap, are the multi-core ARM processors going to be as cheap? I see where you're coming from, but I don't see the benefits over the established hardware solutions to be perfectly honest. You get a single chip which has the ARM core, DSP, RAM - the whole lot - and costs very little whilst doing precisely what you want it to.

I can see it being useful in phones in a similar way, but I don't know enough about how the technology/loads are balanced - how much is software, how much is hardware, in a typical multimedia capable phone.

As for Centrino, I just see it as building a better hammer. Like I said before; brute force to produce what the customer wants - if the desktop OS isn't running quickly enough on a mobile device, make the mobile device faster. It's not the solution I'd prefer (I used to be an Archimedes user... still have about 20 of 'em) but it is the solution the market will lap up.

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Richard Kilpatrick

Operating System

It's a lovely concept. Taking on the UMPCs, which do - in fairness - suffer from hot and hungry CPUs (or just Not Very Good Ones) is a very worthwhile task as the market for these devices matures/converges with PDAs.

But what OS is going to power these? The UMPC's benefit to the consumer is easy, instant access to mature and well-developed (or at least, functional) applications on an OS that they are familiar with. Will the multi-core chip be supported by derivatives of Windows Mobile?

In which case, will we see manufacturers migrate from what is already becoming an expensive platform, where unsubsidised hardware like the HTC Advantage costs £650 for a 256MB ROM, 128MB RAM, 8GB HD device with a 5" screen and a 624MHz CPU that spends most of its time at 102MHz in a struggle to get an 8hr runtime. The same money will, whilst losing the telephony capability, get a 1.2GHz VIA C7-M powered Ubiquio 711 with 1GB RAM, 40GB HD, and Vista which will do about 3 hours of snappier, more versatile operation. Neither device really fits in a pocket for most users, after all.

Will we see Linux, perhaps? Devices that are slightly unfamiliar to the mass market, and at a fair guess will take two to three years to be developed and marketable (remember how long it took for UMPCs to be developed and ready for launch).

Symbian? Palm?

By the time this CPU is ready to hit mass market in a UMPC-style device, Intel's 45nm chipsets will be there, LED backlights will be cheaper, HD density will have improved, and who knows, maybe MS will have managed to drum up some enthusiasm for Vista. Where ARM's clever little chips will of course continue to make the world tick and people communicate, I think that Intel and Microsoft's approach to the PDA will ultimately succeed by sheer brute force, by giving the consumer the ability to carry their desktop not in terms of "productivity" but in terms of actual functionality and familiarity. OQO's Model 03+ will be sporting a 1.5GHz variant on Intel's A100 chipset, 2GB RAM, a 160GB HD and an HD screen for £999, FlipStart will be selling the V2.0 with a Core 2 Solo and 80GB HD, and Ubiquio's OEM sources will be mass producing OQO performance in a bigger box for half the price. Sony will probably be shipping 1.86GHz Core 2 Duo systems for £2000, and all of them will have HSDPA or equivalent comms.

Of course the ARM chip would offer theoretically better performance for a given clockspeed, or better battery life, and would be vastly more efficient with a decent OS on top of it... but it's not going to change what the market wants. And the market is still unsure it wants anything at all, but when it does figure it out, it wants "desktop, in pocket".

iPods don't need multi-core. They work perfectly well as they are, and that's not a "no-one needs more than 640K RAM" statement - once the iPod needs that kind of CPU power, it is becoming a new device.

There is one mass market device I can see, and it's mentioned here. If Apple, instead of as rumoured shifting to Intel, deploy this multi-core CPU in an iPod Touch, with more real RAM and storage memory, and a suitable port of OS X on ARM... then perhaps Apple could develop the PDA that does become the device everyone wants.

Before that, I think we need iSync and .Mac support on Windows, and open development on the platform. The question everyone asks is "WIll it run MY apps". Until the answer is yes, very few consumers are interested and only the geeks and those truly new to computing will attempt to work around the limitations to gain access to the hardware. For an Apple PDA to truly succeed, it has to be available to both Windows and Macintosh users.

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Brute force attack yields keys to Google's kingdom

Richard Kilpatrick

How odd...

I clicked the provided link, removed the ?, and watched as information about Toyota Supra nonsense appeared.

No malware on my machine at all. How peculiar.

I guess it must not work on OS X or, presumably, anything other than Windows ;)

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O2 takes it to the EDGE

Richard Kilpatrick

I care

3G makes mobile working feasible. Extortionately expensive? T-Mobile do an exceptionally good deal if you also need a phone; Flext 35 is £180/month allowance of 'phone' usage, Web 'n' Walk is "unlimited" (I've extrapolated upon this before in other responses; it's "good enough" in real-world terms) and coverage is great.

WiFi I find infrequently outside of the festering metropolis known as London, and as for hitching a ride on other people's connectivity - most people have sussed out how to make their networks tolerably secure from casual passers by.

3G is most definitely not only available in major cities. I find it surprisingly frequently - even in the Scottish Borders, my Vodafone has a 3G signal. T-Mobile will no doubt follow soon.

I'd sure as hell rather have 3G than EDGE - EDGE is painfully slow, and you pay for the data regardless of how it is delivered. You pay per MB fetched, not bandwidth, so why on earth favour EDGE? There's no logical argument; 02 paid for 3G licences, they are providing the tech anyway.

iPhone may be alright for some people, but I personally think it's a bit of a dud product for the technologically savvy. Even so, the UI is reportedly very nice - it just doesn't compare to devices like the T-Mobile Ameo for actual versatility.

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Apple restricts ringtone rights

Richard Kilpatrick

Apple to blame, of course...

Once again, Apple are to blame for iTunes costs and restrictions. Maybe they are. What would be nice would be if some reporting went into this, some investigation.

If we're going to lambast Apple for charging twice - and I do agree that it is an unwelcome double charge - we should ask WHY Apple are charging twice.

I suspect it's our friends in the record industry, who have long eyed up the lucrative market for infuriating bleepy renditions of tunes. Yes, we can get the latest awful tripe for the 'yoof' to listen to whilst 'txting' from some premium-rate subscription service, but do those services pay the labels?

Regardless of the answer, I suspect that Apple are far too easy a target and bedfellow to let the opportunity pass. If the ringtone providers pay for the music they are selling, then why shouldn't Apple users have to pay for it? After all, the buyers of the ringtone probably own the same track on artist CD, compilation CD, downloaded MP3 before they bought it... they pay over and over for the same IP and material.

If the providers don't pay, then Apple are a very easy target to make pay.

I look forward to reading about the origin of Apple's ringtone charging - if it's Apple doubling their profit on iTunes sales (which has traditionally been reported as very low, though one assumes the volume makes that an inaccurate perception - maybe it is a low percentage, but the actual amount on the bottom line is, I'm sure, worthwhile) or the labels - yes, the providers of the content - milking their loyal fanbase further.

Since there are a number of tracks available to convert, rather than any track in your library being convertible, I think we can work it out without taxing the braincells too much...

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General Dynamics offers rugged UMPC

Richard Kilpatrick

Flip...

The GD Itronix MR-1 is related to the Paul Allen/Vulcan Inc. FlipStart, initially revealed as the MiniPC way back in 2004. I've offered El Reg a review of the FlipStart several times since the system's release, but for some reason they seem disinterested! Perhaps freelance contributions are discouraged, lest Reg hacks not get the chance to lurk about on sun-drenched yacht decks - or perhaps the readers aren't going to be interested in another UMPC, least of all one which costs half the MR-1's pricetag :)

FlipStart is powered by a 1.1GHz Pentium-M, has 512MB RAM and a 30GB HD, but has a very similar appearance and screen. The touchscreen is not implemented; in my own experience this results in a better quality display than most touchscreen-equipped UMPCs, but I haven't seen the GD tech and therefore can't comment on it.

Assuming UK releases go to plan, the FlipStart will offer WiFi, Bluetooth and UMTS/HSDPA (the EVDO module fitted for the US market is a standard unit judging by the FCC filing, and could easily be replaced with an internal 3G card - a SIM socket exists on the PCB already). US retail is $1999, and not as a reviewer but as someone who has had the benefit of using the machine for a couple of months, it's a very nice, clever bit of hardware.

The unique feature for the FlipStart - all the UMPCs outside of Origami have to have one, at least - is a small screen on the reverse of the display. With fast navigation, this is akin to the old Xircom "Rex" or similar in theory of operation - it synchronises with your Outlook data for appointments, email and contacts (the system can be set to wake, collect email and sleep again with one menu option) and these can be viewed even if the rest of the computer is in standby. The navigation control for this also doubles as a rapid-access zoom control, or a scroll wheel.

With clear Psion influences (the packaging, manual design and keyboard design in particular), the device doesn't initially have the Wow! factor that some UMPCs have - the clamshell form factor, slightly chunky dimensions, make for an 'unsexy' package (imagine the MR-1 without the rugged bits), but in actual real-world use it's a class-leading design. It's also very, very small.

El Reg hasn't featured the FlipStart since February 2004, when it was just a twinkle in Paul Allen's eye - and it's been on the market stateside (and internationally through importers like Dynamism) since April this year. I've got 4,500 words, 20 pictures going free here formed from a (smaller) review for a published magazine - come and get it ;)

0 0

Get a passport, enjoy casual sex with foreigners

Richard Kilpatrick

If we give the people to whom this literacy appeals passports...

Will they PLEASE leave the UK, and stay in whichever loutish, beer infested 'last' resorts they choose to invade?

I have no problem with the idea that you should have a passport to go shag foreigners. The gene pool in this country needs a little diluting before the masses end up displaying perfect speciation. It already seems nu-labr is working hard on ensuring they're have insufficient education to realise that they're being screwed by the Government; offering them the chance to be screwed elsewhere seems oddly appropriate.

How about one for the literati? A nice, bookish study, with a beautifully handcrafted postcard sent from the colonies. "These nubian girls are quite remarkable in their appearance and athleticism".

I suggest a counter-campaign for the countries most likely to be targeted by the British Youth Demographic. "There's a reason the British are coming here to get laid; your country has more attractive people. Why settle for less?"

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Russia plans 2025 Moonbase, 2035 Mars shot

Richard Kilpatrick

@Andrew Prentis

I think I'd like more than a few years, please. Depends on what they do with the waste materials of mining, but removing x unit of any material through mining tends to involve removing considerably more of the materials in the way...

0 0
Richard Kilpatrick

@John Stag

I've seen the Chinese are planning to mine Helium 3, and I've got this horrible feeling that mining the moon is A Bad Idea.

Somewhere in the back of my mind is a schoolboy calculation that thinks that messing with the mass of the moon is going to change how it relates to the Earth, which in turn, will change tidal behaviours and so forth. Even a small percentage might make a difference, it might not, but humans aren't known for dealing in small percentages when it comes to energy consumption.

0 0

NBC to Apple: 'You're fired!'

Richard Kilpatrick

Objectivity in reporting...

"Overpriced, DRM-shackled, handheld status symbol"

Is this the editorial quality we can expect from The Register's technical reporting? Is this what the readership is expected to swallow? That any device - and I'm fully aware of the iPod and other media players, and how they compare, and indeed how DRM relates to the "handheld status symbol" (for the benefit of your contributor, the handheld status symbol is not DRM shackled, the purchased content is).

This is not an Apple fanboi post. This is an objective, technically aware, balanced response. I'd respond the same way if similarly erroneous and biased statements were made about any product.

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Boy racer cuffed for 140mph YouTube jaunt

Richard Kilpatrick

Speedometer accuracy

Analogue speedometers are rarely accurate; early digital ones are nearly as variable due to the drive mechanisms, though in recent years instrument packs have become fully electronic even when the display is analogue. A good example would be a car like the Ford Focus, where a control module reset (if you've removed the battery, perhaps, or reflashed the PCM) will result in all dials sweeping.

My RX8's speedometer is an accurate instrument. It could be utterly accurate; the level of error (at least checked against GPS, which itself isn't 100%) is a constant 2mph overread; this increases slightly with tyre wear.

Older cars which have been messed with can be insanely inaccurate; they usually take the speedometer drive from the gearbox via a (non electrical or electrical) cable to the mechanical dial. Changing anything after this point in the final drive will result in an inaccurate reading, regardless of the technology - wheel sizes, final drive ratio, speedometer head (some have different internal gearing, others just have different markings and assume that the gearbox output speed will be appropriate to the model of car they're fitted to). Some modern cars take the speed from the ABS sensors, which would only be inaccurate if the wheel diameter were changed.

Due care and attention - using the mobile phone camera whilst driving, for example - is a fair prosecution based on available evidence. A further examination of the car would verify constructions and use validity - if the instruments are over-reading, under-reading (not supposed to under-read at all - a common thing to get boy racers on when they shove oversized wheels on their cars), tyres are of the correct type, etc. However, if an outright, clear cut speeding conviction results from the evidence as reported here, then someone should have sought legal assistance.

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Richard Kilpatrick

@Bemused

The phrase "souped-up" has origins both in cooking and food technology advancements. Specifically, standard models of a car are referred to as "cooking". When someone adds stripes, large exhaust, then it's taken to simmering. Once the engine is uprated, it's "hot" - although this terminology also applies to inexplicable thefts of 1988 Metros from sink-hole estates by 15 year old morons.

To further expand upon this, the 1920s hot-rod community fuelled by prohibition and the need to run moonshine great distances fast in rural USA adopted cooking terms for their modified vehicles, but had to distinquish between these terms and the terms they used for their moonshine production - where boiling, simmering, hot, cold etc. would also apply (also fermenting, but that's more likely to apply to the stale vomit and spilled milk in the back of any Scenic/Picasso/Zafira middle-class virility badge these days).

Pop culture was taking hold - it wasn't long until Andy Warhol was to be born - and his influence was already coming through. The 'shiners adopted soup terminology with varying degrees of success - supercharging and skimmed heads were no longer "compression", but "condensed", as you got more bang in a smaller space (remember that early American cars had engines approaching 20 litres per cylinder, so like the process of making the power of Univac pocket sized, engines also had to be miniaturised - early days! I remember when the first Youngsmobile (they renamed them Oldsmobiles later) was released you could stand a full grown man in one cylinder bore!).

"Cream of" was an early form of water injection. "Noodle" was used to refer to the practise of adding additional leads from your magneto to the ignitors. "Won Ton" was the target weight and load capacity. "Cullen Skink" was the practise of getting in touch with the well known tuner/'shiner, Skink "Arthur" Rogers.

So, clearly the term souped-up doesn't involve actual soup, but does have origins in food production.

0 0
Richard Kilpatrick

Um, RS Turbo...

Both RS Turbo models are 1.6, push out a frankly feeble 132bhp (though at the time, this was compared to XR3i 105bhp, and Golf GTi 115bhp), and are dragged along by a wheezy CVH engine. Top speed is about 120mph and 0-60 is 8.1 seconds, which is only a touch better than my ragged old Volvo estate can do (and the Volvo will hit that 120 with rather less fuss and drama than the Escort). Unless it's an Escort Cosworth, then it's modified, or he's got the only RS1700T in the wild ;)

Modified cars aside, a Ford Escort doing 140mph indicated is plausible. Actually doing it is another matter. The fastest Escort likely to be in the hands of someone this young and stupid will be a Cosworth (unlikely), RS2000 (of the Mk 6 variety) or an XR3i/GTi. The RS2000 will do 133, and therefore will probably do an indicated 140 with a long enough run up. It's worth noting that measured top speed, and what's attainable on the road, are very different animals, and even on the track my RX8 will cease storming ahead at 130ish, taking a fairly decent length of time and road to claw in the final 15 or so mph to claimed maximum.

I'm tempted to do a YouTube showing me doing a steady 100 down some A-roads, recorded with accurate timebase; I wonder how long it would last in court when I pointed out that I played the video back at 1.6x speed and had switched the digital display to kph... and showed the entirely hands-free rig holding my video camera.

@ Matthew: Quite a few Fords are capable of 140mph, and not all of them have Cosworth on the back, though they may have it on the engine covers. Car top speeds have increased somewhat since 87mph was a likely Vmax for a family car and doing the ton was a big event.

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Wii tops US July console sales chart

Richard Kilpatrick

It's not the hardware...

It's the games.

Wii's games have massive market appeal, and Nintendo has always been very good with quality control/content (some NES titles were poor, mostly film tie-ins, and that will probably continue if the Pirates of the Caribbean game I bought in the hope of Wii-mote driven swashbuckling is any example).

Likewise I now consider Bioshock to be a good reason to get a 360, though I prefer the PS3 as a bit of hardware - my Elite is intrusively loud.

If you look at the marketshare of the main consoles; gameplay is what is driving them. Wii, 360 and PS3, roughly in that order, and this reflects the quality of the gaming experience available and the breadth of the market appeal for the various games. PS2 had the market with Singstar and EyeToy, but the PS3 has been slow to maintain this momentum. Singstar PS3? Still not out.

PS2 was also a bit of a sleeper; had it been launched without the PS1's success and 3DO's demise, it may well have failed. PlayStation's post '95 dominance and the relatively flat gameplay experience allowed the developers time to get up to speed with the hardware - Xbox introduced competition and 360 was quite a jump in power, but developers seem to have been able to work well with it - PS3 doesn't have the luxury of being viewed as an evolutionary step, or a lack of serious competition, and the frequent reports of developer woes combine with a lack of visible titles in the shops to make the PS3 a choice for hardware/technology enthusiasts, and not casual gamers.

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Europe finally granted Xbox price cut

Richard Kilpatrick

Old news now, but...

I collected my pre-ordered 360 Elite; having ordered at £329.99 from Gamestation; the actual price was £299.99 with one free game (Blue Dragon, marked at £44.95 rrp but not a title I was aware of) plus any other game for £20 (naturally, I chose Bioshock).

Haven't taken it out of the box yet, but the serial number flap shows a build date of June 26th; I'm not sure if it's possible to tell if you have the revised heatsink layout by peering though cooling slots or such.

However, if this little serial number door is on all Xbox 360 boxes, perhaps people could be made aware of the build date the revised heatsinks apply from, and look for machines from that date when buying...

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Total world Wii sales close in on Xbox 360 tally

Richard Kilpatrick

@Mark

Don't get me wrong, I am not at all denying the massive range of titles for the 360 - I don't own any 360 titles yet since the Elite won't be out for another fortnight, but I envisage myself owning 3 definite acquisitions when I get it - PGR3 (which is now a budget title anyway), Halo 3 Limited when it's released as I pre-ordered it, and something like Gears of War perhaps - I'm unsure. I got NFS:Carbon for PS3 so don't see any reason to get the 360 version despite the superior controllers on the 360 for that genre.

My kid has a 360 Core, and I've seen the games on his (hence how I know how PGR3 plays, and that I do want a 360 at all despite having the PS3) - he has a big stack of games for it already, and is probably more representative of the genre, but he also prefers the Wii for many games, particularly the multiplayer/social aspect of it since they don't have an online connection, and therefore don't get to use the online capability of the 360.

It's a race to see which console I'll get GTA:IV for, though. PS3 is definitely ahead for me at the moment (I have NFS:Carbon, MotorStorm, and Obvlivion for the PS3, and of course the free Casino Royale which I haven't watched yet - only just got a 1080 HDTV to go with it!). I might go for the 360 version if better PS3 controllers don't surface, though - the sixaxis feels flimsy and the analogue triggers are too small/lack sufficient travel to provide controllable throttle in the way the 360 does.

I'm also aware of the retro games on 360 (and PS3), but I haven't seen the selection of titles for the 360. PS3 doesn't allow demos of all titles, only some, and last time I looked the retro collection was decidedly sparse.

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Richard Kilpatrick

Mark, Chris R,

Mark: I own a lot of consoles, and if I look at the shelf, my set of games is dominated by Wii titles. I'm expecting to have two or three 360 titles, the PS3 I currently have 3 titles for, and the Wii I have 10 games on.

Also, the other two consoles I have only a few planned purchases on.

The Wii's success is simple: I'm not gamer, I'm just a geek who likes games. I bought PS3 for the technology, pure and simple - I like the way it links to my PSP (tellingly, I also find my DS/PSP experience to mirror that of the Wii/PS3). I bought 360 primarily for Halo and PGR (which features one of my mates on the soundtrack, and is a very good, fun driving game anyway), and the Wii, I bought because of the quality of games available and the diversity. If anything, the FP Shooters and driving games that dominate modern video entertainment fall down on the Wii due to the control system, but it offers a lot more variety as a result.

Gamers will laugh at the paltry selection of games I have, but even when my primary system was a PS2, I don't think I had more than 20 titles for it.

Finally, you're probably overlooking the appeal of the simple retro games on the Wii. Many people remember their NES, SNES systems fondly - many of the best titles are appearing for the Wii as low-cost downloads. That's still an attachment rate, and TBH I wouldn't be surprised if it were not a profitable one.

Chris:

Equivalent to a PSOne? Whatever you're smoking, I'll have some. Wii is a 729MHz PPC core and a fairly powerful GPU. I think that if Sony had been offering that, instead of a 33MHz MIPS, in the 1994-tech PSOne/PlayStation, they might be dominating more than just the games industry by now... If anything the Wii is "comparable" to an original Xbox, though only by people not quite smart enough to grasp the numbers are relating to very different hardware.

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Richard Kilpatrick

Unsurprising

That the significantly cheaper Wii, with much wider potential sales from the "kids and elderly" demographic that Nintendo make a point of targeting (or to be less inclined to marketing BS, the fact that Nintendo has always had a fantastic spread of games to appeal to younger and older audiences), has sold so well is no surprise. It's also a sweet price point with no "better" console to make you feel you were short-changed by your choice - you can't get a SuperWii with an HD.

That lack of decision making makes a Wii an easy snap purchase.

What is telling is that the PS3, widely held as a poor seller, has managed to gain so much ground. In under a year, a massively premium priced console with a fairly poor selection of games has managed to sell half the number of units the X360 has.

The 360 is heading for a revamp - I'm thinking (and I've been thinking this since the Elite was announced for the US; there is now evidence to suggest that part of it is already happening) that the HDMI-port equipped Elite was merely going to result in all models having an HDMI port, and that as the 360 matures it can be repositioned to take on the Wii and the PS3 comprehensively.

The Wii is currently £179 in the UK; the Core 360 is £199, but you know there is a better model in the premium which has compelling additional hardware. With the new HDMI equipped motherboards not appearing in Core systems, I think that (maybe before Christmas, certainly next year) the Core will be dropped in favour of a £179 or £199 (the lower price point making it head-on competition for the Wii) with a 20GB HD, but wired controllers, model. This offers a quantifiable upgrade over Wii's on paper technology for the Argos catalogue type buyer.

The premium system, currently £279 pretty much, would then carry the 120GB HD and wireless controllers. It oocupies a unique slot in the marketplace and the large HD would be compelling to people considering the PS3 but unwilling to spend so much.

And the Elite should be repositioned to £379msrp (currently £329) with a built-in HD-DVD drive and 120GB HD. This, unlike the present Elite, offers a serious technology advantage, and would also allow MS to drop the HD-DVD upgrade if sales are poor. People will always buy the expensive console version. Of course, as an Elite owner I'd be narked if this happened before Christmas, but it's also a price hike.

At £379, the Elite lacks integrated WiFi to compete with the PS3, but there is a larger HD, better games library, and of course the external WiFi module is available.

I've no vested interest in 360s selling; I've got one of each of the consoles and I think they have very different qualities - the Wii is the ultimate party console, great fun, the PS3 has the most interesting technology and a lot of promise, and the 360 is a really good all rounder (I've played one and ordered a UK Elite, so I haven't spend ages with it). This is pure speculation, but I am amused to see that the logical step of all 360s having HDMI is being taken - so wonder if the other logical steps will follow.

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Xbox 360 Premium to get HDMI?

Richard Kilpatrick

@mark

Elites in the UK should have the revised fans, and it makes sense that the HDMI modifications make it to all machines - it simplifies production.

My theory (posted elsewhere) is that we'll see the end of the HDD-less 360, and we'll have three options:

Core - 20GB, Wired controller, £179 to compete with Wii (remember that Wii includes WiFi, 360 doesn't).

Premium - 120GB, Wireless controller, £279 to maintain current 360 market position with no direct competition at that price point.

Elite - 120GB, HD-DVD drive internally, black shell and wireless controller, £379 to undercut PS3 whilst offering larger games library and directly-comparable features (apart from WiFi, again).

Remember that including HD-DVD would have been pretty pointless at launch, MS has no real issues regarding success of the format one way or anther, whereas Sony's media interests have an interest in the success of BluRay. Now there is a market for HD-DVD devices, MS could judge from the popularity of the add-on drive if an Elite as I've described it would be a worthwhile option, or if a different feature would be needed to make it a range-topping device.

Can you imagine how much people would have laughed if the 360 had launged with PS3 matching specs and a PS3-matching price?

Bring all of these changes in with 65nm, and you've got an easy way to combat the bad publicity the reliability issues may have caused - "This new revised range is clearer, more competitive, and easily identified in the marketplace" (you wouldn't buy an old Premium or Core and think you were getting a new one, as the old Premium would have a 20GB HD, and the Core, none at all).

The Wii lacks sufficient internal storage - as downloadable games become more relevant, having that 20GB in a Wii-price console may be very worthwhile. Nintendo would have a lot of my cash if I weren't worrying about filling the internal memory with retrogames! Unfortunately, you can't store titles on SD card and play them.

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