Re: Hot-desking?

either that, or include an array of UV LEDs in the screen...

Re: Peugeots + electrics =

>the correct Bosch fuel system

Something to do with alkalinity of the chip fat rotting lesser fuel lines, IIRC.

Re: Am I the only one who saw xXx w/ Vin Diesel?

Which left cheek?

Likewise, in movies when we see footage purportedly taken with a camcorder: '[REC]' flashing in the corner of the screen...

But still, I've grown to accept that cars will burst into flames when colliding with anything above 5mph.

Re: This is why we went Good

>And I'm surprised that this article hasn't managed to get the trolls out,

I too have been pleasantly surprised by the maturity of this thread... except for Drefsab who is seeing 'iSheep' (what ever they are) where there aren't any...

I dunno.... 'NATAS' self-tattooed across their forehead?

I give up, why don't you tell us?

Re: Upgrades

> You want a phone, get a 6310i, it does the job *much* better. As it's a computer, the OS is upgradeable.

I both agree and disagree with Mr Campbell.

Many people don't WANT a pocket computer ( though I do) but they do want a pocket device that goes on the internet and plays Angry Birds. Something I have heard many times from the less IT savvy is that they don't like the way "things keep bloody changing as soon as I've just got used to them!" (Apple seems to know this, iOS and OSX look roughly like they always have done)

Technically, I'm sure Mr Campbell is correct- its self-evident that securing a smartphone is a far bigger challenge than securing a fine old 6210i- though it is itself a connected computer.

That said, my advice to old boys in the pub inquiring recently about getting a smart phone is: stick with your clamshell phone with big buttons and buy an [Android- 'cos of the price] 3G tablet (no long term contract) for checking the cricket scores and emailing grandchildren, and as a general email option for when your laptop starts playing silly buggers again. (This isn't a generalisation of the abilities of my senior fellow drinkers, but based on specific individuals talking about their eyesight, fingers and what they might want such a device for). Any input from Reg readers- or even a Reg article- on this subject would be appreciated.

Cheers

Re: I already wrote this once today..

At least it was the microUSB plug that failed, and not the micro USB female part of your phone... I did read that was by design, and a reasonable decision it was too. That said:

The micoUSB 3 plug is a mess - looks like it came with a Sony Ericsson phone from 2004... it is basically a microUSB 2 plug with an extra bit bolted on the side. So you can't even use a micro USB 3 plug to charge or connect to a USB 2 device... So it is bigger and less elegant than it was before, still not reversible, not backwards-compatible, still liable to scratch whatever you plug it into and also not suitable for just slotting a device onto, dock style.

Some twit has accused FutureShock of being a shill... Why? All he has done is to point out the shortcomings that we, as non-Apple users, have experienced first hand.

Apple have produced a good connector. Now, how can it be brought about that other device makers start putting some thought into the same issue, ideally as a standard? Or maybe this brave new world of near-field data and wireless charging will render the question moot within a couple of years.... your answers on a postcard, please.

Re: Time for some disruptive innovation, please

You forgot that bloody weird phone that rotated around a hinge, the axis of which was perpendicular to the face of the phone- as if you had joined two dog-tags together with a split pin.

Re: What STEVE said..

As far as I can make out, the connector will contain a DAC... Apples website says something like "Have some existing kit with the old 30 pin connector? No problem, simply use a converter!* *Not suitable for all 30 pin accessories. No support for iPod Out or iPod Video"

Suggesting that audio docks will work with the connector. Since the slide at the Apple event explicitly stated this new nine pin connector is completely digital, one then assumes the converter will contain a DAC. But let's wait until iFixit rip one open to see.

Re: Peugeots + electrics =

hehe, not wrong. But then I'm basing that on older models that we have deliberately chosen for having the more reliable engines- mostly that near immortal 1.9 diesel unit before they became high pressure injection. We've gone through a fair few Berlingo vans and a 306 (before they have met their fate under the wheels of tractors etc), and whilst the engines have all been as good as gold, the electrics have often been eccentric. When my friends fell about laughing at the noises my central locking made in a spirited but unsuccessful attempt to work, I would just say "It's a French car, the electrics are supposed to be like that!"

On one occasion, an engineer couldn't get his brand-new diagnostic tablet to talk to my 306 to reprogramme the ignition key... after an hour of head scratching and swearing, he changed tack and addressed my car as a Partner van, and it worked. To be fair, it was his box of tricks that was at fault, not the vehicle. "I'm never getting version two-point-ZERO of anything ever again!" he declared.

Re: Why not buy a much better Samsug Galaxy S3 today?

When the The Register gave us ten alternatives to the new iPhone in an article yesterday, most of the featured phone were larger than the iPhone. If you are used to the size of iPhones, but want to try Android, then you could do worse than the Sony Xperia P.

iPhone 5 124 x 59 x 7.6mm

iPhone 4 115.2 x 58.6 x 9.3 mm

Xperia P 122 x 59.5 x 10.5 mm

I'm no expert; the Xperia P is my first smartphone. I do note that my thumb can reach most of the screen very easily, something I imagine would give me cramp on a larger screen. Since Reghardware positively reviewed the phone, the Ice Cream Sandwich update has been released and has significantly improved the battery life (mostly achieved by giving an option to turn off off non-essential data when the phone is in standby)

There is no microSD card slot, but there is the option of reading thumbsticks and memory card readers with USB OTG, if you use a cable- not included. A mini HDMI cable comes in the box, though, and it happily puts iPlayer on a big TV.

Re: Gullible hacks...

>It's been well demonstrated it was the poor choice in thermal compound under the heat spreader that made Ivy Bridge "run hot."

That's my understanding of what happened, too. Recently built a passively-cooled, completely silent PC around a i7 3770 S. The 1 Kilogram cooler looks like it fell out of the hood of a 1970s American muscle car, but has kept the chip around 45º.

Re: ::confused::

It is neither too small or too cheap to convert an uncompressed digital video signal to analogue. However, it doesn't.

http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/47498/25-quid-lightning-adapter-free-upgrades

Paragraph 7 "you'll find Apple's website also states: "Many of your 30-pin accessories.* Video and iPod Out not supported." And that asterisk refers to this statement: "*Some 30-pin accessories are not supported.""

Strange, cos Apple's UK website makes no such caveat:

"Soon many iPhone accessories will be Lightning compatible. But if you have one that depends on the 30-pin connector, you can still connect it to your iPhone 5. Simply use a Lightning to 30-pin Adapter (sold separately)."

www.asa.org.uk/...

Re: which is it?

@Fuzz "On top of USB they need at least two pins for SPDIF or similar digital audio."

It is possible for the USB pins to carry digital audio, so additional contacts aren't necessarily required- in fact, it is promoted as a feature of Jelly Bean 'USB AUDIO':

http://www.talkandroid.com/119937-jelly-bean-brings-usb-audio-support-to-android-devices/

@Annihilator

Why do you say that the adaptor won't convert signal types?

The slide at the iPhone clearly states that their new cable is "all digital", whilst most docks receive an analogue signal from a iPods. This suggests that any dock adaptor twixt the old and the new requires a DAC, if a new iDevice is to be used with an older speaker dock.

Or am I missing something?

Re: yawn

[A CCTV slowly pans from left to right. Pauses. Zooms in. Zooms in again. Unusual: A man with an old Nokia. The camera follows him. The camera alerts its neighbour...]

Re: Nokia PureView 808 Vs Lumix LX-5

Nokia PureView 808 Vs Lumix LX-5 - comparison:

http://asia.cnet.com/shootout-nokia-808-pureview-vs-panasonic-lumix-dmc-lx5-62216561.htm

They give the nod to the PureView. Heck.

Nokia would have a great product if they ditched the phone part and packaged the tech to compete with ruggedised 'action sports' type compact cameras- the sort you might take up a mountain. Its surely easier to protect a camera with no moving optics against shock and dirt ingress.

USB On The Go

I don't know about the other phones listed, but I'm under the impression that at least the Galaxy S3 and the Xperia S allow USB On The Go (USB OTG), if you want to order an appropriate cable. Making your own is possible, but varies in difficulty depending on how much glue the makers of your spare microUSB cable have decided to use at the male end. Short pin 4 to ground, solder it to a female USB A, and you're good to go.

Okay, it isn't elegant, but arguably more versatile than just a microSD card slot, in that you can use card readers and USB thumbsticks. Keyboards and mice, too.

For your future information

The convention (across many technology sites, not just The Reg) is that 'hands-on review' means a journalist's first impressions after having played with a device for ten minutes.

Real reviews are, conveniently, titled 'Review'.

Re: The Jaguar problem

That wasn't Jaguar's problem... their problem was that the successor to the XJ8 looked like the Ford Mondeo that it was!

Re: USB plugs

Not just you, I could never understand why USB A only goes in one way, but is bloody tricky to determine which way that is!

Whilst micro-USB is D shaped, micro-USB 3 is just weird- can't really blame Apple for using their own solution. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/usb-3.0-superspeed-external-enclosure,2597-2.html for a picture of a microUSB 3 plug.

Re: Thinth

>Am I alone in finding thinner phones more awkward to handle?

I found my aluminium Xperia P a bit easy to fumble, so placed a strip of self-adhesive plastic down one side. I haven't been able to find a silicone case for it yet.

>Yeah, what's teh point of 'thinnest ever'? Surely there's some cutoff point where the phone just gets very awkward to handle.

Not necessarily, for example a credit card can be held by its edges fairly securely. With the first square iPod Nano (with the little scroll wheel), the polycarbonate face was deliberately made sharp, so as not to slip from the finger tips. To prevent slip you can either up the co-efficient of friction by choosing a different material, or you can increase the pressure by decreasing the surface area (like the knurling on a Maglite body)

Re: So hang on...

Given the cost per MB when abroad, that is probably for the best.

@ Frank Bough

Whilst I wouldn't have chosen that language* to make your point, Ms Leach does often have trouble with her subject matter, her use of the English language, and, in her article this week, her choice of metaphor. To say that something has 'evaporated' suggests that it has gone for good, whereas the emails in question are merely inaccessible.

*The Reg has featured articles might be read as celebrating immoderate language. Not that two wrongs make a right...

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/10/28/peaches_roasted/ Paragraph 4, the following was reproduced from the comments following a blog post by Peaches Geldof:

"i think they were right to delete all the nasty, bitter comments that were based on no more than ignorant and irrational prejudige. however, the person who posted the word 'c*nt' 11,000 times made a valid point, one that was based upon sound reasoning and enlighted argument. i see no reason why that should have been censored."

Re: Is it just me?

>Isn't there a good reason we don't use i7 in servers?

Yeah, it called 'market differentiation'. Modern Xeons already use the 'Sandy Bridge' architecture as their i7 brothers, but have different features enabled, such as support for multiple CPUs, ECC RAM and some virtual stuff.

Re: Not to throw a damper on this lovefest...

Again, have you a link for this? I can't find any mention of it elsewhere.

Other links suggest that this new architecture supports DirectX in addition to OpenGL and OpenCL etc. Can you re-read your source, and just confirm for us that you're not jumping at shadows? Ta.

Re: the issue disappears as you learn new ways of working

>Only the sheep without the wit to do more than follow the herd.

Er, and those who use software not available in Linux are what, exactly? Engineers, designers, people who find it useful to use the same systems as their suppliers and clients...

We're all supporting to your right to choose, so why knock other people's choices?

Re: Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated

Other hard-disk PMPs are available from Cowon and Archos, though sadly not longer from iRiver. The Archos unit that had a 500GB HDD did have problems with building its database if there were over 10,000 or whatever audio tracks on it, but this appears to have been fixed with a firmware update.

However, I'd probably buy a Sansa Clip and a pouch of microSD cards which are currently around 50p /GB. I'm clumsy and so have learnt to avoid gadgets with moving parts, so far as I can.

Though the iPod's scroll wheel is a handy thing (used to have one on my Sharp MD player) for long lists of music, I prefer to be able to drag n' drop.

Presumably this Nexus device has USB OTG? (not that the existence of an ungainly workaround is any excuse for the thing not behaving as advertised)

Re: Good typing and mousing experiences

>I'd be happy to have a tablet (screen only) device that had two USB connectors (probably small or micro size) so that I could use a 'proper' keyboard and mouse (via connector adaptors) when I felt the need to do so. Has any tablet manufacturer done that?

Yes. A fair few tablets and phones already support this... Google USB OTG. Supported by both Galaxy and Xperia phones, and probably more. You can get the cable (Male Micro USB > Female USB A) online for a couple of quid, or else see it as a test of your soldering skills: http://tech2.in.com/how-to/accessories/how-to-make-your-own-usb-otg-cable-for-an-android-smartphone/319982

(in this guide, the diagrams show a blue cable in place of the white cable you will actually find in the plug)

Re: re: Onscreen Keyboards

Hmm, maybe someone could knock up a silicone 'bumper' case incorporating a chorded keyboard...

Re: screen ripple effects

Some people are reassured by a feeling of solidity, some don't care as long as the gadget works.

Re: Trucks and GPS

Possibly, but people don't stash stolen trucks in private houses... police have more excuses to visit commercial premises, in which you could store a truck. That, and the thieves might use a GPS / Cell jammer.

Re: That's probably why they're starting with Promethius

Ripley, Ellen: Just tell me one thing, Burke. You're going out there to destroy those DVDs, right? Not to study. Not to bring back. But to wipe them out.

Burke,Carter J: That's the plan. You have my word...

Ripley, Ellen: Then I'm in.

***

Burke,Carter J: It was a bad call.

Ripley, Ellen: BAD CALL???? THESE VIEWERS ARE DEAD BURKE!!!! DONT YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YOUVE DONE HERE?!?!?!

Re: Fair enough

I may well see it, but was hoping for a more colourful MegaCity One, like Blade Runner warmed up, or with a touch of Luc Beson's The Fifth Element... like a Brazillian favela made vertical. Ideally though, they would have made it in the nineties with Clint Eastwood instead of Stallone.

In this new movie, Karl Urban looks more like Mad Max than he does a Judge with leathers so polished he could make a drill sergeant weep with shame.

Hmm... Judge Dredd Vs Mad Max might even work... you can imagine Dredd's mutant-infested wastelands playing host to a Road Warrior type character.

Re: Apple said it will work, so it will work, right...?

The Samsung Tab's wall charger with USB socket is rated at 2A

Re: They may have lost me as a customer in the future...

Jelly Bean has 'USB Audio', apparently... maybe the first step to an Android dock solution. Have you played with it / have any idea what it is? Documentation seems a little light.

Re: universal Android dock

>You mean the maker of Android *the operating system*? and for them to standardise something on hardware? Ok.

You sound dubious. I do appreciate that Google make the OS and not the hardware, but have you a suggestion as to who might be better placed to encourage for Android licencees to get together on this? And a dock system isn't just hardware, it requires the OS to support some functions- such as remote media controls and hands-free kit integration.

Samsung and Sony have already tried their proprietary systems, and they didn't work because the critical mass of users wasn't big enough to either make it a selling point, or to encourage third parties to support it - in speakers, hifis, cars etc. If Samsung, Sony, HTC and others got together, they would have a large enough market share for a single dock design to take off- if Android market share continues as it is.

It is not unheard of for a software vendor to specify hardware- MS did exactly that with Windows 7 Phone.

Re: Surprise - another US Court that fails to find against Apple...

er, Apple DO use Corning 'Gorilla Glass'.

"Corning employees in Kentucky and New York who create the majority of the glass for iPhone,.." - Apple

http://9to5mac.com/2012/03/02/apple-acknowledges-use-of-corning-gorilla-glass-on-iphone-means-gorilla-glass-2-likely-for-iphone-5/

Re: Next step

Can't help but feel this is not taking advantage of the cockroach's existing sensory equipment. If there was a way of having them use their chemical sensors to seek out CO2/ human scents/ etc instead of their usual food, then all you would need is a tiny transmitter backpack.

Some sort of selective breeding or genetic manipulation might be able to achieve this.

I'm assuming that cockroaches are already pretty adept at finding what they want and ways of getting there- better than a clumsy human operator with a mouse would be.

Re: Oh great...

Cockroaches are a good source of protein... though to be fair, you can last weeks without nutrition- it is water that you need.

Re: Next step

>No, next step is to control a hamster with a Raspberry PI.

more or less already been done... not by using embedded computer to control the rodent directly, but rather to control a Skinner Box (an automated way of training animals using rewards and punishments to reinforce desirable behaviour). The application is to air-drop a Skinner box into a country with a landmine problem. Locally available rats are then automatically trained by the box to sniff out landmines. Of course, this approach uses the rat's own 'software'. Unlike sniffer dogs, which require a close and long relationship with a salaried human trainer, rats are cheap. And can squeeze through far smaller gaps than spaniels, if used in a post-earthquake search and rescue operation.

Re: endless rental

If you've waited a few months after the cinema release for it to be available to rent for £3, why not give it a few months and buy for £3 from a major supermarket chain?

Re: That's probably why they're starting with Promethius

Has Ultra Violet been cracked yet? Otherwise, as the next reply stated- pirates will already have had their hands on it anyhows. I was on a cross channel ferry last week, and thought I'd watch Prometheus in their 'Cinema*'- I don't know what the source was, but would imagine that once films are distributed to these smaller set-ups (optical disc or proprietry DRM'ed watermarked format?) pirates will waste no time in snagging a copy.

*Don't bother. The projector mount resonated with the vibrations of the ferry, there was a green hue to the right of the image, dark areas (of which there are many in Prometheus) were barely visible, and the screen, though a fair size in 4:3, was used in 16:9 and appeared no bigger than most people's TVs these days. A dodgy copy on my laptop would have been a more immersive experience, so I walked out for a refund before the main title credits started.

Re: Mini USB

I am looking at a Blackberry branded microUSB cable, and a Blackberry microUSB mains charger (which doesn't work). More coffee, sir?

But still, no biggie- miniUSB cables are still widely and cheaply available. Asda do one for £3 if you're ever stuck without one.

Re: No thanks, never a Mio again

>For relatively small-name players like Mio, you also need to bear in mind that "lifetime updates" are "updates for as long as the company continues to exist / feels like supporting this".

As opposed to large companies like Nokia who have a well-regarded map system? Okay, your's is a valid point and I'm being churlish, but a even a big name might not be around in a half a decade, let alone a lifetime. [See Palm]