Posts by Sulphur Man

There's clearly some bright and intelligent thinking at BB that didnt get culled or run off to the competitors.

This is an interesting but flawed product from a much leaner company who are smart enough to realise that emulating their rivals is not more commercially viable than creating something unique like this.

Could prove a great live 'test' product, which will lend it's most successful ideas into a more universal form factor (ie narrower) coupled to fully mature OS.

Good luck, BB, there's still room for you at the table.

HP might be onto something with this, as many comments above have speculated on it replacing a kitchen or bedroom TV. It's not a TV, but if HP decide to add a DVB-T2 tuner I'll be first in line.

For me, the 'Smart' TV revolution has been distinctly underwhelming - taking a TV and augmenting it with some crude and laggy walled garden functionality. This is better, build a large touchscreen tablet first, then add the TV functionality on top

Batteries still suck

Why does the range extender exist?

Because the weight and cost of adding additional batteries to get the car over a 200 mile range on a single charge is too great. Much lighter and cheaper to deploy a small motorbike engine with a briefcase fuel size tank as generator, in the space where more batteries could go. That says it all about electric car technology right now.

Without a big breakthrough in battery longevity, cost and weight, the tech simply cant be accommodated in the styles of cars we choose to drive. The alternative, as experimented by Renault Twizy and risible G-Wiz, is to make us drive very unconventional vehicles which can alleviate some of the drawbacks of batteries.

People's motoring behaviours are definitely changing, I have no doubt - the sheer cost of motoring is forcing the issue. But even in the face of these rapid changes, electric vehicles are still falling far short of the 'affordable' mark. Far more research and investment into better battery tech is needed for anything to substantially change.

How can any credible business analyst can compare the technology markets of 2013 with those of the 90s simply beggars belief. The services and requirements of all technology users, be they conglomerates or the domestic housewife simply cant be compared between then and now.

The www didnt begin to take hold in the developed world until 1995, and arguably wasnt of real worth until the first search providers launched, circa 1997.

Mobile phones were the preserve of the moneyed and business communities upto 1994, only reaching the masses from 1995 onwards, and they were anything but 'smart', or secure.

In the 90s. personal technology, and internet access specifically, simply wasnt a necessity for the vast majority of us. We didnt budget for it, like we do fuel, food and clothes. Now we do. A smartphone tarriff is attached to millions of bank accounts. Ditto home broadband. Apple attempt to bring the best internet and communication experience to the masses. You'll pay for it of course, but for many thats a price worth paying.

OnCue rollout problems

Hard to gauge financially, but Intel's ongoing struggle to develop a new broadband-driven TV set top box, apparently called 'OnCue', might contribute to this stunted growth.

OnCue is now delayed until "sometime 2014", largely due to a lack of content deals being struck. Would surprise no one if the plug was pulled before XMAS. They've sunk a lot of cash into that,

Its like designing a new car with an irregular sized fuel-filler and then requesting that all the suppliers offer a fuel pump on the forecourt specifically for that car.

'Naive' doesn't begin to describe it.

Ludicrous

Doesn't a push towards tele-conferencing and home-working lead to reduced office space requirements. Which leaves this wandering down an empty corridor.

I'll buy one, as long as it's not 3D-enabled.

I did wonder

The strict ASA guidelines on car manufacturer ads have been around for ages, and are well documented They apply to both print and broadcast advertising. .

Basically a car cannot show any visual signs of fast (meaning potentially dangerous) movement, which has lead to some weird magazine adverts, such as a BMW M3 oversteering a track bend with its front wheels pointed straight on. Have a google you'll be amazed how strict they are

When I saw the Toyota GT86 ad, I did wonder how they'd got away with it, thinking that maybe the virtual reality aspect got round the rules. Interestingly, after the car smashes through the glass, it carries on down the road in a sensible, ASA rule-abiding manner, perhaps to highlight the difference between the VR and bit and the actual road.

But not in the eyes of the ASA it seems. It does make me wonder why the ASA doesnt scrutinise adverts BEFORE they're broadcast, instead of banning it now - this campaign been live for nearly two months. Which leads to the strong suggestion that rival manufacturers have been moaning about it.

Good 'bad' publicity for Toyota though. They'll probably give this news a subtle push too. Gives the car a bit of brand edge.

"I can't seem to find a decent program to allow me get files, like pdfs, avis and cbr from my PC or NAS (and possibly stream them) via wifi"

Which NAS do you have? I have a Synology, and the suite of Synology iOS are superb - browsing, file access, surveillance cam control, torrent client control and more. I dont think it's any coincidence that Synology's smaller home NAS boxes actually look like iDevices...

and that original Xbox controller....

Worth remembering that Halo CE was released onto a console with the single worst controller in video game history. Worse than Intellivision. You know the one I mean.

If anything cements Halo's mythical status, the triumph over that ergonomic catastrophe must be it.

Is it any wonder Apple are suing Samsung from every angle possible. Products of this quality must be terrifying them.

Like pretty much every human being on the planet, my eyes were happier when TV went HD. My eyes are not so happy with active shutter 3D. It's simply not a comfortable viewing experience, not just the glasses, but the flickering, the loss of brightness and contrast, and the often cringeworthy efforts of the films producers to present certain scenes as 3D demonstrator content (I'm looking at you Alice in Wonderland).

So passive 3D jettisons the glasses (good) but regresses back to SD..

The words 'straws' and 'clutching' spring to mind. Although, 'horse', 'flogging' and 'dead' might be more apt.

Siri....

....is just FaceTime for Nobby No-Mates.

Simple question, how many iPhone users think they get value for money from their purchase?

Not knocking the phone, it's one of the best on the market, but it's far, far too expensive. Or for iPhone users, reassuringly expensive.

£150 too much

A smart-looking smartphone. I've tried the glass keyboard input thing, and hated it, so went back to BB9700. But the price......too much. Hopefully they'll bring it down below £400 soon. Lob £150 off this thing and it could do very well. Perhaps it'll drop in price before Xmas.

RIM would never admit this, but I'm certain there are bods in their marketing and branding department who won't have minded the 'riot organiser' smears aimed at the brand recently. Notoriety is powerful selling tool.

Nice box, but

Pay a bit more and get the Pure Avanti Flow, which does all this one does, but has stereo speakers and integrated subwoofer.

Flawed comparison

Any reason why the Lenovo Thinkpad Edge, an obvious rival at this pricepoint, is not included in the performance comparisons?

they'd better be the Phat one then

No Linux support on a Slim.

Slightly baffling why they'd choose to build a supercomputer in this way, considering the proven power/performance/price ratio of the latest data centres.

Its just a load of flyboys LAN gaming, isnt it.