Techcraver.com | Craving tech, craving life!

Just a quick public announcement that I have a new writing gig.  I’m now writing at one of my favorite blogs, Web Worker Daily.  For those of you unfamiliar with it, Web Worker Daily is a fantastic blog that focuses on tech news and productivity for those who work on the web.  It’s one of Om Malik’s blogs and is part of the Giga Om Network.

I’ll primarily be writing at Web Worker Daily and I will also get the opportunity to contribute to the other blogs on the network, namely the flagship GigaOm.com.

To see my articles on WWD, check out my page on the site.  Also, if you want an RSS feed of my articles, check out feed://feeds.feedburner.com/jasonswritings.

Just wanted to announce that I’m now writing for  Download Squad.

Download Squad is an amazing blog that I’ve been a long time reader of.   They are part of Weblogs Inc (owned by AOL) and are a sister blog of Engadget and TV Squad.

If you want to just check out my stories, follow this link.  As you can see, I have about 9 stories under my belt.

If you want an RSS feed of just my writings, subscribe to feeds.feedburner.com/jasonswritings

Don’t worry, this won’t cause my blogging here at techcraver.com to subside at all.  You’ll just have one more place to find me.

Netscape Navigator will be discontinued as of February 1, 2008, according to Netscape’s blog.

It’s a sad day.  I remember first using Netscape on a Macintosh SE back in 1994.

I also wrote about this on Download Squad, feel free to check it out.

Last night, my buddy Kevin and I attended Ignite Portland.  Ignite is a presentation event that has an innovative way of pitching an idea or message.  Presenters get 5 minutes and prepare 20 slides and get 15 seconds per slide.  The PowerPoint is set on a timer so if you don’t finish your slide, you lose out.

The topics range from how to pitch idea to a VC to unwilding (just look it up).   I have to say that the presenters were way more memorable than their messages.  Everyone did a fantastic job.

The event was held in downtown PDX at Weiden+Kennedy, just about the coolest facility we could have held this thing.  Great job to Josh, Raven, and Dawn - you guys were awesome.

It was great to meet some twitter peeps that I’ve met over the last few months including @verso and @ahockley.

Techcraver N800 Review

Overview:

When I think of Nokia, I think cell phones. Which is why I was surprised when I heard about the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet. The N800 is a beautifully designed 3 1/2 inch mobile tablet that allows you to surf the web, chat via Instant Message, and do VoIP calls among many other tasks. The N800 has a lot of onboard hardware including wi-fi (802.11B/G), bluetooth, and a video camera. You can interface with the device using the included stylus, onboard keys, or through its amazing touch screen. The N800 is a follow-up device to the Nokia N770 Internet tablet, which received poor reviews. The N800 has better hardware, fixing a key complaint about the N770 - sluggishness.

Another bonus is the N800 is running a Linux based operating system, meaning external developers can write software for the N800 Tablet. This fact alone makes the N800 a very attractive package. Unlike the new Apple iPod Touch, the Nokia N800 is an ‘open’ device that outsiders can develop software and hardware for. This is very powerful. For example, the N800 came with an FM receiver, but Nokia didn’t ship the N800 with the software to utilize this facility. Someone took it upon themselves to write the software and now you can use the N800 as an FM receiver, adding to its utility.

At First Glance:

The Nokia N800 is a beautiful device. The screen, which is simply stunning at 800×640 dominates the front side of the screen and is surrounded on the sides and bottom by the speakers. On the upper left of the screen are the directional navigation/operation buttons. There is a swing-out stand that allows you to view the N800 on a table when watching media. On the sides of the device you have the pop-out webcam, stylus, headphone jack, power jack, and power/volume buttons. Nokia really took their time to design a functional and eye catching portable computer.

Capabilities:

So you have a mini portable computer, but what can you do with it? The short answer is many, many things, most of which are focused on staying connected. Even though this device isn’t a cell phone, you can make phone calls via VoIP. Out of the box, Nokia has a client called Nokia Internet Call Invitation. In addition to this software, you can install a custom version of Skype and the Gizmo Project has just released a client allowing access to their network. The Skype software integration is of great interest to me and should be to anyone who is a traveler. Think about it. Anywhere you can hop on a wi-fi network, you can have voice calls and instant messaging conversations to anyone on your skype contact list. This ability to add portability to Skype makes the N800 of great interest to me. More on the Skype client below.

Another thing that was really fun to do was to have the N800 be portable with Gizmo Project as well. By pairing Grandcentral and Gizmo Project, I can get phone calls directly to the N800 to my ‘normal’ grandcentral number, allowing me to get regular phone calls at no additional cost. Pretty cool!

The web browser available on the N800 is Opera. This browser is fully functional and allows to display webpages as they are meant to be seen, not scaled down as normal on cell phones or other mobile devices. The N800’s Opera 8 client allows you to zoom in and out on webpages and supports Javascript and plug-ins. It’s pretty cool to be able to watch youtube videos right out of the box with no add-ons! Sure any smartphone can surf the web - but the N800 has Flash built in and a full browser so surfing the web is beautiful on this device.

Nokia also included a fully functional RSS reader and e-mail client which supports POP3 and IMAP4. In addition to email, the N800 supports Instant Messaging via Google Talk, Jabber, Yahoo!, MSN, and Gizmo Project. It should be noted that Yahoo! and MSN access are a feature of the Gizmo Project N800 software.

Aside from Internet connectivity, the N800 offers many multi-media features. It can take 2 SD cards (the same ones that go into your digital camera or PDA) so you can import and play media. The built-in kick stand allows you to put the N800 on a tabletop and comfortably watch a movie, video podcast, or other video without having to hold it in your hand. Also you can play mp3s or virtually any music file. I have read that some people were unhappy with the N800’s video playback, but I found the video to be smooth and high-quality. The speakers are a little tinny and not loud enough, but this would be expected of tiny portable speakers on any electronic device.

Skype on the Nokia N800

One of the main reasons I wanted to evaluate the N800 was it’s special Skype client. Shortly after the N800s release earlier this year, Skype was fast to develop a customized client specially designed for the Nokia N800. Downloading and installing the application is quick and easy. I fired up Skype and was happy to have my skype contact list with me as I walked around my home office. I fired up a chat window and used the N800’s touch screen to type out IM’s. I found this to be a little clunky, but I immediately became comfortable typing and was doing so pretty quickly.

Next up was testing voice quality. There are two ways to make voice calls on the Skype/N800 package - using the onboard mic and speakers and with a special pair of headphones with an onboard mic on the headsets. I called a skype contact using the onboard mic and speakers. The caller said I sounded great, however the tinny speakers on the N800 didn’t relay his voice very well. The caller, to my surprise, said there was no feedback on his end. When I make calls on my MacBook with onboard mic and speakers, people always complain that they can hear their voice and quickly become annoyed with the feedback. Also, skype calls with the included headphones/headset sounded great both for the caller and myself. So, overall the N800 is a fabulous platform for running Skype on the go.

I have two main complaints of Skype on the N800. First, you can’t currently make voice calls using a Bluetooth headset. Knowing the N800 had onboard Bluetooth, I tried to sync it to my Motorola Bluetooth headset to no avail. Through conversations with Nokia and Skype, I found that the Bluetooth onboard is currently only used to pair with a mobile phone for access to mobile data networks. So unfortunately if you want to make a skype call on the N800, you’re bound to being physically hooked up with a standard pair of headphones.

Secondly, even though there is an onboard webcam, Skype currently does not take advantage of this capability for skype video calls. You can do webcam calls with a proprietary Nokia software package, but I’d like to see Skype embrace the webcam on the N800 so make awesome video calls wherever you can get a wi-fi signal.

Conclusion:

I have throughouly enjoyed the N800 in the time I’ve had it. It’s great to be able to get access to the web or IM networks without having to lug around my laptop. Should you buy the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet? Well that depends on what you need in a portable device. If you mainly want a media player and you think it’d be cool to be able to routinely surf the web, then I’d recommend you buy the iPod touch. Especially considering you can use iTunes to keep the iPod Touch and your media in sync between your computer and the portable device.

However if you consider yourself a technophile, the N800 is the device for you. If you are in support of open standards and expandability, the N800 is for you. As of the time of this writing, the iPod Touch does not have the ability to have 3rd party applications added to it. The N800 is built on linux and new apps are being continually being released for it.

The N800 is currently aroud $350 so I think it’s main target audience is geeks who constantly want to be in touch and who are in environments where they are constantly around a Wi-Fi device or have a smartphone that they can get online with.

What are your thoughts? Please leave a comment or call me and let me know!

-Jason

Random thought: I wish there was a synchronization utility for keeping this in sync with a PC, namely my MacBook.

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

Skype, the darling of software based VoIP products, maybe down right now; but I love what they ARE doing.  They’re communicating to their users.  On their blog they have updated their status multiple times.  After being a victim of Sunrocket’s demise, it’s refreshing to see a company doing it right.

Bravo Skype!  Thank you for being up front with us!

Flickr has added 7 new languages to their site including French, German, Korean, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and traditional Chinese, with other languages to follow. 

On another note - Zooomr just launched Mark III, their new user interface loaded with 250 new features.  It’s no secret that Zooomr has a very excited and fanatic user community.  One facet about zooomr that people love is that it’s been localized to so many different languages.  I think Flickr’s internationalization is, at least in part, a response to zooomr.

Congrats to Kris and Thomas for keeping them on their toes!

Yesterday Apple gave an additional option for those considering an AppleTV. It used to be you could only get it with a 40GB hard drive, but as of yesterday you can upgrade it to 160GB directly from Apple. Not a bad upgrade, but the new price is $399!

Wow. I’m an Apple fanboy, but $400 for a little box that plays my iTunes bought TV shows and movies on my tv in crappy resolution? hmm….no thanks!

Technorati Tags: apple, itv, appletv, iTunes, movies, TV

In the spirit of Scott’s recent blog post, here are the tech
items that have changed the way my day-to-day life goes.

Tivo (DVR) – I know this may be a little redundant but it’s
impact has been pretty powerful. It’s so
nice to be able to free yourself from the TV schedule and being able to watch
YOUR content when YOU want to. Yeah it’s
nice to be able to skip through some commercials, but just having the show
ready when you want to watch it is so valuable.
In fact, I just recently switched from DirecTV to cable and if Comcast
dind’t have a DVR, I wouldn’t have switched.
Actually I *hate* the Comcast DVR and when Tivo actually comes out with
an HD Tivo that isn’t $500+, I’ll buy one and kick Comcast’s piece of crap to
the curb.

VoIP (Internet telephony).

VoIP replaced my conventional landline about 2 years ago. I have had both Packet8 and Sunrocket. I was lucky enough to get Sunrocket last year

for $199 for 2 years. That works out to
be like 8 bucks a month. It’s so
liberating to be able to call someone whether they’re across the street, a
couple of towns away, or across the country.
No toll charges, included CallerID, Call Waiting, etc – sign me up!

iPod. The only reason I even listen to any radio nowadays is for news and traffic when I’m driving. Otherwise I have my iPod on. Again it’s awesome to have *my* content on *my* schedule.

Technorati Tags: tivo, iPod, apple, voip, sunrocket

I was riding my bike around yesterday and I came across this sign. You know how many real estate agencies have automated call-in where you can enter in a code and get information on a specific property? Well this Realtor is smart enough to allow us to txt for more information! Brilliant!

This is kind of like in Europe where if you’re waiting for a train, you can txt a code with the Stop ID and find out when the next train is coming. I wish Tri-Met would employ this in the Portland area, rather than they’re little call center that’s only staffed part of the day.

Technorati Tags: sms, realtor, real estate, txt, biking