Its Electronica

Lately, I’ve been reading a ton about going “green.” We’ve recycled for years at my house, but most recently I started doing it the correct way, with the plastic and paper truly separated and left out for the recycle company to take away.

Of course, when it comes to electronics, that’s where I still need help. I have backup power supplies, laptops, desktops, printers, lights, and just about anything you can think of that’s electronic constantly running in my house. I guess that’s still going to be a work in progress.

As for my car, I drive a Toyota Camry, pre-hybrid days; and an SUV is my other car, so no chance of going “green” there.

In the spirit of going “green,” I jumped at the chance to give ANYCOM’s Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit a go. The package itself came with a sticker that said “GO GREEN!” on it, so that alone was a reason to take a second look. My favorite part, even before giving it a go, was the claim that it could charge itself using the embedded solar panel–no need to wrestle with more wires in my car.

The ANYCOM Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit is pretty straightforward in its implementation. It comes with a windshield mount, suction cups, and 3M tape (you can decide which method you want to use for mounting it), a car charger with USB cable (for those moments when you’re not charged up or there’s no sun), and a user manual written in 7 different languages.

For my test, I figured I’d mount it to the windshield using the provided suction cups, since the manual actually shows a picture for the “Recommended Installation Position.” I then took the Solar Car-Kit and placed it into the mount. Next, I turned the kit on by pressing the multi-function button / phone icon for 2 seconds. I was greeted with a booting tone and a flashing status LED. I then paired it with my iPhone, which required that I shut the Solar Car-Kit off again.

The mount is pretty straightforward

This is the preferred mounting spot. I tried it in other places, and the callers said that the voice quality did not change

The pairing process worked exactly as I had hoped with me shutting the Car-Kit off, then pressing and holding the multi-function button for 5 seconds. I heard two short beeps after the boot up tone, previously mentioned, and then searched for available devices through the Bluetooth interface on the iphone. The iPhone found the kit right away, and when I selected it, I entered in 0000 for the passkey. I then heard a beep letting me know that it was paired, and the iPhone interface also indicated that pairing was successful.

Next, I dialed a number. Seconds later I heard a confirmation tone right before the audible dialing and then moments later heard the person on the other end through the Car-Kit. The speaker quality was excellent, and the volume adjusted higher than I needed it, which is a huge plus for any car kit.

Notice that it was perfectly recognized by the iPhone

Features
The ANYCOM Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit has a bunch of cool features built-in. Most notably is the solar panel, which keeps the Car-Kit constantly charging as long as there is sun available. According to the manual, 3 hours of sunlight buys you 30 minutes of talk time, and the Car-Kit will continue to charge while you talk, too. If there’s no sun or you are paranoid, you can use the included USB cable and car charger and charge away from your cigarette lighter–a full charge takes 2 hours.

close-up of the solar panel, which is on the opposite side of the multi-function button

As for other features, it includes the usual feature set of a wireless car kit, but the execution of them is flawless. For example, you can redial the person you just dialed by just clicking the multi-function button. This is a great feature except that the button is so large that I found myself accidentally hitting it when raising the volume level at times. There’s also volume up and down buttons.

That’s it, button-wise, but those buttons do a lot. For example, to check the battery status hold the volume up and down buttons simultaneously and then release them. The battery status is indicated by the number of red flashes and a beeping sound. For example, out of the box, my unit beeped 3 times, indicating more than 5 hours of use was available. You can also check your Solar Power Charging Status by pressing the volume down button for 5 seconds when you turn the unit on. If it’s receiving enough sunlight, the battery status LED will glow red.

In addition to the above, you can mute your call (press the volume down button for 1 second), reject a call (press the multi-function button for one second when a call is coming in), answer call waiting (press the multi-function button for one second while on a call), voice dial, and more.

The only complaint I have about the Car-Kit is that while I was using it while driving on the highway, some callers complained of hearing noise. I moved the Car-Kit closer to my mouth, but it didn’t seem to alleviate the problem. Since they could still hear me, just with some background noise, I’m not going to fault the company, though some better noise cancellation (this one uses Echo-Cancellation and Noise Reduction) in a future version couldn’t hurt.

Overall, the fact that I really don’t have to think about charging the car kit and just have to remember to enable Bluetooth on my phone, is a HUGE plus. Also, because of its unique design, it can just as easily work as a hands-free kit outside of the car in conference rooms or for impromptu conference calls.

For that reason, as well as others, it has now become my preferred car kit, supplanting the Parrot MINIKIT and has also been awarded a Geek.com Pick.

You can read more about the ANYCOM Bluetooth Solar Car-Kit at Anycom.com.

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You splurged and got the ipod nano in your favorite color, so why don’t you have matching earbuds? Now you can with Griffin Technology’s “Tune Buds” which come in 5 snappy colors (Silver, Light Blue, Purple, Light Green and Red).

At $19.99, your’e not going to expect the quality of your Shure earbuds, but they’re surprisingly good, especially with the bass, which is always tricky.

The secret is not only the neodymium dynamic drivers, it’s the specially-engineered ear cushions, shaped to perfectly conform to the shape of the inside of your ears, which means enhanced audio isolation from outside distractions. Size matters, folks.

With 3 sizes of interchangeable soft washable silicone ear cushions included in every package, there’s a size for everyone, so no more “ear-fatigue.”

Next time I want to skip work, I wonder if my editor would accept “my ears are fatigued” as an excuse?

Kodak, a household name when it comes to all things photography, has just announced an enhanced Digital Picture Frame portfolio which consists of three different digital photo frames, ranging from 7″ in size to 8″ and 10″ to suit just about every need there is for a casual living room accessory. Not only does Kodak claim that these will look both sleek and stylish, they also boast a range of features including the recently unveiled Quick Touch Border for easier image manipulation and maintenance. All it takes with Quick Touch Border is a slide or touch of the finger at the highlighted sections, as this will not result in a smudged screen which will interfere with photo viewing.

Check out what the press release has to say about the three photo frames released - the Easyshare M820, M1020 and P720.

The KODAK EASYSHARE M820 and M1020 Frames display crisp, vibrant images and video on 8-inch and 10-inch (diagonal) screens, respectively. Set up is a snap and with an illuminated Quick Touch Border and Kodak’s unique scrolling feature; you can easily scroll through your images with a simple slide action. Your favorite MP3 songs can be played through built-in speakers, bringing a special dimension to any picture slideshow. Enjoy any JPEG picture, most video types (MPEG 1 and 4) and MP3 music using all the popular memory card formats (CF, SD, MMC, xD and MS). Boasting 128MB of internal memory, the frames can store up to 300 pictures and even more pictures when using the two convenient memory card slots or by copying digital files from a digital still camera, home PC, or USB Jump Drive.

The KODAK EASYSHARE P720 Frame features a 7-inch (diagonal) high-quality viewing screen and Quick Touch Border. In addition to USB flash drive compatibility, the KODAK EASYSHARE P720 offers SD, MMC, xD, and MS card slots, plus an additional SD slot to configure your frame with the amount of memory you want. The frame is not limited to tabletop display thanks to a new sleek white cord design, which allows for easy and neat mounting to walls.

The Kodak Easyshare P720, M820 and M1020 will retail for $119.95, $179.95 and $229.95 respectively.

Press Release

Some people like to express their moods and convey messages by the t-shirts they wear. So, if you have a lot to say or your mood swings like a wind chime in a hurricane, then you probably have a closet full of tees to express yourself. But what if you want to change your t-shirt message during the middle of the day? Well, unless you want to run home and change your clothing, you are kinda stuck with what you have. That is, until now.

Now, there is the T-Sketch T-Shirt, which features a whiteboard that will let you change the message on your chest as many times as you want. Want your message to stand out even more, no problem. The whiteboard on this tee can be fully illuminated and can even flash to really get your point across.

At US$60, this t-shirt isn’t exactly cheap. Considering, however, you can replace your entire closet of funky tees with a couple of these T-Sketch shirts, you are saving not only space, but also money.

Read more at DVICE.

Nuance Communications is putting some hands-free voice control into the Palm Treo and Centro smartphones. The Treo 755p from Verizon Wireless and the Centro from AT&T will both be loaded with Nuance VSuite. In addition to these models, the VSuite software is also supported on all Palm OS based Palm Treo smartphones.

VSuite gives users the ability to use their voice to dial by name, dial by number, address messages, look up contacts, and launch applications. If you want even more voice control, then Nuance offers a subscription service appropriately called Nuance Voice Control. This service allows the user to connect to the mobile Web with his or her voice in addition to dictating e-mail, text messages, and calendar entries. The service can even search the Web for business listings, news, weather, stock quotes, and sport scores using your voice.

Hands-free use of a smartphone can be pretty tough even with a Bluetooth headset. Nuance is offering users the ability to add some voice commands to their smartphones to make their Palm devices truly hands-free while at the same time allowing folks to remain productive while on the go. Best of all, no training is required, since the software uses simple commands.

Read more from the Nuance press release.

Apple has given us something for the weekend: a 2.1 update for Aperture. Normally a “point” update wouldn’t get a mention, but this one introduces a single feature that could be enough to wrest photographers away from its rival, Adobe’s Lightroom.

The feature is dodge and burn, and is not even real new feature, just an example plugin from Apple to showcase the new plugin support introduced in this release. This is big because now anybody can write image manipulation tools. Lightroom only supports export plugins. These additions mean that more can be achieved in Aperture without taking a trip to Photoshop. And all of those edits remain non-destructive. If you are shooting RAW (and if not, why not?) then your original files will never be touched.

The dodging and burning actually occurs in a new window, which pops up after Aperture has “prepared” the image. The first time takes a few seconds on a MacBook, but is no slower than opening the image in Photoshop. There are also settings to fade, saturate, sharpen, blur and add contrast. Very impressive stuff. This should have Adobe running to catch up.

Press release [Apple]

For iphone and other mobile phone users who rely on EDGE technology to get connected to the web using their mobile phones, the start of Nokia Siemens EDGE Evolution program comes as a welcomed development. Nokia Siemens has announced that as an initial salvo to the EDGE Evolution program, data speeds for GSM/EDGE capable networks will increase to 524kbps. The current EDGE standard for data speed is set at around 262kbps.

Nokia Siemens is set to implement what it calls the Dual Carrier EDGE solution via software upgrade by the third quarter of 2008. So you, iPhone fanatics will have to wait a couple of months more before you get to enjoy the same data speed that 3G-enabled mobile phone users are enjoying right now.

But the Nokia Siemens goodies don’t stop there. The Nokia Siemens Network also announced that initial plans for the next generation of EDGE technology, the EGPRS2, is on its way to full operation. Nokia Siemens is aiming to bring downlink speeds of its GSM/EDGE network up to 1.2 Mbps via EGPRS2. In case it sounds familiar to you, that’s because 1.2Mbps is the normal download speed that we get through broadband connection.

“By 2015, we expect to live in a broadband-IP world with five billion people ‘always on’ and therefore Nokia Siemens Networks is committed to protecting customer investments and continue to implement leading EDGE technology. Dual Carrier software upgrade is an easy and extremely cost efficient step to bring broadband user experience to GSM/EDGE networks”, says Ari Lehtoranta, Head of Radio Access Business Unit, and Nokia Siemens Networks.

It would be interesting to find out later on, if current users of the iPhone would still consider upgrading to the rumored 3G iPhone, which is being touted for release later this year, should the data speed of EDGE equal or even surpass the 3G data speed.

Via [jkOntherun] Read [Nokia Siemens Network]

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NTT DoCoMo of Japan claim to have successfully developed a molecular delivery system which it hopes to see incorporated into cell phones one day, allowing instant remote diagnosis of the user’s current health and emotional state. With a biochip of sorts integrated inside, it will be able to perform both biological and chemical analysis from the user’s sweat or blood. This analysis will be able to identify an array of diseases in addition to a person’s level of stress, anxiety or excitement. All generated data will be transmitted to a medical specialist over the cellular network, allowing doctors to keep tabs on their patients even closer than before.

AMD today announced the availability of multi-core desktop processing solutions. AMD’s updated desktop processor offerings include five new AMD Phenom X4 9000 series quad-core processors and two AMD Phenom X3 8000 series triple-core processors.

Representing the fastest quad-core CPUs AMD has ever offered, the new “50 series” Phenom X4 processors maximize performance for gaming and multi-threaded applications. Part of this new series is the AMD Phenom X4 9850 Black Edition with tunable performance. The AMD Phenom X4 9100e takes energy efficiency to a whole new level for high-def and digital media enthusiasts. And as the world’s only triple-core CPU, AMD Phenom X3 8000 series processors bring multi-core technology to a broader audience for higher performance desktop PCs.

Shade Pixel takes the road less traveled by rendering information on a deformable skin surface, resulting in a 3D texture output. Developed by researchers at the Design Media Lab at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), you will find a dot-matrix array of solenoids attached to a flexible Spandex skin. The right signals will cause the respective solenoids to move accordingly, creating characters that will rise and fall from the surface accordingly. Other than obvious use for the blind, are there any other practical use you can think of this at the moment?