New fiber optic cables promise to bring better, cheaper internet access to West Africa

Last summer, the lone undersea cable linking West Africa to the rest of the world was damaged, forcing Nigeria to fall back on slower and expensive satellite connections, and knocking several other countries completely offline until the cable was repaired. While that has been a relatively common occurrence to date, the chances of it happening again in the future are now considerably less likely. That’s because a second undersea cable project was just completed this summer, which is the first of two more cables planned, and just the beginning of a new round of investment in the region that the U.N.’s International Telecommunications Union says will vastly increase the bandwidth available by mid-2012. As the AP reports, that additional investment in the region promises to not only increase reliability, but significantly reduce the cost of internet access as well, which currently costs nearly 500 times as much as it does in the U.S. on a wholesale level. Exactly how much cheaper it’ll get remains to be seen, however, and there’s also still the issue of expanding internet access further inland, where infrastructure remains spread thin and in the hands of only a few companies that tightly control access.

New fiber optic cables promise to bring better, cheaper internet access to West Africa originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Aug 2010 15:59:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Xperia X10 family’s Android 2.1 upgrade coming by end of September, says Sony Ericsson UK

When we talked to Sony Ericsson for the Xperia X10 for AT&T review, reps informed us that the phone is upgradeable but no further information could be provided. Now, we can’t say if this latest bit is global or just for those across the pond, but the official Twitter account of SE’s UK arm wrote today that Android 2.1 is “due for release before the end of September this year.” Certainly a step up from the Q4 2010 time frame we heard previously, but again, we’ve no clue if this applies to the US as well — we’ve messaged a stateside rep and will let you know what we hear. A blessing for some X10 family owners, just a cherry on top for others.

[Thanks, Henrik]

Xperia X10 family’s Android 2.1 upgrade coming by end of September, says Sony Ericsson UK originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Aug 2010 15:37:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Finis Swimsense: Wrist Performance Monitor for Swimmers

finis swimsense.jpeg

If you’re a serious swimmer (i.e., you generally eschew water wings), you’ll love this new product just announced by Finis, maker of many useful products for aquateers. Similar to the Nike+, the Swimsense is a performance monitor that you wear on your wrist.

After you configure it for pool size, meters or yards, gender, and weight, the Swimsense keeps count of your laps, total distance, how many calories you burn, and your lap time, pace, and stroke count. You can sync it up with an Online Training Log to track your ongoing progress and to plan workouts. And this smart little gadget has built-in accelerometers and magnetometers that let it recognize four stroke types–backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly, and freestyle–  to help you further analyze your performance.

You can check your tracked information instantly, even as you swim, and even view up to 14 past workouts. Download apps and software updates instantly, as well (the company has a planned FInis App Store in the works).

Look for the Finis Swimsense to ship in time for the holidays, at a list price of $199.99.

BlackBerry Bold 9780 spotted in the wild yet again, this time in white

It’s still not official, but the BlackBerry Bold 9780 hasn’t exactly been making itself shy over the past couple of months, having turned up in the wild, on video, and now in the wild yet again in a white version. As before, the device appears to be mostly identical to the Bold 9700 it’s presumably replacing, with the biggest changes being a new 5-megapixel camera, 512MB of RAM instead of 256MB and, of course, BlackBerry 6 for an OS. Still no firm indication of a release date, but Phone Arena is speculating that it will launch in October, possibly on T-Mobile and AT&T. Hit up the source link below for a few more pics.

BlackBerry Bold 9780 spotted in the wild yet again, this time in white originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Aug 2010 15:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Best Gadget Is the One That Gets To Your House

"Happy Christmas Everybody!" by allerleirau/flickr. Used gratefully via a Creative Commons license

New e-readers, new tablets, and new game console accessories are all wonderful, but even in a down economy, just keeping up with demand will be a serious challenge for many gadget retailers — especially as we get closer to the holidays.

Over at Teleread, Chris Meadows looks at order-to-ship times for two hot gadgets, the Kindle 3 and the iPad. The new Kindle is being staggered out to customers according to when they were ordered (dates from Amazon’s Kindle Community Forum via KindleWorld):

  • Orders placed before 8 p.m. Pacific Time on August 1st will still ship by the August 27th release date.
  • Orders placed before 10 p.m. Pacific Time on August 5th will ship on or before September 4th.
  • Orders placed before 12 p.m. Pacific Time on August 12th will ship on or before September 8th.
  • Orders placed after 12 p.m. Pacific Time on August 12th will ship on or before September 12th.

Apparently it’s the new “Pearl” E Ink screens that are the problem; PVI can’t make enough of them for Amazon to ship its Kindles out the door, especially since other companies are clamoring for the screens too.

The iPad, however, which had crazy wait times for months after launch, is finally meeting demand. “Apple basically ran out of product the first weekend and didn’t catch up for months,” Fortune reports: “The iPad 3G launch had to be pushed back, the international roll-out postponed by a month, and shipping delays at Apple’s online store reached as much as three weeks (15 business days).”

But now Apple can ship iPads within 24 hours. iPhone 4? Not so much. Will they be able to keep it up through December? Can Amazon catch up? If demand remains high, it’s not a bad problem to have.


Tapping this app gives special-needs users a voice

A new wave of App Store offerings, including Proloquo2Go, is gaining favor over clunky and uberexpensive devices for those with communication disorders–and making assistive technology cool. pOriginally posted at a href=”http://news.cnet.com/8301-27083_3-20014973-247.html” class=”origPostedBlog”News – Health Tech/a/p

LG unveils ‘world’s thinnest’ 3D OLED TV

This Korean entry is a sizeable 31-incher that measures just about one-tenth of an inch and supports 3D playback.

Motorola XT300 mini portrait slider leaks out in clearer photos

We’ve been wondering about this oddly intriguing mini Motorola portrait slider since we saw it back in July, and a new set of leaked photos today hasn’t done anything to diminish our curiosity, since that keyboard looks pretty amazing. The reappearance of the red Droid eye seems to indicate this one’s eventually destined for Verizon, but we’ll see — we’re curious about the XT300 name being used in this photo set, which ties in with Moto’s GSM naming scheme, and Verizon’s reserved the Droid name for higher-end sets so far, while this thing looks like a mid-range Blur phone to us. Video after the break — and more photos and vids at the source link.

[Thanks, Thomas]

Continue reading Motorola XT300 mini portrait slider leaks out in clearer photos

Motorola XT300 mini portrait slider leaks out in clearer photos originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Aug 2010 14:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Microsoft launches Bing search app for Android

Bing for Android is Microsoft’s most significant Android contribution yet. While it isn’t quite up to par with the iPhone version, it’s still a smooth operator. pOriginally posted at a href=”http://www.cnet.com/8301-19736_1-20015066-251.html” class=”origPostedBlog”Android Atlas/a/p

What Will Apple Announce at Their Music-Centric September 1 Event? [Apple]

Apple has finally made their September event official, and it’s coming sooner than many expected—the “special event” will be held September 1 in San Francisco, and from the look of things it’s going to involve music. More »