Hasta La Gadget!

Let’s all feign surprise now, as Dell has just gone official with its worst kept, though perhaps sexiest, secret ever. The former Mini 5 has been christened the Streak and is launching at the beginning of next month. The UK will be getting the first bite at this cherry, with the rest of Europe following soon thereafter and the US a disappointingly distant third with a launch “later this summer.” If you’ve been living under a (Round) Rock, this is Dell’s big foray into the smartphone market: a 5-inch supersized Android handset, housing a 1GHz Snapdragon, a 5 megapixel cam, 16GB of built-in memory (expandable to 48GB via MicroSD) and a customized UI. Curiously, Dell’s opting to market the Streak as “the ultimate portable tablet pc” and would prefer that this device, albeit fully equipped to carry out cellular calls like a phone, not be called a smartphone.

We got a chance to play with it during a briefing in London recently, and frankly, aside from the snazzier paintjob, there’s nothing new to report. Just like the prototype unit we’ve previewed to exhaustion, the device on hand was running Android 1.6 and Dell’s skinning team hadn’t yet laid on the goodies that we’ve been promised. The battery is the same 1,530mAh cell as before, and we even managed to get the browser to crash in the exact same fashion that our own Streak exhibits on occasion. Now that’s consistency. We’re not being told the specific Android version that the Streak will ship with, but a couple of flavors are being mulled over right now. Till we get more info, we suggest sitting back, relaxing, and perusing the gallery below for the roaring red number that’s currently on show. It won’t be available at launch — you can have any color so long as it’s black — but “a range of colors and designs” will swiftly follow to sate any aesthetic concerns. Video and full press release after the break.

Update: The Carphone Warehouse listing for the Streak shows Android 1.6 as the OS with an “OTA upgrade available soon.” Pair that with word direct from Dell that Android 2.2 and Flash 10.1 are coming “later this year,” and you can connect your own dots [Thanks, Azza].

Update 2: O2’s website now has a precise date for us: June 4.

Continue reading Dell Streak official: exclusive to O2 UK in early June

Dell Streak official: exclusive to O2 UK in early June originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 May 2010 05:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

You’ve overclocked it and hacked it to run OS X and Android, now you can return your N900 to its native Maemo 5 OS with the launch of a version 1.2 software update. The V10.2010.19-1 bump now available in the UK (global on Wednesday) packs several enhancements including face-to-face video calling, improved Ovi Maps, and a better email experience with bundled Facebook IM Chat and the ability to accept or decline event invitations from the inbox. You’ll also see a number of new games when the Ovi Store switches over on Thursday.

And after much speculation, Nokia’s also admitting that MeeGo will not be officially supported on the N900 once the Intel / Nokia OS is device ready. Nokia will continue to support the core Maemo OS, however, as demonstrated by today’s update. Regardless, we’re sure that the N900’s active fan-base will deliver a MeeGo update outside of official channels, especially since the N900 is already being used as a platform for ARM-based MeeGo development.

[Thanks, Pasu]

Nokia updates N900 to version 1.2 in UK, closes door on MeeGo originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 May 2010 03:48:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  Nokia Conversations  | Email this | Comments

This article was written on August 27, 2007 by CyberNet.

I’ve been a huge fan of the online Google Reader ever since they launched the much needed redesign almost a year ago. Since then I think they’ve taken feed reading to a whole new level, and have drawn many users away from Bloglines.

Today Ask, who acquired Bloglines back in 2005, announced that Bloglines Beta is now available to the public. The great news is that the Beta was setup so that you can seamlessly switch between Bloglines Beta and the classic Bloglines, and any changes you’ve made in one account will show up in the other. As far as new features go there are quite a few that are notable:

• New look and layout that brings a bunch of AJAX goodness to your fingertips!
• Bloglines now has what I consider to be a built-in Netvibes. You can customize the new Bloglines Start Page with all of your favorite feeds, and it scales beautifully to fit the width of your browser.
  
• Reorganizing your feeds is as simple as dragging-and-dropping them.

And then there are three new views to read your feeds in:

• Quick-View: Browse your feeds only by their titles. This is one of the fastest tools I’ve seen for reading through large amounts of news.
  
• Full-View: This is essentially classic Bloglines, but there are a few enhancements.
  
• 3-Pane View: Think of 3-pane as a feed reader with an email application interface.
  

Right now I use FeedDemon (a non-free desktop app) to track all of my feeds, but picking between Google Reader and the new Bloglines Beta isn’t easy. The one thing that really sells me on the Bloglines now is the Start Page, which is super nice since you can put your favorite feeds there. Then anytime you go to read some news the first thing you’ll see is what’s most important.

You should also note that this is an early Beta, and more features are still expected a little bit later:

• Mobile – Bloglines on the cell phone (it’s already on the iPhone).
• Actions and activities involving a post – Save, Send, Share.
• Personalization Preferences – Edit a Feed or Settings.
• Creation of Disposable Email Addresses.
• Upgraded Developer APIs.
• Creation of a Link-Blog.

Putting Google Reader vs. Bloglines Beta is definitely tough right now, but if I had to crown a winner at this time I would still give the crown to Google. Although I’ve fallen in love with the drag-and-drop in Bloglines, as well as the customizable Start Page and resizable panes…none of which Google offers. So I’m kind of pulled in both directions right now. Who do you think is better?

Bloglines Beta Homepage
Source: ProBlogger

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Google Reader Goes MobileNewsGator Online RSS Reader Gets A Little BetterFirefox Changes The Way We Use RSS FeedsCyberWare: GreatNews Newspaper-Style RSS ReaderBloglines Lets You Subscribe To Other’s GMail Feeds

Looking for a cheap Android tablet that’s neither KIRF nor vaporware? You could do worse than the $199 Archos 7 Home Tablet, now shipping from Amazon a full week ahead of its “early June” release window. For three Benjamins less than that other slate, you’ll get a thin, spacious device that serves as an excellent media player, coupled with a sub-par Android 1.5 experience and a resistive touchscreen. If the lack of Android Market isn’t a dealbreaker, you can slap down your bills right after the break, but we’d recommend reading through our full review to see it in action (complete with video) and find out exactly what you’re getting yourself into.

Archos 7 Home Tablet now shipping, days ahead of schedule originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 May 2010 01:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink DAP Review  |  Amazon  | Email this | Comments

At the recent BevTech Japan trade fair we caught a display of Japanese regional ciders (sadly, non-alcoholic) and loved the retro labels so much we wanted to share them here.

On the left below there is the Unzen Lemonade (温泉レモネード) from Nagasaki, complete with charming lass on the front. The bottles on the right are the beet cider Sepia no Shigeki (セピアのしげき), from Hokkaido.

Local Japanese cider is apparently experiencing a minor boom. Asahi’s Mitsuya Cider might well be the only one you can see in your convenience store but, according to the Japan Soft Drink Association, the number of regional ciders has increased from 62 in 2007 to nearly 130.

The success of Showa era films like Always has made even younger consumers yearn for “nostalgic” tastes (including when the nostalgia is for a time before they were born).

Recent bloggers have also highlighted growing sales and the incredible variety of flavors from around the country. At BevTech alone we saw a wide range, including apricot, takoyaki, mango and yuzu drinks. Certainly beats endless variations of canned coffee!

Given that many of the ciders are completely new products, this “retro” could be said to purely be about the packaging and not much else. Another sure way to attract young consumers, though, is pricing: the drinks come pretty cheap, most bottles costing 2-300 yen ($2-3).

[Pic source]

We also like the Kamen Rider series of ciders too (above, left), which taps nostalgia not so much for furusato (old hometown) tastes but retro pop culture.