Hasta La Gadget!

Back in the stone age — iPhone OS 2.x, that is — men wrestled wild boar to the ground with their bare hands, wore Members Only jackets, and connected to AT&T hotspots using an archaic, ridiculous process involving text messages, websites, and prayer. One previously unpublicized feature of the just-released OS 3.0, though, changes all that: connecting to your rightful WiFi coverage is now a seamless, no-brainer experience, which magically and very suddenly makes AT&T’s hotspots useful. If we had to guess, these guys are looking for every reasonable way to get iPhones from the 3G network over to WiFi as often as possible, and this should certainly help. Follow the break to see exactly what it means to have an iPhone in close proximity to a Starbucks, in case you’re curious.

Continue reading AT&T’s free hotspot access finally useful with auto-connection in iPhone OS 3.0

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

AT&T’s free hotspot access finally useful with auto-connection in iPhone OS 3.0 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Jun 2009 18:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Remember that Novatel MiFi 2352 we got our hands on a few months back? Well, it looks like it got a little makeover just in time for yesterday’s launch on Telefonica Espana. While we’re digging the look of the thing, it’s what’s going on under the hood that really piqued our interest: Adding to the usual WiFi connectivity and encryption, this guy sports two processors, a separate Linux OS and additional flash RAM for hosting and running third party apps accessible to its WiFi clients. If anything, this suggests that Novatel has “big plans for the platform,” as SlashGear notes. While available apps are currently limited to Alcatel-Lucent’s Nonstop Laptop Guardian (a user admin package for enterprise users) we’re looking forward to seeing what the company and its partners cook up in the future. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s commence with the unboxing. Shall we? Video’s after the break.

Continue reading Video: Novatel Wireless’ GSM MiFi 2352 launches on Telefonica Espana

Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Networking

Video: Novatel Wireless’ GSM MiFi 2352 launches on Telefonica Espana originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 16 Jun 2009 12:43:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’re all pretty spoiled in these digital days; not that long ago taking a look at a vacation’s worth of photos required a trip to the store, a couple of hours (or days) wait, and then the better part of an afternoon getting fingerprints all over a stack of poorly composed shots that you daren’t throw out because you just paid good money to have them printed. Now you pop a memory card into your computer, wait a few seconds for them to fly into an appropriately labeled folder, and then… probably forget you took them. It’s so much easier it’s hard to fathom the process getting even more simple, but that’s what Eye-Fi has done with its line of wireless flash memory cards, which beam pictures directly from your camera. The company has just announced the $149, 4GB Eye-Fi Pro to make the process even more direct, letting you send pictures straight to a computer while also adding some additional features that pros and semi-pros will appreciate. We put it through its paces after the break.

Continue reading Eye-Fi Pro wireless SD card hands-on

Filed under: Digital Cameras, Storage

Eye-Fi Pro wireless SD card hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Jun 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We can’t say for sure, but we’ve all ideas that Broadcom has spent the majority of the past month just rolling in dough that’s being begrudgingly transferred in from Qualcomm. During the downtime from that, however, it apparently whipped up three new Bluetooth 3.0 + WiFi modules designed to bring both connectivity options to netbooks and UMPCs that would otherwise go without. Said cards arrive in half mini-card form, which ought to slide into places where only one or the other used to fit. We’re told that the company is now sampling these very chips, with volume production expected to begin in Q3 2009.

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds, Wireless

Broadcom InConcert module brings Bluetooth 3.0 and WiFi to smaller devices originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Jun 2009 20:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Hold up AirTran — not so fast with those wild claims of in-flight WiFi superiority. If you’ll recall, the aforesaid airline proclaimed that it would soon be the first to have its entire fleet doused with Gogo, but it looks like Virgin America has swept in to claim that title. We should point out just how unfair the challenge is, though: VA has 28 planes as of today, whereas AirTran has 136. At any rate, we’re still thrilled to see airlines duking it out in order to get more WiFi to more fliers, and we fully anticipate that every new aircraft added to Virgin America’s fleet will be lit from day one. Now, if only they’d allow Skype functionality for more than just an Oprah demonstration, we’d really be playing with fire.

[Via Gadling]

Filed under: Transportation, Wireless

Virgin America lights up entire fleet with in-flight WiFi originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 May 2009 17:46:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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