BlackBerry Storm 2 review: first look

Thursday, October 15th, 2009

So RIM has dumped the mechanical click screen of the original Storm completely and has replaced it with a brand new system. And having spent nearly an hour in the company of its successor – the BlackBerry Storm 2 – I can confirm that it’s a huge improvement.

The Storm 2 uses a system of four software-controlled electro-mechanical actuators (which sit behind the screen), to give a sort of localised haptic feedback. Press the screen anywhere on its surface and it gives feedback in response – but this is like no other feedback vibration I’ve experienced before. Incredibly, pressing the screen feels just like clicking a button, and it’s very responsive too.

Coupled with the BlackBerry OS’s effective auto correction, I managed to get up to a rapid typing speed instantly, and because it’s multitouch, you don’t have to wait to finish one key press before beginning another.

(more…)

Acer 3D laptop review: first look

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009

Acer wasn’t satisfied with just unveiling the dual-booting Android and Windows 7 netbook at today’s global press conference: it also revealed the world’s first mainstream 3D laptop, the Acer Aspire 5738PG (at this point, I should point out to Acer that if Apple launched a 3D laptop it probably wouldn’t give it a terrible name like 5738PG).

(And before any pedants jump in to point out to me that, actually, all laptops are 3D – yes, I know.)

The background you see above is, actually, really in 3D. That is, it uses a combination of software, hardware and specially coated glass (if you’d like more detail than this hazy description, we wrote a whole feature dedicated to the future of 3D a few months ago), and you then have to watch the image using the polarised glasses supplied.

(more…)

Acer Android netbook review: first look

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009

Following Acer’s announcement of its dual-boot netbook that boasts both Google Android and Windows 7, I got an opportunity to spend some time with the netbook in question: the Acer Aspire One D250 with Android.

On this occasion, it isn’t the hardware I was interested in, but the software. For this is the first netbook PC Pro has seen to include Android as the OS, and the big question is – just how well can an operating system designed to work on a phone work on a full-blown PC?

(more…)

Did Stephen Fry and Twitter really score a victory for free speech?

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009

“What’s the difference between libel in print and libel on the web?” the trainer on a recent legal training course I attended asked rhetorically of his audience. His answer: “None whatsoever – the law applies to both.”

You’d be forgiven for thinking after the events of yesterday, however, that the rule of law had completely collapsed online. For while a team of smart solicitors effectively managed to gag The Guardian from revealing that oil company Trafigura was the subject of a recent question in Parliament concerned with the dumping of toxic waste, it wasn’t able to silence the Twittering classes.

Within hours of the judge awarding the injunction, bloggers were already untying the gag, openly linking the oil firm to the Parliamentary question – a practice that could have landed The Guardian editor in jail if he’d done likewise.

Meanwhile, thousands of Twitter users, including Twitterer-in-chief Stephen Fry, were bandying around the #Trafigura hashtag on tweets linked to the story. Subtle, it was not.

(more…)

Has video conferencing finally come of age?

Tuesday, October 13th, 2009

I spent yesterday morning with a company called LifeSize, whose CEO (Craig Malloy) was keen to suggest that 2010 would be the year when video conferencing became massive. (Strangely enough, LifeSize is a company that sells video conferencing products.)

He certainly gave the most impressive demonstration of video conferencing I’ve yet seen. We were in a small meeting room with room for around eight people, and sitting at one end was a 40in LCD TV.

(more…)

Why ignorance isn’t bliss when it comes to NDAs

Monday, October 12th, 2009

I have acquired a rather unfair reputation in the PC Pro office for being a bit of a moaner. However, I’ll happily (or should that be grumpily?) confess that one thing is guaranteed to get my dander up: non-disclosure agreements (NDAs).

These horrendous documents are becoming increasingly common in the technology trade. For those of you who are unfamiliar with their evil ways, they work as follows:

Company A decides to launch a new product, but it doesn’t want Company B or (more importantly) its customers knowing about it, just in case Company B decides to copy it or its customers decide to stop buying its current products and wait for the launch of the Shiny New Loveliness. So Company A invites a bunch of journalists along to see the new product, but before said hacks can get a sniff of the goods, they have to sign a five-page document promising not to mention said product before such and such a date.

(more…)

The Microsoft Windows 7 party pack in pictures

Friday, October 9th, 2009

The sacrifices we make. You see, PC Pro went undercover and applied for one of the Microsoft Windows 7 party packs, as advertised in the unmissable video below.

We’re still undecided whether this is a parody or a serious ad; we’d love to believe the latter, but we’re starting to wonder if Microsoft has a sense of humour. Worrying.

Our undercover plan worked, however, and I can now reveal exactly what you get in the box…

(more…)

The shame of Microsoft’s Media Center EULA

Thursday, October 8th, 2009

For reasons too boring to relate, I just had to fire up a Windows Media Center installation on an HP touchscreen device – the one that comes with every bell and whistle, and is actually quite a nice box.

In going through the TV setup for a DVB-T TV tuner which is built into the device, you get to this glorious licence screen. There are a half-dozen lines of text in that box, and then sixty-nine, yes SIXTY-NINE pages to scroll through. It’s 67 pages if you maximise the window to full screen on this large, high-res display. (more…)

The mystery of Vodafone’s mobile broadband filtering

Thursday, October 8th, 2009

Whatever your views on porn, I’m sure you will agree with me when I say that content filtering just seems like such a good idea. How nice to be able to decide what you see, especially when it seems that makers of adult materials go through occasional phases of trying their utmost to stick something in front of you when you’re looking for something else.

When that happens, I’d like my content filtering services not so much as a way of protecting my innocence, but more so I can just do my stuff without interruption. So I am having serious trouble understanding exactly what is driving the content filter on Vodafone’s 3G dongle service.

Some days, whole swathes of the net are invisible – not because they are known to be rude, but because Vodafone claims it can’t even decide whether they are rude, or not. Vodafone’s content filter is offline, so to be on the safe side it just bars all accesses to marked sites.

(more…)

The HTC Magic and Google Android: a Real World test

Tuesday, October 6th, 2009

Perhaps I’m a luddite but my mobile phones have tended to be, well, pretty basic since my first, screen-less brick 13 years ago. My priorities had been limited to good signal quality, long battery life, the best possible camera and easy-to-use texting. Occasionally, I’d look up the football or cricket scores on the BBC’s mobile site but that was about the limit of my ambitions.  The BlackBerry passed me by completely (I don’t like phones with QWERTY keyboards) and I’d had little interest in the iPhone due to its long, expensive contract options and umbilical connection to the truly loathsome (on a PC at least) iTunes.

And then I found myself tempted by the Apple beast just because I’d come across some teenagers mucking about with theirs, leaving me feeling jealous and inadequate (shallow, me?). So I nearly gave in. But I just couldn’t justify it. I’d either have to pay the best part of £100 for the phone (pay? for a phone?) or saddle myself with a £45 a month contract for two years: that’s an expensive and long-lived mistake to make. (more…)