TechWire

Panoramic shots with Sony's NEX-5N

I'm getting very fond of the latest cameras. I've impressed with the capabilities, ease of use and extra features that Micro SLR (or 'four thirds') cameras bring. 

For the last week, I've had Sony's NEX-5N, an upgrade in Sony's NEX-5. The lens I've had is an 18-55mm (3.5-5.6) model from Sony.

I won't go into a long review here (that's what the paper is for, folks!). But what I've tried so far, I like a lot. In particular, I've enjoyed one 'gimmicky' feature very much: the panormaic sweep shot. Earlier this evening, I went out to take a few panoramic shots of a rather nice sunset in Elly Bay, Mayo, where I'm hanging out for the weekend.

Vodafone's new broadband dongle hits 14Mbs. (Yes, in the real world.)

Yesterday I got hold of Vodafone's latest mobile broadband dongle, a Huawei K4605 model. Its selling point is that it is the operator's first HSPA+ dongle.

That means that it has a (notional) top download speed of 42Mbs. Vodafone itself claims that its peak speed is likely to be closer to 27Mbs, which is still a phenomenal result -- if borne out -- for a mobile broadband dongle.

So far, I've only used it in Dublin's city centre. While I haven't got 27Mbs (or anything like it), I have recorded download speeds of 9Mbs and 14Mbs (see screenshot). Upload speeds have varied between 2.4Mbs and 2.9Mbs.

This is a very impressive result for a mobile broadband dongle.

Vodafone says that its HSPA+ (not to be confused with HSDPA) service is available in Irish cities, with the rest of the country to be upgraded "within 18 months".

The dongle costs €35 per month.

More Lumix GF3 messing around

A little more on the GF3, as described in my last post. This time, a few video clips.

I'm pretty impressed. (I'd be even more impressed if it had stereo recording.) Turn the resolution up to either 720p or 1080p (bottom right of YouTube frame) for true reflection of quality.

 

Panasonic Lumix GF3

Today I picked up a review unit of Panasonic's latest Lumix GF3.

It's one of those nice hybrid 'Micro SLR' (micro four-thirds) cameras with the body of a compact and a choice of interchangeable lenses.

The 12 megapixel review model itself came with a 14mm lens (no zoom). It has a nice one-touch video button, too (full HD). It's light and has a full array of manual controls. The touchscreen is a little clunky to use, but you can get around using the clickwheel.

Even though I find a prime 14mm lens a little limiting, there's no doubting the quality of the glass. Like other Micro-SLRs (Sony's Nex-5, Olympus's EP series) this is a gorgeous piece of kit.

The model I got -- with 14mm lens -- costs €500. A cheaper variant -- with a 14-42mm lens -- costs €450.

Here are a couple of test shots in the local park earlier this evening.

Irish operators' wifi dongle plans: a comparison

Looking for a 3G wifi broadband plan? It's a byzantine task trying to compare Irish operators' pricing and data plans. So here's a chart comparing Irish operators' (i) prepay wifi dongle plans and (ii) billpay wifi dongle plans.

 

Mobile operators sell two kinds of mobile broadband devices. One is a stick that slots into your computer's USB port. The other is an oval dongle (see picture above) that generates its own wifi signal. Up to five devices (laptops, iPads, smartphones, desktops) can use it at the same time. This is the one I'm focusing on in this post.

Note: this is aimed mainly at novices and beginners. In other words, where there has been a choice between various 30-day access packages, I've chosen the cheapest one available, based on an assumption that novices are less likely to be power-users. I've added in the higher data options in the fine print section below each table.

(i) PREPAY WIFI DONGLE BROADBAND PLANS

Operator                   3            O2         Voda     Meteor    Emobile

Dongle price:           €70         €60        €60        €70*         €60

1 day access            €5           €4           €3          €3           €3

1 week access          €10          --           €10         --             --

1 month access        €15         €20         €20        €20           --

Out-of-bundle MB      €1          €0.02*     €0.19    €0.02*     €0.02

 

(ii) BILLPAY WIFI DONGLE BROADBAND PLANS

Operator                    3         O2        Voda      Meteor    Emobile

Dongle price:            €10      €30        €40*        €40          €40

1GB                          €10        --            --            --             --

5GB                            --         --            --           €17           --

10GB                          --         --           €20         €20          €20

15GB                         €20      €20         €25*         --             --

20GB                          --          --            --           €25           --

30GB                         €26*       --            --            --             --

Out-of-bundle MB      €0.05   €0.02     €0.02       €0.02       €0.02

* Now here's the fine print (including data caps) on PREPAY plans:

3 Ireland: 1 day access up to 500MB. 1 week access up to 2GB. 1 month access up to 1GB. HIgher-priced 1 month packages are also available for up to 20GB (€35). 3 also has a current offer where pre-pay broadband dongle comes with 1GB of free data pre-authorised. However,  wifi dongle is currently out of stock. O2: 1 day access up to 500MB. 1 month access up to 5GB. Out-of-bundle charge of 2 cents per megabyte applies until the session is over and then you must take out a new full-price top-up. O2 also offers a "free 24 hour pass" when you initially sign up. O2 also has a special dangle purchase price of €80 with €40 credit. Vodafone: 1 day access up to 500MB. I week access up to 2GB. 1 month access up to 5GB. Add-on data allowances of 500MB (€3), 2GB (€10) and 5GB (€20) are available on prepay plans. Meteor: dongle is €60 if purchased online. 1 day access up to 500MB. 1 month access up to 7.5GB. Free access to Eircom public wifi hotpots with subscriptions. Meteor's high speed broadband access coverage is limited to large urban areas. Emobile: 1 day access up to 500MB. 1 month access up to 7.5GB.

* And here's the fine print on BILLPAY plans:

3: 30GB tariff of €26.24 is a promotional tariff, ends Feb 28th. O2: purchase price is based on 18 month contract. For 12 month contract, €50 purchase price applies. For 6 month contract, €60 purchase price applies. Vodafone: 15GB (€25) plan also gives higher speed, free modem ('up to' 14.4Mbs download) on 18-month plan. A reduced rate of €17 per month is available to Vodafone bill pay phone customers. Meteor: Prices based on 12-month contracts. For 18-month contact, 20GB product falls to €20 per month. Wifi dongle costs €20 extra if bought with 5GB or 10GB plans. Free access to Eircom public wifi hotpots with subscriptions. Emobile: 12-month contract applies

So which one do I use?

I've used wifi dongles from 3, O2 and Meteor, on and off. Of these, I've found 3's dongle probably to be the fastest and the widest in reach. Meteor gives a great perk in the form of free wifi at Eircom public hotspots, but its own high speed 3.5G coverage is far more limited than its rivals. I only recently started using O2's Hotspot wifi dongle and have found it to be a reasonably decent service.

OTHER ISSUES/QUESTIONS

1. How wifi broadband dongles work with your computer/tablet/smartphone: when you turn the dongle on, it emits a wifi signal (based on the sim card housed within it). You will see the dongle's wifi signature in your device's wifi detector. Simply choose it, enter the given password and you're connected. Up to five devices can access this wifi signal at the same time. The dongles are rechargeable: you will get between 3 and 5 hours use from a single charge, generally.

2. Where do they work? Anywhere that you find a 3G mobile phone signal (which is all urban areas and most towns or large villages). I have used dongles with little problem in remote West Cork (Beara peninsula) and rural Mayo (Erris and Belmullet).

3. Do they suffer form the same constrictions as mobile phone signals? Yes. So for example, they work less well in basements or deep inside a large building (unless there are extra transmitters in the building, such as a shopping centre). So if you normally have difficulty picking up a strong mobile phone signal in your home or your office, you will also have difficulty using one of these devices for your internet access.

4. What speed to they connect at? Generally 'up to' 7.2Mbs (download) and 'up to' 5Mbs (upload). (Some connect 'up to' 14.4Mbs.) In practice, it's about half that speed in urban areas and can be as little as a tenth of the advertised speed.

In general, I've been pretty happy with 3G broadband, mainly because I move about a lot. But it may or may not be the right service for you. 

8 Must-Have Apps For New iPad Owners

So you got an iPad for Christmas.  Nice, isn't it? Now comes the fun bit: looking for apps to use on the tablet.

There are over 300,000 of them out there: everything from spycams (currently the top-selling app) to fertility advice clinics. The App Store's charts will give you a good idea of some quality apps. But here are 8 apps that I've found to be truly excellent at various stages over the last six months.

When you're finished reading through them, why not take a look at my review of 15 quality business apps for the iPad?

1. Google Earth
The iPad was made for Google Earth. And vice versa. No other device shows off the application in as stunning a way. For the novice, it is an amazing thing to see the program zoom in from space to the driveway outside the house you are standing in. The application now incorporates Street View too, a brilliant way of researching other cities.
Price: free


2. Flipboard
Flipboard is a beautiful app that turns website feeds into magazine-style pages. Instead of scrolling, you 'flip' the page. You can customise it to suit whatever content tastes you have (its optional tech feeds include All Things Digital, TechCrunch and Engadget, for example). It'll take a little while to get the hang of customising it and will mainly appeal to frequent iPad users. But it's one of the loveliest, most creative apps out there.
Price: free


3. Angry Birds HD
It is the most successful game on either the iPhone or the iPad in the last 12 months. It's easy to see why: there are no high-octane laser cannons or RPG quests. Just a a few pissed-off birds looking for revenge on some cheeky pigs that have stolen their eggs. They get it by hurling themselves against the pigs' flimsy structures, using a giant catapult. What could be more fun? Very little, it would seem. The iPad version costs more than the iPhone version, but is worth it.
Price: €4


4. Facepad / Friendly
Bizarrely, Facebook has not yet made an app for the iPad. That has left the job of keeping you updated on Facebook to a number of alternative apps. While we've already mentioned Flipboard, either Facepad or Friendly would be the two best options for a standalone Facebook app. The Facepad, which has just launched is the simplest, cleanest-looking app. However, it's not optimised for the iPad's specs, so the screen is a tad blurry. Friendly is very nice app, giving you its own user-interface on your Facebook news, photos and friends.
Price: both free


5. Twitterrific
If you have a Twitter account -- and it seems very many of you do -- you've got to have a Twitter client for your iPad. There are some very nice paid Twitter apps. Osfoora HD has outstanding functionality and used to be a firm favorite of mine. But it kept crashing. And freezing. And crashing again. So it's back to (perfectly usable, efficient) basics with Twitterrific. Whatever you do, don't rely on Twitter's iPad app. It stinks.
Price: free


6. Pages
The iPad comes with Notes, a basic note-taking applications. It's fine. If you're looking for something with a little more power and flexibility, Pages is my choice. Based on Apple's word-processing program of the same name, it lets you easily incorporate images and other rich features into documents. And you can easily upload or email the pages out.
Price: €8


7. Documents To Go Premium
This is one I featured in the business apps roundup, but it's worth mentioning here, also. While Pages is a great standalone word-processing app, it doesn't incorporate Microsoft Word documents into it to work on. You can with Docs2Go. Not only Word, but Excel and Powerpoint, too. Not only that, you can synchronize the whole thing with your desktop computer's Microsoft Office suite.
Price: €14


8. Google
Yes, Google has its own iPad app. Granted, there's a (small) Google search panel in the default Safari web-browser app. But the Google app allows you to stay signed in using your Gmail or Google Docs account and keeps you updated if new communication comes in.

Christmas gifts on a budget: Archos 1 Vision 4GB MP3 player

iPod schmiPod. If you're on a tight budget and looking for an entry-level MP3 player with a screen and enough memory for well over 1,000 songs, this MP3 player is a good choice.

It can take songs in almost any digital format and lists them on its 1.5 inch colour screen. At this price, it's hard to go wrong.

Okay, the operation isn't as smooth as an Apple MP3 player. And there are no fancy features, such as photo-viewers, album-art or fitness software synchrinisation.

But here's its killer feature: €30 (€50 for an 8GB version). That's about a third of the price of an entry-level, colour-screen iPod.

You'll get it for €30 from Gamestop shops nationwide or from Pixmania.ie (including delivery charge).

Touchscreen gloves for the big freeze

Cold weather and touchscreen smartphones do not go together hand in glove.

Every time you need to take a call, you have to take a glove off. Why? Because wool just doesn't work on a touchscreen. Luckily, one canny manufacturer has stitched special conductive lining into the thumb, forefinger and middle finger of this pair of 'faux wool' (acrylic) gloves. The result is a fully functional phone and non-frozen fingers. They cost €15 including delivery from Firebox.com.

Alternatively, if you're still not getting a purchase on your touchscreen, you can try these forefinger-less gloves from Etre. They cost €35 (including delivery).

Get directions in Dublin on this website. (Walking, bus, Luas, Dart.)

Hittheroad.ie: I like this website. Just drag and drop two locations on the Google Map of Dublin and it will tell you how to get from A to B, using a combination of walking, bus routes, Luas routes or Dart routes.

Very simple.

Just happened across this site: the developer is a guy who responded to a tweet of mine.

Wimax v 3G: will 3G run into problems soon?

One of the things I didn't get around to reporting on at CES a few weeks back was Intel's Wimax stand.

It had several laptops on display from Dell and Lenovo (among other brands) that had the Wimax processor built-in. For those unaware, such a laptop can receive a Wimax broadband signal, if it's available. In Ireland, Imagine has launched Wimax and is building it out across the country's biggest cities and towns. The service offers speeds of 7Mbs (for €25 per month).

The Intel demonstrator knew all about Imagine. He knew about the frequencies involved and the general project underway in Ireland. This would tend to lend credence to Imagine's claims that Intel is taking Ireland seriously as a Wimax test-bed.

I asked him about competition, especially from mobile 3G networks, who will soon move to speeds of ("up to") 14Mbs and, according to the head of 3 Ireland, may hit 28Mbs by the end of 2010.

He made one interesting point about mobile 3G broadband. While the speeds can be turned up, there is a lack of spectrum to host very many people using the service at the same time. That means that if the numbers signing on to 3G broadband continue to grow at the pace they're doing at the moment, it doesn't matter how fast a download speed an optimum signal can deliver: it'll never deliver more than 2Mbs or 3Mbs at peak usage times.

Right now, though, 3G definitely has the edge over Wimax. The main reason for this is coverage. If you sign up for a Vodafone, O2, Meteor or 3 Ireland 3G dongle, you can use it just about anywhere in the country. (Okay, so there are a few place not covered. But the vast, vast, VAST majority is covered.)

You can also use it in some European countries (although watch out for data roaming costs, which are insanely expensive). At the moment, you can only use Wimax in a handful of Irish cities and not when you're on the road.

Dept of Comms: Cars, SUVs now need TV licences

Cars, SUVs, vans and motorhomes all need TV licences if gadgets used to watch telly are used in them. That's according to correspondence I've received from the Department of Communications. Even a tent needs one if you catch Seoige and Seoige on a Sinclair.

The Department also said that any premises using a laptop or home PC to catch a TV signal needs a licence. That is, unless it's accessing the signal online, in which case it's exempt.

Mobiles are exempt.

But using a Slingboxes would mean that any device that connects remotely to it will draw down a need for the host premises to have a TV licence. Wonder what happens if you use it on the bus, though?

What next?

What should I be doing on this blog?

Take a Loox At Me Now

Get ready for a spate of Our-PDA-Is-Actually-Fun type marketing pitches from big manufacturers in the post-summer season. First up is Fujitsu-Siemens with its new Loox N110, which "can play MP3s at the same time as navigating" with its on-board Navigon MobileNavigator 6 GPS device. It holds 20 hours of music and costs €370.

"Nokia's Blackberry" for Ireland next month

Nokia's E61 smartphone -- styled and presented like a Blackberry -- is to be launched "properly" in Ireland in July, according to Vodafone executives. This means that it will be available at a subsidised price on a mobile tariff plan, which this blog understands to be €200. The phone is available with push e-mail, similar to Blackberry's, and a Qwerty keyboard. No word yet from other operators as to whether they'll take it up, but it's unlikely.

Satnavs: useless in new cars?

Looking for a satellite navigation gadget? Watch out -- it may not work with your make of car. A growing number of vehicles are being made with athermic -- sometimes called solar -- windscreen glass. This type of glass has a thin layer of metal attached to it to block parts of the sunlight that heat a car up too much. Environmentalists like it because it reduces the need for air conditioning, thus saving energy. But sun rays are not the only thing the glass stymies. It knocks back lots of different kinds of radio signals, including those used by GPS satnav devices. I discovered this when trying to use Sony’s Nav-U50 in a Mercedes. (Not mine.) Other devices that have difficulty with the athermic windscreens are radar detectors and even mobile phone car kits. To get around this, luxury car makers are building satnav devices directly into the dash and wiring them to a small ‘shark-fin’ antenna on the roof of the car.

Cars built with athermic glass include new Renaults, Citroens, Peugeots, Vauxhalls, Audis, BMWs (X5s anyway) and some higher-end Mercs.