Breaking: Sky Player for Xbox 360 confirmed for 27 Oct
Sky has announced to TechRadar it will be bringing its on demand Sky Player to the Xbox platform on 27 October.
The company leaked the new deal date in its recent magazine, but refused to confirm this was correct until now.
On-demand content
The Sky Player on Xbox deal means owners of the console will get access to on demand content, as well as live streaming, as long as they have the correct Sky account (or are willing to pay for a subscription).
We're still waiting for exact information on what it will bring, especially as it's missed the start of the Premier League season by some margin, but it will at least bring the satellite service to a new platform.
More to follow...
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In Depth: 12 Gmail Labs add-ons every Gmailer needs
Google is famed for its experimentation. One of the most fertile grounds for such testing is the Labs section of Gmail (or Google Mail depending on where you live) and it's possible to completely customise the way you use the service.
Gmail Labs is, in Google's own words, "a testing ground for experimental features that aren't quite ready for primetime".
As such, the items here aren't always the most reliable of add-ons, but these 12 are definitely worth a look. Some are extremely clever or help you avoid email faux pas, while others are simple productivity tweaks. You can turn on any of these features from the Labs tab under Settings in Gmail, or click the green conical flask icon in the top-right of your Inbox window.
1. Don't forget Bob and Got the wrong Bob?
The two strangest-named Gmail labs add-ons are also one of the cleverest. "Forget" will let Gmail suggest other contacts you might want to include on an email based on those people you email most often. Better still "Wrong Bob?" will check if you meant to include Bob Smith rather than Bob Jones – useful for making sure you don't email your boss with NSFW material. Not that you email that kind of stuff, obviously.
2. Clever previews
We've gathered together a few add-ons here, but Labs enables you to preview YouTube, Picasa, Flickr, and Yelp content directly within Gmail. Each is a separate add-on you'll need to enable. So if somebody sends you a YouTube video, you can view it directly from within your email. Lucky enough to live somewhere with Google Voice? You can play messages back directly from the notification email as well.
3. Message translation
Turn on this clever new add-on and Gmail will translate any email you receive in a language other than your own. We wonder if it'll work for Americans trying to understand Brit-speak?
4. Title bar tweaks
This is the kind of simple but oh so useful tweak we love Google to provide. It changes the browser title bar from "Google Mail - Inbox (20) – dang123456@gmail.com" to "Inbox (20) - dang123456@gmail.com - Google Mail". Eh? Well, it means that even if your browser window is minimised (or you have a lot of tabs open), you'll still be able to tell how many new emails you've got.
5. Tasks
Probably Gmail Labs' most essential add-on, Tasks shares a to-do list that's common with Gmail, Google Calendar, iGoogle and on gmail.com/tasks on your phone. If only it would sync with our corporate Microsoft Outlook tasks (sigh). Tasks has actually been so successful that it has now graduated from the Labs to become a Gmail feature proper.
6. Undo send
Really? Yep. If you've sent sexy speak to someone you shouldn't have, this add-on prevents divorce/unemployment/being taken to a tribunal. It's a failsafe that can stop messages from being sent for a few seconds after you hit the send button (a little "cancel" appears alongside the "sending" message). One of those things that you hope you'll never need, but it could save your life if you have a little "issue".
7. Search autocomplete
A small but potentially extremely handy add-on. Search autocomplete provides search suggestions for contacts as you type in the search box - very useful to find emails from a particular contact quick smart.
8. Quick links
This affixes an extra box to the left-hand column in Gmail that gives you a single-click access to a variety of bookmarked URLs. This is most useful for frequently-used searches, though you could use it for other resources you might commonly use.
9. Forgotten attachment detector
We've all done it, we've all been annoyed by it. This tool stops you from forgetting attachments by checking your mails for mentions of files in emails with no attachment. Save that face!
10. Create a document
If you've enabled Gmail keyboard shortcuts, you can create a Google Document automatically from an email conversation. Simply press "g" then "w".
11. Multiple inboxes
This clever tool enables you to add multiple lists of emails in your inbox. That means you can show a saved search, or messages with a certain label or starred messages - all at a glance.
12. Mouse gestures
We like this a lot. Enable this add-on and you can use your mouse to navigate with gestures. Holding right-click and moving the mouse left takes you to a previous conversation, while an up movement will take you back to the inbox.
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Review: Pentax K-x
Pentax has been a strong name in the burgeoning budget DSLR market for a long time. The Pentax K-m, for instance, is a surprisingly good 10.2MP camera that can be had for as little as آ£330.
The آ£700 Pentax K-x continues in a similar vein. Indeed, hold both cameras at the same time and it's only the branding that allows you to tell them apart.
Their outward specifications are identical - they're the same size and almost exactly the same weight, and they both have a 2.7-inch LCD on the back. The layout of the buttons on the back of the cameras is the same as well.
That means all the changes are internal. The K-m's PRIME (Pentax Real Image Engine) has been replaced by the PRIME II engine, and where the older camera has a 10.2MP CCD sensor, the new K-x has a 12.4MP sensor.
It isn't just the pixel density that has gone up - the K-x's sensor is a CMOS chip, and that means the headline act isn't bigger pictures, but HD video.
Like most of the HD-capable DSLRs we've seen, such as the Nikon D300S, the Pentax produces excellent quality video. It records in Motion-JPEG AVI format, like Nikon's HD-capable cameras, and you can choose from 1,280 x 720 (720p) at 24 frames per second or 640 x 480 (480p).
If you've handled the Pentax K-m the K-x will feel familiar as soon as you pick it up. It's solidly-built and arguably more comfortable than the Canon 500D.
The grip is larger, which makes it easier for those with big hands to keep hold of. It's certainly more comfortable than cameras such as the Olympus E-450. Only the front grip is rubber-coated, but we didn't feel in danger of dropping the K-x during testing.
The controls all fall neatly to hand and the control wheel and power switch both turn with a satisfying click. The shutter has been rated by Pentax to 100,000 actuations, and overall the camera feels like it should take its fair share of knocks. The flash is electronically activated via a button on the left hand shoulder.
The menu system looks very basic compared to either Canon or Nikon's. The font is blocky and in terms of navigation the K-x falls behind. The quibbles are largely aesthetic, though, and after a while we were happy that we could get to the K-x's main features.
The four-way directional pad at the lower right of the body doubles as a set of shortcut keys. Pushing Up gets you to the timer and continuous shooting modes, while Right allows you to set the ISO and so on. It's a handy way of compensating for the relatively - if unsurprisingly - low number of controls on the body itself.
Click here to watch Pentax K-x test video in HD
Like Nikon's Motion-JPEG cameras, video quality from the Pentax K-x DSLR is excellent.
In our tests the K-x produced terrific colour accuracy and fine detail, and the chief selling point of HD video on a DSLR - increased control of depth of field thanks to the large sensor - is in evidence here.
And, unlike Nikon's HD-capable DSLRs, which can shoot HD video for a maximum of five minutes, the K-x doesn't have such a tight restriction.
Pop in a 4GB card and you can shoot roughly 11 minutes of 720p footage. An 8GB card can accommodate just less than 24 minutes, which compares excellently to the Nikon D5000's five-minute maximum.
The Pentax K-x also allows a measure of manual control in video mode. The Canon 500D famously prevents you from setting the aperture yourself in video mode, which reduces your control over the depth of field or brightness in the final video.
The K-x gives you control over the aperture by default - just like in still mode, the aperture blinks on the display if you're going to end up with an under-exposed video.
You can't set the ISO yourself, but having control over the aperture will come into its own if you buy a fast f/2.8 lens. The Nikon D5000 also allows you to set your own aperture in movie mode.
It's not perfect
The K-x is imperfect, though. The so-called 'jello' effect, in which objects which move laterally across the frame appear skewed to one side, was a frequent bugbear during our testing. Fast pans, or vertical objects moving from side to side often wobbled badly.
The Pentax seemed more sensitive to this than other HD-DSLRs we've tested, with even small amounts of camera shake producing pronounced wobble.
It's easy to avoid, as long as you stick to static shots rather than trying to shoot from a moving car, for instance, but it's a restriction we'd rather not have, particularly when our test footage was otherwise so good.
Another unwelcome restriction is the inability to use autofocus while recording video footage. Although this is a hampered feature in other cameras - the 500D uses only contrast detection in video mode - it's something beginners will expect.
Work-arounds
Another way to help avoid the jello effect is to enable the excellent SR (shake reduction) feature.
Pentax's SR works in the same way as Sony's SteadyShot system, by adjusting the sensor inside the camera rather than steadying elements inside the lens.
The chief advantage is you get optical image stabilisation on virtually every lens you can buy. (Pentax points out that screw-mounted lenses - which you need to use with an adaptor anyway - and 645- and 67-system lenses might not work.) So even more expensive fast telephoto lenses will have a few stops of stabilisation.
The system is very effective. At the far end of the bundled 18-55mm kit lens, using SR mode effectively cancelled out camera shake, which is excellent news for those caught in fading light without a tripod, or shooting video.
It also largely cancelled out all but the most severe cases of frame wobble, although it was still something we saw from time to time.
The lens is also one of the best we've seen bundled with a camera. The 18-55, f/3.5-5.6 specifications are nothing special, but it was sharp in our tests. It also feels beautifully smooth and well machined, both on the zoom and focus rings.
This makes it easy to make minor adjustments. And, despite the all-plastic construction it feels better-built than the 18-55mm IS lens that comes with Canon's consumer cameras, and at least as good as the 18-55mm Nikkor lens you get with the Nikon D5000.
Image quality from the Pentax K-x was generally superb. The sharp lens helps immensely, but we also saw accurate, vibrant colours and generally low noise.
The K-x's ISO range can be pushed to the equivalent of 6400. Noise is definitely a factor at this setting, but we found if we kept the shutter speed as fast as possible we were able to get reasonable shots nonetheless.
Shots taken at ISO 3200 were excellent. There was some evidence of the K-x's noise reduction algorithm's stepping in and producing a little over-sharpening, but bumping up the ISO is by no means a last resort.
The K-x also has a slight numerical advantage over other mid-range cameras. Most mid-range DSLRs - the Canon 500D, Nikon D5000 and Sony A200 and A330 for instance - have a maximum shutter speed of 1/4000th.
The maximum shutter speed of the K-x is two-thirds of a stop faster at 1/6000th. This extra speed isn't much use on its own, but if you plan on buying particularly bright lenses it could come into its own for shallow depth-of-field jobs.
The only slight disadvantage the K-x has in feature terms is the lack of white balance bracketing, which is a fairly standard inclusion of a camera of this price.
The Pentax K-x follows the cheaper K-m in its use of AA batteries. This makes it unique compared to competitors - Sony, Canon, Nikon and Olympus all use rechargeable lithium-ion batteries in their DSLRs.
The use of AAs is a disadvantage out of the box. You get four non-rechargeable lithium batteries with the camera: according to Pentax that's enough for 640 shots, or 420 shots if you use the flash half the time.
That's reasonable - we took well over 270 shots plus videos in a single day and didn't run out of power. However, if you want to recharge the batteries you'll need to buy four Ni-MH AAs plus a charger - count on spending آ£20 on a complete set.
The use of AAs does have its advantages though. Firstly, Pentax claims that four rechargeable Ni-MH batteries will be enough for 1,100 shots with 50 per cent flash use, which far outstrips the Canon 500D's lithium-ion battery (400 shots) or the Nikon D5000's (510).
Secondly, if your proprietary lithium-ion battery dies in the middle of nowhere you're stuck until you can find somewhere to plug it in; AA batteries can be bought virtually everywhere on Earth.
The K-x's performance is typically DSLR-like. We measured its start-up time at 0.20 seconds, which unless you have the twitch muscles of a cheetah is much quicker than you could bring the camera to bear on a subject.
There's no shutter lag to speak of and unless you're in continuous shooting mode the time between shots is negligible too - in our tests we measured times as fast as 0.3 seconds between shots.
There are two continuous modes - Hi and Lo. Pentax claims the high mode should produce speeds of up to 4.7 frames per second if you keep your finger on the shutter button. We took 11 shots in 2.16 seconds, which is actually slightly faster - 5fps.
That's impressive for a mid-range camera. It's not so proficient at prolonged bursts - after around 17 shots speed slowed, and over the course of 11 seconds the K-x averaged 2.21fps. At its peak, though, the K-x is faster in continuous mode than either the Canon 500D or the Nikon D5000, although it only squeaks past the latter.
We liked:
The K-x's image quality really stands out, and the kit lens is superb. We also like the build quality, which feels tough, and the ergonomics. And, while its video capabilities are a little hit and miss, the ability to fire off a 720p video with such gorgeous colours and depth of field makes the K-x versatile.
The screen is bright and sharp, and easily visible in Live View mode. We also like the layout of the controls on the camera - after a few days we were zipping through the menus and changing settings at lightning speed.
It's a flexible camera - there's enough help in the menu system to make it a good choice for beginners (although not as much as the Nikon D3000) and enough high-end features and speed to allow plenty of headroom, making this an excellent choice for a first DSLR.
We disliked:
The biggest problem the K-x currently has is its price - it's brand new and that means you'll pay around آ£700 for the version we've reviewed.
That puts it at a distinct disadvantage against the excellent Nikon D5000 and Canon 500D both of which are better value for money. You should keep an eye on the K-x's price, though, as it's likely to drop significantly in the run-up to Christmas.
Other than that there's little to dislike. It's less comfortable than the Nikon D5000, and to us it appears to produce worse camera shake in video mode, which isn't ideal if you're looking for a one-size-fits-all camera.
Whether or not you like the use of AA batteries will be a personal choice - the upside is around twice the battery life of most mid-range DSLRs. The downside is that you'll either need to regularly replace batteries, or spend آ£20 on top of the already steep price to get a charger and a set of rechargeables.
Verdict:
The K-x takes absolutely superb pictures, and that's the main thing.
It handles noise well and the extended ISO range isn't just bragging on the specification sheet - there are times when it's genuinely useful.
The K-x also handles superbly and the bundled lens is outstanding. HD video is nice to have and undeniably high quality. There are compromises to accept, but that's true of all HD-capable DSLRs at the moment.
The K-x is worse than some - the lack of on-the-job focusing isn't ideal and sensor wobble can be severe. But if HD video is an occasional hobby and you're looking for a good, well-made DSLR to grow into, the K-x is a strong possibility.
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Interview: Sky Songs takes on iTunes
The Sky Songs beta launches on PC and Mac this month, with TechRadar being treated to a first-look preview of Sky's new subscription-based music streaming and download service.
First impressions? It seriously rocks.
The service is very much based on the Spotify-model of offering instant access to stream or download DRM-free MP3s from a library of over 4,000,000 tunes (and growing).
Firstly, the really interesting news about Sky Songs is the fact that Sky has decided to partner with respected pop music blog Popjustice and the UK's leading online celeb gossip destination Holy Moly! to provide editorial for the site, meaning it's not just a place to get music, but to read about it too.
And while the service will only be available via PC and Mac initially, Sky Song's General Manager Justin Moodie informed us that the editorial features on Sky Songs that provide "useful information on music and artists and so on... is really something different from what other sites are offering."
"It's quite irreverent, quite light-hearted, giving you recommendations of what's going on... and this is obviously on top of the recommendation engine built into the service."
If you wish to stream your music, then tunes play instantly through Sky Song's web-based player – providing of course you are logged-in to your account. Or if you wish to download your MP3s, the service will automatically open up your default media player – iTunes, Windows Media Player and so on.
"The majority of the tunes on there are 320Kbps MP3s," says Moodie. "We've asked for the highest bit-rate the labels can provide."
Easy to play and share
The service also allows you to share your playlists with friends, as well as posting links to your favourite tunes and playlists via all the major social-networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.
So why the urge to make it a paid-for subscription model and not follow the Spotify model of offering an option of a 'free-to-end-user' streaming and download service funded by advertising?
"It is who Sky are. What we do is we offer subscription services to customers and try to make them easy to use and great value. So we have followed that model from our existing businesses with Sky Songs.
"Also, our rates are very competitive," adds the Sky Songs boss. "On the other side, you can choose to dip in and dip out. You can try out one month's session then choose to leave us for a month or two and then come back if you like. That's fine with us."
Essentially Sky's service is a hybrid between the streaming model (Spotify) and the download model (iTunes) pitched squarely at mainstream pop music fans.
Discussing plans for further, deeper integration with the likes of Facebook and MySpace, Moodie adds that "at launch you will be able to link and mention us on those services and going forward we are looking at what would be most appropriate with such services... what we are very keen on is making sure whatever we do makes sense [for Sky Songs].
"Sky Songs is not a me-too proposition. We are leading the way with the business model. We are leading the way with the service."
As for future plans to bring Sky Songs to other devices – mobile, Xbox 360 and set-top box – Moodie tells us: "At launch this is PC and Mac only, but Sky Songs on Xbox is something that we are discussing.
"It is no surprise. We are absolutely committed to pushing this beyond the PC. We think it is a fabulous proposition. We think mobile platforms and the connection with our customers in their homes via set-top box and Xbox is going to be great. There are currently technical issues with us bringing the service to set-top box, but we think that this is something we can overcome."
Taking on iTunes LPs
Does Sky have any plans to offer any additional 'added-value' type services to music consumers – along the lines of Apple's recently announced iTunes LP format, which offers a whole host of extras such as exclusive visuals, videos, lyric sheets and the like to fans, on top of the MP3s they are downloading?
"It is absolutely something that we are looking at. However, as this is an online service, we could have delayed the project indefinitely until it was absolutely perfect in every way. But at some point we want customers to start using this service and to start enjoying it.
"So we are launching in beta. We think the service is of a superb quality and it's fantastic. But it also recognises the fact that we are going to be making lots of improvements as we go along."
Interestingly, Sky Song's recommendation engine is powered by Gracenote – the service that is also used by Apple's iTunes.
The paralysis of choice
'What should I listen to?' is often the question that pops into your head when you use a music streaming service. And on many occasions users will choose, quite naturally, to listen to what they know and what they like. Or what their friends recommend.
Yet while collaborative, user-generated playlists and the like are going to be an important part of the Sky Songs offering, Justin Moodie is adamant that the service has to have a strong editorial voice to appeal to British music fans.
"We think we have got a really strong and clear voice, editorially. We think that customers will enjoy and like to hear from us and like what we have to say," says the Sky Songs boss.
"I mean, when you sit down in front of a service where there are already over four million tracks instantly available, you are almost paralysed by choice. Our [editorial] brief to Popjustice is simple. We want entertaining and interesting stories linked to our music and to playlists that customers can use to discover and re-discover music."
Moodie demonstrates this by showing off recent editorial features on Sky Songs relating to the recent tragic deaths of Boyzone's Stephen Gately and 'King of Pop' Michael Jackson. Alongside each story there is a playlist tab, that will take users immediately to that artists' (or bands') entire discography.
Basically, he shows that the service lets users choose "any album, any playlist, anything that they are engaged with... and add them immediately to their own playlists."
Sky loves Holy Moly!
And what was the thinking behind employing Holy Moly! and Popjustice to provide the editorial and music features for Sky Songs?
"Well, we love them, we love their irreverent style and – while we are Sky and the sorts of things Popjustice does might not seem entirely appropriate for us – they are professionals and they understand UK music and they are great guys to work with."
Sky Songs launches (in 'beta') on 19 October and is going to cost from آ£6.49 a month. Customers can then purchase music per-track (from 65p) and per album (from آ£6.49).
With over 4 million tunes up there already, it is well worth checking out. If you are already a Sky broadband customer, you also have the carrot of a free downloadable album worth آ£6.49 to tempt you to give the service a month's trial to suck it and see if you like it more than other streaming and download services you currently use.
Plus, in addition to Sky's deals with the likes of EMI, Sony Music, Warner Music and Universal, they also have deals in place with a range of independents and distributors such as the Beggars Group (4AD, Rough Trade, Matador and XL recordings).
Whether it is going to truly be a 'Spotify-killer' and take a significant chunk of revenue away from Apple's iTunes (the elephant in the corner of the room) of course remains to be seen...
Stay tuned for TechRadar's fully-detailed review with Sky Songs early next week.
In the meantime, for more (and to sign up for the beta launch on October 19) head over to Sky Song's website.
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Rumour: Nvidia Tegra-powered Nintendo handheld due 2010
Rumours and speculation that an Nvidia is readying an Nvidia Tegra-powered hi-def handheld gaming console are spreading across the internet.
But are these 'next gen DS' rumours based on any substantive information from sources in the know?
The latest reports emerge from BSN news, that claims: "Incredibly how it may sound [sic], from what we are hearing nVidia is dead on achieving its course. With a very aggressive approach, the company managed to sway not just Microsoft with the Zune HD multimedia player [based on Tegra APX 2600] or Samsung's BeatPlayer M1 [also known as YP-M1], but also a long-time IBM and ATI customer - Nintendo."
An immense deal
Nintendo owns 68.3 per cent of worldwide market share of the handheld gaming market with DS, DS Lite and DSi. If the new turns out to be true, then this is an immense contract for Nvidia to have won.
"According to our confidential sources," that report continues, "Nintendo is going to use Tegra System-on-Chip processor for the successor of DS/DSi handheld console. Unlike the current design, nVidia offered a single-chip proposal to Nintendo, a company famous for keeping the hardware platform absolutely simple."
BSN goes on to speculate that a new next-gen DS handheld could well be fully backwards compatible with current DS and DSi games "given the fact that Nintendo DS hardware is based upon 16-bit and 32-bit ARM cores."
What we really need to know is whether or not such a contract has been signed. And, if so, whether or not it then looks likely that Nintendo will bring out a handheld console in 2010 with considerably more processing grunt and graphical power than any commercially released handheld gaming console to date.
TechRadar has contacted Nintendo, Nvidia and ARM for comment.
Stay tuned!
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Acer takes lead in Android race with Liquid
Acer has announced its new range of Android smartphones, dubbed the 'Liquid' series, and has brought with it some industry leading specs too.
The phone will be packing Android 1.6, which allows manufacturers to release devices with a higher resolution screen. This has resulted in the industry's first QVGA (800 x 480 pixel) screen, giving the best experience on a mobile for video and web browsing.
The grunt is there too - Acer has nabbed the Qualcomm Snapdragon 1GHz processor, previously used in the TG01 and forthcoming the HTC HD2, and this will help speed Android up no end.
Sense and then some
And in keeping with today's Android skins - Acer has promised YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Flickr integration with contacts, meaning you're able to interact with them easily from within the phone.
The overall Android experience is very similar to the HTC Magic from the outset - apart from some scrollable tweaks - but it's under the bonnet that is going to set this phone apart from the rest, with 3D graphics possible thanks to the upgraded processor.
There's no official UK release date as yet, but we've heard that it will be coming around December this year, so you might want to put it on your list to Santa.
We're publishing a full hands-on with the phone later today, so get ready for a full range of pictures with the Acer Liquid Android phone.
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Jobs voted biggest teen entrepreneurial pin-up
Steve Jobs has been voted the entrepreneur most admired by teenagers, according to a new report.
In a survey which was carried out by 1,000 teens, the Apple boss came out on top, with 35 per cent of the votes.
Others who were voted for in the survey, which was created by Junior Achievement, include: Oprah Winfrey (who notched up 25 per cent) and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg (who got a mere 10 per cent of votes).
Making a difference
Speaking about the survey, Jack Kosakowski, President of Junior Achievement, said: "We live in a celebrity-obsessed culture, so it's no surprise that teens admire famous entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs and Oprah Winfrey, who have built brands around their personas as well as around their products.
"More importantly however, given that many teens show interest in entrepreneurship, we want to provide them with the tools to start successful businesses."
While Jobs garnered 35 per cent of votes, of those, 61 per cent actually selected him because he "made a difference in/improved people's lives or made the world a better place." 33 per cent chose him because of his "success in multiple fields."
We're assuming this means making computing, PMP and phone products, like the iMac, iPod and iPhone. And not in relation to his secret past as a farmer.
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Jobs voted biggest teen entrepreneurial pin-up
Steve Jobs has been voted the entrepreneur most admired by teenagers, according to a new report.
In a survey which was carried out by 1,000 teens, the Apple boss came out on top, with 35 per cent of the votes.
Others who were voted for in the survey, which was created by Junior Achievement, include: Oprah Winfrey (who notched up 25 per cent) and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg (who got a mere 10 per cent of votes).
Making a difference
Speaking about the survey, Jack Kosakowski, President of Junior Achievement, said: "We live in a celebrity-obsessed culture, so it's no surprise that teens admire famous entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs and Oprah Winfrey, who have built brands around their personas as well as around their products.
"More importantly however, given that many teens show interest in entrepreneurship, we want to provide them with the tools to start successful businesses."
While Jobs garnered 35 per cent of votes, of those, 61 per cent actually selected him because he "made a difference in/improved people's lives or made the world a better place." 33 per cent chose him because of his "success in multiple fields."
We're assuming this means making computing, PMP and phone products, like the iMac, iPod and iPhone. And not in relation to his secret past as a farmer.
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In Depth: 7 tech falls from grace
Watching something that was once great go through the tragic decline from essential to average to laughing stock and finally horror show is a sad yet fascinating part of the world of technology.
It's not the same as watching a much loved product become obsolete through the sheer passing of time, since that at least has dignity; rather it's watching changes in direction and development warp something into such a horrific mess that you just wish somebody would take it into the back garden and put it out of its misery with a shovel.
Here are seven of the saddest cases of recent years.
1. Operation Flashpoint
More of an exercise in brand necrophilia than a true sequel Codemasters recently released its follow up to the classic military simulator Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis. Using a completely different development team, setting, characters and engine the new game, Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising owes more to Call of Duty and Rainbow Six: Vegas than the original.
Although Dragon Rising is not a bad game on its own merits, expectations from the original lead to a lot of unwelcome comparisons and disappointed fans who wanted a true sequel as opposed to one more contemporary shooter.
2. Facebook
At first this was a great idea: find your friends, post up pictures, send messages, all things that are good.
Facebook now is more a personalised spam cannon, popping up in the email inbox every day to ask stupid questions about people you haven't seen in years. The good stuff is still there, but is it worth the dig?
3. Sonic The Hedgehog
Oh Sonic, what have they done to you? Remember the first Sonic the Hedgehog game on the Megadrive? It was as good as Mario, hell Sonic 2 was probably better, and that's praise indeed for an orthodox platformer.
Sonic had it all, his own console, his own schtick, he could have been bigger than Kong. Now look at him; sharing a Winter Olympics game with Mario.
4. Steam
In many ways Steam is great and getting better: one stop games shop, update provider, decent social networking, even a pretty nifty chat interface.
What's not to like? The answer comes from the prices. In December 2008 Steam changed its prices from dollars to local currencies. On the one hand switching from $ to آ£ on the prices let's you know what you're spending, but on the other hand simply swapping the currency with no consideration for the exchange rate increased the cost of most games by more than a third.
Steam is now one of the most expensive games distributors around and has gone from a greener, more convenient alternative to buying a game on disk to a luxury option.
5. Nintendo
Plenty of people love the Wii and it has been a clear and resounding commercial success. But there's something more than a little tragic at seeing what was once a cutting edge console and game developer reduced to flap-happy Wii-mote sports games and rolling out another title in the Zelda franchise every couple of years. It's like if Ferrari ditched sports cars to make shopping trolleys.
6. Resident Evil games
While some games, such as the Rainbow Six series, can trace the decline of their unique selling points to a need to adapt for the console market the Resident Evil series has always been console based.
So when Resident Evil 5 waddled out of the paddock having abandoned even the pretence of being a survival horror game in favour of becoming just another high octane third person shooter it was a dark day. Not that it was bad, it just wasn't Resident Evil. Another series embraces the generic. So it goes.
7. MySpace pages
In principle MySpace was a trailblazing social networking system that people around the world could use to stay in touch, listen to music and view pictures and whatnot.
In practice it was never really easy enough to use to be considered fun and having served as proof that social networking was something that could really take off it was ripe to be usurped by the Next Big Thing.
The embedded audio endears it to some but few services have gone from ubiquitous to niche in such a short span of time.
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In Depth: 7 tech falls from grace
Watching something that was once great go through the tragic decline from essential to average to laughing stock and finally horror show is a sad yet fascinating part of the world of technology.
It's not the same as watching a much loved product become obsolete through the sheer passing of time, since that at least has dignity; rather it's watching changes in direction and development warp something into such a horrific mess that you just wish somebody would take it into the back garden and put it out of its misery with a shovel.
Here are seven of the saddest cases of recent years.
1. Operation Flashpoint
More of an exercise in brand necrophilia than a true sequel Codemasters recently released its follow up to the classic military simulator Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis. Using a completely different development team, setting, characters and engine the new game, Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising owes more to Call of Duty and Rainbow Six: Vegas than the original.
Although Dragon Rising is not a bad game on its own merits, expectations from the original lead to a lot of unwelcome comparisons and disappointed fans who wanted a true sequel as opposed to one more contemporary shooter.
2. Facebook
At first this was a great idea: find your friends, post up pictures, send messages, all things that are good.
Facebook now is more a personalised spam cannon, popping up in the email inbox every day to ask stupid questions about people you haven't seen in years. The good stuff is still there, but is it worth the dig?
3. Sonic The Hedgehog
Oh Sonic, what have they done to you? Remember the first Sonic the Hedgehog game on the Megadrive? It was as good as Mario, hell Sonic 2 was probably better, and that's praise indeed for an orthodox platformer.
Sonic had it all, his own console, his own schtick, he could have been bigger than Kong. Now look at him; sharing a Winter Olympics game with Mario.
4. Steam
In many ways Steam is great and getting better: one stop games shop, update provider, decent social networking, even a pretty nifty chat interface.
What's not to like? The answer comes from the prices. In December 2008 Steam changed its prices from dollars to local currencies. On the one hand switching from $ to آ£ on the prices let's you know what you're spending, but on the other hand simply swapping the currency with no consideration for the exchange rate increased the cost of most games by more than a third.
Steam is now one of the most expensive games distributors around and has gone from a greener, more convenient alternative to buying a game on disk to a luxury option.
5. Nintendo
Plenty of people love the Wii and it has been a clear and resounding commercial success. But there's something more than a little tragic at seeing what was once a cutting edge console and game developer reduced to flap-happy Wii-mote sports games and rolling out another title in the Zelda franchise every couple of years. It's like if Ferrari ditched sports cars to make shopping trolleys.
6. Resident Evil games
While some games, such as the Rainbow Six series, can trace the decline of their unique selling points to a need to adapt for the console market the Resident Evil series has always been console based.
So when Resident Evil 5 waddled out of the paddock having abandoned even the pretence of being a survival horror game in favour of becoming just another high octane third person shooter it was a dark day. Not that it was bad, it just wasn't Resident Evil. Another series embraces the generic. So it goes.
7. MySpace pages
In principle MySpace was a trailblazing social networking system that people around the world could use to stay in touch, listen to music and view pictures and whatnot.
In practice it was never really easy enough to use to be considered fun and having served as proof that social networking was something that could really take off it was ripe to be usurped by the Next Big Thing.
The embedded audio endears it to some but few services have gone from ubiquitous to niche in such a short span of time.
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Review: Sony Ericsson Satio
Sony Ericsson has finally launched the Satio, the phone it showed off back in February under the guise of Idou, packing the best of all its brands into one phone. But can the sheer range of gadgetry and a new OS be enough to lure customers back to the brand?
Not content with being leaders in cameraphone and multimedia technology, Sony Ericsson has decided to put the two Walkman and Cybershot brands together in the new Satio. This means an industry-leading camera, a full range of multimedia playback options and it's based on Symbian S60 5th edition to boot.
The overall feel of the handset is odd. Thanks to the sheer range of camera-related gadgetry on board the rear of the phone has a massive camera section bolted to the back, which makes it a little chunky.
But weirdly the phone didn't feel heavy at all – in fact we thought the battery needed to be put in, it was so light, but the power pack was snugly under the cover, so this is pretty impressive.
The Satio feels OK in the hand – it's not snug, but the 3.5-inch touchscreen (although sadly resistive rather than capacitive) is well positioned, and most of the functions are within a thumb's reach.
The front of the phone is very minimal – it's got a call, hang up and menu key, and that's about it. We would have quite liked to see a cancel/back button too, but that obviously wasn't on Sony Ericsson's agenda with the new Symbian OS it's packing.
There is a front facing video camera on there too for all that video calling fun everyone has these days, but it's down the sides of the phone where the button frenzy really begins.
On the left-hand side is the slider for unlocking the phone (which is in just about the right place for most hands), the standard Sony Ericsson port for USB connection, charging and headphone connection (boo!). Below that lives the microSD slot, which is covered by a nice hinged flap.
Over on the right side of the phone we get the camera controls, with the zoom buttons doubling as the volume up/down keys, despite having the 'proper' zoom icons on.
Below this is the photograph playback key, allowing quick access to your snaps in both camera mode and standby. There's also a video/camera swap hard key as well, which we're trying to work out if it has another function in other applications. It appears not to.
And below that is the stylishly hewn shutter for the camera. This side of the phone is well put together, laid out in the right manner and given the Satio's penchant for touch operation, a welcome addition.
On the back we've already mentioned the massive camera section, and while the cover might be massive it still has a really pleasing action to it, uncovering the decent lens underneath.
It's not the most wieldy of phones, we'll admit, but given the sheer amount of technology under the hood we're happy to say this is pretty much the best job Sony Ericsson could have done.
In the box
The Satio is being tipped as a multimedia device, and to that end the box is filled with audio and visual goodies. We've already pointed out how very, very disappointed we are there's no 3.5mm headphone jack on the Satio, but Sony Ericsson has tried to temper that problem with a variety of headphone options in the box.
The connector also comes with a music controller, which works pretty well for both media and as a hands free unit. The bundled buds are of a slightly better quality than the usual pin-thick ones Sony Ericsson puts in the box, but we quickly changed these to some better options.
However, if you do want to use them, there's a variety of ear buds to fit your ears, which we liked.
Video-wise, Sony Ericsson wants you to see the Satio as more of a multimedia hub, and to that end has popped a video out cable in the box (and a pretty rugged, rubberised one at that). It connects using the standard port on the side, and allows you to pump whatever you want to the TV from the phone.
Beyond that, there's a charger, a USB cable and a stylus – you might as well have this if you're using a resistive screen, and handwriting recognition works better with it.
And there's no installation CD in the box – Sony Ericsson has placed that on the phone in the bundled 8GB microSD card. We like this idea a lot, as it just simplifies the process, so well done to SE.
The Sony Ericsson interface is built on Symbian S60 5th edition, which has been used in all Nokia's touchscreen devices so far (bar the N900) and also on Samsung's i8910 HD.
However, Sony Ericsson has taken it one step further with the Satio, making it a lot easier to navigate around the areas users need.
The homes screen is almost Android-like in that it has a number of different screens to scroll left and right to.
The photo section is the most impressive – it shows the photos in all their glory, yet is superbly quick to scroll through. Considering the Sony Ericsson Satio only has a 600MHz processor on board, this is an area where we expected the phone to struggle.
The central home screen also has some quick links to important areas of the phone, such as a search button that opens both Google search and the contents of your phone – such as messages, music tracks, pictures and video clips. It lacks the slickness of the iPhone or Android and is rather slow in checking for stuff, but it's still a nice feature to have nonetheless.
The bottom icon bar also holds access to stored media, which has been Sony Ericsson's forte in recent years. The interface jumps to a pseudo-Xross Media bar when entering this area, listing music, photos and videos in a similar fashion to the PS3 or Bravia TVs.
The bottom bar also gives access to the dial pad and a direct link to messaging too, although we have problems with the former of the two.
Yes, we know we can set up favourites, but to not have a direct way of accessing contacts from the home screen seems counter intuitive to us, as this is the real reason for phones still, despite what the likes of Apple are trying to make us believe.
Flicking left and right to move through the separate levels of the home screen can be a bit of a pain, especially past the gallery section, as inadvertently hitting a picture happened all too frequently, meaning we have to fiddle about with cancelling menus a lot.
There's also an option at the top of the screen to call up information on active connections and the alarm, although you seemingly have a 2mm thin gap to hit at the top of the phone to activate this, and we couldn't make it work first time no matter how hard we tried.
Using the Symbian S60 OS is a good and bad thing for Sony Ericsson to have done in our book. On the one hand, it's a well established, hard working OS with a lot of heritage and development gone into it. Compare it to the TouchWiz-based proprietary Samsung UI on the Pixon12, and you can see the potential for widening your experience on the Satio.
However, it suffers from the 'stereotypical Symbian lag', whereby you'll ask the phone to do something and it will pause slightly, flash some blocky screen transitions and then get round to what you asked. This is mostly apparent in the messaging section, where opening a message will lead to the phone showing you all the commands it has to execute before opening your message.
It's not the biggest problem in the world, but when we've become used to the likes of Apple, HTC and Palm all giving us slick UIs, we've perhaps started to expect a little bit more.
And another problem – the Satio uses a resistive screen. This means that although you can use handwriting recognition and work it with gloves on, it's just not as accurate as a capacitive screen, which recognises the presence of a finger much more accurately.
This means we were constantly left tapping a menu option a few times in order to open it up – we're sorry, but we're just not using a stylus any more, technology has moved on too far for this to be necessary.
The menu systems are both a bit long winded and confusing too – sometimes you need a single tap, sometimes a double. This can also change depending on how long ago you pressed the screen, which combined with the aforementioned lag can result in pressing the wrong option in the end.
And if you're looking to change something on the phone, for instance the alarm time, you have to hit the menu option, which opens up a dialogue box for editing. You then need to tap that again to edit it – very long winded.
The lock method is also far too convoluted for our tastes. Too often the phone screen would burst into life with a message or the like and we wouldn't be able to touch it because we've failed to notice the tiny key icon in the corner, meaning we have to use the slider to open it up.
This then lags for up to a second to open up the phone, especially when coming out of blank screen sleep mode, and we'd imagine this might get a little infuriating over time.
Overall we're fans of Symbian, as it's a simple, well laid-out OS with the bits mostly in obvious places. But it's possibly getting a bit long in the tooth, and combined with the touchscreen isn't really what we were expecting from the Sony Ericsson Satio.
The contacts menu on the Sony Ericsson Satio is arranged in the standard list format most people are used to on their phone, and have mostly managed to get used to on a touchscreen.
However, the problem with scrolling on the S60 5th edition is there's no dynamic control on the list, meaning if you flick down the list doesn't fly past as you'd expect it to (and the way it does on the iPhone and Android handsets).
In fact, it goes the opposite way, meaning you have to either hold your finger down to scroll through (which is highly inaccurate in practice) or use the scrollbar at the side, which is equally difficult to perfect.
The best way of finding the right contact is to simply type the name in the bottom – it might take a little while for the dialogue box to come up, but the phone cleverly lets you only type in letters relevant to the person's name, making it easier to locate the contact you're after.
Each name has the usual stuff you can assign to it, and SO much more. You can obviously do pictures, ringtones, mobile number and name. So far, so standard.
But then you can add a fax number and email address. A company name. An assistant's number. The assistant's name. Even a carphone number.
You can also set up groups of contacts if you're into that sort of thing, allowing you to send messages or call a group when trying to set up a meeting. If you're the captain of some sort of team this function is invaluable, if you're not – then you probably won't use it.
At least calling is a simpler process, with video and voice calling all in the box and easy to access. You can either highlight a name and simply press the call key to get things going, or select video call from the menu.
We actually like video calling on the Sony Ericsson Satio, as it allows you to do a lot of things with it. For instance, you can use the front VGA camera or the rear 12MP effort to show off your video, although the latter does lag somewhat.
You can also share a picture from your gallery as your video image, making things a lot more palatable if you've just climbed out of bed to take the call.
However, while signal was generally very good, call quality was apparently not. Despite having full bars on a number of occasions, we had people telling us we were cutting out a lot, with one remarking it was 'like speaking to us over a very low bandwidth connection'.
Calls coming in sounded great, but if the person on the other end can't hear you well enough, then calling becomes something of a problem. It mainly happened over 3G, but given the need for data connection for many applications we were loathe to switch it off.
Messaging on the Sony Ericsson Satio is actually well laid out and easy to do, thanks to the refined Symbian S60 system. It simply lists your inbox, sent messages, outbox for pending messages and so on, and it's all easy to work out what's going on.
You can also add in a personal webmail account through the wizard, as well as a corporate Exchange account using the bundled RoadSync software, which instantly pops up in the account list when you install it.
Parsing through messages is a similar experience to looking through contacts – except this time you don't have a search function, so you're best relying on the scrollbar to do what you need.
It's not the most accurate way of doing things, and we really hope that Sony Ericsson decides to follow Nokia's lead and update its phones with dynamic scrolling.
Typing a message is a bit of a hit and miss affair on the Sony Ericsson Satio as well, mostly thanks to the resistive touchscreen in our opinion.
We mostly opted for the full screen version of the keyboard (although the alphanumeric approach was pretty good too especially for one handed operation), and we constantly found ourselves hitting the delete key when we misspelt words.
And curiously, at one point the phone stop registering the haptics touches (where it buzzes under the finger when using the screen) and just carried on letting us type without it. Then the buzzes seemed to remember they were supposed to be there, and all happened at once in a hurry – very odd indeed.
We're very much against the need for handwriting recognition on a mobile phone – we've yet to encounter a system that will let us input more than 30 per cent of the letters we write accurately, so we're not really sure of the point.
You are able to drag the handwriting box around the screen, but ultimately it's not enough for us.
Using email was a little bit easier, especially when it came to the push variety with Roadsync. Emails turned up instantly into our mobile inbox, replying was a doddle and generally it all worked as it should.
Google Mail was a little harder to work out, as the phone couldn't find the relevant settings for automatic installation of our account. This means a long old trip on the internet to find the exact settings to allow forwarding of our Google mail to a mobile account, and inputting these all with painstaking precision.
And you need to keep the messaging window open at all times to receive the email from Google (that's thankfully not the case with Roadsync, but that does need to be open anyway).
The weird thing these both have in common is that you can't drag the screen to move through the message – this just activates the copy and paste functionality. Don't get us wrong, we're all for that, but we'd also like an easy way to move through the message without highlighting everything in sight.
If it seems like we're making a lot of negative comments on the messaging function on the Satio, that's only because the main functions of the phone are blindingly simple – it's just the stuff around the edges that's niggly.
We're not saying you'll struggle to tap out a simple text, because you won't. It's just if you want to extend messaging a bit further and use some of the additional functionality on the high end Satio smartphone you may struggle a bit though.
The internet browser on the Sony Ericsson range has previously been a little basic to say the least. It's been functional, but it's ranked alongside Samsung's proprietary browser in basic needs and a dependence on mobile versions of pages.
The good news is the Sony Ericsson Satio moves beyond that with some nifty tricks thanks to the Symbian S60 browser, allowing full HTML browsing.
It's pretty darn fast on the Satio as well, which bodes well. We're not talking iPhone levels of page rendering here, but if you're used to using some of the more basic SE browsers in the past then this is going to blow you away.
And that's only over 3G – when you get Wi-Fi involved the whole thing ramps up to some ridiculous speeds, enabling very fast downloading and web browsing.
One thing we will say about web browsing – take some time to familiarise yourself with the connections menu in 'Settings'.
You need to make sure your Wi-Fi and 3G connections are both ready to work with the internet, and set to do so automatically, else you'll find yourself having to decide on a connection each time you connect.
The buttons to help you navigate through the browser are nice and easy to press thanks to the 5th edition upgrade to the S60 interface, but going full screen either involves waiting a very long time or heading through the menus, when there should be a simple button to do it for you.
We like the ability to view multiple windows as well, although switching between them can be a little bit difficult, as you have to trek through two menu options and then select another simply to close a window.
On other handsets you could simply press the 'cancel' button and it went away, and given there's no physical cancel key on board it's not an option with this phone.
Another annoying feature of internet browsing on the Sony Ericsson Satio is there's no hint of smart-fit technology, so when you're looking at pages with wide elements of wording, you have to either zoom out far enough to see it all at once or scroll back and forth.
Given the likes of the HTC Hero is able to resize text almost infinitely as the screen zooms in (through a nifty pinch and zoom method) it's a bit of an oversight for Sony Ericsson not to have included it.
If it is possible, we couldn't find it when hunting through the settings, and it should be turned on by default if it is.
Zooming in and out is a little bit of a conundrum too – double tapping the screen does work, but you really have to master the knack of doing so, and it will mostly zoom right in or right out for no apparent reason.
You're better off using the slider bar, but after the problems with reformatting the text we found it often easier to stay zoomed out.
We found ourselves using the internet less than usual on the Satio beyond our usual range of bookmarks – although we have to doff our cap to the excellent RSS reader on board in the browser.
The browser is very good at detecting feeds present on the page, and will allow you to subscribe straight away. It updates quickly and lets you jump from story to story with ease, which is a really nice touch if you're somewhere without signal and still want to keep up to date with your latest technology website.
This is the bit we've been really excited to talk about – and for good reason too. The Cybershot range on Sony Ericsson mobile phones has been leading its class for a number of years, and the Satio continues in that tradition.
We're talking a smooth sliding cover that clicks nicely into place, a good quality lens, a veritable plethora of photography options and just being able to take some darn good pictures.
We love the fact there's touch focusing (where you tap the screen to re-focus on a specific object), BestPic really does often find the best in a bad bunch, and nearly every other feature you'd expect in a decent compact is there as well, such as face detection, sports mode, macro mode, and so on.
The only slight downside is the time it takes to shoot another photo directly afterwards, where we found we had to wait as long as we might on an Android phone at times (and that has a noted problem with such an issue). Also, 12MP shots were only able to be taken in 4:3 ratio, whereas we like to see them in glorious widescreen (you have to drop down to 'only' 10MP to get this option).
But check out the photos on comparison to our prosumer Olympus SP-565UZ camera and make up your own mind whether the Sony Ericsson Satio is worth picking over a separate device.
Here we show two Satio pictures - the former without intelligent auto capture on, the latter with:
Sony Ericsson Satio - As you can see, both pick out detail well, but the Olympus does better with overall colour:
Olympus SP-565UZ:
Sony Ericsson Satio - There's no match between optical and digital zoom, but the full digital extent on the Satio is pretty poor:
Olympus SP-565UZ:
Sony Ericsson Satio - and the same at lower distance - the Satio loses detail quickly in zoom:
Olympus SP-565UZ:
Sony Ericsson Satio - Both the Olympus and the Satio have excellent macro modes:
Olympus SP-565UZ:
Sony Ericsson Satio - The Olympus does better in sunlight, although the Satio does better than most compact cameras:
Olympus SP-565UZ:
Sony Ericsson Satio - The Satio actually picks out wording in greater detail than the Olympus thanks to a dedicated text shooting mode:
Olympus SP-565UZ:
Sony Ericsson Satio - The Satio arguably has the better, more even flash, creating a less harsh shadow and more even glow:
Olympus SP-565UZ:
Video recording
Video recording is excellent on the Satio, with VGA recording at 30fps easily matching the likes of the iPhone and several sub-HD camcorders on the market.
Video was able to be taken quickly and with minimal lag (although the camera didn't like capturing continuously shaking motion, which may be something to do with the anti-shake feature).
There's an LED video light as well, meaning even those late night vids you want to shoot (no, not those – there's no night mode) are easy to do – another nice touch from Sony Ericsson and showing it's really thought about this category.
There's a number of options to upload both your photos and video too, with Picasa, YouTube and Facebook links all included. Getting to these options is a little long-winded at times as you have to navigate through three menus to get to YouTube for instance, but overall it's a great device to have for both video and photo, with only the Samsung Pixon12 coming close to providing the same level of features.
And from great photography to a cracking media offering as well. Sony Ericsson's decision to marry the Walkman and Cybershot brands together has resulted in a well-stocked package media-wise, with music and video taking centre stage.
When it comes to headphones, you could use the bundled adaptor, but we'd advise heading out to get some Sony Ericsson MH100's – a Bluetooth adaptor for your normal buds. From easy syncing to music controls to a touch sensitive volume control, this was the ideal way to get around the 3.5mm jack problem.
Music
Those of you who have used a Sony Ericsson before as a primary music player will know that the company has pretty much got playback nailed on its devices, and that continues with the Satio.
However, let's remind ourselves that Sony Ericsson has scored something of an own goal by not adding a 3.5mm headphone port onto the Satio – especially as it's managed to do so on the acclaimed W995 recently, so you'd assume the flagship handset would carry the same.
There's no messing about with the SensMe stuff on the Satio either – it's a straightforward list of songs, easy to play, with nice and large buttons to hit when you need to make things shuffle or repeat or whatever.
The album art is easily displayed, and the track listings are well laid out too – with the kinetic scrolling we talked about earlier making it easy to look through your collection. Why the same principle can't be applied to the contacts list we don't know.
But despite needing an adaptor to use your own headphones (admittedly it's a better quality one than usual) from the mini player on the home screen to the connectivity to audiobooks, the music playback on the Satio is top notch.
Video
We've noticed that as time has passed and phones have gained higher resolution we've become a little bit snobbish when anything but the best is used on a handset.
The Satio uses a (made up by some phone manufacturers) near-HD pixel count on its phones – it's 640 x 360, which isn't really near HD at all. But the point is while it's a little lower than the WVGA (800 x 480) resolution, phones video still looks very good on the Satio.
The demonstration videos don't really do the handset justice, as it's when you use your own video that the Satio really gets going. There is a but here – if you're thinking about using DivX or AVI files, it's not going to happen unfortunately. But other types – MP4, RealMedia, and so on will all play OK, and the PC software features a converter.
We know it's not ideal, and we don't know why support isn't there either.
But those videos that do play look great, and the screen is just about big enough to watch a full length movie, although you may feel a little bit tired afterwards. The widescreen aspect ratio is able to stretch movies to make them look even better on the display too.
One problem with the Satio is that it is a little rotation happy, meaning even the slightest movement makes it change orientation. This can get very annoying as if you are listening to music this stops it playing – so get ready to keep a rigid grip on that Satio.
Also included in the box is a TV out cable that allows you to port your videos to the big screen – we found this less useful without AVI and DivX support as all our 'proper movies' (ie those in the necessary resolution for a large screen) were in that format, and mobile footage looks very grainy when pumped up to that level.
FM Radio and TrackID
A staple of the mobile phone, the FM radio is a very basic affair with easy to use up/down and left/right buttons to tune and cycle through stations. It manages good reception in most cases, and is definitely part of the new more functional wave of radios on mobile phones these days.
And anyone that knows Shazam will know what the next application does – TrackID does the same music recognition thing, and when it recognises the song it will send you either to the Sony Ericsson PlayNow arena or your network provider's music store in order to help you purchase the track.
It has searchable elements, a portal to the most listened to and downloaded tracks and an easy to use interface – but at the end of the day you'll just use it down the pub to see what's on the jukebox.
YouTube and BBC iPlayer
These applications are fast becoming old friends of Sony Ericsson thanks to being available on the phones nearly every time now.
We won't go into too much depth as they both simply work in the way you'd hope they would, with searchable content and in the case of the iPlayer, downloads over Wi-Fi.
A couple of niggles – YouTube is clearly made for the mobile and the range of videos on offer is pretty poor compared to the proper website, and the iPlayer won't allow you to watch licensed videos on a large TV.
Those of you that are waiting with bated breath to see how Sony Ericsson is trying to take on the might of Apple and Google with its own version of an application store should breath now or asphyxiation is certainly on the cards.
We were told the PlayNow Arena would be that portal when we were given the phone – let us tell you: it's not.
It has roughly 50 applications on there now, with most of them appearing to be (expensive) dictionaries. We're hoping this ramps up quickly, but it's making Nokia's Ovi Store look bulging in contrast.
Of course you can buy music and movies from the site as well, but that's not really what we're looking for. We want pointless free applications we can play with and put down after five minutes.
We did find Snaptu, the application that can pretty much do everything from Twitter to News to London Underground updates, but it's a drop in the mighty Apple App Store ocean really.
However, there are some pretty neat applications already installed, so let's run you through the best:
Worldmate
Not just a place to learn the weather or check your flight times – this will give you a recorded announcement at 9PM and when your alarm goes off in the morning to let you know what the weather is going to be like.
Labyrinth
You play David Bowie, intent on uncovering the mystery of a fantasy world... OK, not really. It's that wooden game with the ball bearing, but using the accelerometer. Infuriating and addictive.
MyLook
Mess about with your wallpaper – let the phone change it for you every day, or depending on your location, or even if you just shake the phone.
Who wants one wallpaper these days? You're right – losers, that's who.
We're sadly back to the negative points again when it comes to battery life – a 1000mAh battery isn't enough to sustain a phone with all these capabilities.
We were using Roadsync pretty much all day, as well as being open to Google Mail, Wi-Fi scanning when needed and also listening to streamed music through Bluetooth headphones, which is a lot for any phone to take. But given the way Sony Ericsson is pushing the Satio in the market, we'd expect to be able to multi-task this way with no problem.
However, there is a problem, in that users will find that the battery will run down in a day under such usage. It's not a massive problem as if you charge every night you'll be fine – but we found ourselves getting pretty close to the border of battery life at times.
The organisational skills of the Satio are pretty good too – don't expect them to throw you a birthday party or anything, but if you want synchronised Google and Exchange calendars here you've got it.
There are the rest of the things you'd hope to find on a Symbian phone – calculator, converter, PDF reader, QuickOffice – but we think you're a pretty smart bunch and will be able to work these out.
Location based services
Google Maps is included on the phone, as is a trial of WisePilot for turn-by-turn directions. Both of these are massively helped by the presence of an excellent GPS chip that can locate you seemingly in milliseconds – a far cry from the Nokia N86 which threatened to get us lost every single day.
Google Maps works better with the resistive touchscreen – but although it's nice to have a semi-dedicated sat nav, we doubt there will be hoards of people heading over to pick up the Satio just to get the free trial of WisePilot.
As we just mentioned, the Satio is fully stocked with some great connectivity options, even if these do drain the battery somewhat.
Wi-Fi is very good as it sits in the background, quietly switched on until you need it to connect to something for you – it's reliable and very rarely failed on us.
GPS is just fantastic on the Sony Ericsson Satio, as we just said, locating us within a few seconds and sending us on our merry way. This made geotagging photos a lot easier, which is something that will probably become more prevalent in the next year or so.
Bluetooth is only v2.0, which means you have to mess around with passcodes to pair devices, but stayed strong in terms of signal, had a good range and most of all was able to auto-connect to our MH100's without a single hitch.
The PC software was bundled inside the phone on the 8GB memory card, which we liked a lot as it makes the installation process just that much easier.
We're actually pretty impressed with Sony Ericsson's PC Suite, as it offers the basics and does it nicely. Backing up contacts, saving texts (so many people find this element crucial) and converting media to work on the phone are all there and included too.
The interface is plain, as you can see, but it does the job it needs to, as well as providing some more advanced functionality like Adobe Photoshop Elements for touching up photos.
Sony Ericsson needs a strong handset this year as it's slightly come off the boil with its plethora of mid-range beauties. The likes of the Xperia X1 have failed to capture the imagination, and we're having to wait until 2010 to see the Android offering.
We wanted the Satio to be that phone, but we're not sure it scales the necessary dizzy heights.
We liked
The photography on the phone is fantastic, and is backed up by a decent video player as well. The sheer amount of customisation to your photography is great, but we all know Sony Ericsson can do this well.
Media was also well put together – the Satio really could be your media hub (if the file compatibility problem is solved). Video, Music, YouTube, iPlayer - you can't really ask for more.
Add to that a well designed, light handset with decent elements like a nice RSS reader and you've got a nice package.
We disliked
Sadly there was a lot to dislike too. What's more annoying is the phone is just filled with little niggly points rather than one big problem, like the HTC Hero had with lag before the firmware update.
No dynamic scrolling, a fiddly accelerometer, no smart-fit on the web browser, inaccurate touchscreen... the list goes on. We're sure most people can live with this for the functionality the Satio brings – but the question is: would you want to?
TechRadar verdict
The Satio is a good phone, there's no doubt about that. The sheer amount of technology under the hood is testament to a good design team, and we can see a lot of photography lovers seeing it as their must-have phone.
However, the amount of little problems (as well as the big ones, like a poor touchscreen at times and no 3.5mm headphone jack) all add up quickly, and it's a shame as we wanted to Satio to be one of the biggest devices of the year.
It might well still be, but it's not going to challenge the top dogs for phone of the year or anything – we're still waiting to see how good Sony Ericsson's Android offering will be, as that could be the turning point for the company.
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Logitech announces Notebook Kit MK605
Logitech has unveiled its Notebook Kit MK605 – a trio of peripherals for your laptop including a wireless mouse, keyboard and stand.
The Notebook Kit MK605 comprises a laser mouse and wireless keyboard that are both connected up to the laptop via the nifty Logitech Unifying receiver.
With a UK release date of November and a price of آ£79.99, Logitech is no doubt trying to lure in the gift givers ahead of Christmas.
The pivoting riser stand can be set in three positions so you can pick out your favourite height, and can be used for laptops up to 15.6 inches.
Pick and choose
"Depending on the task at hand, you can pick and choose which components to use," said Rory Dooley Logitech's Senior Vice President of Control Devices.
"For more involved tasks you can use all three. Or, when chatting with friends you might just need the keyboard, while when surfing the Web from your favourite coffee shop you'd be more comfortable using your mouse."
It would have been nice if the riser had a fan or a speaker built in, but it's certainly an option if you are seeking a whole range of laptop add-ons.
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Large Hadron Collider sabotaged by time travel?
An interesting theory has been revealed which may point to the reasons so much is going wrong with the Large Hadron Collider, and it revolves around time travel.
The New York Times has unearthed an article by physicists Holger Bech Nielsen and Masao Ninomiya that pose a number of 'timeless' questions surrounding the LHC.
The essay is titled 'Test of Effect From Future in Large Hadron Collider: a Proposal' – although we would have called it 'Run for it Marty: Doc Brown was right' – and put forward the theory that bad luck will dog the launch of the LHC, with future influences stopping the Collider from doing its job.
Interestingly, these theories were announced before the calamitous string of incidents that have postponed the LHC from finding the hallowed Higgs boson particle.
Future shock
In the article it states: "Since LHC will produce particles of a mathematically new type of fundamental scalars, ie, the Higgs particles, there is potentially a chance to find unseen effects, such as on influence going from future to past, which we suggest in the present paper."
The pair then go on to explain the effects the LHC may have on the future by way of a card game.
Although this theory has been royally bashed in a number of science blogs, as the New York Times points out, the physicists believe it to be crazy too but: "While it is a paradox to go back in time and kill your grandfather, physicists agree there is no paradox if you go back in time and save him from being hit by a bus. In the case of the Higgs and the collider, it is as if something is going back in time to keep the universe from being hit by a bus."
Heady stuff, and while it might be total nonsense and not explain the reasons behind the LHC being broken, it does sound as if the physicists may well have cracked the barmy plot of Lost. And that can only be a good thing.
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In Depth: Digital switchover: what you need to know
The great digital migration has begun in earnest; analogue TV has already disappeared from the airwaves of parts of Scotland, Cumbria, Wales and the south-west of England.
The majority of the country's 60 million TVs are already digital and 90 per cent of households are enjoying digital TV on at least one set.
But there are 14 million or so analogue TVs and 26 million VCRs that need converting to digital compatibility, and it's Digital UK's responsibility to ensure nobody ends up watching a blank screen when D-day comes around.
The organisation is systematically working across the regions offering assistance, while spending آ£200m to publicise the event and its implications for householders.
So every household and all premises in the country will receive a switchover leaflet, there are numerous roadshows, a barrage of local advertising and onscreen messages on the analogue channels.
A Switchover Help Scheme has also been set up to offer practical guidance to roughly seven million less techno-savvy viewers and households on low incomes. Eligible people include those aged 75 years or over; anyone who has lived in a care home for six months or more; those on certain disability benefits and anyone registered blind or partially sighted.
Eligible households get one Freeview box installed and demonstrated plus follow-up support. There is a fee of آ£40 for the help, which is waived for those on income support, job seeker's allowance or pension credit, who do not have to pay.
Digital UK's task is complicated by the fact that as there is no simple solution to going digital, there remains a strong possibility that uninformed consumers will spend money on inappropriate equipment.
Stuff to consider
The number of factors that need to be considered is potentially overwhelming.
Which platform to use (Freeview, satellite, cable or broadband); how to convert each TV (digibox or replace with an IDTV); how to convert each VCR (digibox or replace with a PVR, which will also convert a TV)?
Will the cheapest method be the least stressful option? Will the aerial need upgrading? Is the aerial downlead up to the job? Will a set-top aerial be sufficient for converting portable TVs?
Would a subscription, maybe as part of a bundled deal with a phone line and broadband services be preferable? Is a satellite dish allowed on the building? Is a landlord responsible for ensuring that a shared aerial will work?
The final estimated costs to the consumer, based on using a آ£20 entry-level digibox for each analogue TV and VCR, show that the public is expected to spend around آ£800m to convert or replace remaining analogue TVs and VCRs.
In reality, the cost will probably exceed آ£1bn, since many people will use superior digiboxes and PVRs such as Humax's PVR-9300T with its آ£200 price tag. On top of that, it is believed that over a third of the country's 14m aerials need upgrading at a cost of between آ£60 and آ£180 each, which equates to between آ£840m and آ£2.52bn heading into the pockets of the aerial installation industry.
Post-switchover, most TV viewers should be happy with the greater selection of channels, red button services and PVR functions (eg pausing live TV, series link) but, hardware makers and pay-TV providers aside, the real winners of switchover will be the Government, who expects to reap somewhere between آ£5bn and آ£10bn from selling off the analogue spectrum.
Less eco-friendly
Another less obvious cost of switchover is increased power usage. Digiboxes are less energy efficient than IDTVs as they introduce a second power supply and also consume a significant amount of electricity in standby mode.
Higher electricity consumption also means higher CO2 emissions, so digital switchover is making an unwelcome contribution to global warming (especially as the process is being repeated globally). So much for the costs, what about the logistics of the switchover?
The recently completed Border area switch saw 52,000 homes, served by the Selkirk transmitter and its 11 relays, say farewell to analogue.
Afterwards, Digital UK's chairman, Barry Cox, said: "I am pleased to say that the lessons from Copeland (Cumbria) assisted a successful process in the Borders. That is not to say that switchover passed without any problems, but we were able to assist everyone who needed extra help."
Two weeks later Digital UK conducted a survey and, most crucially, says that every home had converted its main television set to digital, for which it deserves credit. So what problems were there?
Apart from 13 per cent of secondary TVs remaining unconverted the main issue was that many viewers lost their digital channels because they failed to retune their equipment.
Switchover is a two-stage process with BBC2 going digital first, followed by the remaining analogue channels two weeks later. In this way the viewing public is given a chance to address reception problems caused by the loss of just one channel before the rest disappear.
On both occasions all IDTVs, digiboxes and Freeview+ recorders need to be retuned. Independent retailers in the Borders received a high number of enquiries about retuning and complaints when customers were charged for retuning call-outs on each of the two switchover dates. Digital UK is working to improve its retuning message.
Converting to digital provides no guarantee of perfect pictures, and it's impossible to ensure every TV and recorder will work at switchover. The nature of digital equipment is such that some compatibility issues only surface after the event.
One Border resident wrote to the local paper claiming that aerial engineers had had many call-outs to owners of DigiHome and Thomson PVRs. There were also complaints about poor reception and the lack of channels.
Although the digital terrestrial signal will only reach 98.5 per cent of the country (the same as analogue), most reception problems will be caused by ineffective aerials or downleads (digital TV is far less tolerant than analogue in dealing with interference and the picture breaks up or disappears rather than appearing fuzzy or ghosted). A simple check is to ask neighbours what their reception is like.
As for the number of channels, many people do not realise that 10 per cent of homes receive their signals from relay transmitters that can only carry around 20 of the 40 Freeview channels. Not all homes will get the minor commercial channels such as Sky Three, Sky News, Sky Sports News, Dave, Virgin1 and TMF.
A similar problem emerged in Exeter, which went digital in June this year, where the St Thomas relay transmitter serves around 19,000 homes and many people complained via the www.thisisexeter.co.uk website that they were misled.
Digital UK spokesman Joe Smithies said of Exeter: "We certainly did not mislead people. We were absolutely clear about what services would be available from relay transmitters. What we don't do is provide universal coverage of commercial channels. There is not sufficient spectrum for all the transmitters to carry [them]."
But Digital UK's own website and leaflets have conflicting advice. The introductory pages set out the options stating that Freeview has over 40 channels, however, you need to enter a postcode checker on the website to get a more accurate forecast of the number of channels available after switchover.
It may be possible for some residents to re-direct their aerials towards a main transmitter rather than a relay, otherwise they will be forced to choose a subscription service, which is an unpleasant pill to swallow for someone who has just bought a new IDTV.
Hi-def rage
But whilst a relatively small proportion of viewers feel misled over the number of channels available today there will surely be far more resentment over the matter of HD broadcasts.
Most consumers have got the message that HD Ready TVs don't have HD because Freeview is in standard definition. But by the end of the year there will be four HD channels (BBC, ITV, C4, five) on some Freeview transmitters, edging towards around 50 per cent Freeview HD coverage in the UK by the 2010 World Cup, and universal coverage in time for the 2012 Olympics.
Director general of the Digital Television Group, Richard Lindsay-Davies recently said: "As we get towards Christmas, we'll see some quite significant commitment from the broadcasters about promoting this service."
Critically, current Freeview equipment is not compatible with HD's DVB-T2 signals. This means that HD Ready TVs won't show Freeview HD without an adaptor. So numerous TV viewers will be compelled to spend yet more money on still more equipment to get HD for free.
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Review: MSI CX700-021UK
The MSI CX700-021UK is a large, comfortable machine which – unsurprisingly at such a low price – offers little wow-factor, but may be worth a look for those after an entry-level desktop replacement system.
The 17-inch screen dominates proceedings but, despite featuring a 1600 x 900-pixel resolution, is not as sharp as we expected. It does boast a 16:9 aspect ratio though, so it is less likely that you will find black lines framing your films.
A Super-TFT screen is in place, but it's not especially distracting in bright light.
CFP technology
Chassis design is sufficient and employs MSI's Colour Film Print technology which aims to protect the laptop from scratches and fingerprints. This works to a certain extent, with markings showing up less prominently than they would on similarly shiny rivals.
Build quality is generally decent, but we found a few of the chassis' panels bent under light pressure.
The matt-black keyboard is great to use and there's very little flex evident. The keys travel a comfortable distance, are tapered and are also nicely spread out to give a fluid action.
Due to the size of the laptop, MSI has found room to include a dedicated number pad, which is useful for those who regularly input data.
A row of hotkeys above the keyboard provide access to the integrated webcam (suited to video chatting) and also MSI's ECO engine settings, providing specific pre-set power profiles to help you balance your performance and battery needs.
Dual-core Pentium
The dual-core Intel Pentium processor is joined by 4096MB of memory, but everyday performance is a little poor. Nevertheless, office work, email and internet browsing will run smoothly enough and, thanks to the dedicated ATi graphics card and 512MB of video memory, light video and photo editing is definitely possible.
The inclusion of a 500GB hard drive is very welcome and will easily store an entire family's digital content, as well as provide good future-proofing.
This laptop is also pleasingly light for its size, weighing in at only 2.8kg, so you'll be able to carry it around with no issue. The 133-minute battery is less impressive, however, and falls below the three hours we expect.
802.11n Wi-Fi and Gigabit Ethernet provide the fastest wireless and fixed networking currently available, and there's also VGA and HDMI ports providing flexible options when hooking up to an external monitor. Three USB ports for adding peripherals round off the specifications.
The MSI CX700-021UK is a decent laptop, but the lack of power may be an issue for you, and it may only appeal to those with basic user requirements.
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Sky News streamed for free online
Sky News has utilised the power of the Sky Player and is now free to view online.
The streaming version of the news channel was always available to registered and paid members of the site, but now Sky has decided to unleash the channel for everyone to view.
Found at www.skynews.com, the new 24/7 streaming version of the channel can be found in a tab to the right of the site's top stories, labelled: 'Watch Sky News TV Live'.
The use of Sky Player is just one of many tweaks that have been done to the site, with Julian March, Senior Executive Producer for Sky News online, saying about the updates "reinforce our total commitment to video on the site.
"Breaking news in video is right at the top of our offering. We're delighted to showcase the great quality of Sky Player, and to give non-Sky customers access to just one of the many channels available to subscribers.
Multiple platforms
March also commented: "With Sky News now available on more platforms than ever – on TV, online, on mobiles, through iPhone and iPod touch apps, at train stations and on planes – there's barely a screen in Britain where you can't access Sky News."
The move to free is an interesting one for Sky, who is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation.
Murdoch has been in the headlines recently with his views that online news should be paid for.
The launch of Sky News for free may well be a model for the future – get the video for free, but the words you have to pay for.
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Review: Acer Ferrari One
Acer's Ferrari range has traditionally been made up of high-end ultraportables with expensive price tags to match. The Acer Ferrari One is considerably more affordable, bringing the Ferrari brand to the masses.
It's a stylish and well-made product with high-quality plastics and a cohesive design that creates a premium feel.
Not everybody will appreciate the Ferrari branding and oddball design touches – such as the rubber feet that feature a tyre-tread finish or the bright-red lid and prancing horse badges, but to our eyes it's an attractive netbook.
HD ready screen
The 11.6-inch screen is impressive, with a sharp 1366 x 768-pixel resolution. It's one of the brighter panels we've seen, although colour reproduction could be better straight out of the box. We found slight issues with contrast and some colours looking over-exposed.
The Windows 7 software includes colour calibration tools, however, and we found it easy to adjust the screen, producing vivid images after slight adjustments.
It's also more than capable when it comes to video playback, with the ATi Radeon HD 3200 graphics chip making light work of movies. It'll even run HD films without issue – something that can't be said of most netbooks that use Intel's previous-generation GMA 950 chipset.
The keyboard offers keys that are among the largest we've seen on any netbook and are ideally suited to users with big fingers. It's high quality, with the keys moving responsively and quietly. It won't suit everybody, however, as the keys are completely flat – and the lack of definition make it easy to make mistakes.
AMD processor
Unlike most of its Intel Atom-based rivals, an AMD Athlon processor is used here. Running at 1.2GHz, the main benefit is that it's a dual-core chip – offering better multitasking capabilities.
We found it smooth and reasonably fast, but while our review sample featured 4096MB of memory, base spec models will be sold with 2048MB. An additional 2048MB is available for آ£30. How much this will affect overall performance remains to be seen.
The three USB ports are standard fare for a netbook, with a VGA port for an external display. Unusually, you'll find ATi's XGP port in place, letting you connect a compatible external graphics card for enhanced 3D performance.
802.11g Wi-Fi is included, although future models will also boast 802.11n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Overall, the Ferrari One is a highly attractive netbook. It's a shame that there aren't more features included as standard, but it still has a lot to offer. We were particularly impressed by the keyboard, screen and overall quality.
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Review: D-Link DHP-303 Powerline HD
The D-Link DHP-303 Powerline HD starter kit consists of two Powerline adapters, two Ethernet cables and documentation.
The adapters look like bulkier versions of the heating thermostat found in most homes. They are made of white plastic with a black control ring to highlight the four specific control modes.
On the base of the units you'll find a single Ethernet port for creating your network. The supplied cables are a little short. They are fine for connecting to your broadband router, but you may need to buy a longer cable if your main work area is a little way away from the mains socket.
Simply plugging the adapters into the wall and adding the supplied Ethernet cables is enough to make the connection. However, D-Link supplies a number of software tools to help you get the most from the kit.
This includes using the built-in QoS engine technology to prioritise bandwidth to different uses, such as gaming or video and audio streaming.
Simple encryption
What we like about the DHP-303 is that you don't need to install the encryption software to secure your connection.
Simply press the big white button on the front of the adapter and wait for the green LED light to flash and then press the button on the other adapter and the 3DES encrypted connection will be made. We found the connection speeds to be quick and reliable.
D-Link claims it's fast enough to stream HD video around the home and our test video ran smoothly, with no delays across the network.
There is one caveat with this device, however. The DHP-303 is based on the Universal Powerline Association (UPA) standard, which means it won't currently work with Powerlines that use the rival HomePlug technology.
The DHP-303 Powerline HD is as fast and reliable to run as it is to set up. It may not be the most discreet or compact of Powerlines, but the connection speeds are both fast and efficient.
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Review: Blogger
Back in the day, Blogger was the ubiquitous leader among hosted journal services. It looks a little tired now though, especially next to the sleek Wordpress.
We put that down to two things. The first is a tortuously slow development cycle. Blogger looks almost the same now as it looked in 2004, when Google relaunched the platform.
The second is that, in an attempt to make it easier to use, Google has made Blogger more difficult to hack around with, giving it much less of a development ecosystem to make use of.
Still, Blogger remains one of the most complete of the free systems for hosting blogs and news sites on the net. Unlike Wordpress.com or Vox, you can get to the raw layout code and edit it manually – meaning that you can have any layout you like.
There's built-in support for domain mapping on Google's free Blogspot hosting service, or you can publish static pages direct to your own server if you prefer.
Static pages make it slow to update sites – but Blogger's powerful and free features make it a perennial contender.
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Google Building Maker arrives
Google has launched Google Building Maker, finally allowing people to add a third dimension to the buildings on its maps.
Previously, the buildings that were given a more solid appearance in Google Maps were handpicked by Google – but that is all about to change.
A new tool, Google Building Maker – which is described as a cross between Maps and a 'gigantic bin of building blocks' - will allow you to create three dimensional structures, which will then be compared against the original photos and, if it seems accurate, placed into the system.
Open source building
"Some of us here at Google spend almost all of our time thinking about one thing: How do we create a three-dimensional model of every built structure on Earth?" Asked Google's official blog,.
" How do we make sure it's accurate, that it stays current and that it's useful to everyone who might want to use it?
"One of the best ways to get a big project done — and done well — is to open it up to the world. As such, today we're announcing the launch of Google Building Maker, a fun and simple (and crazy addictive, it turns out) tool for creating buildings for Google Earth."
So how exactly does it work? Google explains: "Basically, you pick a building and construct a model of it using aerial photos and simple 3D shapes – both of which we provide.
"When you're done, we take a look at your model. If it looks right, and if a better model doesn't already exist, we add it to the 3D Buildings layer in Google Earth. You can make a whole building in a few minutes."
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Gaiman kicks off interactive Twitter story
Author Neil Gaiman has kicked off a collaborative interactive story on microblogging service Twitter, asking the public to add to his opening line.
BBC Audiobooks US will be stitching together the best lines on the hashtag #bbcawdio after Gaiman kicked things off with a revolting mirror image.
Gaiman is one of the hottest authors around, having penned the likes Coraline – a recent movie hit – American Gods and the Sandman comics.
Woman in the mirror
"Sam was brushing her hair when the girl in the mirror put down the hairbrush, smiled & said, "We don't love you anymore," reads Gaiman's opener.
The final script – minus all the dull contributions of course – will be turned into an audio book which will be available for free.
Well, it's certainly an interesting experiment.
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45% of youths 'feel happiest online'
It uses a tiny sample of UK youths, but a study has suggested that nearly half of the 16-14 year old age group feel happiest online.
A rather paltry sample of 994 young people were surveyed by charity YouthNet, and the results show just how crucial being connected was to the younger generation.
When asked when they felt happiest, 45 per cent suggested it was when they were online and 32 per cent agreed the statement that there was no need to speak to a person for information when the internet was available
Information? Nah!
Bizarrely one in five of those surveyed suggested they had never looked at the internet for information and advice, although 37 per cent would use the web for advice of a sensitive nature.
This has led to the conclusion from report author Professor Michael Hume that young people need more support, which, guess what, author commissioners YouthNet do.
Funny that.
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Hands-on: Nikon D3S review
As with all professional camera releases from Nikon, the weeks and sometimes months leading up to a launch can spew out all manner of conjecture about what new product the camera company is going to bring to market.
This is both a blessing and a curse for Nikon, as not only does it builds people's expectations up (obviously a good thing), sometimes the expectations are so high (definitely a bad thing) that even if they started giving their cameras away for free, some pro photographers will be left wanting.
Enter the Nikon D3S, possibly the most revolutionary camera ever when it comes to low-light shooting. But its movie shooting capabilities will have people wanting more.
From the off, the camera is built around the company's D3 chassis. This is no bad thing, as the company created something in the D3 which photographers love – both when it comes to its durability (it's made from a strong but lightweight magnesium alloy) but also the ergonomics.
It's a body which will take all you throw at it, whether it's the dust of a safari, mud of a football match or sweat of a pushy celebrity. And this can only be a good thing.
Tweaks have been made to the exterior, but these are mostly button related. You now have a dedicated Live View button, which gives access to two Live View modes. Also found here is a zoom function, adding that extra layer of functionality to an already fine feature.
There's also a Quiet Shutter release now available on the Mode dial, which allows for non-intrusive shooting, just in case you happen to be in a wildlife situation which demands quiet.
As for the shape of the buttons, the ASF-on button has been made much smoother and the battery changer has been re-designed. While these are undeniably small tweaks, they make a big difference. This is because they have been designed with the outdoor photographer in mind, and have been made glove friendly.
The majority of new features the D3S brings to the table are within the chassis. As we touched upon before, the Nikon D3S has upped the ante so much when it comes to the ISO range that it won't be long before cameras are able to see in the dark without the use of night vision.
The D3S holds an ISO range of ISO 200 to ISO 12800 (expandable to 102400 (Hi3)). This means that you can now take shots of subjects in near darkness. Essentially, the camera will pick out subjects the human eye can't see in the dark. And while this does bring about a fair amount of grain – though not as much as you would expect – it's a fantastic feat and one that has set a benchmark for other camera manufacturers to follow.
It also means that for the first-time with a Nikon pro camera, you will be able to shoot night-time photography without the aide of a tripod. This handheld night-time shooting option is something that Sony is also boasting about in its new Alpha range of cameras, so it would be nice to compare and contrast the two together.
Unfortunately, we didn't get to check out the ISO range ourselves, but looking at a specially shot video (yes you can shoot video on this ISO range) and some photography, the results were impressive to say the least.
The reason Nikon can broach such ISO levels is all down to the heart of the camera – its sensor. The company has decided to completely re-design the way this chip takes in light, adding new micro lenses which improves signal-to-noise ratio and widens the camera's dynamic range capabilities.
The sensor itself is 12.1MP. While this is nowhere near the dizzy heights of 24.5MP the D3X brought to the table it is the same as the more-than capable D3.
An interesting new feature which Nikon is debuting on the D3S is the ability to edit RAW files in-camera, and saving them to useable JPEG.
There are options to alter things like white balance, noise reduction, exposure compensation, saturation and contrast of image.
While you can't do anything near as sophisticated as batch processing, the camera will remember your settings for further image editing. This feature will be welcomed by those on assignment, looking to get images faster to the picture desk.
Now we come to the over-expectation part. While it was well-known that Nikon was prepping a HD movie mode for the latest in its D3 series, some were hoping that the function would be 1080p. It's not.
This is something Canon has managed to utilise for its camera range but Nikon has made the decision that 720p is enough for the 3DS' D-Movie mode.
When quizzed on why this was, James Banfield, Group support and Training Manager for Nikon did make a good point; explaining that this was all down to file size.
He noted that at 720p and with the compression the camera is using you will get five-minute bursts out of the allocated 2GB continuous shooting space. If the camera were to shoot Full HD then this would be significantly less.
He also stressed that the D3S is a stills camera that is to be the very best at ISO, and the movie feature is an extra functionality.
As 720p seems to be the de facto option for the likes of Sky and the BBC, we don't think that DS3 users will have many problems if they are to try and use their movie footage in a broadcast situation. But it does mean that it might not be long for another video update for the D3 range – something you will have to consider when spending thousands of pounds on a camera.
In our very short time with the D3S, it's easy to see that Nikon has another winner on its hands in the professional market. With the company currently dominating in the market for cameras over آ£2,500 – its D3 range holds a 63 per cent share – even in tough economic times it seems times are good for the camera market.
The Nikon D3S will be available for آ£4,199.99 and the camera has a UK release date of December. Go to www.nikon.co.uk for more details.
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Nikon D3S DSLR camera officially announced
Nikon has finally announced the arrival of the D3S – the company's professional snapper which moonlights as a video camera.
Toting a 12.1MP FX CMOS sensor, the D3S is modelled round Nikon's D3 chassis, but packs in some brilliant new features.
Nikon has been extremely busy in the last few years, quickly redefining professional cameras for the marketplace.
The company has built up a desirable pro range: from the D3 and the D300, to the prosumer D700, to its last efforts the D300S and D3X.
Although the latest addition, the D3S, doesn't have anywhere near the pixel power of the D3X (which boasted 24.5MP) the camera certainly packs a punch when it comes to low-light shooting.
Heart of darkness
This is all because of the camera's stunning ISO range. The D3s offers an ISO of 200-12,800. This has been achieved with a lot of jiggery pokery on Nikon's part, where they have completely re-designed the sensor.
This latest ISO range is definitely redefining the boundaries as it means that you will be able to shoot handheld footage at night with the camera.
Other new features include: an optional 1.2 Crop mode; a re-jigged AF Fine Tune menu (there's now six options); the AF system's auto area has been improved which ups the quality when shooting 9fps; and there's also been a buffer increase.
D-Movie mode
Another great addition is the ability to edit RAW images in-camera. For the first time you can tweak colour levels and the like and export to JPEG all within the camera.
The biggest draw, however, will be the D3S' ability to shoot HD video.
Nikon is no stranger to adding video to its DSLRs - in fact it was the first company to do this with the launch of video on the D90.
Interestingly, Nikon has chosen not to go with Full HD but has settled on 720p 24fps shooting for its D-Movie mode. This can be done in up to five minute bursts, which will take up around 2GB of memory.
The Nikon D3S has a UK release date of December, and will cost آ£4,199.99. For more details, go to www.nikon.co.uk.
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O2 furthers iPhone reach with Phones4U deal
O2 and Phones4U have announced a new deal that will see the iPhone 3G and 3GS sold on the O2 network throughout the country.
Building on the deal with independent retailer Carphone Warehouse, the new agreement will see the iPhone stocked in a further 450 venues throughout the country.
Customers will be able to pick up the phone on the full range of O2's contracts as well as on Pay As You Go, with Apple-approved accessories on sale too.
Reinforced position
"Being able to distribute the iPhone through our partner Phones 4u helps us develop our strong trading partnership and, of course, reinforces O2's position as home of the smartphone" said Stephen Shurrock, O2's UK sales director.
After the announcement that O2 is losing its exclusivity on the iPhone, with rivals Vodafone and Orange to begin offering it in the next few months, it was crucial the network hung on to some USPs with the device.
A wider range of outlets, coupled with the exclusivity on the Palm Pre, will help it to extend its reach to more consumers, at least in the short term.
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