Wi-Fi enabled SD cards coming to a camera near you

While digital cameras with Wi-Fi built in haven't exactly taken off, it makes sense in this ever-more wireless world that Wi-Fi will become a standard means of connecting a digital camera, eventually. However, Eye-Fi have come up with a solution which might be a bit nearer off and save you the trouble of updating your camera yet again. They plan to incorporate a Wi-Fi chip directly onto the standard SD card format, so you would get storage and connectivity in one. However in addition to easily sending photos to your personal computer you'll also be able to share photos instantly with online photo and social networking sites.

Elgato Turbo 264

As someone who often has their Mac churning away all night converting "things to watch on the way to work" into H.264 format, this sounds like an ideal little device to help lighten the load.

Essentially a video encoding/decoding specific chip on a USB stick to help your processor out and take the strain. Out in Europe for 99 euros, seems like a bargain if it saves as much time as it says.

Not much english language info available at the moment, but if you're German's good you might want to check out Macwelt's test report.

iPod Shuffle - mini review

How cool are these things? The new iPod Shuffle from Apple is a wonder. They look amazing, and you just don't realise how small they are until you're holding one. They really are something special. From their oh-so-small form factor to their specific dock, they are a mini marvel. Apparently they're demand is out-stripping supply in the US, I had no problem at all ordering direct from the Apple UK site, ordered on Monday, with engraving and it was being delivered on Wednesday morning - impressive, despite Apple predicting it wouldn't ship for at least a week.

With a cool to the touch, brushed metal feel, a strong clasp and simple interface this really is a great feeling product. Lightweight, naturally, it clips onto your clothing easily and within moments you forget its even there - except of course for the rather excellent sound quality. The standard iPod headphones seem to have improved over previous versions, I found my Sennheiser CX300 performed as well as on the Shuffle as I would have expected from my 60Gb iPod Photo.

The Shuffle charges through USB. The indicator lights on the unit go from Green to Orange depending on charge state. There's a very definite off switch on the unit as well as a shuffle switch, you can play your songs back in the order they are on the iPod or have them shuffled. Loading content is done through iTunes 7 and the interface is childlike simple. Choose the whole music library or a specific playlist to Autofill content from or you can add songs individually, by album or playlist with simple drag and drop.

The iPod docks upside down, impaling itself through the phono port onto the dock. Personally I found it a little fiddly to dock, mostly due to its small size, but you can't have tiny and then complain its too small.

The transfer speed is what you'd expect and seemed to autofill quickly enough. For easy pick up and go music, if your computer's on its a pretty swift operation before you leave the house.

The packaging from Apple really is raising the bar. They are forcing other manufacturers to up their game - evident in the now ubiquitous unboxing sites all over the web. Delivered in a translucent, plastic sarcophagus, this little treasure hovers mid-packaging. Remove the plastic seal at the top and the front falls down to reveal your spoils.

Simple operation cards accompany the Shuffle, making it great introductory iPod, especially for the older generation. I can even see people picking these up as 2nd iPods for exercising with. 240 song capacity, Mac and PC, in a super-small package - an obvious christmas stocking filler.

If you haven't checked out the brilliant TV ad its up on the Apple site now.

Tags: Apple, iPod, Shuffle, 1GB, small, MP3, iTunes, clasp, simple, lightweight, USB, Mac, Windows, Autofill

TVDuo: Miglia's new twin tuner for Mac

TVDuo enables you to watch, pause, rewind, skip forward and record live TV on your Mac. You can watch digital terrestrial TV on your Mac, it now has two TV tuners, so that you can watch one channel while you record another or record two channels simultaneously.

You get the usual PVR-esque features of pause, rewind and skip forward live TV, but because you use it with your computer you get these added benefits - it comes with with Elgato’s EyeTV 2, allowing you to record TV, remove the adverts and then export to your iPod Video or PSP.

Features include an EPG (electronic programme guide) and Picture-in-Picture feature. A full-size remote control, for typical TV style experience. And the great ability to schedule recordings of shows via the internet or mobile phone thanks to its online tv guide.

These are brilliant little devices, I've a Humax PVR in my lounge and I definately find I've always got something to watch, however its a little more tricky taking that content off the Humax and putting it onto my PSP or Mac for alternative viewing. With the TVDuo you're already on your Mac so archiving to DVD or transferring to another media is relatively simple -especially with the built in capabilities of EyeTV.

No sign of price just yet, but this is a great UK/Euro solution for Mac based PVR. Read all about it here.

Tags: TVDuo, Miglia, PVR, Mac PVR, EyeTV, Elgato, Twin Tuner, HD-Ready, Humax, Digital, Terrestrial TV

Samsung NV10 - point and shoot impressions

Samsung NV10
-10.1 Megapixels
-3x Optical Zoom
-Advanced Shake Reduction (ASR)
-“Smart Touch” User Interface
-Large 2.5" TFT LCD
-ISO 1000

Over the weekend, I got to put the NV10 through its paces a little, I say a little because I didn't use it as anything more than a put-it-in-your-pocket snapper.

I had fairly high hopes for this little fella, I like the retro black look and the hookup to my Mac was as usual, a piece of cake.

However for a 10.1 megapixel camera I hoped for more and those hopes were mostly dashed.

The unit is small and light, but the screen's prone to scratching, the USB cable that plugs in and acts as a charger too, means you can't stand the camera up whilst connecting it to your computer, which means it lays on its screen or face -neither being ideal.

The back is lined with a series of touch sensitive, contextual buttons. It takes a bit of getting used to, but it does work. Not great if, like me, you choose your settings as you go, lining up a shot then needing both hands to operate the touch sensitive buttons on the back.

The macro mode is good, but didn't seem as good as the Sony T10 I used recently. The resulting images are ok, but again, I've been more impressed with my rather old (if now broken) Sony P10.

The camera responds quickly, the burst modes and video modes work well, time between shots seems fast and initial switch on to picture taking was acceptable - but overall I was disappointed.

The unit's realtively cheap to buy, about £225 on-line. And for that sort of money maybe I'm being too harsh. However, I thought that image quality was lacking, colours seemed quite dull and the heralded ASR (anti-shake to help with your images) wasn't that great either.

I've not gone through the unit exhaustively, in fact I've used it as I would any easy to pick up point and shoot. But in those circumstances, my 4-year old Sony P10 did a better job, albeit slower and more chunky.

Tags: Samsung, NV10, Digital Camera, Point and Shoot, ASR, Macro, photography, smart touch, 3x Optical Zoom, 10.1 Megapixels

Free TomTom Traffic Updates, sort of.

How about not paying a yearly subscription for TomTom traffic and instead being able to use the over the air RDS-TMC traffic info instead? Any lucky 'GO' users out there can make the one off payment for the RDS-TMC Traffic receiver and make use of the free service to replot and avoid traffic incidents.

So what are the differences in terms of the service? Well, the RDS-TMC is going to require fm radio signal and a source that provides the information, this is obviously going to vary location by location, versus the GPRS on-demand nature of the TomTom Plus traffic system. The RDS-TMC wont work on every TomTom device, so 'ONE' users like myself will not have this option. Also the RDS-TMC has a limited number of messages, so its likely that the more expensive (in the long term) TomTom Plus service is more suitable if you must have the latest, most detailed traffic info.

At around £68 its not bad value, depending on how well it performs in the field. Of course you do have yet another attachment (the RDS-TMC Traffic receiver) to take with you, versus the omni-present mobile phone which connects you to the TomTom Plus service.

You can check it out on the TomTom UK website here or google it to your heart's content.

I would be remiss if I didn't chuck in a quick mention to any TomTom owners, mac or pc, who dont have the rather good TomTom Home software, for managing their beloved device. When I bought my 'ONE' it didn't have any mac software available, now it does. Recently installing it and allowing it to update my TomTom firmware gave 'Jane' a very nice face-lift. All gradients everywhere and some improved/re-vamped icons. Added functionality included the ability to navigate to Latitude and Longditude also the arrive by time function - where you can put in a time which you wish to arrive by when you plan your route. TomTom Home can be downloaded from this page on the UK site.

Tags: TomTom, GPS, RDS-TMC, Traffic Receiver, Traffic updates, Radio, TomTom Home, firmware, latitude, longditude

Dot-it, anywhere?

During SCB's absence I've promised to post more often, of course I promise to do this when he's around too so its a fairly empty promise. With that said though, I did just spot these, are they gadgets well, sort of.

They're cheap LED stick-anywhere lights called Dot-It. 100 hours of replaceable battery-life for about 8quid a pop. Personally I can think of a variety of places these could come in handy, under kitchen-cabinet lighting, illuminated wardrobes but I intend to put a couple in my garden shed - until I get some power wired in there.

In the UK they're made by OSRAM, various others in different regions - all essentially the same, you remove the adhesive label and stick em up, press to turn on and off and relocate at will. I've ordered a few so I'll let you know how they go.

I just bought mine from here but there are others out ther too.

Tags: LED, lights, sticky, bright, shiny, small, cheap

Tom Tom One, two, three?

Old news from an international point of view (US got this a couple of weeks back) but now Europe and the UK will have the pleasure of the smartly re-designed TomTom One. But for whatever reason its not totally straight forward. You see the TomTom One (the original) isn't going anywhere, in fact its still on the site and more expensive then the new TomTom One. Possible reasons include the different processor speeds (slower in the new unit). In addition to this, there are two flavours of TomTom One (new) a local version and a Euro version, with maps to suit.

Regardless this has got to be one of the sexiest and slimmest top notch navigators out there. My personal experience with the original TomTom One has been a fantastic one, a complete liberation for someone who equates Up and Down the country with my personal altitude and direction at that particular time, homing pigeon I am not.

Tags: TomTom, GPS, Sat Nav, in-car navigation system, gadget, satellite navigation, maps

Segway Centaur, step forward or back?

There is something about the Segway that I like. I don't know what it is - maybe its a childhood dream of being Johnny Five, but I've always thought they were neat.

Living in the UK they're a rare sight, but on an Orlando holiday last year, I watched as the security in the parks whizzed around on them - I was tired from walking around all day so this made me especially envious.

But this is the Segway concept, called Centaur and you can catch a neat video of it at YouTube. Is this an improvement over the two wheeled version? Well I'm not sure, it seems more versatile and its more quad like appearance might help it to be more widely accepted -but then isnt it kind of against the whole two wheeled, up right approach that makes the Seqway interesting? Perhaps though this version will catch on better as except for the odd President and Park Security the current Segway's hardly a roaring success.

ATO's new iSee for HD

For those non-video iPod owners ATO has had an iSee product available for a while that lets you store videos on your pod and play em back through its sleeve-like adaptor. The announcement of an upcoming HD capable version at a relatively low price $200-250 makes for an interesting device for mobile video junkies with older iPods and spare gigs lying around.

Personally I'm going through a film or so a day with my PSP on the comute, its biggest drawback being the memory stick capacity. The chance to use some of that free space on my 60gig iPod is pretty tempting, especially as the ATO iSee sports a good sized 3.5 LCD display.

Skype release beta for Mac with Video

Finally, after what seems an age Skype pulls its finger out and gives Mac users video - albeit in beta. Was hoping this would replace SightSpeed, however apparently they've a new vid codec launching today which is supposed to greatly improve their offering. Guess I need to try both out to find a winner. What I really want is iChat AV to work with PC users too - I can dream I suppose.