Apparently Dell‘s not the only one with a low-priced Pocket PC in the works — HP (Compaq), who had the most successful Pocket PC with their iPaq, is soon going to be releasing this little gem called the iPaq 1910. Measuring just 4.5″ x 2.8″ x 0.5″, it’ll sport a 3.5″ screen (smaller than other iPaqs) and an X-Scale processor of just 200 MHz. Expansion sleeves of the old iPaqs will not fit the new unit, and the only expansion option will be through SD/MMC card. Price is going to be around $300. More info and pics from Infosync
Bruce Sterling on Open Source
This came out in July, but it’s so wonderful it deserves a good read. Viridian Note 00325: Open Source Speech
The older Bill gets, the uglier he gets. He’s a guy riding a white horse, that turned into a runaway bronco bull, that turned into a scaly crocodile, and now, it is turning into some kind of diseased revenant. It’s like the Steed of the Nazgul, those black, flying zombie horses that explode when exposed to fresh water. That’s what Microsoft is like now. These guys, these Nazgul… They used to be kings. They were originally human beings, they had wives and children and futures, they had their own little nations to govern and manage. But then there was the One Ring – One Ring to Rule Them All. One. And they couldn’t resist. And they gave in.
Application Acelerator speeds system performance
I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t tried it… here’s my experience using Intel’s Application Accelator to achieve WinBench disk improvements of 34% on a Win 2000 box, and 19% on an XP. Done by some form of disk pre-fetch, I believe.
Check it out, it really works, and it’s a free download from Intel.
Free Sprint PCS module for Handspring
Handspring is giving away for free the Sprint PCS module for their Visor products. When combined with Sprint’s “Free and Clear” plan, you can browse the web as well as use your Visor as a cell phone. Hey, it’s no Danger Hiptop, but if you already have a Visor, and aren’t comitted to another cell provider, this could be the thing for you. These things used to be 300 bucks, now they’re yours for the $8.95 shipping!
Good Lord, Am I A Geek
I was just sitting here in my home office and realized the number of screens I have pointing my way….5.
The “Wired” of Science Mags?
Here’s an interesting pub that someone sent us a link to. It’s called SEED and it alleges to be a magazine that marries pop culture and science (exploring the influence that science is having on culture and vice versa). From the (scant) material on the site, it looks like it may be more about the POLITICS of science as it rubs up against culture, and be from a leftie perspective. Still, looks like it could be worth checking out. I will and report back.
[Thanks to John Bergin]
Bandwidth Got You Down?
I just noticed a cool new feature of my favorite download site tucows.com. If you’re one of those people always looking for great new shareware, but you don’t have the time or the bandwidth to download the gigs of data that you want, tucows.com will now let you create a custom CD-ROM full of all the shareware (up to 600 megs per disc) and then they’ll mail it to you. Seems very retro to be using snail-mail to ship bits, but it works around that problem of having the broadband at work but no CD burner, or just plain no broadband at all. Cost is $10 per disc, plus $2 shipping worldwide.
Swiping with Style
Following the advice of a well-connected Net celebrity, I started using Limewire to fulfill my P2P needs on OS X. Then I discovered Iswipe Connects to three times as many networks, including Hotline and some others I’d never heard of. Finally, I’m able to find some artists that just weren’t showing up in Limewire. Iswipe is also donation-ware.
Fun with Mozilla
I’ve recently been playing with Mozilla plug-ins on my eMac. Googlebar emulates the popular IE searchbar, and Composite lets you do WYSIWYG HTML (sorta) in text areas such as form submissions. The Mac OS X version of Composite has no Save button and the OS X version of Googlebar has to be re-selected to show up.
I Go Pogo
While we’re talking about Tablet PCs (see Nate’s Street Noise item), check out this lilliputian wonder: the Pogo. This baby is a mere 155mm on the diagonal. It sports a color touch screen with a Web browser, has dual-band GSM/GPRS, SMS and email, an MP3 player, organizer software, etc. The Pogo is currently availble only in the UK (for as little as £50 w/Web service contract) and there’s no indication on their site that the device will be available elsewhere.