There you are standing on the edge of a beautiful lake on a warm July day. With the naked eye the scenery is magnificent. Captured with the 3GS’ video you get a full sense of it. Unfortunately while the upgraded camera on the iPhone 3GS works well, any given image only captures a small portion of the view. Fear not! For there is a simple way to capture and share a beautiful panorama of the entire image in just moments. Here’s a quick “iPhone How-To”.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

The Rivet Hard Leather Pouch is made from a hard plastic shell that’s surrounded by a high quality leather exterior. The case has a vintage look to it that separates it from a traditional black or brown leather case.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Straight from the Cold War files comes a strange story I saw today from Boing-Boing. It seems that WSJ’s Jason Zweig is being charged $103.60 for use of a FREE AOL e-mail account he was given (again, free of charge) for being a Time-Warner employee. It seems that AOL is “secretly” charging some users for use of their service.  These users often aren’t aware of the charges, the billing activity, and aren’t informed until the account is forwarded to a collection agency.  When Jason asked the agency contacting him regarding the delinquent account, dating back to 2008, for a copy of the bill so he… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I was looking for a new speaker system to use in my kitchen with my laptop or mp3 player, when I came across the expressionist PLUS system from Altec Lansing. The Altec Lansing expressionist PLUS is a attractive speaker system that not only looks good, but sounds good as well. … Continue reading on Gear Diary …

In a post comment last week Wayne referred to using a mindmapping application on his new iPhone. Fact is, mindmapping is a great way to brainstorm and organize your thoughts and the iPhone lends itself to this technique surprisingly well. On the iPhone my mindmapping app of choice is Instaviz. It is a powerful, yet easy to use app that can’t help but impress. Let’s take a look and, if you like what you see, you could win one of five copies we are giving away this week.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

My first thought after taking my first video with the iPhone 3GS… “Flip better move quickly to add features because this thing is going to be huge.” My second thought after taking my first video with the iPhone 3GS… “Flip will be okay. The Ultra HD takes much better pictures and only owners of new iPhones get the video goodies.” My thought today after hearing word that Apple just ordered TONS of video camera modules that will likely be used in the next gen Touch and, since the order is SO larger, even the Nano… “Game Over???” (video quality on iPhone and Mac is excellent, on YouTube… not so much) iPod Touch with video… NICE, but I still love my Flip and hope… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Just in case you missed the news, it seems one ambitious hacker has decided not to wait for the iPhone Dev. Team to release their official Jailbreak program for the iPhone 3G S (they’ve said they plan to wait until the 3.10 upgrade is released before releasing their official jailbreak app.) Code named, “purplera1n” the application is now available for both Windows and Mac users. You can find out more about purplea1n on the developer’s web site. Note:  Use the software at your own risk.  Gear Diary takes no responsibility if you end up bricking your phone… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

A couple of days ago I reviewed the Jaybird Tiger Eyes earbuds, which include a microphone and are designed primarily for mobile phone users.  But what if you aren’t looking for earbuds to use with a mobile phone?  Enter the Endorphin Rush earbuds from Jaybird. These earbuds have the same titanium drivers that the Tiger Eyes, which promise similar true to life sound.  … Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Welcome back to the GearGames weekly video game release feature here at Gear Diary! This post holiday week is very light and has something that I can’t remember seeing in a very long time – no new releases for the Nintendo DS! While I’m sure there are some low-budget shovelware things popping out, no site I checked some up with anything new for the DS! My big pick for the week is the rebirth of the adventure game classic Monkey Island series! Telltale Games, who has produced two wonderful seasons of Sam & Max adventures are releasing the first of five chapters in their season of Monkey Island Tales, called Tales of Monkey Island Chapter 1: Launch of the Screaming Narwhal. They are offering a pre-order special for the season at TellTaleGames.com – sorry for the short notice – I just discovered it when I went to order it myself!… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

First impressions are important – and the Palm Pre makes a great first impression. It’s small, light and fits nicely in the palm of your hand. The screen is bright and easy to read in nearly all lighting conditions. Data downloads on the Sprint network were fast and my Gmail account delivered email nearly instantly – at least as fast (or faster) than either of my BlackBerry devices. So why was I left with the feeling that the looks of the Palm Pre faded quickly once I began to peer beneath the surface of Palm’s new flagship phone?… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Now that iPhone/iPod Touch OS 3.0 is out, we are seeing a number of navigation apps appear.  Add to that mix AT&T Navigator, from Telenav – a title that also appears on a variety of handsets (with GPS support) out there.  Dan and I will be taking an in-depth look at this product in a review very soon, but here are a few first impressions we had:… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

So fact of the matter is, I will never be confused with a CPA or give classes on money management. I have yet to look at my check book register since the lady at the bank wrote the beginning balance…that was almost 11 years ago when I was 18! Luckily I have a job that keeps a nice cushion in my bank account and I never really worry about balancing my account…hope my wife doesn’t read this ) Having said that I have always wanted to carry my check book with me to keep tabs, I just hate the whole pencil and paper gig. So what better way to do this than on my BlackBerry that is never more than an arms length away. SplashMoney by SplashData makes this all possible.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

The Bothers in Arms franchise of shooters has seen some ups and downs. The PC games have been universally good, the DS game was solid, the console games were of mixed quality, and the PSP game was junk. The iPhone version was release last December and has gotten some mixed reviews, based mainly around how well you can manage the controls. If you have no issues with controls, the games’ length and varied missions make it a fun experience … but if you cannot master one of the three preset control schemes it is an exercise in frustration. Either way it is now available for free! It started out at $9.99 and saw a drop to… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

The makers of the Klondike bar, that yummy ice cream treat, have launched a few new tasty, non-edible, treats in support of their “What would you do for a Klondike bar NOW?” campaign, which highlights the bars’ new thicker, chocolaty shell.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

It’s not everyday I get a bag like this in the mail.  Tom Bihn makes, in my humble opinion, the best travel bags period.  The new Tristar bag is no exception! I say this as a Tom Bihn owner for quite some time.  I have taken the Tom Bihn Aeronaut with me to DC on my last flight, and I used the Western Flyer and the Aeronaut when my son and I went to camp.  The Aeronaut was kind of large to take on a school trip with my son to camp.  Well, next year I can just use the Tristar as it fits squarely in the middle of the Aeronaut and the Western Flyer.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …