One thing I didn’t realize would happen when I upgraded my Dell Axim x51v to Windows Mobile 6.1 recently, was that I would lose the ability to read my DRM-infested ebooks in Reader format because Microsoft Reader didn’t support the latest version of Windows Mobile. As far as I could tell Microsoft Reader was a dead product. I searched around on forums and blogs, and the only solution I could find was using utilities to transfer my Reader books to a format readable in Mobipocket Reader. I did that for one book I bought a while ago and had wanted to finish on a business trip this past weekend, but in general it wasn’t something I felt good… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

There is a new kind of switcher on the rise these days, and whiles its numbers are limited, they are nonetheless notable. No, we aren’t talking about people who make the move from Windows to Mac; we are talking about people who dropped one device for the iPhone, but now find themselves making the move back again- most of the time to a Blackberry it seems. The latest victim to succumb to this switcher-mania is CNET’s Adam Richardson. … Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Apple shook up their hobby project that goes by the name Apple TV. They just dropped the 40GB model entirely and discounted the 160GB model to what HAD been the 40GB price- $226. That is a $100 price cut. I really like my Apple TV, but don’t use it nearly as much as I thought I would. Regardless, the 40GB version is gone, the 120GB version is $100 less, and most people STILL don’t get the point of an Apple TV. via MacRumors Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I am a big fan of time management games. They combine some of the most interesting elements of action and puzzle games into a single package. Cooking Dash is a follow-up to the hugely successful Diner Dash game. Let’s see if it lives up to the expectations created by the original.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

After all of the dust settled from the Apple Event the other day, there was one segment that left me with a particularly bad taste in my mouth – the part where Phil Schiller put down the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP and supported his claims of gaming greatness with the slide above. That segment left me with three words to describe Apple – arrogance, hubris, and cluelessness.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

(Editorial note: Larry would be writing this himself but he is in the midst of a 24 hour shift at the firehouse and is dealing with his 3rd call of the night!) One of the great things about the iPhone accessory world these days is the huge number of different accessory companies making awesome cases, cradles and more for our favorite device. It means you can always find the right case for your budget and taste. (Heck, you can even get a custom Gear Diary case!!) It also means you can choose which companies get your money and which don’t. There are many companies I like to work with. They include, among others, Case-Mate, Incase, Agent18, iSkin, Sena and more. The list of companies I WILL NOT DO BUSINESS WITH is actually much shorter. But an exchange Larry had earlier today with a little company called Rebel Scholar further solidified my position that, even if Rebel Scholar had the best cases ever, I would not do business with them. At this point the whole thing is laughable, or it would be if it weren’t so sad. Here’s the latest chapter in LGreenberg V. RS. No folks, you aren’t going to [...]

It seems like only yesterday that I was New York City for the release of the first Vivienne Tam Digital Clutch, the MiniNote netbook that she had personally worked with HP to design, and now there is already an update. Last night Vivienne Tam’s new digital clutch was unveiled on the catwalk of her Spring 2010 fashion show. The HP Vivienne Tam digital clutch features an original butterfly design inspired by the classic Chinese love story “Butterfly Lovers.” Beautiful butterflies are brought to life on a champagne gold backdrop. “To me, butterflies symbolize love, freedom, independence and transformation,” said Vivienne Tam. “I love working with HP because they are also inspired by nature. Together we bring life, color and personality to the computer world, creating fashionable technology for modern women.” Continue reading on Gear Diary …

qTweeter is one of the best reasons to jailbreak. Once installed via Cydia all you do is draw your finger down from the top of the screen and an input window appears and allows you to quickly update your Twitter or Facebook status. Now the app has been approved by Apple and released in the App Store for $.99. That’s the good news. The bad news?? The key drop down functionality that lets you launch the app from the status bar is missing. Continue reading on Gear Diary …

What is the best camera currently on the market? Gear Diary knows and we’re willing to let you in on the secret… The best camera currently available is… the iPhone 3GS. “Huh?” You say, “It is just 3MP, doesn’t have a flash. Isn’t the fastest sensor around. And the list goes on and on and on. The iPhone 3GS is the best camera… you’ve got to be kidding.” No we’re not and here’s why.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Welcome back to the GearGames weekly video game release feature here at Gear Diary! After the mega-game event last week with Beatles Rock Band, this week might seem slow … until you look at the list! There are hot games coming out on all platforms across multiple genres, such as Need for Speed: Shift, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2, and the competing hockey games NHL 10 and NHL 2K10. For me the DS and PC are the big winners this week – read on to find out why.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I apologize for the quality of this video. I took it late in the day yesterday on my iPhone 3GS while visiting Electronic Arts (aka EA) for Blogger Day. One of EA’s huge successes is their line of Sims games which allow you to control and interact your character (called a Sim for simulation) with other characters on screen. Their newest game, MySims Agents (due out September 29, 2009 on Wii and Nintendo DS) is an epic adventure game with a story line and a crime for your Sim to solve. What this video shows is how voice interaction is added to the game. Before yesterday I’d assumed this was all done electronically by a computer. Wrong! There are actors, producers and audio engineers who painstakingly… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I turned on my iPhone after it was off for a few hours (a relative rarity) to find the above messages from Larry. You cannot believe how fast the new version of Jott is on the iPhone. It sends the message as soon as you hit stop, like a second later. Testing it again just to make sure. “Hmmm…” I thought, “Jott was updated. Always a good thing but stop exaggerating Larry…” So I downloaded the update, launched it, added back my contacts (the update removed them GRRRRRR) and found that…… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Mmmmm.  Two great technologies that should go great together:  Augmented Reality and GPS.  Like mixing peanut butter with chocolate for a delicious treat, Austrian startup Mobilizy has merged both the view of a physical real-world environnment with real-time GPS navigation to produce Wikitude Drive. Currently featured for the Android platform, developers can grab the Wikitude  API (or Application Programming Interface) to create their own augmented reality app goodness.  The promise of augmented reality apps continues to look like it will be the next “killer” feature for smartphones.  Once the flood gates open and developers really start taking advantage of augmented reality for mobile applications, will you still prefer the simple views of 2D or 3D?  Hmmmmm.  Take a look of Wikitude Drive in action after the break.… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Ubuntu is in heavy testing for its next release, code named Karmic Koala, or version 9.10.  It is currently in Alpha 5, and it looks very promising already.  There is a huge focus on reducing the boot times of Ubuntu for Karmic.  Jono Bacon, Ubuntu’s Community Manager has recently posted some interesting tidbits about other things coming to Ubuntu in this 9.10 release…… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

An engineer at Microsoft has posted some interesting data estimating the length of time it should take different types of users with differing hardware configurations to upgrade from Vista SP1 to Windows 7. Microsoft assumed for the sake of this study that everyone would upgrade from Vista SP1 and did not compute the presumably worse times that XP users (that’s most of us) could expect. They said that Windows XP is a different system, Windows XP did not support 64-bit upgrades and they really wanted to track 64-bit performance and that Vista SP1 to Windows 7 is a valid upgrade path that exercises all upgrade code. In some instances Microsoft’s own estimate provides that a Super User with 650 GB… Continue reading on Gear Diary …