Josh Bancroft’s TinyScreenfuls.com

msmobiles.com - Second bad news item from Motorola: the Motorola MPx delayed to year 2005

This has been speculated on before, but MSMobiles.com is claiming to have “very reliable confirmation” that the dual-flip MPx Pocket PC Phone Edition will not be available until after the beginning of 2005.

Hopefully Moto is using this time to add more memory to the device. 32MB is just not enough.

Microsoft Monitor: Feeling Dumb About Smartphone

Joe Wilcox over at MicrosoftMonitor just blogged about a bad user expereience he had with his Moto MPX200 Smartphone. He had previously retired the phone, and was going to give it to his daughter to use, but wanted to delete his 1300 contacts first.

The problem arose when he tried to “Select All, Delete” the Contacts on the phone itself. There’s no such functionality. So the next logical step was to turn to ActiveSync - sync the phone to his daughter’s computer that had a blank Contacts list, and let ActiveSync remove the contacts on the phone. Great idea in theory, but anyone who has any experience with ActiveSync can see where this is heading:

My first synchronization [...] failed to zap the contacts on the phone. So, I made the mistake of unplugging the phone from the computer and replugging it to restart the process. Bad idea. ActiveSync wouldn’t recognize the phone had been reattached. This problem would repeat throughout the synchronization process. [...] Eventually, the synchronization reached a point where I had an option to remove all the contacts from the MPX200, overwriting them with the empty address book from the computer. I clicked “Remove All,” and figured goal accomplished. Not a chance.

Joe doesn’t say what happened when he chose “Remove All”, and why it didn’t work out. At any rate, he arrived at the decision that probably should have been first when giving a device to someone else - a hard reset to wipe the memory and restore the phone to it’s factory loaded state.

The hard reset finally did the trick, but Joe points out one of the problems in owning a “multi-vendor device”:

Like many other cell phones, the MPX200 is a multi-vendor product. Microsoft develops the software, Motorola makes the hardware and AT&T Wireless provides the cellular service. But which company should provide information on using the phone? [...] I figure all three companies, on basic stuff like troubleshooting contact synchronization and at least the hardware manufacturer and service provider for resetting the phone.

This is a valid point. Not everyone feverishly learns and plays with all of the nooks and crannies of a device’s functionality like we gadget geeks do. Think of your non-geeky mother or friend having to deal with a problem like this. And the problem isn’t just limited to phones - laptops are another big offender. If I want to update the graphics driver for my IBM T40, do I go to Microsoft (who provides the OS), ATI (who provides the graphics chipset), or IBM (who integrates everything)? Before you say anything, I do know the answer to that question. But it’s because I’m a geek, and I live for stuff like this.

There’s a lot of room for improvement in the overall “user experience” as we move towards ubiquitous converged devices. Cory Doctorow’s latest book, Eastern Standard Tribe (available in full for free under the Creative Commons license, and a great read - go get it!) features a character in the near future whose profession is to design and improve on the user experience. As computing and devices become more and more a part of our daily lives, we need people to focus on the experience, and make all of the pieces play together nicely.

HP iPaq Mobile Media Companion rx3715 review - Intro - Handheld Devices - CNET Reviews

This is one of the gadgets I’m really excited about, and will likely be my next PDA.

The review praises the performance and battery life of the rx3715. Speedwise, its 533 MHz Samsung CPU is only bested by the Dell X30 with an Intel XScale 624 MHz chip, and this is what the reviewer had to say about battery life (thanks to the hefty 1400 mAh battery):

However, the rx3715’s strongest suit is its extremely long battery life. In our drain tests, where we let the device play a movie clip repeatedly with the sound on, set the backlight at High, and turned off the wireless radio, the rx3710 managed to sustain up to 8.5 hours of use, almost twice as long as the former leader, the 312MHz Dell Axim X30. Since our test is designed to drain the battery in the fastest manner, you can expect far longer between charges in real-world general usage. In our more informal testing, we were absolutely astounded at how long this Pocket PC lasted with both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi radios on and the backlight set at High.

The reviewer also liked the included Nevo universal remote control software, but wasn’t so enthused about the new Nevo Mobile Media software, which lets you slowly and awkwardly access photos, music, and video on a PC running the “server” component of the software.

The only thing I’m waiting for is availability. HP “annouced” the new generation of iPAQs officially a couple of weeks ago, and reviews have been popping up around the ‘net, but so far, the new iPAQs don’t seem to be available in stores. I’d like to put my hands on one, and play with it a bit before I decide to replace my 4350. But so far, there’s nothing about the rx3715 that would prevent it from becoming my next “precious”.

demsey.org - A few thoughts about device UI

Link above goes to an interesting piece by Seth Demsey about some UI issues he has run into with his Moto MPX200 running Windows Mobile 2003 for Smartphones (same setup I’m using). I’ve experienced all of the issues he points out (phone vibrating in my ear, having to dismiss dialogs multiple times, etc.), but I guess I just take it for granted that Windows Mobile has these kinds of problems. To me, it doesn’t diminish my enjoyment or usage of the device, but then, I don’t think I’m a regular case. My somewhat fanatical love for gadgets, and my Smartphone in particular, leads me to overlook some of the shortcomings of the platform.

I have my limits, though. Several times in the past couple of years, I got fed up with the problems found in a couple of gadgets that I was otherwise enamored with.

First was the Danger Hiptop/T-Mobile Sidekick. My love of unlimited GPRS data usage for email, IM, and surfing made me overlook the fact that it was clunky to use as a phone, often didn’t ring for incoming calls, and had extremely limited expansion options. Finally, after about a year, the love affair was over, and I switched to a T-Mobile Pocket PC Phone Edition. The novelty was intoxicating - same unlimited internet access for surfing and email, great integration with my Contacts from Outlook, and lots of available applications to play with. But it was even clunkier to use as a phone than the Sidekick, and had some serious stability and UI issues (worse than those that Demsey writes about on the MPX200). The Phone application would often hang or become very unresponsive. Other applications or modal dialogs would pop up and have to be dealt with while I was trying to make or receive a call. It required two hands to use, because of the touchscreen. After the same period of time, the magic was gone, and my wandering eyes fell upon the new beauty on the block - Microsoft’s Smartphone.

I’ve had my MPX200 for about 8 months now, and I’ve been running WM2003 for about a week. The Smartphone fixes most of the issues I had with the Sidekick and Pocket PC Phone Edition with regard to usability as a phone. It’s a phone first, and a data device second. Navigation is well thought out, and you can accomplish anything on the phone with one hand. These are the features that I trumpet to anyone that will listen about why the Smartphone is a great device. Sure, it’s got its issues, but what device doesn’t. That said, I don’t want to let the Windows Mobile developers off easy - I hope they listen to the likes of Demsey and others, and address the problems (UI and otherwise) in the next OS revision.

Because if they don’t, who’s to say that it will be compelling enough to evoke that old familiar gadget lust when it comes out…

TiVo saves man from having to explain himself - Engadget - www.engadget.com

Remember hearing on the news the other day that Dallas Fort Worth International Airport closed for a while the other day, due to a bomb scare? Yeah, me too. I didn’t think much of it. Then I read this twist over at Engadget:

Brian Teasley, a member of band/cult the Polyphonic Spree [...] didn’t think much of it when one of his checked bags didn’t show up after a flight from Dallas to Birmingham, Alabama, but airport security in Dallas sure did. They freaked out over a custom-made microphone in his bag, and after shutting down five gates, Dallas Fort-Worth International Airport security officials proceeded to use a bomb disposal robot to remove the bag from the terminal and take it an open field. Unaware that all of this was going on, Teasley managed to fly home to Birmingham (so basically his bag wasn’t fit to fly but airport security didn’t see any problem with letting a person who may have been trying to bomb the plane get on board), filed the missing luggage paperwork when his bag didn’t arrive along with him, and went home, where he was promptly visited by police officers and other people wearing bulletproof vests. So how’d he prove that his explosively rocking microphone wasn’t actually an explosive device? He gathered all of the police and security officials around his television, where he showed them a recent episode of Craig Kilborn of the band performing (with said microphone) that he still had stored on his TiVo.

That’s awesome. See, there’s a good reason we have all of this geeky technology! You never know when it’s going to save your bacon.

Have you ever had a gadget come in handy in an unexpected situation? If so, post about it below in the comments section!