With the UK launch of the Nokia 3310, I talk to Mark Murphy at BBC Radio Suffolk about the nostalgia behind one of the most popular mobile phones of the last 20 years.
The original Nokia 3310 is without doubt an iconic mobile handset and in it’s original form which went on to sell 126,000,000 units.
Following the licensing of the ‘Nokia’ phone brand to HMD, four new phones, including three running Android, namely the Nokia 3, Nokia 4 and Nokia 5 are to be launched.
Nokia 3310
Alongside these modern smartphones see’s the reborn Nokia 3310.
The handset is described as ‘a modern classic reborn’, retaining the durability and insane standby time of the original. Available in four distinctive colours and with a price tag of £49, expect the 3310 to be popular again.
Don’t forget to listen in to the stream to find our more!
Lighter evenings are upon us at last! We can start to look forward to getting out in the fresh air again after hibernating over the winter months. As always when I start thinking of spending more time outside I begin looking for gadgets that I can take with me.
I’ve recently been sent the Edifier MP280 Portable Speaker something that is clearly marketed to outdoor enthusiasts.
Edifier MP280 Portable Speaker
I’ve always found Edifier really high quality and the MP280 checks that box, it feels solid and well made with special silicone material and metal. The speakers are wrapping around the cylindrical design and give 360 degree sound along with professional grade DSP chips to give exceptional sound quality.
Edifier MP280 Portable Speaker
The MP280 comes with Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity, microSD and Aux sockets. There is the added bonus of a USB out port which means you can use the speaker to charge your phone or other USB device when you are out and about. The speaker can be charged using a standard micro USB socket and when fully charged, the lithium ion battery should give 10 hours of constant playback.
Edifier MP280 Portable Speaker
The on/off button is placed on top of the speaker along with the Bluetooth pairing button. When switched on, the speaker plays a pleasant tune to let you know it’s working and to demonstrate it’s lovely sound quality. On the side is the volume controls and also a button used play and pause music which can also be used to display the current battery charge status which when pressed for 2 seconds displays the battery status using 3 green LED’s.
At the bottom of the speaker is the power / status light and just above this is an NFC contact point. If you have an NFC (near field connection) compatible phone you simply tap your phone on this and it sorts out the connection for you.
Edifier MP280 Portable Speaker
As a smartphone user, I am constantly faced with battery anxiety, where I might struggle to the end of the day without having to plug my phone into a charger. The MP280 can remove this anxiety by doubling as an emergency recharge station to give your phone a boost and continue to play your music whilst charging it up again.
Edifier MP280 Portable Speaker
The speaker will operate up to 10 metres away from your phone using Bluetooth 4.0 technology and the really useful and it also doubles as a hands free device with it’s in built microphone!
If you fancy going for a hike with your friends or family, you can attach the speaker to your backpack using the inbuilt carabiner clip. Again this is feels high quality too.
There are no shortage of portable bluetooth speakers on the market at the moment and the MP280 certainly sits at the top end of this with a well made, high quality product ideal for your camping trips in the coming months.
For the last few weeks, I have been testing the ASUS Transformer Mini, a device which can be a laptop and tablet depending on your mood.
ASUS Transformer Mini T102H
The idea of a tablets with keyboards is not a new one, these were generally add-on keyboards for iPads or Android tablets which worked well, but seemed out of place on a device that was designed to be operated without one. There have also been laptops with detachable keyboards which in turn felt out of place running software which was designed for one.
The key change is the introduction of Windows 10 which can seamlessly transform itself from a keyboard and mouse centric operating system into a touch and swipe based tablet and back again, simply by detaching and reattaching a keyboard,
ASUS Transformer Mini T102H
ASUS have been in the ‘transforming’ tablet market for some time and the Transformer Mini T102H brings a very useful addition to the table with a 10.1″ LED backlit HD screen which uses ASUS’s ‘Splendid’ and ‘Wideview’ Technology to give great viewing angles.
ASUS Transformer Mini T102H
Powered by the Intel® Atom™ x5 Processor and 4 GB of RAM. The hard disk is in fact Solid State memory and gives your 64GB of silent running. Everything on board is low power and there didn’t appear to be any internal fans to cool the device.
The graphics are fast and snappy helped by the integrated Intel HD Graphics processor and there’s also an inbuilt 2 megapixel webcam for Skype or other video chat applications.
The great thing about Windows tablets is the number of connectors, the Transformer has a 3.5 mm combo audio jack, USB 3.0 and Micro USB ports, a micro HDMI socket, Fingerprint reader for login, volume controls and micro SD card slot.
ASUS Transformer Mini T102
The detachable keyboard was really easy to use and attaches using a powerful magnet and always seemed to line up properly and was responsive to use with the inbuilt trackpad. My Transformer also came with a stylus which is battery powered and looks and feels like a real pen, it was great for drawing and painting using the bundled apps and can also be used to write on-screen sticky note.
ASUS Transformer Mini T102H
I really enjoyed using the Transformer and it makes a great device for people who are comfortable with tablets, but also need a real keyboard for their work, possibly an idea for students? At £449 it is reasonably price too.
Welcome to the 100th Episode of The Gadget Man, this time I set myself a very big task of LIVE STREAMING a technology review of the brand new Cross Peerless Trackr Pen. I hope you enjoy it below. The review itself starts at about 2 minutes in!
A few weeks back I was invited to London to attend the launch of the new Cross Peerless Trackr, the worlds first trackable pen.
Cross have been making writing instruments since 1846, so it was a pleasant surprise to see an established traditional brand embracing technology without losing what makes the company appealing.
The pen has Bluetooth technology carefully embedded inside it which works alongside what’s called ‘Crowd GPS’. This means that if you are unfortunate enough to misplace you pen or worse have it stolen, a league of other Trackr users immediately start helping your reunite your prized pen. When a person running the Trackr app comes within up to 30 metres of your pen, they detect it and immediately an anonymous message is sent to you informing your of it’s current position.
Upon receiving the notification, you can then go to that location and using the app on your own phone, you cause the pen to light up and sound an alarm to give you an indication of it’s exact position, after a little bit of searching or discussion with it’s new temporary owner, the pen can be returned to you.
Conversely, the pen itself can be used to locate your phone, so if you are hunting around the house in the morning for your mobile, simply hold down the button on the side of the pen and your phone will start ringing!
The pen itself comes in a very nice presentation box along with instructions for pairing and using the pen, spare batteries, a nice suede case sleeve for the pen and your guarantee from Cross.
Once taken out of the box, the pen feels just weighty enough to feel comfortable and writes smoothly. As a pen on it’s own, it was nice and of course the ‘techie’ addition of the tracking appealed to me too. You should bear in mind that the crowd GPS functionality requires a ‘crowd’, so losing it in the middle of a deserted field isn’t going to help. Saying that, most towns have a large number of Trackr users and Central London was packed with them. You can even see how many people use Trackr by visiting their website.
If you are looking for a high end pen for meetings or a nice birthday or anniversary gift for someone, look no further than the Cross Peerless Trackr 125 Pen, available from all good pen shops for around £212.00.
Thanks to Rachel and Dan at Small Man Media and of course Cross for their kind invitation.
I’ve finished testing the Parrot Bebop 2 camera drone. A fully review is coming up shortly. In the meantime here is a selection of footage I have taken over the last couple of weeks.
This week I have been testing a set of FlyONE Dark bluetooth headphones from DEEWEAR.
The headphones have an real ergonomic design coupled with extremely high audio quality, they are designed in such as way as you stay fixed in your ear by using built in flaps which fit into your ear and remain there even during exercise. Deewear employed Luigi Lorenzi, Parkourer with Team Jestion to test and develop the headphones to ensure they stay in place even during somersaults!
The earphones are contained in a display case charged ready to go, just couple them to your bluetooth device and you are ready to go, the box also contains a USB charger cable , buds and flaps.
The earphones utilise Bluetooth 4.1 and 6th generation CVC noise reduction which means that constant usage stretches to 5 hours music or talk time (using the integrated microphone) or 180 hours standby time.
The earphones are connected together with a flat cable which is reflective on one side which can be seen when headlights shine on it, a usual safety measure if you are exercising in the dark.
FlyONE Dark Headphones in box
When you switch on the ear phones a voice is heard saying ‘Power On’ and ‘Connection Successful’, holding the centre power button will switch off the earphones again with a voice telling you ‘Power Off’.
The three button control allows you to adjust the volume up and down and pause music, you can skip backwards and forwards between tracks by holding the volume up and down for 2 seconds.
When you are ready to charge the earphones, you remove the cap on the back of the right earphone and plug in the micro USB cable. Charging doesn’t take too long, however you can only check the battery level by pairing with an Apple device, be that iPhone, iPad or iMac.
The sound quality of FlyONE Dark is supreme, although you need to ensure they are fitted correctly before using them to experience the excellent bass reproduction. While I was testing them, I viewed a film trailer on my phone, I found myself rewinding the trailer to experience the cinematic bass, it really was very good indeed.
FlyONE Dark can be purchased from Amazon currently more than 30% off at £39.99 which is a very appealing price for such a high quality item.
If you are looking for a set of Bluetooth earphones, FlyONE Dark comes highly recommended.
To listen to the Mark and I chatting about the FlyONE Dark, click on the link at the top of the page or click below
A massive thank you to DEEWEAR for providing the earphones for test and review.
It’s been 10 years since the last Star Wars movie was released and it looked like we wouldn’t been seeing anymore of the George Lucas universe. That was until 2012 when Lucasfilm was snapped up by Disney for $4 billion!
Star Wars – The Force Awakens – BB8 Sphero App Enabled Droid DIGITAL CAMERA
With this announcement came the news that the Star Wars movie franchise was to start again with the release of Episode VII The Force Awakens, followed by Episode VIII and IV plus other Star Wars movies not part of the main series. It’s certainly all go! As with the previous movies the mega marketing machine around Star Wars kicked swiftly into gear and earlier in the year Star Wars Day heralded the official reveal of a slew of toys, games, apps, games and much more.
Star Wars – The Force Awakens – BB8 Sphero App Enabled Droid
The most enduring characters of the Star Wars series have most certainly been the droids R2D2 and C3PO, both featuring in all the films in the current series and set to continue to appear in the future too. Along with these fan favourites a new droid is set to take a starring role in The Force Awakens, his (we think it is a he) name is BB8.
BB8 shares certain similarities with R2D2 in the style the dome that carries the eye, however rather than the dustbin style body with legs, BB8’s body is made up of a large ball with the head magically floating onto as the ball rotates to move the droid around.
Disney have licenced the job of producing a ‘toy’ version of BB8 to the tech wizards at Sphero, who have in the past produced a number of robots based on balls that can be controlled by phone apps. BB8 retains this style of control, requiring the user to control the droid using a iPhone or Android device connected via a special app and Bluetooth. BB8 is charged by sitting the ball in a little cradle and whilst charging the dome head will move around is if taking in the surroundings.
Star Wars – The Force Awakens – BB8 Sphero App Enabled Droid
Once charged, you place BB8 on the floor and run up the special app, the droid jumps into life with all the sound playing through the smart phone. You can choose to pilot the droid using controls on the app, control it via ‘set piece’ moves, set it on patrol around your space where it with detect obstacles and attempt to avoid them whilst chirping away in the same style as R2D2. You can also control BB8 via voice by training the app to recognise different commands.
Finally you there is a entertaining ‘Hologram’ mode. This allows you to record a short video message on your phone and then have BB8 project it like a hologram. In reality this is done by pointing your phone camera at BB8 and having the hologram overlaid onto the image on the screen. It is quite cool though,
The Sphero BB8 is not really a toy aimed at young children and at around £120, it’s fairly pricey to and might have limited interest after the hysteria of the movie dies down. Expect more from BB8 in the upcoming movies and a revised ‘battle damaged BB8’ in 2016
Finally we make it to Episode 83 with our first proper Gadget Man of 2016. This week I chat to Mark about the Edifier R1800BT Bluetooth enabled Book Shelf Speakers.
These are really lovely to listen to and have been either side of my iMac for the past couple of weeks. They even come with their very own polishing cloth!
R1800BT
R1800BT_one speaker side
R1800BT_speaker on end
R1800BT_speakers
Listen in to the audio stream above and stay tuned for our upcoming episode where we will be chatting about the Tesla Model S P85D with Auto Pilot!!
