Lowe Pro has recently added to its line-up of all-weather (AW) camera bags. The new bags all share Lowe Pro's All-Weather construction, with built-in rain covers for when the conditions change. Some feature removable laptop sleeves, one even has a flip-up sunshade for the laptop when on location. From smaller more stealth bags, to holster style cases and full size backpacks, there is something for a wide array of needs for the professional and photo enthusiast.
The Pro Trekker 300 AW, 400 AW and 650 AW are professional grade backpacks designed to carry large amounts of gear. All-weather construction with a built-in rain cover. The model number refers to the largest focal-length lens that can be on the camera when it is inserted in the bag. Has removable waist belt that can be used as a work belt when removed. Hydration ready side pockets with seam sealed pouch. Sharing a design in line with camping backpacks, there is a top cap that covers the top of the backpack and can be cinched down to tighten up the body of the pack. The top cap can be removed and converts into a belt-pack. All three come with a removable foam laptop sleeve that fits up to a 15.4 inch screen. The Pro Trekker 300 AW sells for about $240, with the Pro Trekker 400 AW going for $280 and the Pro Trekker 600 AW for $320.
The Magnum 200 AW, 400 AW, 650 AW series are all black and designed for the professional photographer as a durable, portable toolbox. All-weather construction with a built-in rain cover. They share one piece foam framing all the way around for stronger corners to protect against impacts. The largest in the series, the 650, features a removable laptop sleeve with a built-in sun-shade, for location work. The Magnum 200 AW sells for about $150, with the Magnum 400 AW going for $200 and the Magnum 650 AW for $250.
The Outback 300 AW is a belt-pack, holster style camera bag. Modular belt-pack design with two interchangeable lens cases allowing you to gear up or gear down for the situation. All-weather construction with a built-in rain cover. Designed to protect your gear while allowing freedom of movement by freeing up your arms and shoulders, valuable when hiking and other activities. The Outback 300 AW sell for about $100.
The Versapack 200 AW is a fairly stealth camera bag with a daypack appearance. Great for anytime you don't want to look like you're carrying a camera bag. Two color schemes: black with gray and polar blue with gray. All-weather construction with a built-in rain cover. Lots of pockets easily accessible under front flap, for cell phones, sunglasses and such. Dual side entry compartments. The Versapack 200 AW sells for about $100.
The Classified Sling 180 AW and the 220 AW are all black, and are designed for those seeking a very discreet camera bag, great for travel and tight packed environments. Nimble Handling with its sling strap design. Side access to main compartments. A lean modern shape, designed to easily work in a crowd or on public transportation. Blends right in, doesn't scream camera bag. All-weather construction with a built-in rain cover. The 220 features a zippered, padded pocket that fits up to a 15.4 inch screen laptop. The Classified Sling 180 AW sells for about $130 and the 220 AW for about $150.
"Come on, Flixster. We know you can do better than that."
Those are the words I wrote on Friday to sum up a review of Flixster's movie app for BlackBerry phones. The trouble is, I goofed. I was apparently a day early, reviewing the previous Flixster for BlackBerry, which did deserve the critiques I dished out, and not the update, which Flixster was set to release on Saturday (we still don't see it in the BlackBerry App World as of Sunday, but keep checking the store and this post for an update). A re-review--or rather, a preview of the forthcoming Movies app, version 1.1.6--is only fair.
The updated Movies app by Flixster for
(Credit: Flixster)Flixster's free Movies 1.1.6 for BlackBerry is a pronounced improvement over version 1.0, which served more as a shortcut to Flixster's mobile-optimized Web site than it did a native application. The movie app's navigation looks similar to the previous version, but is now stylized and fixed in place, with only the content refreshing as you move from tab to tab, not the entire screen as before.
As with many mobile apps that sync their content from a master Web site, the application's speed is still contingent on the strength of your connection. If you have a slow connection, the show times and theater lists will be slow to load. This is especially true when it comes to launching previews. It appears that movie previews call on the browser to initiate a download, and then play on the BlackBerry's built-in media player--at least in the case of my test phone, the BlackBerry Bold 9700. An error message that the wireless connection broke appeared after each trailer finished playing. Pressing the phone's "back" arrow key twice restored Flixster's app.
While the guts of the Flixster app are identical to the previous version, and mostly to the main Web site itself, the updated visual wrapper transforms the user experience from basic Web browsing to a cohesive launchpad from which you can read reviews, scour showtimes, and buy tickets by way of Movietickets.com. Flixster's Movies app is one I'd now readily, not reluctantly, use on BlackBerry when that urge to stare at the silver screen sets in.
(Credit:
Barnes & Noble)
Demand is so strong for the Nook that Barnes & Noble has begun telling new customers not to expect delivery of the soon-to-be-released e-reader until the second week of December.
When the nation's largest bookseller unveiled the device in October, customers placing early pre-orders for the Nook were told they could expect the Nook to ship by the end of November; customers placing pre-orders now are being told they can expect shipment by December 11. The new shipping date was first reported by Brighthand.com.
A Barnes & Noble spokesperson confirmed the December 11 shipping date but disputed the characterization of the new shipping date as a delay.
"Like with any hot new consumer device, the sooner you order it the sooner you receive it," said Mary Ellen Keating, senior vice president of corporate communications and public affairs. "We had high expectations for the Nook and couldn't be happier" with pre-order sales, she said. However, she declined to say how many of the e-readers had been pre-ordered.
"We are working hard to meet demand for the holidays," she said.
Earlier this month, start-up Spring Design filed a lawsuit against Barnes & Noble, alleging the bookseller misappropriated its trade secrets in the design of the Nook. Spring Design had announced its Alex e-reader just days before Barnes & Noble formally unveiled the Nook. Both e-readers use the Android operating system and combine an e-ink screen with a color touch screen. It seeks both monetary damages as well as a halt to sales of the Nook.
The $259 Nook, a challenger to Amazon's Kindle, will join an expected boom in e-reader sales. In a report released last month, Forrester Research raised its 2009 forecast for e-reader sales in the United States to 3 million units from its previous prediction of 2 million sales. Forrester also expects Amazon's Kindle to command about 60 percent of the e-reader market in 2009, compared with 35 percent for Sony's Reader.
Beamer, an iPhone case with a built-in LED light, will only be available for purchase if at least 500 people preorder it.
(Credit: Quirky.com)It's not like us to get too excited about an iPhone case, but this one shines--literally--because it's the very device I was wishing for last month while traveling in Europe.
This iPhone day shot of the Leaning Tower of Pisa turned out just fine, but my night shots didn't work at all. Beamer would have helped.
(Credit: Michelle Meyers/CNET)Beamer, as the name connotes, is an iPhone case with a built-in LED light you can turn on to use as both a flashlight and a camera flash. Just the thing I needed when I wanted to shoot the Leaning Tower of Pisa at night with my iPhone, having left my real camera back at our hotel.
And it sure would have helped in Paris when we returned at night to our historic apartment building and had to climb six flights up a pitch-black spiral staircase. (I did light the way with my iPhone, but this would have been much better.)
Beamer has a hard-plastic, two-piece design, equipped with a replaceable coin cell battery that provides about 10 hours of illumination. Pressing the silicone button once will turn the light on for 10 seconds. Pressing it twice in a row will leave it on indefinitely, or until you press it a third time. It comes in an array of bright colors.
The case is just the latest design from Quirky, a relatively new collaborative design community that also conceived of the super-cute DigiDude tripod and that cool Watt Time light-bulb shaped alarm clock.
In line with Quirky's crowd-sourced production model, the Beamer won't be available for consumers until 500 orders have been made, at which point those who have committed to buying it will be charged $32. Right now, 44 prospective Beamer owners have preordered.
You gotta love a Lego rock star.
(Credit: Warner Bros. Interactive)Too busy comparing Droid and iPhone price plans and not waiting in line outside a Verizon store to keep up with Crave this week? Fret not. As always, the weekly roundup is here for you.
• We (finally) got our hands on Dell's Adamo XPS.
• Netflix-compatible video devices--how to choose?
• A closer look at Courier's swipes, snips, and scribbles.
• Let's say you only have $350 to spend on a laptop...
We test-drove an Adamo XPS.
(Credit: Dan Ackerman/CNET)• Next time you have a date with an iPhone user, hide your landline.
• David Bowie in Lego form!
• Salam wa aleikum, Arabic-speaking robot.
• David Carnoy hit the court with NBA 2K10 and BNA Live.
• Global battle of the... power plugs?
See anything we missed? Working on a brilliant and fascinating invention we should know about? Write to us at crave at cnet dot com.
LG Chocolate Touch VX8575 in hand
(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)Perhaps the biggest letdown of the LG Chocolate Touch VX8575 from Verizon Wireless is that it's not the LG Chocolate BL40. After getting teased for months by the sexy shots of the LG BL40, we thought there might be a chance we would see it stateside. Alas, the LG Chocolate Touch VX8575 looks nothing like its European cousin. In fact, the touch screen interface reminds us a lot of previous LG touch screen handsets, like the LG enV Touch for example. The geometric shapes on the back of the phone and the blob-like buttons underneath the display are about the only things that are unique about the phone's design.
Still, that doesn't mean the Touch VX8575 is a terrible phone. Continuing the Chocolate tradition of strong music features, the Chocolate Touch VX8575 has a great music player with Dolby Music equalizer settings (both manual and preset modes), an FM radio, and an integrated song ID feature. There's also a really fun "Join the Band" feature that gives you either a virtual drum kit or a scrolling 88-key keyboard to play along with your tunes. The drum kit even has a cow bell, which we found amusing.
That, and it has a nice 3.2-megapixel camera, EV-DO Rev. 0, V Cast video access, stereo Bluetooth, and a 3.5mm headset jack. We weren't big fans of the full HTML browser -- you have to keep going back to a URL-entry page to enter URLs, for example -- but it's otherwise a decent touch screen music phone from Verizon Wireless. The LG Chocolate Touch VX8575 is $79.99 with a two-year service agreement with Verizon Wireless.
Updated 11/8/09 at 9:15 pm PT: This post evaluated Flixster's Movies 1.0 app for BlackBerry phones. It turns out, we got a little bit ahead of ourselves on this review--but here's the hands-on review for the update to the app described below, Flixster's Movies 1.1.6 for BlackBerry.
Flixster 1.0 sure didn't look this good on our BlackBerry Bold--but the next version will.
(Credit: Flixster)We were excited to hear that Flixster's popular iPhone movie app was making the jump to BlackBerry. Unfortunately, not all apps dive as elegantly into other mobile platforms. Flixster's Movies app is one of them.
The free Movies by Flixster app for BlackBerry has all the essentials: a tab for box office hits, an area to enter your Zip code to find movies near you, a list of upcoming titles, and movies that have come out on DVD. You can even purchase movies via movietickets.com. Yet this movie "app" is not so much a native application as it is a shortcut to a BlackBerry-optimized version of Flixster's mobile Web site.
While a nicely formatted mobile site routinely delivers a better experience than navigating the site through a browser, winding up with a not-app after downloading an application feels like a cheap trick. To top it off, Flixster Mobile looks like a mobile site on BlackBerry and reloads every screen as you navigate. In contrast, the iPhone version, pulls show times and theater information into a stylized interface that in no way resembles the Flixster.com site, apart from the information it downloads.
Users aren't fooled by the bait-and-switch, either. Flixster's movie app on BlackBerry rates 2.5 stars out of 129 votes at the time of writing. The program's average iPhone rating scores higher, with a 3.5-star average for the current version out of about 16,000 user reviews.
Come on, Flixster. We know you can do better than that.
We're getting close to the holidays and we know you're starting to make your wish lists. So we're treating this month's most popular products list as a request. You're spending a lot of your time viewing these products. We get it. Feel free to send this video around to friends and family as a hint.
And while we're at it, let's give you something. Well, one of you. Go watch the video, answer the trivia question, and come back here and post your guess. It could light up your holidays. Literally.
The answer to last week's question was: The GNU Project.
Special hint. If you have a bogus e-mail address in your account, you won't win because you'll never get the e-mail. Just a thought.
(Credit:
Gizmodo)
The single-purpose TwitterPeek is a crazy device. But hey, now that Peek has gone down this road, why stop there? Here are some ideas for the next generation of Peek handheld devices.
NotepadPeek
Take notes on the go! Never be without your shopping list again! Doesn't sync with anything on your normal computer. $99 for six months of service or $199 for lifetime use.
YelpPeek
Find restaurants and businesses around you, and leave reviews of those you go to. How convenient! No GPS. $99 for six months of service or $199 for lifetime use.
TimeZonePeek
What time is it in various time zones? Now you know with this Peek! $99 for six months of service or $199 for lifetime use.
ClockPeek
What time is it? Never ask such a stupid question again! No alarm function. $99 for six months of service or $199 for lifetime use.
Mobile phone maker Nokia is jumping into the Netbook pool with its recently announced Booklet 3G laptop (as seen in the video). We've just gotten our hands on the final version of the system, and here are our initial impressions.
The Booklet 3G is easily one of the most upscale-looking Netbooks we've seen. It feels solid and well-built in your hands, without being too heavy. The screen hinge in particular feels pleasingly tight, while the slightly too thick keyboard tray has zero flex even when pressing down firmly on the keyboard.
Unlike the gently tapered sides of many other Netbooks, designed to create the illusion of slimness, the Booklet has sharp, angled edges. True to the name, there is a booklike squareness to it. The inside is devoid of quick launch or shortcut keys, and even the power button is relegated to the right side edge, next to a tiny hatch covering SD and SIM card slots.
Unfortunately, the keyboard itself is cramped, with tiny keys that are hard to hit accurately. Considering the strides other Netbooks have made with creating very usable keyboards, it was a letdown. The touch pad is large and easy to use, even though we had to crank up the pointer speed in the Windows 7 options.
The 10.1-inch display has the higher 1,366x768-pixel resolution found on many high-end Netbooks, and a single sheet of glass covers the screen and much of the screen bezel, but there's still a separate outer lip, so it's not quite what we call edge-to-edge.
The AT&T mobile broadband service connected automatically, and the process was wonderfully transparent, especially compared with the software setup and manual log-ins required by other mobile broadband laptops. The option to manually join a local Wi-Fi network is also available. Our review unit lacked the final versions of the Nokia and Ovi networking and connectivity software, but we did fine with Windows 7's built-in versions.
Despite an excellent design and well-integrated mobile broadband, the Booklet 3G hits a rough patch as as an actual Netbook. Using the slower Z530 version of Intel's Atom CPU (instead of the more common N270 or N280 versions) means that performance was generally sluggish, especially with only 1GB of RAM.
Opening windows and navigating around the Windows 7 environment led to some stuttering and slowdown. Even something as simple as running multiple Web browser windows and a Microsoft Office doc at the same time slowed the system in our anecdotal hands-on testing.
With a two-year AT&T contract, the Booklet3G costs $299, and its excellent design and build quality puts it miles ahead of other $299 Netbooks. But keep in mind that you're then tied to a monthly fee--usually around $60--for data. The Booklet is also available sans contract for $599, but that's both largely pointless and way overpriced.
We will conduct our usual battery of benchmark tests and report back with a full review next week.
