Dear Sony Ericsson,
Though we've known each other for some time, this is the first time that I've written. For the most part, our relationship has been a good one. Back when AT&T was still AT&T Wireless, the Sony Ericsson T68i was one of the very first phones I ever owned (it's so old that I can't even find the CNET review). At the time, I was the envy of my friends since I had a nifty new feature called Bluetooth. What's more, I was the very first person that I knew to have multimedia messaging.
Sony Ericsson T68
(Credit: Sony Ericsson)Though I had to ditch the T68i by the time that I arrived at CNET almost exactly six years ago (happy anniversary to me!), I continued to use your phones periodically as my personal device. And in my official role at CNET, I've reviewed no fewer than 33 of your handsets. On the whole I've enjoyed what I've seen. You've given us brilliant displays, your Walkman and Cyber-shot phones can offer fantastic multimedia quality, and you regularly introduce conversation piece models like the Xperia X1.
But after reviewing T-Mobile's recent Sony Ericsson Equinox, I no longer can overlook one of my frequent complaints. And no, I'm not referring to your unfortunate tendency to over-design your keyboards and controls at the expense of usability. Instead, I'm talking about Sony's proprietary ports and memory cards.
Now I know that you've pledged to adopt the Micro-USB charger standard, but the rest of the cell phone world is rapidly leaving you behind. Even Samsung, a company that put a different charger port on almost every phone, has largely moved in that direction already. In comparison, you're beginning to look dated and frankly, a little stubborn. So please, drop that pesky proprietary port without further delay.
On the upside, I was pleased to hear last summer that you'll be dropping the Memory Stick Micro format in favor of microSD cards. With the exception of the X1, you've stuck firmly to the costly Memory Stick Micro cards until just recently (the Equinox requires them). I'm pleased, however, that newer models like the Yari, the Satio, the Aino, the Jalou, and the Xperia X10 all use microSD. Not only will that save your customers money, but also they'll be able to transfer data onto their phones from other devices.
The W995's lovely 3.5mm headset jack.
(Credit: Kent German/CNET)Lastly, I have to ask that you stop using your proprietary headset connection and adopt a standard 3.5mm jack. I know you're capable of doing this, but I need to see more effort. One of the best features on the W995 was its 3.5mm jack. I was very pleased that I could use my own headset while listening to tunes without having to fumble with the awkward adapter. Even better, I could use more than one peripheral at a time.
You already offer great phones, but these changes will make them even better. Plus, you'll be showing your customers that you want to offer them the most choice possible. That's a small price to pay for a lot of user goodwill.
Regards,
Kent German
P.S. I'd also like to see more of your phones come to U.S. carriers--I fear that we'll never see the Google Android-powered X10--but I'll save that for another column.
(Credit:
Josh Miller/CNET)
In the beginning, MP3 players relied heavily on memory-card expansion slots, because built-in memory was painfully scarce. My, how the times have changed. Nowadays, internal flash chips offer up to 64GB of storage, and memory-card expansion slots--which almost exclusively take some form of SD media--are merely offered as an extra feature.
Luckily, there's a decent array of MP3 players currently on the market offering this extra, so if you're keen on the option of adding more space on a whim--or you just want to use memory cards a la MiniDiscs, swapping them in at intervals--you have plenty of worthy choices.
(Credit:
Honest Technology)
With the proliferation of digital cameras, everybody and their mom probably has one. In fact, you may come away from parties with hundreds of images just waiting to be displayed. So why wait for the next gathering to showcase your photos?
The Fotobox Plus is an SD card reader that comes with embedded flash memory. But what's unique is that the internal memory also contains an editor that converts your images into a slideshow with music.
The finished product can be uploaded to YouTube or converted into various formats such as DVD, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, and WMV, as well as iPod and PSP formats. The Fotobox Plus works in Windows XP and Vista environments, though Mac and Linux users can still use this device as a memory card reader. It will be available starting next month for $79.99, excluding shipping.
The built-in editor comes in both easy and advanced modes.
(Credit: Honest Technology)(Source: Crave Asia)
It's great that the Nano now has a video camera, but it really should've been able to do HD.
In the course of testing standard-definition camcorders, more often than not, I stumble upon a user review where the person complains that their cell phone takes better video than--insert model name here. Sadly, that appraisal is probably not far from the truth.
For example, the recently reviewed Sony Handycam DCR-SX41 and Samsung SMX-F34 flash-based camcorders are no great shakes in the video department. I have used smaller, cheaper devices that take as good or better video than these camcorders. The only things they really offer are megazoom lenses, compact, lightweight bodies, and better controls and shooting options--all at sub-$300 prices. However, does any of that matter if the video isn't nice looking, is all soft and fuzzy, and loaded with blocky compression artifacts and noise?
Granted, there are a few advantages to SD digital video, though. The files are smaller than HD files, for one. They're also less taxing on computer resources, so editing and viewing them on even a basic laptop or desktop is possible. Plus, the quality is generally so mediocre that the movies are perfect for sharing online at small sizes where imperfections are less visible or cared about.
All of these things can be addressed by changing settings on any HD camcorder that's available, though, and buying an HD model gives you the headroom to take advantage of the higher-resolution capabilities should you eventually want to use them.
At this point, it's feeling like the only reason manufacturers still make SD camcorders are for up-selling consumers to HD models. This goes for YouTube-type minicamcorders, too. Case in point, the Flip family of pocket camcorders currently has four models: two HD, two SD. The price difference between SD and HD: $50.
The fifth-generation Nano with its built-in 640x480-pixel resolution video camera seems like an eventual up-sell opportunity, too. Apple's giving consumers VGA video now, letting them see how crappy it looks, and then next year it can get them to buy a Touch with an HD camera in it.
So yes, it's time for standard-definition camcorders--in all of their various form factors--to just die. The industry-standard minimum should be 720p at this point and just give consumers an easy, fast, one-button-press way to drop the resolution to VGA if need be. If companies such as Pure Digital, Kodak, and Creative can do it inexpensively, why can't the other companies?
The Canon PowerShot S90 is the little camera made for pros
(Credit: Joshua Goldman/CNET)Yes, there was great disappointment that no new digital SLRs were announced by Canon on Wednesday--only PowerShots. However, I was not one of the disappointed as I love point-and-shoot cameras of all shapes, sizes, and capabilities. And Canon delivered exactly that.
Though the SX20 IS and SX120 IS are only minor upgrades to their predecessors, the G11, SD980 IS, and SD940 IS all have major tweaks separating them from their previous iterations.
What was probably supposed to be the big "oh wow" camera, however, was the reintroduction of the PowerShot S series in the form of the S90. Based off of the high-end functionality of the PowerShot G-series cameras, it has several cool features including a 28mm-equivalent wide-angle f/2.0 lens with a 3.8x optical zoom, a customizable control ring around the lens for easy access and operation of manual or other shooting settings, and RAW+JPEG capture--all in a body that can fit right in your pocket.
Read more about the cameras and check out some hands-on photos in the slide shows below.
Lastly, in case you're more into camcorders than cameras, Canon announced one new HD model, the HF S11.
... Read more
The new SDXC specification for faster, higher-capacity flash cards emerged in January, and Toshiba now promises the cards themselves will begin arriving about a year afterward.
Toshiba plans to sell its first SDXC cards in the spring of 2010, with a starting capacity of 64GB.
(Credit: Toshiba)Toshiba said Monday it expects to be the first to bring SDXC cards to market, with testing samples of a 64GB version shipping in November and the real thing shipping in the spring of 2010. Those dates will be key moments in what doubtless will be a gradual transition away from the prevailing SDHC standard.
SDXC backers promise higher capacities and data transfer speeds for SDXC, which is important for devices such as video cameras that can produce lots of data at a sustained rate. But initially, a new generation of Toshiba's SDHC line will match the SDXC's maximum 60MBps data-reading speed, and maximum 35MBps data-writing speed, the company announced, using a new high-speed interface called UHS104.
The fast new SDHC cards, though, will only be available in 16GB and 32GB models. SDHC tops out at 32GB, but the SDXC specification extends to 2TB. In addition, through use of Microsoft's exFAT files system on SDXC cards, individual files can exceed 4GB, which is important for longer videos.
Capacity is undeniably important when it comes to carrying your video camera around for extended periods of time. But do you really need all that transfer speed? Leaving aside the confusing muddle of minimum vs. maximum transfer speeds and certification, even high-definition video only pushes the envelope so hard.
For example, Canon's high-end 5D Mark II SLR, which can record 1080p video at 30 frames per second, requires only a relatively modest 8MBps write speed for its CompactFlash card; high-end CompactFlash today can handle 45MBps.
Of course, there's also the matter of transferring photos and videos to computers, a tedious task at best that benefits from maximum speed. But that's often constrained, though, by the card reader and its interface to the computer.
No doubt those pipes will widen as time marches on, with SDXC and higher-speed SDHC helping to nudge things along on one end and higher-speed interfaces such as USB 3.0 and Firewire S1600 and S3200 on the other end. The SDXC specification calls for 104MBps speeds in 2009 and eventual speeds of 300MBps.
One interesting issue is whether SDXC will displace CompactFlash in high-end SLRs. SDHC is used in lower-end SLRs now, displacing CompactFlash, and is making its way into higher-end models including Nikon's D300s and Canon's 1D Mark III alongside CompactFlash.
SD and its successors have relegated rivals such as xD card from FujiFilm and Olympus and Memory Stick from Sony to product niches, new MacBook Pro laptops from Apple have built-in SD card slots, and Canon USA technical adviser Chuck Westfall had encouraging words for SDXC.
So SD has plenty of momentum, and the SDXC generation certainly has the potential to continue to outpace CompactFlash in price while also becoming competitive in capacity and data transfer speeds.
The diminutive size of SD compared to CompactFlash is an asset when trying to squeeze a slot into a computer or camera. But some serious and professional photographers have griped that the small cards are hard to handle and easy to lose.
Japanese mobile carrier KDDI is showcasing a neat way for providing ordinary cell phones with Wi-Fi.
The trick is to integrate Wi-Fi technology on MicroSD cards, used for storage in most modern mobile phones.
At Wireless Japan 2009, now under way in Tokyo, KDDI is exhibiting two different cards manufactured by Mitsumi Electric and Renesas Technology, Japanese Web site Techon reports.
Both have a wireless LAN IC compliant with IEEE802.11b/g, a transceiving antenna, and passive components. There's no information on release date, compatibility, or battery consumption, which could be an issue, but if the product comes to market it could prove handy.
As opposed to smartphones, traditional cell phones often lack Wi-Fi for a fast Internet connection.
When I say the Canon FS200 is a success, it should be interpreted as "the video's not perfect, but the results are pretty good all things considered and the rest of it is a great package."
After all, there are cell phones and cheap pocket cameras with higher resolutions than your average SD camcorder. Also, video quality is very much in the eye of the viewer, so even defects in low-quality movies can be overlooked depending on who's watching what.
That being said, about the only major issue with the specs and design of the FS200 is its lack of optical image stabilization on a 37x zoom lens. Otherwise it's an excellent ultracompact build that includes, a couple nice shooting features, a headphone output and a mic input, and is relatively simple to use.
(Credit:
PhotoFast)
Admittedly, CompactFlash cards are no longer as popular as they were when digital photography first started. These days, most digicams use SD/SDHC media, while mobile phones mainly accept the physically smaller microSD format for storing data.
This is why I'm puzzled as to the reason PhotoFast has conceived the CR-7200, a CompactFlash card adapter capable of holding four microSD cards and combining their storage space. Given that the maximum a microSD card can now hold is 16GB, the CR-7200's capacity would be capped at 64GB.
Although manufacturers such as Pretec and Transcend have announced 64GB CompactFlash cards, they have yet to retail them. Hence, the PhotoFast adapter may be the only higher-capacity alternative for now. But these days, only higher-end dSLRs accept such flash media format so there are only limited uses for the CR-7200.
Though the PhotoFast adapter sports an "extremely high speed" label, it's not immediately clear how fast the card can read and write data. Often with flash memory, there's a tradeoff between high capacity and high speed.
According to Gizmodo, this adapter will be available for $30 in July.
(Source: Crave Asia)
Though still pricey, the 4GB Eye-Fi card is now a much better deal.
(Credit: Eye-Fi)I really dig Eye-Fi memory cards, which wirelessly beam photos from your digital camera to your PC (and/or an online sharing service). But I always thought they were overpriced.
They still are, but at least you can score a deal on one: Costco has the Eye-Fi 4GB Anniversary Edition for $59.99 shipped. Nonmembers pay an extra $3, and nearly everyone pays sales tax.
In case you're not familiar with it, the Eye-Fi is a standard-size SDHC memory card (meaning it's compatible with most cameras) that happens to have built-in Wi-Fi.
When it's in range of your home network and your camera is on, the Eye-Fi automatically transfers photos to your PC. Alternately, it can upload photos directly to the online service of your choice: Facebook, Flickr, Snapfish, Photobucket, etc.
Ultimately, it's a convenience. A pricey one, yes, especially considering that you can get an ordinary 4GB SDHC card for about 8 bucks. On the other hand, the last time I posted this product, it was $99.
So now that it's $40 less, will you jump on it? Or are you satisfied with your perfectly cromulent SD card reader and/or USB cable?
