I know it's a very specific request but I'm wonderig if it's possible to have CamerAware take a photo witht he built in camera at specific GPS locations, or even better after specific distances have been covered.

The reason I ask is because I'm off on an overland trip to China, and it'd be great to build up a "film" of every mile covered.

I saw a wifi SD card the other day for digital cameras, the idea being that the camera wrote the file to the card's memory and then when you got to a wifi hotspot it'd transfer it either to your PC or to a photo upload site. I was wondering about one of these, as it needed no software at all.

Might not allow net access though, perhaps just file sharing with your PC?

I'll see if I can find it.

I'm off travelling to China overland soon and would like to be able to keep my blog updated, tweak my website, send e-mails, photos, use facebook, listen to MP3s etc. My first thought was a Laptop, but they're big, bulky and not terribly rugged unless made specially. Then I started looking at all the new Smartphones and PPCs around and thought, maybe they can do the job, after all even my old E200 with Eleksen keyboard gets regular use for blogging.

So, what would people recommend? Obviously I'd like WiFi and Bluetooth, Quad band would be good, a reasonable size screen would be nice, and either some built in keyboard, but a decent size, or the ability to run drivers for an external keyboard (my prefered option). And if it's got a decent camera built in that'd be a big plus as it'll do for websites, and video-diaries a la YouTube.

Oh yes, I completely forgot them



One of those would make my little toy redundant, and somewhere I'm sure I read about a micro-LCD projector that's small enough to be built in to a phone too.

Imagine that, projecting your keyboard onto your desk and the sreen image or film onto the wall. Now that would be seriously cool.

I'm surprised no-one's commented on the fact I used an Apple iPhone !!

Why'd I use 2003 in the photoshop? Well it was the first piccie I came across that was roughly the right angle when I Google image searched for Smartphone.

Interesting ideas, but this is more about the features within, not the look of the thing itself.

Forgot to add, in my perfect phone I'd have a 3.5 mm stereo jack for headphones/microphone, none of this silly 2.5mm or USB rubbish.

Iwas thinking this morning about what my ideal Smartphone would look like. Not what its software would do, we've had threads on that, but it's form. I still use my old E200 with the Eleksen flexible keyboard for times like camping, or festivals when I'd be worried about losing or damaging my Universal, so that set me thinking, and this was a rough photoshop of what I came up with.



Phones have got a lot slimmer, and LCDs have become flexible, so there's a lot more scope I figure than there used to be. So what we've got here is the Eleksen flexible keyboard permanently attached to the phone in place of its big bulky stand. On the outside there's a slim LCD display (ok so it might only be monochrome IRL) and the four way joystick buttons with the call and hang up.

With the outside buttons and LCD you could access the basic controls on the phone to make and receive calls, a bit like a clamshell. If you wanted to do more you'd simply open up the keyboard/case and voila full control. The phone could even fold all the way back, so you could use the camera etc. It could I guess even be combined with a touch screen.

Just some thoughts, I'm wondering what anyone else would really like their phone to look like, if they could persuade HTC to build it.

Hi

I don't seem to have sounds for any NOTIFICATIONS anymore, so rather than hard reset I thought perhaps it could be fixed in the registry.

I'm guessing it might be the following HKEY_CURRENT_USER/ControlPanel/Sounds/SMS for instance.

When I open that I notice that the Script Value Data is blank, but for RingTone0 the Value Data is apw3r.

Coulde this be it?

It could be, but then I'm interested to see the bluetooth folding keyboards that popped up for instance. As for SD, yes I'd agree with you on that, although at the time when the C500 came out I remember I could get a decent SD card but only a half decent Mini SD card.

Anyway it was just a thought, perhaps I'm unusual in that I've always hoped that eventually a smartphone will replace my other gadgets so for me the truly Smart Phone would have a decent camera in, and be able to integrate with other systems by having maximum connectivity.

Perhaps the difference is phones are "disposable" and i-Pods aren't?

Perhaps I should have pointed out it's a really small 4x4? Also I've never really had a problem blogging with my ols E200 and a flexible keyboard, I must have good eyes I guess. Plus there's the battery life, and recharging it. a lappie won't last long before it'll need charging, a PPC especially in flight mode will last for ages between charges.

Oh and the built in camera for video blogging appeals too.

Sorry should have said more about why I was considering a PPC.

I'm planning an overland trip this July to September, the route's going to take me through Eastern Europe, Russia, Mongolia and finally to China. I'd like to blog the whole trip as I go, and I'll use that to update the journal section of my website. I'll also be uploading photos too, so as my camera's got an SD card slot it'd make sense to have the same.

Obviously large chunks of the route are well out of cellphone coverage, and anyway the roaming costs would be huge, so I'm thinking that with a combination of wifi and bluetooth and a good old fashioned USB card reader, I should be able to get some form of internet connection at the very occasional hotspot, and much more common cybercafé.

But I'm now totally confused by the marketplace. Ideally I'd like something with a decent screen, and a reasonable keyboard, space isn't such a problem as I'll be in a 4x4.

So what's already out there and what's up and coming, anyone have any advice?

Well that was our point... for whatever reason, all those good bits were missing in the C500, who knows why? Conspiracy theorists might say it was because Orange didn't want you able to add a whole load of peripherals onto your phone, especially not wifi.

Pity though, I'd sure love to have Smartphone integration in my car instead of iPod integration.

I just know I'm going to get flamed for this but here goes.

Was sat in the pub last night with a mate and he asked me why I haven't upgraded my E200 and why I hardly ever get seen with my Universal. I said it was because I reckoned it was the best phone around. Now before the flames start here's the two reasons why.

The hot swapping SD card slot and the "serial" port on the bottom.

I guess I could stretch the argument to say the SPV or E100 were the best, but the E200 had bluetooth which just made it for me.

So why are these two features so excellent? Well because of the potential they had which was wasted - probably given how close Orange, HTC and Microsoft were by Orange more than anyone else.

Remember how excited we were when we saw beta test photos of an E200 with a wifi card? Yes they might have been fakes for all we know, but the potential was there if we had SDIO for a whole range of peripherals based on the SD slot, just like PPCs have. But of course the C500 came along and that potential was killed off before it could even get started.

Secondly the serial port. Remember the Elektex flexible keyboard? I still use mine, and still love it. Ok I could use a bluetooth version on the C500, but it needed a stand, and extra batteries and of course it was more expensive. But again along came the C500 and it was a mini-USB slave, so bye bye peripherals before they could even get started.

So who cares? There's smartphones now with keyboards, and there's 2GB mini SD cards, and there's built in wifi too. So yes, now it's not such a big deal BUT imagine if the C500 had kept the peripherals ability of the E200, we'd have had wifi much much sooner, and because that serial port on the bottom had the ability to control your smartphone it could have been used. Look at all the iPod peripherals there are and imagine if the smartphone had been sold properly, widely. There might have been Smartphone controllers by now, speaker systems you just dropped your phone on, who knows, my car has an iPod compatible stereo, so I can control one using the steering wheel mounted controls, imagine how much better if you could control your phone using the same?

So in the end and after a few beers we decided Orange killed the Smartphone before it even got started. They marketted it at business people, not at media hogs, and with HTC changing the ports, they killed the chance of accessories.

Pity, if they'd done it our way, who really would have cared about the iPhone?

I've noticed in the registry there's two different keys for the backlight control, one is for when the phone's on battery power, one for when it's on "mains" power - for instance in its cradle.

Has anyone managed to alter these so that the backlight stays on for different periods of time depending on power source. Ideally I'd like my backlight on permanently on "mains" and on for say 30 seconds on battery.

Anyone done this or be able to guess how to?

Perhaps it is booting up before other things in the start-up folder, and so they then bootup quicker?

I was just looking at the Expansys sites for the UK and France (being an expat) and stumbled on the UBIQUIO 401 (yeah I know quality issues but it'd do me).

SIM unlocked and with Windows Mobile 5 in English:

UK price DHLed to me (from the UK) including VAT is £238
French Price DHLed to me (from the UK) including VAT is £338

How can the difference be justified? The French site even apologises for the longer delivery time as the phone has to come from the UK.

Very odd.

There's some freeware called MobSync which does axactly this.

http://doosoft.seesaa.net/category/1089151.html

It's written by some Japanese people, so the site's English is minimal, but I can recommend it, been using it for years.

Here's a nice comparison.... An original SPV running the last Rom issued from Orange France.

Glad to know it can create a file quicker than a C600. Pity about the time it took to write it though.

Well good to know there's a whole bunch of Canaries in drawers, it means if I ever want spares I can buy them off you lot for cheap.

Seems like I'm just about the only person still using it though.

Well, I just made the upgrade from SPV Classic (Canary) all the way to i-Mate JasJar in one leap, what a difference !! But I still find myself creaping back to the SPV too.

Am I the only SPV Classic user left? I got mine about three months after French release, and I still like it.

It's working? No free Universal for me then

Mind you good news, as I'm almost certainly going to buy one, and I wanted Tom Tom too, so at least I know what to look out for. Good luck mate.

BUT: If you don't find that it works, then please feel free to chuck it in a large jiffy bag with my address on it. I'll even pay you for the stamp.

Hi

I'm just starting on skinning an IPB board and have been inspired to have an image on the right like the one here.

So I can work out how to put the image in, that's just putting it in as a background image. What I can't work out is how to get rid of something called the logostrip.

Anyone who helped skin this forum want to share how it was done? Or does anyone else know?

Given that this is basically the same phone as the Sagem, and given than Scandisc have SDIO wifi drivers for the Sagem, do we have our first phone with wifi?

If you go into the registry and look at USB connections there's a whole bunch of drivers for bluetooth, and yet there's no bluetooth in the phone.

Anyone have any ideas what they're doing there? And even better, anyone have any thoughts on how they cound be used? Perhaps a dongle on the bottom?