Mobile phones
Son of Siemens
Siemens has unveiled the successor to its popular SL55 phone. Due in August, the SL65 keeps its predecessor's design, including its slide-down flap, which features the phone's keypad, but adds more features. These include a VGA camera with a 5x digital zoom, attachable flash, video capture, Java for downloads and a 64K colour screen. .
Also new from Siemens is the CFX65, a clamshell handset aimed at outdoor sports enthusiasts. It features a VGA camera with LED flash and a built-in torch. It, too, will go on sale in August.
Digital music
£21m music sale
British music downloads pioneer OD2 has been sold to US-based Loudeye for £21m. Former Genesis frontman Peter Gabriel, founder of OD2, said the sale would create "the world's largest licensed catalogue of music available for digital distribution". The deal will take OD2's offering from 350,000 tracks to more than 1.3m, which compares to 700,000 tracks on Apple's iTunes Music Store, and 750,000 tracks on Roxio's Napster.
The company also said it would look to move into mobile phone downloads, and video downloads to PCs. The move comes as the digital music race hots up in the US and Europe. Apple's iTMS currently has a commanding 70% market share in the US, the largest digital music market, and launched in the UK, France and Germany last week. Page 19: Can iTunes keep rivals at bay?
M-Ager or cyborg?
Are you an "M-Ager"or a "cyborg"? A "prosthetic" or "connected but unattached"? A new study from the Teleconomy Group (see Stat of the week, below) has sliced and diced Britain's mobile phone users into this range of curious-sounding groups in an attempt to understand our developing relationship with our mobile phones.
The newest demographic is the M-Ager: a new generation of children between 10 and 14 who have been born into a generation of mobile users so emotionally attached to their phones they can't imagine lives without them. Researchers say the new generation is highly technically literate, and could have a profound influence on the way mobile phones develop, because their parents are buying them the latest models. For instance, 71% of M-Agers were aware of video calling, against 54% of adults; 64% were familiar with Java applications, against 44% of adults. And 55% of M-Agers knew about video capture on their picture phones, against 37% of adults.
Drive the iBMW
In debates about its single-digit market share of the desktop PC market, Apple has often been happy to have itself compared with BMW - a premium manufacturer that owns about the same percentage of the US car market as Apple does in PC shipments. Now, the companies have made the connection more tangible, in the form of a new system of iPod controls to be plumbed into BMW cars. A new adaptor, priced at $149, will let iPod users plug their music player in to a special cable in the car's glove compartment, and then control the device using buttons on the car's steering wheel.
www.ipodyourbmw.com
Listen for 30 hours
Cowon has a pair of new digital audio players slated to launch in July. The key feature on the £299 iAudio M3l is a battery life of 30 hours - more than any of its rivals. It plays back both MP3 and Windows Media Audio (WMA) files, features an FM radio tuner and offers direct MP3 recording from a CD player/hi-fi. Also set for a July debut is a 40GB version of the company's ultra slim iAudio M3. Similar to its predecessor, the £289 model has most of its key controls and its LED screen built into the remote control rather than on the player itself.
www.mp3-plus.net
Hardware
Once seen...
An innovative camera designed to be attached to a pair of glasses or baseball cap to record everything a person sees is to go on sale next month. The Camwear Model 100 from Deja View uses a buffer system to constantly capture video footage. However, as it is paired with a small capacity 64MB SD storage card, only the last 30 seconds of video can be recalled at any one time. Users can, however, press record to capture whatever is in front of them and continue filming. The device will go on sale via the Deja View website next month for around $300.
www.mydejaview.com
Dell and Intel
Dell has launched two PCs based on the Intel chipsets announced this week. The Dimension 8400 and XPS models feature PCI Express expansion slots, 512MB of dual-channel DDR2 (Double Data Rate) memory, Serial ATA hard drives, Gigabit Ethernet networking and other high-end features. Users can have up to 4GB of memory, up to 800GB of hard drive space, and double-layer DVD+RW drives holding up to 8.4GB per disc. Prices start at around £700 for a Dimension 8400 with a 2.8GHz Pentium 4, but you can spend £4,000. The XPS system is aimed at gamers, and includes a dedicated support line "staffed by advanced technicians who share a passion for 3D gaming and enthusiast applications". Other PC manufacturers are also launching PCs based on the new Intel support chips.
Wireless wallets
In Japan, NTT DoCoMo has unveiled four new handsets that will allow users to pay for lunch, go to the theatre, book a flight or even open their front doors using their mobile phones. The handsets have an integrated FeliCa smart card from Sony. Customers can pay for things wirelessly by holding their mobiles next to compatible cash registers and vending machines. The payment is then taken directly from the user's bank account or charged to a credit card. So far, about 40 suppliers are supporting the system, including All Nippon Airways, am/pm convenience stores, and McDonald's. DoCoMo is planning to license the technology to other mobile phone operators. Sony's FeliCa is already used in transport applications around the world, including the Hong Kong underground. The handsets are being supplied by Fujitsu Ltd, Panasonic, Sharp, and Sony. It adds a whole new meaning to the idea of a pay phone.
Stat of the week You and your mobile phone
Research from Teleconomy splits UK mobile users into four groups: mobile-addict "cyborgs", "prosthetics" who see mobiles as a useful tool, "unattached" users who wouldn't really miss theirs, and "deniers" who are really in the first two groups, but can't admit it.
