My MacBook power cord is dying. It has a really bad short just past the transformer that is extremely temperamental. I did not take a picture of the short because I was too scared to remove the tape, but it is very ugly. There are only a few strands of wire left to transmit power. Any tiny movement shorts it out and cuts power to my MacBook. As you can see, I have fixed the problem by securing the transformer to the desk to stop any movement. (click for a larger image)

Mine is very similar to this one, whose owner cut it open and fixed the short. I have not been forced to do this yet, as I do not wander too far from my desk. Eventually I am going to have to repair it as per these instructions on Flickr.

I have blogged about the Livescribe Smartpen previously, naming it my most anticipated product of 2008. It is a newcomer to the smartpen market, and boasts several features not available on competing products. Along with some new product demos, Livescribe has recently released detailed stats for their newly dubbed Pulse Smartpen.

There are 2 different models:

1GB $149

2BG $199

The ship date has been pushed back to march and pre-ordering is still only available to US citizens.

Check out the Livescribe Blog for updates.

Today is the great Dutch Danish toy’s 50th birthday. Since I was a kid, Lego has added many new products, including a Star Wars line. Kids today have it easy; all that is required to make an X-wing is to ask Santa for the kit and then follow the instructions. Before Lego made X-wing kits, we had to disassemble several other models and build X-wings from scratch.

The most prominent display to mark this occasion so far has been the Google logo made with Lego as seen above. Google and Lego seem to be unrelated, but Lego did play an important role in Google’s early days. Google’s Page and Brin used enclosures made with Lego to house hard drives, as seen below.

Complements of Gizmodo, here is a gorgeous time line that shows the distinct point in time when kids lost the need to built X-wings from scratch. (click for the full image)

I have been living with my new HTC Touch for over 2 weeks, and now have a good idea of its features. I am now expanding on my previous first reaction to the phone. Wikipedia has a good page with the rundown of the HTC Touch’s stats. NOTE: the Canadian version doesn’t include 802.11x.

Touchflo

The HTC touch breaks away from the pack of standard Windows Mobile devices by integrating a new touch interface to Windows Mobile Professional. They have modified the ‘Today’ page as well as added a finger friendly application launcher called Touchflo. As Touchflo is pretty hard to describe in words, here is a quick youtube video that demonstrated Touchflo.

I have found Touchflo to be very useful, and I hardly every have to use the stylus. This interface is responsive, which gives the illusion of tactile stimulation.

Plan

In Canada, Bell is offering the HTC touch with an unlimited data plan for $7/month. There have been reports around the blogosphere and forums that this plan is restrictive. I can assure you that this plan is not restrictive for any software on the phone. It provides unlimited access to the internet and email. Even high demand software like Sling Player Mobile is allowed. The only limitation, is that the phone cannot be used as a bluetooth modem for a laptop. Bell is able to do this because the HTC touch is marketed as a cell phone, not a smarphone.

Browsing

This section doesn’t apply specifically to the touch; it applies to any Windows Mobile device. I am now doing quite a large chunk of my feed reading on the go with google reader mobile. This has had an unexpected effect on my reading habits. Since google reader mobile displays pages individually, I tend to read each headline more thoroughly. On the full version of google reader, I tend to quickly scroll through headlines when I am overwhelmed with new items. I am impressed with the browsing speed; text only pages load very quickly, and images load in a reasonable amount of time.

PIM

Windows Mobile has the upper hand on PIM over the iPhone. As I have never used a Blackberry, I cannot compare the touch to one.

I have been using GooSync to sync my google calendar to the touch. This is accomplish over the air, so I never have to dock the phone to sync anything.

My biggest gripe with the phone is that Outlook doesn’t work with IMAP for gmail. This isn’t HTC’s or Microsoft’s fault; it is Google’s. The mail application will show the headers of new emails, but will not show any HTML content. Google is supposedly working on the problem, but it hasn’t been fixed yet. I use Outlook to collect headers and to notify me of new emails. After I view the header, I access my gmail account from Internet Explorer to view the email.

Multimedia

Multimedia is where the touch could use some improvement. Due to its weak 200mHz processor, the picture browsing interface lags and video playback is often choppy. Video playback in Sling Player is actually better than the included Windows Media Player. The Touch tries to mimic the iPhone’s interface by using gestures to navigate through pictures. Again, I don’t think this phone has enough processing power to fully utilize this. The gestures are slightly different than the iPhone, but they are still intuitive.

Text Input

The HTC touch relies on two main input methods. The touch has all of the standard stylus input methods familiar to Windows Mobile users. On top of the standard methods, HTC has added and onscreen keyboard and keypad, which are both usable with fingers. The keypad is a standard cell phone keypad with 3 letters per button. The keyboard is similar to the one on the new Blackberry Pearl and has two characters per button. The touch keyboard is my favourite method of input, however it is not perfect and I am thinking of buying the Spb Keyboard, which offers a full screen keyboard.

The screen does tend to gather a few fingerprints, but the screen is not indented, allowing for quick cleaning on sleeves and pant legs.

Battery Life

Battery life isn’t a big issue, but it is worth noting that the touch doesn’t get great mileage. I pretty much have to charge it every night. Battery life is one area where the 200mHz processor is actually beneficial.

Verdict:

You should buy one.

I have just spent the first 6 hours with my freshly acquired HTC Touch. Today was also the first day in a new basement sweet, and I can confidently say that the new phone will have a bigger impact on my life than the new living quarters.

As Canada doesn’t yet have the iPhone, the HTC Touch was the natural choice for a smartphone with a touch interface. However, I think that I still would have gone with the HTC Touch over the iPhone anyways.

So far, I have been thoroughly impressed (except for the 2 days it took to activate). The interface is fairly easy to navigate with a thumb and fingernail. The stylus can be done without in most scenarios. I used google maps this afternoon to find and call a few stores. This is a feature that I will NEVER be able to live without in the future again! My email accounts pretty much set themselves up and mobile google reader is set as my homepage. It sounds lame, but these are life changing features.

I haven’t used the HTC Touch in day to day usage yet, so I will not do a full review yet, which will be coming next week. If I’m feeling ambitious, I might even post the review from the phone. Check back here in a week for the full review.

My most anticipated product of 2008 is the smartpen: Livescribe . I first read about this over at portable gadget. It is due to be out in Q1 of 2008 and is expected to be priced at under $200. Livescribe looks to capture a market where Logitech and others have done poorly. Beyond capturing written text, the Livescribe has a microphone to record audio. It is rumored to hold 100 hours of audio. It uses dot paper, which can be purchased from Livescribe, or printed out at home. There is also a software devolopment kit available which will hopefully create some good 3rd party apps.

On paper, this sounds like the perfect gadget for a university student. To have the audio and the content of a lecture unified, in a digital format would be invaluable. Written notes are synchronized with audio, allowing the audio playback of the moment specific notes were written. This feature could be useful, as listening to whole lectures is pretty boring.

Hopefully, this pen will turn the tides on the underachieving market of smarpens. Livescribe has huge potential in a market where none of the available products have lived up to expectations yet. I have always thought that spartpens would be useful, but the ones that are currently available are not yet satisfactory. Hopefully, Livescribe will fill the void in the smartpen market, thus making it my most anticipated product of 2008.

Here is some related chatter: Official Livescribe Blog, gizmodo, wikipedia.

I have spent years crawling the web for the best Christmas displays so you don’t have to. Here are the 10 best displays that I have come across.

Note: ‘Excessive’ has no negative connotations.

10. Just barely making it onto the list is an automated display timed to the peanuts theme. Link to Youtube.

9. controltheshow.com offers a unique experience where the user gets complete control over christmas lights that are viewable via a webcam. There is a queue system where the user gets sole control over the lights for a minute.

8. An automated light display of the song Carol of the Bells is one of the better ones around and made it into this list.

7. These aren’t a light displays, or even displays at all, but they are just sooo awesome that I had to put them in here. gotchabox.com has some hilarious fake product boxes (eg. a 28 piece wisk set) to put real presents in. Too bad it’s too late to order these for Christmas.

6. Here is another automated Christmas light display to the Trans Siberian Orchestra’s the Nutcracker.

5. Kipkay has recently posted an easy Christmas Light hack that anyone could easily do. This video explains how to hook up a set of Christmas light to a stereo and blink in time with the music.

4. Automated Christmas Bells playing the Super Mario theme are pretty difficult to make, but would be good for impressing the ladies. The producer briefly explains how he made the bells here.

3. I don’t like techno (or Christmas music either), but this display plays in time to Da Rude’s Sandstorm.

2. Alek has offered his amazing light display for the public to control. He is doing this all for Celiac Disease (you can donate on his website). There is quite a bit of traffic on this site, so the lights don’t always respond to input. This display started of as a hoax, but probably isn’t now. The Musem of Hoaxes covers this here.

1. It was a close battle between first and second, but the original viral Christmas lights movie has prevailed. It is done to the song ‘Wizards of Winter’. This video has also been rumored to be a hoax, but Snopes debunked that here.

I am not a huge fan of hardboiled eggs, but I am a huge fan of this gadget that can peel them. Loup226 (check out his metacafe channel here) posted a little DIY gadget to peel eggs. It is similar to the commercial product: the Eggstractor, but it is way cooler because it is DIY. I am still amazed at how well it works.

DIY: Eggstractor – video powered by Metacafe