Photography: Then and Now

I am on holiday in Devon for a few days so won't be testing out any software for a while.

Also, for it's Sat Nav abilities, I have had to revert to using my Samsung Galaxy Note for the duration of the trip.

However, while out walking in Torquay this morning, I thought it might be a good idea to take a few comparative shots with the camera on the Galaxy Note and on the Sony Clie UX-50.

Unsurprisingly, the UX-50 camera doesn't do well compared to the Galaxy Note.

See the evidence below (UX-50 photos first):

 

 

 

Snappermail Enterprise

I have been having problems with Agendus Mail. It works fine with GMail over Wi-Fi, but via IR to my Samsung E700 it continually gives time-out errors.

The only other email program I could find that has the required SSL settings to support GMail was Snappermail Enterprise Edition, and it turns out this works just fine. So as a functioning piece of software I'd recommend it.

There are a couple of problems though. Firstly, this was an expensive shareware app at the time, and is nearly impossible to find now. I did find a cracked version, but as such I will not be making it available for download.

The other problem is the Codediver settings to make it work fullscreen. I
have played around, and it will run fullscreen, but every time a dialog
opens in smallscreen, it stays that way until you tap the expand button on
the side bar. Irritating, but it still functions properly, so I guess I'll
be sticking with this for now.

If anyone reading this has any suggestions, I'd gladly try them out and
share on this blog.
___
Sent with SnapperMail
www.snappermail.com

Observations of Battery Life

Having lived with The Sony UX-50 for a few weeks now, although I love it, I have to comment on the absolutely awful battery life.

When designing the UX-50, Sony obviously wanted to keep the size down. They succeeded, because the unit is very light, slim and portable.

The obvious sacrifice to achieve this, was battery size. I certainly noticed that today, as the buttons at the edge of the unit kept getting pressed while in my pocket at work today, and I got it out when I got home to find the battery completely drained.

Suffice to say, I have now found the switch to lock they keyboard, so hope for this not to happen again. Nevertheless, I find myself putting the Clie back on the charging cradle at every available opportunity.

I read my eBooks on this for about half an hour in bed at night and find I have to charge it again first thing in the morning to give myself confidence that it will last the working day. If you want to use Wi-Fi on this thing, you better make sure you use it for long, or it'll waste the battery in no time.

It's okay though, I can live with it, but I'll definitely looking into the extended battery if I can get one as well as doing the USB charging hardware MOD I have read a bit about on 1src forums. Why Sony didn't include USB charging out of the box I'll never know.

It got me thinking in more general terms about battery life. I have pretty much got used to daily charging of previous iPhones, tablets, and Android blowers, and battery life these days seem to be slowly getting better, despite that battery technology seems to have hit a bit of a developmental brick wall. It is probably more to do with tech becoming less power hungry and more efficient.

In total contrast however, is my Samsung E700 which I am using as my main phone now. It has a tiny battery and easily lasts three whole days on a single charge!

This was the advantage of having lots of different gadgets: separate batteries for separate t functions. My phone has a battery, my PDA has a battery, my Satnav has a battery, my eBook reader has a battery and my iPod had a battery. Collectively, they probably have a week or more worth of charge between them.

I guess, the point of this ramble is that while convergence in technology has added the convenience of having everything you need in one device, battery technology simply hasn't caught up yet.

Mobile Stream Card Reader

THis is a great little utility which allows you to copy files to and from Internal Memory of the UX-50 or a Memory Stick if you have one installed. I have tried the other free and shareware utilities available that are supposed to do this, but none seem to work with Windows 8.

This one does and it's very handy. It's from the same developer that's responsible for Portrait which is a great piece of software too.

A free trial of Card Reader is still available here.

New in Software Repository

I have added the following Palmos apps to the repository at the top right of the page.

Resco Explorer
This is easily the best for functionality in one package and looks great on the UX-50's HiRes screen. It also allows ftp access to services like StorageMadeEasy.com so that you can upload and download from your cloud drives.

Resco Photo Viewer
With the same look and feel as Resco Explorer, this is a polished piece of software with lots of options.










Network.prc
Sometimes the simplest things are the best. I was fed up with having to keep going into the Prefs app and selecting the network drop-down just to switch off the wireless. This app simply takes you directly to the Network Panel, and if assigned to a hotkey (say Ctrl+1) will take you there in a couple of key clicks. Brilliant!

KeyQuick
I can't pretend to be an expert with this yet, but it allows you to configure your Keyboard to do all sorts of things.

Straight out of the box, it has some pretty neat features enabled though: it makes the Ctrl key "sticky" so instead of holding Ctrl while pressing another button, you can press Ctrl and then the other; and it also makes the up and down keys move between text entry fields, which saves time messing about with the stylus. Genius!

Samsung SGH E700

Photos taken with UX-50
Another oldie but goodie!

This was my state of the art mobile phone 10 years ago or so.

I've cludged this together from three faulty and battered phones from ebay to make one fully functioning and less battered one. I thought these little babies would have survived the years better, but apparently not!

No Wi-Fi, no 3G, no Bluetooth: only two small colour screens, T9 text entry, GPRS, and an infra-red port. What fun. Perfect compliment to the UX-50, that is if I could only get the UX to connect to the E700's GPRS, but more on that another time.

Clie Overload!

I've been playing around with the UX-50 for nearly a week now and I have almost got it working optimally.

I have installed so many applications and done so much tweaking, I hardly know where to start blogging about it.

I am planning to replace my smarthone's functions with this as far as possible, so below is a list of some of the software I have installed so far.

Opera Mini
Not so easy to install: you need  to install Java first, then Opera Mini, which will run, but if you want this to run fullscreen you'll need to install something called Codediver and also an app called Portrait. Both tweak how apps use the screen, as many Palmos apps only run in the usual square dimensions that most Palm devices have.

Having said that, Opera Mini, seems the most capable browser that will work on the Clie.

Agendus Mail SSL Edition
This was the only email program that would run fullscreen and supported the security that GMail requires, and it is a nice polished piece of software.  It even does IMAP which is handy if you prefer that over POP3, and there are many reasons why IMAP is preferable.

Mobipocket Reader
The only ebook reader that is still worth installing in my opinion. It is nice and easy to configure and supports lots of file types.

I use it to read my Kindle eBooks on. These can be easily stripped of DRM if you know what you're doing, and converted with "Calibre".

It's worth noting that despite a checkbox in the settings, the software does not support sub-pixel rendering that gives nice smooth fonts. For that you'll need another tweaking app called FontSmoother which does the job of smoothing fonts in Mobipocket very well.

I also like to read ebooks in Portrait mode and the settings have an option to do this, but I have used the "Portrait" app mentioned above to make it happen automatically.

Kyle's Quest 2
I used to love the original game on my old Palm Pilot and this is the same but in colour and brings back many memories.

Vexed
Another great puzzle game from my old Palm days. Use your stylus to move blocks around and clear the  board.

CliFrotz
Another Frotz port, this one designed for the UX-50's wide screen. I'm not sure I'll be sticking with this one as the font size is tiny even when it is set to"Large".

Datebk 6
I used this on the Palm years ago, and although the built-in PIM is decent enough, it doesn't provide a simple week-view with events clearly shown. DateBk6 does this and much more.

Documents to Go 11
I haven't used this much just yet, and I'm not expecting too much regarding compatability with Word, Excel etc. with such an old piece of software, but it would seem this is as good as it's likely to get.

BT Toggle
USB cable Hotsyncing isn't going to work on a fairly modern PC, but Bluetooth syncing does work and is probably the easiest way to install software (I don't intend to sync my calendars and addresses etc. with Palm Desktop).

So  after frequent Bluetooth Hotsyncs, you will soon tire of going into the Prefs panel every time to switch Bluetooth off. Thankfully "BT Toggle", can automates the whole process for you. I' quite like something similar for the Wi-Fi but have yet to find it.

LauncherX
I  remember using a version of this a long time ago and still think it's the best. It has the best balance between simplicity and configarability IMHO. I tried a couple of others which seemed to be firm favourites among the community but found them too complicated to set up how I liked.  It needs "Portrait" to make it run fullscreen though (see screenshot above).

I'll upload most of these to the Software Repository on this blog, but be warned: most of them are shareware and many of the developers' websites are no more, meaning no way to register them. Where possible, I've registered a couple of these, but have had to be more creative when getting some of the others fully functional.

I hope you've enjoyed this quick run-down. Keep an eye on G3, for more on the UX-50 and Palmos soon.

Sony Clie PEG UX-50

My latest (old) gadget has arrived and I love it!

This PDA is much smaller than I imagined. The picture above should show that clearly enough. The size makes it very pocketable though and easy to type on when lounging about.

The screen is pin sharp and nice and bright, if a tad small, and registers taps easily.

The PALM OS is a joy to revisit: I had a few PALMS over the years but never the UX-50. PALM's strength was it's simplicity, although compared to modern smartphones, it suddenly doesn't seem so simple and easy to use now.

Nevertheless, the Sony is a solidly built and nicely designed piece of kit. Aesthetics are very modern and pleasing to the eye and it feels very nice in the hand.

The camera is nothing to write home about but is a nice little extra.

There is Bluetooth and Wi-Fi on board, but like the Jornada 720, only supports Wireless "B" and WEP encryption (see my earlier post on connecting the HP Jornada to the internet).

Confusingly, you can't rely solely on the keyboard to navigate when in "laptop" mode, but have to frequently resort to poking the screen with the stylus. This is frustrating, and I don't know why Sony didn't try and improve keyboard navigation. The Handheld PC did this much better. Having said that, I may be able to tweak that with software and if successful I will of course update here.

Battery life is poor when using Bluetooth or Wi-Fi so it is important to switch them off quickly when you have finished using them. That way, you might make it through a full day of use, but plonking it back in it's charging cradle when you get home from work will probably be neccessary.

As always with legacy devices, finding software is a bit of a struggle, but that's all part of the fun. Anything I mention on this blog I will add to the software repository which someone may find helpful.

Stay tuned for more updates on the Sony as I learn more about it!
--
Sent using Agendus Mail demo.