GPS: Living With A Nokia N95: A Bug’s Life (2/3)

As we saw on Friday, Richard isn’t too happy with his Nokia N95. Today he tackles the GPS function and tomorrow the day after will be connecting his N95 to a computer, the 5Mpx camera and making phone calls.

GPS – Come to my rescue
Obviously, the narrow West End street where I work wouldn’t be a fair test, so I take it over the road to Golden Square in Soho. It’s Friday, it’s hot and sunny, if a little bit hazy, but I’m in a clear open space with no buildings for 50 metres on all sides.

GPS: Living With A Nokia N95: A Bug’s Life (2/3)Okay, time to try out the device’s killer app – GPS and Nokia Maps. Having previously owned a Garmin Trek and an ill-fated Ipaq 6915, I’m familiar with the sluggishness of finding an initial navigating signal, so I’m giving the Nokia plenty of leeway to be a bit slow at first.
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USB Roll-Up Keyboard And Drum Kit

USB Roll-Up Keyboard And Drum KitYou can always rely on Brando to bring a smile to your face with some completely daft USB gizmo, and once again they haven’t disappointed with the release of their USB Roll-Up Drum Kit and keyboard.

Ginger Baker on a mat
We can’t imagine many people sitting at home and thinking to themselves, “You know what? I could really use a plastic roll up drumkit to hit”, but if you are one of those strange people, prepare to get percussin’
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TMT Companies: Lacking Diversity At The Top? (Exclusive)

Grace Borrelli is Managing Partner of the TMT Practice for Europe at CTPartners. She gives us her view of the diversity, or lack of it, in senior management in the TMT (Technology, Media & Telecommunications) companies that deliver services and products to us.

TMT Companies: Lacking Diversity At The Top? (Exclusive)One of the key issues in TMT currently is whether executive teams have the right skill mix. As head-hunters, we were concerned by the apparent lack of diversity on both European and US Boards and decided to undertake research to look into this issue more thoroughly.
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Nine Inch Nails Release Tracks Via Pirate Bay

Nine Inch Nails Release Tracks Via Pirate BayRockers Nine Inch Nails have released three tracks from their new album, “Year Zero” via the controversial BitTorrent mega-site, The Pirate Bay.

Although the band has already acquired a reputation for dishing out the freebies – new Nine Inch Nails (NiN) content has been available for free both online and on their website for some time – it’s the first time that they’ve released material directly via the torrent protocol.
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Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review – Part 3/3 (73%)

In part one we covered the basics and followed up in part two with how to use this piece of kit.

In the third and final part we take a gander at flash, picture quality, movie mode.

Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review - Part 3/3 (73%)Flash
Although none too powerful, the flash (situated to the top right of the camera) managed a working range of 0.5 – 4.0m at wide-angle and 0.5 – 2.0m at telephoto. Red eye was a bit of a problem, so users might want to consider investing in an external slave flash like the Metz Mecablitz 28 CS-2.
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Living With A Nokia N95: A Bug’s Life (1/3)

Living with A Nokia N95: A Bug’s LifeThe Nokia N95 promises so much. It’s got every gizmo and gadget you can imagine on it, but Richard Davis hasn’t found the dream to match the reality. After you read this, you’ll appreciate that he’s not a happy chappie.

Let me set the scene as to how I came about my Nokia N95. I fell out of love with Nokia after a rather clunky experience with the N73 a while back, followed by various other niggles which led me away.
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Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review – Part 2/3 (73%)

Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review - Part 2/3 (73%)Yesterday we covered the basics of the Canon Ixus 850IS.

Today we look at how to use it.

Using the camera
Firing up the camera in automatic, the Ixus proved to be a nippy performer, starting up promptly and taking no time at all to lock onto focus. Low light focussing was slower but still impressive.
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NetLog Euro Social Network Gets €5m For Future Expansion

NetLog Euro Social Network Gets €5m For Future ExpansionNetlog, who claim to be “the first truly pan-European social networking site,” have had a couple of changes recently.

Firstly they’ve rebranded themselves from FaceBox (perhaps the fear of legal action from FaceBook or confusion between the two might have been behind it), to a more relevant Netlog.
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Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review – Part 1/3 (73%)

Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review - Part 1/3 (73%)Hovering near the top of Canon’s popular Ixus range is the IXUS 850 IS, a 7.1 megapixel ultra-compact sporting a 3.8x optical zoom lens and a 2.5in monitor.

The lens offers a usefully wide 28-105 mm zoom range – great for group shots and landscapes – with Canon’s Optical Image Stabilisation system helping keep images sharp in low light.

With its rounded edges and compact dimensions (89.5 x 58.0 x 25.1mm) the Ixus is designed to be a carry-everywhere pocket snap shooter. It looks pretty to the eye too, with a stylish two-tone, semi-matt metallic colour scheme contrasting against the chrome details.

The all metal case looks pretty tough, with the smoothed and recessed controls ensuring that the camera doesn’t get snagged in your pockets.

Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review - Part 1/3 (73%)All that metal means that it’s not the lightest camera around, and with its lardy 150g weight (without battery) you’re unlikely to forget it’s in your pocket.

The controls

The camera’s basic controls are pretty easy to get to grips with. The illuminated power on/off switch lies recessed on the top plate, which means it’s very hard to turn on accidentally, but, conversely, those with larger fingers may find it quite hard to operate.

Next to the power switch is the shutter control surrounded by a little lever for zooming in/out. Again, folk with sausage sized fingers (or simply wearing gloves) may have trouble getting to grips with it.

Canon Ixus 850IS Camera Review - Part 1/3 (73%)On the back, a circular shooting mode switch – orientated vertically – has a handy lip that conveniently doubles up as a thumb rest, making for a fairly sure camera grip.

A large and crisp 2.5″ 207k colour LCD screen dominates the back of the camera, with all the camera controls positioned to the right.

Most of the camera’s functionality is accessed through a circular 4-way control with a central OK/Function Set button, while two buttons below are used to set display preferences and call up the menu interface, with a third button accessing Print/Share controls.

In Part Two we’ll be looking at how to use the camera.

Digital-Lifestyles Design Changes

Digital-Lifestyles Design ChangesAll change on the look and feel of Digital-Lifestyles today.

Gone is the red-underlined template of the past four months or so, and in comes a new logo and cleaner layout.

As before, you’ll notice some changes as we intermittently make updates to the template in an effort to try and give you the best experience.

First time you use a comment form, you’ll have to enter a code at the bottom of the form. If you’re stuck for what it says, click the speaker icon to its right to have it read to you.

What do you think? An improvement? Any further suggestions? Feedback appreciated.