I had a Sony W800 Walkman Phone in my hands for the first time today at the Sony Media Experience in Bordeaux. There’s already been a terrific buzz about this camera and it was great to get my hands on the thing during what Sony claims was its first European outing.
First impressions – good. Its weight is just right, light enough to make it carriable but sufficiently weighty to make it of substance.
The central music button is the focus of the handset and, not surprisingly, pressing it takes you straight to your music selection.
Once tracks have been selected, there are separate buttons on either side of the handset. The button on the left is play/pause and the right control volume. Again, without having to dive into the menus of the phone. A smart move.
The software comes with the handset will take music CDs straight from the player on your machine to handset, without intervention.
It follows on from other Sony camera phones, in that taking photos is easy. Simply sliding the switch at the rear of the machine, takes the horizontally-held phone straight to camera mode, again without having to devle into menus.
The W800 should retail for €500 (US$644/£341) pre-operator’s discounts.
Single button to access music
Volume controls
Headphones attach at the bottom
Automotive DAB market gets a boost with successful road trials and three new design wins for Frontier Silicon. 
The whole caboodle measures only 55mm x 37mm x 13mm and is designed to mount inside a 1DIN radio/CD player. 
It must be tough trying to get noticed in the crowded MP3 player market. 
The new teensy-weensy MobiBlu DAH-1500 player apparently offers MP3 and WMA support, a FM tuner and a claimed 15- 20 hours battery life (we say ‘apparently’ because our Japanese translation skills aren’t too good). 
If users manage to avoid dunking the player, their publicity photos also suggest they can wear the device as a head tilting earring or lug it around the neck as a clunky necklace. Cool, or err, what? 
Canary Wireless have released their Digital Hotspotter device, which, as the name suggests, is a WiFi detection and analysis tool. 
To scan for more networks, bash the button again. 
And while we can’t disagree with Ben’s summary, we wonder how long it will be before laptop makers start fitting WiFi sniffers into machine cases to let users seek out accessible networks without going through all the palaver of booting up. 
Skype is a Voice over IP (VoIP) service that allows you to make phone calls via a broadband connection to other users for free. And we like it. 
Despite all the benefits of VoIP telephony, the perceived ‘fiddlyness’ of the technology makes it look like an uber-geeky toy for weird, gadget-loving, parameter tweaking folks (cough!). 
Once installed, picking up the Cyberphone causes the Skype interface to immediately pop up on your PC’s desktop (sadly, this amused us for some time) and you can then scroll through your contacts via the ‘+’ and ‘-‘ buttons on the phone’s keypad. 
Naturally, fellow Skype users can ring you for free too, and you can elect to use your PC’s ring tones or use the one built into the phone. 
VERDICT 
iPod killers, eh? You can barely get out of bed without some hyperbolic company boldly giving their new MP3 player the big one, only to discover that it’s proved as popular as a lager lout on a teatotallers daytrip. 
When it comes to battery life, the Sony has taken the iPod around the back of the bike sheds and given it a good thumping. 
Unlike previous Sony models, the NW-HD5 is based around a portrait design where the seven line, 1.5-inch backlit LCD sits above the controls. In a neat twist, the new ‘Follow Turn Display’ feature automatically orients the interface screen horizontally or vertically depending on which way the player is held. 
Living Streets, a national charity, launched its election campaign, “Talk to me about streets”, by making street items like paving and signs talk back to passers-by in Meard Street, Soho, London. 
Paving ‘squealed’ underfoot to point out the dangers of tripping over broken paving while spooky whispering windows resonated with the sound of absent children, no longer able to play in our dangerous streets. 
Living Streets Director Tom Franklin explains, “The streets are the one public service that everyone uses. Politicians can directly improve people’s daily lives by improving the street environment.” 
Verity Parker, who is doing an PhD at Brunel investigating electrical conductive fabrics, worked with Stock Displays to produce talking street signs, labelled in standard UK form, but with short audio samples. 
‘The street that talks’ has the support of the Royal National Institute of the Blind, (RNIB) which also campaigns for streets and the built environment to be more accessible to blind and partially sighted people. 
An accompanying new Living Streets’ pamphlet – written by two of Britain’s most eminent architects, Lord Richard Rogers and Sir Terry Farrell – was also unveiled at the event. 
Pace Micro Technology, a cutting edge UK digital set-top box provider tasked with developing emerging technologies across all television platforms, has trumpeted the launch of a number of STB’s and PVR’s, including the Laguna DC551HD and DC 501 Chicago all-digital set-top box. 
Pace is also offering the Tahoe DC775 HD-DVR, claiming it to be the most advanced high definition DVR for North America, and the first cable set-top box to offer features based on next generation silicon. Interestingly it offers a number of ways to save video content to the 160Gb hard drive – Standard Definition (SD), High Def (HD) and enhanced analogue. With multi-room video distribution and support for high-speed data connections for home computers, wireless routers and VoIP included you might be wondering what isn’t included. 
Pace Americas’ VP of Technology Chris Dinallo had clearly feasted on a diet of buzzwords before adding, “All-digital and digital simulcast are critical industry initiatives, and uniquely, Pace is proud to be the only set-top box provider that can support all-digital on both networks.” 
Samsung have jumped into bed with Digeo – a leading provider of media center software and services – and announced a deal to produce the next-generation Moxi II Media Center product family. 
US cable companies Charter Communications and Adelphia are set to be the first two cable companies to start dishing out the boxes to customers. 
The cost-reducing chip will also offer improved graphics performance with Digeo cranking up the speed of the microprocessor from 733 megahertz to 1 gigahertz. 
The London Underground is to show digital advertising on its escalators for the first time, as part of a trial being handled by Viacom Outdoor. 
The trial is due to start within months, and if successful will be rolled out at other locations across the network.