UK VoIP company, Coms, has just launched two WiFi VoIP handsets in advance of their service which is going live on 9 October.
Coms claim their service will be the first in the UK that let people choose their own phone number from 178 UK geographic area codes.
Don’t forget, all you need to use these handsets is a WiFi connection, either yours, or any open connection. We think these services will be big and eventually seriously dent the income of mobile phone companies, especially roaming minutes when people are abroad.
We’ve had our hands on a few VoIP WiFi phones of late or VoWiFi as we’re referring to them, and have generally found them pretty easy to use – despite them clearly being at the early stage of their development.
While we’ve not had our hands on these particular handsets (yet – watch this space), we seen shots of them and had sight of the specs. Both work on 802.11b & g and use SIP which will allow them to work with most IP-PBX kit.
The F1000 is much like other VoWiFi handsets that we’ve seen and a little reminiscent of early-ish mobile phone handsets. Couple of stats on it. Talk time, up to 4 hours, with a 2-3 hours charge time and a standby of 80-100 hours. It’s 11 x 4.5 x 2.2 cm and weighs in at 111g. The cost? RRP £128 ($239, €189).
The upscale F3000 is a first to us, a VoWiFi handset that is a flip phone. Stats: Talk time, up to 3 hours, with a 2.5 hours charge time and a standby of up to 75 hours. Size: 85 x 43 x 22 mm and weight of 90g. RRP £175 ($326, €258).
Differences between the F1000 and F3000 include the F3000 have a 65k colour 1.8″ screen, polyphonic ringtones.
Shared features are
- Roaming between Wi-Fi access points
- Up to four stored SSIDs with individual security settings
- Up to four hours talk time, up to 100-hours standby time
- Call hold, call waiting, call transfer, call conferencing
- Call logs – made, answered, missed calls
- Caller ID
- Personal address book with auto dial
- Built in Web server for administration
- Automated provisioning – up to 256 byte encryption
- TFTP
- HTTP
Tune in later for reviews of the handsets and the service.
The buzz has been around for months and finally we get to hear the pricing. Retail pricing will be $249 and it will hit the shops in 14th November in the US. 
Along side this will be the Zune Pass subscription service, which for $14.99/month will give access to “millions of songs.” The downside on this one is that once you stop paying, your stop getting access to the music. 
There’s going to be a ton of accessories available at launch, which are listed at the bottom of the 
Good news for UK Tech firm Pace Micro as it receives confirmation from number one US cable company, Comcast to ship combined Set Top Box (STB) and PVR. 
Comcast is mighty, being the largest provider of cable services in the US, with 23.3 million cable customers, 10 million high-speed Internet customers and 1.6 million voice customers. Their business extends beyond simple cable TV provision, in their own words, they’re “focused on broadband cable, commerce, and content.” 
Producing high quality, well-lit, studio-style photographs can be quite a challenge if you don’t happen to have access to a studio set-up at home or be the proud owner of an expensive camera. 
The Cubelite cubes come in a range of sizes, from two foot up to six foot six inches, with each package including a 500w tungsten light and tripod, two-sided silver and white reflector, white background and carry case. 
Unleashing the beast
Following the straightforward instructions, we stuck the lamp on the tripod and set it up so that it shone it through the fabric from a distance of 18 inches. 
A useful, albeit minimal, single sheet of A4 paper advised us on how to sort out the colour balance on our camera, and before long we were knocking out some s-s-s-studio style photos with ease, with the diffusing material making it a cinch to grab attractive, shadow-free results. 
We found the Cubelite easy to lug about, although the towering tripod and heavy duty lamp may have bordered on overkill for such a small set up. 
Rating
ViaMichelin is the part of the Michelin group that designs, develops and markets digital travel assistance products. They already have a successful Website that uses information from the Michelin Guide allowing visitors to plan their travel and routes utilising the Guide info. 
Why get a X-980T?
There’s also a speed camera database for the UK (which isn’t actually available yet, but will be in late October) and other countries. Again it’s included in the price (as are updates). 
Overall Verdict
We love a good laugh at overblown press releases that get carried away with themselves, so we certainly cheered up when we got our hands on Sony’s latest artistic offering describing their new Sony’s new Vaio C range of laptops. 
Or maybe, “Cor blimey, who writes this Cobblers?” 
Connectivity options come in the shape of an integrated 802.11a/b/g wireless LAN, Memory Stick Duo, Memory Stick Pro or ExpressCard media slots and i.LINK (IEEE 802.11) and USB ports. 
With the Photokina 2006 photo fair opening its gates for business, the big guns are rolling out new product announcements at a rate of knots, and Kodak has offered details of their budget-priced 7.1-megapixel EasyShare Z710 Zoom. 
At the rear there’s a (now) rather miserly 2″ LCD, plus the standard array of controls and an optical viewfinder (we like them). 
Kodak are claiming that the 7.1 megapixel image sensor and ‘professional quality’ Schneider Kreuznach Variogon 10X optical zoom lens are capable of capturing high-quality prints up to 30 x 40 inches (76 x 102 cm), helped by their Kodak Color Science imaging processing chip. 
Currently blossoming on the Ugly Tree and ripe for plucking is the new i-mate JAQ PocketPC phone.
As far as we know, i-Mate haven’t officially split from HTC, but the company seems to be following O2’s policy of sourcing Windows smartphones from other manufacturers as well as HTC – a decision perhaps prompted by HTC recently releasing phones under their own name.
Quite a hefty beast at 122x71x22mm and weighing 160 grams, the i-Mate JAQ comes with a 2.8″ 320×240 pixels, 65k colour display, Bluetooth and InfraRed, but there’s no WiFi or 3G in sight, neither is there an onboard camera, which strikes us as a serious omission.
Barely half a year after the launch of the pocket-sized FinePix F30, Fujifilm has launched an upgraded version with the somewhat less memorable name of the FinePix F31fd. 
Fujifilm FinePix F31fd specs:
Currently leaking out all over the Web is this picture of a Palm Treo 680 with Cingular branding. 
Although it looks like a slimmer, sleeker version of the 650, the phone is aimed at the lower end of the market, so is expected to feature a rather disappointing VGA resolution camera along with Bluetooth, 64MB memory and run the trusty Garnet version of the Palm OS (sure it’s as old as the hills now, but it’s still one of the best mobile operating systems around in our opinion). 