I tested Apple’s Magic Mouse with Windows 7 not long after I bought the device a few weeks ago. It paired through Bluetooth with no issues as expected, and works well, but lost was the scrolling I enjoy with a finger flick on my MacBook. Obviously, it’s a driver issue and I never thought twice about it — why expect a Mac-specific function to work in Windows, right?  Luckily, someone else looked into it and hacked a method to get the magic on Windows.

UNEASYsilence peeped a pair of modified bits from Apple’s latest Bluetooth Update and word is that they add touch scrolling to 32- and 64-bit versions of Windows. Although geared for using Windows in Bootcamp, folks are reporting success on non-Apple hardware as well. So far, it’s reported that vertical scrolling is working in a few apps like Firefox and Internet Explorer 8, but no multitouch mousing is here yet. If you’d rather not go the hacked route, Microsoft’s own Sidewinder X8 mouse driver could do the trick as well. I haven’t had time to try either method yet, since I don’t run Bootcamp. I have paired the Magic Mouse with the Windows 7 partition on my netbook though, so I expect a little hackery later today.

Earlier this year, I got my hands on a Pogoplug. This small device aligns with my “personal cloud” theory by easily turning any USB drive into a hybrid device — data is available locally on the drive and remotely over the web. Today, Cloud Engines introduces the next-generation Pogoplug for $129, with availability in time for the holidays. This new version adds three more USB ports, bringing the total to four. That allows for the addition of multiple USB drives — traditional drives or flash memory-based — to your personal cloud. Along with easier sharing on Facebook, Twitter and MySpace, the new features supported include:

• Automatically Synchronize Photos, Videos, Music and Other Selected Content – you can set Pogoplug to monitor drives for media so you don’t have to manually add the files. New content from iTunes, Windows Media Player and iPhoto is supported.
• Drag-and-Drop Music and Photo Slideshows – once you create a slide show with drag-and-drop, it’s easily sharable with anyone via the web, right through a browser.
• Easier Sharing with Pogoplug Address Book — after sharing your data with someone, Pogoplug remembers their contact information for future use, even if you remove the share.
• Global Search Across Multiple Drives and Pogoplugs — want to share data but you’re not sure which of your drives has it? Pogoplug can search all of them at one time. And if you have multiple Pogoplugs on the same account, it will even search across the devices.
• Organize Your Music, Photos and Videos — Music media is easier to browse with automatic displays sorted by album, artist and genre, complete with cover art. Video previews are shown live thumbnails.
• Play movies directly from my.pogoplug.com, or even to the iPhone — Video streaming from a Pogoplug is supported on most cameras, video cameras and mobile phones. You can also share movies for viewing over the web or with an iPhone.

All in all, this sounds like a solid step forward for the Pogoplug. Are there other options for these functions? Sure there are: Orb, Windows Home Server, various web storage and file synchronization services come to mind. But the ease of use and super-fast setup is what I found valuable in my testing of the original Pogoplug. It’s a product that doesn’t require any technical know-how of what’s going on — it simply works after the short setup. Pogoplug is now available for pre-order directly from Cloud Engines.

Friday is here, time to take a step back from the hurried happenings in Mobile Tech Manor and look back at the week. Some gear went back where it came from and other gear arrived for play evaluation. I experimented with alternative e-book readers to get a feel for what I like best before all the “real” readers hit early next year. Step into the Manor and let’s shoot the breeze.

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I’m on a bit of a camera kick this morning. Just after I scored a $299 Panasonic 1080p camcorder from Amazon today, I caught Sal Cangeloso’s thoughts about BorrowLenses.com – a camera lens rental service. I’ve been using my Canon EOS Rebel T1i for months, but only with two lenses. The standard 18-55mm kit lens is a good starter lens, but I’ve added a Canon 50mm f/1.8 prime lens as well. I’m in the market for a fast telephoto, but they don’t come cheap and that’s where BorrowLenses comes in.

For one week, Sal rented a Canon EF 85mm f/1.2 II USM for his digital SLR at the cost of $74 plus shipping and optional insurance. While that might sound like a large sum for a week’s worth of use, this particular lens would cost you $1,900 to purchase. So with that perspective in mind, I think the rental rate is quite reasonable. Some of the telephoto glass I’ve been longing for will easily set me back over $1,000. And if the lens doesn’t really meet my needs, I’m either out that $1,000 or I have to deal with selling it at some discount. From where I stand, a small up-front rental fee is cheap insurance to ensure that I like what I’m planning to buy. Note that some brick-and-mortar camera shops offer lens rentals, so BorrowLenses isn’t necessarily unique. However, Sal’s experience appears very positive, which is good enough for me.

Yesterday, Google introduced a Gmail Labs feature that tells you if your friends are online using an Android device. I can definitely see some benefit to this — before even sending an instant message to someone, you gain a little context of that person’s mobility. And that can help dictate the message scope you send. If I know that someone is on their handset, for example, I try to keep my IM conversations shorter and I also give them more time to respond. I’ve found that if I don’t make that adjustment, the chat conversation gets laggy and both parties are typing over each other because we’re “out of sync.”

The obvious flipside here is one of privacy. I don’t think it’s a big deal that people know that I’m on an Android handset as opposed to a computer of some type. The whole point to instant messaging is the “instant” nature when you want to communicate with friends — if you don’t want people to know you’re online, simply don’t sign in. Or better yet — go invisible. But I’m curious if you see this as a huge red flag. Bear in mind that you can turn this feature on or off in your Gmail Labs settings, so ultimately you have control. Your IM buddies can see the standard availability dots or they can see the little Androids — it’s up to you. Thoughts?

I was working away this morning, minding my own business, when a tweet sent to me and @Gartenberg got me thinking. The Twitter conversation was about reading e-books, and @AppGeniusBar asked us the question that got it all started:

@Gartenberg @jkendrick Have u imagined spending at least 12 hrs without feeling the need for an electronic gadget in ur hand?

I thought about this for a bit, and the answer hit me over the head (or in the hand). I have reached a point in my gadget usage that the gadget simply doesn’t matter. It’s the task I am doing at the time, in this case reading e-books, that grabs all of my attention. It is a testament to how far mobile technology has advanced that I have so many choices in the gadgets I use to do things. As I replied to @AppGeniusBar:

When I’m reading an e-book, and I read 2 – 3 a week, the gadget is simply the vehicle. It’s a book to me, just like paper kind.

That statement couldn’t be more spot on — I do not think about the gadget, I am simply reading a book. The same holds true with all the other tasks I do with a gadget, it’s the task that matters, not the gadget. Sure, it’s nice having a cool gadget that lets me do things I need to do, but when I’m actually doing them I do not think about the gadget at all, as long as it lets me complete the task at hand. This may sound only logical, but for someone like me who is always looking for the “next big gadget”, this was eye-opening. The gadget doesn’t matter, it’s what I do with them.

Did you buy one of those geeky Smartpens from Livescribe and are now looking for more things to do with it? There’s an app store for that. The Smartpen is a digital pen that captures handwritten notes in a format that can be used in a variety of ways. The new store has apps that range from simple games like Hangman to foreign language dictionaries. A quick look around the store shows quite a few apps for 99 cents, and others ranging up to $30.

Travel phrasebooks seem to be all over the store, a smart application for the Smartpen. I see phrasebooks in Japanese, French, German and Spanish, to name a few. Note that apps can be purchased only by customers in the U.S., UK, Australia and Canada only, according to Livescribe. Livescribe is actively looking for developers to build apps for the store. The Smartpen and supplies can only be shipped to the U.S.

The U.S. Thanksgiving holiday is drawing nigh, and the folks at Truphone are giving free calls for the day in celebration of the giving spirit. The promotion runs on Thanksgiving day, Nov. 26, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. EST. All calls to a U.S. mobile or landline will be free to any caller if made with the Truphone application.

“Thanksgiving is a day when family and friends come together to celebrate and catch up across the U.S.”, said Geraldine Wilson, CEO of Truphone. “For those people who can’t get home for the holidays, often because distance is too much, a telephone call to let them know how they are is the next best thing. With this initiative, we are allowing people who can’t be together to catch up on this special day.”

Earlier today, I was less than enthused with BenQ’s e-book entry, but Qualcomm rejuvenated my e-book excitement with this news from SlashGear — color e-book screens will ship in 2010. The chipmaker’s mirasol color display has the potential to shake up the e-book industry — and possibly others in the portable space — just as much as Pixel Qi’s, in my opinion. The magic behind mirasol is the inspiration, which comes from the wings of a butterfly. Mirasol displays reuse external, ambient light, so no backlighting is needed. The company won several awards in 2009 for its 0.9″ mirasol display, but now it’s ready for a bigger footprint — say hello to a  5.7″ mirasol screen.

Image Credit: SlashGear

This larger panel is color-capable and, like traditional eInk displays, requires power only when refreshing the view. SlashGear says the new panel is even capable of video playback, but at usable frame rates, you’ll understandably see a big hit to the battery life, Still, Qualcomm figures that a Kindle equipped with a color mirasol display could last for a full week on one charge. I’m topping off my Kindle’s battery every three weeks these days, but I’d make it weekly for a color display.

I’m also interested in this display technology from a phone and handheld perspective. From what I’ve seen so far, a mirasol display would look fantastic outdoors, which can’t be said about many other traditional screens. Using it for primary computing might not provide huge battery savings, but on a phone, the overall benefits might outweigh the cons. I’d even like to see it on a smartbook. Who’s getting ready to power those devices? Oh, that’s right… Qualcomm.

There is a big work force that works out of their cars, driving from meeting to meeting and trying to keep up with stuff in between. I did that for years and more than once I longed for a simple, cheap way to use my laptop for quick work sessions from the driver’s seat of my car. The Laptop Steering Wheel Desk spotted on Gearlog would have been just the ticket for me, and may be for those in a similar situation.

The Laptop Steering Wheel Desk is a simple platform that hooks easily onto the steering wheel, providing a small desk to support the notebook for work sessions. It puts the laptop at about the right height for comfortable typing, and is easily removed when it’s time to hit the road again. It looks to be able to handle netbooks, but bigger notebooks might create a problem. Of course, users know better than to use the laptop while driving, right?