Subsidized netbooks with integrated 3G are all the rage these days. It seems every carrier is offering them, and the reaction is mixed. There are some who find the convenience of having 3G connectivity in the netbook to be worth the data plan cost, and others who don’t like having the 3G tied to one device. I am definitely in the latter camp, finding the Verizon MiFi meets my needs while letting me use the 3G with any devices I wish. My step-daughter is getting a subsidized netbook, however, and I have to admit her needs make that the best fit for her.

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Amazon is testing using SMS messaging to provide shipping notifications to customers. It is an opt-in service that will send you a text message when your package ships or is delivered. The company says the text message notification is in the testing phase, and is only available to a small set of customers. There is an FAQ explaining how the notifications work along with how to get signed up. Those of you who obsessively check online to see where your new gadget purchase is will want to give it look.

Sony’s old PRS-500 eBook reader gains a new trick with the addition of ePub format support, says MobileRead. Oh, but it’s quite a trick to get the support. While one would expect this to be a simple firmware update, it isn’t. Well, it’s either that or it’s a way for you to get a new model — you be the judge. To get ePub support, you’ll need to send in your PRS-500 to a Sony Service Center. Sony will “update the firmware” — so it is just a firmware update, yes? — and return your reader to you within 14 days. Plan B is to trade up. Sony will give you $50 off of the $199 Reader Pocket Edition or $75 off the $299 Reader Touch Edition if you trade in your older device. Both of the newer models already support ePub, so you gain the new format as well as a newer device if you go the trade-in route. Don’t wait too long to decide — Sony is migrating its eBook platform and store to ePub before the end of the year.

Early adopters of the PRS-500 might be on the fence here, but if it were me and I had the money, I’d probably take advantage of the upgrade for a little cost savings. The newer devices have a faster refresh rate, 8-level grey scale and, in the case of the Touch Edition, offers a touchscreen display. Nice to see Sony give a little something to the first Reader customers.

Memory maker Active Media is claiming their new USB flash memory drive is the “smallest 16 GB USB drive on the planet.” I don’t know about that but no question it is as small as can be. The hardest thing about using one of these drives will be not losing it. The drive comes in capacities from 2 GB to 16 GB, and is embossed with a “wink” emoticon, thus the name. I suspect they’ll be hearing from Sarah Palin’s people pretty soon.

Credit: LAPTOP Magazine

A few weeks ago, I ran some battery tests on my netbook. I have  both Windows XP and Windows 7 installed on my Toshiba NB205, which takes hardware variances out of the equation. My early looks show that Windows 7 offers 10% less runtime on the exact same device. I’ve since done some additional testing, thinking that the graphically intensive Aero features of Windows 7 might be the biggest factor. Unfortunately, that’s not what I found — using Windows 7 with all of the advanced Aero features off not only makes your netbook look like a Windows 95 beta, it doesn’t help run time in any noticeable way.

Readers offered up great commentary on the testing techniques and I can’t argue that there are many ways to run these tests. But even my informal testing shows the same trend continuing. When I use XP in my normal work day, it runs longer than when I use Windows 7 on the same hardware and in the same use cases. But don’t take my word for it. Brad Linder of Liliputing confirmed the same results not long after my testing and now LAPTOP Magazine completes the trifecta.

In fact, LAPTOP put three different netbooks through the paces — and all of them offered less run time on Windows 7. They used an entirely different approach as well, one that’s more reflective of real world usage, so it’s a safe bet that you’ll see less battery life on a Windows 7 device. Will there be exceptions? Of course there will — everyone uses different power management settings, not to mention they use their devices in different ways. But by and large, it looks like there’s a small battery life sacrifice with Windows 7 on a netbook. Should that stop you from using Windows 7? My opinion, is no, but if you’re happy with XP and don’t want or need some of the new Windows 7 features, you might want to stay put.

Living near Philadelphia, I often miss out on the newest tech happenings in places like San Francisco. But I’ve bided my time and now I finally get to try out new tech before Silicon Valley. T-Mobile is in the process of upgrading their 3G network to offer 7.2 Mbps HSPA speeds and they asked me if I wanted to take it for a test drive. To say that my reaction time was faster than the latency of my home FiOS connection would be an understatement– absolutely, I said! I just received their webConnect USB adapter (shown below), so on my next out-and-about work session, I’ll be driving from the farms to the city to give this a run though.

My expectation is to use the connection for my typical work habits of browsing the web, responding to email and creating content. But I know that 3G customers do far more than that, so I’ll watch some streaming video, move some large files around and get a general feel for the bandwidth and latency of the connection. I realize that our readers outside of the U.S. are probably wondering what the big deal is — after all, some of them have had wireless connections of 7.2 Mbps or faster for some time now. Putting this in perspective for you folks — no U.S. carrier is offering theoretical speeds faster than 3.6 Mbps at the moment. Exciting for us… you, not so much.

T-Mobile is working on the network upgrades now on a nationwide basis and currently offers 170 million POPs for 3G access. The expectation is that the 7.2 Mbps upgrade will be readily available by the end of this year. Why the rush? T-Mo is already planning to move towards HSPA+ with theoretical speeds of 21 Mbps in 2010, which is far more aggressive that AT&T’s known plans and competes well with Verizon’s move towards LTE next year. The best part of the current T-Mobile upgrade is that most of the devices they’ve launched in 2009 are already capable of using the faster 7.2 Mpbs network. Based on a call I had with the company, devices like the Cliq, MyTouch, Touch Pro 2, Dash 3G and even the year-old G1 should enjoy faster speeds once the network upgrades are competed.

I’ll have an update on my experience with the tests and will try to get some video of the experience. Since I have a Verizon 3G adapter, I’ll see if can get a side-by-side comparsion too.

This morning finds me back at the car repair shop that I visited a couple of days ago. It’s not that I find it a comfortable place to work — no, that’s not why I’m here. They had to order parts to finish the repairs to my old Volvo, and this morning the work is being done.

I’m sitting here in the waiting room, in typical waiting room chairs that are in no way conducive to working comfortably. I’m using three pieces of mobile tech, however, and that makes the work experience a productive one.

The Lenovo ThinkPad x200 is sitting in my lap currently, and I’m using it in laptop configuration. Typing is the task at hand, so laptop it is. I’m connected to the web via the Verizon MiFi, which is throwing its 3G goodness out for me to tap into my personal hotspot. These two gadgets are more than enough to get the job done, but I’m using a third simply because it makes it easy.

The Droid is out, too, and I’m using it for a certain task that experimentation shows me makes the most sense: to keep up with the hundreds of RSS feeds I track. I can easily do this on the laptop, but I found that I can spin through the huge number of feed items that constantly roll in faster using the Droid. I use the Google Reader page optimized for the iPhone, and that works perfectly on the Droid. I spin through the article titles, tap the yellow star to flag something to return to later, and basically fly through the feeds as fast as I can swoop down the page with my finger.

Once I’ve caught up with the feeds, I jump over to the ThinkPad and access the items I’ve flagged on the Droid. I can honestly say that I’ve covered as much ground, perhaps even more, than I do using just a browser on the PC. Maybe tasks like this explain the high Droid web usage being reported.

I had a flashback moment while sitting here working away. The repair shop has a TV in the waiting room, tuned to the local Fox News. I don’t normally watch Fox, but a glance up at the screen took me back. It seems one of the anchors is the Fox reporter who visited Mobile Tech Manor three years ago to interview me about the unboxing video phenomenon. It was a pleasant and unexpected flashback.

It’s far too early to condemn a product market when shipping products don’t exist, but frankly, I’m worried. Yesterday saw what’s likely the first smartbook, although the device could be a design prototype. It’s made by Lenovo, powered by Qualcomm and will be sold by AT&T. I’m fine with those three pieces of the puzzle, but not so much with the device itself. From the picture and the expectations being set on future devices in this class, I see a huge problem — it’s an underpowered netbook with no gain in portability. The device reminds me of an OLPC running a fresher version of Linux.

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It’s Friday morning and that means it’s the end of another week at Mobile Tech Manor. It’s been a week of bittersweet happenings here in the Kendrick household, and I’ll share that with you.  I am not writing this column as usual, I am actually dictating it.  My renewed interest in dictation was triggered by a fair bit of time I spent with the Tablet PC. Join me in Mobile Tech Manor and I’ll share my week with you.

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Kevin recently wondered where the netbook was headed, and a few of you made it clear you were betting on the smartbook to become a player in the small notebook scene. The smartbook is the small notebook pushed by Snapdragon chipmaker Qualcomm, designed to be an instant-on, always connected portable computing solution. We have been following smartbook news for some time, wondering when we would see devices start to appear. That appearance is drawing near, as today Qualcomm announced a new smartbook produced through a partnership with notebook giant Lenovo.

Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs showed off a red smartbook at an analyst meeting in New York, and went on to share that the smartbook would be appearing at the CES in January. The small smartbook is to work with the AT&T network in the U. S., and no pricing information was offered by Jacobs.

When questioned if the new smartbook would offer a full Internet experience, Jacobs said Qualcomm worked with Adobe to put a full implementation of Flash on the new device. He also mentioned that the new smartbook, as yet unnamed, will play high definition video.

Liliputing found a fuzzy pic of the new smartbook as pictured above.

Related research: The Future of Netbooks (subscription required)