Foxit Software are the folks behind Foxit Reader, a free PDF reader that is a great alternative to the standard Adobe Reader.  The folks at Foxit know text file conversion and formats and in a surprising twist are going to introduce an electronic ebook reader in January.

The eSlick will be short on bells and whistles but it will only set you back $229 in January and $259 shortly after that.  It’s a simple device with a built-in MP3 player, 128 MB of memory, SD slot (2 GB card included) and a 600 x 800 screen.  It appears to only read PDF files and Foxit is including software to facilitate creating your own PDF files to put on the eSlick.

Full specs:

Screen:6″ E Ink® Vizplex screen 600 x 800 pixel resolution at 166 dpi, 4-level gray scale
Size: 7.4″ x 4.7″ x 0.4″ (188×118×9.2mm)
Weight: 6.4 ounces (180g) battery included
Color: Black/Gray/White
Connectivity: USB2.0
Operating System: Embedded Linux
Supported Formats:
- eBook Formats: PDF, TXT, Any printable document(after converted to PDF using included software)
- Sound Formats: MP3
Internal Memory: 128MB
Storage Memory: SD Card (2GB included. Supports up to 4GB)

This week saw big changes in the gear at Mobile Tech Manor (MTM) and the freeing up of a lot of desk space.  I played around with getting multi-touch to work in Vista and have created a great work scheme using Parallels on the MacBook.  Come on in and share my week with me.

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We are all too familiar with the early termination fees (ETFs) that US carriers charge which can be a few hundred dollars to let you exit your service contract.  What most people don’t realize is that some carriers have been charging a fee to upgrade customers to a new handset too.  It’s not a new fee but something just doesn’t sit right with a service provider charging a fee to sell you a new handset which usually comes with a new contract.

T-Mobile agrees and has distributed a press release announcing that their $18 handset upgrade fee is now a thing of the past.  They will be happy with selling you expensive service and won’t charge you to get that gravy train started.  Let’s hope any other carriers still charging an upgrade fee feel the heat and stops too.   Does your carrier charge a fee and if so how much?

Blackberry addicts are so helplessly hooked on the devices that RIM realizes they need to provide some way to get the Blackberry experience on other platforms.  They have been working on the Blackberry Application Suite for months that is a virtual machine for the RIM OS that runs on the Windows Mobile platform.  Details about the suite have surfaced along with some nice pictures and video of the BAS in action.

Why would RIM want to do this?  I’m not sure I can answer that although in theory it’s always a good thing to get your product on as many devices as possible.  It might be a good way to expose WinMo owners to the Blackberry way and create future Crackberries.  Whatever the reason it is definitely cool to see the HTC Touch Pro turned into a Blackberry, complete with touch screen. Continue reading »

There is something about a small MacBook that gets everybody in a dither.  Since the appearance of the first netbook a bunch of smart folks have spent a lot of time getting OS X to work on them, even without Apple’s help.  Not that we approve of such antics, that one time that OS X got on Kevin’s netbook was a real mystery as it just appeared overnight.  Honest.

Judie of Gear Diary is one of those smart people who just recently discovered OS X and has gone through a couple of MacBook Airs.  When a MSI Wind crossed her path recently she realized she missed OS X so she did what many others are doing, she created a Hackintosh.  She’s detailed how she did it and lets us know how it’s working for her so check it out and see how she did it.  Take that, Apple.

UPDATE: credit where credit is due, just found out this conversion was done by Dan Cohen of Gear Diary.  Sorry folks.

No matter how big a geek you are there is something remarkably cool about controlling your desktop computer from your phone.  LogMeIn has long been one of the premier providers of remote access software and services and they have just released LogMeIn Ignition for the iPhone.  This app lets you connect to a computer using the iPhone and interact with the desktop screen just like you were sitting right there.

Of course the screen is a lot smaller on the iPhone but LogMeIn squeezes it all to fit but lets you pinch and zoom to your heart’s delight.  I can see this as a boon to the IT professional who frequently needs to log onto someone’s computer to fix a problem.  LogMeIn Ignition also works on the iPod Touch.  You can pick this program up through the App Store but it will set you back a cool $29.99 making it one of the most expensive iPhone apps we’ve seen.

An industry report details a survey done of 578 Internet activists and found that 80% of them believe the mobile phone will be the primary Internet device by 2020.

“The mobile phone – now with significant computing power – [will be] the primary Internet connection and the only one for a majority of the people across the world,” the Pew Internet & American Life Project writes in a new “Future of the Internet” report. “Telephony [will be] offered under a set of universal standards and protocols accepted by most operators internationally, making for reasonably effortless movement from one part of the world to another.”

We’ve seen this coming but any way you look at it is is amazing how fast the phone has been adopted for heavy Internet usage.  No doubt this movement was aided by the introduction of the iPhone and the “real Internet” capabiities but many other phones are being used for web access too.

What does the 1 out of 5 experts think?  Use Crest for maximum whiteness.

(via Network World)

We first reported almost a year ago that Sharp was shutting down the venerable Zaurus PDA line but apparently that was premature.  The Zaurus has been around for at least ten years and has long been an outstanding piece of engineering from Sharp.  We were very impressed with the last Zaurus we reviewed, the SL-C3000, as it stood the test of time and was an incredibly useful device.  There are enthusiasts all over the world devoted to the Zaurus line and developers are still producing software for it.  Word is out that it is official finally, Sharp has pulled the plug on the Zaurus.  She will be missed.

With online services appearing regularly, how do you differentiate between them? Pricing is surely one way, but features and ease of use ought to play into the mix as well. Business Hacks points out Gladinet as a way to make several web services a little easier to use on a Windows machine.

This free utility turns cloud utilities and data into virtual local folders to make it look like everything is right there on your PC. It supports Windows Live SkyDrive, Google Docs, Zoho Docs, Amazon S3 storage, Picasa and more; each service is integrated nicely within Windows Explorer. Since the data is actually stored in the cloud, Gladinet offers an easy way to create a sharable URL to one of your “folders”, but BHacks says that public folders aren’t working for them. Since the application is still in beta, that’s not too surprising but I hope that gets addressed quickly. Most of the other data storage services have the sharing features down pat.

The Intel Classroom notebook certainly qualifies as a netbook due to the small size and relatively low price.  The Classroom is aimed squarely at the education field, young children in particular, as the name implies.  Laptop Magazine reports that Intel will be showing a convertible Classroom at the upcoming CES in January.  The convertible Classroom is a typical 8.9-inch netbook with a twist.  The screen swivels around to tablet form and can be operated by touch.

We are not fans of touch-screen netbooks unless the device can assume a slate configuration so it’s good to see Intel approach this from the swiveling angle.  What remains to be seen is how well the palm rejection works since the touch-screen is meant to be used for handwriting in addition to the touch controls.  Windows XP Tablet Edition, Microsoft’s only version of XP that supports handwriting and touch, is no longer available to OEMs so Laptop reports that a specially developed interface and utilities have been produced to take advantage of the tablet capabilities.  They were impressed with how well this worked which sounds very promising.

The pictures we have seen of the convertible Classroom show a nice slate form with the screen swiveled and while that is nice there is no indication of the weight of the netbook.  This device is designed to be used by small children and since slate mode usually requires handheld operation the weight will be critical to its success.  It looks over 4 pounds heavy in the photos but let’s hope it’s much lighter than that.  We’ll try to get a first-hand look at this new Classmate when we attend the CES in just a few weeks.