Craptech: The Apple iPad Dock

Normally, here at The Nifty Tech Blog, we try to bring you examples of the best and most useful technology available. If it doesn't measure up to that yardstick, we just don't mention it. Or we wait and watch it to see if it manages to rise above the pack and ask for our notice. But sometimes we run into a product that just utterly fails to provide any kind of utility. For those products, we created the category of Craptech. These are the products that are full of so much fail that everyone had best be warned not to waste their money on them. And the first one of these products that we are going to talk about is the Apple iPad Dock.

ZOOM H1 Handy Recorder - A microphone shootout.

This is a review that has been a long time in coming. For some of you I'm sure it seems like it was too long. But we won't review something on The Nifty Tech Blog until we have had a chance to work with it for at least a month, so if you've been waiting anxiously for this review since we posted the Zoom H1 Unboxing back at the beginning of September, we're sorry for the wait. We've spent that time learning the Zoom H1 thoroughly and determining how it stacks up against other products. We hope that you'll agree that the wait has been worth it.

First Look: Zoom H1 Handy Recorder Unboxing

One of the products that I'm looking at for a future review is the Zoom H1 Handy Recorder that was just released in August and sold out almost immediately! I finally got a hold of mine after having my pre-order shipped, canceled, and then back-ordered. So I figured that I'd do an unboxing video to demonstrate how easy the Zoom is to set up and get using out of the box. At least that was what they told me. Actually Zoom has a very good reputation for portable audio and the H2 and H4 models are very respectable portable recorders.

AirPort Extreme

As mobile devices become more popular, the need for wireless networks increases in order to provide the most demanding apps with the bandwidth they require. And eventually, one begins to look at setting up your own home network. These days, many internet providers are filling this demand by providing uplink devices with built in wireless modems. For some it is an option, for others it is a premium service with an accompanying monthly fee. For some people, letting Comcast or Verizon or whomever set up their wireless network is good enough. But others want more control over the network, and who is allowed on it. In this review, I'd like to show this last group of people one of the easiest, fastest, and most robust ways to set up your own wireless network: The AirPort Extreme.

The AirPort Extreme is Apple's latest solution for wireless networking. It provides the speed of 802.11n (Draft) wireless networking and is still backwards compatible with 802.11g, b, and a devices. Even better, the latest incarnation of the AirPort Extreme has dual-band support. This means that instead of one antenna for the wireless network, the base station has two antennas, so it can use one antenna for the speedy 802.11n devices and a second antenna for the slower 802.11g, b, or a devices. Most other wireless networks will slow down when a g or b device connects to the network. And there is actually a third antenna, so you can set up a Guest Network and allow visitors to use your connection to the internet without letting them see your computers on your local network. With the AirPort Extreme you can connect up to 50 devices on the network and all share the same internet connection. And they don't all have to be Apple devices. 802.11 is an industry standard and should communicate well with any device that follows the standard, be they Mac, PC, Linux, or something else. In this review, I'll be going over the set up of a new AirPort Extreme, to show how easy it is to get going right out of the box. I'll highlight a few of the other features as well, but if you really want to dig into everything the AirPort Extreme can do, go look at http://www.apple.com/airportextreme/ and take a look. Apple sells the AirPort Extreme for $179 in their US stores, but we were able to find it online for $164.39 at B&H. Prices will vary with time and from country to country. Right now we're just looking at the standard base station, not the $99 AirPort Express portable base station, or the Time Capsule, which provides a base station and 1 or 2 TB of network attached storage for $299 or $499, respectively. All of these are Apple AirPort devices and should give about the same feel when setting up and using your network, but may have slightly different features.

A few more features of the AirPort Extreme I'd like to mention before diving into setting up a new network. The AirPort Extreme has a USB port on the back, which you can use to connect a USB hard drive or a USB printer, or both if you also add in a USB hub. Why would you plug your hard drive or printer into the Extreme? Because the AE will share these devices on your network, allowing all connected devices to share the printer and hard drive. Naturally, you can put additional security on your drives to limit access. And unfortunately every computer will need their own drivers in order to print to the printer, but other than that little wrinkle, it is an easy way to share these resources with multiple users.

The AE supports the latest security protocols, so instead of leaving your network wide open (a bad thing to do), you can secure it with a password using WPA, WPA2, or WEP encryptions. Wait, what is all this alphabet soup? These are different standards for wireless encryption. Depending on how old your other devices are, your security needs, and if you're using some features with limited compatibility, you'll probably want to use one of these standards to protect your wireless network. The oldest of these is WEP, which stands for Wired Equivalent Privacy. Unfortunately, there were some flaws in WEP that allowed unauthorized persons to determine the password and decrypt the network traffic. WPA stands for Wi-Fi Protected Access. WPA was developed to eliminate the problems found in WEP, but was introduced quickly and was discovered to still contain some flawed code. WPA2 patched the remaining holes and is the current accepted security standard for networks. I recommend using WPA2 with a strong password: a password that contains letters, numbers, and special characters and does not appear to be a word or a simple pattern drawn on a standard keyboard. However, if you've got some older devices in your network, you may not be able to use WPA2 or WPA. Do the best you can, or try to set up your older devices to be connected to the network with Ethernet cables.

In addition to turning on encryption and setting up a strong password, you can also limit access to the base station to specific MAC addresses. No, that's not a Macintosh address, it stands for Media Access Control address. The MAC address is a unique identifier that each device has when using a particular network protocol. It uniquely identifies that specific device. When looking up a MAC address for your device, make sure you have the wi-fi address. Some devices also have different MAC addresses for using Ethernet or Bluetooth. And lastly, you can set up a Closed network. That means that instead of the base station shouting out "I have a network, and this is its name! Wanna join?", the base station will simply listen for devices that already know the network's name and access password to request a connection. These different security measures are all industry standards, so your devices should be able to work with them, but some devices may have issues when using more than one of these methods. I recommend using WPA2 encryption, and limiting to MAC addresses. Those two methods usually work well together. Your mileage may vary. If you're concerned about the security of your network from intruders on the internet side of things, the AirPort Extreme has a built-in Firewall to keep intruders out of your network.

Now, if at least one of the computers on your network is a Mac or a Windows box, you should have a very easy time with the AirPort Extreme. Apple provides AirPort Utility with the AE and usually installs it with Mac OS X. AirPort Utility provides powerful, easy to use tools to set up and manage your AirPort network.

After taking your AirPort Extreme out of the box, you'll plug in the power supply, and connect that cord to the back of the unit. And you'll need an Ethernet cable to connect to your internet access point. For most people this is a cable or DSL modem. This Ethernet cable plugs into the WAN (Wide Area Network) port. This is on the back of the AirPort Extreme. There are four Ethernet ports back there, the one you want is next to the USB port, on the side where the power supply plugs in. Once you've plugged up the hardware, and installed AirPort Utility on your computer, we're ready to get started.

When you first bring up AirPort Utility, it should scan for Airport base stations that need to be configured. The default name for the base station should be something like "Base Station abcd3f". The last six characters are the end characters from the MAC address for the primary antenna of the base station. This is the one used for the fast 802.11n speeds. It should look something like this.

And we're already into the setup wizard. To begin setting up your base station, click the Continue button. The next screen asks you to name the base station, and to pick a password for it. The name here is just the name of the base station. You don't have to change it unless you have more than one base station. It just helps you figure out which base station you're working with when you're in Airport Utility.

This isn't your network password, but a password that will allow you to change settings in the future. You'll want to pick a password that is memorable and strong. Some people create strong passwords by taking the first letter from each word of a short phrase. By including punctuation and inserting a few numbers, you can usually get a pretty strong password, and it is easier to remember the phrase. If you click on the key icon, a Password Assistant window will open. It will suggest a good password, and will tell you how strong your password is. It can suggest several different types of passwords. So enter your password and click Continue.

This screen asks how you want to set up your network. You can create a new network, replace an existing base station in a wireless network, or add a new base station on to extend an existing network. We're creating a new network, so we'll just click Continue.

Now we're on the screen where we are naming the actual network. You might also want to change from the default name for your network as Apple's default tells everyone whose network it is. This may help hackers find information about you to break your password. Don't make it easy on them.

The password on this screen is the one that your devices will use when joining the network. Again, you want a good strong password that you can remember. Don't rely on Keychain and other things to remember your password for you. They may help with day to day computing, but some day you'll want to add a new device to your network and unless you remember that password, you'll have to reset passwords on the entire network. Make it memorable, and at least 8 characters long. Of course, if you have a huge plot of land and no neighbors, or if you are a strong believer in free Wi-Fi, you can click the No Security radio button and create a totally open network. If you're like most folks, you'll want to enter a new name, and a good password, and click Continue.

This next screen lets you set up a guest network if you like. You can set a password for the guest network, or leave it open with no password at all under the security popup. Or you can uncheck the box and leave a guest network for later. We'll do that and click continue.

This screen talks about how you connect with the internet. Most people will be using DHCP, getting a IP address assigned automatically from your ISP and changing on some set period of inactivity that your ISP controls. If you have a domain associated with your network, or your ISP requires a DHCP client ID, you can enter them here. But for most people, it is just time to click Continue.

And at last we have a Summary screen. This is your last chance to check your settings before updating the base station. Now we click update, and then Continue, and wait for the base station to restart. It should take about 30 seconds.

And that is it! Your network is up and you're connected. Your network is protected by your password. If you want to enable other security measures, share drives or printers, just choose Manual Setup from the Base Station menu. This opens up this screen, giving you access to all the available capabilities of your Base Station.

If you want your network to be a little more secure you can go into Access Control, choose Timed Access from the pop up menu.

From here you can enter a MAC address for a particular device, and set up rules for when that device can access your network. The first entry there is the default, it is the access that machines that aren't on the list get to your network. Be default they can access it all day every day. If you're going to limit MAC addresses, you'll probably want to change that to no access.

If you forget a password, or manage to block MAC addresses without giving access to your own MAC address, you can connect to your base station with an Ethernet cable and fix it.

One of the nice things about the design of AirPort Utility is that most of these screens are pretty self-explanatory. You don't really need someone like me to tell you how to use each one. The hardest part is really the initial setup, and you're past that now. Once you've connected your devices successfully, they should connect right to your network whenever you're in range. The actual range depends on what kind of device you're using. 802.11n signals are pretty robust and have a good range. 802.11g signals are unfortunately prone to interference from cordless phones and other devices. And of course your environment will have an effect on how far and how cleanly the signal carries. In most cases you should have usable signal within 150 feet of the base station.

We have to give Apple credit for building a product based around ease of use. It may not be the right answer for everyone, but for people who just want to set up their network and move on with using it, it really does the job.

ThermaPAK HeatShift Laptop Cooler

Today's review isn't software. In fact, it doesn't even use electricity, but there is a lot of technical research behind it, and it is designed to prolong the life of your legs, and your laptop. I'm talking about the ThermaPAK HeatShift Laptop Cooler, a laptop pad that cools your laptop through thermal conductivity instead of using USB power driven fans that will eventually clog with hair and dust and create a horrendous noise.

The HeatShift Laptop Cooler is made by ThermaPAK Technologies and is available for 13 inch, 15 inch, and 17 inch laptops. The cooling pads come in black or pink, and are sized for the typical footprint of a PC laptop. This means that the 15 inch pad is 13.5 inches by 11.5 inches and about a half an inch thick. But it is a bit hefty, with the 15 inch model weighing in at 23 ounces. There is also a white version that is sized to fit under 13, 15, and 17 inch Mac laptops. So that 15 inch model weighs just as much, but is 14.5 inches by 10.5 inches. If you buy from the ThermaPAK online store, the 15 inch pads run $29.99 regardless of color, with the 13 inch models two dollars cheaper, and the 17 inch versions five dollars more. ThermaPAK does have a number of resellers listed on their site and you may even be able to find them in a computer store near you. We did a quick look at the online resellers and were surprised at an odd three way tie for lowest price. Coming in as the most consistent was Buy.com, where a 15-inch ThermaPAK was priced at $22.99, regardless of color. If you want a black one, you may want to consider shopping at PC Connection, where a Black 15 inch pad was priced at a low $20.05, while the White and Pink versions in the same size were seven to eight dollars more. If you favor one of the other colors, look at Provantage.com, where the White and Pink 15 inch pads are $20.76, but the Black is oddly $29.53. Of course, these prices are just a snapshot, and they may change by the time you are reading this article.

ThermaPAK also has a Competitive Upgrade Program, where they will sell you a pad at a reduced price if you send them your existing cooling pad from another vendor. But you're better off looking at that on their site if you're interested. And they also make 15 inch and 17 inch basic Laptop Bags out of the same materiel as their cooling pads. But for now, we're just looking at the pads.

The ThermaPAK pad uses HeatShift technology (ThermaPAK's trademarked term) to provide cooling for your laptop.  What this means is that the cooling pad that you put under your laptop is made of a thermally conductive fabric, and filled with specially conductive crystals developed by ThermaPAK. At room temperature, these crystals form small hard grains that will move around each other, allowing the pad to be flexed and folded, and even rolled up for storage. When exposed to the heat of your laptop, these crystals melt, absorbing the heat and spreading it out to the surrounding area. As the heat is spread out, it dissipates, allowing the crystals to reform. So in use, the pad is filled with crystals going in and out of liquid state as the heat from your laptop is being spread out and dispersed.

So how do I demonstrate to you that this really works? After considering a number of methods, I decided to use SCIENCE!

The Problem: to demonstrate if the ThermaPAK really does help disperse heat from a laptop.

The Approach: Record the temperature profile of a laptop (in this case a MacBook Pro) on a hard, flat surface (a wooden table) from cold startup for a period of 2 hours. At the two hour point, insert the cool (room temperature) ThermaPAK pad between the laptop and surface. Record the temperature profile for an additional 2 hours.

The Data: I conducted this experiment at home, in a room kept at 72 degrees Fahrenheit. I recorded the following temperature data on my computer using Temperature Monitor. You will probably want to open this image up in a separate window.

I know that there is a lot on this graph, but I think it shows some interesting information. The line that most people will be interested in is the red line on the bottom. This represents the temperature of the bottom of the laptop enclosure. This would be the temperature of the laptop against your leg if you set it on your lap. It took me a couple minutes to boot up the laptop and activate all the sensors in Temperature Monitor so I could graph the data. In that small amount of time, the bottom of the laptop went from the ambient 72 degrees, up to the minimum recorded temperature of 82.4 degrees. As I used the laptop for the next two hours, the laptop's temperature rose steadily until it topped out near 95 degrees about an hour and a half into the experiment. It hovered at that point until I put the ThermaPAK under it at the 2 hour mark, indicated by the dotted cross hairs on the graph.

Notice that after the ThermaPAK was in place, almost all of the sensors experienced a pronounced dip. Even the widely varying CPU sensors display a general decline over most of the next hours, despite the fact that I continued to use the computer. Only the hard drive sensor failed to report any changes due to the introduction of the ThermaPAK. The laptop enclosure experienced about a 10 degree drop in temperature, and then started to heat back up again, although at a much slower rate. It wasn't until the end of the experement, 2 hours after the introduction of the ThermaPAK that the enclosure resumed its former temperature.

The Conclusions: It appears that the ThermaPAK is effective at conducting heat away from your laptop and into the environment, but that capability is limited and only buys you about two hours of cool down time. At the end of that time, the laptop will be back up to the temperature it started at. If your intent is to keep your laptop cool, this may not work for you.

But our primary purpose in looking at the ThermaPAK was to keep the laptop from burning your lap. That, it does admirably by more evenly distributing the heat across the surface of the pad. Although a tad heavy, the ThermaPAK does form a formidable barrier to heat. My wife has been using the ThermaPAK for several months now (she has more of a lap than I do, and is more willing to put her laptop upon it), and she just loves it. It keeps her legs from being burned and is comfortable and easy to pack into a suitcase, briefcase, or laptop bag. This may not be everyone's cup of tea, but if you're fond of the odd bit of computing in bed, the ThermaPAK is a great way to keep your laptop from getting overheated as it sits on your bedspread. And on top of that, it doesn't drain your battery life.

First Impressions: 7 days with the iPad

I got my iPad on Monday, April 26th. Despite all the hype and the "reality distortion field" and the rabid flaming criticism, I wasn't sure about the iPad, so I didn't pre-order it. In fact, I remained firmly in the "I have to touch it first." camp. From the accolades I had heard, I half expected that when I walked into my local Apple store and got to put hands upon one of the demo models, that I'd think it was the most wonderful technological device ever and I'd want to get one immediately. Well... that wasn't what happened.

When I walked into the Apple Store on April 7th and got to play with the iPad for the first time, I was somewhat less than impressed. It was smaller than I had expected, and the thick border on the screen made the viewable area seem smaller still. While the unit feels solidly built, it is light enough to hold in one hand, and only really got bothersome after holding it for a prolonged period in one position. The glass has a good feel, but picks up smudges like nobody's business. I doggedly walked through the demo apps on the iPad in the Apple store. While many of them *looked* good, they either didn't interest me, or didn't behave properly. For example, in the Photo Library, one of the demo shots was in the wrong orientation. It was a landscape oriented shot that was displayed in portrait. Turn the iPad 90 degrees, and the photo swivels so that it is still displayed upwrong. Still in portrait. But it is a touch screen, so I put two fingers down and turn my hand 90 degrees and the picture obligingly pivots underneath my fingers. Until I lift my fingers, at which point it swings back to the original incorrect portrait orientation. This left me severely disappointed. I left the store thinking that perhaps I would be waiting until the next revision of the hardware, or at least until iPhone OS 4 came to the iPad this fall, before I bought one.

But then I thought about the Blog, and you, my readers. With all the media coverage flying back and forth about the iPad, it was only a matter of time before folks expected me to weigh in on it one way or the other. And a few days later I started getting inquiries from some of my readers wanting to know when I would be doing the iPad review. I knew that I'd need to get one just to be able to answer their questions. The things I do for my readers.

And this article? This ISN'T the iPad review. I'm not ready to put my name behind this product yet. It does have some nifty things in its repertoire, but it doesn't seem quite finished. As a first generation Apple device, it makes a strong showing, but still seems to fall short of the goal. But it IS a product worth watching. So in this article I'm going to share some of my first impressions about the iPad and offer some tips and tricks for those who may decide that even in this state it is good enough for them. And buckle up, readers. This is going to be a long one.

What it is NOT.

Despite a lot of wishful thinking about on the internet, the iPad is NOT a computer replacement. If you think you can get an iPad and get rid of your old computer, or never buy a computer in the first place, you are sorely mistaken. Without a computer and iTunes to sync content to the iPad, it is useless. Literally useless. It won't even turn on for more than a few seconds, and then all it will do is display a graphic telling you to connect it to iTunes. You still need a computer.

It is also NOT an iPod Touch on steroids. Despite all the similarities, the iPad is its own creature. While it can run apps designed for its smaller cousins, apps designed specificly for the iPad have a different look and feel, and they behave in a different manner. This is not a machine where you type with your thumbs. This device makes you feel like you're in a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, holding the PADD with one hand and typing over it with the other.

And the iPad is NOT supposed to replace your laptop or your pocket devices. It really is a best-of-both-worlds accessory that augments and extends what those other devices do for you. It is NOT a game changer. It IS a game expander. I hope to make this clear as we go along.

What it IS.

The iPad is a well put-together device. It is elegant in its simplicity, but still manages to be powerful and responsive to user input. That immediate response is probably one of its biggest selling points. With my iPhone 3G, I have a tendency to touch it to activate something, then wait for a response. Even on simple things there is a hesitation there. You 3Gs users may not have noticed this with your faster devices. With the iPad, that hesitation is gone. It just goes from one thing to the next in a smooth and connected fashion.

But I think I'm getting a little ahead of myself. Lets start at the beginning.

What I got.

I ordered before the iPad with 3G became available, and I didn't feel like waiting. For my needs, I expect to be primarily using the iPad at home, or in places where WiFi is available, so 3G wasn't a concern. Your mileage may vary. And there are some uses where the 3G connectivity would be a great boon, but those didn't apply to me. So I ordered the 64 GB WiFi iPad and along with the iPad I ordered Apple's stand. I figured that at the end of the day, I'd pop the iPad onto the stand and turn on the photo album mode and enjoy the pretty pictures when I wasn't using it. The stand is a hefty metal piece with ports in the back to connect a docking cable, or to plug in an audio line out with a standard 3.5mm jack. On the front is the standard iPod dock connector and a metal flange to support the back of the iPad.

Unboxing.

I'm sure that by now quite a few of you have watched videos of iPad unboxings online. Compared to previous Apple products, they're actually quite a let down. Once you pull the shrink wrap from the box, your excitement peaks as you lift the cover and see your iPad for the first time. And then it is done. Apple put as little as possible in the box. There is the iPad, the info packet, a sync cable, and the power adapter. That's it. And the most in-depth thing in the info packet is the warranty info in umpteen different languages. A pair of white Apple logo decals and a single card with instructions rounds out the info packet.

Hitting the power button right out of the box is a little frustrating. The iPad lights up easily, displaying the afore-mentioned pictogram to connect the iPad to iTunes. And in about two seconds, it turns itself back off.

First Sync.

Plug in the docking cable and connect the iPad. iTunes will come up and walk you through the setup process. There will be a point in this process where you will have the opportunity to check a box and have iTunes load all of your iPhone and iPod Touch apps to the iPad. If you have a lot of apps already, resist this temptation. Trust me, you don't want to check the box. First, doing so will make the first sync take a long time. Second, iTunes will pack all of your apps in with the maximum number of apps per screen. This will make it difficult to sort out your apps into a form that you can use. You are much better off minimizing the amount of data that moves across in the first sync, and then enabling each app individually and placing it on the screen you want it on. You're also better off not syncing music or videos until you can plan out what you want to carry on your iPad.

Another thing I noticed while doing the first sync is that my iPad wasn't charging. I had it plugged into a powered hub, but apparently that hub wasn't powerful enough to recharge the iPad's built-in battery. I know this because it helpfully said "Not Charging" in the top right corner next to the battery icon. The iPad's power requirements are higher than any previous Apple device. You really need the included power supply to charge the iPad quickly. If the iPad is connected directly to the computer, or to a sufficiently powerful hub, it will charge while syncing, but no where near as fast as it will when connected to the included power supply.

Interface.

The iPad interface borrows a lot from the iPhone, naturally. You still have the rows and columns of apps, although now instead of a four by four block of apps on each page, you have an extra row of apps (or column when in Landscape mode). And now the dock has room to add in two extra apps that area always available. Add in two more pages of Apps and you've got a lot of space to load apps.

There is also a new layout used by a lot of the apps that takes advantage of the landscape layout. This involves a column of options down the left side of the screen and a larger area on the right where detail of the selected option is displayed. You see it here in the Settings app, and you also see it in Mail, Pandora, and a number of other apps.



Overall, the interface is rather intuitive. You can either see the control on the screen, or you intuitively know what kind of gesture to make on the screen to get the response you want. I have yet to run into anything where I've had to remember some obscure method to achieve something. Then again, I've not delved into every minute function of ever app. But it does seem very usable right off the bat.

The keyboard I'm not sure what to make of yet. Some people have claimed that they can type on it with no problems. I'm not one of them. I learned to touch type, with the emphasis on touch. I'm used to my fingertips lying on top of the keyboard. With the iPad, you really need to hover over the keyboard. I can do it, but it isn't really comfortable. I'm having much more luck with Mr. Data's one-handed hunt and peck, letting my hand dance over the keyboard as I scan for the next letter. Although I'm pretty sure Brent Spiner wasn't actually typing when he shot those scenes.

Apps.

One unfortunate side effect of the release of the iPad is the upsurge of inflated prices in the App Store. Competition for sales in the App Store had lead to a nice, reasonable method for pricing iPhone apps. Take the number of major features in the app, put a dollar sign in front of it, and subtract $1.01. That was your reasonable selling price. Apps that only do one thing are free. The more major functions you provide, the more you can charge. Simple, reasonable.

With the iPad, existing apps needed to be revised to take advantage of the greater screen space. Some vendors have simply released new versions of their apps that work equally well for both the iPhone and the iPad, giving owners of both free upgrades. Most others have built separate versions of their apps specifically for the iPad, requiring users to have to re-purchase the apps if they want to use the version customized for the iPad. Many of these vendors are claiming that Apple hasn't given them any mechanism for offering discounts to existing users to upgrade at a lower price. And yet, many other vendors are offering their iPad versions on sale for a discounted period of time, giving old and new users the very discounts that others say they can't offer. Worse yet, there is a segment of vendors who are offering their iPad versions at two or three times the price of their iPhone counterpoints.

This last group represents the worst kind of price gougers, in my opinion. I'm sorry, while I can respect the desire for a vendor to get paid for their efforts, more pixels doesn't equal more money. Not when the functionality is either unchanged, or reduced.

And sadly, for many apps, a number of functions have been dropped in the haste to get an iPad version through the App Store on time for the launch. I expect that most of these apps will eventually be upgraded to the point where they have the same functions as their iPhone counterparts, but those upgrades will take time.

The base iPad system includes the following apps: Photos, Mail, Safari, iPod, Calendar, Videos, YouTube, Settings, Contacts, Maps, App Store, iTunes, and Notes. It makes sense for Camera to be missing, seeing as the iPad doesn't have one. And the absence of Messages and Phone on the WiFi model aren't that surprising. Less obvious are the absence of Clock, Calculator, Voice Memos, Weather, and Stocks. Each of these apps could be used on the iPad. None of them are dependent on hardware that isn't available. Admittedly, Weather and Stocks aren't that likely to be missed as there are better versions out there for these functions. I am missing Clock sorely for the ability to set daily alarms and set up countdown timers. And a Calculator is always useful. And because these are in the operating system, you can't even use the iPhone versions. They just aren't there. I can only hope that this is because Apple had higher priorities for their programmers to work on and these apps will re-appear in later revisions to the operating system.

Apps I love.

Some apps have made the transition to the iPad in the best possible way. They take advantage of the larger screen size and make the most of that real estate. And they do it without sacrificing the customer experience. In fact, some have significantly better experiences on the iPad than they did on the iPhone.

iTeleport

Formerly known as Jaadu VNC, iTeleport is one of the premier VNC applications for the iPhone. And now they've done it one better on the iPad. For a start, while the iPad version is available separately, the iPhone version of iTeleport was made into a Universal build, allowing customers who bought it for the iPhone to use the software on their iPad for free. And it is worth it to use iTeleport on the iPad. The larger screen give you a better view of the remote computer and makes it much easier to see and manipulate the controls.

iBooks

The much touted iBooks app manages to deliver on a natural and comfortable book reading experience. The app comes with a free book to get you started, A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh with decorations by Ernest H. Shepard. And a multitude of other free books are available in Apple's bookstore thanks to the Gutenburg Project. And any e-book that you can convert into an e-Pub format can be ingested into iTunes and displayed in iBooks.

Photos

Despite not being able to rotate images in the Photos app, it does give you a really fast and intuitive way to look at your photos. You can zoom in quite a ways, and the resolution is amazing. With a pinch and a flick you can jump from album to album It isn't the same feel as the Photos app on the iPhone. It is much more intuitive.

Magic Piano

Smule, the makers of Ocarina for the iPhone, have come out with another social media music hit. Magic Piano turns your iPad into a virtual piano with a variety of layouts. There is a featureless black screen that cooresponds to a linear keyboard for you to play on, a spiral keyboard, a circular keyboard, a regular linear keyboard, and even a songbook mode that will teach you how to play one of a variety of songs. Each of the visual keyboards can be expanded or contracted to have as large or as small a range as you could want. You can even perform a duet with someone elsewhere, or listen to what people are playing all over the world. To some folks, it must look like a toy, but this is a great way for some of us to get into music. And only 99 cents!

Tweetdeck

Tweetdeck has been my go-to Twitter application on my laptop for some time. But I never felt it fit on the iPhone because there was only space to view a single column. With the iPad's larger display, you can view up to three columns in Tweetdeck. Unfortunately, I'm also missing some of the behavior I got used to on the desktop version. Like the ability to clear read tweets from a column, or mark a whole column as read. In fact, most of the column tools don't seem to be present yet. I'm hoping we'll see more revisions soon.

Maps

This is the one app that I would seriously consider getting an iPad 3G for. Lucky for me my wife wants to get a 3G in the fall ofter the new OS is available, so I have time to save up. Maps on the iPhone always seemed a bit cramped. Now there is room to really look at the maps and see the wealth of data that is there. With the WiFi only version, it is great for planning, but once you set out the door and lose your network, you're pretty much stuck. The new directions are much nicer than the iPhone version. They're very clear and they don't block off a lot of the map. The routing for those directions appears to be the same, however.

Now Playing

Now Playing is an app that lets you find what is playing at local theatres, what movies are coming out soon, what is coming to Netflix, even what DVDs are going to be released. This app was a favorite on the iPhone, and it has really adapted well to the iPad. In addition to telling you what is playing where, it can show you a map with the local theatres on it, show you preview, and even give a synopsis of the movies. And you can choose ratings and reviews from RottenTomatoes, Metacritic, or Google.

Apps I hate.

Some apps didn't make the transition to iPad gracefully. These apps actually got worse on the iPad.

Calendar

Unfortunately with the added space available on the iPad, Apple decided that the Calendar app should take on a dayplanner like appearance. While the week view is useful, the daily view is much too busy for my tastes. And there aren't any options. If I could at a few theme templates for my Calendar and decide for myself which was most useful, I'd be a lot happier. But Apple didn't give me that option. And the List view is just as busy.

Contacts

Contacts suffers from the same book-like template on the iPad. It is made to look like a printed book of contacts, and that is the only mode that is available. I'd find this a lot easier to deal with if I could move the center "fold" to one side or the other to control how the screen space is divided up.

Why did they do that?

And there are just some things that I can't figure out why Apple chose to implement the way they did. They had an opportunity to take an app to a better level, but they chose not to, and I cannot find a technical or logical reason why not.

Look at the lack of editing in Photos.  The screen shots in this article were created on the iPad, naturally. But when you create a screen shot, it is in portrait orientation.  In order to get the landscape shots to display properly, I had to ingest them into iPhoto, rotate them, and then insert them into the article.  I couldn't just rotate them in Photos and then upload them via mobile Safari.  Why?  I have no idea.

Another oddity is Coverflow.  Or more accurately, the lack of it.  Open up the iPod app on the iPhone and turn the phone sideways.  Coverflow.  On a tiny screen.  Usable, but ugh.  Now grab the iPad and open up the iPod app and turn it sideways.  Um... same screen in landscape mode.  We finally get a screen the right size for full screen Coverflow, and no Coverflow?  Apple, what were you thinking?

One place where Apple is at least consistently wrong is the lack of sorting for search results in App Store.  It doesn't matter what platform you're on, you can't sort the results.  And looking at a product may take you back to where you were, or may take you back to the beginning.  Not so bad if you're on the second page.  A royal pain if you're twenty pages deep and you still can't find an app with the right features.  Everybody else lets customers sort search results, why can't you, Apple?

And the big question for me, why doesn't the iPad sync wirelessly?  It has 802.11n wireless built into it, just like the Apple TV, but you have to physically plug it into a computer in order to sync to iTunes.  I know it is using iPhone OS, but there is no real reason why they couldn't have implemented wireless syncing.  The iPad can stream video over the internet, the 3G version can stream video over EDGE networks for goodness sake!  But doing a quick wireless sync is too much for it?  Please!  I want to see this by version 4.3 of the OS.  I'll cut you that much slack.

iPhone Apps.

I almost forgot to mention that you can use iPhone apps on the iPad, too.  Or at least most of them.  Camera apps obviously won't work.  How well the others work is really a matter of opinion.  I've yet to see an iPhone app on the iPad that doesn't show some kind of pixelation, but some of the apps are really surprising in how much of their resources render properly on the iPad.  Small icons turn out to either be at much higher resolution than necessary, or are built with scalable vector graphics, while fonts are bitmapped and end up pixelated.

Some people will be able to deal with the pixelation.  Others won't.  I happen to like OmniFocus in 2x mode, but I've heard other people who feel that the fonts are unreadable.  Of course, you could always use 1x mode.  But somehow it just doesn't feel right.

Wrapping it up.

The iPad isn't the second coming of mobile devices.  But it does have a lot of potential that has yet to be reached.  It won't replace your laptop for heavy duty word processing.  At least not without a Bluetooth keyboard.  I haven't got one to test with right now.  But the iPad is still good for looking up your notes on while you're composing your latest novel on your desktop or laptop.  Or for monitoring your Twitter feed while re-coding your website or tweaking your latest video project.

The iPad is better for viewing sites that are built for mobile browsers.  And while the speakers only produce mono sound, they are surprisingly loud when turned all the way up.  It is a decent sized screen for watching video or reading e-books.  And the battery life is astounding.  One report claimed that the iPad can play audio for over 140 hours before failing!  I haven't tested that, but I also haven't been able to get my iPad down under 40%.

I did pick up a case for my iPad.  And doing so immediately made the iPad dock useless.  The tolerances are so close only the thinnest cases, or ones with a specially designed flap will let you use the iPad dock while it is in the case.  I'm still looking for a better case.  Right now, it seems to be months too early for the really good cases.

In a lot of ways, the iPad, and the iPad apps, are just too young to be really useful.  But they are worth watching.  The question is how long of a wait will we have for the iPad to mature to a significant platform?  And how long will it take the market to get used to having access to a digital clipboard that you can carry with you?  No telling.  For now, it is a start.

Disagree with me?  Think I've missed obvious angles?  Think I've overstated the importance of something?  Think I've wasted time looking at the wrong product?  Tell me!  I want to know what you think.  Leave a comment, drop me a letter, or give me a call.  I want to hear what you have to say.  Just be polite, OK?  Hey, drop me a line even if you do agree with me!

BluBridge Auto - Talk

[This week's review for The Nifty Tech Blog is a Guest Review by Odin1Eye of the View from Valhalla blog. I'd like to thank Odin for being Nifty Tech's first Guest Reviewer, and for providing such an interesting review.  Enjoy! - Editor]

Welcome to Nifty Tech. I am your guest blogger, Odin1Eye, and today I will be detailing the wonders of the BluBridge Auto-Talk by Miccus. So please, relax, put down your tray table, recline way back and enjoy the ride.

The BluBridge Auto-Talk (BBAT) device by Miccus is a straightforward hands-free bluetooth speaker phone device. As such it is priced at what I would consider to be slightly above the mean at US $99.99. However, doing a quick web search will (on most weeks) provide sites that have it at a much more reasonable $59.99.

As it’s name indicates, the BBAT is intended for the commuter. In many areas of the country, using a cell phone while driving has begun to become highly regulated. Currently, in the state of Texas, you can drive with a cell phone, but must use a hands free device in school zones. This on again off again legality makes the probability of an accidental violation much more likely and many drivers are opting for hands-free solutions. As well as using it during the drive, it can easily be used as a desk speakerphone if your cell phone’s speaker is not loud enough.

The BBAT is about the size (and looks roughly similar) to a closed communicator from Star Trek TOS. (No, it doesn’t open.) The exact dimensions, provided by Miccus, are 3.89”L x 2.16”W x .66”H. The device utilizes only four buttons. The largest of the four by far is the Talk button, and is nicely placed in the middle of the device. This button also functions to power on/off the device. Two small toggle buttons reside underneath the Talk button providing volume and a small mute button hides on the left hand side.

The Mount, the BBAT, and an iPhone (for scale).

The BBAT easily pairs to your cell phone and is quite easy to setup. Initially, probably due to user error, I had to re-pair the device several times, but after fairly heavy use, I can say this has not happened since getting to know the device.

The BBAT also will allow you to Voice Dial if your cell phone supports it. Since my iPhone 3GS does, it was one of the first things I had to try. Simply depress the talk button briefly, and the speaker chirps and your phone is ready to accept your voice command. Specifically in regards to the iPhone 3GS, you can also use this capability to “tell” your iPhone what music you want to hear if you have it set up to play through your car stereo.

It is also quiet easy to download your address book into the BBAT. Why would you want to do this? Because the BBAT also supports Caller ID. By default it will tell you the number of the person calling you, and once the address book is loaded, it will phonetically pronounce the name of your caller (sometimes with hilarious results).

The speaker volume and quality is really quite good from a relatively diminutive device. The BBAT has a suction cup bracket that ships with it. The intent is that you will place it in the corner of your windshield and basically forget about it. Great in theory, but in my experience this didn’t work quite as well as would be hoped, but about as well as would be expected. Placed on the windshield, the device resides a considerable distance from the speaker, this distance, and the obligatory road noise, results in a situation where the listener is unable to discern what the speaker is saying. This was easily remedied, however, by moving the device to the side window. Once this was accomplished, all of my test callers were unable to distinguish any difference from my normal call quality. (Don’t forget to remove it before rolling down the window however.)

One more note on the suction cup bracket however. The bracket doesn’t seem to hold the BBAT quite as snugly as would be hoped and with placing it right beside your ear, you will hear a bit of rattle occasionally which can be a bit annoying.

So, the BBAT is a great little device, but Bluetooth speaker devices are nothing exceptionally new, so what makes this worthy of NiftyTech?

Well, as the device is suction cupped to your window, it is in reality also charging via the solar panel built into the back of the BBAT. The fine folks at Miccus have created a Bluetooth device that easily defeats my biggest criticism of Bluetooth devices. I can never keep the danged things charged!

Miccus states the the BBAT provides a huge 800+ hours of standby time, (that is over a month of standby time!) which is quite remarkable in itself, and 13 hours of talk time! Add to this fact that as long as you live somewhere that sees the sun at least ones a month, you will more than likely NEVER need to charge the BBAT!

When I initially heard of this device, I felt it was too expensive. However, I told a coworker about it and he rushed out and purchased one at Buy.com during the Christmas sale at $49.99. After having borrowed his for a bit, I decided it was a must and now have one for myself. I truly enjoy it and would recommend it highly to anyone that spends any amount of time commuting and has a Bluetooth cell phone.

[Odin1eye is a husband and a father.  To make the odd coin to pay the bills, he also works as a Teacher Educator.  In what little spare time is left to him, he publishes the blog View from Valhalla, known for his series of podcast reviews.  Odin has retired from the leadership of the Norse Gods, and lives with his wife and godlings in South Texas.


If you'd like to be a Guest Blogger for The Nifty Tech Blog, write to us at NiftyTech@NiftyTechBlog.com.  Give an example of what you'd like to review and why it should be Nifty Tech. - Editor]

Gelaskins Marvel Collection

Earlier in the blog, I mentioned that I had changed my host so that I could apply labels to posts and introduce some new features.  This is one of them.  Items under the tag Personal Stamp are things that are less tech related and more about me and my life.  I hope you'll appreciate these little diversions.

Every now and then, one finds some thing that isn't really tech related, but is just so cool that you just have to share.  This article is about one of these things.  I'm tagging it under Reviews, but it is kind of a mini-review.  Consider it a bonus!  Woo!  Bonus!

Ok, enough silly.  On with the cool.  What I'm here to rave about is Gelaskins new offering.  Gelaskins (at http://www.gelaskins.com) makes colorful decals to decorate (and to a limited extent protect) laptops, iPods, and other mobile devices.  There are other companies in this market, but Gelaskins is one of the more established ones.  Gelaskins started with collections of art from independant artists, but now allows you to upload your own images for them to make into colorful device covers.  This is a great way to make your laptop, iPhone, or iPod distinctive so you always know which one is yours.

But I'm not hear to talk about that.  I'm hear to talk about Gelaskins newest addition to their collection: Marvel Comics.  Yes, the folks at Gelaskins have done a deal with the folks at Marvel and they have gotten a selection of Marvel Comics artwork for creating new skins for your devices.  Some is artwork from the old traditional comics, and some is newer artwork that may have been created just for this effort.  I'm not sure.  It's all cool.  Right now they have 16 Marvel images available for a variety of devices.  Most feature Spider-Man and Iron Man, but there are a couple of X-Men images and one that features a collection of Marvel covers.  Hopefully more images will be coming soon.

Normally on The Nifty Tech Blog, I won't review something unless I've actually had a chance to touch it and live with it and I can really vouch for it.  While I do have Gelaskins on all of my laptops, and my wife has them on her iPod and iPhone, and those have all been beautiful and relatively easy to apply, remove, and change, I have not (yet) gotten my hands on anything from the new Marvel collection.  But there are some beautiful images to customize the devices of any Marvel Comics fan.  Based on the pictures on site, and my past experience in Gelaskins, these look like a safe bet.

Now I want to know what YOU think.  Do you like this product?  Do you like the blog?  Something else you'd like to see?  New features?  I want to hear your opinion, so please comment using the form below, or drop me an e-mail at NiftyTech@NiftyTechBlog.com, write on the wall of The Nifty Tech Blog Fan Page on Facebook, or drop me a note on Twitter @NiftyTechBlog.  Let me know what you like, what you don't like, and what you'd like to see.  And if you like what you see here, share it with your friends!

iPhone

Icon courtesy
of Apple

No discussion of Nifty Tech could be complete without mentioning the iPhone. I know, I know, some of you wouldn’t take an iPhone if someone put a gun to your head and threatened to pull the trigger. Many people have a hatred of AT&T Mobile that makes your typical Holy War look like a children’s squabble. Others are sure that Apple Inc. is the source of all evil. Well, tough.

Let’s face it people. All cell phone carriers suck. They just don’t have any incentive to NOT suck. It is the worst kind of collusion, a conspiracy of mediocrity.  AT&T is no worse than Sprint or Verizon or any other carrier.  And for all of Apple’s faults and mistakes, they do turn out some pretty nifty products. So let’s just accept that and move on to look at the tech.

OK. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last three years, you pretty much know where you can get an iPhone and how much it will cost you. If you’re still not sure, your best bet is to look around at http://www.apple.com. I’m sure you’ll find something.  In the states, a subsidized iPhone 3G can be had for $99 and an iPhone 3GS starts at $199.  If you want almost all of the Apps, and none of the AT&T, you can get an iPod Touch starting at $199.

But back to the Tech. To be honest, there area a number of things about the iPhone hardware that really aren't all that special. The camera is low resolution, it eats battery power, and the reception is fairly iffy. Two iPhones, side by side will show different signal strengths and may not have the same call quality. While the touch screen gives you intuitive control over the software, it isn’t very accurate and it may not register every touch. And it poses problems with use in cold weather. The iPhone isn’t perfect by a long shot.  But it does have its fair share of good points.

The software is full of Nifty. The iPhone is a platform that opens up a world of very nifty tools. Some of these will be covered in future articles, so for now, we’ll just look at the ones that come with the iPhone out of the box.

Whether you’re using the Original iPhone, the iPhone 3G, the iPhone 3G S, or the iPod Touch, the iPhone OS now gives you previously unknown mobility when accessing e-mail, the web, calendars, and a wealth of other information. Mail and Safari aren’t the best of all possible applications, but they do seem to be head and shoulders over anything else on the mobile market. Part of this is no doubt due to the Unlimited Data packages that many carriers are requiring for iPhone customers. Since you’ve already paid for the all-you-can-consume data service, why not just consume data? Got a question? Look up the answer on Safari. Need to send a message? Pop off a quick e-mail with Mail or send an SMS with Messages. Need directions? Get them from Maps.  On my last phone, I never used the browser because the data cost would have quickly broken the budget.  With the iPhone, if you have signal, you're connected.

Naturally, a small screen doesn't make an ideal browsing experience.  But we are talking about browsing on a phone.  Safari on the iPhone does a fairly good job for a phone.  If a screen renders with the font too small to read, just double-tap the section you want to read and Safari will zoom in on that section.  Double-tap again and you're looking at the whole page.  Some people will cite the lack of Flash support as a fatal flaw in the iPhone.  While this may be true for some, Flash isn't perfect either.  Not all sites require Flash, and many of those that do have found that they have to create Flash-free versions for mobile devices anyway.  And even without Flash support, mobile Safari still does the job for quite a lot of the web.

Mail likewise works well for managing mobile e-mail, now that push mail has become available for those who need it.  The only real drawback I've been able to find with Mail is that it only shows up to 200 mails in each account, and it sometimes doesn't push off old mail to make room for new mail.  It renders html based mail well, supports creating folders, composing, forwarding mail, even sending an attachment.  And with some add-on apps, mail can even send multiple attachments in a single e-mail, although it only does one attachment per e-mail by default.

On top of all that, the iPhone allows each application to implement a user interface unique to it’s needs. The touch screen allows each application to place buttons anywhere on the screen, and to change the layout whenever the context changes.  The motion sensors built into the iPhone give it a completely unique control interface. Not every application makes use of this, but those that do give the user a more natural control over the application.

The iPhone is one of those tech devices that is Nifty, not because of what it does, but because of what it makes possible. It makes computing a thing that can be done from anywhere and puts internet tools in your pocket. It can become the right tool for almost any job, providing a programmer can figure out the right way to use the tools at his disposal. It’s not perfect, but it is Nifty Tech.