marc orchant and gadgetry Resources

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ZDNet Author Biography: Marc Orchant has been building, testing, and sometimes breaking hardware and software for 25 years. A recovering graphic designer, Marc is currently the Storyteller at VanDyke Software, a co-host of On The Run With Tablet PCs, a weekly podcast, and a self-admitted "productivity maven, gadget freak and software addict"....; more about Marc Orchant »

ZDNet Resources

First look: Jabra BT5020 Bluetooth headset: I've been using a new Jabra BT5020 Bluetooth headset for the past few days and despite the short period of time I've had to use this device I am already a huge fan. Jabra claims ten hours of talk time and 300 hours of standby time and, while I'm unable...; Tags: Uncategorized, Mobility, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-07-16
Nokia updates the N800 with Skype and more: The mobile blogs have been buzzing all day about the latest software update fo the Nokia N800 internet tablet which was released today. Good coverage in a number of places but your first stop should be Thoughtfix's live blogging of his update experience on Tabletblog.com. I plan to update my...; Tags: Software, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-07-06
Essential gear for the road warrior: For the past few weeks, I've been traveling a great deal. Actually, I've been traveling a great deal for a long time. Part of the price I pay for living for where I do. But I've recently been able to travel in greater comfort and have arrived at my destinations...; Tags: Uncategorized, Mobility, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-07-06
I am such a weak person - I bought an iPhone: I know... I know... I said I wasn't going to do this. I had all the completely valid reasons to stay of the RDF and avoid being swept up in the iPhone madness. But yesterday morning I succumbed to the iPhone's siren song and drove over to the ABQ Uptown...; Tags: Mobility, Mac OS X, Mac, iPhone, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-07-01
iPhone day one - what does it all mean?: My buddy Matt Miller wrote a nice post about alternatives to the iPhone on his Mobile Gadgeteer blog and as I perused and joined in on the comment thread, it occurred to me that a little long-view history lesson might be in order. I've been pretty disinclined to write about...; Tags: Mobility, Mac, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-06-30

Oh yeah - Skype on the N800 is coming soon: Kevin C. Tofel of jkOnTheRun just reported that on his way out of the Digital Experience show in New York City today, he saw Skype running on a Nokia N800 internet tablet. According to Kevin's report, this should be downloadable in July. I've been waiting for this since the N800...; Tags: Mobility, Hardware, Gadgetry, Events; Blog posts 2007-06-28
Dell selling Nokia phones - bad news for carriers: Stefan at intomobile points to new listings on the Dell website showing unlocked Nokia handsets. This is a big deal. One of the stumbling blocks Nokia (and other high-end handset manufacturers) faces is getting distribution for these devices in the company stores operated by AT&T and T-Mobile (the two largest...; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mobility; Blog posts 2007-06-17
Treo 700p patch problems - bad to worse: This is beyond bad. I've heard from a number of people through various channels about the post I put up a few days back concerning the ongoing delays in getting a patch out for Treo 700p users and the ham-handedness with which they're being handled by Palm. Some are concerned...; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mobility; Blog posts 2007-06-06
Kingston does it again with microSD reader bundle: Check this little guy out! Kingston has just introduced a tiny USB reader made specifically to support the microSD cards that are increasingly being used for data storage in phones and other mobile devices. This unit is literally the same size as the tip of my index finger. Kingston is...; Tags: Gadgetry, Mobility; Blog posts 2007-06-06
Palm 700p woes continue: I've been a longtime and loyal user of Palm devices dating back to when the company made software for the Newton. While there have been bumps in the road through the years (as there have been with every technology brand I've used), the manner in which the widely documented problems...; Tags: Mobility, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-06-02
NYC on 2 Nokias a day: A couple of weeks ago, I took the family on a trip to New York City. We got a pretty good deal on travel in the form of a package deal from Hotwired.com that included four round-trip tickets and two hotel rooms for about $600 per person for a four-night,...; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mobility, Productivity, Web Apps; Blog posts 2007-05-26
Treo 700p fixes imminent?: I posted a while back that Palm was promising a much-anticipated and overdue firmware update for the Treo 700p to address Bluetooth pairing, stability, and performance issues. Based on a recent post to their blog that was picked up by Kevin Tofel at jkOnTheRun this weekend, it appears the release...; Tags: Mobility, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-05-21
Does the iPhone "change everything"?: Great post today by Tomi Ahonen, one of the authors of the Communities Dominate Brands book and blog about the sea change in awareness of how mobile computing will change after the release of the iPhone. If you haven't read this book or added this blog to your aggregator and...; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mac, Mobility, Productivity; Blog posts 2007-05-18
Kingston MobileLite 9-in-1 USB card reader: I've just gotten a chance to take a look at the new Kingston MobileLite – a 9-in-1 USB card reader that supports the most popular media formats used in the mobile phones, digital cameras, PCs and portable media devices I carry around. The device which is about the size and...; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mobility; Blog posts 2007-05-17
Mossberg likes the new Samsung Q1 Ultra UMPC: Well, he likes it more than he did the first-generation Ultra Mobile PC from the Korean electronics giant. Although he still thinks the UNPC form factor is rife with too many compromises to meet broad mainstream adoption (and I'm certainly not going to argue with that), he finds the next-gen...; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mobility, Tablet PCs, Vista, Windows; Blog posts 2007-05-16
FlipStart handheld PC now available from Dynamism: FlipStart, the handheld PC released a couple of months ago, is now available from Dynamism, a reseller of high-performance mobile gear. Previously, the tiny PC was only available directly from the company. A number of accessories including batteries and a port replicator for use on the desktop are also available....; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mobility, Productivity, Vista, Windows; Blog posts 2007-05-15
WordPress client for the Nokia N800: Just got back from a trip to New York City and catching up on RSS feeds I see that a newWordPress cleint for the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet has been released. WordPy is a pretty full-featured client for the Maemo Linux OS and runs on both the Nokia 770 and...; Tags: Gadgetry, Blogs, Software, Utilities and Add-Ins; Blog posts 2007-05-14
What's in my gadget bag (this time): Im off to New York City for a few days and just finished packing my gadget bag for this outing. Given the duration of the flight (about 6 hours with ime zone changes), the brevity of the layover less than an hour, and the fact that Im traveling with the...; Tags: Productivity, Mobility, Mac, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-05-10
Another Parallels-Vista success story: Ive been evaluating the Nokia N95 (review coming shortly on this power-packed device and its perfect companion, the N800 Internet Tablet) for about a week now and have been fighting with Nokias PC Suite on the Lenovo X60t Tablet PC trying to get a just-released firmware update performed. No dice....; Tags: Windows, Vista, Utilities and Add-Ins, Software, Mobility, Mac, Hardware, Gadgetry; Blog posts 2007-05-09
New Treo 755p (Sprint) - I want one: As usual, my friend Andrew Carton at Treonauts is the first with breaking Treo news. Today the news is that Palm and Sprint have officially announced the availability of the new Treo 755p. Im looking forward to seeing this device - it addresses the few concerns I have with...; Tags: Gadgetry, Hardware, Mobility; Blog posts 2007-05-09