The race for technology in the palm of our hands is akin to the arms race amongst nations. Research in Motion, Blackberry’s parent company has reportedly taken an entrance in the race. The iPad set a bar that several companies are vying to match and overcome. Blackberry is slated to release their competition in November, no doubt to raise sales in the Christmas season. This has been cited from Bloomberg, which has two anonymous sources reporting the company’s plans.

Of course, Research In Motion is slow to confirm any suspicions. One compelling piece of evidence shows they have registered the domain blackpad.com. The rumors leaking out state this is the new code name for the competitive device going head to head with Apple. The question on the web now is not whether or not the “blackpad” exists, but what can it do. Or better yet, how is it better than the iPad? Several speculations have popped up on what improvements could be made, or how to beat Apple at their cutting edge game.

The truth remains to be seen. Several sources point out what the newest handheld device could boast. One potential overthrow to the Apple giant is a camera. In fact, this device may come with two cameras, one forward mounted for video conferences, the other back mounted. The device will more than likely be completely wired to handle Bluetooth and Wi-Fi capabilities. A rumored feature will be a tethering module for Blackberry phones to allow access to the internet. All of this available for the low price of $499.

Will the Blackpad Stand Against It’s Competition?

This new gadget may stand toe to toe with Apple. It will speculatively boast the same size screen and have a lot of the same features. Aside from the camera aspect, how does RIM have a hope to really launch a campaign against Apple? Statistically speaking, Apple has over 200,000 apps in the stores, not to mention all of the non advertised ones. RIM has six thousand. That is dramatically less than half of a percent. The “Blackpad” has a small hill to climb to launch a successful campaign.

Competition may be a good thing for Apple. Currently though, RIM only has one strong tool against the giant. That is the image the Blackberry carries. The iPad is quietly regarded as a toy. It has the games, it has the goofy, it has a lot of fun, quirky apps that can be entertaining. What it lacks is a solid base of customers in the business world. Apple appeals to the younger generation with a sleek, glowing look. They unfortunately cannot touch the Blackberries functionality in the business world. The “blackpad” may have a niche with the business tablet. Only time will tell.

Lenmar Battery has recently come out with a cover for the iPhone 3G and iPhone 3Gs. The cover itself is a fairly standard hardened rubber sort of affair, with a couple of notable exceptions. For one it has a battery built into the case, which can be charged from an external USB source, it also addresses the lack of a flash on the iPhone.

The case has a super bright LED mounted into the back of it which is turned off and on with a small button on the back, the same button is used to switch the phone from using its internal battery to making use of the external one provided in the pack. While the LED isn’t anywhere near as good as the flash you’d find on an actual camera it does provide a passable amount of illumination for close up photos.

The battery pack itself is a 1300mAh Lithium Polymer battery which according to the documentation will provide you with an additional:

• 4 hours of 3G activity
• 4.5 more hours of Wi-Fi
• 17 hours of additional audio
• 5 hours of video
• Up to 240 hours of standby

The unit sets itself apart from the others in the category by being a fully enclosed case unit in two parts, once snapped into place on the phone it has a nice seamless look and adds very little (2 oz) heft to the iPhone, though it does bulk it up a little.

The battery case charges through a USB (micro) port and also has a handy three stage charge indicator light on the back of the case.

Americans use around 2 Billion disposable batteries a year, one of those numbers that’s big enough for most of us to have no actual concept of it, but it’s a lot.  If you find yourself being a larger than normal part of this statistic the obvious solution would be to use a rechargeable battery.

Generally speaking a rechargeable battery will save you money over the long run, you can recharge most of them up to 1000 times before you have to replace them.  The cost-saving benefits of this are clear when you compare it to disposable batteries.  Though disposables can often have a higher mAh rating they just get tossed out when you’re done with them.

Good in theory but horridly inconvenient

One of the major disadvantages of the rechargeable batteries has been that they don’t come ready to use.  Typically you would need to fully charge your batteries before you used them so you wouldn’t be able to just go to a store and pick some up and carry on.  Often we just don’t have the time or forethought to have some spare charged batteries lying around.

Another issue with rechargeables is that they never really stay charged. After a year or so they’d be generally useless to you and need to be recharged, now however there is a new type of battery that has a much lower self discharge characteristic than previously.

Your standard NiMH rechargeable is below 60% capacity after about 2-3 months and essentially dead after a year.  The Graph above shows the discharge rate for the eneloop battery vs one of Sanyo’s other Nickel Metal rechargeables.

Ready to go rechargeables

Hybrid NiMh cells offer the best of both worlds, you can use them out of the pack but you also get to do the environmentally friendly thing and re-use them.  If polar bears had the capacity to vocalize their appreciation they no doubt would.

Three of the more popular types of these batteries are the Rayovac Hybrid, Ultralast Hybrio and the Sanyo Eneloop series.  Each has essentially the same characteristics, with Eneloop being the forerunner and probably the best marketed.

The hybrids are marketed as being a viable replacement for digital camera batteries, for instance the energizer ultimate lithium (a disposable) makes claims to somewhere around 640 photos worth of battery life.  The Rayovac Hybrid battery states that it will do 400 photos.  Your general use alkaline would struggle to do more than 100.

Also there are the cost savings to be considered. For 8 of the Rayovac Hybrids and a charger you’d pay $23.95.  Four Energizer photo lithium batteries would be around $17.95, and you can only use them for those 630 photos before throwing them away.

The bottom line being that while no rechargeable can hold the power of their high end disposable counterparts, the pre charged rechargeables at the least make going the greener route a more convenient prospect.

One of the more popular items for the holiday season this year will no doubt be the smartphone. Probably the most well known example of this is the iPhone 3G, the Motorola Droid is a fairly recent comer to the scene and has some very nice features.

The advertising campaign Verizon put out to compliment the launch of the Droid was fairly direct and made some less than flattering comparisons between its own 3G network and that of AT&T, the iPhone carrier network. I can attest to the AT&T network being less than stellar in a lot of respects, the dropped calls and spotty 3G coverage are widely known.

Appearance

The Droid of course can’t compare to the sleekness of the iPhone styling. With its sharp corners and slightly blocky appearance it doesn’t have the inherent grace that Apple imparts to its products. Though not hideous by any means, it does lack a certain something and occasionally the default screen image can seem a little ominous.

If the Droids’ design seems a little utilitarian and “boxy” the screen makes up for it. The Motorola Droid sports a brilliantly crisp 3.7” (the iPhone is 3.5”) WVGA display that does very well at delivering video and graphic content. Displaying up to 16 million hues at a resolution of 854×480 (16:9 widescreen) it displays those HD YouTube videos really well (though there’s still no Hulu support).

Keyboard / Usability

The keyboard on the droid takes a little getting used to. The keys are all mounted flush against each other and have very little actual tactile feedback. They’re slick and don’t go down very far when pressed which can make typing by touch a problem.

Eventually though you do get used to it, also there’s a sometimes useful directional pad on the keyboard. My fervent hope is that there will be some games that make decent use of this at some point.

Applications

The Apple Store has well over 100,000 apps for the iPhone, that’s a staggering number of applications and definitely gives credence to the “There’s an app for that” saying that Apple has been using to help market the iPhone.

The Android app store is up to around 10,000 entries. This is bound to increase as Google has taken pains to promote the “open” nature of their platform which allows developers more freedom when creating their applications. This may possibly be to the detriment of the app store as it’s definitely possible that a flood of low quality apps will surface. Time will tell. But at the moment it’s a safe bet that there’s probably an Android app for that too!

Also you may have heard about the GPS service that Google has launched. It’s FREE and works in with Google Maps to provide you with turn by turn directions. It’s just an app so while for the moment it’s only for Android it is definitely coming to iPhones in the not too distant future. This free service is going to play havoc with subscription based GPS (and it’s cool to get turn by turn on streetview).

Though of course you can only run one of those 70,000 apps at a time on the iPhone, so no checking Yelp while you’re streaming Pandora and emailing a friend about dinner plans. That’s a bigger deal than you might realize until you’ve gotten used to doing it I have to say. Background applications are a fabulous thing!

The Droid you’re looking for?

Overall the differences between the two phones aren’t that huge. They’re close enough that some of the deciding factors may be more to do with the service than the phones. The better call quality and somewhat negative public perception of AT&T’s service (possibly helped along by Verizon’s ad campaigns) might be a deciding factor in some people’s choice.

One hint though, if you’re looking to do some more research, avoid forums like the plague, fanboys are rabid and abundant on both sides!

The applications for this range from RFID tags for Identification and tracking through to clothing with circuitry embedded in it. But as the ability to print the circuitry comes ever closer, what will be powering your socks in the coming years?

Blue Spark – Ultra Thin Printed Batteries

Blue Spark Technologies produce printed carbon-zinc batteries, which are small, environmentally friendly and most importantly cheap enough to produce to make them viable. These batteries are also incredibly thin; their standard battery is 750 microns thick (that’s 0.75 of a mm), while their Ultra-Thin series of batteries can go as slim as 500 microns.

The applications for a power source of this nature are boundless, at the moment they’re being used in a lot of RF applications, including one card being used by Sealed Air Corp that monitors and stores temperature data to ensure that food has been produced and stored properly.

As he says in this CNBC Interview Blue Spark Technologies CEO Gary Johnson can see applications for this such as hi tech patient bracelets with stored records, subway or bus passes that display their credit remaining and loyalty cards that track customer information painlessly.

Along with the potential for manifold uses there is the point that these batteries are fairly harmless in the environment. They contain none of the chemicals normally associated with batteries, no mercury or lithium etc. The carbon-zinc chemistry meets all the EU restrictions on hazardous substances and can be safely disposed of.

Konarka – Portable Solar Charging

Ever wanted to have your laptop bag charge your laptop while you went to work? Konarka is working on just such a thing, they produce light weight flexible “Power Plastic” that they hope will become popular as a way to charge up and power personal devices from sunlight.

They envision applications such as a shade umbrella that will power a cooler or a mat that you unroll to charge your cell phones or laptops. Already Neuber a German company is planning to make use of the technology to produce their Energy Sun-bag.

Like any truly great gadget the Powermat is based on science that has a lot of Greek symbols in it while remaining easy to use. The Powermat uses Electromagnetic Induction (which apparently we found out about around 1831 Electromagnetic Induction on Wikipedia ) to charge all your handheld devices without wires…. Sort of.

It’s not entirely wireless, you need to plug in the mats themselves and any device that they don’t make a receiver for needs to use the “powercube”. The powercube comes with mini & micro USB tips standard, though you can get others as you need them. It then sits on the mat, wirelessly, while your PSP for example will be plugged into it via the USB connection. So while not entirely “wireless” it’s probably less hassle than having all those plugs lying around beside your bed for everything you need to charge.

The real appeal of the Powermat comes in when you have a device that comes with a receiver. The receiver allows your device to charge directly from the mat. They’re either a sleeve in the case of the iPhone 3G and iPod touch, a dock for iPods and iPhones or for Blackberry devices a new battery door. The Blackberry door replacement has the least impact on the overall feel of the phone while the dock is pretty much the standard iPod type of dock.

When you’ve got your receiver in place all you need to do is drop the phone down onto the Powermat in the right place and it starts to charge. It gives off a bleep and the LED’s light up (Both of these functions can be switched to either On, Half or Off). One caveat though is that you have to be fairly precise in your positioning of the device over the charging spots on the mat for it to activate properly, though there are magnets in the mat to help you find the sweet spot.
As for the mats you have two choices. There’s the Home & Office mat which is the more stylish option, but doesn’t have the practicality of the Portable Mat. The portable mat folds up into three sections, comes with its own carry case and means that you’ll only have one charger to forget when you travel rather than 5.

The Powermat system isn’t cheap though. The mats are $99 and when you add the price of a couple of the receivers at between $20 and $30 things get expensive fast. That being said though, the system is both innovative and pretty nifty. Anyone who has a coffee table in their bedroom set aside as a shrine to their DS, iPod, iPhones and Blackberry chargers will instantly be able to see the benefits that a system like this can bring. As an added bonus it’s a stylish looking piece of tech in its own right and it actually works!

It wasn’t long ago I set a goal for myself to always keep my mind and heart healthy by maintaining a healthy diet and vigorous exercise regimen…but I’m not the biggest fan of working out. Listening to my iPhone during a workout is a MUST! Heart monitors have also been a popular accessory lately. Now, thanks to the SMHeart Link created by iTMP Technology, I can monitor my heart rate and incorporate my workout data into my iPhone!

Basically, SMHeart link is a wireless bridge device that allows the iPhone or iPod Touch to double as a heart rate monitor and a fitness tracking system. It works by collecting data through sensors (like the ones in workout machines) and then sends it to your iPhone or iPod Touch via Wi-Fi. Best of all, it’s small and compact measuring only 3.5in x 1.5in x 0.5in and weighing in at just 3 ounces so bringing it along with my jog is very convenient.

SMHeart Link works with several heart rate monitors (chest wraps) and also biking sensors to track speed, cadence and power (watts). Compatible equipment is available from companies such as Polar, Garmin, Nike, Reebok, Timex, New Balance and Numetrex. These sensors are sold separately but the large variety of retailers gives you several buying options.

The genius of iTMP Technology is that they have teamed up with New Leaf Fitness and Map My Fitness which allows me to upload the data logged by SMHeart Link wirelessly to my iPhone by using three apps that are now available in the App Store.

1. iRPM – a cardio fitness system and cycling computer that uploads information from the completed workouts to the New Leaf to MapMyFitness.

2. iSpinning – a cardio fitness system that enables you to log your fitness data and cardio exercises that are specially designed for iSpinning® enthusiasts.

3. iNewLeaf – a cardio fitness system and cycling computer that lets users incorporate a NewLeaf metabolic profile to more precisely track and monitor the right workout intensity.

Now I’ll always get the best training for my workouts and it couldn’t get any easier to store my workout data on my iPhone with a simple touch of a button. Not all of these apps are free and the SMHeart Link retails for about $155. For a limited time it is bundled with SMHeart Sleeve, a lightweight case that integrates with the heart monitor chest wrap.

So if you would like to keep your heart and mind healthy, try listening to your heart through your iPhone or iPod Touch!

With Technology taking over in pretty much all aspects of life, its no surprise that books have lost there place in our world today. The enjoyment of curling up to a warm fire with a cup of hot cocoa or glass of wine on a rainy day will soon be a thing of the past. Even the sound of the cracking from the binding of opening a new book and the touch the crisp pages of a book fresh from the press have lost there share of the market. Now I don’t know any statistics at the moment; however, I do know the Kindle, iPod and other eBook readers are becoming more prevalent with a huge market places like Amazon selling eBooks.

I am not opposed to change or technology as long as it is for the better. I had the pleasure of speaking with Monique Tilford, co-author of Your Money or Your Life. We spoke about another project that she is working on but it was a great to find her book on Amazon in an Kindle Edition. Which was a great reminder that because the shift to ebooks has begun that doesn’t mean that the quality of books has diminished. If you wanted to find out more about her book, check out her blog at Your Money Or Your Life.info

So what does this all of this have to BatteriesInAFlash? The Kindle battery has been a very hot seller for us and we have not been able to keep them on the shelves. We have literally sold out of the batteries the same day they arrive. The Kindle 2 has just been released (ironically the battery is unknown to us at the moment) and has been selling out as well.

Although, the Kindle is not alone in the world of eBooks. The iPod Nanos and above have the ability to load eBooks and the iPhone or iTouch have Apps that make eBooks possible and even Sony has the eBook Reader. So with all the options out there where do you stand?

Innovation or Renovation??

Lenmar is in the process of releasing a Universal Charging Station or PowerPort (PPUHUB6). It will be revealed to distributors and guests of the Las Vegas 2009 CES Show which is slated to win a CES 2009 Innovation Award, but does it deserve it?

The picture and spec sheet are all I have to work with in reviewing the PPUHUB6 and it appears to be a powered USB hub multiplied. Although not an entirely new concept, it is a better way to charge your devices. It will eliminate the need to find multiple power outlets to charge your cell phone, iPod, PSP and other USB toys.

What Does It Do?

Simply take your compatible cellphone, pda, iPhone/iPod or any USB device and plug them in simultaneously to charge. You can charge up to 6 devices at one time;
and of course, charging time will vary for each device. There is also a handy storage built into it for your tips so that you do not lose them.

What Can I Power With It?

The PowerPort comes ready to charge any USB chargeable device. It also come with tips to charge select Motorola, Blackberry, Samsung and LG cell phones. As an added bonus there is a tip to charge you iPhone, iPod and iPod Touch. If you a Lenmar product user you are probably familiar with their Portable Power line which allows you to charge your devices on the go. Now you will be able to charge them as well as your phones and iPods. There are also other tips you can buy to add to it if your plug is not in the set provided.

Will I Use It?

Even though I said that it not truly a new idea it still is a stellar idea that I can use to help me free myself from 9 AC chargers for each device I use, and trust me I use a lot of different USB devices. Also it will help me from losing them if they are in one easy to use central location. What are your thoughts on the PowerPort?
Find out more about it at BatteriesInAFlash.com

September 17 nears and anticipation builds as the supposed release of the Google Android dubbed the G1 goes into pre-sale that day. People are already began to say it will rival the Apples – AT&T’s iPhone or will it?. The phone hasn’t hit the market yet and there has already been a lot controversy over the phone. The Android’s development team is displeased with the overall development of the OS and Googles lack of support to say the least.

What is all the hype about?

Rumors have it that it will include a large 5in x 3in touchscreen (larger than iPhones 3.5in screen), a sliding QWERTY keyboard, 3.0 megapixel camera, 3G data plan and plenty of apps that will make users very pleased. The Android will be available for $150 for existing customer and $350 full retail. Take a look a YouTube video that was released on the phone. It is very grainy and hard to tell what the phone is really like but it is, at the moment; the only video.

What is the downside?

There is a time and place for everything is this world and Androids timing may not be the best thought out. The bar has been set with the iPhone’s unprecedented sales and Symbian going full open source, where does that leave room for the Android at the present time. Essentially what I’m saying: our plates are full and we are trying to digest all the recent technological releases and advances. Not to mention, the T-Mobile’s 3G data network will only work in New York and Las Vegas. A definite setback to others around the country, although T-Mobile is working diligently to get the service up and running in 20 something other cities by years end.

Not to sound cliché but only time will tell what the future holds for the Android. Ok, so I did sound really cliché.