Gadgets Control

You have probably suspected, like me, that text message usage is continuing to grow. Well, the wireless association known as CTIA announced the results of a survey this week which shows that text messaging in June 2008 rose to new record levels. For the month of June alone, there were 75 billion text messages sent. That breaks down to 2.5 billion text messages a day.

June 2008 numbers were up 160% compared to text messages sent in June 2007. In all, there was an increase of 28.8 billion messages year over year. Also up were picture and other multimedia messages (MMS). 5.6 billion MMS messages were sent in the first half of this year.

(Read the full post about ‘Text messages reach record levels this year’…)

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It was undeniably cliched and shallow in terms of character and story upon release in 2006, but the original Saints Row on 360 still stands to this day as one of the few GTA clones that wasn’t extremely flawed in terms of gameplay.

(Read the full post about ‘Saints Row 2 trailer’…)

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Many of the Asian based GPS companies come out with many interesting GPS units that come loaded with many nice features. This new GPS, the iNavi K7 from Thinkware, is no exception. One of the K7’s main features is its 7-inch touch screen, that coupled with its ability to display 3D map images the screen will display beautiful and easy to understand images. In addition, it comes with an 8GB SDHC memory card, 256MB of RAM, and it uses geomagnetic sensor to always display maps even when there isn’t a very strong satellite signal. It also comes with LED lights, DMB receiver, and plays videos and MP3’s. One of the main features is the aforementioned display of GPS maps in 3D and if you take a look at the above picture, you can see how 3D images look. If you think about normal 2D images, you can see the difference. It should be available soon, however, only in the Korean market. It is expected to retail for 549,000 KRW, or around $502 US. Via [NaviGadget] Keep up with the latest gadget goodness! - Subscribe to our feed → Tags: pvp, DVD, mobiles, amps (Read the full post about ‘Thinkware intro’s new 7-inch iNavi K7′…)

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Granny doesn’t want to stream music, surf, play games, check directions or update her MySpace page on her cell phone. She just wants to make calls and she’s pretty cranky about it. “Is that too much ask?” she petulantly asks every relative who passes through her door. (That is not to say you should ever underestimate Granny; she is sharper then most people half her age, razor wit, and more spirit than a racehorse.) Fortunately, gadget girl came to the rescue, with the Jitterbug, designed “for Boomers and Beyond.” (That sure beats branding it the “Senior Phone.”) There have been some changes since we first reviewed it, such as the Roadside Assistance Program for an extra $4 per month and more operator features. (Read the full post about ‘Jitterbug - cell phone for “boomers and beyond”’…)

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Ya know, as I type this from my bed, I’m thinking it might be time to admit that an old upturned tray with a corner missing (where someone - not me! - dropped it on the floor and it cracked) might not be the best stand for my laptop after all. This feeling was solidified by seeing something called the Stiletto Laptop stand. Inspired by the shoe (although not really looking very shoe-like, it has to be said) the Stiletto stand holds your laptop safe, and can also elevate it to your eye level. Even handier, there’s a space for papers and pens. Setting it up involves some self-assembly — but not the type that calls screws or glue guns into action (thank goodness). (Read the full post about ‘The Stiletto is a laptop stand with style’…)

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Over the next eight weeks TimeWarner has stated that it is going to be revamping AOL.com with a number of new services. This week saw the first of those new additions in the form of an e-mail aggregation service.

Through AOL e-mail you can now also access some of the other common e-mail accounts we all use. This includes Gmail, Yahoo! and Hotmail addresses.

Bill Wilson, Executive Vice President of Programming said:

With the launch of mail aggregation, AOL will be the first among the big traditional portals to offer a centralized email experience … We know that consumers today have multiple email accounts on different services to keep tabs on daily, and we want to make it easier for them.

(Read the full post about ‘AOL introduces e-mail aggregation service’…)

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Here is a very useful watch if you often work in extreme heat that could end up saving you a trip trip to the hospital or maybe even your life. Called the Heat Watcher, this watch keeps you healthy by taking into account the settings that you set on it for physical stability and the type of work you are expecting to do - either light, medium, or heavy. The watch then takes these settings into account and combines them with constant readings of your body temperature. To keep you from overheating, the watch will then inform you when you need to take a drink of water or when you need to take a rest. The watch also features the ability to read the moisture in the air which is also an indicator for excessive heat exposure conditions. (Read the full post about ‘Heat Watcher watch helps prevent heat strokes’…)

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I never used OiNK, my music tastes weren’t sophisticated enough to receive an invitation. Those that did, though, found themselves running scared when the site was shut down a year ago. I can still remember a girl that I work with, crying and wondering if she should be scared. After all, the British government claimed that they were going to go after as many uploaders as possible, and today, they proved that they meant business.

Of the thousands of users worldwide, six have been detained since the beginning of the investigation in May. The rest received harshly worded letters from their ISPs telling them not to pirate any more.

(Read the full post about ‘Four OiNK users finally facing criminal charges’…)

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Thank you Apple for bringing the ipod nano back in its very cool, tall, thin, original incarnation. Not only that, but for adding some bright, rad colors (9 total). Oh yes, it now comes in 8 and 16GB versions. So what else is new? For starters, it has a feature called Genius which auto-creates playlists based on what songs ‘go together’. It’s an algorithm developed by Apple. The other notable feature is the built-in accelerometer which allows you to shuffle the songs when you shake it! The screen on this new nano is a bit larger and you can view your cover art in landscape mode (yes, automatically), as well as in Cover Flow (the moving album covers feature). (Read the full post about ‘iPod nano 4G - back to tall and slim and now in 16GB size’…)

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Velocity Mobile has come up with a simple-named cell phone - the 103. This device might be mistaken for something from HTC’s stables at first glance, but upon closer inspection, you will find a trackball located in the center. It might have Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional running in the background, but the skin used is known as the Odyssey Interface that aims to ease the painfully complex Windows Mobile user interface (when compared to the iphone, of course). Other features of the Velocity 103 include :- 2.8″ VGA TFT LCD touch screen display 640 x 480 resolution Quallcomm MSM7201 processor 128MB RAM 256MB NAND flash memory microSD memory card slot Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity GPS navigation 2 megapixel camera and VGA camera TV/VGA out Interestingly enough, the Velocity 103 comes with Velocity Over The Air (VOTA) updates that lets you update the device easily without requiring to have too much tech knowledge. (Read the full post about ‘Velocity 103 Phone’…)

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