Feb 03

Jason Dunn (MVP + PocketPCthoughts.com owner) has been interviewed over at PocketPCsummit.

“PPCS: Who is Jason Dunn?

Jason Dunn: There are many ways I could answer that, but I’ll pick one: I’m a student of everything. I love learning new things, and strive to increase my knowledge every opportunity I get.

PPCS: What sparked your interest in handheld technology, specifically the Pocket PC?

JD: I like having access to information, so a PDA is a natural extension of my brain. I’ve never had the best memory, and a PDA helps me keep track of the things I need to do. As for the Pocket PC, it was a natural evolution - I started out with a Velo 1 HPC back in 1997, moved to a Palm-sized PC later on, and now the Pocket PC is the end result….”

Full interview @ http://www.pocketpcsummit.com/press/012003.php
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Feb 03

HP 3970 ROM update no available download link below. Previously only the German version was available.

Fixes

  • Backlight turned off after screen toggle
  • Expansion Pack’title freezing on screen after soft reset
  • early termination of NOTES recording
  • Popping noises at end of wav file playback
  • Screen refresh after soft reset while in a jacket
  • Bust’em audio fix
  • Distorted audio when bass is increased
  • All fixes included in EUU3

Download @ http://h18007.www1.hp.com/support/files/handheldiPAQ/us/download/17002.html

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Feb 03

We thought we’d bring you an update since publishing our original article “What’s next for the iPAQ Pocket PC?”. Not too long ago, HP confirmed much of the rumors that were rampant on the internet and launched the H1910 and H5450 models which confirmed much of the information that was published in our original rumor gathering article. HP has once again taken a great product and made it a better product.

Now of course, there are still a few rumors that are just that - rumors - until they are proven otherwise by HP. Future generations of iPAQ Pocket PC’s will no doubt include more hardware integration into the device itself as has been proven in the past (i.e. Bluetooth, WLAN, Biometrics, removable battery).

Sounds like the next logical hardware integration would be what we have started seeing in other Pocket PC’s like GPS, telephony (CDMA/1xRTT, GSM/GPRS), TV Tuner, and digital camera’s. Other hardware integrations in the future could possibly include bar code scanning, radio tuner, USB/VGA ports and keyboards….

More @ http://www.ipaqabilities.com/news/articles/0103-ipaqsfuture.shtml

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Feb 03

What are some of the coming analog ideas for wireless?
“At Berkeley they are looking at a 10 gigabit-per-second radio with an onboard variable length inductor that can change its personality. You walk into the red carpet room at the airport and your PDA or your personal computer starts sniffing the air to see if there is a 2G, or a 2.5G, or 802.11b network. It covers the spectrum and it picks the cheapest path to the IP backbone and configures itself to be that radio. Let’s say you’re doing something that’s voice intensive. It will still keep sniffing to see if another protocol gets introduced that is even cheaper. “

When National Semiconductor decided to challenge Intel and Advanced Micro Devices in the market for low-end microprocessors in 1997, CEO Brian Halla teased a group of skeptical analysts, saying they probably thought he had been sprinkling testosterone on his corn flakes.

And even though National’s acquisition of Cyrix turned out to be a bad bet, Halla recovered from the blunder and returned the company to its roots in the analog chip business.

Analog chips capture sound, light, temperature and other real-world data and convert it for electronic equipment. Even though the analog business has been hurt during a prolonged industry slowdown, Halla expects a turnaround by the late spring. Wishful thinking? Perhaps, but he believes the revival will be triggered by a technological transformation in which analog chips become the workhorse component in the downloading of images and graphics from the Internet as well as for wireless transmissions of data signals.

In the process, Halla expects analog chips will displace the zeros and ones that have formed the heart of the binary language used in personal computing for most of the last couple of decades.

“The only things on the face of the planet that use zeros and ones are microprocessors and digital signal processors,” he says. It’s fine to do zeros and ones for spreadsheets and that’s why the PC uses the least amount of analog. But we’re not doing spreadsheets anymore.

More @ news.com
Source:PPcnewswire
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