The Aliph Jawbone2 Reviewed

When the very first version of the Jawbone was released, it was widely regarded as one of the best Bluetooth headsets that a user could buy for the money, the proverbial Cadillac of Bluetooth Headsets. And like a Cadillac, it was one of the more expensive solutions, averaging between $85 to $120 when most other BT Headsets were priced between $30 and $60. And although it lacked a lot of the new Jawbone2’s functionality, it was still considered the top dog of the industry at the time.

Aliph has since updated the design and functionality of the headset, calling the new version appropriately enough “the New Jawbone” or “the Jawbone2”, the name I’ll use in this Product Review. When it first came out back in May of 2008, it was one of the single most expensive accessories that you could buy for your phone, with an MSRP (Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price) of $129. But you certainly got a lot of bang for your buck with this device: the inclusion of the new NoiseAssassin Technology and the new smaller footprint (earprint?) makes this version a must-have item for the Ultra Mobile among us, even a whole year later.

Thankfully, the price of the Jawbone2 has also been substantially reduced in the last few months, coming down from the original MSRP of $129 to around $59. This to be mostly a reaction to the release of other “bone” technologies being offered by other competing technology vendors, but Aliph is also making room in their line for the release of their next BT Headset: the Jawbone Prime, which was released back in May of 2009.

Additionally, since most states have enacted some version of a “Hands-Free” law, owning a BT headset is actually becoming less of a want and more of a necessity, especially for those who accept cellphone calls while driving. This, coupled with the afore-mentioned discounted pricing now available, makes this is the perfect time to buy into this model and brand, with it’s uber-cool features.

Out of the three weeks that I wore this headset, it was mostly good times, but there were some frustrations that came packaged with the Headset. Most notable was the ongoing battle to keep the headset in my ear, which proved to be exceedingly frustrating. A distant second was the lack of a dedicated volume toggle switch, but this was minimized by overall good “automatic” balancing of the volume in general by Jawbone2 itself.
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Quick Review: SPB’s Quads

When you think of mobile gaming Windows Mobile tends not to be the platform that comes to mind. Indeed, 3D gaming on Windows Mobile does not tend to be much to write home about. But that doesn’t mean you can’t have a great gaming experience on Windows Mobile.

For the last week or so I have been playing SPB Software’s great new game called Quads and it is a great time waster. It’s a puzzle type game, much like Bejeweled, that has a nice interface, graphics and gaming concept.

The idea of the game is to eliminate the coloured squares on the screen by finding four squares of the same colour that form the corners of a parallelogram, also known as a Quad. Once you select these corner pieces the whole Quad disappears from your screen to be replaced with new squares. The larger your Quad, the more points you get.

There are also other items that will drop with the squares such as dynamite, nuclear bombs and others that will help you crank the score up even higher. These extras really add a nice edge to the game. Nothing like some explosions to hold my attention.

SPB Quads is playable in two modes; a never-ending type mode and a timed mode. Since this is just a time killer for me I prefer the never ending one. It’s too much pressure watching the timer on the timed mode. I’m so old.

For $10 this game is worth it. Well done SPB!

More screenshots here.

Free evaluation copy here.

Palm and Motorola Call it Quits on Windows Mobile

This past week word broken that both Palm and Motorola would stop using Windows Mobile on their handheld devices. That can’t be good news for Microsoft as they struggle to regain market and mind share as new mobile operating systems are moving in quickly. But is really all doom and gloom? Sure, it’s never good to lose customers to the competition, but did Palm and Moto really bring that much to Windows Mobile?

With all the handsets created by both Palm and Moto, only 1 device ever made Microsoft’s million plus sellers list – only 1. That device was Motorola’s Q, a ground breaking device for its time, even if it had a hard time making it through a day on a charge. Just like the RAZR, Moto has tried to recapture their success with similar styled follow-up devices without much luck.

As for Palm, their users a very loyal and typically love their handhelds. However, Palm was never able to get their popular Treo handsets into the million plus sellers club. It’s no surprise that once Palm was able to release their new, long awaited follow-up to the Palm OS, dubbed the WebOS that they would toss in the towel on Windows Mobile. The new Palm Pre running the WebOS is getting mediocre reviews on the street, but Palm.afford to continue working with 2 mobile operating systems. They need to curb the cash flow and cutting the mobile license fee that Microsoft asking for Windows Mobile is one sure fire way to save a little money in the short term. Can they last purely on their WebOS? We’ll have to wait and see on that one.

For me, I’m more looking forward to what Samsung, HTC, HP, etc… are going to release next, and what LG is going to bring to the table when they get their first devices out of the gate later this year.

A sneak-peek at the upcoming GPS Tuner Atlas

A new version of GPS Tuner 6 is going through the beta test process (the public beta of which ends Monday), and the Regular Build released in a few days after that.

The new version of the program will be renamed GPS Tuner Atlas, so as to differentiate it from the previous version.

The new version will be a free update to existing users of GPS Tuner 6, so those users have good reason to rejoice, because this program is soooo much better than the previous version.

GPS Tuner Atlas should remedy most every bug that prevented users from making full use of the initial program, and also make it compatible with older devices that did not support the Direct 3DMobile API that the original program was written for.

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Microsoft Launches the Zune HD

This past week Microsoft launched their latest version of their Zune music player, the Zune HD. One of the great new additions is a slick looking OLED screen. The Zune HD is a flash based player available in 16 and 32 GB storage sizes. If you’re planning to order from Amazon or pick one up at your local Best buy, then you have 2 choices -the 32GB version sports a Platinum finish while the 16GB version has a black finish. If you head over to Zune Originals, you can pick out a Zune HD 32GB in Blue, Green, Red, and Platinum. The 16GB is still just available in black.

For now, if you live outside of the US, you’re out of luck is you want one of these. Microsoft has said that the Zune HD is for US release. Fingers crossed that the rest of the world will be able to enjoy the Zune HD in short order.

Joel Evans from Geek.com had some problems trying to get his hands on a Zune HD on launch day. Sadly it wasn’t due to large line-ups and demand. It was more related to the staff at Best Buy not knowing anything about the product or that they even had a new Zune to sell. That’s not a good story for Microsoft.

Initial sales issues aside, there are number of reviews and first impression posts popping up across the internet. Here’s some you might want to check out:

Zune HD First Impressions – GotZune

Zune HD Hardware Deep Dive – Zune Thoughts

Zune HD Disassembly – Anything But iPod

Zune HD: Unboxing and Quick First Look – Just Another Mobile Monday

Microsoft Zune HD First Unbox Impressions – Mobility Minded

Zune HD Review – Engadget

The end of the Road for i-mate

Earlier this year, i-mate laid off all of their US staff, and as of a couple days ago they have notified the remaining staff that they would be taking an indefinite unpaid leave. That can’t be a good sign. i-mate busted onto the scene in early 2003 with a rebranded version of HTC’s Tanager.  They spent the next 3 years selling rebranded versions of HTC’s devices. Since the relationship between i-mate and HTC fell apart in 2006, i-mate has struggled to design and manufacture quality smartphone devices. Their most recent device was set to go on sale in August but never shipped to partners. According to ITP.net, the Dubai office is locked and calls to the company are not being answered.

While I’m not really surprised to hear this news, it does make me a little sad that one of Microsoft’s original partners in the mobile space is no longer able to operate.  It’s clear that they made some poor decisions and the breakup with HTC didn’t work out as nicely as it should have. Ultimately, i-mate was the primary source of many of my devices in the early days.  They were known for getting devices out the door quickly while still offering quality products.  They didn’t have the extra time spent dealing with carriers requirements and customizations. So they could get the phones out and in your hands faster.

In recent years it’s been pretty hard to get your hands on an i-mate device in North America. If you did manage to get your hands on a device, you ended up paying a pretty hefty premium for it. Carrier branded devices became significantly cheaper to own – even if you bought the phone outright.

Goodbye i-mate.

Removing Application Lock on Windows Mobile Standard Devices

Now that we know about Application Lock and the general principles behind it, we need to look at how to remove it from our phone so that you can install any application and make more customizations to your device.

Using an XML Provisioning file, you can load and change a number of settings, more commonly referred to as Configuration Service Providers, on your Windows Mobile device. You can find a really good list of the different Configuration Service Providers that can be changed here on MSDN. Depending on the configuration service you want to set, there are different delivery options available to use. When it comes to Application Lock, we’re interested in 4 specific settings.

Security Policy 4102 – This policy decides if the device can run unsigned applications. A value of zero (0) means that it’s locked and that no 3rd party signed applications, like Mobile2Market will be allowed. A value of one (1) means that the setting is unlocked and that 3rd party signed applications should be allowed to run. This policy is related to the following registry location: HKLM\Security\Policies\Policies\00001006. We need to set this to the unlocked state of 1.

Security Policy 4122 – This policy determines if a user should be prompted when an unsigned application attempts to run. The settings are reverse of 4102. A value of zero (0) means that there are no prompts. A value of one (1) means that the security is turned on and that you will be prompted when a unsigned application attempts to run. This policy is related to the following registry location: HKLM\Security\Policies\Policies\0000101a. We need to set this value to the unlocked state of 1. However, that means that we will be prompted when unsigned applications attempt to run.

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Build Quality Issues with HTC Touch Pro 2

It looks like HTC might be running into some build quality issues with the Touch Pro 2. Forum member MightyMike over at PPCGeeks has posted some pictures showing the battery door starting to bulge out on the sides of his Telus Touch Pro 2. If you look carefully, you can make out where the battery door is not sitting right. It’s hard to see in the pictures, but it is much more noticeable in person. This isn’t a “one-off” either, 2 of my co-workers are running the Touch Pro 2 and have noticed this very issue on their devices. It’s not clear if this is a heat related problem, or if it has something to do with wear and tear on the device. Mind you, wear and tear shouldn’t be something to be concerned about on such a new device. It almost looks like a heat related problem, but the phone doesn’t tend to get very warm.

It’s also not clear which devices are experiencing this problem. All the devices in the office, as well as the one posted by MightyMike, are Telus branded. So it could be an issue limited to that particular model. We won’t know if AT&T’s version is affected by this until after it’s launched and people have had a chance to run with it for a little while.

Hopefully the fix for this won’t be anything too involved. Perhaps a simple replacement for the battery door is all that is required.

HTC Announces First Windows Mobile 6.5 Phone

We don’t normally post news items here at MobileJaw; we figure people are already inundated with repetitious news. However, since this is the first device announced to be available with Windows Mobile 6.5 I figured we can get away with it.

The HTC Touch2 is a relatively small Windows Phone that will indeed ship with Windows Mobile 6.5 onboard. It is meant to be a simple and affordable (I’m assuming here) device with fairly generic features. Those features include a 528MHz processor, 512MB ROM, 256MB RAM and a 3.2 megapixel camera.

The screen is a 2.8 inch touchscreen but is only QVGA. I guess that’s not surprising but compared to so many other devices it is a rather anemic resolution. I enjoyed using my HTC Touch (first gen) and was fine with the screen but now that I have been using the Touch Pro (VGA screen) it would be hard to go back to QVGA.

One of the nice things announced with this device is that it’s browser, an IE 6 variant that comes with Windows Mobile 6.5, will support flash. That should make for a decent browsing experience.

The HTC Touch2 seems like it will be targeted to the budget-conscious or first time Windows Mobile users. It looks nice, if fairly uninspiring and will probably be a nice low end smartphone.

You can read HTC’s press release here.