There’s been a good amount of talk lately about what will be included in the iPhone 5. Just as much talk about that has been going on as there has about whether the iPhone 5 is even going to be released this year. Based on Apple’s other iPhone releases, it will. One of the most talked about features is near field communications or NFC.
What is NFC you ask? Well it’s actually a pretty cool way for radios to communicate with each other with electromagnetic fields. Since these fields have some energy they can transmit they can wake up another NFC radio just by being next to it. Pretty cool eh? The radio doing the transmitting is said to be the active and the other is the passive radio. Both can be active but I think the active/passive model is the cooler one because it means one of the devices can run with lower power.
Great, one radio can wake another radio up. Why do I care about that you might ask. Well, ever since phones started to do more than make calls people have been using the term “convergence device” to describe them. Meaning that many every day functions done with different devices or on paper have converged on the phone. Calendar, contacts, calculator, radio…you get the idea. This is just another step in that direction. Some uses that have been prototyped are payment systems, social networking applications, medical monitoring devices, electronic ticketing, and more. Imagine checking in at the airport and checking in by just waiving your phone over the kiosk, AMEN!
The jury is still out on whether NFC will be included in the iPhone5 and only time will tell. However there are some devices that already have it. Unfortunately until there’s a big push of implementations of payment systems, kiosks, or ANYTHING it’s basically vaporware.
Hopefully we’ll see some cool stuff soon tho! What cool ideas have you seen for NFC?
Well we’ve seen iPod to iPhone hacks before. Here’s a much more “refined” one posted up at lifehacker. This hilarious bug eyed looking case is strangely well designed. No not designed as in something you buy, designed as in something you make. That’s right. This iPod mod uses the iPods own packaging.
Today Apple announced that they’d be releasing an update for it’s operating system iOS4. The update is said to fix an incorrect equation used for calculating and showing signal strength. The fix is to be released in “a few weeks”. The update also contains a change to make the first few bars of the signal strength indicator taller and consequently easier to see.. (more…)
I just wanted to do a quick hit on my upgrade experience for my iPhone 3gs.
I came home for lunch today so I could do my upgrade. I hit up iTunes PRAYING that I wouldn’t get queued up for download like last time. Also in my prayers was that after going through the trouble of downloading that I wouldn’t get the dreaded “cannot contact activation server” error.
On May 14th Google announced that the Nexus One will soon not be available for purchase via Google.
In a post on the Google blog they basically said oops, although Android has done better than we thought, we realize now that people like to play with phones when they’re buying them. (more…)
Gizmodo may have the scoop of the year with their story today on the possible iPhone 4.0 prototype that was found in a bar. Where else would it be found?
This week’s app is called Chalkboard Stunts and it’s done by Manta Research. I’d sum this game up as excite bike on a chalk board with a truck. Except you can’t build your own courses. Aside from that it’s a fun little app from the company who’s also done other games like Cubes, Cubix, AppSniper, and Virus.
The objective of the game is to navigate your truck through various obstacles using the controls provided. Four onscreen buttons allow you to go forward or backward and also rotate your truck clockwise and counter clockwise in case you get flipped over.
Sprint has announced that this summer it will be releasing the HTC Evo, a 4G Android phone. It seems like people have given up on an “iPhone killer” but this is quite a powerful phone. (more…)
Nexus One(TM) is planned for the Sprint Mobile Broadband Network with twice the network coverage of AT&T and ten times the network coverage of T-Mobile, both by square miles; Expands Sprint’s Android(TM) portfolio
OVERLAND PARK, Kan., Mar 17, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Nexus One, the first wireless phone sold through Google(TM)’s web store, is planned for Sprint’s 3G Mobile Broadband Network. Sprint (NYSE:S) will announce pricing and an exact availability date soon. Nexus One will benefit from Sprint’s 3G network with twice the coverage of AT&T and 10 times the coverage of T-Mobile, both based on square miles.(1) (more…)
AMD (NYSE: AMD) today announced professional graphics users can access several new ATI FirePro™ graphics driver features designed to accelerate application performance and enhance reliability. Available for download, version 8.702 of the ATI FirePro™ graphics driver incorporates tremendous application tuning efforts, resulting in significant performance improvements − more than 20 percent –for Dassault Systèmes CATIA, Autodesk® 3ds Max® and PTC® ProENGINEER® users, for example1. (more…)
