Wi-Fi
Faster wireless
US Robotics is offering consumers a wireless networking system that it claims is capable of delivering the fastest data transfer speeds available. With its proprietary Accelerator technology, the company says its equipment ramps up speeds of the 802.11g standard from 56mbps to 100mbps. Most domestic wireless systems in the UK adhere to the 802.11b standard and run at 11mbps. The system, due in July, has a £100 wireless access point and router, and either a PC Card or PCI adapter to connect the computer to the network, both of which retail for £60.
The company claims the extra speed increases efficiency for multi-PC networks, while enabling consumers to stream Mpeg2 (DVD-standard) video between PCs.
www.usr.com
Wi-Fi trains
One day soon, passengers on Britain's rail networks will be able to use their laptop to connect to a Wi-Fi network to access the internet and collect and send email. That's the view of Graham Wilde of research group BWCS, who told the Wireless LAN conference in London's Olympia exhibition centre last week that many of the country's rail operators were already trialling Wi-Fi systems. Wilde added though, that companies first had to overcome the substantial hurdle of working out the best way to connect the network to the internet. Satellite, GPRS, 802.11b, or even a mixture of the technologies are all under consideration.
Movable bytes
Not enough storage space on your PDA for all your favourite files? Toshiba may have the answer. It is apparently considering a UK launch for its innovative Hopbit gadget. The Hopbit is a small 5GB hard-disk storage device designed to connect wirelessly via Bluetooth to a PDA. Hopbit owners can then access their library of MP3 music, photo or video files on their handheld device. Toshiba claims it can function for six hours before its Lithium Ion battery runs out of power. Toshiba will have to move fast. Other manufacturers are working on similar devices. www.toshiba.co.uk
Mobile phones
Casio phone
The quality of camera phones continues to improve, alas not in the UK, but in Japan. There Casio has been parading the first ever 1.24 megapixel phone, which takes much larger and higher resolution images than its UK equivalents. Due to be launched next month, the A5401CA phone also boasts an impressive array of photographic features, including the first- ever panoramic shot mode on a camera phone. The phone also boasts 16MB of memory - much more than UK phones - to enable the user to store up to 80 pictures.
Consumer
48-hour DVDs
Buena Vista Home Entertainment, a division of Disney, is introducing DVDs that will not play after 48 hours, allowing film rentals without returns. The EZ-D discs, made by US firm Flexplay, stop working by disrupting the laser beams used to read DVDs, and can be recycled after use. The 48-hour period is triggered when the disc is exposed to air. Buena Vista plans to introduce the discs in the US in August, with Spike Lee's latest film 25th Hour as one of the first titles. There are no plans yet to extend the technology to Europe. www.flexplay.com
Home Office truths
The Home Office consultations on retention of, and government access to, communications data close next Tuesday. Communications data includes the name and address of phone and email subscribers, the data on phone bills and in the headers of emails, even the locations of mobile phone users. Privacy International recently used official figures to estimate that government agencies access details on 100m phone calls, along with subscriber data on one million people, every year. The Home Office says it welcomes your comments, emailed to commsdata@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
Computer museum
If computers bearing names such as Acorn, Sinclair, Atari and Amstrad bring nostalgic tears to your eyes, then it is time to head for Swindon where a History of Home Computing exhibition opens tomorrow at the Museum of Computing. Star of the show is a rare 1978 Science of Cambridge Mark 14 designed by (Sir) Clive Sinclair boasting 256 bytes of RAM resembling a large circuit board. It started Sir Clive on a road which led him, briefly, to dominate the home computer market selling more computers (by units) than anyone else. Sadly, most of the early pioneering computers are with us no longer. But that's another bit of history. For details, see www.digitalhistory.org.uk
Broadband
Balloonacy
According to a York-based company, the answer to providing broadband to the UK's rural communities is up in the air. Eschewing the traditional route of digging up roads and laying cable, SkyLinc is suggesting that remote areas such as the Scottish Highlands could get online via a series of tethered floating balloons equipped with base stations hovering 1.5km above the ground. The company reckons that 18 balloons would be enough to deliver broadband coverage for the whole of the UK. Users access the broadband signals via a satellite dish. SkyLinc adds that a key advantage its system has over its rivals is the service's download and upload speeds of 2mbps. While terrestrial broadband providers can match those download speeds, their upload speeds are much slower. The company's first broadband balloon is to launch outside the UK in the next 12 months. SkyLinc has already secured moorings for two balloons in Yorkshire and is in talks with UK-based ISPs. www.skylinc.co.uk
Making movies in front of your eyes
It might look like a pair of rather flash sunglasses, but the Eyetop, due to be launched in the next few weeks, is in fact a hi-tech viewing device. Integrated within the lens is an LCD screen that when connected to a PDA, laptop or DVD player, delivers an image much larger than the one on the device's screen.
The glasses, or miniature monocular eyewear display, as the company calls it, connects by a wire to a belt-worn control unit. This in turn hooks up to the device via its composite video connection. As the Eyetop has a 16-degree diagonal field of view, users can wear their Eyetop all the time without it interfering with their field of vision. It has a QVGA 320x240 resolution with 65,535 colours but movie fans should note that the screen format is 4x3 not widescreen. The Eyetop, which is battery operated and compatible with PAL (European) TV systems, will be on sale via the company's website and retail for $600.
www.eyetop.net
