Something for you to read while I'm offline for a while....

On 11 April 2013 I'm finally getting some long needed surgery on my troublesome sinuses. Provided that everything goes according to plan, I'll be back home the same day...with a wad of dressings up my nose and possibly a black eye or two.

The reason I'm telling you this is because afterwards I'm going to take approx 10 days off and therefore won't be updating the site or responding to comments, messages or emails during this time.

Making decent quality voiceovers will be impossible until things heal up, so apologies to anyone who has sent me items to review - I'll get to these as soon as I can when I'm back up and running properly.

(UPDATE - Surgery was successful, but recovery is likely to take a while - next site update -  May 2013)

To give you something to do in the meantime... here is another in my occasional series of Trips Down Memory High-Street.

Below is a Christmas 1985 Catalogue from the UK High Street Electrical Retailer Laskys. Laskys was less common than Dixons (in more ways than one). Their product line was a bit more upmarket and aspirational, for example they sold HiFi separates where Dixons preferred ready assembled Mini Systems.

I remember the Laskys in Manchester's Arndale Centre as being a long dark cave filled with flashing LEDs and VU meters. When I started working in Manchester a couple of years after this 1985 catalogue was printed, I regularly visited their shops to lust over the CD Portable Boomboxes which would have cost me well over a month's wage at the time. This catalogue is interesting because it claims to feature the "Worlds First" portable Compact Disc Stereo, which cost £399, the CD555 from Philips.

Another very strong Laskys memory I have from around this time, probably the same shopping visit where I picked this very catalogue up, was seeing an demonstration of an Atari ST and its High Resolution SM124 Monochrome Monitor with the (at the time) impressive resolution of 640x400 at 71.2hz. It was the first time I'd seen a computer display that didn't flicker and looked to my eyes then, as sharp and white as a piece of paper.

Other things to look for in this catalogue are the Sony WMW800 Back-to-Back Tape-to-Tape Walkman, an Aiwa Personal Stereo with a wired Remote Control - something I remember being desperate to own, a Panasonic 'portable music system' with a slide out turntable, the last of the Disc cameras, a Casio B&W pocket TV, the Nintendo Donkey Kong 3 Micro Vs LCD Game, and the popular James Bond Musical Alarm LCD watch. CDs were already well established by the time this catalogue was printed with various players available, including a twin disc model and portables including the D50 from Sony.

The competition to win the Golf GTI has expired now so don't bother entering, I think the car has probably been scrapped by now too. The thought of getting the sum of £50 spending money for your free holiday made me smile.

Laskys was bought out by Comet in 1989, and the branches disappeared completely, but the name was resurrected in 2006 as an online retailer, which then disappeared when the Comet chain closed in December 2012.

The Belkin Ultimate Keyboard Case for iPad

It's not often that I get to try something before it's released - but Belkin gave me the opportunity to do just that when they sent me over a pre-production sample of their 'Ultimate Keyboard For iPad'. 

My two previous experiences with iPad keyboards had been less than satisfactory...but it seems like things have moved on in leaps and bounds since then. One of my main objections to using a physical keyboard with the iPad in the past was the constant need to revert back to touching the screen to do things like move the cursor or use cut and paste. Now I don't know whether Apple has revised the way that the iPad can interact with a bluetooth keyboard - or whether the previous keyboards I used were just particularly poor - but it transpires that functions like these can now be accessed directly from the keyboard itself. This makes a physical keyboard a much more attractive and useful proposition. I didn't demonstrate it in the video - but Command X, C, V also work for Cut, Copy and Paste and B, I and U operate Bold Italic and Underline as expected.

Now as this was a pre-production version I was advised that there were a couple of things that are being tidied up before release - the open to wake function has yet to be implemented and the rubber pads to protect the iPad are not the finished article. The case is due out in a few weeks and I can see it being very popular with people who like to travel light and type everywhere. 

I post these blog entries from a laptop - if I had to type them on an iPad screen it would be torture. The Belkin Ultimate Keyboard case would make jobs like this a breeze, even in the cramped conditions of an economy (coach) seat on an airplane. The price is right at the top end - but people who make their living from typing will appreciate the true value of a quality product like this.

One thing I didn't mention in the video was it's weight, it's probably lighter than my normal iPad case - according to the Belkin website it's just 17 ounces or 481 grams.

More information is available from Belkin themselves - links below

Belkin US

Belkin UK

Blackvue DR500GW-HD WiFi GPS Car Camera

Most people will have heard of Sony, Samsung or Panasonic but the names of dashcam manufactures are less familiar. One of the biggest name in car cameras at the moment is the Blackvue range, from the Korean company Pittasoft. I was very happy then when they got in touch and asked me to review their latest and greatest model, the DR500GW-HD.

This is a fully featured, highly specified, yet easy to use device which warranted a very complicated review. With the built in GPS, WiFi and supplied software there was so many things to demonstrate that I that I ended up creating what is possibly one of my most detailed (and quite probably long winded) videos yet.

Normally once I complete a review of a car camera I immediately remove the mount from the car so I can move on to the next one... but with this one I've left it in place. That's because I hope to be able to revisit this one again if a firmware update is released which resolves the issues I experienced during my week of testing.

This specification of camera commands a premium price (£250-£300) and the best place to obtain one appears to be eBay.

I have uploaded a zip file containing original 1080p & 720p clips here.

Update - Thanks to Stefan Leone in the youtube comments for providing the fix for the GPS mislocation bug. This is resolved by downloading the latest V1.001 of the Player software from the Blackvue website here.

The DR32 Dashcam - A Full HD car camera from the team behind the 808#11 & 808 #18

From the comments I receive it’s clear that many people are under the false belief that all the different 808 key ring cameras are made by a single manufacturer. 

 

The reality though is that there are a number of companies behind the various iterations. The company responsible for two of the better models, the 808#11 and the 808 #18 recently got in touch to ask me if I’d like to test out their new car camera. Co-incidentally this was a camera that I was just about to order myself, so I asked them to send it over.

 

For brand recognition purposes they want me to refer to this model as the 808 #18 DR32 Car Camera – which is a bit of a mouthful.

 

This is a low to mid-priced camera, with a performance that exceeds many considerably more expensive models. The price will fluctuate depending on the  international exchange rate and where you are shipping the camera to - so I would suggest clicking on one of the seller links (provided by the manufacturer) below to get the latest price (look for DR32 listed in each store's inventory on the left hand side).

 

powerdigital898   power-gps   beetleonline   eletech086   hxelepro360   internet-shop365

I’ve also put a few UNTOUCHED DOWNLOADABLE CLIPS HERE to enable you to see the true quality of the original video without  the artefacts generated during the youtube encoding process. 

I didn't go into any detail about playing clips back through the camera either on screen or via an HDMI lead in the video, so I'll cover this information here. AV out via phonos or HDMI both work in the same manner. They allow you to display the clips you've recorded earlier on your TV screen. There is no live viewfinder streaming or display of the setup screens.  When playing clips you can skip forward or back, play and pause and it continuously plays subsequent files. When playing back through the camera itself the sound on the built in speaker is nice and clear. 

 

By the way, since I've now got a line into an HD keyring camera manufacturer I've reiterated my desire for a budget HD action camera the size and shape of the ACT20 combined with the h.264 video quality from the key ring cameras. They say they will look into making this happen, so watch this space.....

Update - 28 March 2013 Answering a few questions and comments.

The manufacturer has been in touch. In response to comments left here and on youtube they will develop a new firmware that has an option to flip the video. They are also looking for different more compact mounting options. They also advise that setting the brightness level manually (e.g. to +1) should resolve the low-light brightness fluctuation issue.

Someone wanted to know the weight of the camera - it is 70g - you can see the specs on the side of the box 46 seconds into the video.  

I mentioned this already above - but to reiterate... the AV out does not display a live viewfinder, it is only for playback.

720p modes have a narrower field of view than the 1080p mode. The 720p60 mode is a true 60 frames per second with no dropped or duplicated frames.

Pressing the Keep Button just locks the current file - not the previous one or the next one. As I've mentioned many times now - a 32GB card will hold over 5 hours of 1080p footage. The oldest files on the card only get deleted one by one when the card is full. Some people seem concerned that they will lose recordings of events. You will….but only after 5 hours of driving. If there is something amazing that you want to keep on the card, you would have to be incredibly daft to lose it with a five hour notice that it's going to be deleted. If you do still lose a clip despite having those five hours to do something to stop it being wiped (e.g. swap the memory card out or stop recording) then frankly, you deserve to. 

Finally - Yes the camera auto-starts when it receives power and stops when the power is disconnected, that's the feature that differentiates car cameras from other types of cameras. All car cameras have this feature. 

BIG NEWS...Small Mount! (Update 30 March 2013).

Here are the pictures of the new smaller mount that will be supplied with the cameras - some of the retailers are already showing this with the camera - others will no doubt follow shortly. You really have to say that things move quickly with these guys. 

They are also now selling the camera with a bike mount and external battery. Bear in mind that the camera isn't waterproof  but the video quality this camera produces is so high that you can understand the attraction of using this camera for different activities. 

 Lets hope we see the internals from this camera used in a number of different form factors in the future.

The work on a new firmware with the video-flip option also continues. 

By the way, the manfacturer of this camera is a company called Hetai. Their website is HTInter.com

Zoogue - Case Prodigy - The best iPad case (again).

It's been a few months since I hung up my iPad case reviewing hat. I stopped reviewing cases after I'd bought the ZooGue Case Genius because I decided that this was the ideal iPad case for me. However when ZooGue contacted me recently asking if I'd like to take a look at their new latest top of the range iPad case - the 'Case Prodigy' I couldn't resist. If ZooGue believe that they have made a case that improves upon their Case Genius - then I want to see it (and more importantly I want to use it myself). The easiest place for me to link to for more info and a purchasing links is probably ZooGue themselves.

Here's the video.  

The A8 Car DVR - Another 'smallest' Car cam.

After reviewing the faulty Smallest Car DVR and still coming away impressed with it's design and night-time performance I thought I should see if I could get a fully working version of the newer h.264 model in to test. So I ordered another one and here it is. 

 I didn't do a exhaustive review this time as some of the info was covered in the previous video - I would recommend you watch both reviews as the cameras perform quite differently from each other. This new one records using an h.264 codec in a .avi container (not the .mov format mentioned on the box).  

Given the number of different variations of this model I've provided a link to the auction from where I bought mine - HERE IT IS 

 If you want the older mjpeg one I reviewed previously, you'll have to do a bit of a search yourself - THIS LINK will point you in the right direction. The main visible difference between the two cameras is the absence of a Mute slider switch on the old model. Assuming the seller is using accurate pictures - then you'll need to check the specs to ensure the camera is 720p as there are some 640x480 versions available too.

The New Video Intro - why, what and how.

I know that some people dislike the idea of intros on videos - but I think they can be useful. Beyond the obvious branding function, they give the viewer time to adjust the volume, set the resolution and make the video full-screen. The best intros are also entertaining - like the Luxo Jr animation at the start of the Pixar Movies

My new intro is 12 seconds long and utilises a mechanically created persistence-of-vision effect. I've had this idea in my head for a few months now. To achieve it, I purchased an old mid 1970s reel to reel tape player off ebay (a Philips N4414 which I'll continue to use after this video). The message is displayed using a bike wheel led message display (also bought from ebay - which worked just long enough to make this). My computer no longer recognises the USB component - so no new messages for me.

Because the low-light conditions played havoc with the focus on my Sony HX-100V I ended up shooting this with the Sony HDR-AS15 action camera due to it's fixed focus and excellent low light capabilities. I used it in the AKA-LU1 case so I could use it's tripod mount as well as the LCD screen to accurately frame the shot.

The sound was created by layering tracks up in Garageband on my Macbook until it sounded right to me - I'm not a musician but I wanted a swell and then a tail-off with a bed to talk over.

The overall feeling I am attempting to convey is about having fun with gadgets to achieve interesting and entertaining results. 

If  you are old enough to remember late 70s or early 80s UK children's TV - I was very influenced by contraptions created by Wilf Lunn's appearances on 'Vision On' or the contestants on 'The Great Egg Race'. 

I may have more to come regarding reel to reel recorders because I've become obsessed with them for some bizarre reason.