Review: New Hotmail reaches Australia
After reading reports that only 1% of Microsoft customers had received the updated hotmail, I was ready to wait a number of months before getting access to the updated Windows Live Hotmail UI. Much to my surprise, this morning I logged into hotmail and I know have the new version.
If you’ve been waiting anxiously for the update, it may be time to check your Hotmail.
Rules !!
Borrowing from Outlook, Microsoft have finally added Rules to Hotmail. This allows users to route email to specific folders based on user-selected parameters. This feature alone will mean most home users no longer need Outlook or even Live Mail. A couple of nice inclusions are Mobile alerts (needs configuring) and flagging.
Sweep
Another new feature in the new Hotmail is Sweep, this allows for bulk control of email. Designed to save you time when organising lots of email at once.
Filters
At the top of your inbox now, there’s a number of filters available. Selecting any of them will instantly filter your inbox to only display mail that meets the selected criteria. Something like Social updates for example only shows email from Services Like Windows Live or Facebook.
Integrated Messenger
This feature really makes a lot of sense, when you think about the crossover between the people you email and the people you IM. While these people may not be exactly the same, a typical workflow may involve receiving an email from a contact, then seeing their presence set to online, then you can follow up the email via an instant message conversation. 
New Message
There’s a new simplified compose email toolbar, allowing for easy insertion of your standard Attachments and Photos, but the new addition is the ‘From Bing’ option. The screen shot below shows the images search Images pane on the right, but what’s surprising is the lack of integration from your Windows Live Photos, this should really be a source to select from the Photos drop down.
Active View
One of my favourite new features is Active View, allowing for content like images and video to viewed right within the email. Clicking on content launches a lightbox-type window allowing for video playback or a pretty slick image slideshow.
Overall the Windows Live team has done some great work here, adding features that show an understanding of how real-world people use email today. If you don’t have the New Windows Live Hotmail, there’s nothing you can really do to speed up the process, Microsoft is slowly rolling it out across all users.
More @ WindowsLive
Review: Microsoft Office 2010
While today marks the consumer launch of Microsoft Office 2010 in Australia, I got a chance to take a look at the professional edition so here’s the review.
First of all lets cover what’s included, there is new versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Publisher and Access. It’s important to not the lack of InfoPath and remember Visio and Project are not included in the Office suite, but are still branded as Office products.
Chances are if your a business, it’s a good bet that your already running Microsoft Office, so the question really becomes should you upgrade. One of the most important influencers for the upgrade decision is the ‘what’s new’ list, so lets cover that now.
Backstage view – New to 2010 is the replacement for the file menu. The Backstage view gives you all the common tasks you would perform in one simply full screen view. Filling the application window, Backstage lets you create new documents based on new documents from templates, send or save your file or review your available print options. It actually works quite well, but will take some time for consumers to adjust.
The Ribbon – First introduced in some Office 2007 office apps, the successful ribbon is now refined and standard across all Office apps.
Jump Lists – All Office 2010 apps support Windows 7 Jump Lists, allowing convenient access to your recently used documents which can be pinned for easy access.
Templates – Basically every new version of office includes new themes, so this is nothing new, however there are some fairly good ones on offer, so don’t start from scratch, find a template and modify from there to save time.
Word 2010
Microsoft Word is arguably the most used application in the Office suite, so there should be key changes to improve productivity gains in Word 2010.. so is this the case ?
Text effects – this include the ability to add text effects directly to text, this previously required you to insert word art with some pretty average results.
Embedded search – Gone is the very dated popup search box, searching through a document now produces a search panel on the left, finding all references to your search term throughout the document, allowing you to easily skip between results.
Excel 2010
Sparklines – These are tiny charts that fit in the space of a single cell, this allows for a visual summary of trends alongside data.
64-bit – Excel is commonly used to store large amounts of data (sometimes this data really should be in a database). Excel 2010 can now take advantage of multithreading improvements to speed up the retrieving, sorting, and filtering data.
PowerPoint 2010
Transitions and animations – these have really taken a big step forward in this version. Now available is a long list of interesting, more professional transitions, as well as a slew of pre-built and custom animations for objects within your presentation.
Broadcast Slide Show – If you need to show off your presentation remotely, then the new Boadcast Slide Show feature will be an important feature for you and your business. Previously you may have had to resort to a 3rd party remote desktop solution at a decent cost to achieve this functionality. From the Slide Show tab, just hit Broadcast Slideshow, it’ll be uploaded (may require a LiveID), and then you receive a URL to send to remote viewers. Transitions sadly don’t make it over the wires, but animations are preserved.
Video – The fact is video and PowerPoint have never really worked well together, in this release that changes. Inserting a video is now a menial task which also comes along with effects and basic editing controls. It’s also easy to compress video to save on file size, so no need for standard users to learn about transcoding. If you find a video online you’d like to including in your presentation, Outlook 2010 makes it easy to paste in the embed code (note: some video effects won’t work on embedded video).
Mobile - One of the most unique features built into PowerPoint 2010 is the ability to use PowerPoint Mobile to control your presentation from your Windows Mobile phone. This feature does however require an add-in called Presentation Companion, this should be included out of the box. Hopefully this is also supported by Windows Phone 7 that ships later this year.
OneNote 2010
Taking notes is not just for students, professionals can also take advantage of taking notes, sketching ideas or flushing out concepts in OneNote 2010.
Linked Notes – If you’ve ever wanted to make notes about a document, but not actually include said notes within the document itself, then the new Linked Notes feature is for you. This would be great for making notes while proofreading, editing or reviewing a document. These are location aware, so when you make a note, it links to the location in the document you were in when creating it.
Outlook 2010
Social connector – This feature connects Outlook to your social and business networks, this allows easy access to more information about the person contacting you. See their recent activity on social networks, previous emails from the contact, attached files, IMs and connections. Currently the Outlook Social Connector only supports Linked In and MySpace but Facebook and Windows Live support is coming soon. Also it’s important to remember social connectors are only 32-bit, which means 64-bit users are out of luck.
Quick steps – These are designed to be a one click solution to common tasks in outlook such as marking an item as done, moving mail to a specific folder. Users can create custom Quick Steps to suit their workflow needs.
Publisher 2010
See through paper – Paper isn’t fully opaque, it’s slightly transparent, which means you’ll likely see some of the content on the page underneath when your document is printed. Publisher 2010 recognises this through a new backlight feature.
Access 2010
Expression Builder – This allows you to automate complicated database expressions easily, without writing code.
Application Parts – Databases can now be built in a modular fashion with pre-built Access components. These can be added to the database with a few simply clicks. New templates from Office.com also help get you up and running quickly.
Improved Forms and Reports – UI improvements are plentiful in Access 2010, particularly when it comes to forms and reports.
Price & Availability
Microsoft Office Professional 2010 costs A$849.00 if you buy through Microsoft’s online store. If you look around you can find it at places like CitySoftware for A$683.00. Another way to buy is to purchase a Product Key Card and download it yourself, using this method, it’ll set you back A$499.
Overall
If your still on 2003 it’s a no brainer, it’s time to upgrade. If your on Office 2007, then the ribbon standardisation is a much needed inclusion and backstage is nice addition, but its hard to point to many ‘must have’ new features for Office 2010.
While Microsoft will try and tell you Office 2010 is more collaborative than ever before, the reality is there’s a long way to go. Having multiple people work on a single document in reality is just 1 person working on a document and pushing changes to a central location (SkyDrive or SharePoint). There’s now live updating, nor is there chatting or conversation support while co-editing.
Update
It seems there is a way to chat to colleagues whilst editing.. it just requires Office Communicator 2007 R2. 
More @ Microsoft Office
Review: Virgin Mobile Wi-Fi Modem
In today’s technology driven world, a lot of our devices support Wi-Fi. While most of our homes have Wi-Fi these days, stepping outside is a whole other world.
Laptops, netbooks and most recently iPads are all devices that would benefit from being always connected. The good news is there are options available to make that happen. Not a new market, but one that’s certainly emerging is the portable Wi-Fi hotspots. Very few phones on the market today have hotspot functionality so other options are needed until this becomes the norm.
The pocket sized Virgin Mobile Wi-Fi Modem is one such solution. Containing a sim card that connects to the Virgin / Optus 3G network, the device emits a short range (up to 15m) Wi-Fi network allowing up to 3 devices to get online simultaneously.
Remember that the speeds will vary based on Virgin network coverage and the number of users downloading data. The device charges via a USB cable, but other that really should be the only time you need to connect it. A number of other Wi-Fi modems come in the form of a USB dongle. This is a pretty ugly solution and specifically won’t work with Apple’s iPad.
Personally I like the concept of having a connected car. Given it’s size, it easily fits in the glovebox of your car allowing your passengers to go online for that extended road trip. You would need to charge from time to time, unless your lucky enough to have a USB port in your car.
As a test I took the Virgin Mobile Wi-Fi Modem and my Wi-Fi only iPad to the coffee shop. This solution worked great. As I mentioned earlier speeds do vary, the same as they do on your phone, but if the other option is to not be connected at all, I choose connected.
So how much does this always connected functionality cost ?
There’s two options available, Post-paid and Pre-paid.
If you were seriously considering this as a dedicated device for your iPad you may want to reconsider and get the 3G + Wifi iPad. There’s one good reason for this. The iPad data plans are much cheaper than devices like this for two good reasons. You can only use data from the iPad, not multiple devices like Wi-Fi modems. The second reason is the amount of potential data you could burn through on the iPad is relatively low.
Overall the Virgin Mobile Wi-Fi Modem work well as an ultra-portable hotspot to get you and your devices online.
Review: iPad accessories
![image_thumb[1]](file:///C:/Users/techAU/AppData/Local/Temp/WindowsLiveWriter1286139640/supfiles677B0A/image[4].png "image_thumb[1]")
Accessories
After owning your iPad for a while, you’ll start to open your mind to further possibilities and use cases for the device. One way to extend the functionality of the iPad is to look at accessories. Unfortunately Apple are notorious for charging an arm and leg for accessories, still, if you want the functionality, your left with little choice other than to fork over the cash.
I chose to get the Dock connector to VGA cable, the camera connection kit and the 10W USB power adapter.
iPad Dock Connector to VGA Adapter (A$39.00)
The VGA cable is designed to output the iPad content to a larger screen. I’ll be using it to control content on the 24” monitor in the background of the podcast. Unfortunately there’s no way to stream the entire iPad interface, output is only supported in specific applications. It works in Video, YouTube and Photos, but only when you run a slideshow, not while your browsing your library. TWiTPad supports video out for the stream, but doesn’t fill the screen with the chat window, it should. It’s really hit and miss, Joost for example doesn’t support VGA output at all. Also remember you’ll be left with the audio coming out of the iPad unless you run a 3.5mm cable out of the headphone port.
This accessory does not work with the iPhone.
Camera Connection Kit (A$39.00)
Featuring 2 dongles that hang unstylishly from the bottom of the iPad, you can connect your camera via USB, or remove the SD card from your camera and insert into the SD dongle. Importing supports both RAW+JPG file types, making it great for DSLR cameras. After importing some or all of the photos, you are prompted to choose whether photos should remain on the card or not. Importing photos actually had a pretty dramatic effect on performance of the iPad, so while you can use other apps while importing happens, you may not want to.
As an added bonus, the USB dongle of the Camera Connection kit supports USB headphones for listening to you favourite tunes. This actually works really well, so expect the iPad 2 to have a USB port built in.
This accessory does not work with the iPhone.
10W USB Power Adapter (A$39.00)
One of the biggest annoyances with the iPad is it’s sporadic charging behaviour. When you connect your iPad to your computer via USB, you’ll find that some ports will have enough power to charge the iPad while the screen is on, when others will not. If you turn the screen off, the 5Ws for most USB ports is enough to charge the device, slowly. With the 10W Power adapter, you can plug your iPad into mains power and have it charge, while in use. This is incredibly valuable when running the iPad as a supplementary display or long-term digital photo frame. The battery is great in the iPad, but it won’t last days.. this solution will.
More info @ Apple
Review: The Australian iPad app. The future of newspapers ?
Check out this video walkthrough of The Australian Newspaper’s iPad application, just launched in the App Store. It costs A$4.99 per month, have a look if it’s worth the cash.
Review: Apple iPad 6 weeks in
This article originally appeared as a guest post on iTechReport titled ‘Thoughts on the iPad’ but sadly they have recently shut down. I’ve decided to repurpose the post as a updated review of the iPad.
My experiences are detailed after spending around 6 weeks with the 16GB Wi-Fi version of the iPad.
The iPad is a very interesting device, allowing people to consume and create content in a new way – direct multiple-touch input. The iPad is supposed to be a ‘new category’ however in my experience, it’s replaced 90% of the things I use a laptop for.
Whether it’s flipping between IM, Facebook and Twitter on the couch while watching TV, or taking notes in a meeting, there’s a mountain of reasons to love the iPad.
Touchscreen
The iPads 9.7" inch multi-touch screen produces amazing viewing angles and responsiveness. I’m not going to lie, fingerprints are an issue, something that can be overcome by increasing brightness, but that’ll hurt battery life. The lowest brightness setting in my opinion is still too bright for viewing comfortably in a dark room.
Many people feared just how useable an on-screen keyboard would be. In my experience, the answer is very! In landscape mode I can actually touch-type on the device with a fairly high rate of accuracy. The only downside is Apple’s crazy auto-correct, which helps 95% of the time, but will leave u wanting to throw the iPad the other 5%.
A travellers new best friend
I found travelling with the iPad a great experience. While travelling around the US I spent a number of hours in the bus between cities. The iPad really helped fill in the time, playing games, browsing photos or writing posts, it worked great. Then there was the 14 hour flight home from San Francisco to Sydney, I can’t speak highly enough of a device that gets the battery life of the iPad. I spent the trip using the iPad for around 7 hours, sleeping for 4 hours and watched a movie for 2.5 hrs. My only wish is that transport of the future all has Wi-Fi.
Then there’s things like cars, trains and trams. I’ve tested the iPad in cars and can confirm it works great, your probably going to want a case with stand though. I find typing on the landscape keyboard fast and can be pretty accurate, even in bumpy conditions.
Usable by all ages
I’ve been amazed to watch how people from all walks of life use the device when touching it for the first time. From my very non-tech-savvy 61yo father, to my gorgeous 2yo niece, to complete strangers enquiring about the device, they all "get it" almost instantly. With essentially no instruction most users can successfully navigate around the device. That’s amazing, when considering the complexities typically associated with an online device.
There are some apps that use a non-standard UI, these could benefit from a help guide to smooth the learning curve. Also Apple user interface guidelines seem to be ignored in a lot of cases to applications detriment.
Reading
One of the key uses for the iPad is reading, on a device that’s around the size of an A4 page. I’ve not noticed any eye strain from reading or using the device, even for extended periods of time. The iPad is however 2 heavy to hold comfortably for long periods of time, especially single handed.
Apps
Due to the limited applications that come on the device, the iPad lives and dies by 3rd party apps. To be frank, right now the app selection is kind of limited. Most categories have a decent number to choose from, but the quality of the iPad apps varies, a lot. It’s been said many times before, competition drives innovation and were simply not far enough into the development cycle for serious competition to emerge to drive that innovation.
Naturally some apps are strong out of the gate, but I’m talking across the board. Maybe we’ve just been spoilt with the 2 years of iPhone app development.
Right now the standout 3rd apps are for me are Scrabble, Pinball HD, Epicurious and Air Hockey. These each offer a unique experience unavailable anywhere else.
Naturally the photo app from Apple is awesome, but the calendar leaves a lot to be desired. Im also puzzled as to why we haven’t yet seen additional apps like Remote for the iPad from Apple, and an Apple TV remote, you’d think these could be a selling point for the device.
Flash
Adobe and Apple’s longstanding, now very public feud over Flash on Apple’s mobile products simply hurts consumers. Regardless of the arguments offered from each side, when you come across flash content and you can’t view it, it really breaks the experience. There’s been times where I’ve had to fire up my laptop just to view that one piece of content, this leaves me wondering why I don’t just use the laptop in the first place. Then of course I remember the noise, heat and weight of a laptop.
So while it may be fine to say you don’t need flash when your browsing casually, when your actually trying to get work done and you can’t reach the content you need to, its a serious problem.
If flash doesn’t run well, I would have much rather Apple worked with Adobe to ensure that it does, rather than simply saying no. Like I said, this just hurts consumers. Apple’s claim that the iPad is the best way to experience the web, isn’t true for this one single reason.
Overall
Personally I love the iPad, it’s a great device that fits a number of use cases – streaming live audio/video while doing tasks around the home, browsing the web while watching TV, taking notes in meetings to mention a few. Does this mean I think everyone needs one? Not at all.
It is a device that’s new, unique and one of the hottest tech products on the market, but most people already have laptops at this point that work perfectly fine. It is also A$628 + for the iPad, which is reasonable, but normal people have kids, mortgages and bills to pay.
What will be interesting is when it comes time to update that laptop, the iPad maybe a viable alternative for a lot of people, but then again, hopefully there’s some.
2x iPads being used to DJ
iPad Review from an iPad owner
I’ve know owned an iPad for around a week, so thought it’s time I shared my thoughts on the device, as one of only a few Australians who actually own and have used it at length.
This will be a short wrap-up as I’m still travelling (currently in San Francisco), a much more detailed review will arrive once I’m back in Australia.
Keyboard
After using the iPad for a few days now, typing on the on-screen keyboard is becoming easier, particularly in landscape mode. Although when compared to a traditional keyboard, input is much slower.
UX
The iPad is incredibly responsive, launching applications, flipping rough photos and menus all happen instantly. It makes for great demos and vie often found myself unknowingly turning into an Apple salesman. Responding do immediately does encourage use of the device. The only real issue is the physical one of how to hold the devices. It’s something you have to learn and something I’m sure will vary, person to person.
Battery Life
You’ll find many uses for the iPad, but there are going to be many times where the iPad spends it’s time on the coffee table. This means standby time Is important. The iPad has exceptional standby battery life, lasting days while not powering the 9.7″ touch screen.
Naturally your battery life while using the iPad will vary based on your use. Running 3D games or watching movies are most taxing, with average mixed use getting around 8 hours. Not bad considering Apple claim 10 hours, which can usually be halved in the real world.
Screen
The 9.7″ touch screen of the iPad is incredibly bright and responsive, but there is one big issue. It’s kind of unavoidable with a device your touching, but fingerprints are a problem. If you think Apple include a micro-fibre cloth, you’d be wrong. That said, the screen is gorgeous and increasing brightness can help, but hurts your battery life.
Applications
The iPad comes preloaded with some customized apps from Apple, but 3rd party apps can be installed via the App Store. There awesome default iPhone apps that are missing from the iPad – calculator and weather being prime examples.
Accessories
On the accessories front, we are still waiting for most of them like the camera accessory to be released, but my ‘must have’ recommendation is the case. If not the Apple case, then a case with a stand. This is especially valuable when travelling on the bus or plane. This meant I could position the iPad using it’s triangle shape for easier typing or for passive viewing without hands.
Australian release date and pricing
While originally announcing the iPad would be available in Australia ‘late April’ that date has now been moved back a month to ‘late May’. There’s also no confirmation of Aus pricing.
