Blackberry May be in Trouble

I was talking to a friend the other day and we were both discussing how we thought BlackBerry was in trouble. They owned a niche with their killer push email service and just stopped there. I can’t think of a single impressive innovation from them in the last several years.

There are several reasons why I think that they are in for a long slow slide into irrelevance.

• Can’t cross over as consumer devices
• Too many superior alternatives
• They will lose the enterprise (and that’s really all they have)
• Software is stale and boring

Can’t cross over as consumer devices

You have to admit that their hardware is fugly. Their best hardware feature is their amazing keyboards and they keep turning their backs on them. The Storm touchscreen that made you ask, “Should I touch it, tap it, or press it?” How about that stupid “two letters on one button” idea on the Pearl and Perl Flip? What a train wreck. There are both bad ways that they deserted the traditional keyboard. The problem is that if they include that big, wonderful keyboard, you’ll probably get a big, ugly phone. That’s fine for corporate drones, but not 16 year old girls.

Too many superior alternatives

iPhone – Except for the keyboard, it kills BlackBerry in every conceivable areaGoogle’s Android Platform – any good handset maker has free access to great softwareWindows Mobile – Available to any handset maker. Enterprise support, Better UI, Better Media, Better appsPalm’s Web OS – It’s just sexierNokia’s Symbian Platform – Take a look at the worldwide stats.

They’re Losing the Enterprise

The only thing that keeps BlackBerry afloat is their absolute stranglehold on Enterprise mobile email. They currently have 21 million enterprise users or a 60% +/- share of enterprise mobile email. Nowhere to go but down.Here are a few reasons why that will erode fairly soon:High cost of their email services for enterprise – In order to supply “push email” to those Crackberry addicts, you need to have a very expensive addition to your IT infrastructure. Most companies either use Microsoft’s Exchange or Lotus’ Domino mail servers. BlackBerry devices can’t connect directly to those servers. You need to have the BlackBerry Enterprise Server, a second “shadow” mail server that is the intermediary between the corporate mail server and the phone. Extra server, extra software, extra support staff; you do the math.All of their competitors can connect directly to Exchange serversAll of the other major smartphone Operating systems can connect directly to the Exchange server. BlackBerries do work better for email, but not enough to justify all that expense. Plus, key decision makers would love to ditch that bulky extra phone.

The Software is Stale and Boring

Does anybody actually “like” using their BlackBerry for anything other than email? Let’s face it, the software is kind of boring.The fact that the vast majority of customers are corporate workers who don’t own the phones means that their apps store faces problems too. Think about it; are you going to buy a bunch of software to install on the phone that your work owns? That’s if your IT department doesn’t have it locked down before they give it to you. No Up-sell

Other Nails in their Coffin

Gmail – It works amazing on mobile phones and supports “push email”. The mobile web interface is great too.

Google Docs / Zoho Office – You can view, edit, and create office documents for free. They also support real-time collaboration.

Tablets and Netbooks – Did anyone see the iPad? True, I knocked it for a few issues, but version 2.0 and beyond will start taking big slurps off BlackBerry’s milk shake. What happens when another 30+ iPad competitors hit the streets? Those slurps start turning into chugs.

Conclusion

Now I know, Palm is still around. Heck, I even cited them as one of BlackBerry’s threats. But they used to be a household word, not the fifth bullet in an argument. People labeled an entire electronic gadget category (Personal Digital Assistants) as Palm Pilots. Kind of like all mp3 players are called iPods today. Now they’re an afterthought.I’m not saying that they will shut down operations next week, but I do anticipate a several year slide into obscurity. Don’t be surprised if in 2016 you hear yourself say, “Remember CrackBerries?” Kind of like when we make fun of those huge cellphones that rappers carried in their videos.

What Do You Think?

Do you think that BlackBerry’s best days are behind them? Or, are they about to seize control of the handset market?

5min.com Video of the Day

Making Life a Little Nicer

Sometimes I find myself complaining about things that frustrate me. Well, it’s actually pretty easy to find things that suck, but I decided to take some time to talk about a few things that have been making me particularly happy lately.

Instaper – This is a simple tool to save web pages for reading later. If you see a page, article, story, or whatever that you don’t have time to read now, you can tuck it away to be read later. You can go back and read your saved stuff later on either your computer, iPhone, Kindle, or even good old fashioned paper. Plus, you can send pages to Instapaper from your browser, RSS reader, Twitter apps, and a bunch of other places.

Netflix Streaming for PS3 – You can instantly stream movies from Netflix to your TV via your PlayStation 3. The best part about it is that the movie starts instantly. That’s right, no stupid credits. I spent two straight days home sick from work recently. I don’t’ think I would have made it without the dozen movies that I watched.

PixelPipe – When I create videos for my tutorials/podcast, I need to upload them to multiple places on the web. PixelPipe allows me to load my videos, images, and updates to accounts on dozens of sites. (YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Vimeo, and many, many more.) If you have a lot of videos, images, or updates to make, this service will save you more time than you can imagine.

My New Moleskine Notebook – I got this notebook from the team at Automattic for volunteering at the WordCampNYC conference. It’s just the right size for me to carry it everywhere. It has a nice little pocket in the back to hold business cards, scraps of paper, and other stuff. I use it to plan projects, articles, and other tasks.

Get your own awesome Moleskine Notebook.

Windows 7 – I decided that I needed to upgrade to WIndows 7 so that my tutorials were more up-to-date. I started off by installing a new Parallels Virtual Machine on my Mac. First of all, this is easily the best OS that Microsoft has put out. It’s prettier than Vista and as light as XP. My wife needs a new laptop and I can’t wait to set up a full-fledged machine running Windows 7. Nice job Microsoft!

Applications that run on Windows, Mac, and Linux – Being that I’m constantly switching between Operating Systems and it is really helpful to have a few applications that are supported on each. This really eases the transitions. Some of my favorite are: Firefox, Filezilla, Picasa, VLC, and any Adobe AIR apps.

Google Voice – I love the new Voicemail text transcription feature. Isn’t that enough?

Movies in 2D – Because 3D is just retarded! I’m looking at you Avatar. (and Coraline, and the upcoming Alice in Wonderland travesty.)

5min.com Video of the Day

2009 Was OK, But Things Can Get ALOT Better

2009 is almost over and I’m making my technology wish list for 2010. Being that it’s a “WISH” list, I decided to shoot for the stars. in order fro 2010 to be the best year ever in tech, here’s what I want.

iPhone – My Biggest Joy and Disappointment

The iPhone plays a huge role in my IT infrastructure. It bridge the gap between the VitaminCM global headquarters and the vast wastelands that lie outside my door. Sometimes I actually have to go out and mingle with the great unwashed hordes. Gasp! While there are so many things to love about my trusty companion, here is what I desperately wish for:

• AT&T to get a decent network
• Verizon to get the iPhone
• Flash and JAVA support – It’s flippin’ 2010 already!
• Support for a Bluetooth Keyboard (No, I don’t want to Jailbreak my phone.)
• Front and back Video Cameras so I can gitz my Skype video conference on.

Windows Applications that Need to be On My Mac

I switched to a Mac this year and for the most part I like it. My biggest problem is finding suitable replacements for some of my old favorite Windows applications.

• Windows Live Writer – How can I be forced to blog with this overpriced collection of crapware.
• Digsby Multi-protocol Instant Messenger (plus twitter, facebook, myspace, etc.) – Adium is marginally acceptable.
• Microsoft Office (The real thing, not that hideous crap with the crooked yellow logo.)
• A Delete key that Deletes, not Backspacing. (Yeah, I really feel like pressing the Function button.)

Software and Services that Can Be ALOT Better

There are a lot of great applications and services out there, but this is what it takes to go from good to great.

• FireFox – please stop crapping out every 3 minutes.
• Evernote to integrate RememberTheMilk into their tool. Two great tastes that taste great together.
• Google Earth to go live with “real-time” images. Yeah, it’s creeptacular but you know you want it too.
• Good VIdeo Production Software for Linux so I can build my $600 Super Computer out of two clustered PS3s.
• FaceBook to disable Mafia Wars, Farmville, Fish Tank, Movie Quiz, and Family Finder.
• Linux to do what you want it to, on the first attempt.
• DropBox – give a brotha more disk space.

Gadgets that I want

Who doesn’t love a shiny new gadget. Well, I want a little more than a fancy box and a high price tag.

• An E-Book Reader that is actually cool.
• Roll UP LCD screens (in stores, not labs)
• Laptop Batteries that work for more than five minutes
• Solid State Hard Drives (that I can afford)

Jerks

The tech world doesn’t just happen in a vacuum, it’s run by people. Some of them kind of suck. Here are a few people that I would like to see come off the naughty list in 2010.

• Apple to get the litigious stick out of their litigious butts.
• Sony, please stop hassling people for making your products more useful.
• Verizon – stop hating customers. Don’t cripple our phones, rip us off, and provide poor customer service.
• BestBuy – just go away already.
• While I’m at it, could the RIAA and MPAA just commit hari-kari.

Television

Now that I have a 1080p TV and a BluRay player I wish that someone would erase the memory of my 100 favorite movies and add them to the top of my NetFlix queue.

Crazy Town

How about a few off the wall things:

• Robots! Lots of robots.
• Monkeys that can be trained to be my butler.
• An automatically organizing desk.
• A koi pond stocked with teany-tiny Great White Sharks and even tinier seals.

Last but certainly not least…

I wish that my wife would just understand that I NEEEEEEEED all of these things and so many others. They are all critically important to my survival as a human being. Kind of like the dry cleaner, house keeper, 4 hour trips to the salon, and karaoke all keep her alive.

What Would You Like to See in 2010?

5min.com Video of the Day

What’s a Year End Without a Countdown?

As 2009 draws to a close I decided to do a quick look back on the top posts of 2009. The list is based solely on the amount of visits that each article received, however I threw in a few of my less appreciated favorites. Without further ado, here’s the list.

10 – You can Create the Web Operating System Today (My Personal Favorite)

This post shows how to cobble together a complete Web-Based operating system from a bunch of common, free web apps. The main tools used are iGoogle, and Zoho apps. This was a fun article to put together.

9 – iPhone Photoshop Application Review

One of my favorite iPhone apps is Photoshop. You can do quick, simple edits to your pictures right on your phone. There are just enough features to make your photos go from blah to good.

8 – Never Forget Another Idea – Capture Everything with Evernote

Evernote is one of my very favorite productivity tools. This tutorial shows you how to use it on Windows, Mac, iPhone, Windows Mobile, and Linux (via the web). If you need a great note taking system that goes anywhere, take a look at this article.

7 – How to Upgrade the Memory in your Netbook

If you have a netbook computer, one of the biggest drawbacks is the performance. If you max out the RAM, you will get a noticeable boost. This video shows you how to replace the existing memory with a new stick.

6 – Add Magical Powers to Your Browser with Bookmarklets

Bookmarklets are like regular browser bookmarks on steroids. They have javascript commands that add extra functionality to your favorite web sites. Bookmarklets can do things like open a url in an email, subscribe in Google Reader, send a link to Twitter, and many other things in one click. See how to make it happen in this article.

5 – Remote Control Your Computer From The Internet

Did you ever wish you could log onto your home computer from work, a friend’s house, or even your iPhone? Well, this tutorial shows how to use VNC and your router’s Port Forwarding to do just that. You will be able to access your computer from anywhere in the world.

4 – Sync Files on Multiple Computers Using DropBox

If you work on multiple computers (work, home, etc.) then you know what it’s like to not have the files you need. DropBox will cure this problem for good. This tutorial shows you how to set up and use DropBox on all of your machines.

3 – 36 Ways to Work Seamlessly on Two Computers

If you use more than one computer with some combination of Windows, Mac, and Linux and a Smartphone than you know how difficult it is to have all of your stuff when and where you need it. I’m going to show you a variety of tools and strategies to help you have everything you need, when and where you need it.

2 – 26 Best Free Mac Applications

This year I switched from exclusively using Windows to spending most of my time on a Mac. I cover a collection of very useful free applications that you can use on the Mac. If buy a Mac and have no money left to spend on apps, take a look at this article.

Drum Roll Please…

This was far and away the most popular post of the year. It actually had 10 times more visits than the second place finisher.

1 – 22 Most Useful Free Applications for your PC

List of the most useful free applications for your Windows computer. Firefox, Digsby, filezilla, Picasa, Cute PDF Writer, rocket dock, windows live writer, etc. If you’re looking for some great free apps for your PC, this is the article for you.

What Was Your Favorite?

I would love to hear what your favorite article was. Also, if there is something that you would like to see covered I REALLY want to hear that. So jump into those comments and let your voice be heard.

And Thanks for another great year!!!

OVERVIEW: This video tutorial shows how to use Google Voice to convert your speech to text that can be used in other applications. Use the feature that converts voicemail audio to text.

The Best Voicemail System Ever

Once you see the iPhone’s Visual Voicemail, you realize how cool it is. Well, Google Voice has actually one-upped them by adding the new voice transcription feature to what is already an incredible voicemail system. The audio for all of your messages is saved in an inbox that works just like an email inbox. This alone is pretty cool, but then they convert the message to text and put it in your inbox too. When you click the play button to hear the voicemail, the transcribed text is highlighted in sync with the audio. The words that are in black text are usually perfect, while the ones in gray are 50/50. They also send the text to your email, so that you can read the message without having to play it. This cuts hours and hours of blah, blah, blah time out of your life.

I have been using this feature when I come up with "good" ideas while I’m on the go. I just call my Google Voice number from my mobile phone and leave my idea as a message. Then, when I get home, I just copy and paste the transcribed text into Word, an Email, or whatever other application are applicable.

How to Use Google Voice’s Text Transcriptions with Other Apps

Just log in to your Google Voice account and go to the Inbox.

Once you call your Google Voice number and leave a voicemail, it will be saved in your inbox as an audio file. Google’s severs will also convert the audio in the voicemail to text.

The length of the voicemail will be displayed next to the Play button. The words that are in gray text (not black) are ones whose accuracy is "questionable". You should double-check them for accuracy.

When you click the play button, the text gets highlighted in green along with the audio. (This is actually pretty cool.)

Now that your voicemail has been converted to text, you can copy and paste it into any application that you want.

See How it’s Done

The following video tutorial shows how to use the Google Voice audio transcription feature to use your messages as text.

Good, But Not Perfect

While this is a cool feature, it is FAR from perfect. I’m sure that there will be tweaks and upgrades down the road, but I’m really impressed with its humble beginnings. I would love to see some vocal training or learning features added, sort of like Dragon Naturally Speaking has had for years.

Overview: This list will help you find the right gifts for the technology buff in your life based on price range.

Who Says You Can’t Find Cool Gadget Gifts in Your Price Range?

Let’s face it, we’re all on some sort of budget. That still doesn’t mean that you can’t find great gifts. This list groups my favorite electronics and gadgets into the following price ranges:

• Under $50 (Good Things in Small Cheap Packages)
• Under $100 (Best Bang for the Buck)
• $100 – $300 (Breaking the Bank)
• Over $300 (The VIP Room)

Under $50 (Good Things in Small Cheap Packages)

Who says you can’t buy cool gadgets on a small budget? Here are a few awesome additions to any techie’s bag of tricks that will fit into any gift giving budget.

Pink Tranquility Laptop Bag Just because they’re carrying computers doesn’t mean that women want their laptop bag to look ugly. Pick up a stylish, feminine laptop bag for the lady geek.

Price: $25

Targus Netbook Case Wrap up that new netbook in style. Let a fancy new bag add some sheik to that geek.

Price: $25

CORSAIR Flash Voyager 8GB USB 2.0 Flash Drive Carry all of your files around with you. Portable Flash Drives serve 101 different uses.

Price: $25

Remote Control Helicopter All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. A remote control helicopter will help relieve the stress of crunching all those boring old numbers

Price: $25

Kingston 8GB USB Flash Drive Carry all of your files around with you. Portable Flash Drives serve 101 different uses.

Price: $45

Griffin PowerMate/USB Multimedia Controller This USB device allows you to control aspects of just about any program by turning the know or pressing down on it. Aside from providing a unique user control capability, it just looks amazing on any desk.

Price: $45

CALL OF DUTY 4:MODERN WARFARE Sometime you just want to blow something up. Call of Duty will let you get your frustrations out in a safe and fun way.

Price: $45

Leatherman 830146 Core Pocket Multi-Tool The ultimate do-everything tool for any geek. A Leatherman tool will allow you to fix, build, or disassemble anything.

Price: $49

Under $100 (Best Bang for the Buck)

The $50 – $100 price range offers a lot of great gifts. Here are some cool tools to add on to any respectable gadget collection.

STM Bags Small Loft Laptop Bag (Chocolate/Orange) Just because we’re men doesn’t mean that we want to carry our computers around in ugly bags. Why not spruce the place up with a cool, stylish laptop bag.

Price: $55

Eye-Fi Share 2 GB Wi-Fi SD Memory Card This two-in-one miracle goes in your camera and stores all of the photos that you take. After that, it can wirelessly send them back to your computer or up to the web using wi-fi.

Price: $69

Logitech Cordless Desktop Wave Pro Any computer can be improved by adding a solid keyboard and mouse. After all these are the two things that you touch all day long.

Price: $79

Memory Upgrade If you know someone with a computer, you know someone who wishes it were faster. Help them speed up their machine with a memory upgrade.

Price: $

Memory Upgrade

Digital Photo Frame After taking thousands and thousands of pictures, why not show them off? A digital photo frame allows the photographer in your life to proudly display a collection of their favorite images.

Price: $50 – $100

Roku HD Player Media Streamer The Netflix Media Streamer hooks up to the TV and allows you to click and watch streaming Netflix movies instantly. No more waiting around for your new disks to arrive.

Price: $100

Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player Hook the WD TV to your television and plug in a USB drive with music, photos and videos and you have a great home theater. The WD TV allows you to stream your media right onto that huge, beautiful TV and get out of the computer room.

Price: $99

Rock Band Game Let’s face it, all geeks and nerds want to be rock stars. Well this will let them, if only for a few hours. Jam out with groups of friends and family members.

Price: $99

$100 – $300 (Breaking the Bank)

If you have a little extra room in the budget (really?), you can hit a home run this Christmas. Put one of these gems under the tree and you’ll see some eyes light up.

Powermat Wireless Charging Device All of those gadgets in our life make quite a mess with their chargers. Well why not ditch them all? The Powermat Wireless Charger allows you to just drop your devices onto a pad and have them charge without hooking up any wires.

Price: $125

Apple iPod nano with Video Camera This super tiny iPod now has a really good video camera built into it. So now, not only can you take your music, pictures, and movies with you, you can capture new movies too.

Price: $135

Nintendo Wii Console Nintendo Wii is great for family members from 2 to 102. No other system will provide more hours of fun for everyone.

Price: $150

Roku SoundBridge Music Streaming System The Roku Sound Bridge will allow that special someone to stream the music from their computer, pandora, or internet radio stations wirelessly to the bathroom, basement, garage or back yard.

Price: $165

Flip Ultra HD Camcorder The best way to capture videos is to have a camera with you. With the size of the Flip UltraHD Camcorder, you can carry it with you at all times. The video quality is very good and the user experience is so simple you won’t believe it.

Price: $175

Canon Powershot SD780 Do you know someone who needs an incredibly good and incredibly small point and shoot camera? Well look no further than the Canon Powershot SD780. This thing is like a chubby credit card that shoots great pictures and sharp video.

Price: $199

Xbox 360 Console Microsoft Xbox 360 provides hours of gaming and entertainment options.

Price: $199

Apple TV with 160GB Hard Drive This is probably the most simple way to get all of your music, photos, and movies onto your TV. If it’s in your iTunes Library, then you can have it on your TV in a snap.

Price: $229

Kindle EBook Reader Know someone who loves to read? Are they a commuter? Well the Amazon Kindle is the perfect gift. They can carry tons of books, magazines, and newspapers in their pocket.

Price: $250

Slingbox TV Streamer If your geek is on the road a lot, why not let them watch their favorite TV show and Sports teams from anywhere. The Slingbox will stream their home TV and DVR to them over the internet or 3G phone.

Price: $275

Logitech diNovo Keyboard and Mouse Combo Want to add killer form and function to your desk, get a high-end keyboard and mouse setup. Your fingers and eyes will thank you.

Price: $299

Super Portable Pico Projector Want to share your pictures and movies on the go? Then you need a Pico projector. These cell phone sized projectors can display images and videos from your computer, camera, iPod or other device anywhere.

Price: $299

PlayStation 3 Console Video games, streaming media, BlueRay DVD movies, what more could you want from a home entertainment console?

Price: $299

Over $300 (The VIP Room)

Who says money can’t buy love? If you spring for one of these gifts, you sure can test the theory out. Hopefully my wife will give it a shot

Super Portable Netbook Computer Have a student or globetrotter in your life? Why not get them a tiny, but powerful computer that can go anywhere and do anything that they need?

Price: $300 – $400

Canon PowerShot G11 Maybe your nerd has outgrown their tiny point and shoot camera, but still wants something that they can take with them. The Canon G11 has most of the quality and features of a DSLR at a fraction of the size. It allows fully manual control and has a mount for a good flash attachment.

Price: $449

Canon Digital Rebel DSLR Do you have a serious photo buff on your gift list? Well they’re probably ready to move up to a Digital SLR. The Canon Rebel is the most affordable way to get into a DSLR. Great quality and usability all in one.

Price: $575

Canon VIXIA HG21 Camcorder If your Martin Scorsese needs a little more quality and control than a Flip camcorder, than you might want to look at one of the mid-range Canon camcorders. They have powerful zoom lenses and great quality without breaking the bank.

Price: $699

Other Resources for Saving Big on the Perfect Christmas Gift

Don’t See something you like here? Well here are some places that you can find really great deals on electronics and gadgets.

Save a Fortune at Amazon.com

Amazon has an product line that goes on forever. There is always something on super-terrific clearance sale. You can find giant discounts on products at Amazon.com. The links below list products that are at least 75% OFF in their respective categories.

75% Off Books

75% Off Cameras and Accessories

75% Off Computers and Accessories

75% Off Video Games

75% Off Electronics and Gadgets

Find the Best Selection of Computer Gear at NewEgg.com

My absolute favorite place to find the best prices on computer and electronics is Newegg.com. They have tons of great deals every day.

Get Great Deals on Macs and their Accessories

MacMall and ClubMac have a lot of deals on Macs, iPods, and other gear.

Get the Absolute Best Prices on Cables and Accessories

MonoPrice.com has the best prices on cables for everything. Seriously, I got a good HDMI cable and a mini-display port to DVI cable for $15 with tax and shipping included. NEVER buy your cables from Bestbuy!

If you are looking for other arrangements of electronics and gadgets Christmas gift suggestions take a look at one of these other lists.

Complete Electronics Gadget Christmas Gift Buying Guide

Best Chrismas Tech Gadgets for Women

Best Chrismas Tech Gadgets for Men

Find the Best Christmas Gadget in Any Price Range

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock lately, you must have heard about Google Voice. Google Voice (formerly GrandCentral) is a cool new phone service that gives you the power of a sophisticated corporate phone service for free. Here are some of the great things that you can do with a Google Voice account:

• Google voicemail: voicemail like email
• Voicemail transcription: read what your voicemail says
• Custom greetings: vary voicemail greetings by caller
• International calling: low cost calls to the world
• Notifications: read voicemail messages via email or SMS
• Share voicemails: forward, embed, or download voicemails

Those features are available if you want to keep your existing cellphone number. Take a look at some of them in action.

If you don’t mind using a new number supplied by Google, you can also get these awesome features:

• One number: a single phone number that rings all your phones
• Free SMS: send, receive & store text messages online
• Block calls: send unwanted callers straight to voicemail
• Record calls: record phone calls and store them online
• Conference calls: join several people into a single call
• Screen callers: hear who is calling before you pick up

See what you can do with these features:

Google Voice Giveaway Rules

I have been using Google Voice since it was Grand Central and I love all of the cool things that you can do with it. I have some invites to give away to three lucky VitaminCM.com readers.

Let’s keep it real simple: Leave a comment below about what you would use Google Voice to do. (Be creative.) On Friday, November 13th I will pick three completely random commenters and make Friday the 13th their lucky day.

Good Luck!

P.S. I’m working on getting a few Google Wave invites. I’ll do the same when the come in.

If you have ever taken pictures on your iPhone, you realize that they seldom turn out just right. A little off center, too dark, not vivid enough, whatever. Sure, you can sync them to your computer and edit them, then sync them back to your phone. If you have like 4,000 hours to kill. Well, Photoshop.com Mobile’s iPhone application is just what you need. You can take any picture on your iPhone and make quick, simple, effective edits in seconds just using your pointer finger.

Photoshop on your computer has millions of filters, effects, and features that are great for pros, but the Photoshop iPhone application has just what you need to clean up your phone pictures. Did I mention the price? That’s right, FREE!

Get it at Photoshop.com and give it a whirl. Direct download link.

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

See the Photoshop iPone Application in Action

Take a look at the video below to see why I love it so much.

One of my favorite desktop applications of all time is Dropbox. Dropbox allows you to sync important files between multiple computers. You just install the software on your computers and set up a dropbox (folder) and place files in it. The files will instantly appear on all of your other computers.

While this is amazingly convenient if you are at one of your computers, what happens when you are at someone else’s house or out on the town? Well, the contents of your dropbox are not only on your computers, a copy is also available on the dropbox website. (They are securely protected by your ID and password.)

Well, they just released an iPhone application that will let you view and open the entire contents of your dropbox in the palm of your hand from anywhere. Once you install and log in to the iPhone application, you can see all of the files and folders just like they appear on your computer.

Just touch one of the files and view it on your phone. (View only, no editing.) You can view any file that the iPhone can handle:

• Office files like Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and PDFs
• Audio files like MP3s, WAVs, AACs
• Video files like MP4s and M4Vs
• HTML files

Cool Features

Using the iPhone has its own set of constraints and capabilities that make it a unique user experience compared to your desktop computer. There are a few really cool features that make this a great iPhone application.

Alphabetical File Browsing – You can quickly scan through your files by name using the alphabetical browser bar running down the right side of the screen that works just like like the Contacts application. If you have a lot of files, this really helps speed things up.

Favorites – You can mark important files as "Favorites" and they will be saved locally on your iPhone. Now, the file can be opened locally without having to wait for it to download over AT&T’s amazingly slow 3G network. If the file is edited on one of your computers, it will be updated to your phone.

Photos – You can add photos taken on your iPhone directly to your dropbox. This doesn’t sound like much, but previously I had to sync my phone and pour through my pictures to move the right one into my dropbox. This is so much more convenient, especially if you are out and about and see something that you want to remember.

Wish List

While Dropbox is 98% awesome, there are always a few things that could be improved. Since the iPhone does not support many common media formats (Quicktime, AVI, WMV, WMA, MPEG, etc.) it would be cool if they could build in a simple media player that would allow me to view these files. Yeah, I know that this is an iPhone problem, it’s just that I’ll take help from anywhere I can find it.

Why you should use Dropbox

If you’re still not sold on Dropbox, watch this video and you just might be.

See this complete tutorial on using Dropbox to sync files across multiple computers.

I recently wired up my whole house with full gigabit ethernet ports in all of the rooms. The only problem is that my router, a five year old Belkin Wireless G router does not support gigabit networking or fast wi-fi speeds. To compound things my router has been dropping my internet connection a lot lately, so I decided to upgrade the heart of my home network.

What I needed from a router

I had a few big requirements from my new router:

• The wired ports had to support gigabit data transfers (1,000 megabits per second)
• The wi-fi format had to be 802,11N
• Support for External USB Hard Drive networking

I did all of my research at Newegg.com and decided on the D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit Wireless Router. This router met all of my requriments for around $90.

Networking Setup – I just unplugged my old router and plugged this in and I had no problems.

USB Sharing – This was a little more tricky. There is a CD that comes with the router that lets you install a utility on Windows machines in a snap. The drive just shows up like a USB drive plugged right into my machine. The software for my Mac was not quite as effective, You have to do some crap from the command prompt and it doesn’t exactly work well. Oh joy, more fiddling. Linux is just as flakey.

Performance – I have not dropped the internet yet and my speed seems to be pretty good. The speed inside of my network is where this thing shines. I ran a backup of my Windows machine to the USB Hard drive and the transfers seemed really fast. I can’t wait to stream video to my TV.

Reccomendation

If you need a really fast router that allows you to plug in a USB drive or printer and don’t mind spending close to $100, then you should definitely take a look at the  D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit Wireless Router. If you have more modest needs, head over to the Networking section at Newegg.com. and see their huge selection.

See the Video Review Below

UPDATE: I have to give a shout out to my friend Dan from MenuPix.com for suggesting this router to me. Good call Dan!

Where to Buy

You can find a good deal at the following locations:

Buy at NewEgg.com D-Link DIR-655 Xtreme N Gigabit Wireless Router

Buy at Amazon.comD-Link DIR 655 Router