It’s time for another Samsung Mobilers mission – so far this year I’ve had the opportunity to user and review the Samsung Galaxy S 2, Galaxy Pro, and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 (a day in my life using the new Galaxy Tab 10.1), and now we’ve been tasked with a few more lighter missions.  This next mission is for us to list our top 5 favorite games and explain how to install them:

1.  Angry Birds: 

This is the game that I play the most, and I’m sure most everyone has at least heard of it and at least seen it played (if not play it themselves).   It’s a very addictive puzzle game where you fling birds at buildings and pigs to try and free their eggs (and some birds have special abilities like becoming a bomb or dropping explosive eggs:

One of the things that makes this game great is that there are currently 3 versions  which can be downloaded from the Android Market (Angry Birds, Angry Birds Seasons, and Angry Birds Rio) and each version has TONS of levels (and more levels are added on a regular basis).   Also, the sound effects are quite enjoyable as well… If you don’t already have it, download it now, it’s free!

2.  Peggle:

Peggle is another puzzle game only this time it’s like an extreme version of Breakout.  There are multiple rounds where there are a number of bricks on the screen that you need to destroy by having a ball (that you launch) touch them on it’s way down to the bottom of the screen.  Touch all the red bricks within your 10 available balls and you move on to the next round. 

You can check out some sample game play in AndroidSPIN’s youtube review here:

So you’ve searched for it in the Android Market and can’t find it?  That’s because it’s currently only in the Amazon AppStore.   Simply head over to the Amazon AppStore and enter in your email address (that you can check from your Android phone), or your phone number to get a text, and click on the link in the message.  You basically just need to enable non-Market apps to be installed (such as the Amazon AppStore), and then download and install the AppStore.  There’s a very simple video from Amazon that shows you how to install it and start getting apps from it:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/mpd/permalink/m25J6SKSWIK6HC/ref=ent_fb_link

3.  Words with Friends:

Here we have another extremely popular game which is essentially Scrabble that you can play with other mobile phone users.  What makes it especially great is that you can play with users using multiple platforms such as iPhone/iPod/iPad and Android!  You can grab the free version (ad supported) from the Android Market

4.  Robo Defense:

Robo Defense is variant of a tower defense game done well.  You are basically given weapons towers to construct in order to defeat the enemies before they are able to cross the screen.  On the free version, you are given 3 different choices for towers with each having a few different upgrade paths and just one map available – even still, you can find yourself playing again and again while trying to configure different layouts to try to get to the 100th round:

It can be downloaded from the Android Market in a free version (limited to one level) or paid version (multiple levels, upgrades, and maps).

5.  TapTap Revenge 4: 

For those who like Guitar Hero/Rock Band, TapTap Revenge 4 is essentially a port of those games over to Android – use your thumbs, fingers, and even the built in gyroscope sensor to hit the right notes at the right time with tons of different (and even recent/popular) music.  

I was worried at first that it would be relatively easy, even on expert mode, but the songs can very quite difficult, so it should be able to keep you busy for a while (if you want to try to get a high score).  Like the other games above, it too is free and available from the standard Android Market

Do you have a particularly favorite game that isn’t listed here?  Know of any other sources to get games that weren’t mentioned?  Let everyone know about them in the comments and stay tuned for more Samsung Mob!ler missions!

With more and more GPS navigation apps arriving in the App Store,  how does the new MapQuest Navigator compare?  A subscription based app ($4 monthly, $10 quarterly, $30 yearly), it requires a constant data connection but offers turn-by-turn and text-to-speech routing – but is it worth the cost over the free Google Maps app and is it cheap enough to buy instead of the $80+ “stand alone” apps TomTom and Navigon (or even the $35 CoPilot)?

Initial thoughts:

It’s subscription based.  As soon as I saw this I was instantly turned off – however – after sitting on it a bit and thinking about the price, it’s not that bad for a subscription.  At $4/month, $10/quarter, or $30/year, that price will probably be cheaper than what you will have to pay for TomTom or Navigon map updates (no word how much they will be);  $30/year is at least cheaper than the map updates of $40/year for TomTom and $95/year for Navigon stand alone units.

Update 10/12/09:  MapQuest Navigator was initially $0.99 with a 14 day trial, but due to App Store policies, they had to make it $3.99 which includes the first month of service. 

Requires constant data connection.  Unlike CoPilot, TomTom, and Navigon, this requires a constant data connection (like GoogleMaps); there is no map download that allows the app to read map information directly from your phone.  If you have spotty reception or even spotty 3G coverage this will present a problem for you.

Turn-by-turn, text-to-speech, and live traffic data:  While it has it’s shortcomings, it does at least come with welcomed features.  Unlike GoogleMaps, it does turn-by-turn “3D” directions while also announcing directions and street names (“turn left on twenty third avenue”).  Not only that, but it also integrates traffic data to help adjust your route in order to avoid traffic delays.

So all this is what MapQuest Navigator is “on paper”, how about how it actually performs in every day use?

Navigation, routing, and re-routing:

It’s so-so.  Testing it out on my way home from work today (~9 mile drive), both my TomTom stand alone unit and GoogleMaps have me go the same way – the fastest way (from many of the other possible routes, which I’ve tried).  

However, I found that MapQuest Navigator seems to highly prefer usage of highways.  It wasn’t until the 4th route recalculation that it finally had me go home my normal route (which again, is the preferred route by gmaps and TomTom).  If I were to have taken MapQuest’s route, it would have increased my trip time by 5 minutes (I’ve taken that route before, without traffic).

Re-Routing:  Understandably, it appears that it only downloads enough map data to handle your surrounding route, and also bases it’s immediate re-routing on these “limited maps”.  What I mean by this is that I turned away from the suggested route (to go the way I feel it should’ve sent me) and each road I passed it wanted me to turn down to get back on the original route.  After the 5th intersection, it ran out of road and only then did it completely recalculate the route (dotted lines added by me, which signify where the roads actually continue on):

Searching for POIs

First and foremost, it’s nice to be able to search for POIs online vs only being able to use ones that are stored locally (ie: stand alone GPS units).  However, finding the right POI can sometimes be a bit of a pain here.  While located in Baltimore (inner harbor area), I tried to search for BWI airport – I type in “BWI Airport”, click search, and then I have to zoom out to see any results (if there are indeed any).   If there are no results at your current zoom level, a message appears telling you to zoom out, and if you wait about 7 seconds that message goes away and you are looking at the map as though nothing happened.

Then, proceeding to zoom out in order to see any of my results, there isn’t a clear and easy way to tell which of the results is even close to what I’m looking for (at least not without zooming into each one and tapping the bubble to see what it is):

However, if I had chosen to use one of the preset POI category menus from the bottom, "Airports” for example, it finds it right away:

In other words, it’s fairly easy to find “general” POI’s using their preset categories, which are:

• (All) Restaurants
• Hotels & Motels
• Shopping Centers and Malls
• Gas Stations
• Coffee Shops
• Post Offices
• Parking Garages
• Grocery Stores
• K-12 Schools
• Movie Theaters
• Ice Cream Parlors
• Bars
• Pharmacies
• Airports
• Lube & Oil
• Traffic
• (clear map)
• (MapQuest info)

Another plus is that you can navigate to contacts.  From what I’ve read about other GPS apps, not all of them allow you to navigate to a contact, so this is nice.  Just simply tap the address book icon and pick your contact, then their address:

Other items to note

• You cannot play music in the background.  This could very well be a deal breaker for me if I were seriously considering buying it.  When in my car, I use my iPhone to stream music to my car (via Bluetooth A2DP).  If you are playing music and use MapQuest Navigator, the music will stop playing.

• Limited options.  This is a very basic, no frills GPS navigation app.  All you can do is search for destinations/POIs, navigate to them, browse the map or route, enable traffic display, or toggle night mode.  That’s about it.  There’s no “find alternative route”, “travel via or avoid a specific road”, etc:
   

Conclusion

MapQuest Navigator for the iPhone is unfortunately lost in the crowd due to both the free GoogleMaps app and the stand alone CoPilot app.  Though GoogleMaps isn’t really the same sort of app (no turn-by-turn directions), it’s POI and general speedy responsiveness is better than MapQuest Navigator – and CoPilot is only $5 more and yet also has text-to-speech, allows you to download the entire US map locally (no constant data connection required), and basically does everything that MapQuest does.

Good

• Text to speech
• Traffic data no additional charge
• Navigable to contacts and online searchable POIs

Meh

• Limited options
• Requires data connection (won’t work if you are in a no coverage area)

Bad

• Cannot play music in the background
• Limited route recalculation capabilities (takes a few attempts to “really” recalculate a new route)
• Cheapest subscription fee is $30/year, but CoPilot is $35 with no subscriptions.

With Google Voice (formerly GrandCentral) starting to fullfill invites and hopefully opening to everyone soon, many people may not be entirely clear about just what exactly Google Voice is.  I’ve written about it before in an earlier review when it first evolved from GrandCentral, but basically in a short, high level thought, it’s a (free) phone forwarding service — but of course, that just scratches the surface.

What all can GV do for you?  Well, to start out, what you get when you sign up is a new phone number (or, you can port your current number, if you so choose to).  With this phone number, you would probably opt to give all your contacts this new number, setup different forwarding rules on your current phones (to forward to your GV#), so some combination of both.  

What it does:

When someone calls your GV#, it will proceed to ring (forward the call to) all the phones you have listed in your account (or, only certain numbers based on rules you can setup based on who is calling):

For example, if you have a bunch of contacts you have saved under the “Work” category, you can have all calls that come in from someone in there to be forwarded to your “Office” line – have all your contacts from the “Friends” category forwarded to your “Cell” – and then have unknown callers forwarded to all your phones, or perhaps straight to voicemail. 

Once a call is forwarded to one of your phones (cell, office, etc), once the call is answered, you must (by default, but can be changed) press “1” in order to accept the call – this is to handle the event that if the call gets forwarded to two different numbers (your cell and home) and someone from each location picks up the call, the first person to press “1” will actually receive the call. 

Voicemail:

Besides “simple” call forwarding, Google Voice also offers advanced voicemail services which can (attempt to) transcribe the voicemail and send you the text version via email or text message.  At this time, it’s not perfect (as reviewed earlier), but you can usually get the gist of the message that was left and not have to go through all the voicemail prompts and listen to the long messages people can leave :)  — here is an excerpt from my earlier review:

(“hey and here is one set with the radio playing in the car all first five this is back around now just asking about six ninety five people more often the road just kind of thing and stuff like that the fax christian here and now i’m gonna put the alright the speaker and see if there’s any way or not i can transcribe the phone i’m ohh hey nine nine five and that’s the best”)

Send/receive free text messages:

You are also able to send, and receive, text messages from within the GV console (and you can have them forwarded to your cell as well if you wish):

Use as a backup for when you get poor cell reception:

Besides voicemail transcription which I use GV heavily for, I also greatly rely on it’s ability to forward calls to my Gizmo number.  Basically, you can think of Gizmo as Skype – it’s a free computer based (ip) phone client which works on Windows, Mac, and Linux (as well as windows mobile and Nokia tablets) – and, as an added benefit, you can have one of the numbers that your GV# forwards to be your Gizmo number (for free)! 

While there are many implications for this, one that I use it for is to essentially forward my cell phone to my Gizmo (computer) number whenever my cell has no signal or has a dead battery. 

How do you do this?  You’ll want to first setup your phone to forward your calls to your GV# whenever you are “unavailable” (meaning, the cell carrier cannot locate you either because you don’t have signal or because you phone is off/dead).  Then, in GV admin page, you’ll setup a call forwarding rule to forward calls to your Gizmo number.  And now, whenever someone calls your cell and either it’s out of range or is dead, you will still get the call as it is essentially forwarded to your computer!  Perfect for those who live in an area where cell reception is a bit shady!

(however, this means you’ll either need to buy a USB phone, headset, or some other sort of microphone/speaker setup in order to actually talk to someone using your computer).

What Google Voice is not:

Google Voice is not a “phone”.  If you call out from your cell/home/work number, the callee will not see your Google Voice number on their caller ID – so if you give out your GV#, if you call those people straight from your phone, they will not see your GV# but instead your “real” number. 

However, you can of course login to your GV page and place a call from there, in which case GV will first ring your number and wait for you to pickup, and then it will connect you (by calling the callee via your GV#) – in which case, the person will see your GV in caller id.  You can also instantiate the call on your smartphone by either visiting the mobile version of GV page (see the “Quick Call” towards the bottom):

or by using GV Dialer phone app (30 free trial, but must pay after that) on your smartphone:

Wrapping Up:

So basically, Google Voice cannot act as an actual “phone”, but rather is a very resource full tool.  Good for giving out to people you may not want to know your “real” number (i.e. craigslist meets), or even to use as a backup incase you don’t get good signal at your home.   Also, it’s a great way to try to move away from voicemail completely (by setting all calls to go to GV voicemail for transcriptions). 

I have, however, left out some features that Google Voice can do, and on this note, here what Google lists as all of it’s features:

One number for all your calls and SMS

• Call screening – Announce and screen callers
• Listen in – Listen before taking a call
• Block calls – Keep unwanted callers at bay
• SMS – Send, receive, and store SMS
• Place calls – Call US numbers for free
• Taking calls – Answer on any of your phones
• Phone routing – Phones ring based on who calls
• Forwarding phones – Add phones and decide which ring

 

Voicemail as easy as email, with transcripts

• Voicemail transcripts – Read what your voicemail says
• Listen to voicemail – Check online or from your phone
• Notifications – Receive voicemails via email or SMS
• Personalize greeting – Vary greetings by caller
• Share voicemail – Forward or download voicemails

 

More cool things you can do with Google Voice

• Conference calling – Join people into a single call
• Call record – Record calls and store them online
• Call switch – Switch phones during a call
• Mobile site – View your inbox from your mobile
• GOOG-411 – Check directory assistance
• Manage groups – Set preferences by group

(from: http://www.google.com/googlevoice/about.html)

Have you signed up for Google Voice yet?  Any tips/tricks you have discovered to be invaluable?  Share in the comments!

So as a long time GrandCentral user, I was quite excited to try out the new Google Voice.  Yesterday I read about how it would be available "soon" and figured that meant weeks from now.  But to my surprise, I logged into grand central today and saw the update notice once I logged in!

Once I did the upgrade, I quickly went to try it out.  I dialed my Grand Central Google Voice number from my desk phone and quickly noticed that the update reset all my settings and set itself to ring every phone in my account, rather than the ones I had it set to before the upgrade (not a big deal, but it would have been nice to know because I had someone in my office randomly pick up my office phone (one of the numbers in my settings) and I was confused when someone picked up!).    I proceeded to change back my settings to just ring my Gizmo number and left myself a voice mail.  I tried to speak a bit ‘slurry’ as to see how well it would pick up what I said, and about 3 minutes after I hung up. Not only did I get the normal email and text message that I had voicemail/missed call, but also a text message with my transcribed voicemail (and of course the text at google voice website):  

However, what was transcribed was not exactly what I said, but I think it did pretty good considering at times when I listened to my own message, I couldn’t even have even been able to know what I said (had I not known what I already said).  Here is a recording of what I said, then the text of what GV transcribed, and then what I really said:

• Audio File:
• Google Voice’s Transcription:  “this is james i’m just testing out the google grand central riding school voice transcription service i’ll read the headlines CNN dot com right now the department of toughest so if it does profit designation of any kind hadn’t for keeping the so how about on cana bye bye “
• What I really said:  “This is James, just testing out the Google Grand Central, or I guess Google voice transcription service – I’ll read the headline of CNN.com right now, uh, The Department of Justice says it has dropped the designation of "enemy combatant" for detainees held at Guantanamo Bay.”

Wanting to try more ‘real life’ situations, I left my self a few more voicemails. 

One while walking the (less busier streets) streets of DC near GWU:

• Audio File:
• Google’s Transcription:  “this is another test of the transcription your walking down the street washington D C was cards driving by in plane flying over at this is support desk thanks “
• What I really said: “this is another test of the transcription here, walking down the streets of washington dc with cars driving by, and planes flying flying overhead.  Just doing some more testing.”

While walking through Union Station and down a train platform (google could not transcribe it!):

• Audio File:
• Google’s Transcription: Transcript not available
• What I really said: “This is one more test, uh, walking through grand central, eh, union station – walking out on the train platform…to see how easy it is for the google transcription to work with train noise in the background… and people walking around shouting.  I’m now walking down platform-12, getting on the train to get to bwi the marc penn.  <I don’t know…> … or not, walking by one of the train engines.  I’m going to assume it’s not going to be able to…transcribe what I’m saying right now, but I’ll try it and see how it goes.

And then while driving home with music playing in the background:

• Audio File:
• Google’s Transcription:  “hey and here is one set with the radio playing in the car all first five this is back around now just asking about six ninety five people more often the road just kind of thing and stuff like that the fax christian here and now i’m gonna put the alright the speaker and see if there’s any way or not i can transcribe the phone i’m ohh hey nine nine five and that’s the best”
• What I really said: “and here is one test with the radio playing in the car.  I’ll first try it with it just in the background  … uh…. just passing now 6-96 Baltimore off camp mead road .. just kind of saying stuff so I can test the transcription here.  And now I’m going to put the cell right next to the speaker and see if there’s anyway that it can transcribe the song [song plays – and not even I can hardly understand what song it is!] … Hot 9-9-5.  And that’s the test”

Update (3/15/09): In doing my initial review, I failed to notice the ‘embed’ feature that can be used to simply paste code that directly plays your message (including the option to add a ‘caption’). Below is a sample recording I received from a SPAM / Telemarketer [a pre-recorded automated message], and google voice did a pretty good job transcribing this one:

• Google transcription: warranty on your vehicle may have expired and should be reactivated to protect you against the cost of repairs if you have not responded to this notification it’s not too late please don’t make a mistake of driving without a warranty you are still eligible to reactivate warranty coverage this is the final call before we close the file press one to speak with a representative now about your vehicle press two to be removed from the follow up west

Browsing around on the site a bit more, I noticed the option where you now can directly enter in a number you want to call – as opposed to before, in order to make a call FROM grand central you had to click ‘call’ from a log in your call history, or someone from your contact list.  You weren’t able to just call any number.

As you can see, it has the look and feel that all of Google’s products have (looks just like Gmail).  Unfortunately, at least for now, I don’t see an option to ‘integrate’ it into the Gmail screen  like Google Docs is. 

What else is nice is the new SMS feature where you can send text messages:

At first, I just figured that you could only send messages.  But then I thought I’d go ahead and try replying and see what would happen, and to my surprise, the message showed up at Google Voice and it appeared in a threaded-sms style:

Another positive change is that you can now create/manage user groups (before, you were only allowed to use the 5 pre-defined groups, Family, Friends, Work, WebButton, and Other):

You also have the option on the left panel to check out your SMS messages, recorded conversations, and call logs.  Below that, you have your remaining balance for making international calls – are they good prices?  I’m not sure…I never call international so I wouldn’t know :)

However, you can see for yourself here [google.com/support…] as well as below where I’ve listed a few countries:

• Argentina – $0.02 land / $0.16 mobile
• Bahamas – $0.04
• Brazil – $0.04 land / $0.19 mobile
• Canada – $0.01
• China – $0.02
• Costa Rica – $0.07
• France – $0.02 land / $0.15 mobile
• Germany – $0.02 / $0.18 mobile
• India – $0.07
• Japan – $0.02 land / $0.15 mobile
• Mexico – $0.05
• Mexico City – $0.02 / $0.19 mobile
• Puerto Rico – $0.02
• Spain – $0.02 land / $0.19 mobile
• Taiwan – $0.02 land / $0.09 mobile
• United States – $0.00 (free!)
• UK – $0.02 land / $0.19 mobile

Conclusion:

I think this is a great addition to Google Grand central’s offerings.  Did it take a while for them to make updates since they first rolled out with GC? yep, but it’s alright, it’s free!  My ‘real world tests’ of leaving voicemails were a bit extreme, even when I was speaking clearly [at least as far as I think], it did manage to miss the correct words, so maybe it will get better [or maybe I just can't speak clearly? haha]. One, of many, uses for Google Voice would be for those with poor cell phone reception by combining it with Gizmo — [for those who don’t know, you can have Google Voice also ring a Gizmo number that you can use on your computer].   where they could have their cell phone forward to their Google Voice number if they’re out of range [and then they could pick up their gizmo phone]; Hopefully Google won’t sometime decide to charge for Voice!  +1 Google!

After a long wait, ordering on 8/27/08 and finally receiving it 9/25/08 (wow, almost as bad as the Dell XPS M1330!), I finally have the wonderful machine that is the Lenovo IdeaPad U330.  Preliminary thoughts after using it for about 2 hours?  Neat features, very responsive, I hate the placement of the Fn key, and awesome screen. 1 day? Great screen, very cool facial recognition webcam, awesome screen, bad battery life, nice keyboard, quite responsive, quiet, and I don’t like vista.  Seeing as how I just received this laptop, this will be a somewhat simple, initial review.  It will take a few days to do full battery testing, performance metrics, etc etc, but I will post updates to this page as I go along, and post a final review in a new post once it’s complete!

On with the review!

The specs of the machine I ordered, which if I remember right, was the only configuration available at the time:

• Intel Core 2 Duo (Centrino 2) P7350 (2GHz, 1GHz fsb, 3mb L2 cache)
• Windows Vista Home Premium
• 13.3" WXGA (1280×800) LED TFT Screen (16:10, 300:1 contrast, 300nits)
• ATI Radeon HD 3450 256mb Dedicated AND Integrated Intel 4500MHD (dynamic switching between them! 
• 3GB DDR3 PC3-8500 1066MHz
• 320GB 5400RPM Sata drive (1.5gb/s
• DVD-RW/CD-RW
• 1.3mp webcam with dual array mics (with facial recognition software)
• Intel Wireless WiFi Link 5100 (a/b/g/n)
• 6 cell battery
• Memory card slot
• Dolby Home Theater premium audio
• (no express or pcmcia card slot) ExpressCard/34 Slot (thanks Andrew!)
• 2x 2.0 usb, 1x firewire, 1x HDMI (HDCP), 1xVGA, 1xEthernet (10×100), Bluetooth 2.0
• 4lbs 4oz (with 6 cell battery)  – this is the actual weight measured with my digital scale
• 12.5" x 9.3" x 0.9-1.1" (318mm x 237mm x 23-28mm)
• (full spec sheet available here from lenovo.com)

Review Updates:

1. 9/27/08, 10:53a – Vista experience scores for ATI video card
2. 9/27/08, 3:49p – Running BatteryEaterPro tests (1.5hrs max performance)
3. 9/27/08, 7:36p – Added info about heat and noise while running BEP tests
4. 9/27/08, 8:40p – Added pics of weight
5. 9/27/08, 9:25p – Video of sticker removal
6. 9/27/08, 9:42p – Video of touchpad keys, keyboard, and fan noise levels
7. 9/27/08, 10:54p – Install XP
8. 9/27/08, 10:58p – 3dMark Vantage not working…
9. 9/28/08, 8:52a – No bios option to turn off annoying boot jingle…
10. 9/28/08, 10:26a – Battery time (~3.0hrs power saver mode, intel graphics)

Sections of the review (so far):

• Unboxing
• Different Physical Views / Aesthetics
• Performance
• Keyboard
• Webcam (face recognition only, so far)
• Heat and Noise (just writing this review, and light video editing)
• Build Quality
• Battery
• Install XP
• Bios / Drivers

Unboxing:

Here you can see all that comes in the box:  manuals, paperwork, charger, battery, and the laptop itself.  There are no cd’s included in the box (no windows re-install, nothing).  What may look like a case is actually just the fabric they put in between the screen and the keyboard for shipment.  And that ugly sticker… why’d they have to put that on the palm rest!?  (don’t worry, it’s not "sticky" — it comes right off — whew! ).

Different Physical Views & Aesthetics:

Here’s a look from the top, and the bottom

Left (fan exhaust, VGA, ethernet, HDMI), and Right (Firewire, 2x USB, DVD-RW, Power, lock)

In the front we have what looks to be an IR receiver for a remote (no remote included, I’ll report back on what this is later), activity lights, memory card slot, headphone/mic jack, wireless switch).

The first picture shows how far the lcd can be opened, and the second picture shows how thin it is (pretty thin!)

And last but not least, the keyboard (WHY oh WHY did they switch the position of the Fn and Ctrl key!?!?!?), and the glossy-ness of the screen.

Update 5: 9/27/08, 9:25p – As you saw in the picture above, there is a huge sticker on the left side of the palm rest – at first, I was pissed because in my experience, these stickers can be a pain to get off without leaving nasty, sticky residue.  However, fear not – the sticker isn’t really sticky, and comes right off without a problem:

Performance:

I haven’t had a chance to do much hard core testing, but I’ll start out with the HDTune Results and Super Pi.  HDTune showed results of:  7.5mb/s minimum, 64.8mb/s maximum, and 49.2mb/s average transfer rates, 17.3ms avg seek time, 50.0mb/sec burst, and 22.9% CPU usage.  It also does have NCQ enabled:

Super Pi results:  1M = 25 seconds, 2M = 59 seconds.

Vista Experience Scores (Intel graphics):  3.7

• Processor:  4.9
• Memory:  5.7
• Graphics: 4.0
• Gaming graphics:  3.7
• Primary hard disk:  5.3

Vista Experience Scores (ATI graphics): 4.4

• Processor:  4.9
• Memory:  5.7
• Graphics:  4.5
• Gaming Graphics:  4.4
• Primary Hard disk:  5.3

Below, is my initial boot sequence video (very simple, and just from power on to the login screen) — not much editing has been done in any of these videos, so if it sounds like I’m "uhhh, and, uhhhh", just deal with it :).  Upon boot, it plays a short little audio jingle, which is cute, but I’ll turn it off as soon as I look into doing it.

Update 8: 9/27/08, 10:58p – Okay, so I’ve been trying to run 3dMark vantage now about 4 times, and each time I do it, it’s getting about 1-2fps, and then it says that there must be some error and give me a 3dmark score in the low 200′s.  I’m going to keep investigating.  Hopefully I figure this out…

Keyboard:

The keyboard is very nice — sturdy, fairly quiet (though the Dell Mini 9 is quieter), and larger than normal labels (which is good).  Unfortunately, the home and end keys require the use of the Fn key to be held down, but that’s fairly common (though I don’t like it).

Again, as I stated in my Dell Mini 9 review, I HATE when keyboards are not laid out in their standard way.  And I know IBM/Lenovo has had this with their other laptops, but WHY oh WHY did that have to swap the left Ctrl key with the Fn key!?  I suppose if you are already a IBM/Lenovo user, you may be used to it, and my whines will be falling on deaf ears, but for everyone else… I hate it, haha.  However…  The more I use it (writing this review and such), the more I am becoming more conscious about moving my pinky to the right a little when I’m looking to the left Ctrl key, so perhaps… after a while… it won’t be as big of a deal as I’m making it out to be.  but you have been warned.

Other than that, the keyboard is alright.  There is a little bit of flex in the middle, just a little, and I keep thinking it’s a bit (a very little bit) raised/bulged in the middle too — but then I look at it level with the palm rest, and I don’t see it being higher… (reminds me of the m1330 keyboard bulge..).   I asked someone else if they thought it looked bulged, and they couldn’t see it (maybe my eyes have bad barrel distortion???).  Another thing I’ve noticed, as I’ve been writing this paragraph (haha), is that I have to press directly in the center of the ‘?’ key in order for it to register – as if there’s a loose contact or something.  (I’m going to assume that’s just a fluke with my particular keyboard… let me know if any of ya’ll have this too!)

I do, however, love the touch sensitive media pad!  There is a "switching" button that toggles the buttons from "media" to "equalizer":

Webcam (and face recognition):

For now, I’m just going to talk about the face recognition for logging in — and I must say, this is pretty sweet!  Basically, it’s very fast at recognizing your face, fast setting up, and doesn’t confuse my cat’s face for my own.  I also tried using a couple pictures I had of my self on my other laptop, put it’s screen in front of the webcam, and it couldn’t recognize it — but I didn’t try very hard.  I’ll later try a printed picture, or on a better quality screen, so see if it can be beat!

Heat and Noise:

So far, after just writing this review (about 2 hours), doing some light video editing in Windows Movie Maker, it has been rather warm at times (and it’s been on my lap the whole time).  Hot enough for me to have said "wow, this is getting kind of warm on my leg (the left side, where the hard drive is).  The fan turns on, on and off, but never gets very loud;  I can hear it, but it’s fairly faint.

After I do more of the review (performance testing, normal usage, etc), I’ll be able to better report on how hot it gets, and how warm it is most of the time.  But so far, most of the time the fan is on but hardly audible, and it’s pretty much always ‘luke warm’, and when doing the video rendering and such, it can get slightly hot (it makes me start to get hot, and a bit sweaty on my legs when it’s on my lap).  The palm rest never gets HOT, but it does stay a little warm most of the time (but again, all laptops I use do too).

Update 9/27/08, 7:26p — During the running of full battery eater pro tests, I was curious to see how hot and loud the laptop was.  The fan seems to be pushing out a lot of air, and it still isn’t very loud at all — it’s surprising how not loud it is.  Now, I’m not saying it’s silent, but compared to the noise my acer aspire one and dell latitude d630 can make, this thing is surprisingly quiet.   Also, it does get quite warm (borderline hot), but it’s mostly just where the hard drive is located — yes, the palm rest and rest of the keyboard gets warm as well, but it’s not bad.

Update 6: 9/27/08, 9:50p – Here’s a video of the loudness of the touchpad buttons, keyboard, and fan.  (for some reason, all the fans sound louder on camera than they do in real life — it really isn’t as loud as the camera makes it out to be. ):

Build Quality:

This laptop has it’s pros and cons when it comes to build quality.  The keyboard and bottom chassis (everything but the screen) is very sturdy, and there’s no flexing (except the bit mentioned earlier, in the middle of the keyboard).   A commenter in my ‘coming soon’ post asked if the screen seemed to have a solid frame, and unfortunately, it’s quite easy to flex and bend — a bit of a disappointment for me.  If I hold the top of the screen in one hand (at the webcam), and push in the middle of the back of the screen, it will bow in a bit.    If I grab each side of the screen, and use my fingers to push in the middle (from the back), it too is pretty easy to flex.

With the lid closed, there’s no latch to keep it closed, and it’s not a "tight" fit — what I mean by that, is if I were to turn it up side down in my hand and hold it by the sides, the lid opens about a millimeter or so.   The hinges, though, are tight enough to not allow the screen to wobble when you typing, or your using it on your lap.

Update 4: 9/27/08, 8:40p – Wasn’t sure what ‘section’ to put this in, so I put it here, haha — The actual weight of the laptop with the 6 cell battery is 4lbs 4oz, and the charger itself is about 1lb 2oz:

Battery:

So far, battery times are not looking good (at least with the ATI card enabled).  I’ve run the BatteryEaterPro twice (for some reason, it didn’t create the graphs), with settings at 1280×800 32 and full screen, with brightness maxed, wifi and bluetooth on,  and I keep getting right at 1 hours 30 minutes.  1:30!!!!  Okay, so maybe it will be better with the integrated video…. I’ll keep ya’ll posted!!

Update:  I’ve switched back to intel graphics, and "power saver" mode, and vista is reporting that I should be able to get 3:30 (we’ll see about that, haha)

Update: 9/28/08, 10:26a — Okay, so I just tested the battery time with the integrated Intel graphics, 3/10 brightness, wifi/bluetooth on, and "power saver mode" on.  This also allowed the screen to turn off during in activity, which happened a few times.  With 7% battery life left, I had just reached the 3 hour mark — I was watching the debate skit on SNL on Hulu, and then the screen turned off, audio eventually stopped, and about 2 minutes later it turned off (why did it take so long to hibernate?).  3 hours on lowest settings… not anywhere near the claimed 5 hours by ibm… (perhaps it will fair better with xp!?)

• Vista
  • ATI Graphics, max performance, 10/10 brightness, wifi/bluetooth on, BatteryEaterPro (1280×800 full screen)
    • 1 hour, 30 minutes (ran the test twice)
  • Intel Integrated Graphics, 3/10 brightness, wifi/blueooth, with ‘moderate’ usage (web browsing with IE, watching Hulu clips, uninstalling programs, editing this review)
    • 3 hours, 1 minute (just ran this once)
• XP
  • {soon to come}

Installing XP:

Okay, so I’ve yet to jump on the Vista band wagon, as I am still in love with XP.  After trying to do this review for a while, and trying to figure out where everything is in Vista, I’ve decided I’m going to (eventually) do this review in XP as well.  For those of you who have this laptop already, and went to lenovo’s site and can’t find the drivers for XP, here is the link:

• http://consumersupport.lenovo.com/lenovo/Drivers/list.aspx?CategoryID=849

Once I get more stuff on this review finished (or not, ie: 3dmark isn’t working…), I’ll back everything up and then install XP and let ya’ll know how things fair there!

Bios / Drivers:

Tying to figure out how to stop the ‘cute’ boot up jingle, I started looking around in the bios. Basically, there’s nothing there except boot sequence, passwords, and changing the time. Very disappointing seeing as how I see no other way to stop the jingle from happening other than in the bios! Here’s a breakdown of the bios options (values are editable unless specified):

• Information, just simply lists the following (nothing to change):
  • CPU Type: core2duo p7350 @ 2.00ghz
  • System Memory: 3072mb
  • HDD Info: 320gb sata
  • System BIOS version:  OFCN46WW
  • KBC Version: 03.37
  • Product Name:  Lenovo IdeaPad U330
  • Unit Serial Number:  [I'm not going to list this, haha]
  • Lenovo SN:  Invalid (what???)
  • UUID Number:  [like a 30 digit alphanumeric string]
• Main
  • System Time
  • System Date
  • Network Boot  (enabled/disabled)
• Advanced
  • Legacy USB Support:  (enabled/disabled)
  • Wireless:  (enabled/disabled)
  • Sata Controller Mode:  (Non-AHCI, AHCI)
  • Graphics Device: Switchable graphics, discrete graphics)
    • in the "item specific help" on the right it says "Switchable graphics mode allow switch between discrete and integrated graphics.  NOTE:  This mode should only be selected if you are using WIindows Vista and the corresponding driver installed.  Discrete graphics mode will achieve higher graphics performance"
• Security:
  • Set Supervisor Password
  • Set User Password
  • Password on boot
  • Primary Hard Disk Password
    • Set Hard Disk Master Password
    • Set Hard Disk User Password
• Boot:  just simply allows you to change the boot order — the ordered list contains:
  • USB FDD:
  • ATA CD/DVD: HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GSA-U20N
  • ATA HDD: WDC WD3200BEVT-22ZCTO
  • USB HDD:
  • USB CD/DVD:
  • PCI LAN : Network Boot
  • No boot drive
  • No boot drive
• Exit
  • Exit saving changes
  • exit discarding changes
  • load setup defaults
  • discard changes
  • save changes

And that’s it’s folks.  Not that I was expecting a whole lot, but at least an option to turn off the audio jingle!!  Not cool…! (unless, has someone figured out a way to kill the jingle??)

I’m also looking to install XP (and maybe a fresh install of Vista…we’ll see), so those who want the drivers, you can find them here: EDIT:  looks like they’ve now combined the pages for XP and Vista drivers, and it looks like they removed some of the XP drivers….???? What’s going on here?

• Vista: http://consumersupport.lenovo.com/lenovo/Drivers/list.aspx?CategoryID=849
• XP: http://consumersupport.lenovo.com/lenovo/Drivers/list.aspx?CategoryID=849

That’s all there is for now.   Check back tomorrow for more updates!!! Keep checking back for updates. (I am in the process of downloading game demos, so I’ll be able to get on those tomorrow as well soon — including battery times, etc).   Be sure to list, in the comments below, anything you want to see!

WinPlay.com just released Guitar Hero Mobile (direct link) for mobile phones, so, being the Guitar Hero fan I am, I had to buy it and try it out!  What did I think? — It’s definitely worth the money ($15 one time purchase, $5/mo subscription)!  I chose to go with the one time buy because I could easily see my self playing this after 3 months, assuming it’s good, and I hate to waste money, haha.   

The game play is very similar to that of the “non mobile” versions, such as on playstation or xbox, other than it’s only 3 keys instead of 5.  At first I thought it would be way too easy with three keys, but when playing expert it was hard enough to be fun.  You start out with 15 songs, 4 to begin with, and like the real game, you have to play through career mode to unlock the other 11.  Here is a list of differences from the mobile version to the console version:

• 3 keys instead of 5
• Songs are not nearly as long and fade out in the middle of the song when done
• Fewer characters and guitars
• No vs gameplay
• No ‘buying’ songs

Other than those items listed, the game is pretty much the same as full blown guitar hero!  You have the note streak count, star power, rock meter, different venues, requirement to beat career mode to unlock songs, etc.  Playback was not completely smooth, but I do not know if that is an issue with the video drivers on my HTC phone or what, but it’s good enough to play and enjoyable.  It comes with a good variety of songs, game play is intuitive and hard enough to be fun, and works in portrait or landscape.

One thing that bugs me is that each time you play a different song, it has to download it and then delete the song you just played…  To get around that, at least in windows mobile, is browse to your guitar hero directory and make that song read only!

Conclusion?  Go buy and download it!!  Check out my youtube review here which has gameplay, side-by-side comparison for easy, medium, and hard, and more:

Pros:

• Just like the console version
• Hard enough difficulty to be fun
• 3 new downloadable songs every month
• Landscape and Portrait support

Cons:

• Not free (haha)
• Playback is a LITTLE choppy
• Cannot assign buttons

Finally, a FREE and working desktop app to sync your outlook calendar with your google calendar!  This is especially great news for windows mobile users (among any other applications that use an outlook calendar) cause now both gcal and outlook can sync up with your pda/phones!  Now, if only there is a way to trigger a sync update when activesync syncs with a device..!

Direct link:  http://www.google.com/support/calendar/bin/answer.py?answer=89955

Just saw this posted on lifehacker, tried it out, and had to spread the word!  This freeware smartphone app will turn your wifi enabled smartphone into a wifi router (ad-hoc, aka: computer-to-computer) — in other words, you can take your windows mobile phone, and if you have a data plan and wifi, you can have any other wifi device connect to it as if it were a router!  I could definitely see this as being useful when my Comcast connection goes down and my roommates and I all need to have simple access to email and such until it goes back up!  Not just that, but also if you have a laptop (or any device) that doesn’t have bluetooth to utilize the bluetooth internet sharing in wm6, you can just use this as devices are more likely to have Wifi than bluetooth. 

It’s easy to install too — just head over to http://www.jongma.org/WMWifiRouter/, and you can either install a self install exe (which installs through active sync), or you can download the cab (copy it over to your phone or simply download from your phone directly).  It sets up the ad-hoc network for you automatically, so all you have to do is install, tap “connect”, and then have your laptop (or other wifi device) connect to the “WMWifiRouter” network!  That’s it!

Keep in mind though, as lifehacker and the creators of WMWifiRouter state, it’s still under heavy development — but as it is right now, it works great on my cingular 8525 with two different computers connected to it at the same time.   I was curious if there would be any speed loss on my laptop vs using direct cable or bluetooth, and I still got just over 120k/sec:

One thing though, as stated in their FAQ [link, 2nd post], you may have to manually set your wifi adapter on your phone to only connect to ‘computer-to-computer’ for WMWifiRouter to work correctly (and therefore, create the WMWifiRouter network) — I had to do this to get it to work because I had a bunch of wifi networks preconfigured to automatically connect on my phone. 

verdict?  Head over to jongma.org right now and install it on your windows mobile device!

I can’t express how excited I am over LogMeIn’s release of Hamachi for Windows Mobile (download it here) — though it may have been out for a while, but I just found out today!  This opens so many doors for connecting your pda/phone to your hamachi network. 

for those who don’t know, hamachi is a free vpn client which can connect all your computers together as if they were on the same network, even when they’re not, onto their own virtual network (vpn).  It works behind firewalls and creates a secure connection between all computers (read more about hamachi security framework here).

What makes hamachi great is it’s ability to simply connect computers that are on different networks.  For example, I have a desktop and server at home, and I have my laptop which I carry with me where ever I go.   With hamachi, I can connect to either of those computers (from my laptop) as if I were at home — what I mean by this, is if I want to access a file from my desktop, I just go to start->run-> \jrindesktopmusicasong.mp3.   With hamachi installed on both my desktop and laptop, I can access files when I’m home, or on the go!

Not only is this useful for basic file access and sharing, but you can also do remote desktop (though using LogMeIn’s software is usually a better experience for remote desktop when not on the same physical network), map network drives, print remotely, virtual lan parties (gaming and such), and so much more!

Installation is a snap as well – simply download the hamachi installer and run it, power it on and create a nickname (ie:  “jRinDesktop”, “jRinPhone”, etc), and then join or create a network ( ie: “jRinNet”) with a password.  Then that’s it!  All computers connected to the same network are now (for most intents and purposes) as if they were all connected to the same router!

Installing it on my phone was just as easy as installing it on a computer — simply download the cab file from their site, copy it over to the phone, run it, and create a nickname and join my network! 

What do I use hamachi for regularly?

• Printing from my laptop, to my home printer (connected to my desktop), when I’m away from home
• Remote desktop’ing to my desktop’s at home to use software I don’t have installed on my laptop
• Run backups of my family and friends’ computers to my server (albeit this is slow, but only because most people’s upload speeds are slow :- )
• Have access to my laptop or desktop when I’m using a computer that’s not my own (during boring labs at gatech, for example, haha)

And now that I have hamachi on my phone:

• Access all my files on my laptop and desktop from my PHONE (this is useful cause sometimes my laptop battery is dead, and I need that document for class I have on my desktop, so I can now just use my phone and put the file on my SD card!)
  • I do this using TotalCommander (a free file manager replacement for windows mobile), and then just type in the machine name (ie: \jrindesktop)
    
• Copying pictures and movies taken with my phone to my laptop or desktop

What I want to TRY to do:

• Print to my desktop at home!
• Be able to access files on my phone from a computer (instead of other way around)
• Remote desktop!! (I can’t seem to get logmein to work on my phone… )

Over the next few days,  I hope to find new and interesting things to do with ‘mobile hamachi’ — I’ll update this post if I discover anything!!  Now go out and get a smartphone (if you don’t already) and install hamachi!!

• find the song you want,
• add it to your cart,
• purchase,
• and download straight from their site.

AND finally, a music site that’s firefox friendly!.  You can also opt to download their music downloader software, but it is not necessary, which is just a simple download manager for amazon music downloads (it’s nice for what it is, it will automatically add the downloaded songs to your windows media player play list).  Also, unlike walmart, it’s easy to search for mp3′s because all they (amazon) have are mp3s (whereas walmart has a mix, and last time I used it, it was hard to find mp3′s vs wma’s)

(goto amazon.com mp3 downloads)

here’s some screen shots of purchasing/downloading a song (using their downloader):

1.  Find a song
 
(click image to enlarge)

2. Purchase the song 

3.  Download the song (using amazon downloader) — and if you weren’t using the amazon downloader, you would/could just have the direct .mp3 download instead of the .amz here.

Then from here, it downloads and is available for listening! simple, quick, and cheap!