Dell Venue Pro - Stylish review

As we saw with the HTC HD7, there were some issues with the OS. The Dell Venue Pro however may have just set a benchmark where Windows Phone 7 devices are concerned. Even though I didn’t think it is possible, the Venue Pro does manage to showcase a slightly smoother UI as compared to other WP7 devices we’ve tested. A new a'Venue' from Dell Design and Build Quality  The Dell Venue Pro can pretty much be considered the WP7 version of the Dell Venue Android handset that came sans QWERTY keypad. The Pro manages to out shine its competition with other WP7 devices when it comes to looks, but not much else. The slightly curved full screen display adds a touch of class to the phone. The sides of the phone and the Dell logo are finished in chrome. The back of the phone is also finished with a stylish patterned design. To say that I am completely awestruck by the beauty of this phone is an understatement. The Dell Venue Pro features a 4.1-inch AMOLED display with an 800 x 480 (WVGA) resolution (Gorilla Glass). This handset comes with a portrait side QWERTY pop slide keyboard which has elegant hard plastic keys. The spacing of the keys is made to precision and typing is not a problem at all. The keyboard however would have been much better if it was in landscape mode thus fully utilizing the massive size of this device. On the face of the phone are three capacitive buttons - back, home and search, which light on contact.                                                                                           27,900  The top of the phone sports the circular power/ sleep button to the right and on the left is the 3.5 mm audio jack. On the right side of the phone are the volume keys and below them is the camera shutter release. All these are flushed along the side of the phone and made with the same chrome finish that adds to the elegance of the device phone. The bottom of the phone features a set of stereo speakers with a micro USB port for charging or syncing with a computer in between. Features and Performance Interface The Dell Venue Pro operates its WP7 UI with a 1 GHz Scorpion processor and a 512 MB RAM. Even first time WP7 users should have no problems navigating through the new OS. The responsiveness of the interface is as smooth as an iPhone’s with no lag. The designated search button allows you to connect easily to Microsoft’s Bing search engine through either 3G, Wi-Fi, GPRS or EDGE. Bulky in design The ‘Start Screen’ is customizable to an extent and just about anything can be added to it. This can be an interesting feature to have all your most used items on the main screen.  The Tile system of the Home screen is very attractive in a ‘modern art’ sort of way with the tiles being either square or rectangular in shape. Navigating through the main menu is only available in portrait mode. UI auto-rotation is possible while texting, web surfing, emailing or viewing images. Social networking on the Dell Venue Pro is seamless as it connects your phone contacts with your Facebook, Windows Live, etc. accounts. Automatic social updates, Facebook style, can be viewed through the ‘What’s New’ tab in the People hub.  Through this feature you can also update your Facebook or Windows Live status while also being able to comment on posts. There is no Twitter integration but a third party app can be used to post your tweets. Patterned back with chrome Dell logo One feature where iOS (now) and Android are ahead of WP7 is multitasking. Along with Office, People, Music & Videos, Internet Explorer hubs there is also an Xbox Live Games hub; where Xbox Live games can be downloaded on to the phone and played. Overall the interface of Microsoft Windows Phone 7 is sure to be a force to be reckoned with in the future. Multimedia WP7, being a closed interface like iOS, multimedia can only be transferred by syncing with the Zune software on a PC. The audio/ video playback on this device truly does provide a sensory feast to the user. There are five different options in the media hub – music, videos, podcasts, radio and the marketplace for media related content. The handset supports - MP3, WAV, WMA and eAAC+ audio formats. The music hub interface is very smartly designed - not only does the album art show but also a picture of the artist as well in a sort of wallpaper layout. There audio playback was excellent even at high volumes, no distortion noticed whatsoever. Tones were well balanced however, the lack of any presets negate any personal customization, which not everyone will be ok with. The Dell Venue Pro also has an inbuilt radio, something that is lacking on the iPhone. The radio reception was good and no signal loss was noticed. A variety of video codecs like - H.263/H.264, 3GP, MPEG4, WMV and VC-1 are supported. Viewing videos on this 4.1-inch AMOLED screen was a delight. The performance of the video was tested by using a file converted by the Zune player whilst syncing it to the device. It was encoded at a resolution of 1280 x 720p which fit the entire screen of the phone.  The Venue Pro features a 1400 mAh lithium Ion and comes loaded with 8GB or 16GB of internal storage with unfortunately, no expansion option. A big issue with WP7 devices. (Apple anyone?). As opposed to the Venue’s 8MP camera, Dell has downsized and equipped the Pro with a 5 megapixel auto-focus camera and LED flash. Dell went to great lengths to manufacture a phone that could live up to our ever increasing high standard in terms of design and build quality. It looks like it could take a couple of knocks and still come out on top. It weighs in at a whopping 192.8g. Size and weight apart though, this is one beautiful looking handset. Connectivity This smartphone has 3G capabilities as well as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1 and USB. The call quality of the Dell Venue Pro was a little poor as there was some voice distortion and static noticed. However, the person on the other end didn’t seem to notice any distortion and found the calls quite clear. There was also no dropped calls or loss of network during the usage of this phone even in areas where cellular reception was low. Stylish design The Wi-Fi speed on this device is on par with any other smartphone in the market and the speed of file transfer or downloads were good. Browsing the internet on this phone is really pleasing as the page load rate is really quick thanks to the IE browser on board. The Marketplace is Microsoft's answer to Google's Android Market and Apple's App Store.The WP7 Marketplace allows you to purchase music, videos, apps and podcasts. It has apps ranging from games to lifestyle, health & fitness to finance and many more. Although, it may not seem like much now, the number of apps are steadily increasing. The games option in the Marketplace directs you to the Xbox Live page. In this page you can download Xbox Live games (online multiplayer as well) made especially for WP7. Here’s the big catch with the Marketplace though, it’s not yet available for India. But, where there’s a will there’s a way, and work arounds are possible if you want to access it. Bing maps for WP7 are also available for use with the Venue Pro’s built in GPS module. Misc. Features Office on WP7 is great as you can not only view but also edit and email the content you work on. MS Office on the Dell Venue Pro has PowerPoint, Excel and Word applications. OneNote which is Microsoft’s answer to the hugely popular Evernote is of course also part of the Office set up. Basic mobile features like – a calculator, Alarm clock and calendar (syncs to Windows Live) are also onboard. Besides the highlighted features above, the Dell Venue Pro also has other interesting features like People, Hotmail, maps, Internet Explorer, G-sensor, e-compass, proximity sensor and ambient light sensor. However, one major issue with WP7 is the lack of a chat application.

Camera The Dell Venue Pro sports a 5 megapixel, auto-focus camera with an LED flash it is also able to record videos at 720p. Settings include white balance, a few scene modes and geo-tagging, ISO levels (up to 800) which are quite limited when compared to others available in the same price bracket. The outdoor images were decent with a fair amount of detail and no color supplementation was noticed. All the natural hues are visible and no pinkness was seen in sunlit areas. Overall the outdoor picture quality is good. A lot of detail is visible with outdoor pics The same cannot be said about the indoor image quality with there being a lot of color supplementation and even with the LED flash on, the area photographed could not be lit up enough. Further to this, in low light environments the images came out quite grainy. Indoor pictures are grainy The performance of the auto-focus fluctuates and can frustrate a bit when it sometimes captures blurry images. However, when macro images were clicked using the Dell Venue Pro the outcome of the same was quite sharp. To sum it up, the quality of the camera on this WP7 handset is decent. Macro pics are crisp Battery The 1400 mAh battery of the Dell Venue Pro is decent where normal usage is concerned that is making calls, browsing the net over Wi-Fi, listening to music, watching videos or playing games all in moderation and had lasted around 17 hours. Under somewhat heavy usage (playing music continuously) the battery got fully discharged in just over 14 hours.   Verdict At a market price of  27,900, this may not be the most ideal phone to purchase. With the size and weight of the Dell Venue Pro being a major issue there is also no proper weight distribution when the keyboard slides out. The Pro has some great features and it's fitted with an operating system that is surely going to do well in the future, right now though, there's plenty of room for improvement. The Zune Marketplace is not available in India thereby, making it difficult to download apps. Though the Dell Venue Pro is a good looking phone, with a price tag of 27,900, you would be better off with the HTC Mozart or a phone with another operating system that can offer better specs and at the same time be easier on the pocket.

Adobe Launches Creative Suite 5.5, the Mobile Web Just got Better

Adobe has just announced the immediate availability of the Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 product family. Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 is designed to deliver important advances in HTML5 and Flash authoring. Creative Suite 5.5 products also feature new innovations in the areas of video production and editing and brings in new capabilities for digital publishing. With Creative Suite 5.5 content authors worldwide would be able to deliver high-impact work to multiple platforms, operating systems, Web browsers, smartphones and tablets – including Android, BlackBerry Tablet OS, and Apple iOS devices.

What this means for the end consumer is higher end and more interactive content for mobile and tablet devices. Reading newspapers and magazines on these devices will take on a whole new form and will of course make the content even richer than it already is. Web designers and developers will also get a serious boost out of the new Creative Suite as it should enable and easier way to work with HTML5 conetnt development.

Bring forth CS 5.5 and let there be interactive content all around

Adobe Flash Professional CS5.5, Flash Builder 4.5 Premium and the Flex 4.5 framework are built to allow users to quickly and easily develop, test and deploy high-performance mobile applications for Android, BlackBerry Tablet OS and Apple iOS. Creative Suite 5.5 will enable print publishers to create interactive publications on the latest tablet platforms.

Adobe today also announced the immediate availability of the Professional Edition of Adobe Digital Publishing Suite, a turnkey solution that includes hosted services and viewer technology that allow publishers to publish content to Android tablets, BlackBerry PlayBook and Apple iPad.

The new Creative Suite product lineup is headlined by Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Master Collection, which includes, in a single package, all of Adobe's tools, such as Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Acrobat, Flash Builder Premium, Flash Catalyst, Flash Professional, Dreamweaver, Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects. 

These products are available separately or as components of one or more of the five Creative Suite editions. The complete Creative Suite 5 lineup includes Creative Suite 5.5 Master Collection, Creative Suite 5.5 Design Premium, Creative Suite 5.5 Web Premium, Creative Suite 5.5 Production Premium and Creative Suite 5.5 Design Standard.

Live Images of the BlackBerry Torch 2 Running OS 7 Leak

RIM is back in the spotlight this week with their handset being caught on pictures and a video. Those of you following BlackBerry news might have already been used to the pre-release images of their smartphones. Anyway, coming to the pictures, the Torch 2 has been caught on some really clear pictures this time.

The sensor is NOT a camera

From what sources say, the handset will be running on BlackBerry OS 7, although about a month back the Torch 2 was said to be running OS 6.1, but let’s leave that for RIM to decide. The device uses both touch and a QWERTY keyboard as input interface. Check out the images of the Torch 2.

Slide out QWERTY keyboard

Apart from the pictures there’s a video as well, but somehow it's acting pretty funny. You can still have a look at the video from this link. Also, from what these guys say, the Torch 2 apparently has a sensor in the front and that shouldn’t be mistaken for a front facing camera.

camcorders-JVC GR-D350AG

JVC’s new mini-DV camcorder aims at the budget buyer. But how well does it stand against the competition? Let’s find out. Build When it comes to pure build quality, there's not much to complain about. The D350AD's body is mostly made up of hard plastic, yet it feels sturdy enough for rough travel. The lens comes with an external lens cap which is kind of a downer since I generally prefer having an automatic lens cover on camcorders, due to the nature of their use. The adjustable grip strap feels comfortable and you can easily wrap your fingers around the 56x94x112 mm body with ease. The recording controls are placed within easy reach of the thumb and the forefinger allowing easy single handed operation of the DV cam. As in all camcorders, you have the option of using the tilt-n-swivel pull-out screen or the electronic viewfinder for shooting and playback. The playback controls however consist of some tight buttons, placed uncomfortably under the pull-out screen, which seemed like a bother to use. Features The D350AD supports a shooting resolution of 520 lines at 4:3 ratio, PAL. It also has an option of shooting in anamorphic squeeze 16:9 aspect ratio, which means that though it will look normal on a widescreen TV, regular TVs will show the video as vertically stretched. A letterboxed 16:9 aspect ratio—which would show black bands on a regular TV to maintain the aspect ratio, would have been better appreciated here, considering that its target audience in not likely to have a widescreen TV to begin with. Another drawback of the anamorphic 16:9 aspect ratio is that even when shooting the video, the visual appears vertically stretched on the camera's display, since the display is of native 4:3 aspect ratio. In the end the implementation of the widescreen mode seems more like a last minute add-on gimmick to increase the appeal of the camcorder. The menu structure of the D350AD is pretty simplistic, but the navigation requires you to fumble around with the inconveniently located playback controls. To make things worse, the menu interface is staggeringly slow, which makes switching between options a cumbersome task. You have a manual shooting option which provides you with a number of special scene modes and special effects like sepia and black and white, but it gets downright frustrating getting to those options. Most users would prefer keeping the camcorder set in auto mode to avoid going through the menu. Unlike most consumer DV cameras these days, the D350AD does not sport an infrared night vision mode for shooting in pitch black darkness. Instead it compensates with a night mode that simply overexposes the sensor, but that's clearly not sufficient.

iXtreamer - Can't Get Any More eXtreme

There are a whole bunch of companies making HD media players, in all sizes and formats. One of the first really popular ones was the Xtreamer. When the craze for media players first started, most models introduced by mainstream PC peripheral brands had the necessary HD playback features.

One of the larger HD media players around

Xtreamer pushed the envelope and introduced wired and wireless support so you could access network shares and also stream content from the web if needed. This was a pretty revolutionary thing for its time. Years later, after introducing a few other models, the iXtreamer is launched. The market now has no dearth of media players, so the iXtreamer has to bring something really special to the table for it to stand out. 

Design and Build Quality

HD media players are going to end up sitting in your living room, right next to your large LCD TV. Previous Xtreamer models have been smaller and minimalistic in their design. The new iXtreamer is bulky to say the least, and it’s probably the largest of all the HD media players we’ve seen so far. It’s more like a compact, mini-ITX PC chassis. 

The player is raised by somewhat larger feet, presumably to allow space for the exhaust fan to cool the player effectively. The player is fitted with plastic panels of different grades and qualities. The end result is a good, solid device. 

Easy 3-5.inch drive installation

The top of the player has a sliding panel that hides the connector for Apple’s iPod, iPhone and iPad devices. A foldable panel on the side allows users to insert an internal 3.5-inch drive in the Xtreamer. This panel feels lighter than the rest of the player and feels loose.

With a typical 3.5-inch desktop drive inserted into the iXtreamer, it’s quite a heavy product. The iXtreamer doesn’t use an internal power supply - a DC wall adapter is provided. 

Features

The Xtreamer is filled to the brim with features. The key feature of the iXtreamer is the ability to play content from Apple devices (iPad, iPod and iPhones). The player does not support the 4G iPod, iPod Classic and 5G iPod. If you use one or more Apple devices, this feature by it should wet your palette.

Connectivity

The product isn’t only designed for Apple products. The two USB Ports should be enough to connect two external storage drives. If you need more capacity, you can fit an internal 3.5-inch drive inside the player. Installation is extremely simple and shouldn’t take more than a few seconds. There is no docking tray or connectors to fit manually. Simply, slide the hard drive in place and you’re good to go. Data can be dumped directly onto the iXtreamer using the other slave USB port, as well.

Plenty of connectors

Moving on to the other connectivity options, the player has the essential HDMI connector along with composite, component and digital audio connectors in the form of a coaxial and an optical out connector. The 100 Mbps Ethernet connectivity should be good enough to stream HD content from an NAS device or PC on the wired network. If you want to go wireless, you’ll have to spend an additional sum for the optional 802.11n USB WiFi adapter.

Usage

The setting up of the player on the wireless network is straightforward. We faced no issues with either of the connectivity options. The bundled remote is large and the size and complexity can be compared to a modern day television remote. There’s a section on the remote dedicated to Apple devices. Press it and the interface changes to a more simplistic one with the most basic of controls for playing back audio and video. The remote control is simple to use unlike the last TViX player we reviewed last week. There are a ton of features on the remote that let you switch things like the aspect ratio of the display, synchronize subtitles and even unimportant things like switching the LED indicator on the player on or off.

Interface

The user interface hasn’t changed much from previous versions. The dark gloomy wallpapers are still present and that’s not how a fun, entertainment system should be. Xtreamer needs to bring in more lively visuals.

The interface is broken into separate menus like any other media player. While most interfaces include the types of media - movies, photos and music, the Xtreamer interface has a Media Library option. Steps are lengthier as you’re then forced to select a storage source and then choose the type of media. A simpler approach would have been to simply choose, then list all the content in a single page with an option to switch between sources. The first menu on the home screen is oddly the Favorites menu, which is obviously empty unless you add favorites. We find this to be an odd choice. 

Clean design at the front

The media streaming feature is called Xtreamering. It’s the same given to the media streaming on the player. There are plenty of sources. For example, Grooveshark can be used for streaming music and Youtube for videos. There are many other sources, but we faced some issues with streaming them. You also find a Media Jukebox feature in this menu, which has the perfect interface that we would have liked on the home screen. Still, there are some bugs on the interface.

Users can choose to dump data directly onto the Xtreamer, if required. If you have content on the portable hard drive, you can even choose to copy data from the external source to the internal drive. The iXtreamer also has FTP support, as well as Windows file sharing support. Like some of the older Xtreamer models, this too has interfaces that can be accessible on mobile phones or other portable devices. If you use a laptop, you can even stream content off the player. 

Performance

Video performance is phenomenal. The iXtreamer handles all the video and audio formats flawlessly. There is no sign of slowdown while playing files as small as 700MB or loading 25GB uncompressed clips. We even tried playing an 1920x1080, 60 fps video clip and it ran flawlessly. 

Apple proprietary dock

Video quality is also very good. Images look great as well. While media playback itself is flawless, the switching of menus isn’t as fast. We would have expected data accessible on the SATA drive to be extremely fast. Depending on the amount of content in a folder, you have to wait a second or two for the list to be displayed on the screen. 

We noticed some odd things as well. For example, the video you’re playing shudders for a second when you mute the audio on the player. Another glitch we noticed is that the screen would go blank for a second when we pressed the Back button on the remote, even though we were looking at the home screen.

The player runs relatively cool. If you wish to save power and reduce noise, there are some efficiency features integrated into the player as well. If you don’t want the player drive to run all the time, you can choose to turn it off, similarly, fan speed can be adjusted. The only actual audible sound was was from the starting up of the drive. 

The remote control has to be pointed a at the player for it to work flawlessly. As long as you do that, it picks up the controls without much delay. 

Verdict

The iXtreamer is very much like some of the older models. When the first models of the Xtreamer arrived, they had more features than most of the other media players in the market. The iXtreamer, outside the iPod dock menu is all over the place. There are menus and navigating through them is a pain. There are also missing menus and services that don’t work - it lacks refinement. It’s almost as if Xtreamer decided to add even more features to the product than it needed.

The iXtreamer, now with support for Apple devices

There are a ton of features, but you’re never going to be using all of them. The iXtreamer adds a bunch of features that Apple PMP users will like and use. For the rest however, it’s hard to justify the added cost of Rs. 17,999 and going in for the cheaper Xtreamer or XtreamerPro is the way to go.

Nandini Jumani

Computex 2011: NVIDIA Announces 3D Vision Wired Glasses

Computex 2011 has not even begun yet, but many manufacturers are launching their products before schedule. NVIDIA  is just one such company announcing their wired 3D Vision glasses. The main selling feature of these glasses for PCs is the price, which is $99. These glasses are an addition to NVIDIA’s range of 3D Vision glasses. NVIDIA claims that these glasses offer the same 3D quality and features of 3D Vision wireless glasses.

USB 2.0 NVIDIA 3D Vision wired glasses with 10-foot long cable

NVIDIA claims that NVIDIA 3D Vision wired glasses, which feature NVIDIA's advanced active-shutter technology, allow gamers and 3D enthusiasts to access the broadest selection of high-quality 3D content available today, including more than 525 full-HD 3D games, Blu-ray 3D movies, and streaming 3D video from YouTube and 3DVisionLive.com. These glasses include a 10-foot USB 2.0 cable for connection to PC or notebook. NVIDIA 3D Vision wired glasses also support more than 65 different 3D Vision monitors, notebooks, and projectors, giving users complete flexibility in configuring their 3D Vision PCs. Phil Eisler, general manager of 3D Vision at NVIDIA said that 3D Vision provides gamers and enthusiasts with the world's largest ecosystem of 3D products and features. He went on to say that 3D fans have been waiting for more affordable glasses, and they are expecting the new 3D Vision wired glasses to hit the sweet spot for them.

These new glasses from NVIDIA are expected to be available from late June 2011 and will be available from leading retailers as well as e-tailers.