Category: Articles

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Hands on: Dreamwork’s Dragons Adventure for the Nokia Lumia 2520 – ‘How To Train Your Dragon’ GPS Game

WP_20131120_12_10_56_ProThis is cool folks.

I think hardware is starting to plateau. Phones and tablets are now “powerful enough” for the services of today, and I think we’re going to see a pendulum swing back to software and services over the next year as developers start tapping into all the raw sensor data available in consumer gear.

I got to spend the day at Dreamworks Animation Studio today to get hands on with their new collaboration with Nokia. A game called ‘Dragons Adventure’ will be launching exclusively for Nokia phones and tablets starting with the Lumia 2520, and it’s featuring some really forward thinking tech… Continue reading “Hands on: Dreamwork’s Dragons Adventure for the Nokia Lumia 2520 – ‘How To Train Your Dragon’ GPS Game”

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Kingston ships new encrypted USB 3 Flash Drives – Password protect your data with DataTraveler Vault Privacy 3.0

prodDT-DTVP30AV-imgI used to work a government contract. Even though I don’t handle sensitive information anymore I still password protect just about every device I own. I recently reviewed the Kingston DataTraveler 6000, a USB 2 flash drive which uses military grade encryption and anti-intrusion measures to make sure your mobile data can never fall into the wrong hands. I liked it a lot.

Kingston is now introducing a pair of USB 3 protected drives which might be good for businesses or those just looking for a bit more piece of mind with their own personal data. The Vault Privacy 3.0  features hardware based 256-bit AES encryption and password protection. After 10 failed login attempts the drive wipes itself clean making sure your data can’t be accessed.

The Vault Privacy 3.0 Anti-Virus offers all of the same intrusion protections while adding anti-virus protections into the mix courtesy of ESET/ClevX to protect against viruses, worms, rootkits, and other malware.

Both Vaults are available in sizes from 4GB to 64GB, and Kingston is first to market with USB 3 protected drives. Check them out if you’ve been looking for strategies to safeguard your info.

See our review of the Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ G3!

Full PR after the jump.

Continue reading “Kingston ships new encrypted USB 3 Flash Drives – Password protect your data with DataTraveler Vault Privacy 3.0”

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Humble Mobile Bundle 3 – Pay what you want for 6 Android games and support charities

hmb3_newsletterJust a quick heads up folks!

Humble Mobile Bundle 3 is ready to roll. For those of you not hip to the Humble Bundle, it’s a collection sold by the developers, artists, musicians, or writers under a “pay what you want” model. This bundle is a collection of Android games: EPOCH, rymdkapsel, SpellTower, Swordigo, Ridiculous Fishing, and Kingdom Rush. To get all six games, you have to pay more than the average price, which at the time of this writing was under $5. Less than a dollar an app.

At checkout you can decide how much to pay, and how much of your payment will go to the Humble Bundle team, the app developers, and to the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Child’s Play Charities. And keep an eye out for future bundles. I’ve gotten some great albums, e-book collections, and PC games through this site.

Get to it folks! These games aren’t going to buy themselves!

Humble Mobile Bundle 3!

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AT&T offering Amber Alert GPS child locator for $129.99

Amber-Alert-GPS-BWe live in a crazy world. Parents face difficult choices in what tools they might use to help protect their children. You might not be able to keep your eyes on your kids all the time, but that’s where data services can help fill in some of the gaps.

Amber Alert GPS is a small puck which fits in the palm of your hand. It logs GPS data on your child’s location, and can communicate that info to you over its own cell phone data connection. The unit also includes a two-way voice call option, parent or child can call each other at any time and communicate over voice service. Any time the child feels like she or he might be in danger, they can hit an SOS panic button which will send alerts to up to ten individuals over text or email.

It seems like a handy piece of gear for monitoring your family members. Small, lightweight, easy to throw into a backback or a pocket. AT&T is now carrying the Amber Alert GPS for $129.99, and to utilize the data and voice features will only cost an additional $10 a month on a family share plan.

Full PR and a video after the jump.

Continue reading “AT&T offering Amber Alert GPS child locator for $129.99”

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FreedomPop adds Bring Your Own Phone option to free Smartphone plan

freedompop free smartphone plan screenshot somegadgetguyFreedomPop is a plucky MVNO which uses Sprint’s network to offer up a potentially market disrupting service. Namely plans starting at FREE per month. Yup. They’re bare minimum plans: 200 minutes, 500 texts, 500MB of data. Still, did I mention that you get all that for free?

Stepping up to plans with more minutes are reasonably priced. Their top plan includes 500MB of monthly 4G data and unlimited calling/texting for around $11 a month.

Until now, the only phone you could use on the plan was an old HTC EVO 4G (also reasonably priced for $100 for a limited time), but now FreedomPop is expanding to older Sprint phones. You can bring your own device to the table and sign up for free. Currently the supported pickings are slim: HTC EVO 4G, HTC EVO 3D, Samsung Epic 4G, Samsung Epic 4G Touch, Samsung Galaxy S III and LG Optimus S. We should see more phones added soon however.

If you have one of these older handsets kicking around, it might be worth it to sign up just to have a spare number use.

Check to see if your phone is compatible at: http://www.freedompop.com/byod

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Oxford Dictionary names “Selfie” its Word of the Year

800px-Dictionary_through_lensYou know what?

I’m actually fine with this. No really. Oxford writes up a fascinating look at the history of the word. They tracked down some of the earliest mentions of “selfie”. They explain the significance of the term. I’m a sucker for etymology, and selfie is one of those terms that does a really good job of summing up exactly what it is.

Compared to Webster Macmillan changing the definition of “literally” to mean “figuratively”, Oxford’s addition of selfie almost seems noble.

Other notable new additions to the Oxford dictionary this year include binge-watch, bitcoin, schmeat, and twerk.

(via Oxford Dictionary Blog)

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AT&T adds Unite Pro to Hotspot Lineup – Connect 15 devices to LTE over WiFi

ATTUNITE3[1]Business solutions often involve work groups. Try to connect a couple road warriors to data while on the go, and you can quickly max out most portable hotspots. Add in the fact that each person on the team will usually have more than one device, and keeping everyone “fed” gets even more difficult.

AT&T is adding the Netgear Unite Pro to their hotspot lineup, and while it comes with a number of handle features like dual band WiFi, a touchscreen, and 16 hours of battery life, the feature most will probably consider first is that it’s capable of connecting up to 15 individual devices over WiFi to share a 4G LTE data connection.

It might bog down a bit if all 15 try streaming HD video at the same time, but you should be served PLENTY of bandwidth to get your work done.

Unite Pro will cost $50 when it goes on sale November 22nd. Full PR and a video after the jump.

Continue reading “AT&T adds Unite Pro to Hotspot Lineup – Connect 15 devices to LTE over WiFi”

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The argument for buying the most expensive phone you can, even if you aren’t “tech-y”…

WP_20130728_004A quick thought here. We recently published our holiday tablet buying guide, and I’ll be releasing our phone guide later this week, but going through the list of candidates something struck me.

We keep saddling non-tech-y folks with under-powered hardware.

There’s this idea that because someone might not be super tech savvy, that all the bells and whistles of a premier smartphone will be wasted on them.

“Why would I want to spend money on stuff I might not use if I just want to check my email and make phone calls?”

Continue reading “The argument for buying the most expensive phone you can, even if you aren’t “tech-y”…”

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