Fitbit vs Misfit on the Pebble Smartwatch

December 10, 2014 | 2 comments

I’ve been a happy Fitbit Flex user for some 18 months now but when Pebble released an update that allowed activity tracking I thought that I would give it a go to see how the two compared.

The first thing to point out is that I am only interested in two things: accuracy and battery life. The second thing is that while I am happy with both the watch and fitness band on my (non-dominant) wrist I would prefer it all in one package.

I chose to run the test over a couple of weeks. The first when I would … Read the rest

Flic: The Wireless Smart Button

November 21, 2014 | Comment

There is something about the simplicity of Flic that I like. That it has no interface and is just a single button but can do so much really appeals to me. Example of what can be achieved with the Flic are:

play music
control lights and heating
take a picture
send a distress signal
notify someone of your location.

There are also a good number of integration partners:

Of course like other crowdfunding products what is delivered might not live up to the hype but this is sufficiently different to have a reasonable chance of delivering on its promises. Come … Read the rest

An iPhone Remote Shutter? It’s a Snap!

August 20, 2014 | Comment

For a while now it has been possible to take a picture with your iPhone using the volume controls on the phone and this also extends to the controls on the headphone mic too. But what if you need to be further away than the length of the headphone cable? Turns out that there is a cheap (under three quid) device for that.

This little two button widget works over bluetooth and emulates the keyboard for sending the command to trigger the camera shutter. It is incredibly simple to use in that you pair it with your device, start the … Read the rest

A Tale of Two Chromebooks

May 30, 2014 | Comment

A couple of years ago I spent weeks searching high and lo for a Samsung Series 3 Chromebook which was the first of the really affordable cloud laptops. I finally found one and paid £240 – nothing compared to the price of some Windows and especially Mac laptops.

Initially I was amazed at the start-up time of seconds and the fantastic battery life. I found that I could access my email and calendar through the browser (as I had been for a while since ditching Outlook) and do all my general web-browsing. I was hooked and decided that, away from … Read the rest

Cocoon SLIM vs Wenger SwissGear Synergy Backpack Review

May 14, 2014 | Comment

For years I have been lugging my kit around in a Wenger Swiss gear backpack, which has been a real rugged workhorse. The thing though is massive and even after years of use I still don’t think I have found all the pockets!

The problem is that because it could carry so much there has always been a temptation to overfill it – you never know when you might need that widget and so in the bag it goes. This became an issue for me because the Wenger is heavy when it is empty let alone when full. So began … Read the rest

A Life in Computers

March 11, 2014 | 1 comment

A trip to The National Museum of Computing at the weekend was a real trip down memory lane for me. You can read about our visit to Bletchley Park at a later date but I wanted to highlight some of the more significant computers that have featured in my life that were on show there. The dates are pretty loose as my memory is not what it once was!

Teletype (c. 1976)

I have written previously about how I encountered my first “computer” at secondary school. In fact this wasn’t a computer at all but basically a printer with a … Read the rest

Happy 1st Birthday Pebble

March 2, 2014 | Comment

So I’ve now had my Pebble smart watch just over a year so I thought that it would be a good time to reflect on the aims and whether they have been met.

For those that don’t know the Pebble is the darling of the crowd funding site Kickstarter, the first and to my knowledge still the only project to have raised over $10M. This was significant because it was only aiming to raise $10,000 and showed what a huge demand there was for smart wearables.

I, along with thousands of others, pledged my support and settled down for … Read the rest

Magnetic Clasp for Chain

January 22, 2014 | Comment

This just about squeezes into technology as a gadget (well it’s is my blog so I can cover what I like!). Recently the clasp broke on a chain and I looked at replacing it with the usual hook kind but the local jewelers wanted to charge me £20 for the privilege. I politely declined feeling that I could get it cheaper elsewhere and do it myself.

While searching on eBay I found a company selling magnetic clasps so I gave that I go and was really impressed. The clasps use rare earth magnets and are incredibly strong but easy to … Read the rest

Mu Folding UK Plug

November 17, 2013 | Comment

There are many great things about the UK plug but size isn’t one of them. This is mainly due to the advantages the plug offers including things that most other countries eschew such as an earth pin and integral fuse.

All this means that they take up an enormous amount of space and a bloody painful when stood on being second only on the pain scale to a Lego brick.

However, help is at hand with the absolutely brilliant Mu Folding USB Charger which collapses into one neat little package. The bottom pins rotate to be in line with the … Read the rest

Holiday Kit

October 21, 2013 | Comment

This holiday I took with me a lot less technology that I have previously. For the the first time in years I didn’t take a laptop at all and relied solely on my iPad Mini. One reason that I needed to take less was simply because of the miserly luggage allocation on the flight.

So I thought it would be useful to explore what worked and what didn’t.

Firstly here is the list of “tech” I took with me:

iPad mini
Kensington Ultrathin keyboard case
iPhone 4S
Slingshot
olloclip
Kindle
Bose Quietcomfort 2
Panasonic TZ5

The combination of the iPad … Read the rest