The control area on the front, with its backlighting, looks great. However, you’ll want to use the remote for everything, since the buttons on the control area are horrible and often unresponsive. At least on the review unit that I got. This was my biggest source of frustration with this radio. Yes, you have the remote, thank God, but if you pay for a radio like this, you want it all to work. These controls will drive you up a wall if you have to type in your Wi-Fi Key without the remote.

Behind the control area is the iPod dock. Just push and it slides out nicely. You get several inserts to make sure that the full range of Apple iPod and iPhone products is compatible. No iPad compatibility here though folks. Also, opening the control panel to expose the iPod dock tray doesn’t automatically change it to iPod mode, which it really should.

The radio measures about 15″ long at the base and it’s about 9″ tall.   The device has a small footprint considering that the sound will fill a very large room. The sound is amazing and it seems like it would fill even a mansion sized room. Sadly though, it suffers from some severely sluggish operation. Unfortunately, it takes far too long to load screens, change radio channels, etc.

In back there is the telescopic aerial that will easily find stations and jacks for Headphone and Aux In along with Composite and S-Video outputs.Along with the remote and main control panel, there are some controls up top along the length of the device, like volume up, down, power and mute.

The final word is that the Pure Contour Internet Radio delivers great loud audio, but misses the mark in many other areas. The control panel is horrible, the overall design could be improved and it is too sluggish. You expect more from a company like Pure, and I’m hopeful they will correct these flaws in what otherwise is a great-sounding and cool-looking device.

I’ll start out by saying that this is the first time I’ve had a 3D TV in my home, as I had just purchased a brand new 58″ plasma months before all the 3D sets came out, and never really saw a need to upgrade. Other than the fact that my set was just fine without 3D, I really didn’t like the expensive, headache-inducing shutter glasses that came with most sets. So when I found out the LG set I was going to get to test drive would use passive lens glasses, I was happy.

I count myself among the masses of you out there who can’t stand the idea of a) paying $100 or more for a set of 3D glasses you’ll use only every once in a while; b) having yet one more gadget to recharge; and c) sitting there and getting a headache after watching 30 minutes of content. I’m happy to tell you that the LG Cinema 3D set I tested has none of these problems. LG’s Cinema 3D displays use a special set of polarizing layers which allow you to use the same sort of cheap polarized glasses you get at the movie theater. In my experience with the display, I found these to be far more pleasant than any of the other 3D glasses I’ve tried on at various trade shows and at the store when checking out 3D sets.

See, don’t I look stylish in my 3D specs? Ok, not really. But the real question is, how good is the 3D? Well, I’m happy to say that the LG Cinema 3D display produced tremendous depth with original 3D content, and I was able to sit for long sessions without a headache the sort of general discomfort the flickering active lens 3D glasses cause for me. Now, there is a trade-off with this technology – horizontal line resolution is cut in half for each frame, sending only half the display’s 1920×1080 resolution to each eye (540 lines). What I noticed was that when watching content in 3D, it was slightly softer than in 2D and on active lens systems, but for the most part I’d say it was worth the trade-off. I’d rather be able to sit through a movie without my eyes killing me than to be able to see every pimple on the actors’ faces.

I tested the LG display with a variety of 3D content, including Blu-ray discs, Satellite 3D content, and 3D video games. Images in movies like Alice in Wonderland and Despicable Me jumped far off the screen, and made me feel like I was in the theater (without all the screaming kids and sticky popcorn goo on the floor). But I’ll be honest, 3D sets are only as good as the content, and at this point, the selection and variety of quality 3D movies and programs is still pretty limited. Never mind the fact that you’ll be paying a premium for 3D discs. Most 3D Blu-rays (when you can find them) will set you back around $40 instead of the regular $20-$25. On the other hand 3D gaming seems to be the most promising use for these displays at the moment. I hooked up my PS3, and had a blast playing Killzone 3, Super Stardust HD and the beta of Uncharted 3 on this set and they all looked great. Here’s a shot of Drake’s Deception running in 3D mode. Of course, it’s always hard to glean anything from a 2D photo of a stereoscopic image, so you’ll just have to take my word for it that it looks good.

There’s no way I could have survived my 5-hour FPS 3D gaming session with active shutter 3D glasses. I think I would have hurled. Sure, I took a couple of 2 minute breaks, but was able to get right back to it with the lightweight and comfortable passive lenses.

The display also offers a 2D-to-3D mode, which manages to extract simulated depth from any source material (although it doesn’t appear to work with content in the Smart TV application.) Depth was definitively less pronounced and realistic than with true 3D source material, but I’m still always amazed that they can even provide the illusion of 3D depth from random content. It’s more of a novelty than anything else, but if you want to wear your 3D glasses all the time, there’s a way you can do it.

So with all that said about the 3D aspects of the 47LW5600, here’s a rundown of some of the other features of the set. Since it’s an edge-lit display, it’s super thin (just over 1″ thick when hung on the wall,) and looks great from the side. In general, I didn’t see too much in the way of cloudiness or variance in brightness that edge-lit displays often exhibit, except on a pitch black screen. And if that bugs you, LG does offer a version of local-dimming to increase contrast and black levels, but I found the feature to be annoying at times, causing occasional jumps in intensity and too much blooming in really high contrast scenes. With an edge-lighting setup, it’s tough to pull off true local-dimming anyhow. Colors on the set were vibrant, and contrast was as good as any of today’s better LED/LCD sets. That said, I still prefer the more natural contrast you get out of a plasma screen – but that’s just me. Refresh rate for the display is 120Hz, which is plenty for eliminating blur on fast motion. Gor those of you who balk at anything less than a 240Hz refresh rate, get over it. Human eyes can’t tell the difference. You only really need higher refresh rates for active lens 3D in order to decrease flicker and blurring in fast-moving 3D scenes. Since this set doesn’t work that way, you won’t miss it.

The set also features LG’s Smart TV suite, which offers access to Netflix, YouTube, FaceBook and other web apps. I found that these apps generally loaded much faster than on my 1-1/2 year old Samsung, but I still prefer the versions of these apps on my PS3 and Apple TV over the ones built into displays at this point. You can also stream media from your DLNA-capable home computer (LG includes a copy of Nero MediaHome Essentials for streaming from Windows PCs).

Each set includes a Wi-Fi dongle for connecting to your network (I wish this was built-in), but it doesn’t protrude from the back of the set, so it’s really not a big deal.Inputs are plentiful with 4 HDMI, 2 component, 1 component, and one RF port on back. There are two USB ports as well – one for content, and the other that’s occupied by the Wi-Fi dongle. They also include 4 sets of 3D glasses (along with protective microfiber pouches.) Additional glasses retail for $12.50 a pair, but you can find them for a few dollars less online.

The LG Infinia 47LW5600 set has a list price of $1699 (USD), but you can find it online for as little as $1000 to $1200. It’s definitely not the cheapest 47-inch display on the market, but if you want a 3D TV and think there’s enough content out there to justify a purchase, it’s definitely worth considering the LG Cinema 3D display or one of its larger 55″ or 65″ brethren. Until such time that someone makes a glasses-free display that actually works without major artifacts and distortion, I’m putting my vote in the passive lens camp.

Wow. A game with worse graphics than Minecraft, now that’s something. Now I’ll tell you that the video review by a guy named “Critical” below is loaded with expletives, so you won’t want to play it at work. That said, it’s the holidays, so what are you doing at work anyhow? And if you are at work, the boss surely has the week off and is playing golf in the Carribean – so crank up the volume and let the rest of the miserable bastards stuck in the office hear it:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Well you heard it here first. For the first time ever, Big Rigs has some true entertainment value. Thanks, Critical.

I’ve been an iPhone user for a couple of years now, but it’s always nice to get the chance to spend some time with the other smartphone platforms out there. Recently I’ve gotten to play with my first Windows Phone 7 phone, the HTC HD7 (T-Mobile). It is among the first of the WP7 phones on the market, with a giant screen and plenty of features.

I’m going to do my best to break this review down into two main sections. First, I’m going to concentrate on the hardware of the HD7. Then I’ll have a go at the Windows Phone 7 operating system.

Hardware

The first thing anyone notices about this phone is the large screen. The screen measures 4.3” which seems gigantic when compared to say, the iPhone 4′s which is only 3.5”. This makes things like playing games and watching videos rather nice. The downside is that the phone itself has to be larger to accommodate such a screen. It takes some time to get used to carrying around a phone this large. Thankfully it is nice and slim, so slipping it into a pocket isn’t any trouble.

They say that size isn’t everything, and that is true of screens. While the HD7′s is large and bright, I was  disappointed by the image quality on the 800×480 display. When you turn the phone away, the colors begin to wash out a bit too quickly for my tastes. Don’t get me wrong, the screen still looks good, just not the best I’ve seen around. If you’re wanting to use the phone for viewing long videos, you’ll be pleased to find a kickstand on the back, which allows you to prop your phone on a table or desk.

As for the touchscreen capabilities, I’m plenty pleased. I had no problems navigating around the various menus, or when typing using the on-screen keyboard. Typing is one of those areas that no doubt benefits from having the larger screen real estate, as the letters aren’t crammed together so much.

While you’re relying on the screen to show you video, you’re obviously going to need some audio to compliment it. This is handled by front-facing stereo speakers. I like this idea, as the phone is generally facing you when you’re listening to audio through the speakers. I wasn’t terribly impressed by the quality here. When watching videos or listening to music, I found the sound to be muddy and lacking in clarity. It wasn’t bad enough that I couldn’t tell what I was listening to, but it wasn’t pleasing to hear.

Camera performance is about average. It can take some good shots, but it seems to have some trouble auto-focusing from time to time, which can be an annoyance. I will say that I like having the ability to activate the camera simply by holding down the dedicated shutter button. You don’t even have to unlock the phone to do this. Sometimes those few extra seconds can make the difference between snapping that perfect shot, and missing it.

Overall, the HTC HD7 is an average phone, when judged solely on its hardware. It’s really not one of the most solid phones out there, or even the best HTC phone that I’ve used. But if you’re looking for something with a nice, big screen that runs Windows Phone 7, then it might not be a bad choice. But that depends on what you think of Windows Phone 7, doesn’t it? That brings us to the next part of the review.

Software (Windows Phone 7)

The mobile phone industry has really had some major leaps in the last few years. First Apple came along with their iPhone, which revolutionized the smartphone market. Then Google brought us the Android platform, which gave us a much more open solution to the mobile phone. In that time Microsoft’s mobile platform was left in the dust. Compared to the other offerings, it just felt clunky and outdated. Thankfully the Windows Phone 7 platform gave new life to the company’s mobile offerings.

First Look

When you fire up a phone running the new OS, you’re greeted with a nice lock screen, which gives you basic information such as date, time, battery life, signal strength and messaging/call alerts. A quick swipe of your finger brings you to your phone’s main screen.

I love the look of the main screen, because it’s so simplistic. You’ll see the time, signal strength and eight tiles. These tiles are your way of accessing the most important applications on your phone. Of course this sleek look is also one of the things that I dislike about the phone’s appearance.

While it is nice to have my most-used apps at my fingertips, only allowing for eight of them to be seen is an annoyance. I’m someone who likes to use their phone to do as many tasks as possible. This means I have to pile up large blocky icons on the Start page to flick through, or go hunting through lists to find the software I need. There are no folders in which to store similar applications, or even different email inboxes. That’s right, if you have more than one mail account, you’re going to need a separate icon for each. There isn’t even a search bar that you can use to quickly find an application.

The UI itself does have some nice, subtle touches that I enjoy. These are mostly in the way of small animations when launching an app, or moving around within one. It is a nice contrast to the very two-dimensional look that the UI generally gives. One second you’re staring at a boring, organized list, only to have the tiles fly away as you launch whatever application you’ve selected.

Basic Functions

When you look at the basic functions, Windows Phone 7 does them well. Tapping on the phone icon brings up your call history, and gives you icons for your voicemail, dialer and contact list. While in a call you have nice big buttons for speaker, mute, hold and add call. If you want to bring up the number pad again, you’ll need to tap a smaller button to bring it up.

Messaging is very simplistic, which seems to be a theme here. Conversations are broken up into contacts, which are listed by the date/time of the most recent message in each. Once in a conversation, each message is listed in its own chat bubble, much as you would expect.

One very basic function that you will not find on this device is copy & paste. This is appalling. You would think with the amount of flak Apple caught for it on the iPhone, Microsoft would have this feature in from the start. It’s supposed to be coming in an update which looks to be hitting next month sometime, but that still doesn’t get rid of the bad taste its current absence leaves in my mouth.

Something else simple that is nowhere to be found is the ability to take screenshots. This feature would come in handy in a variety of situations, especially when trying to do a phone review. After much research, there is currently no way whatsoever to take a screenshot unless you are running the phone’s software on an emulator on your computer.

Marketplace

This is where you’re going to go to add new content to your phone. The Marketplace is broken up into four main sections. First is the HTC Apps (obviously not found on non-HTC phones), apps, games and music. These are further broken down into categories, including featured, free, and new content.

One of my biggest complaints here is the layout. When you first enter the apps section, you’re once again greeted with lists. These lists are written in a thin, white font. That’s perfectly fine if you’ve got a solid black background. But instead they’ve plastered a collage of pictures behind it, making this boring list much harder to read. Once you do select one of the categories from the list, you’re taken to another section, which thankfully has that boring black background that makes everything readable again.

Navigating through the Marketplace is simple enough for the most part, though one does get tired of scrolling through endless lists after a while (something you’ll find in every aspect of the OS). Downloading and installing apps is a painless process. Though I will say that after you’ve installed an extra 20 or 30 things, things start to get harder to find in the phone’s app list. (which means more scrolling).

Xbox Live

As a gamer, I’ve been disheartened to see a lack of official connectivity between Xbox Live and mobile phones. Sure, there are apps available on the iPhone, but nothing straight from Microsoft. Thankfully this is something that they did decide to integrate into Windows Phone 7.

Surprisingly the Xbox Live feature has pretty much everything I’d have wanted in such an app. Your avatar loads up, along with your Gamerscore. You’re able to check achievements, see which friends are online and check/send messages. You can even customize your avatar right from the application.

There is also a separate section for Xbox Live games on your phone. Not every game available on Windows Phone 7 is available here. These are specially-branded Xbox Live games, some of which are also Xbox Live Arcade games. They all seem to be of a higher quality, and all feature demos, so you know what you’re paying for.

Multimedia

As you can no doubt imagine, the heart of Windows Phone 7′s multimedia functionality is the Zune software. If you’ve ever owned a Zune, then you’ll feel right at home with video and music playback. You’ll use the desktop software to assemble and arrange your media, and sync it up with your phone. MP3, AAC, WMA, MPEG and H.264 are all supported.

Zune Pass is also available on the phone, which allows you to stream unlimited music to your phone, for a monthly cost. I’m not sold on the service, as I’d much rather own my music, rather than rent it. Besides, with services like Pandora offering up streaming for free, I have a hard time justifying a Zune Pass.

Conclusion

I could probably go on for days about each and every feature of the phone and its software. However, the bottom line is that Microsoft has delivered a solid mobile phone platform. It’s not without its shortcomings, but with the exception of copy & paste (which should be getting fixed in an update) none are dealbreakers for me.

So is it better than iOS/Android/etc? I would say that it is a strong enough platform that it can easily compete with anything else on the market. As for better or worse, I’d say that comes down to preference. Each has their own strengths and weakness, and it’s going to come down to a matter of preference for the user. What I can say is that the mobile phone market just got a lot more interesting.

These pint-sized R/C helicopters aren’t like some of those really cheap models out there. While they each measure just 7.9 inches long, and weigh just 1.1 ounces, these tiny indoor copters are miracles of modern engineering. These mini copters come ready-to-fly out of the box, and are pretty easy to control for R/C chopper newbies (like me.)

Thanks to a gyro stabilization system, and trim controls for rudder, aileron, elevator and throttle, you can fine tune these little helicopters to hover smoothly within seconds of getting up and running. Each one is powered by a tiny little lithium-polymer battery that can be charged in the base or the remote control. You’ll get about 5 to 7 minutes of flying time before you need to recharge with the included 120MaH battery, ore you can grab a 150mAh battery for a couple of extra minutes runtime. Just keep in mind that since the larger battery is heavier, and the helicopter is nearly weightless, you may notice some difference in the way it handles.

The RF remote control feels at home in any video game player’s hands, offering good heft, with the left stick controlling throttle and rudder angle, and the right controlling aileron and elevator. Or in non geek-speak, the left stick makes you go up and down and spin, and the right stick makes you go forwards, backwards, and bank.  You can also put it into “SimpliFly” mode, which makes it easier for flying noobs to get off the ground. There are also a pair of triggers on the back of transmitter that you can use for firing virtual shots.

Speaking of virtual shots, in addition to just flying around your living room, what really sets the Force RC apart is its gaming modes. Each chopper has a tiny infrared emitter and receptor which let you play games with your friends. As a matter of fact, you can play with up to 6 helis in a single battle. I tested out a two-person battle and it worked as described – fire at your enemy, and you throw their heli into a spin. Hit ‘em twice, and it spins a little more violently. Third strike, and it goes spiraling down to the floor in a ball of flames. Ok, I made up the ball of flames part, but that would be cool. There’s also an optional ground target you can set up if you want to practice shooting stationary targets instead of ones that move. Personally, I had more fun firing at a moving target, but that’s definitely harder to do. You can also assign the ground targets to one of your teams, so you can try and prevent your enemies from shooting the ground target too.

I did my best to capture some video of a brief flight of a Force RC heli, and as you can see, it really is a cool thing. You can also see how I’m a really bad pilot – that’s what happens when I try to shoot video and fly an R/C helicopter at the same time:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Here’s a slightly more professional video from the Horizon Hobby guys:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

In addition to the battery and ground target add-ons, Horizon offers interchangeable plastic canopies so you can personalize your helicopters, and a 4-battery base charger if you want to ensure nearly continuous flying. One thing to keep in mind with these is that they are definitely not cheap kids’ toys. While they’re made out of durable materials for flying indoors, they’re clearly loaded with delicate electronics and mechanisms, so you probably don’t want to get these for kids younger than teenagers.

And with a retail price of $189.99 (USD) per helicopter (currently on sale for $139.99), you’ll want to only get these for your teens if they’re really, really good kids. You can order the Force RC and all of its accessories here.

Since this is the first post in the series, I thought I’d take a minute to walk you through the TouchSmart 600′s hardware. The particular configuration I had my hands on was the 600-1055. The system features a beautiful 23-inch widescreen display, powered by NextWindow’s optical multitouch technology. Since the display uses an infrared touch technology, it can only handle two points of input, but that’s enough for manipulating simple media interfaces and handling gestures like flicks, pinch and zoom with aplomb. The system also has a high quality sound system built in, and the audio is certainly as good as anything you’d find built into a good television these days. It’s no substitute for a full surround rig, but it’s fine for a small room. And of course, there is an SPDIF optical output if you really do want to hook the TouchSmart to a proper surround system.

Under the hood, there’s a serviceable Core 2 Duo P7450, running a 2.13GHz, and the system has 4GB of RAM and a speedy 7200RPM 750GB SATA hard drive, perfect for recording television programs and handling other media utility work – right in the sweet spot for this machine. The system ships with Windows 7 Home Premium, 64-bit edition, so they didn’t skimp on the OS, either.

My first objective with the TouchSmart was to see how well it would work as a TV/DVR. The timing for this couldn’t have been better, as my brand new 58-inch Samsung plasma died and we had no TV in our living room for the last month (eeegads!) So while I wouldn’t normally recommend using a 23-inch display as your primary television, it worked for us in a pinch. The TouchSmart’s display size is definitely better suited to a bedroom, or maybe an office or den. It’s just a little large for most kitchens, but they do offer a 20-inch model as well.

So, back to the TV/DVR thing. There are a few ways to slice and dice this on the TouchSmart, and that’s part of the beauty of this thing. You can watch live television using the computer’s built in Digital ATSC tuner, and using either the included TouchSmart software or Windows Media Center, you can view live programs, and record them for later playback. I personally preferred the Windows Media software for this, as it works with the bundled remote control, and was a bit zippier than the TouchSmart interface. That said, the TouchSmart version does work well if you plan on primarily the touch screen for input, so maybe it would be good in a small room where you will be right by the screen all the time.

I recorded several programs in both the foreground and background, and didn’t run into any problems with playback quality, even for 720p and 1080i HD broadcasts. Oddly enough, I did run into some stutter on HD content in the TouchSmart app during live TV though, but it’s possible some sort of background task (maybe anti-virus or system updates) was hogging resources. This only occurred once or twice in my experience. The recording worked fine, even in the background while other tasks were going on, although since there’s only a single tuner, you won’t be able to record two programs at the same time like you can with some DVRs. However, I couldn’t figure out a way to pause or scrub that program while the program was recording using the TouchSmart software. It works fine with a live program that you’re not currently recording, though, so go figure.

That all said, I felt that the program guide interface for the Windows Media side of the house was much easier to read from a distance and found more APG program data than the TouchSmart version managed to muster. That said, the system includes both interfaces, so its your choice. Here’s the TouchSmart running Windows Media Center Live TV for comparison:

In addition to over-the-air television, the TouchSmart software includes apps for Netflix and Hulu, both of which performed admirably, and featured touch-enhanced interfaces with bigger buttons, and nice scrub bars for jumping through content. I’ll be covering the DVD/Blu-Ray and streaming video capabilities in more detail in my next post.

But what if you’ve got a satellite or fiber-optic receiver? With most desktop PCs, you’d be out of luck. There’s an S-Video input and an IR blaster output if you want to use a set-top tuner with Windows Media Center. And while you can’t use the built-in media or touchscreen software to watch from one of these devices in high-def, the TouchSmart has a handy HDMI input on the side, which lets you flip out of computer mode, and use it just like a regular HDTV.

I tried it with both my DirecTV HD DVR and my Sony PlayStation 3, and it worked great with both. My only issue with this input is that there’s no decent cable management for it, whereas all the other ports on the computer are neatly tucked behind a cover, this cable ends up sticking out of the side of the display. That said, It’s a minor complaint. More computers need to include this feature. There’s also a component RCA and stereo audio input there too, but I’m not really looking forward to watching crappy old video signals on a beautiful 1920 x 1080 LCD, are you? On the other hand, God of War III looks mighty nice.

Overall, I’d say the TouchSmart 600 is a fine performer for watching and recording television programs, and there are numerous choices for how you get your digital content into the system. I wouldn’t say it’s an ideal living room system because of the relatively small screen size, for a bedroom or office, it’s perfect. And while the TouchSmart software itself may not be as refined as Windows Media Center for TV viewing, the hardware is quite capable, and it’s your choice which interface to use.

Over the next few days, I’ll be talking about my experiences with movies and streamed content, as well as music and audio on the system. Be sure to swing by again for more details. And if you’re really attentive, you’ve got a chance to win a TouchSmart 600 for yourself.

Anyway, even though it’s ancient by Internet standards, Pirillo’s reviewing ninjutsu is quite effective and convincing. To maximize the efficacy of his review, you have to play the following clips at the same time. The video below is the Flip Mino HD’s recording of Pirillo’s review. You can get the Flip Mino HD for about $190 (USD) at Amazon. The Mino HD has 4GB of built-in memory.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

That wasn’t so awesome, but the Kodak Zi6‘s performance is actually a tad worse. It currently sells for $126 at Amazon. The Zi6 only has 128MB of internal memory, but you can add up to 32GB more via its SD/SDHC memory card slot. Here’s Pirillo one more time:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Finally, here’s the winner of the PirilloPirilloPirillo show: Creative’s Vado HD. The Vado HD has 8GB of built-in memory. For some reason it’s currently cheapest among the three – only $99, at least on Amazon. And did I say it was the best of the bunch? See for yourself:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Did you watch all 3 at the same time? Are you insane? Why would you do that? Lucky for you, Pirillo didn’t make another video pitting all 3 against the newer Flip Ultra HD. Seriously though, you should do that, Mr. Pirillo, or at least a Vado HD vs. Ultra HD head-to-head. Splitscreen please.

The author of the article, DisplayMate president Dr. Raymond Soneira, singled-out the lack of a respectable viewing angle on LCD TVs, as seen in the pictures below. If you think that Dr. Soneira is nitpicking, think again. He adds, “The significance of this [the narrow viewing angle] is enormous, because it means that the ’sweet spot’ for seeing an accurate picture on an LCD HDTV is only one person wide, even for these top-of-the-line models, so essentially everyone looking at an LCD HDTV will see a picture with noticeably different coloration.” Wow.

But more than praising plasma technology, Dr. Soneira criticized the “marketing gimmicks” of all TV manufacturers – hyping their TVs with “features” like Dynamic Backlight, Dynamic Contrast, Dynamic Black, Dynamic White, and Dynamic Color that do nothing but “reduce picture quality and accuracy and introduce ugly image artifacts.” Other features such as contrast ratios and brightness were either exaggerated or “misunderstood.” The sad part? Most customers don’t care. Perhaps in the HDTV market, size is all that matters for most people.

[via NY Times via tv snob]

First off, my purchasing experience was surprisingly painless. I arrived around 5:20pm on launch day at the AT&T store that’s by Harlem and Irving Park Avenues, just Northwest of Chicago.

There were about 30 people in front of me in line, so I figured that would be okay. Surely, an AT&T store would have at least 30 of these prized possessions for launch? Well, from what I can tell, they had just barely more than that. I was the second to last one to get an 8GB model, while just 5 or 6 more people scored a 4GB.

The staff in the store was surprisingly organized, and things flowed smoothly. Given the fact that I was in an AT&T store, and not an Apple store, this was a surprise based on my past experiences. They started letting in about 10 people at 6:00pm sharp, then let us in one at a time as people left with their purchases. I was in the store by 6:25pm and done with my purchase within 10 minutes, tops.

Unfortunately, at least 25 people behind me in line went home without an iPhone. However, the store claimed that they were the fastest way to get one shipped, citing that it would be faster than the Apple Store if they took an order for those who didn’t get one.

Once I got my phone home, I unpacked it as an eager child would at Christmas time. Inside the small box, there’s the iPhone in a nice acrylic tray, a dock (which isn’t quite the same size as the one I use for my 5G iPod,) a USB to dock-connector cable, a travel power adapter, stereo earbuds with a microphone on the cord, and a guidebook called “Finger Tips”. There’s no comprehensive manual in the box though, so you’ll have to rely on the documentation on the Apple site if want to learn everything there is to know. (FYI, you can download the full user manual here.)

Once you put an iPhone in your hands, you’ll understand much of the hype. Simply put, the phone’s industrial design is stunning. The back of the case is made of a solid matte-finish metal that looks quite durable. A small black door which conceals the phone’s SIM card holder, but all the phones come with a new SIM card pre-installed anyhow. The front features a smoked glass touchscreen with just a single button used for requesting the iPhone’s main menu. Plus, it all comes in a package that’s almost as thin as (and actually slightly lighter than) a 5G iPod.

Activation was pretty painless overall. Earlier in the day, I had upgraded to iTunes 7.3, so as soon as I plugged in the iPhone, it was recognized in about 20 seconds, and the activation process started. Since I was an already current subscriber to AT&T, all I needed to do was enter a few key pieces of information such as my current phone number and last 4 digits of social security number to link up the accounts.

Once I selected a rate plan, I encountered a small glitch. iTunes kept reporting a network error, so I had to retry about 5 times before it would go through. I chock this up to how busy the servers must have been on launch day.

After activation was complete, the iPhone came to life within just a couple of minutes, and I was able to set up music, video, photo calendar and contact sync settings. So far, I’ve only tested syncing of media content, since I plan on using my work computer for calendar and contact syncing through Outlook. Hopefully, that’ll come off without a hitch too.

While in iTunes, I noticed how much space you really get on an 8GB iPhone. According to the software, there’s 7.24GB of available space before you sync up any music, movies or other data. I’m guessing the “missing” 0.76GB is used for pre-loaded data such as wallpapers, ringtones and call history information.

Phone call quality is about average. While it’s a little tinny, it’s no worse than any other mobile phone I’ve had before. The phone’s contact management features are some of the easiest to use I’ve seen, and the phone keeps a great history of all the inbound and outbound calls so you can easily turn them into entries in your contact list. Visual Voicemail is a true marvel. The ability to look at all your voice messages at a glance, listen to them in any order, and fast forward/rewind on screen is a true breakthrough. No more “press 7 to delete,” thank goodness.

It only took me about 2 minutes to get used to the on-screen keyboard, and I already feel like an old pro. The key to using the touch screen is to press with the middle of your fingertip, not with your fingernail. It seems like it can sense the approximate shape of a finger to figure out where the center point is. I’d say I’m at about 95% accuracy with the keyboard now, but it can be a more bit challenging to hit the mark if you’re in a moving vehicle. That said, you shouldn’t be surfing the web and driving at the same time anyhow.

E-mail setup was a breeze for me. We have an IMAP server at work, and I was up and checking messages within a couple of minutes. By default, the phone grabs the most recent 50 messages, but can be set to fetch more or less. You can configure an automatic mail checking interval (every 15, 30 or 60 minutes,) or just check messages on demand. The E-mail application is every bit as good as any wireless device I’ve used. However it doesn’t offer features like message rules. But for quickly reading or jotting off a message, I even think it beats the BlackBerry for ease of use and intuitiveness. And I just love that you can open .DOC, .XLS and PDF attachments right on screen (although landscape mode doesn’t appear to be supported for the document viewer.)

I’ve only played with the other applications a little bit, but I’m pleased with the handy weather and stock widgets, which will grab and update data instantly, whether on a Wi-fi or EDGE network. The Safari browser is very nice, and works well with most websites. I do have to say that zooming in to view sections of the page you want to read takes a little adjustment, especially when your used to having a 24-inch widescreen monitor on your desk. It’s totally serviceable, and miles better than any wimpy WAP browser, though.

Surprisingly, connectivity on EDGE wasn’t bad at all. I was even able to stream YouTube videos when I was on the road in the Chicago area earlier today. I encountered a little audio sync problem on the low speed connection when compared to my Wi-fi network, but that’s about all. An average web page (CNN.com) loaded in about 6 seconds on a Wi-fi connection and about 10 seconds on EDGE for me, YMMV. I’m really beginning to think there is some truth to the rumors that AT&T made some improvements to their 2.5G network in the last week. Certainly the speeds are totally usable for things like checking e-mail and pulling down Google Maps and directions. Speaking of which, Google Maps load smoothly and being able to search for live business information and immediately generate a map and directions is very handy.

Music and video playback really does live up to the “best iPod ever” tagline. The interface is totally intuitive, and cover flow mode is really well implemented. It’s smooth as butta, and lets you quickly flip between albums and tracks, while looking super cool. Most of the video content I’ve watch so far was via YouTube, which doesn’t deliver the quality that iTunes downloads do, but for watching that Dramatic Chipmunk video, it’s fine. Plus, this is the first iPod you can listen to without headphones or an external speaker. Sound quality is still much better through headphones or a stereo, but in a pinch, the iPhone works in standalone audio mode just fine.

One interesting thing I noticed was that you can’t install any of the iPod games on the iPhone. So in this one area, 5G+ iPods actually beat out the iPhone. A rumored partnership between Apple and Nintendo to release games for the iPhone hasn’t come to fruition yet, but I’m still holding out hope.

I really only have a couple of minor gripes with the iPhone, and they’re both pretty superficial. First off, it’s a massive fingerprint magnet. The iSmudginator that I showed you the other day really isn’t far from the truth in terms of the volume of greasy prints you’ll have on the device in just minutes. That said, Apple does include a nice microfiber cleaning cloth in the box. I’m also not overly impressed with “multi-touch” portion of the interface at this early juncture. Really, it’s only used to zoom in and out of the screen, and I actually prefer the alternative method of just tapping twice to zoom in. Sure, the “pinch” effect we’ve all seen to enlarge and reduce photos is nifty, but from a usability perspective, it really does nothing for me.

One other issue will probably be solved by case manufacturers. The initial supply of protective cases (that fit well) is very limited. Every case I’ve seen offers little or no protection for the front of the phone. I picked up the Belkin acrylic case which protects the back of the phone, but not the screen, then clips on your belt loop. However, if you’re used to throwing your phone in a pocket or a briefcase, these kind of cases won’t offer sufficient protection. Sure, there are plenty of people saying that the glass screen is extremely durable, but I’d hate to be the one who proves them wrong.

Overall, I’m pretty impressed with my iPhone so far. I’m not saying that it’s perfect. Having no tactile input can take a little getting used to, and I wish that it did have true 3G network support. I also wish that Apple included a memory card slot. I really hate that my crappy old $100 phone can be expanded to have more memory than the iPhone has. Its high-end design glass and metal design is gorgeous, but I’m used to having a phone you can “trash around” in your pocket. That said, I’m concerned that over time it it might not hold up to real-world (ab)use. Here’s hoping I’m proven wrong on that front.

There’s no denying that the iPhone is one cool gadget. I was able to do things with it that I could never do effectively with my old phone. Sending and receiving e-mail is as easy as using any desktop application, and the Google Maps and instant weather features are totally awesome if you travel a lot like me. I also appreciate being able to go to any website I want, without the barriers that most mobile phone browsers put in the way. Plus, I’m able to get rid of three devices in my briefcase now. Before this weekend, I had an iPod, a Pocket PC and a mobile/data phone. Now, I’m down to one.

Technabob Review Scores
Functionality:
8 out of 10

Design:
10 out of 10

Build Quality:
9 out of 10

Ease of Use:
9 out of 10

Value:
7 out of 10

Overall Score:
8.5 out of 10

Here are a few choice excerpts:

After playing GEOW I now know that I will never play Halo again, at least until Halo 3. That’s right, GEOW is that freakin good.”

“Once we got past the bore fest that was Texas Chainsaw Massacre we got see in my opinion what is the must have game of the holiday season. The controls were great, even though you had to adjust for them, and the game is just plain old fun!”

“This game is amazing! The graphics are epic, no pun intended, and the gameplay follows suit.”

“The single player looks orgasmic and the MP is a joy to play.”

“I have yet to purchase an Xbox 360 and I decided to go to this event and see what the machine is capable of. I came away impressed with what I would call one of the best Multiplayer games I have ever played.

Gears of War releases on November 7, 2006 from Epic Games and Microsoft Game Studios. I think I know what I’ll be doing that night.

[via Aeropause]

[image via Gamertag Radio via Flickr]