Quick Update for Spb Backup w/ WM6.5 Support
SPB Backup is an application for creating backup copies of the data on your Pocket PC. It creates self-extracting compressed executables, thus making the backup and restore processes very simple and intuitive. Backup scheduling supported.
What new in Version 2.1
- Windows Mobile 6.5 support
- Windows Mobile upgrade 6.1 to 6.5 support
- Small interface updates
- Various bug fixes based on user reports.
http://www.spbsoftwarehouse.com/pocketpc-software/backup/
Bing Mobile Updated
Oohhh pretty:) If you’re looking for the latest version of Bing for your phone just direct your phone’s web browser to m.bing.com/download. First thing you’ll notice is that it tries to figure out your current location. Then finally you’ll get to see the improved (prettier) interface that looks less like Windows Mobile 5:) They’ve improved the interface throughout as well as updating the client to include more relevant searches. I had a problem with it locating me (I think it’s trying to use GPS instead of cell tower information) but otherwise you can feel the improvements to the UI immediately. It’s actually finger friendly and attractive. Oh and I’m always reminded of the speech recognition which isn’t just a neat trick – it’s really useful for hands free use of the device and is really accurate. The turn by turn directions are greatly improved. You can see the map with a transparent overlay on top with the written instructions so you get both the instructions and the map simultaneously. It also looks like news was added and weather is now accessed through a ‘search’ for “weather” and gas prices were lost. Everything feels modern and easier on the eye.
Amazon MP3 Announces "25 Days of Free"
Amazon is giving away an mp3 a day which are all holiday themed. Since they are DRM free you should be able to transfer them to your phone without a problem, and yes, they are mp3 format. You do need to log in to an Amazon account to be eligible to download the mp3 and they do ask you to download their mp3 player, but you can skip that. Here’s more info from their press release:
Amazon.com, Inc. today announced that the Amazon MP3 store will be kicking off their second annual “25 Days of Free.” For each day of December until Christmas, a new holiday-themed song will be available as a free download from the Amazon MP3 store. Now in its second year, “25 Days of Free” begins today, Dec. 1, and lasts until Christmas. Every day in December leading up to Christmas, a new song — hand-picked by Amazon MP3 editors — will be unveiled, and customers will be able to download each of these songs for free. For more information about “25 Days of Free” and to download your free music, visit:http://www.amazon.com/25daysoffree.
The MP3 selections this year will range from traditional holiday songs performed by modern artists to some unique holiday-themed originals. A few of the available tracks will be Tori Amos’ “Snow Angel,” Lady Gaga’s “Christmas Tree,” and Casting Crowns’ “Joy to the World.” Tori Amos’ “Snow Angel” is an original holiday-themed song from Amos’ newly released album “Midwinter Graces.” Casting Crowns, one of music’s top Christian rock bands, performs the classic carol “Joy to the World,” from their holiday album “Peace on Earth.” Lady Gaga’s “Christmas Tree” is a festive romp from one of 2009’s biggest breakthrough artists.
“Our customers love that we offer free songs all year since it’s an easy way for them to experiment with artists they are unfamiliar with,” said Pete Baltaxe, director of Amazon MP3. “25 Days of Free is a fun way to discover new holiday music to keep our customers in the spirit at home or on the go.”
Since launching in 2007, Amazon MP3 has grown its selection to include over 10 million songs. Amazon MP3 offers everyday low prices on bestselling albums starting at $7.99, most bestselling songs for $.99, hundreds of free songs, and a daily album deal. All music downloads sold at Amazon MP3 are DRM-free, which means they work on virtually any MP3 player, including the iPhone and iPod. Installing the Amazon MP3 Downloader allows users to easily import music into Windows Media Player or iTunes. Amazon MP3 is also available on-the-go via the Amazon MP3 mobile application, available preinstalled on a variety of mobile phones, including the Palm Pre, T-Mobile MyTouch 3G, Motorola Droid, HTC Droid Eris, T-Mobile G1, Palm Pixi, Samsung Moment, HTC Hero, Motorola Cliq, and Samsung Behold II.
Blownfuze on the Latest NRG ROMs Plus Much More
JT: Hey Doug (blownfuze), what do you think of recent NRG ROM builds? I think many readers would appreciate your professional (and sometimes snarky) opinion.
BF: Hah I knew this was a setup! Okay, good question, good in terms of trying to get me to go on and on about something. There are just a few more things about this branch that I dislike over 23***s which were so bad that I stuck to the stable branch. So 28005 is satisfactorily stable. I’m not rebooting all the time. Things don’t seem slow. But I haven’t benchmarked anything or eyeballed ram usage, just that I am satisfied with the performance which may or may not be a bit better than before. Actually I think we may have plateaued in tangible improvements of higher test builds and the rest is just fine-tuning. Software manipulating HTC Sense/Manila and so on, now when I see someone post a landscape Sense 2.5 or maybe one day a rom with yet another tab in Manila, eye-candy stuff that if I showed off to someone they’d say Yeah, that’s definitely more awesome than when you showed me your phone ten days ago. Give me a new version of google maps, I’m all over it right quick. New Opera? Gimme a link. Herm’s got something funny? I’ve got a dollar ready. But new builds are starting to interest me less. If you want to play the rom game instead of sticking to just one rom and hoping to the next build, at least download another guy’s rom at the same time and try his first to see if it grabs you. A lot more to a rom than the CE build.
Google Maps for Mobile reaches v3.3
As reported by our friends over at wmexperts, Google Maps for Mobile just released version 3.3. Here’s what a blog post from the fine folks over at Google Mobile had to say about it:
“Google Maps for mobile has long allowed you to add stars on a map to mark your favorite places. You may have noticed a few months ago that Google Maps for desktop browsers introduced the ability to star places as well. Unfortunately, there was no way to keep these starred places in sync with Google Maps on your phone. With today’s release of Google Maps for mobile 3.3 on Windows Mobile and Symbian phones, you’ll now be able to keep the starred places on your phone and on your computer completely synchronized.
For users upgrading from an older version of Google Maps for mobile, you’ll be asked, when you log in, whether you’d like to synchronize your existing starred items with your Google Account. This means you can preserve all the work you’ve put into customizing your map on your mobile, and have it show up, conveniently, in Google Maps in your desktop browser.”
Get the CAB file here for the latest version of Google Maps for Windows Mobile.
My two cents: From the information provided, there don’t appear to be any other enhancements added, so, unless you’re really into adding stars, it might not be worth the installation.
Opera releases new betas of Opera Mini and Opera Mobile
Opera today launched the second beta versions of Opera Mini 5 and Opera Mobile 10, available as free downloads. In this second beta release, Opera Mini and Opera Mobile users can now enjoy popular desktop features, such as Opera Link and the Download Manager, from their mobile phones.
With Opera Link, users can synchronize personal browser settings with their Opera desktop browser, as well as all their connected devices, ensuring that their bookmarks, Speed Dial and search engines are always accessible. The Download Manager gives users a better way to control and speed up downloads to mobile phones.
Opera continues its mission to unify its browser products, and today’s beta release is no exception. Features further polished in the second beta release are the unified look and feel across Opera’s browser products, the visual bookmarks known as Speed Dial, and tabbed browsing, one of the most popular innovations in browsing history.
The far-reaching popularity of Opera Mini continues to grow month after month. Opera reports that almost 40 million people used Opera Mini in October, saving the consumers 9.4 billion USD per year just by choosing Opera Mini.
Top 10 Free WM Apps of 2009
PC Magazine just published its list of the top-10 free WM apps of 2009. Here they are:
1. AP Mobile 2.5.7
The Associated Press; www.ap.org
2. Bing for Mobile
Microsoft; www.bing.com
3. CleanRAM 1.8
htcAddicts; handheld.softpedia.com/get/System-Utilities/Enhancements/cleanRAM-74823.shtml
4. Facebook for Windows Mobile 1.0
Microsoft; www.microsoft.com
5. Google Maps for Mobile 3.2.1
Google; www.google.com/gmm
6. Microsoft My Phone (beta) 
Microsoft; myphone.microsoft.com
7. Opera Mobile 10 (Beta)
Opera Software; www.opera.com/mobile
8. PockeTwit 76
Open source; code.google.com/p/pocketwit/
9. slimPASSWORDS 1.1.9480
slimCODE; www.slimcode.com/slimPASSWORDS/Downloads.aspx
10. Viigo (Beta)
Viigo; www.viigo.com
Pretty good list, don’t you think? No? So what would your entries be? Let us know and we can create our own top-10 list.
Resco Explorer 2010 Beta Available
I’m always happy to see one of the heavyweights coming out with an updated product and of course, I love betas cause you get to test things and have your input influence the final product. I’ve never used Resco Explorer so trying this beta was somewhat of a surprise for me – the thing flies. I mean it really flies relative to File Explorer or Total Commander and it’s a lot easier to use and easier to browse files. Some have complained that there aren’t enough new features and maybe some of this is just to get some of us to know more about the product in which case they’ve succeeded:) From Resco’s site:
What will be new or improved:
- Thumbnails of pictures in Thumbnails view
- Supported all the formats that Photo Viewer supports
- If Photo Viewer is installed, working and displaying thumbnails is much quicker
- Upload to social networks (twitter, facebook, picasa, flickr)
- Fixed registry import/export
- Favorites will be reachable from Menu
- Send to (mainly via Bluetooth) will be improved
- and other fixes…
If you try the beta you actually get Resco Explorer as well as Resco Registry (which lets yuo explore and tweak your registry with the finger friendly UI as Resco Explorer) and System Info (which simply tells you the program memory, storage memory, storage card registry and battery info but it is finger friendly and graphically pleasing). Remember that this is a beta so they are hoping you give some feedback. There are some known bugs, like in the newer builds he bottom of the screen is cut off because of he enlarged lower task bar. If you’re up for it the download can be found here and the XDA thread to post comments is here. You should know that this is an exe file that you run from your PC while your phone is connected over ActiveSync.
Guitar Hero 5 Mobile by Glu, Unleash Your Inner Rock Star
Glu Mobile Inc, a leading global publisher of mobile games, today announced the worldwide launch of Guitar Hero® 5 Mobile. The title was developed and published through Glu’s exclusive worldwide partnership with Activision Publishing, Inc.
Guitar Hero 5 Mobile allows fans to pick up their mobile devices and rock out on the guitar, drums and bass guitar to a collection of iconic bands. Gamers test their skills with three difficulty settings allowing endless hours of gameplay and can compare their scores with others from around the world.
“The Guitar Hero® franchise, with its global mass market appeal, is a hit perfectly suited for the mobile platform,” said Alex Galvagni, CTO & SVP Global Product Development, Glu. “A variety of new features and authentic musical gameplay allow gamers and music fans alike to enjoy this rockin’ experience.”
Features include:
- New Instruments - Play guitar, drums and bass guitar for all songs
- New Songs - A total of up to 20 new songs at launch with up to 19 additional downloadable songs
- Iconic Rock Bands - Play along to high quality audio songs from Blink 182, Rush, 3 Doors Down, Sublime, Vampire Weekend and more
- Global Leaderboards - Compare scores to other players from around the world
- Multiple Venues - Play as different characters in 3 new venues – San Francisco, Cairo and the New York City subway
- Gameplay Variety - Unlock four additional guitars and drums, earn 31 achievements and break records
- Enhanced Visuals - Animated rockers, crowds and venue effects will make gamers feel like a true rocker
Guitar Hero 5 Mobile is now available on all major carriers worldwide. For more information, go to www.glu.com. For live updates, follow Glu Mobile on Twitter at www.twitter.com/glumobile or become a fan on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/glumobile.
Sprint 4G Rolls out with Seattle Launch
The wireless future just arrived in Seattle. Sprint today announced the launch of Sprint 4G mobile broadband throughout the Seattle area. As a result, streaming video, fast file downloads and uploads and turbo-charged web browsing are no longer just home, office or coffee shop benefits. Sprint 4G customers can enjoy a blazing fast wireless mobile broadband experience across the city, whether they’re working at a remote location, taking a break on campus, sitting at a favorite eatery, or as a passenger on the freeway or public transportation.
Sprint Brings Wireless Speeds up to 10 Times Faster Than Today’s 3G from Any National Wireless Carrier
Seattle is one of the first communities to enjoy 4G wireless connections from Sprint, the first national wireless carrier to test, launch and market 4G technology. Sprint 4G delivers download speeds up to 10 times faster than 3G.1 (View 4G coverage at www.sprint.com/4G.)
By dramatically increasing download speeds for photos, videos and large files, Sprint 4G is enabling innovative applications now. With Sprint 4G, you can download a favorite song, picture, sitcom or large video in seconds, not minutes, or watch live streaming video – all while on the go, not just from the home or office.
Businesses are discovering that Sprint 4G is an effective, flexible alternative for Internet connectivity that can both increase productivity and expand their capabilities. For example, retailers can implement cost-effective wireless voice and data solutions for their outlets; real estate agents can conduct virtual property tours; construction teams using 4G in the field can save valuable time by sharing schematics with engineers online; insurance companies can speed their claims management through real-time communication with on-site adjusters; educators can enhance distance learning with two-way interactive live video; health care professionals can improve their ability to remotely monitor patients; emergency first responders can rapidly assess and coordinate disaster action with real-time on-site video and audio; and photo-journalists can instantly transfer high-resolution images to the newsroom.
Anthony.
