Wayne Schulz

Woot! has this 8000 mAh rechargeable battery on sale for $39 today (8/11/10) only. Add in $5 for shipping and you’re still about $40 cheaper than the best reputable price I could find on Amazone.

They advertise this as a notebook battery backup – however I’ve been using mine for about the last year as a “super extended” battery for my iPhone, BlackBerry and Android smartphones. In the time I’ve used it during lengthy day trips I’ve never been able to completely drain the battery to empty.

This ships with a large assortment of interchangeable tips so you probably can connect to just about any device you own.

What I’ve done is use my regular smartphone cable and plugged it into the USB port on this battery backup device. Works like a charm!

I’ve largely used this to recharge smartphones — so I cannot vouch for how well it will recharge a netbook computer (which is one of the things it’s advertised to do).

As a super extended battery backup — I recommend it. If you have kids who take their iPod Touches in the car on long car trips this can save you from having to drag a power cord from the front seat of the car into the back.

Remember – this deal is up for 8/11/10 only.

http://goo.gl/uyHM

The BlackBerry 9330 first dropped to $199 on the BoostMobile site sometime around the beginning of July 2010. Presently Best Buy has it on sale for $189. Now Radio Shack jumps in with what appears to be regular pricing of $149. While the BlackBerry Curve 8330 is several versions back in terms of technology — lacking Wi-Fi for example — it’s an adequate choice for someone whose needs are texting and emailing.

This is a CDMA power BlackBerry running on no-contract carrier BoostMobile. Your monthly fee of $60 provides unlimited talk, text, web and email. Cancel anytime with no ETF. The underlying provider of the Boost signal is Sprint (who also owns Boost Mobile).

Specs on the BlackBerry 8330:

• Browse the Internet, take pictures and more with the BlackBerry 8330 for Boost Mobile. It features a full QWERTY keyboard, media player with a standard audio jack, stereo Bluetooth® capability and much more. Plus, you can check your Microsoft® Outlook® emails from virtually anywhere.
• Features an enhanced Web browser that lets you check your POP, IMAP or Outlook email accounts
• 2.0-megapixel camera with flash, 5x zoom and video capability
• Gain access to BlackBerry applications, games and more
• Features a media player with a standard audio jack
• Includes a 1GB microSD™ card
• Has stereo Bluetooth capability so it works handsfree from up to 33 feet away
• GPS and wireless Web enabled
• Add email accounts that are accessed through POP, IMAP and Microsoft Outlook
• Includes a full QWERTY keyboard and trackball navigation
• Provides up to 260 minutes of talk time and up to 264 hours of standby time
• CDMA network compatible
• Unlimited Nationwide talk, text, Web & email with no contracts for $60/month

Not a bad choice as a starter smartphone for those on a budget, averse to monthly cell phone contracts or parents with kids wanting to use a BlackBerry as their first phone. Be aware that BlackBerry has several models that look similar and this is one of the basic ones (lacking Wi-Fi for instance).

BlackBerry Curve 8330 – $149

It’s been possible for a while to stream Sirius radio over the iPhone using the Sirius Radio application. The problem with the Sirius program is that it blocks  some of the more popular channels – including Howard Stern on Howard 100 and Howard 101.

Other applications for iPhone/Touch such as Pocket Tunes ($6.99)  allow for streaming of these restricted channels – but the login process has been kludgy with frequent requests to enter passwords and delays while audio buffers.

A new FREE application called MusicDock in the iTunes store connects via WiFi or 3G to Sirius and allows you to stream over 120 channels – including Howard Stern.

Did I mention this application is free? And it supports high quality audio?

An online subscription from Sirius is  required to initially login and listen to the Sirius audio streams.  What’s nice about MusicDock is  you won’t be prompted to continuously enter a Sirius login and password. Once your login information has been entered it’s stored so in the future you can quickly start up Howard without any pesky buffering or connection issues.

Grab this download!

Features:

• Automated login (no re-entry of passwords)
• Save favorite channels
• See what’s playing on the channel list – with album artwork
• Background listening in iOS4

MusicDock (iTunes link)

If you’re an avid New York City Broadway Show fan then you’ll want to pick up a copy of At The Booth. This (unofficial)  iPhone application posts periodic updates about the TKTS booths’ selections –  located in Times Square, Downtown Brooklyn and the South Street Seaport.

What’s a TKTS booth?

TKTS Discount Booths offer same or next day tickets to Broadway and Off-Broadway musicals and plays at up to 50% off. All locations sell tickets at 50%, 40%, 30% and 20% off full-price (plus a $4.00 per ticket service charge, which helps support other TDF services and programs).

The catch? Availability and ticket inventory change throughout the day and at the discretion of individual productions. Until now this meant the only way you could determine what shows were available was to visit the booth.  Every time we’re in New York we make sure to visit the TKTS booth to see what shows are available. Unfortunately that’s not always convenient if you’re all the way across town in the city. With At The Booth for iPhone you can remotely view an approximation of what’s going to be available at the booth (the information is not real time so it could change by the time you get to the TKTS booth)

This application (which is not sponsored by TKTS – who states they have their own official application slated for September 2010)  lists Broadway Shows generally available as well as giving a great rundown of show synopsis , their performance times and directions (maps) to the theater. New visitors to New York will definitely want to grab a copy of At The Booth since it easily replaces the need to carry a map and show guide when visiting the city.

At The Booth (iTunes link)

In a blog post today Google pulled the plug on their “never quite caught on” web based collaboration tool named Google Wave. Originally introduced in May 2009 as the hoped for successor to email – it touted features such as real time collaboration and multiple revision of documents.  Wave gradually succumbed to what appeared to be lack of interest by Google.

At a time when everyone worldwide was moving to the mobile web, Google Wave sorely missed a way to access data while mobile. All viewing and entry had to be done on a desktop computer.  In addition for a product that touted collaboration the use of groups was embarrassingly simplistic. Google Wave never supported the creation of groups of any kind. Rather it required you to setup a second group structure on another service called Google Groups and invite people who you wanted to include in a group on Wave to join the Google Group.

Confused yet? Apparently so was everyone else. Google Wave just never caught on. Development seemed to slow to a snail’s pace.

Today Google announced that enough was enough and Wave would be defunct at the end of 2010 as a public product.

Google says goodbye to Wave