Today Research In Motion announced the new "Blackberry Curve" which is the first of the new 8300 series phones I've been hearing about and definitely waiting for. AT&T (Cingular) was confirmed as one of several carriers who will offer the new phone and as an AT&T customer I'm certainly happy about that. However, I'm hoping I'll be able to get one of the more advanced models in the series. The Curve as announced today is just the lowest end model, lacking both the WiFi and GPS capabilities expected of other models in the line. (Word on the street is that the 8320 will add WiFi, and the 83XX will offer both WiFi and on-board GPS.)

I've seen indications that T-Mobile will offer the 8320, which is consistent with their rumored plans to launch several phones later this summer with WiFi, along with a service for making voice calls via WiFi hotspots.

I'll keep my figers crossed that AT&T will offer at least the 8320, and with any luck the 83XX. None of today's press from RIM or AT&T mentioned an expected availability date for the 8300, so I'll just keep poking around on the web until the 8300 shows up in a nearby AT&T (Cingular) store and I can go check one out first hand...

There are a number of things on the web I'm trying to keep an eye out for so I'll know when they arrive:

• Lightning 0.5 - My preferred calendar client is the Lightning extension to Mozilla Thunderbird.  I am currently using version 0.3.1 which works reasonably well but is missing a few features and has some rough edges from a usability perspective. I'm keen to get Lightning 0.5, which is due out any day now. I'm keeping an eye on the Calendar Weblog at Mozillazine for word that the Lighning 0.5 Release Candidate is available so I can download it and make the upgrade move.
• Pidgin 2.0 - I am a big fan of instant messaging and use it on a daily basis to keep in touch with my family and my work colleagues. For quite some time now I've used 'gaim' as it gives me a multi-platform, multi-service, multi-protocol client with a compact, uncluttered user interface. Version 2.0 of gaim has been due out for some time -- I've been on various beta builds since early last fall. Recently it was announced that a major agreement with AOL had cleared the way for the official release of version 2.0, but due to some trademark and naming issues the client is now officially being renamed "Pigdin". According to the updated (and relocated) project site the official 2.0 release is only a matter of days away.
• Blackberry 8300 - I like my Sony Ericsson W900i phone but would benefit from a better interface for sending and receiving email given that's how the great majority of my work-related interactions play out. I am able to do quite a bit of communicating via text messages but fundamentally need easy access to my email inbox to get things done in real time. After some research I admit I'm most attracted to the rumored soon-to-be-released Blackberry 8300. It has the well-regarded Blackberry email platform and all the current Blackberry features (e.g., Bluetooth, web browser, good display and keyboard) plus camera, GPS, and WiFi support, at least according to some sources. Of late it has been claimed that Cingular will release the Blackberry 8300 on May 25th, but I am not sure which model in the 8300 line will be initially available. We'll see...

I'm taking satellite radio for a test drive and thought I'd share a few initial observations, particularly since the experience so far has been a positive one.

Our high school band's annual Crab Fest fund raiser includes a silent auction. At the event two weeks ago I won an XM Satellite Radio package which consisted of a Delphi Roady2 receiver kit and $45 worth of service. I'd been contemplating satellite radio for some time as I'd long ago grown weary of all the mindless chatter and endless commercials on drive time radio, as well as the horribly limited range of musical content even though we have quite a few FM stations here in the Bay Area. The package I won at the silent auction seemed a reasonably low cost, low risk way to find out if satellite radio was indeed a better solution.

Installation was fairly straight forward, but reading the instructions pointed up a few limitations I didn't realize going in:

• The receiver requires three separate input connections - one for power, one for the antenna, and one for audio output (generally to the car cassette deck through an adapter included in the receiver kit). This creates a pretty serious tangle of unsightly and bothersome cables that have to snake their way into the unit. There is no practical way to hide them as they connect right next to the display and control panel, them though the installation kit did include a cable wrap so I could bundle the three modest-sized wires into one much larger and more unsightly assembly. You can dispense with the audio output connection and connect the unit via an FM modulator in the XM receiver but past experience with similar setups has shown them to be annoying due to a need to constantly shift the broadcast frequency and retune the radio, plus the audio quality of the FM connection is noticably worse than a direct feed through the cassette deck
• The antenna needs to be mounted outside the car on a horizontal metal surface, fastens with a magnet, and trails a small wire that must be fed back into the interior of the car and connected to the receiver. Happily the magnet is quite strong and the antenna cable more than long enough, but I admit I was hoping I could mount the antenna inside the car on the top of the dash board just as I do my GPS antenna when using it on long trips. The instruction manual specifically warns against using the antenna on the dash, saying it was designed ot only work well when mounted on a large metal ground plane. Some basic testing with the unit confirmed this to be the case - I got almost no signal with the antenna on the dash but got a quite strong one with it on the roof.This meant having to run the antenna cable along under the dash, through the door opening, along the edge of the roof via the rubber door gasket, and then out in the open on the roof to somplace approxmately near the center line of the car. This also means the antenna is just sitting there for some prankster to haul off, unless I want to take it off the roof and lock it inside the car.
• The receiver power cable is designed to plug into the cigarette lighter rather than connect to the fuse block. That's bad because I already have two other devices to plug into my cigarette lighter - my cell phone charger and my iPod charger (especially given the problems I'm having with my iPod battery). Clearly I need to get under the dash and find a way to add a few more 12VDC power connections so I can charge my cell phone while listening to satellite radio.

Once the unit was installed I needed to activate it. I had intended to do that via the XM web site as the activation fee is $9.95 via the web and $14.95 via the phone. However, I discovered you can't redeem a gift certificate if you activate via the web and as I had a $45 gift card as part of my auction purchase I had no choice but to go the slightly more expensive phone route. In doing so I learned that each XM radio has a uniqe ID, which might actually cut down on theft since I'm assuming XM would be able to recognize when someone was activating a unit that had been reported as stolen. Activation was easy, and within less than ten minutes of completing the procedure my receiver was fully operational. One thing I liked about XM radio was their simple programming plan - $12.95 per month for all their channels. Not having to mix and match packages to get what you are looking for is so much easier and less irritating than dealing with, say, cable TV.

After a week of regular use I can say I'm pretty pleased. Reception has been solid except for a few cases in remote areas along heavily wooded mountain roads with limited southern exposure. There are a wide variety of channels to chose among, and the Roady2 supports three different banks of 10 preset stations each so tuning across stations is simple. I've actually found I do far less station jumping than with FM as the music seems consistently good and in keeping with each stations theme plus the lack of commercials and "on air personalities" means less annoying content to dodge. My daughter even seems happy with the mixture of musical content so our morning shared commute is more relaxed.

The Delphi Roady2 isn't a bad little receiver. It is compact and easy to install. The display is reasonably large though it only has two lines and so can only display a subset of what you want to know. (The options are 1) Station and Artist, 2) Station and Song Title, 3) Artist and Song TItle, or 4) Artist and scrolling stock quotes.) I wish it could scroll artist or song title when they are longer than will fit on the display. You can chose among several backlight colors to pick something that matches your taste and existing dash lighting scheme. A nifty "Favorite Song" feature lets you bookmark songs you like and the receiver will automatically switch to them if they are being played on any XM station. It also seems easy to move it between cars or between car and home so I plan to pick up a few other antennas and see how that works.

I still have some experimenting to do. I haven't tried accessing the local traffic content and though there are a number of news and sports stations haven't investigated them yet. I'll keep you posted

In 1978 my brother Mike got the Mattel Football 2 handheld electronic game. We were instantly addicted, and spent many hours playing against each other. The game was simple enough, using small red LEDs as the offensive and defensive players as well as the ball (when in flight on a pass or kick), but required quite a bit of practice to play well. The sound effects were simple too, but somehow managed to fit with the visuals. Overall, it was amazingly immersive, which may be hard to believe. (Well, hey, it was 1978.)

Recently it occurred to me I might be able to track down a working version so I could relive those days and also show my kids what electronic games were like when I was younger. Naturally I turned to eBay and learned that indeed vintage instances could be had for a reasonable price. Surprisingly, I also discovered that Mattel had recently reissued the game and it could be purchased new from eBay merchants as well as from Amazon. Further research, however, revealed that the reissued version wasn't exactly the same game. For some reason Mattel mangled the passing mechanics so it was clear I'd only be able to truly enjoy the original version. I soon tracked down and bought one, and by happy coincidence the seller was from Nashville, TN (where I grew up and spent so many hours playing the game nearly thirty years ago)..

Everything was just as I remembered it. It took me only half an hour to recapture the basic reflexes needed to dodge rushing linemen, slip sideways to escape tacklers, and dance around in the pocket to set up a pass. I still find it great fun playing, though it's about one gazillionth as sophisticated as a Madden football on a PSP.