Shola's Home Gadgets

Mobile Phone Incoming calls only

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 15:26:00 +0000

If you are looking for a mobile phone provider in the UK that would support using a mobile phone SIM account for incoming calls only without a contract, then you should consider GiffGaff which is a subsidiary of O2. Most UK PAYG SIM only packages will allow you to use your account for incoming calls only for a limited time of anything between 3 to 6 months but require you to either topup or make a chargeable call/text once every 90 or 120 days to keep your account active, however with GiffGaff as long you have incoming calls your account will remain active.

If you have never heard of GiffGaff, you mght be wondering is this a con? The reason why GiffGaff doesn't demand you topup every 3 or 6 months is that every mobile network owner gets paid a fee for terminating a call, so as long as people call the mobile phone thee network is making money, but the bigger networks are greedy, and make more money by getting people to topup and force them to make calls.

GiffGaff even has a monthly bundle especially designed for people who get a lot for incoming calls, for a fee of £5 you get 60 mins and 300 texts and for every complete minute of incoming call you get, they add an extra minute to your call allowance.

So if you have an unlocked mobile phone or an O2 iphone, then for a one off SIM activation fee £10 (you get £5 extra credit if you use this link), you can have an incoming calls only mobile phone package.

If you have a locked mobile phone from a UK network provider, check out the free GiffGaff Guide to phone unlocking.

LG RZ37LZ55 Sky HD + remote code

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Sat, 21 May 2011 11:00:00 +0000

If you have a Sky HD box and need to programme the remote control to operate your LG HD RZ37LZ55 TV, then the code you need is 0206.

The process for entering the code into your SKY HD+ remote control for the LG HD TV is as follows, make sure you are not near the LCD when doing this:

1. Press the TV button.
2. Press and hold the Select and Red buttons down until the red light above the SKY button flashes twice, then let go.
3. Enter the code 0206 and press select.
4. Press the SKY button once, this completes the programming sequence.

Your Sky HD+ remote should now be able to control the basic features of your LG RZ37LZ55 tv, such as volume, standby, and channel selection or mode.

Do you need a cheap PAYG no contract SIM?
Setting up email on your sony ericsson mobile phone.

Cheap PAYG SIM for unlocked Mobile Phone Excellent Value

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 13:44:00 +0000

One of the cheapest Pay as you go SIM only no contract mobile network providers in the UK at the moment is GiffGaff. They currently charge only 8p per minutes for mobile or landline calls (ASDA mobile is same rate), but in addition don't charge you for calling freephone numbers from your mobile phone! Text messages cost 4p each. This is a vitual network run on O2 infrastructure, so solid partners behind them.

If you are interested in monthly bundles, they have unlimited texts for £5, 250mins, unlimited texts and unlimited mobile internet for £10 (this is a special offer that expires 31st March 2011, 150mins after that date). Other bundles available, and unlimited text/internet are standard above £5, they also offer free unlimited calls/text to other GiffGaff numbers (topup required every 90 days) so an ideal package for teenagers to use amongst themselves without running up huge bills. You can see their full call charges here.

If you have a second unlocked mobile phone or O2 tied handset and are interested in trying them out order a free Sim card with £5 credit (affliate link) or non affliate order page but not free credit and see for yourself.

They have a very helpful community, and no matter what version of handset you have, they will be able to get you up and running.

And by the way talking about mobile phones, did you know that by the end of 2011 all phones manufactured in the EU will have the same charger? Check this info video.

Samsung Omnia new mobile phone

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 15:02:00 +0000

My old Xperia Sony Ericsson phone has broken, so I urgently had to get a replacement Samsung Omnia lite Windows mobile handset in order to continue running my business because all my appointments, contacts and client details were held in text messages that I had luckly backed up using microsoft's myphone service.

I did lose some data, but nothing that affected the running of my daily London driving lessons operation, even though it took me a while to get used to the Samsung interface as well as Windows Mobile 6.5 way of organising things. I now make it a duty to sync and backup my mobile phone everyday via my home WiFi network, and try to be extra care when out and about not to drop my phone (this was partly to blame on the one year old Sony Experia).

I'm not as hung up on the latest gadgets nowadays, especially when money is tight, so the new Iphone 4 was not on the tables since I'm a light mobile call user and don't need the large bundle of minutes offered to get these latest android and IPhones off the shelf. Hopefully my Samsung Omnia will last at least a year before developing a fault.

Hitachi DZ-HV565E Battery Life

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 16:13:00 +0000

The HV565E spare battery I bought recently lasted over 2 hours while recording a driving lesson in my car, though it was not capturing in HD mode, as I only had a 2GB SD card, and needed to film continuously for 120mins.

I don't know if I had a larger capacity SD card if the battery in the Hitachi DZ-HV565E HD camcorder would have lasted the 2 hours in the HD mode, but I do know it lasts over 1 hour.

So far I'm happy with the performance of my Hitachi pocket HD camcorder and the batteries.

More Reading
My new Hitachi DZ-HV565E HD camcorder.

Hitachi DZ-HV565E camcorder spare replacement Battery

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 06:47:00 +0000

I have just bought a spare replacement battery for my Hitachi HV565E HD camcorder, it is the energiser FLNP60 3.7 1100maH Litium rechargable battery, because I needed to record longer driving lessons videos, and the orginal cell only lasted about 1hrs and 10minutes when recording in full HD mode.

It is much cheaper and affordable than the original Hitachi HV565E battery, and also lasts a little longer.

So if you want an extra battery or need a replacement, then why not order yours today.

VHS VCR is not dead!

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 06:56:00 +0000

The VHS tape recorder is not dead in my house at least.

In a recent house cleanup, we found some old children's VHS tapes which we hadn't watched for years, and since I have a five and 4 year old boy and girl, we decidec that they might want to watch these Veggie Tales videos which while available on DVD, we wanted to see if our Sony SLV-E720 VCR would still play them since it had been sitting on our consumer electronics shelf for years.

Well plugging in the Sony SLV-E720 into the mains, connecting the SCART cable to the TV and popping the video tape cassette in produced an excellent picture on our CRT TV, so we've been watching some of these old VHS tapes.

It was back in 2005 that Dixons announced they would stop selling VCRs and 35mm film cameras and it is now virtually impossible to buy a Video Tape recorder anywhere.

So the VHS recorder has followed in the steps of the sony betamax, 8 track car music players, vinyl, and the siclair ZX81 to the history books. I will be keeping my Sony VCR for as long as it works, hopefully my electronics background will deal with any minor repairs like cleaning the video heads, though lack of spares will probably mean one day I'll have to give it up totally.

I remember the days when we used to have cassette tape duplicators to produce copies of audio sermons at V2V church, now it is Podcasts and MP3s!

Sony Ericsson Xperia X2 not available in the UK

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 14:14:00 +0000

I have just got an email from Vodaphone saying that they will no longer be selling the Sony Ericsson Xperia X2 on their network through their shop outlets anymore.

I had pre-registered with the vodaphone shop to know when the newer version of my current Sony mobile phone would be available, put it looks like the X2 will now not be officially sold through any of the 4 UK cell phone networks.

The email does not give any reasons for dropping the Xperia X2 from its portfolio in the UK, but it did mention that it will be stocking the X10 after it is released in Febuary 2010.

I think O2 has also planned to sell the Xperia X2, but has since shelved those plans.

Electricity Power cut 24hrs London

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 11:15:00 +0000

We recently had a 24hr electricity power cut here in Mill Hill, London and I only realised how highly dependent the mordern world has become on this source of energy.

The power cut occured around 2am, but the effects were felt immediately. Obviously the street lights went out, but near to us, was the bedside electric clock radio which we use to tell the time. While we didn't feel the effect immediately because we were in bed, the home central heating system also shut down, which meant no heating and in the morning no hot water from the taps, and this being winter is a MAJOR problem.

Luckly for us, the cooker is gas, so once we found matches, we were able to boil water, heat milk for breakfast and later cook food that was defrosting from the fridge and freezers.

My neigbours could not make outgoing phone calls because their phone relied on electricity (we have an old phone to plug in when power fails), but computers were out, laptop batteries can only last so long, even mobile phone batteries were running dangerously low, so no unnecessary calls.

The house was very quiet, as even the radio did not have batteries in it, obviously everyone was cold and all huddled up in the sitting room.

4pm the house was dark, we had candles but it was really cold, noone was thinking of the gadgets, games consoles they got for christmas, all we wanted was light and some warmth.

While the electricity power cut was due to an underground cable fault, and the utility engineers from EDF Energy had been working round the clock to rectify the fault, by the time power was restored almost 24hrs later, it had really been a tough day, and I can't imagine being homeless in winter out on the streets!

Hitachi DZ-HV565E Merry Christmas

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 14:55:00 +0000

If you are thinking of get the Hitachi HV565E HD pocket camcorder as a gift for a family member or a friend, then here is some christmas snow HD footage that might persuade you to do so. This was edited on my Apple MacBook Pro using final cut.

I have really been having a lot of fun with this little Hitachi HD hybrid camera, the battery life is quite very good, allowing me to record almost 2 hours of a driving lessons in HD, the limiting factor being that the camcorder runs out of storage space since I only got a cheap 4GB SD card from Amazon which the Hitachi camcorder has not had any problems reading.

Most of my recordings have not required sound, but it performed well during my daughther's christmas school play, for me to be happy. The other thing is I think I might have a resolution to the HV565E auto focus issue, and will be posting about it later, after I have done some more tests.

HP Smartmedia Homeautomation Server

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 16:39:00 +0000

Following my recent article about my simple home automation media solution using an IPod, I have come to notice that HP wants to capture more of the HA and Home media entertainment market by launching the Smartmedia server.

Did you notice the strategic placement of the 17TB server next to XBox 360 media extender console in the video above? They are obviuosly trying to show how easy it integrates with microsoft's product.

The HP smartmedia server will perform the function of centralising your music, videos, pictures and will mean that you can show off all those family photos and home videos made over the years, and is compatible with iPhones as well.

While I'm still thinking of my options as I reconfigure my home automation system, I've got enough storage space already, so don't think I will be buying one of these media streaming devices.

Simple Home automation whole house audio

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 10:35:00 +0000

I'm currently reconfiguring my home automation system, and for that reason, my HTPC is down, but it still wanted to have some of my whole house audio still available to distribute relaxing music while I work from home during the day.

At first I thought of using my apple macbook pro as a temp solution, but then I remembered I had an Ipod which was not being used lying around.

So all I did was copy a couple of hundred of my favorite songs to the 80GB hard drive of the Apple Ipod, create a few playlists, plug the MP3 player into my audio distribution amplifier which is already wired to the rooms and corridor of the house, and now I can continue to enjoy music around the house.

If you are living in a small flat or appartment, you can implemet this simple home automation idea using an Ipod shuffle which has no moving parts (less likley to breakdown), a cheap doking station (there are many cheap ones available now, not just Bose).

To prevent my Ipod from running out of power, I ordered a cheap usb power adaptor for £1, and use the Apple supplied cable to permanently connect it to the MP3 player. This also means in the even of a short power cut, I don't have to reset the playlists or press the play button.

The other part of my home automation system the XBox 360 media extender continues to work okay, providing stunning pictures on my 3 year old LG HD LCD TV.

Playstation Video Store

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:13:00 +0000

It is christmas time, and if you are looking for a gift that you could give to a gaming console addict, then maybe you might be thinking of getting a Playstation.

Having used an XBox 360 as a media entertainment centre for over 3 years, Sony has decided to launch a playstation video store to offer easy access to HD quality entertainment on their console, in addition to the blu ray dvd playback features.

Movies, games etc, all downloaded directly and ready to view in minutes.

New gadget Sony Ericsson Xperia X1

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 16:09:00 +0000

I have just acquired a new gadget, it is the Sony Ericsson Xperia mobile phone.

The windows mobile 6.1 phone is on a O2 contract, and is a worthy replacement of my old and trusted SE-K750i that I've had for a very long time.

The reason I chose the Sony Ericsson Xperia is that I'm looking for a gadget/device that will act as a mini mobile office as I'm out and about alot, so need to keep track of appointments, email, contacts, surf the net, create simple word documents and the Xperia fits the bill.

I have only had the Sony X1 for a short time, but it is living up to its expectations. I'm yet to buy an external memory card for it, but that will be ordered soon.

Using Apple Mac and PC

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 09:24:00 +0000

I have been using an Apple MacBook Laptop recently (last year or so) to do a lot of my work having used PCs for most of my adult computing life (right from Windows Version 3.1) and computers had 286 processors 16MB of ram and 40MB hard drives.

My Apple Mac is currently not available to me, so I've had to move back to working with PCs, and it has just dawned on me how I have become used to the Mac.
Simple keyboard shortcuts are different, and some characters are in diffrent positions, in particular the '@' symbol which I use a lot.

One of the things that you don't miss from being on the PC, is the lack of viruses when it comes to the MAC, I don't have any antivirus software running on the laptop, and don't have to worry about adware, spyware or malware. What a world of peace. I'm trully missing my Apple Mac.

While I don't think the PC will be ever threathen by Steve Jobs creation, they are getting more popular, and while still more expensive than a windows PC, they are getting more affordable, and with generous discounts available to students, a lot are being bought.

More Reading
Connecting Apple Macs to TV.
BoinxTV Mac video production software.

Hitachi DZ-HV565E good daylight pictures

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 13:31:00 +0000

I took my recently acquired Hitachi DZ-HV565E camera on a family holiday, and was pleasantly surprised by the quality of photos the camcorder took in addition to the already mentioned good HD video footage.

While the DZ-HV565E takes very good pictures in the outdoor daylight conditions, I was disappointed by the results produced indoors at night especially since it doesn't have a flash for taking photos, the inbuilt light no being of much use.

I have posted samples of the pictures taken by this wonderful Hitachi HD camcorder below of some steam raliway locomotives if any of you are into small guage engines.

So far I've been very impressed with this cheap Hitachi HD camcorder, and while it is not the perfect gadget for taking both video and photos, for a portable handheld device it is perfect in my humble reviwing opinion.

Hitachi DZ-HV565E Auto Focus problems
Sanyo Xacti C40 pocket hybrid digital camcorder.

Hitachi DZ-HV565E Auto Focus

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 21:46:00 +0000

The auto focus on my Hitachi HD Camera can not be disabled or turned off, this creates a problem, as the algolrithm doesn't always choose the right thing to focus on, as shown by the video clip below.

I'm interested in my shoe which takes up most of the shot, but the Hitachi DZ-HV565E is more inclined to focus on the black surface in the background. Not very selective!

While I like the quality of images produced by this cheap HD camera, this issue does put it in the bad books for me, as serious home movie maker would not be able to be creative if he can tell the camera what to focus on. I'm still going to hang on to mine though.

New Hitachi DZ-HV565E HD Camcorder

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 06:02:00 +0000

I've just bought a new gadget, it is the Hitachi DZ-HV565E HD digital camcorder which will be replacing my Sanyo Xacti CA6 which I still have, but was a camcorder I didn't like!

The Hitachi camcorder was a birthday present from my wife, and has already been put to use for recording high definition driving lesson videos with very good clarity as shown below (high speed ADSL broadband internet connection required for this video clip).

This gadget reminds me of my first digital camcorder the Sanyo Xacti C40 which I loved so much and was gutted when it got lost or stolen under misterious circumstances.
It has many of the features of the Sanyo C40 that were missing in the CA6.
Rotatable LCD screen, full size tripod mount, can also take photographs as well as record HD video, the only disappointment is that the battery can not be charged while in the camera. The Hitachi records to solid state SD cards, so is tapeless, which means quicker editing times of the quicktime mov files it produces (I use final cut express on a mac for editing, but I'm sure you can use Movie Maker or Adobe Premier Elements on the PC).

So far I've only used the Hitachi DZ-HV565E to record video, and have been happy with it, and I can see that it will get more use than my Sanyo Xacti CA6. One question that a lot of people often ask is what is the low light recording like? Being a semi-professional videographer, I tend not to shoot in low light as even the professionals use lights in daylight, not to talk of indoors, and I will be using it mostly for outdoor activities in the day.

If I do have a genuine reason for shooting in low light, I will let you know how I get on with the inbuilt LED lights on the front of the Hitachi hybrid camera.

I will post more video clips and photos from the DZ-HV565E once I've had more time to evaluate it, and would give a proper review then.

More Hitachi Camcorder views
DZ-HV565E Camera auto focus Issues.
Hitachi HD camcorder spare battery

WII Games Console

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 12:16:00 +0000

I've had a xbox 360 media extender since 2006, and have never tried playing games on it even though my son has football and racing cartridges to use on it, so I've never thought of getting a Wii games console despite the many TV adverts promoting this excellent product, but that is about to change.

A recent family holiday where I was forced by my 4 year old son to play some Wii games with him in the entertaiment room at our resort gave me an idea of how good the Wii games console and the wrist held remote are. I enjoyed how close to reality the tennis, golf and boxing games really were, and the feedback vibrations from the Wii remote was very good.

I am now seriously considering a Wii as a good complement to my 37 inch HD LCD TV based entertaiment system, and would make a companion to by XBox 360 which doesn't get any gaming action.

More reading

Xbox360 as Media Extender.

Flip Video Camera Sample

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 07:57:00 +0000

One of the many camera's that I have access to for my church video production activities is a Flip video camera which I won as a prize for a short film from current tv.

Many might think this is a fun camera that might not have much use for a professional, but the following flip sample video clip shows how a simple device can be used to accomplish tasks on a low budget.

Basically there was a need to shoot a very quick church video announcement, and it was about 30 minutes before the service started, so all our Sony PD170 cameras where already setup for the service and unavailable to use, my sanyo xacti CA6 digital camcorder was in the car, but I didn't have a usb cable to connect it to the Apple Macbook laptop, so we had no option than to use the Flip Video Camcorder.

Our Pastor had already been told that this was going to be an impromptu rough video, so the expectation had already been set, and nobody was expecting a HD professionally produced production. Shooting took less than 10 minutes, and due to the inbuilt USB interface cable, connection to the Apple MacBook was a very easy and it took less than 5 minutes to import the video clip.
A quick edit in Final Cut software, and the video below was the result.

Everything was ready for the time announcements were made, and we were very pleased with the quick turn around allowed us by the Flip Video Camera.

You can check out the orignal full quality file here.

See also Hitachi HD pocket digital camera.

BoinxTV on MacBook Pro Review - First Impressions

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 00:24:00 +0000

I mentioned the BoinxTV Video mixing Software sometime ago, but haven't had the time to test it on the Apple MacBook Pro and produce an episode of our church's video podcast on it until last weekend.

Our church video ministry already has a 2 channel video mixer, so my use of BoinxTV was going to be cut out the post production required to add a logo and lower 3rds to the video podcast, adding these features live while the church service was being recorded meaning that I would have a more professional looking video and not have to spend time later at home to do this (I don't have the time anyway, which is why there are none of these features currently included in our video podcasts.

Since this was my first time of really playing with BoinxTV, I needed to do some pre-production thinking of the layers required, what settings I needed and how it would work in the video podcast.

To give you a fair idea of what you might need to run BoinxTV on your MacBook Pro, I'm going to post the specs of my Apple laptop here.

Model Name: MacBook Pro
Model Identifier: MacBookPro3,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2.4 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Boot ROM Version: MBP31.0070.B07
SMC Version: 1.16f10
Serial Number:
Sudden Motion Sensor: State: Enabled

In order to connect the switched output of the CMX07 Video Mixer, I used a Sony DV camcorder as a bridge, with the compsite video and stereo audio being fed into the camcorder input connectors and the firewire connector of the camcorder being connected to the MacBook Pro.

Because I was going to use BoinxTV only for producing a video podcast for the internet, I had created a template that would record the output file at a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels, so on firing up the BoinxTV software on my MacBook Pro, I open this document. The first thing I had to do was add a new camera source to the software to allow the software to recognise my firewire connected DV camcorder.

The system resources meter showed that it was using about 40% processor with only BoinxTV and nothing else running except one instance of Finder on the MacBook Pro.

I created a new template for a larger video output of 640 x 480 and opened this with BoinxTV.

Note that I have the video layer selected in this case, and that resources are now running at 82%. It was apparent that my MacBook laptop would not be able to handle the 640 x 480 video output size (I hadn't pressed the record button yet), so I closed down the template and reloaded the smaller template into BoinxTV.

I now started playing around with the lower 3rd settings to get something that would be suitable for my video podcast, I had already added the logo layer, and imported the appropriate image for use. When I had what I was happy with, I then decided it was time to try to recording a video to disk, so I plugged in some headphones to monitor the sound, but couldn't hear anything!

The problem was later traced to the fact that I hadn't enabled the audio pass through feature.

Audio Pass through Icon

With the audio levels sorted out, and the layers prepared, I was ready to record my first video podacst, so I clicked the record button, but the recording stopped after 1 minute, which turned out to be because the timer recording was enabled on BoinxTV.

In the end I was able to record a few minutes of the church service using BoinxTV and tried out some of the effects of this live video production software for the Mac.

My impressions of the software are mixed at the moment, I like the features that it possesses, but until I'm able to fully test it on a more powerful Apple Mac, I wouldn't be able to say if it will be used for the actual total production of our videos.

BoinxTV V1.0 Lanches

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 13:14:00 +0000

Boinx Software today announced the public realease of BoinxTV Version 1.0, their live video production software for the Apple Mac which allows a laptop such as a MacBook Pro to act as a portable TV studio, supporting up to 3 camera sources.

The key motto of BoinxTV is 'Say goodbye to post production' and this video mixing software has all the features that allows a video producer to create a professional looking podcast or live recording of a TV show. There are layers for lower thirds, logos, graphics, transistions, keying etc.

BoinxTV now brings professional features to a wider range of video content producers, and in some circles is seen real competition to the other portable TV studio product on the market, the Newtek Tricaster.

Price of the video production software for the Mac starts at $199, and is available to download from the BoinxTV software download page.

Nokia 2310 Speed Dial setup

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 01:45:00 +0000

The Nokia 2310 phone is a cheap mobile phone on offer from the Nokia stable, and while it is not something that will be of much interest to a gadgets fan like myself, I found myself in possession of one due to the fact that my trusted Sony Ericsson K750i mobile phone was broken and I needed a quick replacement mobile phone while I decided on the upgrade model I was going to buy.

The first thing I noticed with my new Nokia 2310 phone was that I needed to setup the speed dial settings, as this was a feature I used very much on my old mobile phone, especially since I could call home by just pressing one button instead of having to go through my contacts list and then choosing my home number.

To setup speed dial on the Nokia 2310 mobile phone, there are just a few steps to take.

1. Make sure you have created contact entries for the numbers you want to assign a speed dial on your Nokia phone.

2. You only have 8 speed dial numbers available to use on the 2310, numbers 2-9, as 1 is automatically assigned the voicemail speed dial code and is not changeable (this is convetional on all mobile phones), while 0 is not available.

3. You now need to activate speed dialing on the Nokia 2310, by selecting menu, contacts, speed dials, on. This makes the feature now available and the phone will automatically assign contacts to the numbers 2-9 which we will want to edit to our preference.

4. To edit the pre-assigned numbers on the phone, go to menu, contacts, speed dials, edit. The first pre-assigned key 2 will be displayed with the contact number, to change this select options, change to call (if you want make a phone call to the number), or change to SMS (if you want to send a SMS text message). You will now be presented with your contacts list, scroll through till you get to the number required for this speed dial, and press select, you should see a message confirming the change and the sreeen will then show the new number assigned to key 2. Scroll down to the next key, select assign and repeat the process till all 8 keys have numbers allocated to them.

You now have 8 speed dials setup on the Nokia 2310 mobile phone for quick calls or text messaging.

Connecting the MacBook to TV

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 17:07:00 +0000

In a previous post I mentioned how you could connect an Apple Macbook laptop to a video mixer.

I've had a few queries about connecting a MacBook to a TV, and would like to note that the CS-320 Scan Converter for PC & Mac is device that you could use to connect a MacBook to a CRT TV. The CS-320 scan converter will also work with PCs as well, so now you can watch those video clips stored on your computer's Hard drive using your large screen TV be it CRT, LCD or even a HD plasma.

The CS-320 also has a pass through port, so you could use it to down scale a the resolution of you Macbook to that supported by your LCD or Plasma TV if it doesn't support the native resolution of your computer or laptop.

For more information about the TV One CS-320 that can be used to connect a computer to a Video Mixer or TV read my Connect computer to video mixer post.

Another BoinxTV Video Podcast

noreply@blogger.com (Shola) — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 09:28:00 +0000

Podcasting with BoinxTV in the field

A bit of a guerilla filming technic using BoinxTV Software and the iSight camera of an Apple MacBook to produce a video podcast interview.

Not quite as refined as the Sample BoinxTV video from DigitalUpgrade podcasters, but it gives you an idea of the various capabilities of this new Apple Mac live video production software.

The video can be found here

I'm looking forward to the release version of BoinxTV in November 2008.