Stories by Author

Stewart Wolpin

writer

Best Buy's answer to 3D HDTVs this holiday? Bah, humbug!

Stewart Wolpin
Friday, December 3, 2010 - 12:36pm
 
We await two potentially seminal technology events this week — Verizon's official debut of LTE on Dec. 5 and the release of Avatar on 3D Blu-ray (so far available only with the past or present purchase of a Panasonic 3D HDTV). Each should presage a new age in their respective next-gen standards. Cellphones with 4G should be all the rage in about a year — perhaps the long-rumored Verizon iPhone will be LTE. But the eventual release of Avatar 3D may be too late to save 3D HDTV, especially the way Best Buy is — or, more appropriately, is not — selling it. See how Best Buy is bah, humbugging 3D HDTV after the jump.

iPad vs. Galaxy Tab: A real life comparison

Stewart Wolpin
Monday, November 29, 2010 - 9:46am
 
"So," the question invariably begins when I whip out the Samsung Galaxy Tab (hereafter to be referred to as the gTab), "is it better than the iPad?" "Better," however, is the wrong adjective when addressing the inevitable and ultimately false equivalency between the two. Why a false equivalency? Aren't they both tablet PCs? gTab fits in your pocket. iPad doesn't. So choosing between the two really comes down to a question of posture and location. More after the jump.

The problem with T-Mobile 4G? It's not 4G

Stewart Wolpin
Friday, November 19, 2010 - 2:51pm
 
Ooh, isn't T-Mobile clever? The company's new MyTouch 4G "piggyback" commercial mocks and borrows the stark white gestalt of Apple's now defunct Justin Long/John Hodgeman "I'm a Mac" commercials. It uses a pretty young thing representing the MyTouch 4G to sympathize with a guy carrying a bigger guy on his back — that's the iPhone saddled with AT&T's over-burdened 3G network. Poor iPhone. T-Mobile's answer, of course, is her, the MyTouch 4G, and its 4G network, which the company hawks as "America's largest 4G network." There's just one problem. T-Mobile's network isn't 4G.

Video calling app showdown: FaceTime, Qik and Movicha tested

Stewart Wolpin
Saturday, November 13, 2010 - 9:09am
 
Once upon a time, texting was a walled garden. Messages could be sent and received only shared between phones from the same carrier. Cell-based video chatting, still in its infancy, is in a similar segregated state. Video calls between phones are restricted to within a specific video chat platform, currently Apple's FaceTime, the Android app Qik, available on the two Sprint 4G phones (the HTC EVO and the Samsung Galaxy S Epic), and a new entry, Movicha (pronounced "moe-VEE-cha"), powered by a technology from a company called Damaka. I recently tested them all, and (risking once again being accused of being an Apple fanboy) the winner — clearly, literally and figuratively — is FaceTime by a wide margin. Read on for the details.

What's awesome about Windows Phone 7 (and what isn't)

Stewart Wolpin
Monday, November 1, 2010 - 4:11am
 
I admit it. As many of you've suspected and accused me of over the last few months, I'm not a huge fan of Microsoft. I wouldn't exactly characterize myself as an Apple fanboy, but I'm sure others would (and have). My own view is that any attachment as fierce as "Apple fanboy" implies to anything other than a body part is emotionally unhealthy and a waste of time and energy. I have extolled Apple for its innovations, and have equally excoriated Apple for its idiocies.

Is Nook Color worth the money?

Stewart Wolpin
Wednesday, October 27, 2010 - 8:07am
 
It's impossible not to look at the ur-tablet Nook Color (aka NOOKcolor) and think of iPad and other tablets to come. Aside from its color e-book reading capabilities, Nook Color does a lot of tablet-like stuff like run Android 2.1, surf the Web and play videos and music. With a bright 7-inch color LCD touchscreen, Nook Color looks much like the Samsung Galaxy Tab. And Nook Color is "only" $250, half the price of iPad, so that makes it a good deal, right? Only if you took math lessons from Abbott & Costello.

5 pros, 5 cons for Sony Internet TV

Stewart Wolpin
Tuesday, October 12, 2010 - 7:27pm
 
Sony and Google TV have finally fulfilled a 30-year-old search for a successful convergence of the TV and the PC. And while the Sony Internet TV powered by Google (the official mouthful of a name) runs on Android, the OS looks and acts nothing like Android does on a smartphone, and bears only a passing resemblance to current connected TV interfaces. It could completely change the way you watch TV — in a good way.

7 awful things about Windows Phone 7 (updated)

Stewart Wolpin
Tuesday, October 12, 2010 - 1:55pm
 
For every wonderful trick and treat Microsoft presents in Windows Phone 7, there were plenty of functions absent that iOS and Android have made names for themselves doing. Once compared, it's obvious WP7 is not finished, Considering how advanced Windows Phone 7's competition is, the following seven deficiencies make a mockery of Microsoft chairman Steve Ballmer's claim of Windows Phone 7 being "thoroughly modern."

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