New cell phone can run Java, respond to different settings
Motorola, Nextel and Sun Microsystems have brewed up an appealing new concoction in the i85: A cell phone that runs applications in the Java programming language.
This is an important development in the battle to dominate cell phone software. In rival camps are Microsoft, Palm and Symbian, a consortium that includes many of the world’s top mobile phone makers.
That cell phones will incorporate more elaborate, more powerful operating systems is inevitable. Users increasingly want them to perform complicated tasks such as processing e-mail or orders on corporate sales databases.
The $200 i85 lays the groundwork for that and much more, though few Java applications are available for the initial release. They include calculator, game and expense pad features.
Java aside, the i85’s developers have built innovative features into the phone, which is markedly smaller and more visually appealing than previous Nextel-Motorola collaborations.
The i85 allows users to instruct the phone on how to behave in such settings as a meeting, car or office. It can be programmed to ring louder in a car and not to ring during meetings. It can also display text in a larger font size and on a brighter screen for incoming messages received, for example, while a user is in a dark theater.
Voice quality is good, and Nextel’s trademark walkie-talkie feature, Direct Connect, is included. Those features, coupled with Java’s ability to work with corporate applications, will likely make this phone a hit with chief information officer types and others wanting sophisticated functions.
Information: 800-639-6111 or www.nextel.com.
Vikas Bajaj/KRT
HP Scanjet 7400c delivers twice the scanning power
When are two scanners better than one? When Hewlett-Packard puts them into one big package.
Big (and ugly) best describes the HP Scanjet 7400c ($450). At 23-by-12-by-4.5 inches and almost 10 pounds, this monster needs a lot more desk space than one of those sleek, slim desk jockeys.
That’s OK, because you’ll get far better scanning performance from this flatbed than from most other scanners in this price range or below.
Two CCDs (charge coupled devices) – the sensors that take a picture of the image you’re scanning – come in the 7400c, which has true 48-bit color capability (and can save images with 24 bits of color, the limit for most applications). One CCD is for fast, low-resolution scans up to 600 dots per inch, and the other is for high-end scans up to 2400 dpi (for example, when you want to blow up a tiny original). In most instances, 600 dpi is considered overkill.
Although I edit most of my scanned images to enhance colors and sharpness, the images scanned with the 7400c at medium resolutions were colorful and crisp enough to e-mail without editing.
Text scanning worked well, too, with documents easily imported for further word processing work.
The scanning bed allows for legal size images and documents. By removing the lid and replacing it with an adapter, you can scan transparencies, negatives and slides up to 5-by-5 inches.
Easily installed with quick start instructions, the 7400c uses Universal Serial Bus and SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) ports, though it does not come with a SCSI controller card or cable. It can be used with Windows 98 and later editions or Mac OS 8.5 and higher. The healthy software bundle for both platforms includes HP Precisionscan Pro 3.0, image-editing and management, optical character recognition and Internet faxing software.
My only gripe is that HP doesn’t include a printed manual – a short one appears on the installation CD – requiring an Internet connection and a trip to HP’s Web site to get detailed answers to questions.
Information: 888-999-4747 or www.hp.com.
– Kevin Washington
