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Solmeta Steps Up to A Pro Model Geotagging GPS

It wasn't long ago that I declared the Solmeta N2 GPS as my choice among Nikon DSLR compatible GPS units. Solmeta has stepped up its game to win my heart over even more with a new "Pro" model. Their NEW Solmeta Geotagger Pro offers the same features as the N2 model that I've come to love, but it adds something that I wasn't even thinking of and that's an LCD to display the information that it's tracking. At first I thought, "do I really need that?" After all, the current model Nikon DSLRs have a great GPS menu display that shows this information whenever you need it. So at first glance I wasn't impressed that this info would be on the GPS itself until I actually got one in to test. I'm totally hooked now! It's soooo much nicer NOT having to navigate to the GPS menu on the back of my Nikon camera and instead concentrate on shooting. I can see at a glance that not only has the GPS unit acquired a signal, but exactly what my Longitude, Latitude, Altitude, Heading, Time, Battery Level, etc. are. Do I need to know what my longitude and latitude are on screen? Nope! I really don't. At that point they might as well just be random numbers. However, it's the other stuff that's helpful like seeing the battery level and the fact that I do have longitude and latitude (even though I don't really care what the numbers themselves are) to let me know that it's functioning properly. Having the heading info is also important to see sometimes. So yes, it's GREAT having an LCD on the GPS itself! Oh and yes, the LCD also has a backlight feature so that you can see it in the dark if need be.

 

Field Tested in Singapore

I wanted to give this new unit a real world test so i brought it with me to Singapore and India. Satellite acquisition time was great and accuracy seems to be dead on. The shot above was taken in…… why not just Click it to see it on Google Maps?

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Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 VRII Lens

I'm often having to balance my "hobby" with reality. That reality is that although I LOVE photography it's not my day job. It's not even my night job. I shoot for the sheer joy of shooting. So when I think about spending $2,400 for a lens I have to really really really think about it. When the NEW Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 VRII Lens came out last fall I put it on my "that would be nice to have if the opportunity comes up" list. After all I already owned the Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 VR Lens. This was lens was an "update." It was also much more than the original lens that I bought. I think the original 70-200 was around $1,800 or so and this one was coming in at $500 MORE! Like anyone I wanted to know what would I get for spending MORE than the original costs?

 

The New Lens Promised 3 Things

The first and most obvious is that the NEW 70-200mm lens offers VRII. This is Nikon's updated image stabilization. This update promises to give you better hand held shots. OK great, but still not enough. The second thing that this new lens promised was to fix an issue with using the original lens on Full Frame cameras like my Nikon D700. The original 70-200mm would cause some veinetting at certain focal lengths when attached to a full frame camera. Yep, that is something I wanted, but still not enough. Lastly, the new lens promised to have better autofocus than the original. Now I'm interested! With my original 70-200mm the autofocus was "good", but depending on the available light it could be tricky getting it to lock on to your subject and since I do a lot of portrait work it was sometimes frustrating. While no one thing that I've mentioned above was motivating enough to get me to upgrade, the three things together made it tempting. 

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TiVo Wireless 802.11n Wireless N Adapter: 2nd Look

Last week I shared with you TiVo's announcement of their NEW 802.11n based WiFi adapter for their Dual Tuner DVRs including the TiVo HD and New TiVo Premiere. I said then I that I thought this adapter was over priced, but I still wanted to test it to see how much of an improvement it was over the 802.11g based one. I was totally surprised by what I saw when I opened the package. 

 

It's nothing like the old adapter

Don't let the design and pictures fool you. The reason that I thought that the new adapter was over priced was that it looked just like the old one and therefore I figured it connected to the USB port like the old one. It doesn't! This NEW Adapter is a completely new design and instead of connecting via USB it connects to your TiVo's Ethernet port. You also have to plug it into  the AC to get power to it. Actually there is nothing TiVo specific about this new adapter. It's just like any other Ethernet based 802.11n Wireless Bridge. Unlike the old adapter you can't even configure it from the TiVo HD. You either have to use your computer or you have to have a wireless router that has a WPS button. Although my New TRENDnet router does have the WPS button, I opted to just configure it directly by plugging into my MacBook Pro via Ethernet. Configuring it was pretty straight forward and once I was done I plugged it into my TiVo HD and it worked perfectly!

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Time for a new Cable Modem?

If you're a cable modem user chances are your cable modem is on 24/7 doing its job and you don't give it a second thought. Most people go for years without upgrading their equipment because as long as it's working the cable company has no reason to upgrade you and as long as it's working you have no reason to think about upgrading right? Think again! Like any other technology out there, cable modem manufacturers add new features too. So while your old cable modem is functioning, you may not be getting all of the speed out of your connection that you could be getting. Here in Michigan my cable provider is Comcast and while I've had my issues with them for Cable Television off and on, my Cable Modem service has worked very well for over 10 years. As a matter of fact my internet speeds have steadily increased over the years. So I've been a happy customer.

 

And then something went wrong…

Very rarely does my IP address change and usually when it does it means that Comcast has changed something on their end. Normally their changes have meant good things for me. Not this time! I was out of town and wanted to connect to my home network and I couldn't (at least with the IP address that I knew) because my IP address had changed. It wasn't a big deal and I moved on. However, once I got home I immediately noticed that my upload speeds were in the toilet. Here's a speed test I performed back on July 7, 2008 (yes almost 2 years ago) when I noticed and blogged about how much faster my service had gotten:

Great download and upload speeds back then.

Here's the speed I was getting when I got home from my trip:

While my download speed was still rocking as fast as ever, my upload speed was way way down. Below 1Mbps. This all happened around the time when I was needing to upload lots of video content via FTP for the CS5 launch and therefore a slow upload speed was very painful.

 

It's not our fault

I immediately got on the phone with Comcast support (after doing the standard unplugs and resets). They claimed that nothing had changed on their end. Of course! We tried a bunch of things and best I could get was about 1.75Mbps when connecting my computer directly to the modem and a little less than than on the router. I know that routers add some latency, but this was more than just a latency problem and again it wasn't all that much faster connected directly to the cable modem. Comcast told me that they only promise 2Mbps UP on my plan and since I was getting very close to that, there wasn't much they could do. 

 

It's my own modem

I own my own cable modem because it seems that since they don't change very often the math works out in my favor to own rather than rent. Since I own my own equipment that means that I can upgrade to the latest standards whenever I want. If I ask Comcast to bring me out a new cable modem, they will but I'll have no control over what they bring. I know that Comcast is going to be upgrading to faster speeds and you'll need a cable modem capable of handling DOCIS 3 to get those faster speeds. I also know that this kind of upgrading of their systems doesn't happen over night and I figured that they had already started putting some of this new gear in place. So why not take advantage of it?

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Apple iPad Review: WiFi+3G Model

When the Apple iPad WiFi model shipped I did a pretty in-depth review of it, which you can see here. Therefore the purpose of today's review is focus primarily on the 3G capabilities. (and yes that's a custom Gelaskin on the back because that's just how I roll 🙂 )

 

Which model did I go with?

I had planned all along to go with the 16GB WiFi model for testing and reviewing and then get the 64GB WiFi+3G model for my own use. That's exactly what I did. Although I don't "need" 64GB's of space for my info and media content, I do plan to use the iPad for field backup of my photos and instant touch up and sharing using the iPad Camera Connection Kit. I typically shoot to either 8GB or 16GB memory cards and almost never fill them up in one day. After loading everything on the iPad that I wanted to have on it  (including a couple of movies), I still had over 32GBs of free space. That will be plenty for photo backup each day of shooting. My wife claimed the 16GB WiFi version in case you were wondering.

 

What's different on the outside?

Not much. The only two visual differences on the outer case are the black bar across the top for the antennas/GPS support and the MicroSIM tray on the left side. Otherwise it's visually identical to the WiFi model. 

 

What's different on the inside?

The obvious and biggest difference on the inside is that the WiFi+3G models include 3G wireless technology to allow you to connect to the internet pretty much anywhere there is GSM cell service. The other difference is that these models also include a real GPS chip. So while the WiFi mode can detect your location based on available WiFi signals, the WiFi+3G model can do so based on GPS satellites, cell towers AND WiFi signals. This also means that it's capable of running turn-by-turn GPS navigation apps although it may be a bit conspicuous on your dashboard. 🙂

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Creative Suite 5 is NOW SHIPPING! Trial Download Available Too

There is no doubt that the launch of Adobe Creative Suite 5 has generated a LOT of buzz and excitement. One of the number one questions I get asked is "when it shipping?" The answer is TODAY! You can buy or upgrade here. Not only is Creative Suite 5 shipping today, but today marks the first day in Creative Suite history that the Creative Suite Trials are also available on the day of ship. Typically the trials lag several weeks behind the shipping product. However, you can get your CS5 groove on right now by downloading fully functional 30 day trials here. 

 

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW59kenBIcU

 

See CS5 in Action!

Check out the new features of CS5 by watching videos here and here.