There are now over 2400 Windows Phone 7 applications in the Marketplace. However if you don’t have a Windows Phone or the Zune Desktop, but are still interested to see if Windows Phone 7 is for you you need at least to install the Zune desktop software to browse for available applications. Now that is not needed anymore……

A new website has been launched by Paul Willen called MarketplaceBrowser. This site gives everyone easy acces to see and read descriptions of all available applications for the Windows Phone 7 that are currently in the Marketplace.

Potential new Windows Phone users can easily search and discover the apps that will make their future Windows Phone 7 device the device they want.

Even if you have the Zune Software or a Windows Phone 7 this site will give you a better search and discover experience compared to the Zune desktop Marketplace and the Marketplace on your Windows Phone 7 device.

Key Features of MarketplaceBrowser v1.o

• Application Icons.
• Application description.
• Application version number.
• Application Publisher.
• Search on title and keywords.
• Most up to date app listing from the Marketplace compared to others including Bing Visual search.
• Link to Zune Desktop software and or Windows Phone 7 to Try,Install and Buy.
• Categories are listed in full with sub categories.
• Number of applications per (sub) category are listed.
• Screenshots of applications in slideshow format.
• Top 100 listings.
• Featured applications by the Author.

Do it the quick and easy way and only use the Zune desktop client if needed. Go ahead and visit MarketplaceBrowser.com and search and discover all the applications for Windows Phone 7.

For me, I would like to see the following functionality to be added in Version 2. This way I really don’t have to go to the Zune Desktop to find out if it is worth my time opening up the Zune Desktop software and install the app I want:

• Price of the application
• Reviews of the application
• Mobile version of the Website to easy navigate the website on the Windows Phone 7.

The author is looking to steam ahead for Version 2. Let us know what you would like to see added in Marketplacebrowser.com

How to’s, Windows Phone 7 core features, the Samsung Omnia 7 and the LG Optimus 7 have been reviewed on this website. However with the new Windows Phone 7 it is really hard to get the status of your battery. In all the settings you can’t find the percentage left on your battery. But with the Samsung Focus and the Omnia 7  there is now a better way to get this.

With the new Windows Phone 7 you only can see a little small battery meter when you slide down your finger from the top of your screen down. However with this little battery is hard to see where you really at with your battery. Two days ago we gave an article how to view your WIFI Mac Address on your Samsung Windows Phone devices using a build in Diagnostics Samsung tool.

Now we have found the code as well to check the status of your battery on the Samsung Focus and * #Omnia 7  Windows Phone 7.

Steps to check your battery level in percentage on your Samsung Focus and Omnia 7 Windows Phone’s

• Go to the Phone section (as if you were going to make a call)
• Enter ##634# and select “Call“

• It did not call anything.  There should now be a “Diagnosis” option on the top of your screen with a numeric keypad;
• On the Keypad you enter *#2*#

• The first screen will show you Battery Percentage on the bottom of the device

• Tapping the Windows logo will get you back to your home screen.

Tip:

Make a contact  named Samsung Diagnostics in your People Hub for quick and easy access to these diagnostics.

Samsung Diagnostics
Phone number: ##634#
Notes:
Mac Address *#1234#
Battery Status *#2*#
Test Brightness (bonus code) *#3*#

On my device I also have the Samsung Diagnostics show up in my app list as “Diagnosis”. This appeared after the first time I used it.

Video Demonstration

Previous how to’s for Windows Phone 7

• How to easy find the Mac Address on the Samsung Focus and Omnia 7 Windows Phone 7
• How to do more with Windows Phone 7 Messaging
• How To Share Your Zune Pass Safely with a Family Member on Windows Phone 7 and Zune HD
• How to quickly Search People in Windows Phone 7 Peolpe Hub
• How To Change your Picture Tile Image and Picture Hub background on your Windows Phone 7
• How to access Marketplace for Windows Phone 7 (or Zune HD) from outside the USA
• How to add (Windows Phone Radio) podcast to your Zune HD or Windows Phone 7 !

We are so excited with the launch of the new Windows Phone 7 devices that we want to make sure that you are not the only one in the know. Earlier this week we had the official announcementof Microsoft new mobile platform of Windows Phone 7 on 9 devices, the HTC 7 Surround, HTC  7 Trophy, HTC 7 Mozart, HTC HD7, HTC 7 Pro, Samsung Focus, Samsung Omnia 7, LG Quantum and the Dell Venue Pro.

Help us spread the word of these great new devices with Windows Phone 7 and you can win a Windows Phone messenger bag.

The rules for this contest are very easy.

1.Follow @MobilityMinded and @WindowsPhone on twitter first. If you already Follow us, Great !! and thank you.

2. Tweet the following: “   Follow @MobilityMinded to win a @WindowsPhone Messenger Bag, check out the easy rules here http://bit.ly/9ZTJBF “

The contest ends on Monday October 18 11.59 pm EST. We will use the number of entries from the MobilityMinded twitter mentions list and use Random.org to select our winner. We will cross check the winner on the followers list from WindowsPhone.

We will announce the winner on Tuesday October 19th.

If you new to MobilityMinded.com don’t hesitate to discover what we all are about.

Thank you for supporting MobilityMinded and Windows Phone.

Sometimes you think that software just can’t get any better. For instance Shazam; The famous application which gives you information about the current song on the radio. Today while browsing through the OpnMarket I found the application Midomi; A very good alternative to Shazam. Midomi has 2 different modes for finding a song. Grab Search and Sing Search

Grab Search

Grab Search is the mode we all know from Shazam. For Grab Search make sure there are not to many noises around you, click the record button and hold the phone near the speaker where the sound comes from. The sound is processed and after a few seconds you’ll get to see a list of results.

In the example above I listened to “Money for Nothing” by Dire Straits. Midomi found the song correctly.

Sing Search

Now sing search is really a bit revolutionary. When using the Sing Search tab the record button and sing or hum a part of the song. Do this at least 10 seconds and at max 30 seconds. Again after the recording stops, you’ll see that the recorded part is being uploaded and searched. A few seconds later you’ll get to see the result. The first time I tried this feature I uhm-ed “I got a feeling” by Black Eyed Peas and was very surprised that the way I uhm-ed it really returned me the right result. (eventhough it was the second search result)

Now I’m not a good singer, I nether uhm very well, so I’m really impressed that my uhm-qualities were that well that some results are returned correctly. I tried several times; some times it didn’t return the right result, some times it surprisingly did.

Song information

Midomi also gives advanced song information. Depending on the song this can be from album information to even buy the song

The album art is downloaded, if there’s album art available for the specific song. Some songs have a Preview option and can be listened to for about 30 seconds. The other menuitems are links which actually opens Internet Explorer to Youtube, Amazon (Buy Song) or Google (Find Lyrics).

Concluding thoughts

Midomi is a really cool application ad a very good Shazam alternative. Not only for song which are currently on the radio or through the speakers of your stereo, but also if you’re on the road and got a song in your head but haven’t got a clue how the song is called.
Simply uhm or sing the song in Sing Search mode and you’ll very likely get the right result back. To me Midomi is definitely added value over Shazam.

Adapt Mobile has sent us a sample of the latest version of the ADK-100 keyboard. This Micro Keyboard is the smallest Bluetooth keyboard in the market supporting a wide range of devices.
The keyboard comes in a blister package and contains the keyboard, a driver CD which also contains the manual and a Micro-USB cable for charging the keyboard. The keyboard contains 2 LED’s. One (red LED) indicates you are charging it and one (blue LED) shows you the status of your Bluetooth connection.

Yesterday Resco released a new version of their advanced text-input keyboard software; Resco keyboard Pro 6. Resco is known for their applications like Resco Explorer 2010, Resco Photo Manager 7, Resco Audio Recorder, and other great applications. With version 6 of Resco Keyboard Pro there are a numerous new features in this application. In this article I’ll go through the most important features of Resco Keyboard Pro 6.

Five Resco Keyboard Pro layouts

Layout 1: The QWERTY-layout

In the screenshots below I’ll give an overview of the standard HTC Touch Pro 2 keyboard and the Resco Keyboard Pro.

Looking at the differences between the two input methods there are only a few noticeable. The most important difference is that the up, down, left and right arrow aren’t available in the QWERTY-layout of Resco Keyboard Pro and that in Resco Keyboard Pro 6 the buttons are larger than the original HTC input method. The keyboard lay-out is only a little bit difference between these two input methods. But Resco Keyboard Pro 6 has a special feature: Swipe.

If you swipe to the left an other layout is being displayed. Which is screen 2: The symbol layout.

Layout 2: The Symbol-layout

The Symbol layout has two different pages:

The Symbol layout features a lot of special characters directly available on the keyboard. Not only characters like <, >, &, @ and $ but also the more advanced characters like [, ], ^, | are available in the 2nd page of the symbol layout. A really nice feature is that the bottom-left of the screen has the “aBc” key which brings you back to the QWERTY-layout within 1 single tab on that button.

Layout 3: The FX-layout

The FX-layout is a special layout which features 11 of text presets. If you tend to type a long sentence a lot, than you can set this sentence as a preset in the FX-layout. One single tab on one of the 11 text presets types the text completely. But not only text is being typed. This layout is called the FX-layout because it can also use simple formulas for example to enter the current date or time. Again, just like in the Symbol layout, the bottom-left button is the “aBc”-button which directly brings you to the QWERTY-layout

Layout 4: The Calculator

The calculator layout is something I personally like a lot, and which is a feature I use very much. It happens often that when I have to write an e-mail or text-message that I need a calculator. Resco Keyboard Pro 6 brings a calculator directly to the input screen, without opening a special calculator application. Calculations can be made and added to the e-mail or text-message directly.

Layout 5: Copy/Cut/Pate-layout

The Copy/Cut/Paste-layout is features only a few buttons, but a few very good ones to improve the usability of the device. Copy/Cut/Paste is a great feature and Resco Keyboard Pro 6 makes it via this layout very accessible. Also the arrowbuttons up, down, left and right which hadn’t seen yet are available in this layout. The last row brings all the other 4 layouts directly accessible with one tab on the button.

Secondary Language Support

In the Settings (which will be discussed in the next chapter) it is possible to set a primary and multiple secondary languages. These languages can be selected just like selecting any other keyboard.

Settings

The settings of Resco Keyboard Pro 6 are available as a separate application, but also when choosing “Options” while selecting any other keyboard. The settings page looks like this:

Most of these settings are self-explanatory.

• It’s possible to select Resco Keyboard Pro 6 as Default input method.
• Select a Primary Language for the language you write most of the time.
• Select multiple secondary languages for all the other languages you use to communicate
• The Tab Notification setting lets you set how to experience a tab. Via haptic feedback (Vibrate) or with several different sound-notifications
• The Button Preview setting lets you choose where the preview button is displayed in the screen (Disable, Above button, Middle of the screen)
• Skin: There are two different skins to choose; Default (Blue-ish) and Gray.

Speed

Another great feature of Resco Keyboard Pro is it’s speed. switching between the different layout’s works really well and has no lag. I’ve tested Resco Keyboard Pro 6 on the HTC Touch Pro 2, and my good friend Remo tested the application on the HTC HD2. We were both surprised about how well the keyboard works on the HTC Touch Pro 2 (with a resistive touchscreen) and also on the HTC HD2 (with the capacitive touchscreen).

Concluding thoughts and wrap-up

Resco Keyboard pro is a great advanced keyboard for windows phone users. The multi-layout design of Resco Keyboard Pro 6 is practical, easy to use and understand. Resco Keyboard Pro is a good solution for Windows Phone users who think the default input method isn’t sufficient, especially on the devices without hardware keyboard.
Read the full press release here.

We just received the KIN ONE and the KIN TWO devices. These two new devices are brought to you by Microsoft running the new Windows Phone operating system with the special designed KIN User Interface. The devices are made by Sharp and are available in the United States by Verizon.

The KIN Devices are unique due to the four different elements which we will look at in upcoming reviews:

1. KIN SPOT – is about sharing. Drag everything you want to share to the spot, pick your people and hit send
2. KIN LOOP – is whatever you want to know, whenever you want to know on the display of your KIN
3. KIN STUDIO – Manage and share your photos, videos, text/mms messages, phone settings and contacts with the online KIN STUDIO
4. THE CAMERA – Take amazing pictures in even low light with LumiLED Flash (5 mp on the KIN ONE and 8 mp on the KIN TWO)

Below is a video where we are unboxing both the KIN ONE and the KIN TWO.

In earlier articles we looked at a virtual experience with the Facebook Connect on www.KIN.com and Capturing the Magazine of your life with the KIN Studio.

We will follow up soon with user experiences of these two KIN’s. However these devices are designed and marketed for the teenagers under us (I feel old now) and we will have to make sure that our views have to reflect their experiences.

Since May 6th  the KIN ONE and KIN TWO are available online at Verizon.com. The Verizon Communications Stores will have the KIN’s available starting Thursday May the 13th.

The KIN ONE is available for $49.99 with a new 2-year contract with an added smartphone plan of $29.99. The KIN TWO will be available under the same conditions for $99.99.

If you are familiar with Dropbox, you might have noticed that you cannot access Dropbox directly from Windows Mobile, but only from the web-version. Developer Ruttensoft has developed a beta version of Dropbox for Windows Mobile, which is the missing frontend for Dropbox and gives you access to all your files and folders in the Cloud.

It runs on all Windows Mobile 5 and higher versions and all these resolutions are supported:
320×240, 240×320, 640×480, 480×640, 800×480, 480×800, 320×320.

Like most programs you need the .NET Compact Framework 3.5 installed to run it.

Features

Below you can see the current feature list. The application is still under development and a new beta is expected very soon.

• Browse through your Dropbox Files and Folders
• Create/Delete/Move/Copy Folders
• Delete/Move/Copy Files
• See properties of a file (Name, Folder, Size & Last modified)
• Upload a new file
• Upload a whole folder (!)
• Download a file
• Download a whole folder (!)
• Create a new Text note using the builtin text editor
• Edit text-files within the application, it will directly be saved to your Dropbox account
• Edit all other file types in your favorite Windows Mobile App, afterwards reupload it to your Dropbox account with one click!
• Share your files by sending a link per Email
• ==> All files using a 30-day-expiration link
• ==> Move/Copy a file to the public folder and then share it with one click
• Share your files by sending the file as Email Attachment (Downloading it to the device first)
• Create folder favorites to quickly browse to them
• See your Dropbox Account informations (Username, ID, Space used/Free)
• Lots of file type’s are skinned in the list
• Autorotation of the app (if supported)
• Landscape & Portrait-Support
• All Touch Screen Devices supported from WM 6.0+, might work on WM 5.0 too.
• Shoot & Upload pictures with one click (!). It will be stored with continuous numbers (SomeName001, SomeName002) directly in your gallery!
• Bit.ly support for short share links (using your own Bit.ly-Account)
• And lots more

While the application is in beta, you can use it for free, the final version will set you back $ 6,99 which is considered a good price for the features you will get.

If you need a Dropbox account, just go here and create one or get an account here
The program is available for download on Ruttensoft’s website.

Microsoft My Phone is a service for backing up data from your Windows Phone to the cloud. Here on MobilityMinded we wrote a few times about Microsoft My Phone, because we really like this service. Remo wrote an interesting article in February 2009, when My Phone launced. Back in October 2009, on the launch date of Windows Mobile 6.5 I wrote an article about the My Phone premium services.

A live example of the advantages of My Phone Premium Services can be found on the twitter account of John Obeto, CEO and Chief Technology Officer of Logikworx, Editor-in-chief of AbsolutelyWindows.com posted a live example how the My Phone premium services worked for him.

Thought I lost my LG Expo in a cab, but thanks to Microsoft My Phone, it was discovered in the hotel lobby when it sent a high-pitched ring.

Microsoft listened to the users and their wishes about the My Phone service and added 3 features to My Phone.

New Features

1) Quickly update and manage you contact conveniently from you PC.

Since I synchronize my contacts with a hosted exchange environment from sherweb, I haven’t been able to see the “contacts” part in Microsoft My Phone. So in order to test this correctly I disabled my Exchange connection and made a “Dummy” Contact List on My HTC Touch Pro 2. The contacts were pushed correctly to the My Phone Cloud. The new feature is that it is now possible to manage the contacts on the My Phone website. So I added an email address and a Nickname. Both were correctly send over to the HTC Touch Pro 2 on the next sync.

Contacts can be added, deleted, archived and even duplicate contacts can be found. This feature looks very similar to the exchange contact-sync feature which I totally like!

2) Easily download, upload and share you photos.

Photo synchronization already was an option in My Phone. But now Microsoft added a feature on the My Phone website to share the photo’s with social networks.

This is made really simple by selecting one or more photos on the My Phone website and click the “Share Photos” button on the top of the screen. After selecting the sharing services (you can choose from Windows Live, Myspace, Facebook or Flickr) the photos are being uploaded to that specific (one or more) service.

3) Use Wi-Fi to sync your content

The whole test for this article was done by Wi-Fi sync when Wi-Fi is available. This has 2 main advantages. It is quicker and you don’t necessarily have to have a data-plan to use My Phone.

The next time a user of the My Phone application will syc with the My Phone service they will have to update the My Phone software on their Windows Phone.

Concluding thoughts.

I personally think that My Phone is a great service. I am always looking for a way to make users of phones aware that when they loose their phone, notebook or any other device containing personal data, they’ve got a good backup of their data.
Microsoft My Phone is a great service for backing up data from your phone. I case your phone gets lost, stolen or want to transfer your data to an other Windows Phone, My Phone is the service you need.

Today at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, HTC has introduced the HD mini. This brand new Smartphone with touchscreen is equipped with Windows Mobile and HTC’s well-known Sense interface and it brings the unparalleled experience of the HD2 in a very compact device.

This HTC HD mini is based on the latest version of the Sense-interface where the user of this smartphone plays a central role. HTC Sense stands for 3 fundamental principles, which are developed by watching and listening on how people are living and are communicating. These principals “Make it Mine”, “Stay Close” and “Discover the Unexpected” belong to the core of this new HTC Sense experience.

Multitouch

The  HTC HD mini sports a  3,2 inch capacitive touchscreen that allows users with the slightest touch on the screen to view pictures, open Microsoft Office files and view PDF documents and are able to zoom in and out. With Multitouch support in the new HTC Sense-interface, is it possible by touching  the touchscreen with multiple fingers to zoom in and out in several applications. Apart from this, you will find a 5 megapixel camera in this device.

Just like it’s bigger brother HD2, this HTC HD mini is focused on “people-centric communication” with full Outlook integration and a direct insight in your personal communication. The HD mini helps the user to stay in contact with all your important friends and colleagues by giving a complete overview of all communication with this person, whether it’s about text messages, emails or status updates on social networks. Just like the HTC HD2, the HTC HD mini has the  Windows based Twitter application, HTC Peep.

Design inside out

The HTC HD mini combines a strong usability with it’s own character and design. You’ll notice that the mounting points at the backside are visible to show robust craftsmanship that was used to create this new smartphone. The bright yellow inside of this device shows the continuation of the focus on design.
The HTC HD mini is equipped with different sensors like a proximity sensor and a light sensor that automatically adjusts the brightness of the screen depending on the circumstances. With 3G broadband connectivity the HTC HD mini offers access to all online resources including WiFi. A broad selection of applications from the Windows Marketplace gives the user the possibility to adjust the mini to his own style.

This morning Sony Ericsson announced their latest Windows Phone, the Sony Ericsson Aspen, which is the first announced device to run on Windows Mobile 6.5.3 -the latest version of Microsoft’s Windows Mobile operating system. The Windows Mobile 6.5.3 is seemingly a small update, and in this article I want to address the main improvements.

As you will see in the article the improvements consist of both ”cosmetic improvements” which set a new step towards full touch control, and “improvements under the hood”. Let’s have a quick look …

Start menu, “touchable tiles” and icon drop “bar”

When you have a look at the screenshots above the first thing to notice is that the start menu button has moved to the bottom, and that both the former softkeys have been optimized for touch control. It is more like a taskbar idea you know from your Windows powered notebook.

Another item address by Microsoft is the relative small icons in the topbar, which were sometimes hard to accurately select with finger touch. When you tap on these icons a drop down bar is openened, with larger easier to select icons.

While these are the most striking facts from the screenshots above, you can find a list of improvements of the Windows Mobile 6.5.3 release below:

• Capacitive touchscreen support;
• Platform to enable multi-touch;
• Touch controls throughout system (no need for stylus);
• Consistent Navigation;
• Horizontal scroll bar replaces tabs (think settings>system>about> screen);
• Magnifier brings touch support to legacy applications;
• Simplified out-of-box experience with fewer steps;
• Drag and drop icons on Start Screen;

The first two items of capacitive touchscreen support and multi-touch are (in fact) already demonstrated by HTC with the incredible powerful HTC HD2 which is reviewed on this website some time ago. However it was the first capacitive touchscreen device running on Windows Mobile.

In the following section I would like to address the last item from the list: “drag and drop icons on the start screen”.

Drag and drop icons in the start menu

Microsoft introduced the new start menu with the announcement of Windows Mobile 6.5 back in 2009 at Mobile World Congress Barcelona. One of the limitations of the new start menu was the ability to order the icons on the grid to a personal preset. Until now you could only move icons to the top or to the bottom.

In Windows Mobile 6.5.3 you can simply drag and drop icons to the position you prefer. Let me emphasize that I’m really happy with this improvement, but it is furthermore also a more natural way to reorder the start menu. The series of screenshots shows you such a drag and drop sequence of the games-icon.

Horizontal scroll bar replaces tabs

As a Windows Mobile user you are certainly familiar with the tab structure, for example in the connections screen. Another example is shown in the screenshot above, where under Windows Mobile 6.5 you have the tabs: Time, Alarms, More. As you can see the tabs are replace with a horizontal scroll bar, which is more optimized for finger friendly use.

Furthermore both the time-field and the check boxes are larger as well, which make it easier to touch.

Internet Explorer for Windows Phones

Another key change in the initial Windows Mobile 6.5 release is the Internet Explorer browser on Windows Mobile.

• Page load time decreased;
• Memory management improved;
• Pan & flick gestures smoothed;
• Zoom & rotation speed increased;

While we have seen  optimizations for touch control, and the fact that this browser was based on the robust Internet Explorer 6 (for desktop) platform, Microsoft has further improved Internet Explorer for Windows Phones in their latest Windows Mobile 6.5.3. release.

A few other improvements

• Updated runtime tools (.NET CF 3.5, SQL CE 3.1)
• Arabic read/write document support
• Watson (error reporting) improvements and bug fixes

Finally Microsoft included new functionality in a few other area’s as well. While I consider the runtime tools and Watson as strict technical improvements, the Arabic read/write document support could have a much bigger impact.

Overall first thoughts

Mauricio Freitas, Windows Mobile MVP and Editor in Chief of Geekzone, summarizes in the article “Windows Mobile 6.5.3 in the wild: advances in User Interface“:

“The update in itself is a small release but it should bring the venerable operating system closer to current consumer markets.”

I fully agree that the Windows Mobile 6.5.3 release is a huge step towards full touch control, which has become more or less the standard in the current smartphone market. The first step was Windows Mobile 6.5 and this is the second major step, which makes the overall navigation, control, and user experience more consistent.

Personally I’m trying to find the logic in the version number, since I think the Windows Mobile 6.5.3 release features a major set of incremental improvements. Some of these improvements have a large impact on the userinterface and device navigation (position of start menu button and redesigned softkeys), so I wouldn’t be suprised if the version number was higher in this release of new features !!

Windows Mobile 6.5.3 is a huge second step towards full touch control of you Windows Phone. What do you think ??

Resco, founded in 1999 and based in Bratislava (Slovakia), is one of the “oldest” developers for the Windows Mobile platform. A few days ago Resco announced a new version of a multiple award winning application:  Resco Explorer 2010.

I have been using Resco Explorer 2010 for a few days now, and in this article I would like to write down my findings in a mini-review format. I will mainly focus on the new features, but will also address a few other aspects that really make Resco Explorer the default  file manager for your Windows Phone.

Let’s start quickly and download the Resco Explorer 2010 cab-files from the Resco Explorer Downloads page. Compared to the previous versions, there is no separate cab-installer for the FTP plugin. I install all cab-files of Resco Explorer 2010, and as you can see in the left screenshot above there are about five Resco shortcuts added to the start menu: (1) Resco File Explorer, (2) Resco Registry, (3) Resco System Info, (4) Resco Update, and (5) Resco Task Manager.

I you have used previous version of Resco Explorer you will certainly know the Resco Registry and Resco System Info plugins. The first gives you the ability to manage and edit the registry on your Windows Phone, so you don’t need to install an additional program just for this ability. The latter gives you an overview of the “realtime” storage- and battery statuses.

In the right screenshot above you see the “main” screen of Resco Explorer, and as you can see the userinterface is completely optimized for touch control. This approach results in big buttons in the bottom toolbar and also each entry in the folder list is large and easy to select. Since I installed Resco Explorer 2010 on the HTC HD2, which is designed for complete touch control, the interface works exceptionally well in practice.

Resco Explorer 2010 features a touch optimized Task Manager

One of the five Resco shortcuts in the Windows Mobile 6.5 start and settings menu that I didn’t discuss in the previous section is the Resco Task Manager.  When Windows Mobile 6.1 was released back in 2008, one of the improvements was a default Microsoft Task Manager for Windows Mobile. This is a kind of similar solution which we can see on Windows Desktop, with the limitation that this Task Manager isn’t optimized for finger friendly use.

A new feature in Resco Explorer 2010 is a touch optimized task manager, which can be launched from the start menu or the re-designed today plugin. When you start the Resco task manager, a kind of overlay is openened with a list of running programs. The large buttons, and list entries make is very easy to close a slingle program, or you might use the option close all to kill all running programs.

Remarkable is furthermore the used memory per application, for example Active Sync – Memory: 489k, and a total memory overview in the header – Memory 207M (of 337 M). You can close the Resco Task Manager with the red button in the Taks Manager header, or simply by tapping on the screen outside of the Resco Task Manager area.

A completely redesigned Resco Explorer 2010 today plugin

In the previous version of Resco Explorer, there already has been a today plugin implemented. You can see the (old) today plugin of Resco Explorer 2008 in a very extensive review of  Terry Davis, Editor of PocketNow.

“The last improvement affects Explorer’s Today plug-in. The old one has been replaced by a new totally customizable plug-in with Task Manager and other handy tools.”

As you can see in the screenshots above, the Resco Today plugin consits of a few bars. On the top there is the so called timebar, which shows date, time, alarm clock and mobile operator. Below the timebar there are by default three itemsbars, which can be customized and extended.

Via tap and hold you can customize the Resco today plugin. As you can see in the right screenshot above you can remove current shortcuts / widgets, and add new items to the today plugin. You can add: (1) Phone Contact, (2) Keyboard Lock, (3) Battery / Memory, (4) Application, and (5) Documents.

As an example I choose to select the option “application”, which brings me to a new screen with a list of current installed applications. I selected WordlCard Mobile from the list, as you can see in the left screenshot above. Furthermore I have added the Wi-Fi Router application, the ComManager and a Phone Contact, which you can see in the right screenshot.

Via a tap-and-hold on a today plugin item you open a pop-up menu. In case of the bluetooth switch you can set the bluetooth mode to invisible or visible, while in the case of a phone contact you can choose a communication method directly from the homescreen. Remarkable is furthermore that the number of itembars can be extended, which could give youa complete grid of shortcuts on your today screen.

Upload pictures to your social networks directly from Resco Explorer 2010

Resco released Resco Photo Manager 7 back in end December 2009, after a few beta releases. Resco Photo Manager is extensively reviewed by my colleague Paul Willen, who also tested this application in the beta-phases. In the Resco Explorer press release you can read:

“Resco team enriched Explorer with the popular feature of uploading images to Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, Picasa, MySpace and Photobucket.”

When you have a look at Resco Photo Manager there is clear synergy, and probably code sharing with this similar implementation of sharing pictures on social networks directly from Resco Explorer 2010 or Resco Photo Manager.

In the left screenshot above you can see the “Upload To” menu item when you tap and hold on a picture. When you select this item a new list with social networks is presented to which you can upload the specific picture. In the right screenshot above you can see this list.

Picasa and Flickr are large photo and picture storage websites / networks. Personally I was looking for a dedicated Flickr application for Windows Mobile, with a similar functionality as the Flickr Uploader for Windows. I have found my solution here, within Resco Explorer 2010.

You can also upload pictures to the social networking sites Twitter and Facebook. The advantage is that you can upload pictures, without having a dedicated Facebook or Twitter application installed on you Windows Phone. If you want to compare, please have a look at the step-by-step review of the Microsoft Facebook application for Windows Mobile.

I decided to share the Specialized Tarmac SL3 frameset picture on Twitter, so I selected the Twitter service from the list and logged in with my credentials. When you are logged in you will need to choose an album for the picture, like presented in the left screenshot above. You can either share the picture public or not public, which is something you will recognize from Flickr for example. After you have chose the album the picture is uploaded to the specific service, while the progress is shown in a typical Resco Explorer progress bar.

Thumbnail view mode in Resco Explorer 2010

Another new feature in Resco Explorer 2010, which is also aimed at the management of pictures is the thumbnail view mode. When you tap and hold on the Specialized Tarmac SL3 frameset picture, you can see the view menu item. Selecting this menu item results in a presentation of the picture, like you can see in the right screenshot above.

“Next main improvement is the introduction of thumbnails view mode. This new mode simplifies work with the image folders. It improves navigation and helps to find the right image. Another big issue; users will be able to recognize interaction with the Photo Manager. The thumbnail loading will become faster and Explorer will support more image file types if users install both programs.”

Here you can again see the synergy with Resco Photo Manager, which results in a clever integration and faster loading times when both applications are installed. The screenshots above however show the situation when Resco Explorer 2010 is installed “stand alone” !

Other great features and functionality in Resco Explorer 2010

While the previous sections describe the main new improvements in Resco Explorer 2010, I would like to address some of its great older features as well. These features are mainlyproductivity related, and help you to get things done on your Windows Phone !

Virtual Folders

The first feature I would like to discuss is the virtual folders, which you can access via the favourites button (yellow star) in the upper right corner of the Resco Explorer 2010 screen. Virtual folders provide you the ability to have easy access to certain types of files, no matter where these files are physically stored (main memory or storage card).

In other words you can access documents, encrypted files, images, music and videos directly from the virtual folders, without for example the need to browse to a three level sub-folder on your storage card. The idea or concept is quite similar as the Libraries under Windows 7 (for your desktop), which is very well explained by Jim Henderson -editor of makeuseof.com- in the article: “Windows 7 Libraries Explained – And Why You Want Them“

Resco Registry Editor

With the Resco Registry cab-file you turn Resco Explorer 2010 into a full feature registry editor for your Windows Phone. The great advantage is that you don’t need to install another separate registry editor, like SmartReg 3.5 for Pocket PC (payware) or PHM Registry Editor 0.70 (freeware). Furthermore you can edit the registry of your Windows Phone, directly from within Resco File Explorer 2010, like you can see in the right screenshot above.

FTP Explorer

In the previous versions of Resco Explorer you needed to install an additional CAB-installer for the FTP plugin, however in Resco Explorer 2010 this is not neccessary (it is build-in by default). I have a Synology Disk Station DS-207+, where I can access backups over FTP, so therefore an embedded FTP client is very welcome.

As you can see the FTP client of Resco Explorer 2010 supports also the Secure FTP protocol if available, so you can safely transfer your documents. The only other freeware file explorer that has a build-in FTP client is Total Commander for Windows Mobile, however the Secure FTP protocols aren’t supported.

Network Browser

Resco Explorer 2010 also includes a so called Network Browser to explore shared network drives and the documents on it.

ZIP compression

Resco Explorer 2010 furthermore includes a build-in “ZIP/unZIP-application”. For example when you need to e-mail a Microsoft Word-, Microsoft Excel document, a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation or simply a multimedia file, it is very helpful to compress a file first before you sent it (in order to save data).

Via the tap and hold action on a specific file, in the example the Specialized Tarmac SL frameset picture, you can open the menu and choose the item “compress” to pack the file. In the right screenshot above you can see that it is possible to set the name of the archive, the location, choose the compression level from the pull down menu and apply encryption if you like. Finally you can check the option move to archive, which “deletes” the original (non-packed) file.

Encryption

Via the same tap and hold action, you can open the menu and choose the Encrypt menu item, you might have noticed in the screenshot above. A new screen is opened where you need to set the encryption details, which is shown in the left screenshot above. At first you see the password- and confirm password fields, where you need to enter the password to decrypt later.

The option delete original file(s) is checked by default. However more important is the encryption algorithm, which is shown in the upper left corner. The default value is  “RC2″ 128 bit encryption, which can be changed via the settings button. I would personally change the encryption into the ”AES 256″ encryption, which is a stronger algorithm.

Finally when you install Resco Explorer 2010 via a Microsoft Installer on your desktop, an encryption component is also installed in your Windows Shell.

Favourites and search

Finally two features that make everyday life a lot easier. In the upper right corner of the left screenshot above you can see a yellow star, which is the favourites button. With this button you can quickly open your favourite folders / locations. If you wan’t you can easily add your own favourites, via the large yellow-starred button in the bottom toolbar.

Left next to the favourites button, you can see the magnifier glass representing the search function. When you tap on the magnifier glass a search box is opened, where you can enter a search string and search your current folder. A great function when you have a large set of files in a specific folder, since you don’t need a lot of scrolling anymore.

Concluding thoughts

Resco Explorer is the first application I install on my Windows Phone, and I hope that this extensive review provides a good overview of the features and functionality (new and old) in Resco Explorer 2010. The Resco Team would describe Resco Explorer 2010  in the press release as:

“Resco Explorer is the best selling file manager on Windows Mobile Market. Moreover, the fully touch-optimized application provides functions of a launcher, viewer, zipper, registry editor, ftp explorer & network browser. It is a true Swiss knife for daily use of each Windows Mobile user.”

If you are a current user of Resco Explorer, you are elligable to upgrade to Resco Explorer 2010 with a 50% discount !! This is a very reasonable quality for such a high quality application.

Furthermore I hope that some of the innovation outlined in this great new version of Resco Explorer 2010 for touch-devices will find its way to non-touch devices in a future release. It would be great if I could upload pictures to my social networks directly from within Resco Explorer on my HTC Snap.

While I can only conclude that Resco Explorer is absolutely the best File Explorer on the market. The term Swiss Army Knife is an understatement, since  you carry a fully packed MacGyver toolbox in your pocket !! Check out the Resco Explorer product page, to download a trial or buy your copy, you simply can’t go wrong with this application.

A couple of months ago we took a look at the Navigon Mobile Navigator for the iPhone .  After a couple years in absence, due to the focus on the Personal Navigation Systems, Navigon has come back to the Windows Phone Market. Navigon also released a version for the Android platform.

Some key feature of the Navigon Mobile Navigator for Windows Phone are:

• Reality View Pro (on devices with landscape format support) displays photo realistic 3D views with actual road signs and lane guidance for virtually every highway interchange and exit drivers will encounter.
• Lane Assistant Pro Helps drivers prepare to make an upcoming exit or turn by providing a lane map complete with arrows and actual road geometry.
• Text-To-Speech announces street names in addition to turn-by-turn directions.
• Speed Assistant with adjustable audio-visual warning.
• Day & Night Mode for map display.
• Direct Access allows navigation to contacts saved in the phone’s address book.
• Route Planning.
• Branded Points of interest.
• 2D and 3D map view.
• Automatic switch between Landscape and portrait mode.
• Intelligent address entry.
• Real signpost display
• GPS simulation in tunnels.

In the first video I will give you an impression how the Navigon Mobile Navigator 7 runs on the LG eXpo Windows Phone.

 The video below (no sound) will show you the start up time and all the possible screenshots you want to see.  In these screenshots you can see the many possible settings and functions the Navigon Mobile Navigator has for the Windows Phones platform.

The demo was done on the HP iPAQ Glisten with a smaller resistive AMOLED touchscreen is 2.5″ with QVGA 320×240 resolution. I hopefully will get a demo set-up soon using the LG eXpo we earlier reviewed.

When installing the application through your desktop you have the option to install different language voices, including the Text  To Speech voices (TTS) and different maps.

The Screenshots below are from the Navigon Mobile Navigator 7 on a Android Phone.

Conclusion

As with any other Nnavigon product, the software is designed with a professional looking, easy to use User Interface. The platform is now available on Personal Navigation Devices, iPhone’s, Windows Phones and Android Phones. My experiences on all these platforms are similar. Navigon is one of the top navigation software’s on the market.

The Navigon Mobile Navigator 7 is now available and on sale at PocketGearfor $68.36 from $89.00 until February 14th  and is equipped with maps of North America (US, Canada, Hawaii and Puerto Rico)

João Ribeiro, published a post on his TechNet Blog a few days ago about a new release of Windows Live for Windows Phone. In this article I will provide an overview of Windows Live for Windows Phones, and hopefully I can find the new improvements of this release and highlight them.

Most of you probably do know the concept of Windows Live and the Windows Live Essentials applications, which e.g. include Windows Live Messenger, Windows Live Writer, Windows Live Photo Gallery and Windows Live Movie Maker, from the Windows Desktop.

Windows Live for Windows Phones components

However I would like to start with a kind of functional description from Windows Live for Windows Phones product page:

“Get the full Windows Live experience – including e-mail, instant messaging, contacts, what’s new feed, photos, people, profile and more – right on your Windows phone for free!”

In the screenshot left above you can see the new version number of Windows Live for Windows Phones, and the different installed components. These components perfectly reflect the functional product description above, while the right screenshot shows the new Windows Live Messenger icon (with the yellow swoosh) in the Windows Mobile 6.5 start menu.

Hotmail or Windows Live mail

One of the major components of Windows Live is Windows Live Mail, previously called Hotmail. Back in August 2009 I wrote an article about Windows Live Mail and the push mail functionality on Windows Phones. Therefore I won’t elaborate that much on the Windows Live Mail component, since my conclusions was:

“Combining this e-mail push on Windows Live Mail, with a set of additional free tools like Microsoft MyPhone, Evernote and the proposed Sianix Calendar Sync, users are able to gain an almost-complete Microsoft Exchange experience for free.”

Windows Live Messenger

The second major component of Windows Live for Windows Phones is the Messenger Instant Messaging client. Windows Live Messenger is a large player in the instant messaging field, and both the screenshots above show that the Windows PC experience is brought to the Windows Phone.

Even some more advanced feature like sending and receiving voice clips from and to a Windows Phone isn’t a problem. Personally this is the component of Windows Live for Windows Phone which I most often use. Simply to stay in touch with friends, while you are on the go. With a flat free cellular data subscription this is far more cost efficient that sending a text message.

Bing Search

The third component of Windows Live for Windows Phones is the search component. In the screenshots of the August 2009 article you can see that Windows Live Search was integrated into the Windows Live bundle for Windows Phones. In the meantime Windows Live Search is “replaced” with Microsoft Bing for Mobile. Bing embodies more or less all search activities of Microsoft, and can be found on a few places in Windows Live: 

1. Windows Live Home screen;
2. Windows Live Home People screen;
3. Windows Mobile Today screen;

I furthermore assume, but not 100% sure, that Windows Live for Windows Phones and Microsoft Bing for Mobile perfectly integrate. At least that would be a great scenario, so if anyone has tested this yet please drop a comment. Sean Ludwig, Editor of PCMag.com, has written a great review about Microsoft Bing for Mobile.

While the Bing Search component of Windows Live for Windows Phones integrates with the “old” Windows Mobile todayscreen, like shown in the right screenshot above, it doesn’t integrate with the renewed Windows Mobile 6.5 todayscreen !!

Contacts

Another major component in Windows Live for Windows Phones is contacts or people. This isn’t a big surprise since most of the major components are aimed at inter-human-communication via voice, instant message or simply via e-mail.

Please have a look at Microsoft Outlook Connector first which, enables you to integrate Windows Live Mail with Microsoft Outlook in an Microsoft Exchange like experience !! Contacts management is one of the best parts of the Microsoft Exchange – Microsoft Outlook combination, which also comes to Windows Live in a more advanced form.

The screenshot above lets you choose to store your Windows Live contacts on your Windows Phone and integrate for example with an existing Microsoft Exchange contact. In my situation I have kept these separated, so I unchecked the option, while I remember this integration part caused some problems in a previous release because of the option wether or not to integrate.

Windows Live Contacts furthermore form a significant ingredient to the Windows Live Social Network ”strategy” ! 

Windows Live Home

The last component that has undergone the most changes, in my perception is the Windows Live Home component. At first you can see the Bing search integration in the left screenshot above. 

You might remember that Microsoft has given Windows Live for PC a social network makeover, and now some of the features are coming to Windows Live for Windows Phone as well. When I hit the Windows Live Home button, from the Windows Live screen (left screenshot) I’m redirected to my Windows Live “Social Network” page, featuring the “What’s New” tab which is shown in the right screenshot above. It gives a kind of Facebook Live Feed experience, and shows the status updates in your Windows Live social network.

Furthermore you can upload photos and pictures taken with your Windows Phone or stored on your Windows Phone, and post them to your Windows Live ”Social Network” page. It would make sense if there is an underlying integration with Windows Live Photo Gallery, unfotunately I haven’t installed it on my Lenovo X60 tablet.

The final tab you can access through the Windows Live Home screen is the “People” tab. In the right screenshot above you see that your Windows Live (Messenger) Contacts are shown and you are also able to search accross these contacts.

Concluding thoughts and wrap-up 

Unfortunately the Windows Live release notes of this latest version aren’t updated yet, but my personal feeling is that the largest improvements can be found in the Windows Live Home and Bing Search integration part.

What I can experience is that the Microsoft three-screen-and-a-cloud-strategy is bringing a quasi-similar experience to the end-user no matter if you are working on a Windows PC or a Windows Phone. Look for example at the Windows Live Messenger, which is almost as feature rich on a Windows Phone as on a Windows PC.

If you combine this with the experiences from the article: “Windows Live Mail pushed to Windows Phone” you can only conclude that Windows Live for Windows Phones is a highly valuable suite for both the mobile professional as well as the average end-user !!

No matter if you have a Windows touch Phone or a Windows non-touch Phone, Windows Live is updated for both types of devices. So please head your browser over to http://wl.windowsmobile.com and download your copy of the latest version and let us know what you think of the improvements.

This is already part 5 in our review series of the LG eXpo. In the video below I will be going over the add-on Pico Mobile Projector. It will connect very easily to the back of the LG eXpo by replacing the battery cover with the Mobile Projector.
The Projector is powered by the battery of the device. Once you open the slider of the lens it will activate the power to the projector. A screen pops up on your device explaining with not to many words how it works. Yes, that easy, One more slider on the projector will get you your picture in focus and the camera button on your device will make you switch between landscape and portrait mode.

Take a look at the video below how it works. At end of the video I have a little surprise announcement!

(ps. At the time of the video there are no specifications or set prices available for the Pico Mobile Projector)

Please see our other video reviews of the LG eXpo by AT&T:

• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 1 -Unboxing
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 2 -User Interface
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review -Part 3 – Fingerprint Scanner & Headset
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review -Part 4- Fingerprint Scanner Set-Up

Currently the LG eXpo is available at AT&T for $199.99 after a $100 rebate with a 2 -year contract.

The specifications are as follows:

• UMTS/HSDPA Tri-band (850/1900/2100 MHz). Yes data on a world radio
• GSM/GPRS/EDGE Quad-band (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
• Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g
• Bluetooth v2.1
• Display: 3.2 inch WVGA, 16M color 480×800 touch screen
• microSD slot
• Smart sensor fingerprint recognition and navigation(d-pad functionalities)
• Voice and Data at the same time
• GPS
• 5MP camera
• Slide out Qwerty keyboard
• All the Windows Phone applications (Mobile Office, text, mms, internet explorer)
• optional Pico Projector
• and more

In our earlier video’s of the LG eXpo from AT&T reviews we took a look at the speed of unlocking the device using the fingerprint sensor.

Below I have made a new video walking you through the process of setting this feature up. I have done this since the settings are really hard to find. The settings to train your fingers for the finger print sensor unlocking feature are actually located in : Start-> LG Menu-> Phone Settings-> Lock-> Unlock device with fingerprint sensor.

Take a look at the video below and I will walk you though the easy steps.

Please see our other video reviews of the LG eXpo by AT&T:

• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 1 -Unboxing
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 2 -User Interface
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review -Part 3 – Fingerprint Scanner & Headset
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 5 – Pico Mobile Projector Set-Up

Currently the LG eXpo is available at AT&T for $199.99 after a $100 rebate with a 2 -year contract.

The specifications are as follows:

• UMTS/HSDPA Tri-band (850/1900/2100 MHz). Yes data on a world radio
• GSM/GPRS/EDGE Quad-band (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
• Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g
• Bluetooth v2.1
• Display: 3.2 inch WVGA, 16M color 480×800 touch screen
• microSD slot
• Smart sensor fingerprint recognition and navigation(d-pad functionalities)
• Voice and Data at the same time
• GPS
• 5MP camera
• Slide out Qwerty keyboard
• All the Windows Phone applications (Mobile Office, text, mms, internet explorer)
• optional Pico Projector
• and more

SPB Flash Cards is the latest application for Windows Phones, released  by SPB Software just before Christmas. In this article I would like to provide a step by step overview of this application, but what type of application is SPB Flash Cards ?

My personal first guess was that it was a kind of game, since SPB Software has included an educational twist in their games. Think for example about SPB Brain Evolution or SPB Geo Game. However SPB Flash Cards isn’t a game as you can read in the press release:

“SPB Flash Cards provides great assistance in learning a new language, although it has no claim to be the sole mean of doing that. When mastering a new language, it is crucial to skip the stage of translating a word into mother tongue first, memorizing a direct match of a subject and a foreign word instead. SPB Flash Cards software is aimed at just that – the process of learning begins with a new flash card appearing, showing an image of an item along with the matching word and the right pronunciation from a native speaker. But this is just the beginning - several other memorizing techniques are also included. Besides, SPB Flash Cards contains a smart algorythm to track the user’s progress and adapt further learning process accordingly.”

The basic “gameplay” of SPB Flash Cards

At first you select the language you want to study from the SPB Flash Cards download page. In this review I will choose for the Dutch cab-file and install SPB Flash Cards on the HTC HD2. If you are a native Dutch speaker you might want to check out a different language for example the SPB English Cards. At this moment there is an impressive number of 13 different languages to learn !!

In the left screenshot above you simply launch SPB Dutch (Flash) Cards via the start menu, while in the right screenshot the main screen with categories is shown. SPB Flash Cards includes more than 1000 words distributed over more than 65 categories.

In the bottom right corner of the category graphic you can see the number of items/words in the category. Above the category graphic you can see a bar that visualizes the progress for each category. Let me start by selecting the category “Accessories”.

When the category accessories is opened, the first step in the learning process is a graphic of the item with a description below in your own language. The left screenshot above shows you the graphic of a tie and the englisch description “tie”. Furthermore you can move the item to the recycle bin, with the button below the graphic, however I don’t see any reason why you should do this.

When you tap on the graphic the card is turned, as you can see in the right screenshot. The description in english stays at the same place, while instead of the item-graphic you can see the dutch translation for tie, which is “stropdas”. Furthermore you can see that in the bottom right corner of graphic-box there is a “sound” button. If you tap on this button the word “stropdas” is played, and this helps you to pronounce the word “stropdas” as the native speaker of the chosen language does. You can tap the button as often as you want, just to illustrate that the word is not just played once.

Below the graphic-box you furthermore see two large buttons. When you are sure and confident enough that you know the word you simply hit the green “I knew” button, while if you need some additional practicing you hit the red “I didn’t know” button.

A closer look at the levels and underlying learning mechanisms

“If you say you knew the word the program will consider this word as a word that was known before and will not ask it again. SPB Flash Cards will help you to learn the words you did not know before. There are five levels for each word.” 

In the screenshots above the second level of SPB Flash Cards, when you don’t know a word, is outlined. Again a graphic is shown of an item together with the description in your own language. When you tap on the graphic, the card is turned, just like in the first level. However you now need to choose the right translation from four options !!

Furthermore I should remark that you can’t “enter” the second level on the same day due to the spacing effect which is outlined on the SPB Flash Cards Learning Algorithms page !! SPB Software has done quite some research on learning, algorithms and psychology and I you might be interested in the following references:

Wikipedia (Spacing effect)

Ebbinghaus, Hermann (Memory: A Contribution to Experimental Psychology)

Wired (Want to Remember Everything You’ll Ever Learn? Surrender to This Algorithm)

On the first level you see a picture and should answer for yourself how it is called;

On the second level the program shows you a picture and gives you four different word variants and you need to choose the right one;

On the third level SPB Flash Cards shows you a word and you should answer for yourself what it means;

On the fourth level you need to choose the right picture for the given word among four options;

On the fifth level the program plays you a sound and you should select the right picture among the four given.

In the screenshots above the third level of SPB Flash Cards is shown, in line with the description above. In short this is the inverse of the first level of SPB Flash Cards. The translation is shown, and when you tap on the box, the card is turned and the item graphic is shown.

The screenshots above show you the fourth level of the SPB Flash Cards algorithm. At first the translation is shown in the familiar box, while you can also listen again to the pronounciation. If you tap on the Flash Card, the card turns and you now need to collect the right graphic that visualizes the translation of the item. In this example “sjaal” means scarf so the bottom right graphic is the right one.

You will need to start using SPB Flash Cards yourself to find out how the mechanism behind the fifth level of the SPB Flash Cards algorithm works.

A closer look at options and settings

When you have a look at the SPB Flash Cards main screen there are two buttons in the toolbar at the bottom, which look similar in design as SPB Mobile Shell v3.5. The left button executes the “exit” or “back” command, while the right button opens the options menu like is shown in the left screenshot above.

The “About” and “Registration“ menu items don’t need much of an explenation. When you click on the “Options” menu item you get the possibility to change your own native language (this is not the language you want to study) as well as you can change the “sound mode” here. For example you can let the sound play automatically after the card turns.

Furthermore you can get an overview of your overall progress via the “statistics” menu item. Or you can “clear statistics”, by category or you can clear all categories at once. The screenshots above show the statistics commands. Finally the options menu consists of the undelete command, in case you have deleted one or more particular SPB Flash Cards.

Concluding thoughts and feedback

I would like to start the conclusion by concluding that SPB Software deservces a big compliment for the overall design of the application and the underlying research on learning algorithms and psychological effects of learning. To my knowledge this is a total new concept for an application that didn’t exist before, and which transforms your Windows Phone into a personal language learning assistant.

I haven’t taken any language courses recently but I can remember the problem at the secondary school, when you needed to make the switch from memorizing the word to pronouncing it and using the word in practice. These are two different aspects and cleverly combined into SPB Flash Cards.

In the introduction I already discussed the difficult positioning of SPB Flash Cards (at least from my perspective). Like I told before SPB Software tends to include an educational twist into their games as well, and perhaps it is because I got used to it, but unfortunately I miss some kind of competitive gaming element. Have a look at SPB Brain Evolution, SPB Geo Game or even the ability to upload scores and battle in the “online competition” of SPB Quads.

Furthermore I need to remark that the footprint of this application is large, +/- 10 MB. This might not be a big surprise, because the pronounciations and graphics of more than 1000 items somehow need to be included included in the SPB Flash Cards application. I highly recommend to install the SPB Flash Cards on the storage card of your Windows Phone.

You can purchase SPB Flash Cards for $9,95 per language from the SPB Software website, which is a reasonable pricepoint given the amount of embedded science, innovation and the complete new concept !

Since a few weeks, a dutch developer named Halil Yüksel of MobileLayers.com is developing applications for Windows Mobile that are easy to use without a stylus and were on the wishlist of many dutch Windows Mobile users. Amongst them is a program that has been made only available for iPhone and Android named NU.nl to read the dutch news and Trein! that you can use if you travel by train a lot. Halil has already made Windows Mobile versions for those aforementioned programs and since two days, a beta version of tweakers.ml has been developed to read the news from the biggest tech website in The Netherlands named Tweakers.net

The program is easy to use without a stylus and straight to the point. It has no difficult options, just read the technews and nothing else. Although all the screenshots are in dutch language, you’ll see that the application is intuitive and very useful if you read the tweakers.net newsfeeds often.

The program starts with the main interface with all the news sorted by category. You can choose to read Mixed news which is basically a mix of all the other categories or read from Core, Pro, Games, Electronics or Mobile News. Sadly the Mobile News category does not fit on the bottom bar, so you have to access that category with the “Meer” (Next) button.

The program even runs in landscape mode. This is not done automatically, but you can choose this from the menu.

If you want to download tweakers.ml (not a typo!) or one of the other applications, just point your mobile browser to http://m.mobilelayers.com and save the cabfile to your Windows Mobile device.
What should be the next port of a popular program on your wishlist that is currently not available for the Windows Mobile platform ? Let us know in the comments.

Our earlier video’s of the LG eXpo from AT&T reviews we had some questions about the speed of the fingerprint scanner and the Internet Explorer application.  In this video I show you how both these work very well. Yes the internet speed can always go faster. I probably will install the Opera browser on this phone since I like this better compared to the Internet Explorer the Windows Phone comes with.

I have also addressed the question about the 3.5 mm headphone adapter. The LG eXpo comes with a headset where you can remove the earphones from the microphone section and connect your own favorite earphones to the microphone. This will give you the headset with your own earphones.

Please see our other video reviews of the LG eXpo by AT&T:

• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 1 -Unboxing
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 2 -User Interface
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 4 – Fingerprint Scanner Set-Up
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 5 – Pico Mobile Projector Set-Up

Currently the LG eXpo is available at AT&T for $199.99 after a $100 rebate with a 2 -year contract.

The specifications are as follows:

• UMTS/HSDPA Tri-band (850/1900/2100 MHz). Yes data on a world radio
• GSM/GPRS/EDGE Quad-band (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
• Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g
• Bluetooth v2.1
• Display: 3.2 inch WVGA, 16M color 480×800 touch screen
• microSD slot
• Smart sensor fingerprint recognition and navigation(d-pad functionalities)
• Voice and Data at the same time
• GPS
• 5MP camera
• Slide out Qwerty keyboard
• All the Windows Phone applications (Mobile Office, text, mms, internet explorer)
• optional Pico Projector
• and more

In these next 2 videos we will show you the specific User Interface LG as implemented on the eXpo which runs on the Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system.

These 2 videos will give you a very good impression what the possibilities are. LG has done some small little things that we are finding back on the iPhone as well.

We  forgot one small thing we really wanted to show you.  It is the iPhone like scroll wheel in the Calendar application.

Please see our other video reviews of the LG eXpo by AT&T:

• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 1 -Unboxing
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 3 – Fingerprint Scanner & Headset
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 4 – Fingerprint Scanner Set-Up
• LG eXpo by AT&T Review – Part 5 – Pico Mobile Projector Set-Up

Currently the LG eXpo is available at AT&T for $199.99 after a $100 rebate with a 2 -year contract.

The specifications are as follows:

• UMTS/HSDPA Tri-band (850/1900/2100 MHz). Yes data on a world radio
• GSM/GPRS/EDGE Quad-band (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
• Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g
• Bluetooth v2.1
• Display: 3.2 inch WVGA, 16M color 480×800 touch screen
• microSD slot
• Smart sensor fingerprint recognition and navigation(d-pad functionalities)
• Voice and Data at the same time
• GPS
• 5MP camera
• Slide out Qwerty keyboard
• All the Windows Phone applications (Mobile Office, text, mms, internet explorer)
• optional Pico Projector
• and more

Make sure to check out the LG eXpo website for some great video presentations what the LG eXpo from AT&T can do for you. This all in conjunction with the Promotion of Avatar the movie.