Mighty Gadget Blog: The latest technology news & reviews in the UK

With the PMA(Photo Marketing Association) tradeshow a month away in Vegas we’re sure to see a lot more coming from the camera genre then but Olympus has stunned the world with its the next ultra-zoom compact camera the SP-800UZ.

Firstly its a 14MP camera but what really really grabs your attention is the massive 30x optical zoom. Now obviously despite the fact its a compact it needs the room to house the lens which makes a little bigger than your average compact but still smaller than your SLR's. With 2GB of internal memory and SD expansion you can also video 720p and then output it to your telly via its HDMI out.

It also comes with the usual face detection, image stabilisation and has a 3” LCD panel on the back to view your shots. You can even plug it in and charge via USB, handy if you don’t carry your charger around and have access to someone’s computer.

Also a smaller 12MP 15x optical zoom camera, the SP-600UZ is coming out alongside it.Both are out in March and will be priced at £369.99 and £259.99.

Now I’m a big fan of the Panasonic Lumix range(owning a TZ-65) so i’m always excited to see what cameras Panasonic are putting out. Now we will have the DMC-FS10 and FS11, the DMC-FS30 and FS33 and also the DMC-FP1 and FP3.

The DMC-FS10 and FS11(pictured) are a 12.1MP and a 14.1MP camera respectively. Both have a 28mm high quality wide angle LUMIX lens and both give 5x Optical Zoom. Turn it round and you have a 2.7” 230,000 dot LCD screen and boasts a light sensor to adjust the brightness when required. Both can shoot 720p movies at 30fps as well as 640x 480 and a wider 848x480

The DMCFS30 and FS33 again both contain a 28mm wide angle but are capable of 8x optical zoom. The only difference between the two cameras is on the flipside with screens being different. Both have a touch panel LCD screen only the FS30’s is 2.7” and the FS33 is 3”

Then we have the FP1(pictured below) and FP3. “Ultra-slim, Super Stylish Cameras with Folded Optics, Intelligent Auto Mode and Sonic Speed AF” say Panasonic. Both again with 4x Optical Zoom. The FP1 is a 12.1MP with a 2.7” screen and the FP3 is a 14.1MP with a 3” screen.

Pricing and availability are unknown and will probably be released sooner to release.

It seems despite O2’s successful trial of LTE that we talked about yesterday, its them pesky Scandinavians always beating us to high speed internet(shakes fist). Swedish operator TeliaSonera have said today that they will launch the first 4G network. The company is going to trial it’s service with its users in the Stockholm area of Sweden and the Oslo area of Norway in the early part of 2010 with Finland coming shortly after.

As we said yesterday we’re going to be looking at the end of next year before we get 4G mobiles, TeliaSonera are allowing users to get download speeds up to 100Mbps using a laptop and a new Samsung mobile dongle.

Ericcsson has put the infrastructure together in Sweden whereas the Chinese company Huawei who’ve just done those tests near Slough we spoke of, are setting the Norwegian side up. Still its all good news and for once shows that Britain won’t be lagging too far behind for a change.

The mobile giant O2 has been testing and been successful in the next stage of mobile information speeds. 4G mobile broadband can reach speeds up to 150Mbps. This will surely see an end to HSDPA and will see “LTE” as its known come to our mobile phones and other web devices in the future.

The Chinese company Huawei worked alongside O2 in the UK near to where O2’s headquarters are based(in the Slough Area) and managed to get download rates to the 150Mbps mark. Currently HSDPA can only get between 3.6Mbps or 7.2Mbps(but we all know this is just theoretical and never actually happens just like your home broadband).

This obviously isn’t going to be instantly out there in the market as its only the first successful test of LTE that has worked and apparently we’re looking at late 2010 at least before we see 4G dongles or phones out there, with more than enough capability of HD streaming over the mobile network. The speeds are also obviously a lot faster than current home broadband speeds so lets hope we can see an improvement there too.

Here’s one for my boss as he loves skiing and for all you other powder lovers. Now you can get a set of goggles with a built in HUD or “heads up display” for the non-techs out there. Designed and manufactured by Recon Instruments the goggles house a 15mm diagonal micro display inside the lens, obviously seen on the inside by the wearer.

The display will show various kinds of information to your eyes whilst you’re careering down the slopes( to me that sounds dangerous, but i haven’t skied since i was 13). With GPS capabilities the HUD can display your speed, jump hang time, altitude, temperature and also has a stopwatch to time your runs. It has also been said Recon are trying to get the display to tell you where your friends are located if they have the goggles too.

Not got a release date yet but you’ll be looking at parting with $350 to $450(£230 to £300 approx.)

There’s been plenty of rumours of Amazon’s Kindle being released on these shores and at last it’s here (and 99 other countries)

For those unsure on what this piece of kit is, its basically the best e-reader money can buy (if you believe everything you read of course) It has the ability to connect to a 3G network, allowing it to download new books directly from Amazon online(a choice of 250,000 books). You can also subscribe to online magazines and newspapers (The Times, the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail and the New York Times) and it will download these automatically. It also has the ability to receive Microsoft Word documents and also email capabilities and has a keyboard to facilitate these.

Now getting one isn’t as easy as you’d think. You cant just order an English kindle from Amazon.co.uk. Instead you need to get onto Amazon.com and order one from them. This will set you back $299 and a $45 import tax which roughly translates to £220. This will come with an American power adaptor but will work just fine here in Blighty as will the free 3G access.

The Spawn Labs “Spawn HD-720” is a set top box that allows the user to play their console on their PC via a WiFi or broadband connection. No more waiting for the wife or parents to go to bed so you can get some time on the console. Just plug your console to this and you can sit at your PC in another room and not get into trouble for destroying “soap time”

The Spawn HD-720 supports the Xbox, Xbox 360, PS2, PS3 and Gamecube. You can have up to 2 of them connected at once and with an adaptor, another three people can play from another location.

The HD-720 will be out in the US in November for $200 and Spawn Labs have confirmed that the UK will be seeing this gadget at some point in the future(not entirely sure when). The idea behind it is brilliant but no doubt a great WiFi network will be needed and I’m sure it will gobble up bandwith like no other.

Soon UK 3G customers of Vodafone will be able to get a whopping 14.4Mbps mobile broadband, making it faster than what most people have on their home broadband. The super fast speeds are being primed after they were trialled in various locations in the UK (London, Liverpool and Birmingham)

Vodafone has said its new service will be available to 80%  of its users whether they be mobile dongles or phones with no extra cost to upgrade to the service. Easy peasy then for you to be viewing sites or your favourite youtube videos even faster than you already were.

Obviously the likelyhood of you getting a 14.4Mbps connection speed will be slim, but it’s claimed an average of 10Mbps will be achievable still a lot faster than current mobile speeds and your average ADSL or Cable Home user. Could this be the end of home broadband, all we need is unlimited usage and it could be the future of broadband.