Monday, November 20, 2006

3210.aspx

Monza Rally Show 2006 - 25-26 November

I did not manage to go to the Monza Rally last year and it looks like I cannot go to watch Valentino in action this weekend either at the 2006 Monza Rally:



It should be great fun though. Valentino Rossi just finished 11th in the New Zealand Rally with a one year old privately owned car. Impressive considering he has only driven one other rally before, the 2002 UK rally – which lasted just a few corners before he crashed out. With a cautious start he was only 28th after the first races but quickly mastered the car to finish in 11th place.



Video from 2005

Sunday, November 19, 2006

3204.aspx

EICMA 2006

I went to EICMA 2006 yesterday with some friends and had a great time. The automatic ticketing system worked like a charm. Just hold the printed bar code in front of one of the many kiosks and it writes the personal ticket on the spot. I forgot to mention their Pocket PC application in my previous post; it downloads the entire catalog and map of all the stands offline. The only thing missing was a Bluetooth or wifi system that could be used for finding out where you were.


= Bikes =
There were loads of beautiful bikes. Too many to mention here. My favorites were two new Aprilias.


Aprilia 750 Shiver
I really like the looks of the bike and it is comfortable even for someone as big as me. It has a new 90° V2 that is extremely compact and capable of offering levels of power (95 CVs) that are comparable to the category’s 4-cylinder bikes. 
  



Aprilia 850 Mana
It is a good looking bike but the really cool stuff is the technology in the bike. It has a totally automatic transmission and a sequential shift with 7 gears and three separate mappings.


 


Suzuki B-King
The "Baddest" looking bike was the Suzuki B-King. It may well be the King of the road with its 1300cc engine but when it is too much it is just too much:
 



 


= Moto Live =
I tried the Yamaha MT-03 and quickly realized it has been almost two decades since I drove a motorbike with a manual shift. It was raining and the “track“ was wet and extremely slippery which did  not make it any better. I did not make a total fool of myself but it was not able to drive it like I wanted through the corners. Spoiled by using a scooter too long I guess.


I had a great time with the Goes Quads though. I am large enough to force it to go where it should go and slide it trough the corners on the dirt track. Great fun to drive on a dirt track but I cannot understand why people buy them to drive them in town…


3203.aspx

NetFront 3.3 Internet Browser for Pocket PC

NetFront 3.3 won the Pocket PC Magazine 2006 award in the Browsers and Web Utilities category. It is no wonder considering the impressive feature list:



  • Smart Frame Operation
  • Web Data/Password Manager
  • Pop-up blocker
  • RSS and Atom Feed compatibility
  • Page translation
  • NetFront SMIL and SVG Player
  • Auto-Cruise function
  • Runs external applications
  • Internet Search bar
  • Smart-Fit Rendering with multiple browse modes (Full, Text, Simple, Rapid-Render).
  • Virtual Canvas for rendering on virtual screen sizes. Multi-window function (tab browser)
  • Java JV-Lite2, Macromedia Flash

 

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

3190.aspx

Removing duplicate contacts in Microsoft Outlook

I recently started synchronizing all my devices (Pocket PC and mobile phones) with Microsoft Outlook. The good news is that I finally have all my contacts everywhere. The bad news is that I got tons of duplicate contacts as some contacts had the phone number while others had the e-mail. I was about to write my own "merge tool" when I found the free Contacts Scrubber™ for Outlook via Slipstick



The free version can merge up to 1.000 contacts. The registered version has several neat features:



  • Ability to process an unlimited number of items

  • Ability to create user-defined duplicate definitions

  • Auto-processing: scrub duplicates without user intervention

  • Ability to scrub across two Contacts folders

  • Special bonus: adds an Outlook menu option that lets you scrub open Contact items right from within Outlook!

Monday, November 13, 2006

3181.aspx

glofiish X500: World's thinnest Pocket PC Phone, GPS and Wi-Fi

The glofiish X500 promises to be the world's thinnest Pocket PC Phone, GPS and Wi-Fi All-in-one device:



The x500 has a 400Mhz which should make it less sluggish than other entries in the ultra compact Pocket PC Phone edition marked.


Main features:



  • Windows Mobile 5.0™ software for Pocket PCs

  • GSM/EDGE Quad-band: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz

  • GPRS/EGPRS Class B, Multi-slot Class 10

  • 240 x 320, 65,536 colors TFT-LCD

  • Built-in 2.0 mega pixels digital camera with flash light

  • 4x digital zoom

  • Video recording

  • Built-in Bluetooth® v2.0 + EDR (Enhanced Data Rate)

  • Built-in Micro SD card slot for expansion memory and peripherals

  • Messaging functionality includes MMS, SMS, email and MSN Messenger

  • WiFi® IEEE802.11b certificated

It is significantly thinner (15.5 mm) than the M600 (22 mm) I used earlier this year which is great news. The only sad thing is that they have dropped the SD/MMC card slot in favor of Micro SD cards which costs more (and are easier to loose).

3180.aspx

64th International Motorcycle Exhibition in Milano 14-19 November

I really enjoyed the exhibition last year so I am going to the 64th International Motorcycle Exhibition in Milano this weekend. The ticket queues were not bad last time but why risk when you can buy the tickets online.


Like last year there will be many races and exhibitions in the outdoor "MotoLive" area:


More info:



  • Tickets: Full price € 16,00 – Concessions € 10,00

  • Evening ticket – Friday 17th from 6.00 p.m. onwards - € 10,00 (Free entry for women on Friday 17th)

  • Go by motorcycle as the parking is free or take the underground. Car parking costs almost as much as the ticket (€ 14.10 for one day and € 9.90 for half a day)