FirstImpressions
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iOS 7 on an iPad mini: First impressions
After seeing Dave Caolo's post about his first impressions of iOS 7 on an iPad 2, it occurred to me that I ought to write up my feelings about the OS on an iPad mini. The device isn't equipped with a Retina display, but it is one of the devices that can take full advantage of the features of iOS 7. So how does iOS 7 stack up to its predecessor on the iPad mini? The quick answer: very well. Why? Well, for some reason iOS 7 seems to scale to the smaller size of the iPad mini screen better than it does on a full-sized iPad. While the thin Helvetica Neue text almost seems to get lost on a Retina display iPad, it's right at home on the smaller iPad mini display. As my middle-aged bifocal-equipped eyes are not as great as they used to be, I still used this video tip to set the system text on the iPad mini to bold. Perhaps it's the fact that the iPad mini's processor doesn't have as many pixels to push around, but it definitely seems snappier to me on the iPad mini than on a Retina display iPad (third generation). As for battery life, that also seems to have improved. Your mileage may vary on both of these counts, but I was able to pump music from iTunes Radio to a Bluetooth speaker for three hours yesterday and only saw a 7 percent drop in battery level. That's much better than I had experienced in the past. I was happy to see that my browser of choice on my iDevices -- Chrome -- today provided me with the option to get data compression on the fly. This capability, although it isn't part of iOS 7, is also making the iPad mini seem brand-new. As with Dave's post, I'll follow up with any quirks or items that seem to merit attention, but for the most part, I'd recommend the iOS 7 update to anyone with an iPad mini. Just remember to back up first, OK?
Galaxy Nexus HSPA+ first impressions (video)
Wow... The Galaxy Nexus. It's finally here, in our eager little hands, and it's delicious -- just like Ice Cream Sandwich, in fact. Our review unit is the same unlocked HSPA+ version we briefly played with in Hong Kong and is running Android 4.0.1. We've only spent about a day with Google's newest superphone and we're already hard at work on a full review, but we wanted to share some raw, immediate, first impressions -- after the break. %Gallery-139724%
First impressions of iPhone 4
For those of you whose preordered iPhone 4 arrived early, just realize that the rest of us were jealous ... incredibly, incredibly jealous. It's one thing to hear it from Walt Mossberg and David Pogue, but seeing countless others rave about the iPhone at about the same time made me that much more anxious to get my hands on the iPhone 4. Was it worth it to get in line at the Apple store at 3:45am with the excitement of a kid on Christmas morning? In a word, yes.
My anticipation for a full day of iPhone 4
I'd love to give you my first impressions of the iPhone 4, but unfortunately only impression to date is how long my library is taking to synchronize. That's not new to the iPhone 4; I've been through this with previous Apple product releases. The difference today is how amazingly long it took to get my iPhone. In the past, I've been able to scoot in and out of the mall, or have the unit delivered to my home. Today is the first time that I actually spent multiple hours in line. I ran out of battery on my 3GS. I ran out of books to read (real ones, not iBooks). On the other hand, Apple kindly catered with coffee, water, egg rolls, and pizza. "I'm so excited about today," one of the Apple employees told us. "Last night I could barely sleep."
HP Envy 13 unboxing and first impressions
We've got one of HP's sexiest laptops ever staring us down here, the brand new Envy 13. It hits the streets on October 18, running Windows 7 and brazenly demanding a $1,700 base price tag. Worth every penny? Perhaps. We'll be going more in depth with the laptop over the next few days, but here are a few first impressions. This is one sexy laptop. It's incredibly quality in its construction, and intensely attractive. The screen in particular is a knockout, showing up very bright and vibrant behind its glossy, mirror-tastic sheen The single button trackpad is severely miscalibrated, and perhaps an altogether bad idea. We're having trouble scrolling consistently, but clicking is also a hit or miss affair -- having multiple fingers on the trackpad at the same time seems problematic, with our cursor glitching this way and that. It's also actually possible (likely even, if you're as bad at mousing as we are) to "click" the pad and yet have nothing happen, which seems very counterintuitive. The keyboard is comfortable, but has a bit of a loose, pushover feel to the key action -- not cheap, but not really best-in-class either. Boot time is pretty snappy, even with the quick boot Envy "Instant-On Solution" Linux acting as a pit stop along the way. With a full Core 2 Duo processor inside and a real feeling of heft and thickness compared to other laptops in "thin and light" land, it's surprising that the Envy 13 goes with the same external Ethernet dongle of its predecessor, the Envy 133. That full-powered processor? Snappy. It takes on YouTube HD, the real computer killer of our times, without breaking a sweat. The great thing about a "luxury" laptop like this (as HP dubs it) is that there's so much more to explore, including an external Blu-ray drive in the box, the endless wire-free adventures promised by the optional slice battery, and of course the real prowess of the GPU when faced with 3D gaming and some HDMI output. Good times shall be had, we promise you that. %Gallery-74293%
Windows 7 install roundup
After resting up and settling into our post-CES golden desk chairs, team Engadget got busy at installing Windows 7 on pretty much anything they could find. Most installs went off without a hitch, and BSoDs were fairly few and far between. You can check out all our various first impressions after the break... the names aren't made up, but the stories are true.
Palm Pre in-depth impressions, video, and huge hands-on gallery
We just sat down with Palm for a more in-depth look at the Pre, and here are our takeaways. First off, the software and hardware they're showing right now aren't the final versions. They're updating and tweaking as we speak, so some of the features haven't been implemented yet. Our take? Check it all out after the break, along with video, a full spec rundown... and in case you're wondering... it rhymes with Tree! %Gallery-41184%
New Xbox 360 Experience hands-on and impressions
Thanks to a special blessing from the folks in Redmond, we've had an opportunity to thoroughly give the rejiggered Xbox 360 Dash (AKA, the New Xbox Experience) a serious run through, and we've got the lowdown on the future of your gaming life. As you probably already know from the numerous posts we've done and generally available info (Microsoft has been pretty forthcoming with this stuff), the Xbox team has completely revamped the Dash experience, giving the system not only a visual overhaul, but trashing the underlying tech and rebuilding things from the ground up. The result is a beautiful, intuitive interface which loses almost nothing from previous versions while adding a considerable new feature set to the mix. Read on for our first impressions.
New MacBook / MacBook Pro unboxing and first impressions
We've had a chance to spend a little time with Apple's new laptop offerings, and we wanted to give you a taste of what's changed -- and stayed the same -- in the MacBook and MacBook Pro. Included after the break is a rundown of our impressions. We're going to be doing a longer, fuller, more exciting review in the very near future, but this should give you an idea of what to expect if you're planning on diving into one of these anytime soon. If you just want to get into the heavy stuff, you can hit the galleries below for a thorough look at the hardware. If you're wondering why the color temperature seems to vary in the photos, we shot it at the Revision3 studios while filming a segment for Tekzilla and they kept changing the lights (lovely folks, lighting changes notwithstanding).%Gallery-34531%%Gallery-34532%
iPod touch 2G unboxing, hands-on, and first impressions
We'll tell you that when we first got a chance to handle Apple's latest generation of the iPod touch on Tuesday, our gadget-nerd alarms went clanging like there was a really, really bad fire somewhere. The improvements the company has made in design aren't remarkable, but they are entirely welcome. The new housing is smooth, incredibly thin, and feels like a solid metal brick in your hands. The built-in speaker is a nice addition, as are those volume controls (finally!) -- the screen is incredibly bright (on par with the iPhone 3G), though it also looks like it got the 3G's new color temperature. On the software side, 2.1 is definitely feeling smoother and slicker than previous versions, the Nike+ inclusion is huge if you're a runner, and the implementation is well integrated -- overall, we're leaning towards a thumbs-up on those bug fixes too. Unfortunately, we couldn't seem to get the Genius function working on the device (anyone else having this issue?), though that may be more of a server-side conflict than something funky with the player, as we were getting errors in iTunes when trying to flip the switch. We'll be blowing this out with a full review, but for now you can enjoy the succulent pics in the gallery below!%Gallery-31721%
iPod nano 4G unboxing, hands-on, and first impressions
We had a chance to paw this beauty on Tuesday at the Apple event, but finally getting home and spending some quality time with the device has given us a far deeper impression of just what the folks in Cupertino have done. So far our impressions are favorable: physically, the nano redesign is a move in the right direction for the company, leaving that awkward previous generation nano on the cutting room floor, and falling much more in line with Apple's current design language. The player feels solid and compact -- maybe a bit too tiny for our big paws -- though build quality is on par with the 1st generation iPhone. You can tell a lot of careful rethinking went into this, and there's not an edge out of place. We're going to be doing a full review of the device and its new software, but for now feast your eyes on the gallery below.%Gallery-31711%
First Impressions: Jumpgate Evolution
At Codemasters' Connect08, we had the chance to sit down for a few minutes with upcoming space MMO Jumpgate Evolution and take it for a wee test drive. "Space MMO?" I hear you cry, "Let me guess, it's spaceships flying around shooting at each other and enemies?"In a nutshell, that's exactly what Jumpgate Evolution is. You pilot a spaceship. You shoot stuff. You get a better spaceship. Repeat. But, as with many MMOs that can be distilled to an equally dull one-line summary, there's far more to the game than that. Read on for our gameplay impressions (bearing in mind this is an alpha pre-release, not the final shipped product). %Gallery-18375%
HP's iPAQ 100 series gets unboxed on video
You've already tuned in to see Nokia's newfangled N82 get unboxed on video, so here's yet another one to feast your eyes on. HP's kinda-sorta delayed iPAQ 100 has finally made its way out (in a non-commercial box, though) to be pored over, and PocketPCThoughts took the time to carefully unbox the unit, spin it around a time or two and toss out a few first impressions for good measure. Granted, you're not likely to find any edge-of-your-seat suspense here, but those still on the fence about picking this thing up can hopefully get a better feel for it after peeping the video posted beyond the jump.
iPhone Second Impressions: On activation, UI, EDGE and answering questions
Another quick round of first impression stuff that covers some user problems with activation, EDGE speeds, Google Maps and Mail. We're working on some more focused, in-depth posts that explore individual features in their entirety, such as Safari, the keyboard, Mail, etc. For now, let's get started with trying to solve some of these activation pains and go from there. Activation Readers at TUAW and across the web are reporting all sorts of activation problems, and I'm truly sorry to hear about it, but I might have some tips that could help get your iPhone on its feet. As I recall, iTunes gave me an error message during the activation process, but the iPhone still kicked me back out to the home screen once it was done, and I received the standard 'your phone is activated' email a couple minutes later. I immediately was able to receive a phone call, and SMS and make an outbound call. I was also an existing AT&T customer, so all I had to do was add the $20 iPhone Data Plan during the process. I'm not trying to brag here, just provide context; by my rough calculations, existing AT&T customers seem to be having less problems than those who are first signing up or porting over service, as those operations probably entail a bit more work in the back-end on AT&T's part. There are a couple tricks that might help here: First, some owners are reporting that simply soft resetting the iPhone (hold the power button at the top of the phone for a few seconds to receive the power off slider) and then booting it back up fixes the issue. Just for the heck of it, why not wait a few seconds or even up to a minute? It couldn't hurt, and it might work some network voodoo to wake AT&T up and get your iPhone rollin'. I honestly don't know about this one as it is simply an idea I had, but: if you have a second Mac or PC lying around with the latest iTunes 7.3 installed, you could try plugging it in to see if the activation process begins again. However, remember: this is just an idea I had, and I have no idea whether that will illicit any results or get your activation process even more borked up on AT&T's books. I honestly don't believe it could do any damage, but I certainly am no AT&T activations engineer either. This is another theory that I haven't seen tested or mentioned anywhere, so take this one with a grain of salt as well: If you're an existing AT&T customer with a SIM card in your current (or - hopefully - soon to be replaced) phone, you could try swapping out the iPhone's SIM card as outlined in the iPhone User Guide (not included with the phone itself). Simply open that in Preview and search for SIM; your first result should be a guide for removing the SIM card and inserting a new one. Then plug your iPhone back into iTunes to see if a new activation process can begin. Again: this is just a theory; I haven't tested or heard anyone try this as a solution for activation problems. Update: More readers are reporting that turning off your old phone before activating the iPhone might help with activation issues. While this tip won't do you any good if you're already caught in the limbo of AT&T's activation system, it might help if my idea of re-trying activation with a different computer is worth anything. EDGE It's surprisingly fast. The best speed test I've found so far for Safari on the iPhone is dslreports.com/mspeed, offering a really scaled down page with a few download size options and no-nonsense results. I'm getting, on average, about 150 kbit/sec downloads on my phone. In light of the drawbacks of EDGE's (traditional) speed, the only reason that makes sense as to why Apple and AT&T didn't make some massive announcement of a network upgrade is that they're getting hammered this weekend with iPhone activations and people tinkering around with surfing via EDGE. If they're going to announce this at all, waiting until maybe sometime next week makes sense as the iPhone storm might be dissipating to more manageable levels where most users will see this increased speed across the country. Of course, this is just speculation on my part, but the tests don't lie: users across the nation are reporting that EDGE has upgraded from its previous 20 kbits/sec speed to anywhere from 100k - 200 kbits/sec. This is great (unofficial) news. Call me crazy, but I think YouTube is serving up different movies based on whether you are viewing via Wi-Fi or EDGE. I've watched three separate videos via both wireless methods, one of them user generated with crummy equipment to start with, and I swear I see a higher quality version over Wi-Fi than when watching with EDGE. Whether this means there are literally two separate files encoded at different qualities or if YouTube is working some streaming + compression magic I have no idea, but I would love to hear other iPhone users chime in on this one. Google Maps usually impresses me with its speed when viewing satellite images over EDGE. Simply viewing the standard map and searching for a location is almost always snappy over EDGE (sometimes there seems to be a delay, but not often), and even downloading satellite imagery is usable. Google Maps This was probably demoed and I just don't remember, but I'm talking to enough iPhone owners who didn't know this that I felt it warranted a mention: you can pinch to zoom in and out of either Google Maps views. This is fantastic. Traffic reports are usually pretty snappy, again even over EDGE. The Bookmarks feature of Google Maps (accessible by the blue book in the address bar) is a great way to save frequently used routes and quickly get at the addresses of contacts. At first I was slightly disappointed that I can't hook the iPhone's Google Maps up to my actual Google Account, but after exploring that Bookmarks feature, I deem it a non-issue, at least for me. Mail, selecting and deleting items Some readers are asking about doing operations like deleting more than one Mail message at a time. While you can slide your finger across any single message to invoke that red delete button for just that message, hitting the Edit button at the top of any message list will invoke red buttons to the left of every message in the list. While this isn't exactly the same as holding the Command key on a Mac, selecting a bunch of messages and hitting the delete key once to trash them all, this is the quickest way I can find to perform large deleting operations. This seems to be the UI for any situation where you have a list of items that can be deleted; there's no way to select a few of them at random and hit one delete key - instead, you enable a 'delete mode' which makes it easier to delete more than one message, but still one at a time. I'm slightly disappointed at the lack of the 'One Inbox to Rule Them All' like Mail in Mac OS X has; if you have more than one account synched to the iPhone, you have to drill down into each account's inbox to view any new messages, drill back out to the accounts list and then drill back into a new account and inbox to view that account's new messages. It's clunky, but it's also becoming inspiration for me to consolidate email accounts. That's about it for now. Like I said, stay tuned for those more in-depth posts on individual features, but in the meantime, I hope everyone's activation problems can get solved soon.
iPhone First Impressions
It was difficult, but I finally tore myself away from playing with my 8GB iPhone to put together a First Impressions post. I tried touching on a few things that we might not have discussed before, or at least things that I particularly appreciate that might not have made it into the keynote or video spotlights. Given the complexity and depth of such a ground-breaking device, you can be sure this won't be the only first post of its kind from me or the rest of our team, but for now, read on for some initial thoughts on one of Apple's most anticipated devices of all time. I just need to get it out of the way: Words cannot describe how incredibly wonderful this thing feels to touch and hold. It is an absolute marvel of engineering. Gorgeous in every way. It's light; surprisingly so. Not quite as light as I remember my Samsung BlackJack being (one of - if not the - slimmest and lightest smartphones on the market), but considering how bad the BlackJack and Windows Mobile in general sucked, it's honestly a non-issue. Amazingly, just about all facets of the phone's software work as advertised. Switching from the browser back to the Home screen is a snap; hitting the Home button the middle of a YouTube video is also a snap. However, YouTube videos take a bit longer than advertised on TV to buffer and begin playing, even over Wi-Fi. Not too worried about it. Google Maps is surprisingly responsive, even over EDGE (which wide reports are saying has received a significant speed boost in the last couple days. Hmm, wonder why). The magnifying glass effect is quick and very, very cool. However, it unfortunately seems to negate the possibility of selecting a block of text for deleting. This would have been handy in instances like blowing away a URL already in Safari to start typing a new one; the only workaround for this is tapping at the end of the URL and holding the delete key down and waiting for each character to be deleted in succession. Kind of annoying. Update: Thankfully, a commenter pointed out the big grey X sitting in Safari's address bar, allowing for a one click deletion of an entire URL. Much handier. The reader.mac.com app seems a little misleading - all it does is display a message on the iPhone instructing you to add a direct URL for a site's feed in Safari, in which case it will display that feed much like Safari RSS on a computer. It isn't a web-based app at all from what I can tell. Unless Apple has something more planned for reader.mac.com, I'm calling this another fumbled addition to the .Mac family (though, for the record: I'm a happy .Mac customer, I just increased my storage to 2GB and I fully plan to renew my account in October). Have I mentioned yet that this seems to be a device designed and engineered by angels? Because it is. Changing the ringer/phone volume or toggling the vibrate switch elicits a translucent Mac OS X-like volume feedback. Seeing translucency on a phone with this gorgeous of a display is nearly worth half the price in and of itself. The SMS app looks like iChat and almost sounds like iChat; it features a different sound for incoming SMSes, but the default iChat sound for sending SMS messages. My only question is: where is iChat! YouTube H.264 videos look as gorgeous on the iPhone as they do on the Apple TV (remember: Apple got YouTube to convert a portion of their catalog for the iPhone and Apple TV into H.264 from the original uploaded files; this isn't a conversion from original > Flash > H.264). Note to YouTube: drop Flash, switch to H.264 video for your entire catalog. Now. Snapping a picture on the camera features a virtual shutter that snaps shut and open again once the picture is done being snapped and saved. Kinda silly, but more entertaining than a 'saving' or 'please wait' message. The 160 dpi display is even more gorgeous than in the videos and up on stage in a keynote. According to John Gruber, the iPhone's UI is all done in Helvetica, which I am definitely a fan of. I also agree that Notes being done in some icky Comic Sans-y type is... weird. That's about it for now. We'll hit up more of the (predominantly) wonderful impressions as soon as we can roll them out.
24 inch iMac first impressions
No, we didn't whip out the old TUAW corporate card and get ourselves a new 24 inch iMac, though it was very tempting. Paul Stamatiou, up and coming tech blogger, had to get a machine to use whilst his ailing MacBook was off being repaired. He did what any red blooded Mac user would, got the biggest iMac ever.Paul was kind enough to write up some of his first impressions. They boil down to: it is big, fast, and the speakers aren't very good though they are louder than previous iMacs.Check out the post for some great pics of this gargantuan iMac.
First Impressions: iPod nano 2G
I broke down in the name of TUAW and picked up a new 8GB iPod nano. Of course, running out of space for workout jams on my 1GB nano might have had something to do with the purchase as well. I've put this second generation iPod nano through the trials enough (including some Nike+ runs) to warrant a first impressions post. Like others who have already weighed in, I'm pretty satisfied, but there certainly are some (mostly iTunes 7-related) quirks.I'd post unboxing pictures and all the typical stuff, but others have already been there, done that. I'd rather touch on the other little things that make product evolutions like this so (well, mostly) sweet.
First impressions: buying a game from the iTunes Store
Scott beat me to buying a movie from the store and posted his first impressions, so I thought I would move on to the new games section (iTS link) of the store. The games work with 5G iPods (of which I am an owner) as well as the newly announced 5.5G iPods. I can't decide whether I'm surprised you can't play the games right inside iTunes, but this post isn't about my indecision, for I dropped some cash and bought my first game: Cubis 2 (iTS link). The way iTunes handles games is interesting, largely in part because you can't really do anything with them in iTunes - you can't even rate them or modify any of their metadata; they're only usable and playable on an iPod. Read on for all the details!
Next-gen Sega Rally: Damn good donuts
Two things I remember from my closed door look at the rebirth of Sega's famed arcade racer for PS3 and 360:1. Sega Driving Studio Director Guy Wilday's first and last name. It just rolls off the tongue. Guy Wilday. Guy Wilday.2. The dynamically deformable terrain will have you making more donuts than Krispy Kreme.
First impressions: Too Human
The big issue with Silicone Knight's Too Human is going to be the camera. It's completely controlled by the game, and you have to fight the urge to try and swing it around with the right analog stick when it gets in an awkward spot. It also likes to take a wide angle view leaving your human looking like an ant on the battlefield. The game puts you in the role of an Unreal Tournament-type warrior with the ability to make some pretty colors with a sword. You can bust out combos with the right stick and take out waves of insectoid enemies or dual wield a pair of laser guns and blow them away. The combo action is supposed to be super-deep but it didn't feel that way when I played. Pressing B at certain times launches your most powerful attack, which looks cools but unleashes a looong canned sequence. I assume you unlock more moves as you progress. The framerate hitched when things got crazy. Not sure why I keep thinking of this game as an RPG when it's the total opposite. Maybe the title is a little too esoteric. I'd call it a sci-fi 99 Nights with a little less foot traffic.
