vincent nguyen

Twiddling your memory knobs back to August this year you might remember SlashGear’s coverage of the Onyx concept phone, designed and crafted by bespoke hardware and interface designers Synaptics and Pilotfish. With no physical controls such as the keypad, joystick or scroll wheels found on traditional phones, Onyx instead relies on a system of touch, proximity and gesture.

Built around a high-resolution LCD screen and Synaptics’ ClearPad touchscreen technology, a transparent touch-sensitive capacitive sensor, Onyx can discriminate between one and two finger use and can even tell when it is being held against a cheek. This opens up whole new avenues of interface design: pop-up onscreen scrollwheels for volume and moving through contact and media lists, “flicking away” text messages to send them, dragging photos and files from screen to screen.

SlashGear has been lucky enough to visit Synaptics and get a live demonstration of Onyx, from none other than their Human Interface Architect, John M. Feland. Under the ever watchful eye of Clark Foy, the company’s marketing VP, we filmed some exclusive footage of the prototype in action. The ethos of Onyx is “All About Fun”, about using technology in a humanistic way; hopefully you’ll have fun looking at what might just be the phone of the future.

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Once again proving that you can’t keep anything hidden from a determined geek, AppleInsider, via one of their members, has dissected the latest iPod firmware to get an idea as to what Apple has planned for future iterations. As it turns out, the latest iPod firmware makes pointed references to both phone and instant messenger system calls, meaning that the vaunted Wi-Fi-enabled iPod might not be as far away as we think.

The new firmware makes reference to a number ‘t_feature_app_PHONE_APP,” “kPhoneSignalStrength,” “clPhoneCallHistoryModel,” prPhoneSettingsMenu,” “prPhoneSettingsMenuView,” prPhoneEnab ileSetting” and “prPhoneMenuItem.” Most of these are self-explanitory: checking the phone’s signal strength, interfacing with a phone application (iCaller?), call history, phone preferences, etc. The new firmwre also includes calls for interfacing with an IM application (most likely the next version of iChat), meaning that we could also see an IM-enabled iPod with the next release.

We won’t know anything for certain until Apple releases new details on their upcoming iPods, but new concepts like this could account for the delays in shipping the next-generation of Apple’s popular music player. With the Microsoft Zune quickly approaching with an impressive feature set, Apple needs to do something drastic to make sure that their iPods don’t get left in the dust. Phone functionality and IM should do the trick, don’t ya think?
[via Apple Insider]

Hot damn! The Motorola Q has arrive; and you can buy it online for only $199.99 after $100 advance device credit with a new 2-year activation on a voice and data choice bundle plan starting at $79.99 monthly access. In my opinion, two-year commitment is a long time and should you want to leave early, you’ll be charged $175 early termination fee along with other charges.
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Steve Jobs, CEO of the ever popular Apple, seems to be filled with confidence as his company heads in to the future. In fact, Jobs is so excited about Apple’s success, that even HE couldn’t keep a completely secretive attitude during a recent shareholder’s meeting. During the meeting, Jobs revealed a few directions in which Apple may be headed. While nothing in terms of specific products was revealed, Jobs’ comments will get any reader quite a bit hyped towards the future.

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