Emirates Airlines announced yesterday that passengers will no longer have to switch off their mobile phones and will be allowed to make calls and text people during their journey on-board.

The first flight with authorized mobile phone calls was made on 20th of March between Dubai and Casablanca on-board of an Emirates Airbus A340-300 fitted with AeroMobile system, which ensures mobile telephones operate at minimum power during flights and make sure mobile phone signal does not interfere with aircraft navigation equipments.

A second aircraft equipped with the same AeroMobile system will be in service shortly.

Rates were not published, but in 2007, cost per minute was estimated between 2.50 and 3.50 USD.

Source: Arabnews via Wi-Fi Networking 

Passengers will no longer be able to pack loose lithium batteries in checked luggage beginning January 1, 2008 as new federal safety rules take effect. The new regulation, designed to reduce the risk of lithium battery fires, will continue to allow lithium batteries in checked baggage if they are installed in electronic devices, or in carry-on baggage if stored in plastic bags.

Common consumer electronics such as travel cameras, cell phones, and most laptop computers are still allowed in carry-on and checked luggage.  However, the rule limits individuals to bringing only two extended-life spare rechargeable lithium batteries, such as laptop and professional audio/video/camera equipment lithium batteries in carry-on baggage

The following quantity limits apply to both your spare and installed batteries. The limits are expressed in grams of “equivalent lithium content.” 8 grams of equivalent lithium content is approximately 100 watt-hours. 25 grams is approximately 300 watt-hours:

• Under the new rules, you can bring batteries with up to 8-gram equivalent lithium content. All lithium ion batteries in cell phones are below 8 gram equivalent lithium content. Nearly all laptop computers also are below this quantity threshold.

• You can also bring up to two spare batteries with an aggregate equivalent lithium content of up to 25 grams, in addition to any batteries that fall below the 8-gram threshold. Examples of two types of lithium ion batteries with equivalent lithium content over 8 grams but below 25 are shown below.
• For a lithium metal battery, whether installed in a device or carried as a spare, the limit on lithium content is 2 grams of lithium metal per battery.
• Almost all consumer-type lithium metal batteries are below 2 grams of lithium metal. But if you are unsure, contact the manufacturer!

Indeed this regulation will first be applicable on US registered aircrafts but as usual we may see this new regulation applicable on all International flights. 

Usually all electrical devices, including batteries, are subject to safety certification so either their are considered to be safe or manufacturer has to review quality and safety of its products. 

I really wonder on which basis these new rules are made from. Did anyone saw any incident statistics, reports etc.. (apart Sony made laptop batteries) or is it just one additional constraints air travel passengers will have to deal with.

After lighters and matches in 06, liquids in 07, 08 will add batteries to the restriction list.

All details are here as well as the complete list of items with air travel restrictions

Not yet sure if it is a good news or not, but Air France has become the first airline in the world to offer an in-flight mobile phone service on international flights.

One Airbus A318 aircraft operating European routes has been fitted with a mini GSM base station to provides 123 passengers the possibility to :

• Send and receive sms and mms messages
• Send and receive emails via all phones with Internet access

During the second half of the trial, passengers will be able to make and receive phone calls, with the service being regulated to maintain passengers’ comfort and well-being.

If passengers kindly turn off ringing traffic data from/to an aircraft should not be a big deal, if not journeys may become quite annoying with uninterrupted flow of incoming messages ringing alert.

Hard to imagine how will be a long haul flight with full mobile phone services (voice and data) "offered" to passengers. 

At the end of the six-month trial, Air France will examine the feedback and comments made by customers to determine whether to launch this service on all its flights.

What is your feeling about the availability of in-flight mobile phone service ? 

For the technical part,
Air France uses Mobile OnAir onboard mobile telephony system, certified by EASA (European Aviation Safety Authority) which does not interfere with the radio-navigation instruments on this Airbus A318 and may only be used at cruising altitude once the new illuminated sign “Switch off your phone” is turned off (recycling the "no smoking" sign ?).  The system is activated at 3,000 metres (10,000 feet).

More about this trial on AirFrance site including a video of the 1st trial flight.

Since, mid-2006 mobile phones with a built-in 3 MP camera and optical zoon are available on the market and already represent an alternative to low end digital camera. More than 70 models are available today with a 3 to 5 MP resolution. One of the first phone with a "real camera" was the famous one Nokia N93 and its Carl Zeiss Optics.

Samsung is now putting even more pressure on camera makers with the soon release (first on European market) of its G800. A 5 MP digital camera with 3x optical zoom into mobile phone… or is it the opposite? 

The specifications are rather attractive:

• Quad bands (900 / 1800 / 1900 / 2100  )
• Data network HSDPA 7.2 Mbps
• 2.4 inches TFT display with 256K colors
• Size 101x52x19mm for 129 gr (25% lighter than the Nokia N93)
• Standby 220 hours, talk time 3.5 hours.
• Memory 160 MB + MicroSD slot
• Document views (Office, PPT, PDF,)
• Email (POP3, IMAP), SMS, MMS,
• Connectivity: Bluetooth, USB 2.0, PCSync, OutlookSync, etc..
• FM Receiver, Java embedded, MP3, etc..

and indeed the built-in camera:

• 5 Mio Pixel
• 2592х1944 pixels
• autofocus
• video recording mode: MPEG4, 3GPP, H.263, H.264
• xenon flash
• 3x optical zoom /4x digital
• 4 shot modes
• 4 quality settings
• brightness adjustment

 All other specs are here

The big plus is definitively the 3x optical zoom which makes the difference with other 5 MP phones.  The resolution race continues as Samsung (them again) Electro-Mechanics announced on November 15th that 8 MP camera phones may be available by next summer following the successful development of a 10.5 x 11.5 x 9.4mm 8 megapixel CMOS censor.

Will camera makers develop new "point and shoot" camera with built-in phones  and multimedia facilities such MP3 player and FM receiver ?

I'm impatient to have one "box" less to carry when traveling…

What will you drop first ? your camera or your phone ?

Swiss Post launches new stamps with a built-in two-dimensional mobile tag (kind of barecode) which can be captured using the camera available on most mobile phone using Beetagg reader and connect you to a particular Internet page

New Swiss Post "Beetagged" stamps will promote Swiss Tourism. 

Similar codes are widely used in Japan for quite some time and most of modern mobile phones operating systems have all needed capabilities to read these tags. 

BeeTaggs are developed by connvision AG, a Zug-based company, can have logos, images or text attached to it and are also readable in very small formats.

Last year, PostBus Switzerland and yellowworld trialled BeeTaggs on signposts and at approximately 100 Postbus stops could be used to access timetables.

Mobile operating systems supported: Java, Palm, WM5, Symbian, Symbian 9.x, UIQ3, Symbian UIQ.

WM6 doesn't seem to be supported yet and WM5 version doesn't run on a WM6 phone.

Nomadcom Beetagg. Try it !  

More infos: Swiss Post, Beetagg.
Source: Nouvo

Finally, long waited HTC S620 (Excalibur) upgrade to Windows Mobile 6 has been released. This upgrade was already available in July for T-Mobile Dash users.

Windows Mobile 6 upgrade will provide the following new and improved features :

• Stay connected to your e-mail, calendar, and contacts.- Find what you need quickly and easily including business listings, maps and directions with Windows Mobile's powerful search and filtering features.
• Get access to corporate networks for data and documents stored on file shares and SharePoint sites.
• Fit your style with a variety of designs ranging from touch screen devices with slide out keyboards to sleek full-keyboard smartphones or compact flip phones.
• Receive HTML e-mail support, improved security and encryption, greater integration with Microsoft products including direct SharePoint® intranet access from e-mail links and superior connectivity to Windows Vista™.

45 MB upgrade package is available on HTC member page but be ready for a slow connection as I can imagine the server to be a bit overloaded with S620 and TyTN upgrade downloads.

More once upgrade completed
Update completed, first impressions posted

Source: HTC Club 

I went yesterday to the "Thailand Mobile Expo 07" with hope to discover some "real" new products. Instead I found the Expo 07 to be more a fair than an exhibition where you can find at least 2-3 salespersons per visitor, but no real new innovations.

• Samsung was presenting their Ultra Edition II series (U600, U300 and U100)
• LG came with the Prada
• Motorola was around with the Razr2 V8
• Sony Ericsson shown the new P1i & T650i
• HTC publicized the Touch and P3600i
• and Nokia with lots of different models with the N95 among them

Aside of mobile phones, they was a huge sale of different accessories such bluetooth headsets, car accessories, and all type of memory stuff such memory sticks, SD cards, MicroSD etc..

In resume, nothing different that you can already find in Bangkok IT shops and not a single word about incoming products such Apple iPhone, HTC Cavalier or Shift as per examples which is a bit pity in country where carrying the last mobile phone is still very trendy.

Let's see what next week 2nd Annual Asia IT will come with.

Nokia has identified that in very rare cases, Nokia branded batteries BL-5C manufactured by Matsushita (Panasonic) between December 2005 and November 2006, could potentially experience over heating initiated by a short circuit while charging, causing the battery to dislodge.

This advisory applies only to the 46 million batteries manufactured by Matsushita between December 2005 and November 2006 and not BL-5C produced by other contractors (300 millions unit produced)

According Nokia press statement, there have been approximately 100 incidents of over heating reported globally and to date no serious injuries or property damage have been reported (serious incidents already occurred in 2005). Nevertheless, Nokia and Matsushita offer to replace any BL-5C battery subject to this product advisory.

Mobile phone concerned are the following ones:

Nokia 1100, Nokia 1100c, Nokia 1101, Nokia 1108, Nokia 1110, Nokia 1112, Nokia 1255, Nokia 1315, Nokia 1600, Nokia 2112, Nokia 2118, Nokia 2255, Nokia 2272, Nokia 2275, Nokia 2300, Nokia 2300c, Nokia 2310, Nokia 2355, Nokia 2600, Nokia 2610, Nokia 2610b, Nokia 2626, Nokia 3100, Nokia 3105, Nokia 3120, Nokia 3125, Nokia 6030, Nokia 6085, Nokia 6086, Nokia 6108, Nokia 6175i, Nokia 6178i, Nokia 6230, Nokia 6230i, Nokia 6270, Nokia 6600, Nokia 6620, Nokia 6630, Nokia 6631, Nokia 6670, Nokia 6680, Nokia 6681, Nokia 6682, Nokia 6820, Nokia 6822, Nokia 7610, Nokia N70, Nokia N71, Nokia N72, Nokia N91, Nokia E50, Nokia E60

but it also applies on batteries sold separately.  

Complete public advisory and battery identification number check are available on Nokia site.

While HTC Europe concentrate all its marketing on HTC-Touch, in Asia, HTC under its Dopod brand name has released earlier last month the Dopod C730 also known as HTC Cavalier successor of Dopod 720w (HTC S620).

At first look there are not many differences between both models. the C730 is slightly thicker (0.7mm) but also lighter 120g (-10g) than its predecessor.

Price tag in Singapore : 790 SGD (513.- USD)

Main differences are the following :

• MicroSD slot is now accessible from outside. Easier to swap cards
• Operating System is Windows Mobile 6 which integrates more services (Office files edition, Live Search, MSN, etc..)
• Camera 2 mega pixels.
• Better battery capacity (1050 mAh)
• Samsung 400 MHz CPU, 64MB of RAM and 128MB of flash ROM
• Quad band GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz) + 3G and HSDPA connectivity

Some points are still missing or require improvements

• Touch-sensitive strip on the edge of the phone is still hard to tame (usually I just use it to adjust volume during calls).
• Only a 2 megapixel camera when Nokia proposes 5 mega ones.
• No LED flash and front-facing camera for 3G video calls.
• No standard audio jack but a multi-purpose mini-USB connector instead.

Full Specification available on Dopod Singapore site

Sources : CNet Asia, Dopod Singapore

Yet another post about Apple iPhone, even if, as most of people, I haven't seen it yet. However, reading some articles about this "famous" iphone (11'000 print articles and 69 millions hits on Google in the last six months according the New York Times. 

I find very surprising that following support or services (according Presse-Citron review) will not be available on the, soon to be release, first Apple iphone :

Audio jack is not a 3.5mm standard. An adapter is needed if you want to use your iPod headphones.

Without 3G, Web browsing with the iPhone will be an experience..if you're patient enough and unlucky enough to not find a WiFi hotspot close by!

and last but not least, the antenna is located at the bottom of the phone, right there were your hand holds the phone. This will surely helps a lot when the signal is weak.

Cherry on top of the cake, iPhone will be available only with a 24 months operator's subscription and its price tag is above 500 USD. Even without seeing it live, the so much expected iPhone will not replace my HTC 620.

Sources : Pogue's iPhone Tour & Presse-Citron