Many states have laws about using your cell phone while driving. Even where the law permits it, using your phone while driving can be dangerous. I have to admit, I talk on the phone while driving a lot. Although I can still drive safely, it’s inconvenient and ties up my free hand. Nokia sent me something that makes it all easier.
About the HF-510
The Nokia Speakerphone HF-510 is a hands free kit for your car that connects via Blue Tooth to your phone. Simple enough, but what makes this different from other hands free kits out there? I’ve seen a ton of them and decent kits start around $50 last time I checked and the HF-510 comes in a little over that mark. The first difference this device has over others is easily noticed the first time you look at it. The large, easily mountable speaker allows for nice clear audio and can be pretty loud if you want, too. Because I didn’t want to mount the speaker for my review, I found myself throwing it in the cup holder in my car. The speaker size is just about a perfect fit for the cup holder, so if you want to share it between cars, you could try that.
The next stand-out feature I found on this device was the OLED display for caller ID. The whole point of a hands free kit is to not be messing with your phone while driving, so it’s nice to have the incoming caller’s number displayed. This is a great feature and shows up nicely. I hate getting stuck on the phone in my car with someone I don’t want to talk to or someone trying to sell me something. If you don’t mount the speaker or use the included visor clip, though, this feature is not as easy to notice without taking your eyes way off the road. So if you need the caller ID, mount the speaker or use the visor clip.
Other Features, Likes, Dislikes
Additionally, the Nokia HF-510 has a ring around the outside that is used to control the volume and sift through the phone book. While it’s kind of cool and probably works fine if you mount it very stable, it otherwise makes the phone book navigation and volume control harder to accomplish with one hand. While I didn’t really use it long enough to notice any battery issues, it boasts up to 30 hours of operation time and 180 hours of stand by time on the included battery. That’s pretty decent, but they provide a car charger for those really long trips.
Conclusions
This hands free kit just worked well. I might have liked it a little smaller for my visor, but it has a nice design and was generally easy to operate. Call quality was as good as being on my phone, itself and it paired up really really easily. For the extra extra mile the HF-510 goes, I expected a slightly higher price than what I’ve seen and that doesn’t hurt one bit. The Nokia HF-510 looks and works great at a good price, leaving little to ask for.
As you may know, I had my own little security problem at my house when a guy was repeatedly urinating on my storage building in the wee hours of the morning (no pun intended). Luckily, I was slated to review a very flexible and professional security camera system and caught the guy on video before catching him in person. The video and photo are in that post above, but today I learned of something just as interesting that happened at CES.
In the incident I referenced above, my late night visitor had no way of knowing I was recording him because I hid the camera very well and it was dark and late. In this story, the star of the video, Willy Wu, walks up to a booth, picks up the contacts book full of information from potential clients looking for further contact from the company, leafs through it, and casually walks away with it. At any other booth, he may have gotten away easily in a show as enormous as CES. Unfortunately for Wu, the booth he took the book from was that of Swann Security, a global leader in security monitoring solutions. Now that’s just dumb.
According to the article, Swann staff caught up with the guy at CES pretty quickly and he handed over the book without hesitation, but then ran off. Eventually, they’ll catch back up with him, but the important thing here is that he didn’t get away with all that client data.
Have you ever held a flashlight in your mouth to shine light on something you needed both hands to work on? If so, keep reading, because Joby sent me something they’ve designed for just such a situation.
What Is A GorillaTorch?
The item pictured above is a product called GorillaTorch. The idea is to free up your hands while it still shines light on whatever you need to see. The web site touts it as a
must-have for auto repair, home improvement, camping and more
While it doesn’t seem to be made for standard walking around flashlight use, it seems to have the above mentioned situations in mind with it’s bright light and included tripod.
When I saw this in the mail, I decided that this thing needs to do two things and do them well to get a passing grade from me. It’s a flashlight, so obviously it’s ability to illuminate a dark area with lots of light was my first demand. It’s 65 Lumen CREE LED light source was not only super bright, but also adjustable. I usually keep it all the way up, but it’s nice to be able to conserve the batteries with less light when you don’t need as much.
The second make-or-break feature for this torch is the ability to have it point where I need it without holding it. I’m no stranger to Joby products, having recently provided a Joby GorillaMobile review, so I already had some expectations. As I thought, the GorillaTorch’s tripod was almost the same as on most of their products. It’s what they do, after all, so it did not surprise me that it did a wonderful job of gripping to just about anything I tried to wrap it around. What I didn’t anticipate is that it’s magnetic. It’s not something I would have thought necessary, but it certainly doesn’t hurt.
The average battery life is 20 hours at full brightness all the way up to 80 hours if you dim it down. This seems acceptable given that it runs on three AA batteries.
Conclusions
Compared to high end flashlights running upwards of $90 and supermarket flashlights you can get for a couple bucks, the GorillaTorch fits nicely in the middle at $30 but has some benefits neither offer. Comparisons aside, it’s a very reasonable price for the only torch I’ve seen that would fit some of my needs. As part of my testing, it found its way into my server room where I actually needed to use it when the power went out. After having to shut down servers with one hand by iPhone light too many times, the GorillaTorch has a permanent place in that room now and has already proven useful. Anyone who needs light and both hands at the same time should give the GorillaTorch a look.
Unaware of what would be announced, I stayed up late for the Nokia virtual press event I was invited to check out. While it wasn’t some hot new Nokia handset as I had hoped, it was still pretty cool news.
I was greeted with a video from Anssi Vanjoki (Markets) who announced that Nokia will now provide their OVI maps for free… forever. How’s that for a nice bold statement. That’s a great thing for you Nokia users, but what about me? OVI Maps is a product for the desktop, too.
The picture above shows OVI Maps in it’s 3D view displaying the Eiffel Tour, which I thought was pretty cool, but there’s a lot more to the maps than some 3D tricks. At first glance, it seems they’ve really set out to compete with Bing and Google in the map and mobile navigation space. Now I just need another Nokia phone to play with so I can really give it a spin.
I’d love to hear opinions from any of you Nokia users.
