Mobility and Wireless: Reviews

The HTC Droid Eris marks the second in Verizon Wireless's parade of the Droids. Also due this week from Verizon, the Droid Eris shares the Droid moniker and many features of competing Android phones, but it also adds some touches that improve the experience for business users.

Touch-screen notebooks are nothing new, especially in the realm of handheld smartphones and PDAs, but due to disappointing hardware and the lack of OS support, they've remained a small market niche for business notebooks and desktop systems.

Samsung Electronics gave the world a first look at its upcoming Galaxy handset, which runs Google's Android operating system, at the CommunicAsia exhibition in Singapore, where I had a chance to try it out.

Residual effects of the 2008 netbook craze are now popping up, with users complaining of cramped keyboards, missing DVD drives and limited functionality. Those are just some of trade-offs for a laptop that is dirt cheap and small in size. Some small accessories designed with netbooks in mind can ease those discomforts. The devices, which include portable keyboards, external storage devices and DVD drives, are small and draw less power. However, some devices can be pricey, so watch your wallet.

Acer Aspire One 3G

HP EliteBook 6930p

Adobe Flash Lite

Web-based applications and products like Apple's iTunes have made it easy to turn a laptop or a desktop into a music player. At the same time, thousands of radio stations are re-broadcasting their audio over the Internet to anyone who wants to listen. But what if you want to listen to, say, modern jazz from Mali or pop from Paris without dragging around a laptop? Enter the Internet radio: an appliance that looks like a radio and has an antenna -- but connects over Wi-Fi to the Internet, and streams audio to speakers.

With dual-mode phones dominating the home sector of the VoIP market, Linksys' SPA962 snubs the home consumer in favour of business-focussed approach. A pure VoIP phone, the SPA962 offers administration via an embedded Web server, support for six SIP-based extensions, and customisation by the end user, making this a fantastic option for a company-wide switchover to VoIP.

There are enough smartphone choices to make you dizzy. Yet in the business world, it arguably comes down to RIM's BlackBerry and select Windows Mobile-based devices -- with the strong possibility of Apple's 3G iPhone stealing some of their thunder.