Tekkeon MyPower All 3400 extended battery/charger

I bought the Tekkeon MyPower All 3400 extended battery/charger for just under £100. It's a multi-device charger giving roughly 4 hours power for the Amtek T770. I have not actually managed to run it out of juice yet as I only use my Amtek for 2/3 hours at a stretch.

It comes with various charging tips which attach to the curly lead coming out of the device. The item itself is shiny black, gray and silver, quite small & not too heavy.

I bought this rather than a second battery as it gives much longer charge time & also the second battery for the T770 is not available yet.

Can't find a perfect case etc da de da

Still early days with my Amtek and I don't have a decent case nor do I have a second power adaptor or backup battery. There are a few UMPC cases around most notably the Samsung Q1 one but nothing I think is perfect.

If I was to review the T770 today I would point to the touch screen calibration as being a bit poor and the wireless being weak but overall it's a great device. I'm even getting somewhere with dialkeys, the software keyboard when I don't have my wireless one attached.

I wish the hard disk was bigger as I'm filling it up and I wish Vista was not so insane (I now know 2 ways to make the recycle bin vanish and can also lose the icon so there's a patch bound to come along soon from M$ to fix it)

Probably the single most important thing is that a UMPC is really usable. I've had PDAs for years and the limitations are clear when you move up to UMPC.

Got a bluetooth keyboard

Not content with the wireless keyboard I bought I purchased a Xema Blue keyboard.
Its cheap and the driver was hard to install but it works fine and is as small as possible. It's folding like so many of those for PDAs etc. Only big issue is the keymap which does not seem to be correct.
It's a US layout but Vista does not read all the keys while on XP it's fine? Will try a Vista reg fix I got from Microsoft.

A nice wireless utility - shame I needed it

I came across a decent wireless utility in my struggle to get my Belkin wireless extender integrated into my network. It's supposed to just sit there and work but causes all sorts of nonsense. Anyway the utility is HomeNet Manager from SingleClick systems. 30 days free trial so enough time to evaluate & get some real use before we have to pay.

The program makes a better job of reporting wireless device status than Vista's built in and looks pretty nice as well.

Wireless with everything - web browsing speed - Open Office

I have bought a wireless keyboard (small media centre type with mouse layout like the UMPC) and this works fine but the wireless receiver looks ridiculous as it has a long USB tail and is quite large.

I'm going to try a bluetooth freedom or stowaway type shortly once I confirm compatability.

My USB wireless dongle arrived and does give a stronger signal than the built in though if I connect both at once the built in wireless signal goes up in strength (weird). I will need it when I'm far away from my Livebox router.

Browsers: IE7 seems to be really slow so despite being a Microsofty I installed Firefox which seems to perform much better.

Open office seems to perform badly so I plan to install MS Office 2000's Word & Excel assuming that will be much quicker.

Still learning, Still searching

I'm trying to find a good keymapper which lends itself to the Amtek so I can have a series of settings for different games, emulators etc and as yet have not found anything that's close to usable. If I can get some source code I can build my own but that takes time which Idon't have much of.

On the wireless front I'm not only buying a USB wireless adaptor to beef up the range but I've also bought a Belkin wireless extender so I can get a signal much further away. I want to surf from upstairs in bed and the signal strength is not good enough. Update: With a cheap Belkin wireless extender in place I'm now picking up all over the house without using any external wireless on the Amtek. I was even picking up routers from the train on the way home so in ideal conditions the Amtek is picking up signals from quite a distance.

Found a wierd thing about Vista. The recycle bin is just a shortcut on the desktop so you can delete it if you click the wrong menu item & you then have to get it back via the personalize, icon options.

Website and forum set up

The domain name www.amteksite.co.uk now belongs to me and I have begun to create the homepage by adding links to this Blog and to a message forum for the Amtek http://p197.ezboard.com/fsundialsoftpocketpcfrm4
Hopefully the forum will be used otherwise I will have blown $18 on a forum with no adverts :)
The Domian pointing will take 24 to 48 hours to ripple round the world so the site should be fully working some time tomorrow.

SIdebar Gadgets - Trying to convert Google gadgets & failing

As a software developer to trade I would expect to be able to pick up any utility and get on well with it but I've failed miserably to use one of the most popular converters available. I can get the web source in etc but when generated there's nothing in the list of gadgets.
I won't give up on this so expect more soon.

Gaming on the T770 - the beginning

So far I have only tried Age of Empires II to get a feel for playing a game on the UMPC.
The game plays well at all 3 resolutions and I have played exclusively using the synaptics mouse and buttons rather than the stylus (I hate scratching the screen). My only issue has been the lack of keyboard. Neither the 2 built in ones (Dial Keys and the soft keyboard) will pop up correctly in AOEII nor does Inscribe. MessagEase will pop up if programmed on to one of the keys but closing it is a bit 'Iffy'. As I only want the keyboard to enter cheats it's no big deal but I will keep searching for a perfect solution.

YouTube Videos and Gallery of T770 Photos

The first of the two YouTube videos is here:-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNg2sxTf14c

and the follow up is here:-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jm2b9cWvnbc

There's also a nice photo gallery over at UMPCPORTAL
http://www.umpcportal.com/gallery/v/t770-handson/

I will do a few screen movies of the UMPC and post them in the next week.

The Amtek T770 has arrived at last

Following it's launch at CEBIT in March 2007 the Amtek T770 has finally gone on sale in the UK and limited numbers of machines are finding their way into the hands of those who registered to buy one.

This Blog is here to allow existing and prospective owners to learn, discuss, criticise and enjoy the T770.

Having had the UMPC for just one day I can report that I am pretty happy with the machine but faced with the Vista learning curve (it comes with Vista home premium) I have to learn how to use a UMPC and a new Windows at the same time.

Out of the box there's the device itself, a battery (partly charged) and a UK power lead, US power lead, headphones, a screen cleaning cloth and the infamous bright yellow carry bag, what were they thinking ? There's no manual but that's available electronically as a PDF.

In a few days when I have had time to use the T770 I will post a review but in the meantime there is an unboxing video on Utube for all you nerds out there and a follow up video as well.

The Amtek T770 is available in the UK from the nice people at http://www.pocketpc-solutions.co.uk/