New gadgets of interest

Partially as a follow-up to the iPod article, it's worthing noting that the forthcoming Nokia 6126 supports streaming MP3 over bluetooth. "The 6152 also supports the A2DP profile for stereo audio streaming over Bluetooth, which enables wireless playback of MP3, WMA, eAAC+ and MP4 formats from onboard memory or a microSD memory card." See InfoSync for the details. With decreasing costs of large memory cards, wireless headphones and the ability to download ringtones and songs via EDGE/GPRS, telcos are likely to be taking a bite of the Apple pie.

On another topic, there's always fringe markets that make serious advances without getting much press attention. PDAs are still struggling to include GPS with poor mapping applications and yet they are already old news amongst outdoor enthusiasts. For example, Garmin's line of mobile devices for boating and hiking are feature rich with electronic compass, altimeter, weather receivers, etc. In particular, the Rino 520 actually has text-messaging and group visualization technologies built into it.

"As with other members of the Rino family, the 520’s patented location-reporting feature allows you to send and receive GPS positions with other Rino users in your group. One call to your partner's Rino, and your location shows up on the map page. You can even poll another Rino user's location in emergency situations."