The Wireless Communications Solutions Division of ARC Wireless Solutions, Inc., (“ARC”) (OTCBB: ARCS) an antenna technology solutions company, introduces the new Freedom Antenna® all-in-one product with a completely redesigned look that is compatible with the top 10 selling cell phones sold in the US along with 200 other cell phone models. The all-in-one product is the first to be launched as part of a complete consumer antenna product line introduction that will include new antennas, additional adapters to increase compatibility with many more cell phones and wireless devices, as well as new consumer friendly features never seen before on the Freedom Antenna®.

The Freedom Antenna® is the world’s first portable personal antenna with broadband capability to provide clearer reception for cellular phones and other wireless devices by extending the range and reducing dropped calls caused by hands-free and other demanding uses. Utilizing patented technology, the Freedom Antenna® is compatible with all major wireless carriers and technologies and offers high performance in a slim package for both fixed and mobile hands-free use in vehicles, offices, homes and is ideal for travel.

The all-in-one Freedom Antenna® will soon be available through ARC’s extensive network of value-added resellers, distributors, and retailers for a suggested retail price of $34.95 (US) and will include the new antenna design, stand, suction cups for window mounting and adapter cables connecting the antenna to over 200 cell phones models. Further information is available on the ARC Wireless Communications Solutions Division website.

The launch of Shiro latest new product Shiro SK9500 represents another major breakthrough. The Shiro SK9500 Embedded Color Skype DECT Dual Phone allow user to make and receive Skype call without any connection to computer. It truly becomes a consumer oriented product suitable for non-computer expert, children and even elderly adults who loves ‘free’ calls communicating. It is so simple to use, you can simply pick your SKYPE contact list from the SK9500’s user-friendly LCD screen phone book to instantly talk to your favorite buddies’ contacts! In addition, the other phone features encompassed makes SK9500 the latest, first-rate equipment in the market.

Key Features

Other Features Include:

I like sleek as much as the next geek and put anything in a glossy black skin and you’ve got a looker. You know, iPods, Maybach Exeleros, rock station web sites. Wait, scratch the last one. But you get the point.

Well futrio kinda figured that out with its VoIP handset that’s ready to plug into your dull PC and wake it up with a Skype call! Offering three sleek black encompassed handsets for Windows users, you can get the top of the line luna for $75 that features a dial pad or the $55 luna sans the numbers. If you want portability so you can easily bring that sleekness with you on trips, then score the solo. The self winding USB cable for optimal cable management and snazy case will cost you $65.

When I had Vonage VoIP, I loved it’s CallVantage feature. It integrated with Outlook and let me select a contact and instantly dial it. Within seconds, my phone was ringing with the call in progress. But when I left Vonage due to lack of a data centers in the 209 area code (which it still doesn’t have) for Packet8, I lost my beloved feature. Sure, there are phone dialers that work with modems, but lots of good that does me on a MacBook Pro. Thankfully, a guy named Jon felt my pain.

Not to be confused with SvenOnTech’s own contributor, Jon is another famous Jon that develops some neat applications for the Mac. You may have seen his Docktop the last time you visited an Apple Store. You know, the little collection of applications in the middle of the screen that you could launch much like the Apple Dock but it’s in the middle of the screen. Ya, it’s sweet. Well Jon has applied the same sweetness to JPT, short for Jon’s Phone Tool.

If you’re a lucky Vonage user, you’ll be able to use JPT with it much like CallVantage which is great for Mac users since Vonage doesn’t have a Mac version of CallVantage. But if you don’t have Vonage, as I don’t anymore, then you have other choices to get that number dialed from your Mac. This list is long, but I’ll be brief with it. Methods include Bluetooth (sends the number to your mobile or one of the handful home phones with Bluetooth), VoIP, touch-tones through your speaker, and good ol’ analog modem. If you’ve bought a Mac recently, then the latter won’t apply to you as it doesn’t for me. That leaves good times with those tiny speakers (or VoIP for you Cisco cats)!

I played with JPT for maybe ten minutes before I found myself at Kagi’s site making a purchase of this fine tool. Jon knows how good his dialer is since he not only mentions the competition but even puts links to them on his FAQ page! With the its ease and power, it just was too easy not to even consider looking at the other dialers. For $15, ya, I’ll feel fine slapping out the credit card numbers via 1Passwd since it’s just that good.

A couple of things I do want to tell you potential dialer users before I conclude. First, its integration with various address books is great. It tapped right into my Entourage as well as Apple’s Address Book. Since I connect to an Exchange server, the dialer took a great amount of time to find my number I was searching for; however, Address Book was instant. Since Entourage now lets you sync with Address Book, I ended up just keeping JPT settings to use Address Book.

The other feature I wanted to let you know about is the ability to dial Mnemonics directly. For example, if you see a number that is, say, 1-800-GO-BEARS, you input that and off it dials. Very, very nice!

Again, you can’t go wrong with this dialer. It’s spot on. If you make frequent calls throughout the day and need a break on the dial-pad, let Jon’s Phone Tool help you let your fingers get a break. I did.

UPDATE: Jon let us known that Docktop was inspired by the very application found on the Macs at the Apple Store and is not the application seen there as earlier reported. Thank you, Jon, for the clarification!

iGo manages to take all of your various power supplies of all your electronic items and condense it into one “brick” with individual small little tips to match your devices power input. By doing this, you lighten your load for powering your devices on the go to nearly nothing and add smart to your tech warrior title.

You once had to share power time with the iGo strip and wait until your little gadget was done charging before hooking up the next one to replenish its battery. Well, now you can juice up two at a time with the new iGo Splitter!

iGo told SvenOnTech that the new splitter when used with a compatible iGo adapter will, “charge and power two mobile devices simultaneously, such as a mobile phone, Bluetooth accessory, MP3 player and more.” Compatible devices would include iGo auto/air40, everywhere15, auto15 elite, everywhere, auto and wall power adapters and dualpower accessory.

For $15, this is a great addition to an already excellent family of power accessories. If you don’t have an iGo set-up for your electronics, then I highly recommend you go purchase the whole package before your next trip. You’ll thank me for it!

Camera phone ownership and usage is climbing across the U.S. and Europe, reports M:Metrics, the mobile market authority. With summer vacations in full swing in America, photo messaging has increased 32 percent since February, while in Europe, it has increased 20 percent in France and 16 percent in the United Kingdom, while remaining steady in Germany, where 19 percent of mobile phone subscribers used photo messaging in June.

“At 50.7percent, the number of mobile subscribers in France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States owning camera phones has grown 22 percent since February of this year,” said Mark Donovan, vice president and senior analyst, M:Metrics. “We also see a direct correlation between camera resolution and propensity to use photo messaging, as 44.3 percent of subscribers who own phones with cameras with resolutions exceeding one mega-pixel sent a photo over the network, versus a global average of 30.5 percent.”

The RAZR is the popular camera-phone in the United Kingdom and the United States, while the Nokia 6230 tops the German market and the Sagem my X-5 is the camera-phone of choice among the French. However, in terms of conversion rate, meaning those who use their camera phones to generate revenue for their operator by sending a photo on the network, the top devices are the Nokia 6630 in France, the Nokia 6280 in Germany, the Nokia 6111 in the United Kingdom and the Danger Sidekick II in the United States.

M:Metrics applies trusted media measurement methodologies to assess the audience for mobile content and applications. As the world’s most authoritative mobile market measurement firm, M:Metrics delivers the most accurate mobile market metrics through the largest monthly survey of mobile subscribers in the U.S., U.K., Germany and France, as well as automated data collection methodologies.

Source M:Metrics

Ever since Microsoft slapped Windows Genuine Update Notification on my Windows XP Professional install, it now starts up with this wonderful crash message every time. It appears that Microsoft has added an extra component to its software checker, to insure you are not running an illegal copy of Windows, in which it also phones home to Redmond, Washington, and notifies Microsoft all is well…or not. Thing is, though, there is no need for this to happen daily. It has also raised privacy concerns by many as well as to what is being sent to Microsoft, which denies any information other than product validation is being sent.

Debate the phone home aspect all you want, I don’t really care about that at this point; what drives me nuts is that Microsoft punishes me, a paying customer, with buggy software. I can not un-install (or even re-install.) Until now.

Thank the security gods of Firewall Leak Tester, a personal firewall company, for it’s lovely tool, RemoveWGA. It will remove both the validation tool and the notifier (phone home component). One quick download, execution of the program, and a few clicks and the spyware is gone! And don’t worry about your system not running, it will. You’ll probably be prompted to download and install it again if you visit Windows Update, but that’s okay, you can keep this excellent tool around just in case.

It seems that Firewall Leak Tester’s site is down, so you’ll have to look elsewhere for the tool for downloading. Softpedia has two links for download that SvenOnTech was able to successfully use. We do suggest you read the Google cached version of the authors web site for any disclaimers, however.

Us? We’re just happy that Redmond no longer knows about us on a daily basis.

Now all this leads to the larger question: why is Microsoft putting spyware on your system and Apple doesn’t? I’ll strike the obvious right off the bat. Yes, Microsoft has a much larger install base and thus has a tremendous problem with counterfeit software. Granted. However, even with Apple’s rising popularity, Apple doesn’t add any type of software to its installs. In fact, it encouraged users with its Family Pack that allows five family members to install OS X on their Macs for only $70 more than the price of a single user license. (Microsoft quickly followed suit with a similar plan that was more costly.)

You know, it’s hard to trust a company that adds spyware to its operating system to report what the customer is doing. Kinda makes you wonder what Bill Gates meant in his infamous memo, Trustworthy Computing. I can’t speak for Apple, but I just feel that it wouldn’t do this if it were in the same situation. Apple is too clever for that. I figure a better anti-piracy scheme would be developed.

Anyway, here we are with Microsoft and it’s Big Brother program that crashes and causes more problems than it’s worth. Maybe it’ll be just one more reason to cause Windows users to come to the Mac. And if they’re still feeling a little home sick and want to phone home to Redmond daily, they can still do a little Boot Camp to keep the ties there. No worries, mate.

Cell phones are changing the way do things every day. When the technology first graced our ears nearly two decades ago, productivity shot up since one was no longer tethered by a cord. Now we can surf the Internet, download movies, and buy tickets for the big screen, too! Today, you lucky Brits get to join the club we here in the States have enjoyed for some time.

HMV and Digital Rum (dR) today launch a unique mobile service that enables music, film fans and gamers to Txt2Buy CDs, DVDs and Games directly from their mobile phones for the very first time. The new Txt2Buy service allows consumers to respond immediately to HMV adverts appearing in the national and lifestyle press, using their credit/debit cards to buy products ‘on the move’ in a simple three step process over the mobile internet.

From 5th June, HMV will place a series of adverts in national magazines and newspapers with a unique ordering code for new music, film and games titles. Customers simply text back to a shortcode number, and receive a mobile internet link to a secure site where they pay using their credit/debit card details. The first titles to be promoted in this way are still to be confirmed, but will feature new release chart CDs, DVDs and Games. Read the rest of this entry »