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EVERYONE loves playing with Apple’s 3G iPhone: it’s neat, it’s cool, it’s revolutionary and compelling, if expensive.

It’s not just a mobile phone but a dinky little computer that puts web browsing, game playing, GPS navigation and many other matters in the palm of your hand.

But from the day the 3G iPhone hit the global market, including Australia, in July, it’s been bedevilled by complaints that some aspects of its performance aren’t up to par.

There has been a multitude of horror stories about dropped calls, 3G connection problems, slow internet access and poor battery life.

Most, it seems to DoubleClick, have been coming from the US, where there’s only one mobile telecommunications carrier, AT&T, offering the 3G iPhone.

AT&T’s network is still being put together, and there are signs that it doesn’t have anything like the impressive coverage of Telstra’s longer-established Next G.

In Australia, as well as Next G, you can connect an iPhone to Optus or Vodafone’s 3G networks. The coverage is impressive and we have heard of few dropouts or connection problems on the scale the Yanks are reporting. In a corner of the Watagan Mountains, on the edge of NSW’s Hunter Valley, the other day, DoubleClick was able to ring home on the iPhone while other people with assorted Nokia’s and Samsung’s were reporting no mobile coverage at all.

But battery life remains a problem: best to recharge our iPhone every night, we find.

If, like us, you sometimes want to watch a movie or play video games on the 3.5in widescreen, it’s best to be within reach of a power point. And browsing the internet on a 3G connection can be slow - agonisingly slow.

It’s better not to mention cheaper if you can hook up a WiFi wireless broadband link. The iPhone always tries to find one. But it’s difficult if you’re away from home, work or a neighbourhood McDonalds.

Things hopefully will get better this week with the launch of new software for the iPhone, which was expected to hit the internet over the weekend.

Dubbed iPhone 2.1, it will “fix lots of bugs”, according to Steve Jobs, Apple’s chief executive, who mentioned it during his launch of a new range of iPods in San Francisco last week. “It’s a big update,” Jobs said. “You’ll get fewer call drops and you will get significantly improved battery life for most customers. We’ve fixed a lot of bugs where you have a lot of apps on the phone, you’re not gonna get some of the crashes.”

Let’s hope it’s better than its predecessor, iPhone 2.0.2, which launched just a few weeks back and was supposed to do much the same things, but had little noticeable effect.

One thing we do love about the iPhone is the growing armoury of software applications available via Apple’s online App Store, especially the games. There are now more than 700 games available from the store: some free, some costing a bit of small change mostly a dollar or two, but sometimes up to $12.99. We can highly recommend the addictive Spore Origins and GTS Racing. Then there’s Real Football (that’s soccer), Space Truckers, Air Hockey, Pocket Guitar and many more.

To play such games you turn your iPhone sideways to give you a widescreen, and control the play by tilting the phone from side to side. The built-in accelerometer converts your actions into on-screen controls like sending your GTS racer round the track. You can, incidentally, do the same thing with the new iPod Touch and Nano models Steve Jobs launched last week - both have inbuilt accelerometers.

Let us also recommend the free Shazam app: not a game but software that tells you what music you’re listening to.

Just hold up your iPhone or free iPods Touch while listening to a radio, record player or jukebox and touch your finger to a button: seconds later the screen displays the song title, artist and album its from and offers to arrange a download, for a fee of course

Sony has issued a warning that some models of its Vaio TZ notebook have potentially serious faults that could damage the unit or cause injury to owners.

The company said these units have incorrectly positioned wires near the hinge. This could result in overheating and damage to the notebook.

Although there are reports of 83 faulty PCs in Japan, and some owners suffered minor burns, the company claimed that only “a small number” of notebooks were affected.

It also said that there had been no reported incidents in the UK so it was not issuing a product recall. However, it is urging anyone who has bought a Vaio TZ notebook produced between June 2007 and July this year to check if their model could be affected.

If this is the case it is offering to perform a free inspection in the 48 countries, including the UK, where the notebook has been sold. If the problem is found, Sony said it would correct the problem.

Sony Vaio owners who are concerned should look for the following:

• All model numbers beginning VGN TZ1 (eg VGN-TZ11XN/B)
• All model numbers beginning VGN TZ2 (eg VGN-TZ21WN/B)
• Certain model numbers beginning VGN TZ3 (eg VGN-TZ31VN/R)

Sony has set up a website giving details of the wiring fault and another with phone numbers giving contacts for all affected countries. UK owners of these Vaio models can call the following free hotline: 0800 3680421.

This news is another embarrassment for Sony, which had to recall 10 million lithium ion batteries in 2006 because of fears they could overheat and catch fire.

Ricoh’s Caplio range of cameras has always produced high-quality models with big lenses and screens, but at a cost of being on the bulky side.

The company has addressed that in recent models, which have been getting smaller and smaller, and the Ricoh R8 (the company having dropped the Caplio name) is admirably svelte, although it’s still bulkier than many cameras. It includes a similar 7.1x zoom lens to its predecessors, and has a 10-megapixel resolution, along with a bright, clear 2.7in screen on the reverse.

The menus are clear and easy to use, with a tiny joystick to the right of the screen used for most functions. One annoying feature is that, by default, it forgets any settings you change after it’s switched off, which puzzled us until we found the menu option to make it remember settings.

Like most modern compact cameras, it offers both vibration correction (to counter camera shake) and face detection (to make sure people are in focus). Image quality was impressive, as was the sharpness of the screen although, as with many compacts, in low light there was slightly more noise than we’d have liked. That aside, this is a well-built camera that’s worth the money

If your lounge is home to more entertainment equipment than just a TV and DVD player, it’s likely you also have a bunch of remote controls cluttering up the coffee table.

There are plenty of cheap universal remotes available, but Logitech’s Harmony devices take things much further. The Harmony One can replace up to 15 remotes and, like many others in the range, is configured using an online database so there’s no need to hunt down codes and enter them into the remote control manually.

Simply hook it up to a PC, pick your devices from a list and wait for the codes to be copied to the remote.
You can also create macros to send multiple commands with one press of a button.

For example if you want to watch a DVD, the Harmony One can, in one sweep, turn the TV on, set it to the correct channel, switch on the surround sound speakers and select the appropriate input, and then power up the DVD player – all with a single touch of a button. The device is well designed, with a 2.2in touch-sensitive screen providing access to device-specific controls.

The problem with pocket-sized internet gadgets (such as smartphones) is that the web facilities they offer tend to be patchy.

Even the all-conquering iPhone, for instance, fails to properly display some websites, and is completely stumped by online pages containing Flash animations. This is no good to serious web users, who yearn for a portable internet experience that’s the same the one you get sat at a desktop PC.

Nokia’s new N810 promises precisely this, with the company’s marketing materials boasting that it puts “the entire internet in your pocket”. Happily, the N810 gets web browsing mostly right. Having used the N810’s browser – a slimmed-down version of Firefox – for several weeks we have yet to visit a web page that it cannot display acceptably.

A quick press of a shortcut button and the browser window fills the whole screen – a wonderfully sharp, touch-sensitive display with a resolution of 800×480 pixels. Similarly, a pair of zoom buttons allow the displayed web page to be magnified or shrunk, as best fits for viewing. All this works brilliantly and the N810 undoubtedly offers one of the finest portable web experiences around.

However, enjoying that web experience depends on being close to a wireless hotspot or carrying a Bluetooth-enabled mobile phone for data purposes, as the N810 has no built-in mobile phone of its own. Some may not consider this a big disadvantage but few people want to carry a second device in addition to their mobile phone (which may offer internet access in any case).

The battery life is a little limiting, with about four hours’ continuous use – not enough for a busy working day. Beyond the internet, the N810 is a powerful portable computer in its own right. It runs a mobile version of the Linux operating system, with plenty of applications available for download.

It has a built-in keyboard that slides out from under the screen, while an integrated stand can be swung out to prop the device up on a work surface. The keyboard is okay for short typing bursts, though the top row of keys is awkward to press. Alternatively handwriting-recognition software can be used, though this doesn’t work very well.

For the user’s files and folders, the N810 has 2GB of storage, which is ample for this kind of device, although music fans might find it a little small. There are other faults – the integrated webcam’s quality is awful and the built-in GPS receiver, for mapping and directions, is slow to get a lock on the positioning satellites. The supplied software is limited – it’s more fun than functional.

The Sanyo Xacti HD-1000 is the one of the first cameras we’ve seen that offers full high-definition (1080i) recording.

In theory this means that your home videos will be as clear as the latest Blu-ray film. However, this camcorder is not all it’s cracked up to be. In good light we found that colours were faded and in low light, recordings were grainy. The camera has a 5-megapixel still mode so it can take photographic images but the ones we took were blurry and unimpressive.

The design of the camcorder echoes its cousin, the Xacti VPC-HD2 we looked at a while ago. All the main components, such as the zoom, sit on the top part of the camera behind the lens, and a blue light surrounds the record buttons. Below this is an annoyingly tiny joystick for the menus. The side hides the flip-out 2.7in screen, which is extremely clear. The rest is blank, giving plenty of holding space.

The camcorder itself has no connections: instead you need the supplied dock with sockets for the included HDMI cables as well as a USB port. It comes with a remote control but not a memory card, which will bump the price up a touch.

Microsoft’s Lifecam NX 3000 is designed for use with Windows Messenger and skinny notebooks – skinny because the webcam attaches to the top of the screen and will work on nothing thicker than about 2cm.

It is a 1.3megapixel webcam that, in addition to video, takes impressively clear still shots. The camera was easy to set up: we installed the software, signed in to Windows Messenger and plugged it into a spare USB port. Once installed the camera uses its own dashboard, which has three buttons for snapping photos and recording audio or video clips.

Along the bottom of the window are shown the most recent photos and video or audio clips. On the top of the camera is a call button to quickly ’speed dial’ people and start a video call. The lens swivels up and down, should you need to move the notebook’s screen.

Video from the camera was very clear and we were impressed with the noise-cancelling feature, which was particularly effective at getting rid of extraneous sound. For £30 the NX 3000 does its job well and has some clever extras.

Porsche has come up with its most powerful racing version of the ever-green 911: the GT3 RSR.

This RSR version of the 911 coupé packs a 465bhp non-turbo variation of the classic ‘boxer’ flat-six engine.

To cope with the power of this engine, Porsche has used the gearbox from its RS Spyder Le Mans racer.

That’s just as well as the GT3 RSR is set to become a feature of grids at the French endurance race as private teams will be able to buy this car.

The price is 349,800 Euros plus the VAT of whichever country the owner lives in.

Only 35 GT3 RSRs will be made and all have a unique package of aerodynamic aids to make them as fast and stable as possible.

There are ‘flicks’ on the front spoiler to push the car to the ground, while the rear wing is carried over from the previous GT3 model.

The suspension has been heavily uprated from the road-going 911’s and the brakes have also been increased in size to cope.

If the music tracks, digital photographs and video on your computer rarely get to see the light of day, a media streamer (a device that grabs them off the PC to play it on the TV or hi-fi) could set them free.

Linksys’s DMA2200 Media Center Extender is one such device and, as the name suggests, extends Microsoft’s Media Center software to a TV, allowing users to access all the media stored on PCs from the comfort of the sofa. The PC will need to be running Windows Vista Ultimate or Home Premium and needs to be switched on whenever the DMA2200 is in use.

What makes the DMA2200 stand out is its usability. Setting it up is a breeze and, with the Media Center display, browsing a media library is simple, with everything presented in a logical manner. Within seconds we had a slideshow of holiday snaps on display with a selection of handpicked tracks playing in the background.

Streaming video is just as easy and, since format support is determined by what Media Center can handle, few files won’t play. A selection of online video is also available, including free content from MTV along with subscription-channels. And, if the PC running Media Center has a TV tuner installed, you can also watch, pause and record live TV.

One gripe is that the interface isn’t as smooth flowing as Media Center on a PC, with a short pause often occurring before DMA2200 reacts to a button press on the remote. The DMA2200 can be hooked up to a network using wired or wireless connection.

Linksys has furnished it with the ability to talk using the latest 802.11n wireless standard, which boosts speeds and makes it possible to stream high-definition video wirelessly. However, unless you own a wireless router that supports the same standard, you’ll have to stick to slower wireless speeds, which are fine for streaming standard-definition video.

The box also squeezes in a DVD player. A non-DVD version (DMA2100) is available for £30 less, but this player is able to upscale standard DVDs for high definition screens. It’s no substitute for a Blu-ray video disc but it does make films look better. The jewel in the DMA2200’s crown is undoubtedly its ease of use.

We’ve seen plenty of technically impressive media streamers in the past that were let down by lacklustre user interfaces. Much of the DMA2200’s impressive usability is down to its close ties with Media Center. This is, however, its one big flaw – if you don’t have a Vista PC with Media Center up and running, you won’t be able to use it.