Okay, so the question was going to get asked sooner or later, and given we are only a month or so out from the big day, I thought I’d jump in with it:

What Mobile devices/accessories are you planning to buy this Christmas?

There are a few reasons behind me asking the question – one is of course, that this dilemma is faced by many with some kind of gadget-fetish, but also perhaps from a more altruistic perspective, we might be able to help each other with suggestions, if we ‘crowdsource’ everyones plans together! I’ll get it going with some suggestions:

• Devices: The HTC Hero, which I thought was a very good device when I had hands-on time with it, should now be doing the rounds with the Operators at a slightly reduced price, compared to when it came out – that would make it good value if you fancy some Android goodness! Alternatively, if you want Maemo in your life, then the Nokia (NYSE: NOK) N900 is going to slip in to the market just before Xmas it seems. The eponymous iPhone 3GS is also now becoming more widely available (in the UK at least) with Orange now selling it (and Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) to join shortly after Christmas).

• Accessories: 2009 has really been a year of Mobile speakers as far as I’m concerned, and Altec Lansing are as good as any. Particularly for me, their Orbit-M speaker was a breakthrough combination of portability and high fidelity. Other accessories I like are cases, and in that respect the recent addition to my accessories grotto is the iPhone 3GS variant of the Beyzacases Slimline Vertical Leather Case.

But never mind me – what are you planning to purchase within the mobile sphere, in the next month or so? It doesn’t have to be for you, it can also be a gift for someone near and hear – but hit us up with a comment and let us know where your hard earned moolah is going this Christmas!

I’m always looking for good accessories to make sure my iPhone is protected – and I’ve lost track of the amount I’ve been through including:

• Rubber surround cases
• Leather flip-out cases
• Screen protectors
• Two-piece clip together plastic cases

However, it was largely a poorly-performing area of accessories as far as I was concerned, until I came across what I thought was the ideal type of cases – the Vertical Leather slip case. This genre of case works ideally for me, since I need the iPhone out of it’s case (say to dock in the official Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) charger mount) as much as in it. Now, most leather slip cases don’t afford any protection for the top of the phone (since that is where it ejects), but, overall a good compromise.

Fortunately, I think I’ve found a good performer in this genre of case, in the Beyzacases ‘Slimline Vertical Leather Case’, being retailed by MobileFun.

There actually isn’t that much to say on the case, other than to summarise that it does what it says on the tin – but, I’ll try and give you the highlights:

• Made from real leather
• Snug fit for iPhone 3G/3GS so it won’t fall out
• Cut-out at bottom so charger can still be plugged in, and, phone can be ejected with finger
• Refined styling
• Good protection for all but top of phone!

Actually MobileFun do a range of Beyzacases that you can see here. However, the case I am using is this one here.

In summary, great quality, and a reasonable price – you can get one here.

Anyone that reads IntoMobile regularly will know that I’m a real accessories freak – I love to test the latest innovations and products in the accessories arena – partly because it’s a hotbed of activity (certainly around smartphones at the moment anyway), and also because a good accessory can really enhance the value of the device you own.

Case in point: Altec Lansing’s Orbit range of speakers – currently there are two, the Orbit-M, and Orbit USB. Both are entirely portable, and hence mobile, but are targeted at slightly different audiences. The Orbit-M (which I’ve reviewed, see here) has a 3.5mm jack, and connects to (ideally) your Mobile (though it can connect to other stuff, obviously). The Orbit USB has (surprisingly enough) a USB connector, and hence is for you Laptop – but again a portable accessory you might use when out and about.

The two speakers do have other subtle differences too – the Orbit-M is grey in colour and uses batteries (since no power comes over the 3.5mm connector), whereas the Orbit USB is black in colour, takes its power from the USB port, and also has a nifty little kickstand which can angle the sound trajectory. But, clearly the biggest difference between them is that the Orbit-M takes an analogue signal and then boots it out the speaker, whereas the Orbit USB takes a digital signal, and converts to analogue inside the speaker.

I’m happy to report that both ways round, the sounds is really excellent from such diminutive little speakers! The Orbit USB might just possibly edge it in sound quality, but it’s minimal – much more important is the quality of the source (be it a mobile or laptop) and also the quality of the source files you are playing back.

Personally though, I think that the Orbit speakers, and in this case the Orbit USB, are well priced (£39.99 in the UK), and do the job of providing music on the move, a lot better than a lot of other speakers that I have heard of a similar size.

I think, in conclusion,  the Orbit USB continues the great run that Altec Lansing is having with producing quality audio accessories, at great prices!

For more information on the complete autumn 2009 audio collection from Altec Lansing, you can visit www.alteclansing.com

ALK Technologies, the makers of the popular CoPilot Live Sat Nav software, have announced that their software is doing very well in it’s Android guise – since its launch on Android Market in June, it has risen to become the top paid application on Android Market in the UK. The UK and Europe apps currently hold the number one and number two positions of all paid travel apps respectively.

ALK Technologies has recently released their latest free update for CoPilot Live for Android, adding text to speech voice directions and full compatibility with the latest Donut and Eclair versions of Android. This brings full on-board turn by turn navigation to the latest handsets including Motorola Droid and HTC Tattoo. CoPilot Live brings full featured turn-by-turn navigation to the Android platform, complete with automatic route calculation, some nice 3D map displays, and turn-by-turn voice directions.  Digital street maps are stored on-device, rather than relying on mobile Internet connectivity for per-trip downloads.

A range of CoPilot ‘Live’ services, delivered via the phone’s mobile Internet connection, are also available – these include safety camera alerts, 5-day weather forecast information and a new location sharing service called CoPilot® LiveLink™. CoPilot Live Navigation UK & Ireland can be purchased and downloaded immediately from Android Market for just £25.99.  The European maps version (Western and Eastern Europe) retails at £59.99.

If you happen to have an iPhone, I can also heartily recommend that version of the App – it’s rather good also!

You might remember not so very long ago I posted on giffgaff, which is a new mobile (virtual) network, launching in the UK. Well, time has passed, and now giffgaff is pretty much ready to go:

The new ‘people powered’ mobile network, giffgaff will launch on 25th November 2009 at giffgaff.com with free data to all members for a limited period.  The launch will be supported by an innovative marketing strategy which puts its members in the driving seat

Defining a new ‘people powered’ business model, giffgaff launches by asking people to help make the network famous in return for free UK mobile calls, texts and mobile internet for a whole year.  The original launch campaign is based on a ‘Tool Hire’ concept, whereby a series of fun and eccentric marketing tools will be available for free hire by the public at tools.giffgaff.com/log

The tools are designed to promote giffgaff in an amusing and capturing way, and in true giffgaff sense, those who get involved and simply upload videos of themselves using the tools onto YouTube, have potential to get rewarded – by becoming a V.I.G member (Very Important Giffgaffer) with a SIM that means you pay nothing for UK use of your mobile for a whole year

Sounds interesting, no? It’s from the same kind of mould as Blyk (which was ad-funded), whereby the traditional revenue streams that Operators are looking for are not in evidence. Most MVNOs would traditionally look for voice+text revenue streams, but the likes of some very new ‘network operators’ are seeking to run things in a completely different way – giffgaff is certainly an unusual concept, and I for one will be watching to see how things pick up over the next 12 or so months.

Avenir Telecom (a distributor in mobile telecoms in the UK), has announced some pretty sweet results regarding its customer retention efforts…

In October 2009, Avenir Telecom and its dealer base reduced customer churn on O2 (NYSE: TEF) connections to just 8%. Avenir’s churn rate has been steadily declining each month over the past 12 months and is set to fall even lower in the coming months. This single-digit result is believed to be the lowest sustainable figure achieved by any distributor of Avenir’s size in the UK mobile marketplace.

“Churn has been the industry buzzword all year,” remarks Avenir Telecom’s Managing Director, Andy Tow. “We’ve been working tremendously hard with our dealers on this, specifically with our dedicated customer retention team, which is about to celebrate its first anniversary. So it’s great to come to the end of the year with proof that our efforts are working, and that we’re leading the game.”

OK so it’s not big-ticket news that might excite the pants off you, but on the other hand, this does go some way to explaining why O2 are far and away leading the market in the UK at the moment – if you introduce exclusives like the iPhone and Palm (NSDQ: PALM) Pre, and then manage the customers that are potentially wanting to churn well, you’ve got both sides of the equation under control – customers coming in to O2’s network, and not many leaving – nice!

For all our readers in the UK, eXpansys have been busy cooking up some news deals to tempt you in your hour of need for gadget-related goodness:

• Acer beTouch E200 Windows Mobile 6.5 - Normally £249.99 Now £219.99 Save £15
• Acer beTouch E100 Windows Mobile 6.5 - Normally £234.99 Now £219.99 Save £15
• Nokia 6700 Classic Silver - Normally £209.99 Now £194.99 Save £15
• GMAX 2-Bay Alloy Desktop Hard Drive Enclosure – Normally £39.99 Now £34.99 Save £5
• Novatel Wireless Merlin XU870 3G HSDPA 3.6/7.2 Mbps ExpressCard – Normally £49.99 Now £29.99 Save £20
• B-Stock Palm m500 PDA + Accessory Pack – Normally £34.99 Now £24.99 Save £10
• Chilly the Singing and Dancing Polar Bear – Normally £7.99 Now £4.99 Save £3
• Premier Systems Keyring Breathalyser - Normally £4.99 Now £1.99 Save £3

Personally, I am liking the look of the HSDPA ExpressCard – I’ve been trying to find a use for my ExpressCard port on the Mac – seems like this might be it!

These deals are available on Friday the 20th of November 2009 between 11am and 5pm by following the links above only. Normal pricing will apply outside of these hours.

So I was typing away this evening, and thinking about the movie Swordfish – an enjoyable romp featuring John Travolta, Hugh Jackman, and of course (who could forget) Halle Berry

There are several priceless moments in that film where the lead characters are spewing techno-babble that is devoid of any joined up thinking – trojans, firewalls, ciphers, you name it – all mashed together in meaningless, cringe-inducing, gibberish. But that’s kind of what makes the movie good!

It got me thinking, there must be some of these types of moments involving mobile devices – and then suddenly a couple hit me – but before I name them, feel free to zing a comment on the end of this piece if you can think of others – as I said, there must be lots, right?

Great moment #1: Die Hard 4.0 (2007) - Justin Long is using a Nokia (NYSE: NOK) Communicator, when the mobile networks all drop (as the bad guys are busy taking them down). He turns to Bruce Willis and says something along the lines of surfing the military satellites, and lo and behold, one dodgy cable later, he’s up and running with a mobile data connection!

Great moment #2: Cellular (2004) – a thriller movie, with Kim Basinger and Chris Evans. There’s not a specific moment as such in this film, but they sure do eke out the moment the battery on the mobile phone is running down – it goes on for seemingly forever. As we all know from the irritation of real-world calls, once the battery bleep comes on in-call, you are very soon going to be out of juice!

So what moments can you think of – and no using ‘The Matrix’ as an example please, although there are some quality moments in there too

I’ve reported on the Amazon Kindle International Edition before (here), which is an interesting device, because its packing a SIM card in it that can roam seamlessly across network in Europe – in fact you could argue it’s the main way of acquiring e-books for that device.

Well now there’s another (yes, another) e-book reader, the Bookeen Cybook Opus, which has a couple of interesting traits:

1. Some kind of landscape mode
2. A price-point that is worryingly close to the Kindle

Yep, that’s right, this bad boy isn’t packing 3G data, yet it’s only $40 cheaper – that’s not good, is it?

Right now, from a mobile data connection perspective, Kindle is cream of the crop – but could we see a newer revision of the Opus coming soon, with 3G or WiFi data? Quite possibly.

[Via: e-reader-info.com]

GoPayforit has announced that it has launched its new mobile small payments service to enable bloggers and content owners to more easily sell content online.

“When making small donations of £5 online, or buying one-off pieces of content from websites for say £1 or £2, entering your credit card details can be a long and tedious process,” said Chris Newell, CEO, GoPayforit. “Many potential customers may not even have a credit card, while those that do often just don’t want the hassle of entering all that information, meaning there is a huge drop-off at the payment stage.”

Newell continued, “Not only that, but for many smaller sites there are a lot of hoops to jump through to use credit card payment on the site. GoPayforit is both easier to set up for the website and easier to use for the consumer, making it a better experience for everyone.”