Happy New Year!

10 most read posts written and viewed in 2007

2007 is wrapping up and I thought it would be interesting to see what the top 10 posts here at jkOnTheRun were. Finding that information is easy thanks to Google Analytics and it's interesting to note that out of the several millions of page views here this year, just over one-third of them are the home page. Sounds like a fair number of folks have a jkOnTheRun bookmark!

Before I share the list of most viewed posts in 2007, I want to point out that some of the heaviest viewed individual posts this year were actually written in prior years. I'll remove them from this list so that only the posts written this year qualify. If there's interest, I can share a top-ten list that includes posts from all prior years. Having said that, let's start out with number ten and work our way up to number one!

Raon Digital EVERUN now with WiBro

I don't seen any news on the Raon Digital site to confirm, but MobileWhack indicates that the latest and greatest EVERUN model now sports integrated WiBro for connectivity. The Korean model is S60H and likely supports the 802.16 wireless standard. Since WiBro is the South Korean branding of the WiMax standard, the news will likely make folks in Korea happy. After all, here in the U.S. we're waiting to see if Sprint or Motorola can still pull off a WiMax rollout.

iPhone 1.1.3 video walkthrough: A-GPS, bookmarks on home screen, more

Last week, Gear Live offered up screenshots of the upcoming 1.1.3 iPhone firmware upgrade. Apparently many folks felt that the pics were Photoshopped and some even claimed that the site was simply trying to increase traffic with the alleged fakes. Although I've yet to meet Andru Edwards of Gear Live personally, we have had conversation as peers in the tech blogging world. I've always perceived Andru & his team as hard-working and honest folks, so I really didn't need proof of the 1.1.3 upgrade.

For those that were unsure of the firmware pictures and features, Andru has an outstanding video walkthrough of the iPhone upgrade. In it, he shows off what we might see in the next iPhone firmware version; I say might because Apple isn't going to release a function if it doesn't work as designed, so keep in mind that what you see may not be the final firmware. What's in the version that Andru has, however, is exciting:

• Customization of the home screen and multiple pages for home
• Safari bookmarks for your home screen with icons that are screen snips of the bookmarked site
• Assisted GPS in Google Maps which is essentially the new "My Location" feature
• Hybrid views of satellite and aerial maps
• Ability to send SMS messages to multiple recipients

Again, it remains to be seen if all of these features (or more) will make it to the next public firmware release. My guess is that we'll see all of them and I'd bet that the release will be timed to coincide with the start of CES. At last year's CES, the announcement of the iPhone was the most talked about news item... and Apple doesn't even attend CES!

Mobile tech helps child with clothes at two homes

Regular readers are likely familiar with my ten-year old son, Tyler. If not, you can catch a video of his thoughts on the Asus Eee PC. What you may not know is that Tyler lives with his mom and he's only at our home on scheduled weekends. His mom and I have been amicably divorced for several years and she's a great parent to our son. So why am I sharing this info and what the heck does it have to do with mobile tech?

Much like the small problem I had last year when picking out glasses for myself, I found a drop-dead simple use of mobile tech to solve a recurring problem. Here's the problem: Tyler routinely forgets to return the outfits to his mom that he wears over on weekend visits. We've tried the normal solutions, i.e.: place the clothes from mom's house in a bag at the end of the day and grab the bag on the way home Monday morning. No such luck. What's worse: after several outfits are left, they get mixed in with outfits that are supposed to stay at my house. We all end up wasting time digging through hampers in two homes to find the return clothes and we always seem to forget what Tyler was wearing when he came over.

Couple of good bag reviews up

The quest for the perfect gear bag is almost as pressing to the geek as the quest for the perfect gadget.  We always look for a better and more comfortable way to carry all the stuff we might need on our daily jaunts into the real world (yes geeks do go into it) and I am no different than most in that regard.  I have so many gear bags it's almost embarrassing, note that I said almost, and my bag tree is always full.  I have seen reviews of two bags that look pretty useful and thought I'd pass them along for those of you who are in the active "bag quest" mode.

First up is the CODi Courier laptop bag that got very high marks by PC Magazine.  The courier is a traditional brief case form that has a plethora of pockets and compartments that the reviewer found to fit a 15.4 inch laptop snugly.  For those times when you need to carry extra gear there is a zipper that opens to extend the bag three inches which should accomodate anything you might need to throw in there.  The reviewer rated the Courier 4.5 out of 5 stars so if you're willing to part with the $174 this bag might do wonders for you.  You can find more information about this bag on the CODi web site.

The next bag reviewed is the Skooba Shuttle Backpack, a form that I prefer for carrying my stuff around.  I find that a well-designed backpack makes it much easier on my back to carry a bunch of gear around, although I probably carry less around than many.  Gear Diary has just published a thorough review of the Shuttle with a lot of photos and a real-world perspective that you should check out if you're looking for a backpack.  The Shuttle looks to have a quality I really like in backpacks and that is it has a very thin profile.  I find this to make it much easier to travel with a backpack and the Shuttle looks like it would be very good in this regard.  I also found the interesting open pocket on the front to be potentially very useful for stuffing a sweater or jacket when the temperature gets too hot for wearing one.  The Shuttle is $140 but is on sale now for $120 which is a pretty decent price.  My personal feeling is the Shuttle is too big for me but YMMV.

My bag of choice is still the Booq Boa XS backpack that I have been using for several years now.  Unfortunately this is the smallest size Boa that Booq made and it's no longer for sale, although they do still sell the XM which is a little bigger.

The last OnTheRun with Tablet PCs podcast is big news

You may have listened to the final OnTheRun with Tablet PCs podcast by now.  The podcast that I did with Marc Orchant came to an end with the untimely death of Marc earlier this month.  I expected heavier than normal listenership due to its being the final production but I couldn't figure out until this morning why it has been even heavier than expected.  Messing around on the web as I usually do I found this which I believe explains the high listenership:

This is gratifying because it shows how respected Marc's reputation was in not only the tech world but in the major news outlets.  Awesome!

Proporta Laptop Battery reviewed at Gear Diary

We have always been fans of external batteries that provide much needed extended battery life to our mobile gear, especially on trips.  Judie of Gear Diary has reviewed such an external battery, the Proporta Laptop Battery, and she gives a typically detailed overview of using this battery with her gear.  I'll let Judie tell you what she thinks about the Proporta:

If you have been looking for an external battery solution that will allow you to travel without worrying about where and when you’ll be able to recharge, the Proporta Laptop Battery may be exactly what you need. I think it is definitely worth the extra pound of weight in my gear bag, but the price may give you pause when it’s compared head to head with other external batteries.

Head over and read the review if you are thinking about an external battery solution.  I've used them in the past and they can make a huge difference when you're away from an outlet for hours.

Thanks for the conversation!

I was hoping to catch this one exactly, but I'm at the Toyota dealer getting the Hybrid serviced while James got a few posts out this morning. Call it karma or call it amazing coincidence, but we're ending the year here at jkOnTheRun with over 7,000 posts since the site was started! This is actually post number 7,002; guess I shouldn't have stopped at WaWa for coffee on the way in to the dealership this morning. ;)

James and I chatted about this milestone just last week, and although we think that's a large number of posts for two writers, there's an even more telling number that blows us away: the number of comments. We couldn't believe there were over 23,000 reader comments here on the site! It's a testament to our readers for taking that much of an interest in the conversation here. And that's what our intent is: offer up topics, reviews and opinions but make sure we have a conversation with you. Hopefully, with over 7,000 posts, we've done our part. With over 23,000 comments, we know you have and we hope it continues! Stay tuned later today for another end of year update on the content this past year... and thanks!

Vista sleep woes- an update

The problem sleeping and resuming that my HP 2710p Tablet PC suddenly developed has been preoccupying my time over this long holiday period and has resonated with a lot of readers.  Some readers agree with me that Vista is to blame for my problems and others do not agree with that and believe that something I did caused the sudden onset of the problem or that some of the device drivers are to blame.  There is no answer to the cause of the problems, nothing was updated on the device nor did Vista apply some update that changed the OS.  I am very familiar with battling flaky Windows installations and I can swear that nothing was changed by me during the timeframe when this ugly problem arose.  I have spent a lot of time going over system logs to see if I can spot something that changed to no avail.  Vista doesn't think anything changed yet my sleep problems started happening all at once and consistently so logic dictates that something changed without my knowledge.  This is in my opinion a big problem with the Windows ecosystem as it is not uncommon in my experience.  Read on to see what I've done so far to try and resolve this new issue.