Sunday, May 21, 2006

Nokia 770 as UPnP Media Player & Controller?

I purchased a Nokia 770 yesterday, to continue in my overall and longer term desire to be able to Play & Control A/V Media, Anytime, Anywhere. The Nokia 770 is a small compact Wi-Fi/Bluetooth internet tablet device, running on Linux, with Wireless B/G support. The basic specification, extract from Nokia Site:-

Weight: 230 g, 185 g Dimensions: 141 x 79 x 19 mm, 135 x 78 x 14 mm (without protective cover)
Color: Black and matte silver. Display: High-resolution (800x480) touch screen with up to 65,536 colors. Operating temperature: -10°C to +55 °C

Memory
  • Memory: Flash 128MB
  • Memory card: 64MB RS-MMC (Reduced Size - MultiMediaCard)
Operating system: Internet Tablet OS 2005 edition

Key Applications:-
  • Web Browser (Opera 8) with Flash player
  • Email Client
  • Internet Radio
  • RSS Feed Reader
Media, Utilities and Games
  • Audio/Video player
  • Image viewer
  • PDF viewer
  • File Manager
  • Clock
  • Search
  • Calculator
  • Notes and Sketch
  • Games (Chess, Mahjong, Marbles)
Supported File Formats
  • Audio: AAC, AMR, MP2, MP3, RA (Real Audio), WAV
  • Image: BMP, GIF, ICO, JPEG, PNG, TIFF, SVG-tiny
  • Video: 3GP, AVI, H.263, MPEG-1, MPEG-4, RV (Real Video
  • Internet radio playlists; M3U, PLS
Connectivity
  • WLAN: 802.11b/g
  • Bluetooth specification: 1.2 (For Internet connection and file transfer via phone. Profiles supported: Dial-up Networking, File Transfer, Generic Access, SIM Access and Serial Port profiles)
  • USB 2.0 device mode for PC connectivity
  • RS-MMC (Dual Voltage)
  • 3.5 mm stereo audio out
  • Power connector (2mm)
Within minutes of getting the 770 home and charging the battery I was up and running and web browsing from anywhere in the home. The Nokia seems to have a good level of A/V format support right out of the box.

I found a more detailed list of audio and video formats that the Audio Player, Video Player, Image Viewer, and browser currently support.

Mime type File extension Version Application
audio/x-mp3 *.mp3 MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-2.5 Layer III, CBR/VBR, 8kbps - 320kbps bitrate Audio Player
audio/x-mp2 *.mp2 MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 Layer II, CBR/VBR, all bitrates except free bitrate mode Audio Player
audio/x-m4a *.aac MPEG-4 AAC, LC/LTP, mono/stereo, up to 288kbps bitrate Audio Player
audio/x-amr *.amr GSM Adaptive Multi-Rate Speech, RFC 3267 Audio Player
audio/x-amr *.awb Adaptive Multi-Rate Wideband Speech, RFC 3267 Audio Player
audio/x-wav *.wav Linear PCM, a-law, u-law, IMA ADPCM Audio Player
audio/x-mpegurl *.m3u MP3 Playlist File Audio Player
audio/x-scpls *.pls shoutcast PLS file format Audio Player
video/3gpp *.3gp 3GPP video, MPEG4 Visual Simple Profile Level 2, H.263 profile 0 level 10, audio: Adaptive Multi-Rate Speech, Adaptive Multi-Rate Wideband Speech, MPEG-4 AAC LC/LTP - 3GPP demux based on spec 3GPP TS 26.244 v6.0.0 (2004-03): Basic profile, excluding timed text, audio-only clips not supported Video Player
video/3gpp *.3gpp 3GPP video, MPEG4 Visual Simple Profile Level 2, H.263 profile 0 level 10, audio: Adaptive Multi-Rate Speech, Adaptive Multi-Rate Wideband Speech, MPEG-4 AAC LC/LTP - 3GPP demux based on spec 3GPP TS 26.244 v6.0.0 (2004-03): Basic profile, excluding timed text, audio-only clips not supported Video Player
video/mpeg *.mpe MPEG-1 Video, up to CIF resolution @30 fps Video Player
video/mpeg *.mpeg MPEG-1 Video, up to CIF resolution @30 fps Video Player
video/mpeg *.mpg MPEG-1 Video, up to CIF resolution @30 fps Video Player
video/x-msvideo *.avi AVI file format (containing MPEG4 Visual Simple Profile Level 2/H.263 profile 0 level 10, MPEG audio layer III) Video Player
video/x-real *.ra RealAudio 8,9,10 Video Player
video/x-real *.ram RealNetworks Metafile Video Player
video/x-real *.rm RealAudio, RealVideo 8,9,10 (QCIF @15 fps) Video Player
video/x-real *.rmj Real Jukebox file Video Player
video/x-real *.rmvb RealVideo variable bitrate Video Player
video/x-real *.rpm RealNetworks Metafile Video Player
video/x-real *.rv RealVideo 8,9,10 (QCIF @15 fps) Video Player
video/x-real *.sdp Session Description Protocol File Video Player
image/bmp *.bmp BMP images Image Viewer
image/gif *.gif GIF images Image Viewer
image/jpeg *.jpe JPEG images Image Viewer
image/jpeg *.jpeg JPEG images Image Viewer
image/jpeg *.jpg JPEG images Image Viewer
image/png *.png PNG images Image Viewer
image/svg+xml *.svg SVG Tiny Profile Image Viewer
image/tiff *.tif Tag Image File Format Image Viewer
image/tiff *.tiff Tag Image File Format Image Viewer
image/wbmp *.wbmp WBMP images Image Viewer
image/x-ico *.ico ICO images Image Viewer
application/x-shockwave-flash *.swf Macromedia Flash 6 Internet Browser

I have already updated the 770 to the latest version of firmware "Nokia_770_SE2005_5_2006_13_7.bin" like many other users I found updating the unit via USB a little frustrating, as the provided update wizard hangs first time it's run and in my particular case on subsequent attempts, stopped during update at around 50%. I tried updating on two different XP PC's before turning off Norton Antivirus on one and the update completed successfully.

I have attempted to run TVersities Flash GUI on the Nokia 770, in readiness for the up and coming TVersity Player but the memory of the unit is apparently to low to run the current GUI. The unit locked up whilst displaying the TVersity Logo, see picture.

Friday, May 05, 2006

No Chicks in Bald Eagles nest

It appears that the webcam of the Bald Eagles Nest will not be providing the expected view of any Chicks. I went to view the nest this evening via the webcam and was disappointed to find an empty nest. BBC News Report1 and BBC News Report2 sheds more light on where the nest was located in Vancouver and why there will be NO CHICKS.

There is good news in the BBC Report2, where it seems other Webcams of Bald Eagle Chicks which will be on stream as early as next week. More information on why the two eggs on original nest did not hatch is available via hancockhouse