Product: nuvifone G60

Manufacturer: Garmin

Wired Rating: 0

In the two years it languished as vaporware, the Garmin Nuvifone G60 was hyped by various tech outlets as everything from a smartphone savior to an iPhone killer. (We at Wired resisted such sensationalism.) But now the GPS-enabled smartphone is finally for sale — and it’s a Frankenstein, a monstrous creation that almost makes us want to swear off smartphones entirely.

There’s little good to be said about this phone but we’ll try to break it down before ranting about its copious flaws. It does fit neatly in hand and weighs about the same as the iPhone or the Palm Pre. It also has a 3.5-inch touchscreen too and there’s no added bulk of a physical keyboard. The home screen is also fairly practical; it’s divided into two fields with one area featuring icons for making calls and activating navigation, while the other has a sparse amount of apps like e-mail, web browsing, and a music player. And then there’s uh…

Okay that’s about it for the good points.

Let’s rage against the screen for a moment: instead of a capacitive touchscreen — like the kind that graces the iPhone, Palm, HTC G1 among others — the nuvifone uses resistive technology. You have to practically jam your finger into the display to activate an icon. The result: a bumpy, sluggish experience as you navigate through the device’s options. Typing an e-mail or text message? Get ready for an episode of Extreme Typos. There’s no autocorrect option like with the iPhone.

In another puzzling decision, Garmin has adopted an extreme approach to simplicity. The nuvifone has no buttons, not even a home button. So you are entirely at the mercy of the phone’s software.

That makes us wish Garmin had put more thought into its user interface. In one of the few neat tricks in the phone, Garmin has split the main screen into two. The left half has three major buttons—call, search and applications. A slider on the right provides options such as e-mail, weather, web browser and calendar. It’s a clean interface — as far as it goes.

But a phone that’s dedicated to GPS should be at least good at navigation right? Guess again. While the turn-by-turn directions are fairly accurate for guiding you to a destination, getting data entered into the device is a magnificent pain. Endless menu taps are required to locate the correct fields for entering address information. What’s worse, the maps themselves are graphically ugly: They look like a digital version of cat vomit.

The phone ties the GPS closely to anything that looks like an address. So once I searched for the nearest Target on the browser, I could, with a single click, have the device show directions to the store from my current location.

Unfortunately, the phone’s browser is stunted and terribly difficult to use. Want to type in a web address? There’s no URL bar: Instead you have to open up a separate window to enter a website URL. No multi-touch means no pinching and zooming on web pages. Instead you need to press onscreen + and – buttons to resize the page.

The phone’s virtual keyboard is also tricky. The QWERTY keyboard only appears in horizontal mode. In the vertical mode, the keys are arranged in an ABCDE pattern, which makes text entry take twice as long.
The nuvifone seems stuck in some sort of space/time bubble that exists somewhere around 2004. The phone comes loaded with just a few apps and there’s no marketplace to download any new ones, so forget about Twitter, Facebook, Yelp, or Pandora. Sure, you can get to these sites using the web browser, but that, of course, would require using the web browser.

As if horrible software and hardware wasn’t enough, Garmin adds insult to injury with a mystifyingly high price tag. Even after the $100 mail-in rebate, the phone costs $300 with a two-year contract on AT&T. That’s $100 more than the latest iPhone and more than the Palm Pre or almost any BlackBerry device.
The nuvifone is not just rough around the edges, , it’s a device that seems to have lost its will to live. If you want a decent GPS, we suggest you get a standalone system from Garmin, TomTom — or get an iPhone or an HTC Hero from Sprint. Any of those options will be easier, more reliable, and cheaper than Garmin’s half-baked nuvifone.

WIRED GPS functionality is not THAT bad. Rubberized grip prevents phone from slipping out of hand.

TIRED No multi-touch. No apps. No homescreen button. No video. Suck-tastic Internet browser. Weak battery gave us less than a day of use. Price tag makes us think this phone is part of some elaborate Nigerian e-mail scam.

Product: CyberShot DSC-TX1

Manufacturer: Sony

Wired Rating: 8

If you’ve ever tried to sneak a picture of a celebrity busting a move in a dark club, you know the disappointment that comes with blurry, grainy photos. Well, stalkerazzi, rejoice! The Sony CyberShot TX1 has a new 10.6mm “Exmor R” CMOS sensor with killer low-light sensitivity as well as high-speed shooting and motion-detection abilities. It can take six photos in the blink of an eye and mesh them together so you get the sharpest and clearest picture possible.

If you remember its predecessor, the T90 that came out in February, you already know what this shooter looks like: sleek and impossibly thin with a slide-down front. It’s available in a vibrant array of colors, too. The nuts-and-bolts are about the same as the T90, but we were genuinely surprised to find that Sony reduced the resolution on the TX1, dropping it to 10.2 megapixels from the T90’s 12.1. It may feel like a sacrifice, but the new sensor and amazing speed make up for it, without a doubt.

The 3-inch touchscreen LCD is bright, responsive and doesn’t even require the use of the included stylus for most functions.

Shooting panoramas? The new Sweep Panorama mode, which lets you pan across a scene while the camera automatically stitches together a panoramic shot, works perfectly with no discernible noise or fuzz — and the results rival what you can do in Photoshop.

Our major complaints don’t have to do with image quality. The cam’s tiny chassis (3.75 x 2.38 x 0.65 inches) resulted in a lot of pictures featuring a finger in front of the lens — d’oh! — and the menus can be a bit confusing. But when you do learn the interface and are mindful of your digit placement, the TX1 takes gorgeous, clear images devoid of artifacts, especially in dim lighting.

It’s no substitute for a full-bodied DSLR, sure, but for discreetly snapping images of Lady Gaga making out with a random Jonas brother in some dank corner of the Viper Room, the TX-1 is a bright option. Hello, TMZ!

WIRED Thin and light with an impressive touchscreen and amazing low-light capabilities. A fast 10-fps shutter is perfect for sports, kids, animals and the occasional fleeing celebrity. Cool new features like Hand-Held Twilight and Sweep Panorama modes work like a charm.

TIRED You pay big bucks for such a small cam: Price tag skates close to 4 Benjamins. Confusing menus can make it frustrating to change settings on the fly.

Product: Keyboard Professional Model S

Manufacturer: Das

Wired Rating: 9

People have practically written poetry and love songs to the prince of keyboards, the IBM Model M. Its mechanical, spring-loaded switches gave it legendary durability and a distinct clacking sound that dominated computer labs in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Although IBM and Lexmark have long since abandoned the Model M, Das has done them one better, creating an updated version of the classic, complete with modern flourishes. This keyboard, called the Professional Model S, is much like the Model M, with mechanical switches and gold-plated contacts. The switches are rated for 50 million keystrokes, and are just as clackity-clacktastic when pressed. Typing is actually fun on a Das, not a mushy chore like it is on the typical “slimline” keyboard.

When you push a key on the Das Keyboard, just as with a Model M, you know the stroke has registered. By comparison, with today’s pathetic keyboards, with their flimsy rubber domes beneath the pads, there’s no telling whether any single keystroke has been a success.

Set up for the current era, the Das Keyboard Professional Model S offers a much smaller footprint than the Model M, an extremely long USB cable, and an integrated two-port USB hub. Gamers will also appreciate that the Das Keyboard Professional can recognize up to 6 simultaneous key presses. Hands down, it’s the best keyboard on the market today.

Still jonesing for the original? You can buy restored Model M keyboards or get in touch with Unicomp, a small company that still manufactures Model M keyboards.

WIRED A keyboard like dad used to use: Gold-plated mechanical switches let you type with a loud and forceful clack instead of that unsatisfying thwish when keys are pressed; you know when you’ve hit a key. Can recognize up to six simultaneous key presses. Includes two USB ports. New version includes keyboard-based volume controls.

TIRED Can no longer type on the sly while you’re on conference calls. Zero ergonomic features. New version requires two USB ports to connect to PC.

Product: Mikey

Manufacturer: Blue Microphones

Wired Rating: 8

[Ed. note: In addition to being a multi-talented designer for Wired magazine, Victor Krummenacher is the bass player for Camper Van Beethoven and an audio expert with more than 20 years of experience.]

The Mikey is touted as a “portable recorder for your iPod with awesome sound.” Although the “awesome sound” part is debatable, Blue Microphones’ Mikey is an undeniably smart and easy-to-use device. Simply plug the 2.5-inch black trapezoid into the charging port of a compatible iPod. (Compatible in this case means iPod fifth-generation, iPod classic, and iPod nano second- through fifth-generation.) Once the microphone is hooked in, it operates using the media player’s voice-memo function. It offers hi-def and low-def recording resolutions, while audio sensitivity has three levels of adjustment.

In our tests, the quality of the recordings depended on both the generation of the iPod and the audio source. We noticed fidelity was far better in fourth- and fifth-generation iPods than second and third. Voice recording yielded clear playback with great separation, but live music tended to peak out with some irritating compression spikes. But in conversational recordings, as well as use in a songwriting session with acoustic instruments, Mikey yielded usable and smooth-sounding files.

At best, Mikey is really a tool for recording audio fast and on the fly. There are better means of portable recording available, sure, but they’ll run you bigger bucks and certainly don’t fit as easily in your pocket.

WIRED No software installation. Gain control is adjustable. Not terribly bulky. Can be used with an iPhone …

TIRED … but only when iPhone is in Airplane mode. Big enough to dwarf the iPod Nano. Can’t capture complex audio (read: a live concert) perfectly. But hey, what do you want for less than a C-note?

Product: Twist

Manufacturer: Mypressi

Wired Rating: 9

The Twist uses cartridges of nitrous oxide (yes, whippits) to generate nine bars of pressure. This even stream of happy gas forces hot water through a compressed puck of grounds or an espresso pod. It makes only double doses, but a forked spout can split the portion. It’s dead easy to operate, and since a cartridge makes four pours, there’s not a lot of fiddling between rounds. Best yet, the thick, rich brew is just as good as what you’d get from a $2,000 countertop machine.

WIRED Excellent, creamy espresso. Gorgeous design. Works with pods and grounds. Easy to disassemble and clean.

TIRED Single shots pour unevenly if you don’t hold the unit level — tricky when you’ve had a few too many. No empty-cartridge indicator. Ineffective as an N2O delivery mechanism — we got a caffeine buzz with a nitrous jones.