BASKING RIDGE, N.J. – The company with the nation’s most reliable wireless network today introduced the G’zOne Boulder™ – the newest Push to Talk phone that is exclusively available through Verizon Wireless. This rough and tough phone is built to military specifications to withstand shock, water and dust environments. The G’zOne Boulder provides customers with access to Verizon Wireless’ Push to Talk service that uses the company’s Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) Revision A (Rev. A) network to ensure customers can get their jobs done quickly and efficiently. Packaged in two smart-looking finishes – black and silver or orange – the G’zOne Boulder is now available online at www.verizonwireless.com and through business sales channels. The phone will be available in Verizon Wireless Communications Stores in mid-August.

Leveraging EV-DO Rev. A technology, Push to Talk from Verizon Wireless provides customers with fast two-way communication – all with the assurance of a reliable network so customers can instantly connect to colleagues and friends. Additionally, the G’zOne Boulder supports a number of productivity tools and entertainment services from Verizon Wireless including VZ NavigatorSM, Field Force Manager, V CAST Music with Rhapsody and V CAST Video.

The G’zOne Boulder comes with the following features and capabilities:

* Rugged design that meets military specifications – 810F standards for water, shock and dust resistance; immersion; vibration, salt fog; humidity; solar radiation; altitude; and low and high temperature storage
* Flashlight
* Electronic compass
* VZ Navigator-capable – audible maps, turn-by-turn directions and location information to more than 14 million points of interest that customers can share with others
* Field Force Manager-capable – a resource management tool that provides businesses with the ability to locate, monitor and communicate with their mobile field workers
* 1.3 megapixel camera to conveniently capture an afternoon hike or a night on the town
* V CAST Music with Rhapsody-capable – download music directly to the phone from a library of more than 5 million songs and get the master copy of the song on a PC free of digital rights management software that restricts how and where music can be played. Customers can also sync favorite tracks, albums and playlists from a PC.
* Music player for .mp3, .wma, unprotected .aac and unprotected .aac+ formats
* Create and manage playlists and sync music from a PC to the G’zOne Boulder
* Carry music on an optional microSD™ card up to 8 GB (microSD card sold separately)
* Supports the following Bluetooth® profiles – headset, hands-free (car kits), dial-up networking, advanced audio distribution profile (stereo), audio/visual remote control profile, object push profile for vCard, object exchange profiles for phonebook access profiles, generic audio/video distribution profile, audio/visual distribution protocol, and audio/visual control transport protocol
* Advanced speech recognition with dedicated voice dial key
* Alarm clock, calculator, calendar, stop watch, countdown, timer, world clock, electronic compass
* Voice commands
* Speakerphone with dedicated speakerphone key
* Bilingual interface – English and Spanish language
* Phonebook with up to 500 entries with multiple contacts
* TTY compatible
* Hearing aid compatibility = M4/T4
* Display:
o Main: 2.0” 240 x 320 TFT display with up to 65K colors
o External: 1.2” 96 x 96 Mono STN display
* Dimensions: 3.9” x 2.0” x 0.9”
* Weight: 4.9 ounces
* SAR:
o Head: 1.04 W/kg
o Body: 0.489 W/kg
* Usage time: up to 214 minutes or
* Standby time: up to 63 hours

The G’zOne Boulder is available for $129.99 after a $50 mail-in rebate and a new two-year customer agreement. Corporate discount pricing is available. In addition, customers may choose to purchase the G’zOne Boulder without a camera in silver and black, available today through business sales channels and through the company’s online store.

Verizon Wireless customers can add Unlimited Push to Talk to their G’zOne Boulder for $5 per month, per line to any Nationwide voice plan.

For more information about Verizon Wireless products and services, visit a Verizon Wireless Communications Store, call 1-800-2 JOIN IN or go to www.verizonwireless.com. Business customers should call 1-800-VZW-4BIZ or contact their Verizon Wireless Business Sales Representative.

SOUTHAMPTON, England, July 22

Garmin the global leader in satellite navigation, today announced its first multi-use nüvi portable navigation device (PND) dedicated to walking, cycling, scootering, driving and boating in one rugged easy-to-use unit. The nüvi 500 series comes equipped with the latest technology from Garmin including NavTeq sophisticated mapping data and the ability to accept different types of mapping including TOPO for outdoor navigation and Blue Chart cartography for marine usage.

Clive Taylor, Garmin's Director of Product, said, "The nüvi 500 series is a true chameleon in the gadget world, it extends the use of GPS across the range, from walking to cycling to driving to boating. It's ideal for individuals or families who want to go and explore the great outdoors in every way they can. With the built-in compass and integrated Wherigo(TM) and Geocaching player the sat-nav's use is extended beyond just navigating: Users can enjoy the fun of the many family treasure hunts and adventures available online."

The new waterproof nüvi 500 series combines the latest Garmin navigation technology including Hotfix(TM), detailed NavTeq mapping, millions of points of interest (POIs) and traffic avoidance compatibility, for the times when sitting in a traffic jam is not an option. In addition, the nüvi 500 series comes standard with Garmin's popular "Where am I?" safety feature. At any time, with a single tap of the car icon, drivers can display their exact latitude and longitude coordinates, the nearest address and intersection, and the closest hospitals, police stations, fuel stations and recovery service telephone number. In addition, with Garmin Connect Photos, users can choose from millions of geo-located images provided by Google's Panoramio to photo-navigate on land or water.

With one touch, the nüvi 500 transitions between walking, biking, driving or boating mode;

Walking and outdoor pursuits

Ready for the great outdoors, the nüvi 500 models display shaded digital elevation mapping on the 3.5" water-proof touchscreen. This series comes standard with a compass page, track log and a removable, rechargeable battery for extended outdoor use. The integrated Wherigo(TM) and Geocaching player means the nüvi 500 series is ideal for getting the family to enjoy the great outdoors with the many downloadable 'adventures and treasure hunts' available online. Optional TOPO mapping will give additional detailed maps.

- Wherigo is a toolset for creating and playing GPS-enabled adventures in the real world. Use GPS technology to guide you to physical locations and interact with virtual objects and characters. http://www.wherigo.com

- Geocaching is an entertaining adventure game where individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the internet. GPS users can then use the location coordinates to find the caches. Once found, the visitor may be provided with a wide variety of rewards, all a visitor has to do is ensure that if rewarded, they leave a gift for the next person who finds the cache. http://www.geocaching.com

Cycling/scootering

Where the nüvi 500 series stands out is in its ability to fit comfortably on a scooter or bicycle. Its user interface is easy to control and, with directions via Bluetooth and a scooter mount as standard in select European markets or optional extra everywhere else, it's a great fit for getting around the busy town centres of Europe. The nüvi 500 series has a rugged design with UVA/B & fuel resistant material and bright clear screen that can be seen even in strong sunlight. If the weather turns and the rain comes down, its waterproof body ensures that the turn-by-turn directions get you to your destination using the most direct route and in the quickest time.

Driving

The nüvi 500 series' intuitive interface greets you with two simple questions: "Where To?" and "View Maps." Touch the colour screen to easily look up addresses and services and get voice-prompted turn-by-turn directions to your destination. It comes preloaded with City Navigator(R) NT map data European region or individual country. It's packed with millions of POIs and features digital elevation maps that show you shaded terrain contours at higher zoom levels. With the nüvi 500 series, you can also upload custom POIs such as 'The Good Pub Guide' and 'Falk-Marco Polos Travel Guide' offering thousands of great places to drink, eat and visit.

Boating

When loaded with optional BlueChart(R) g2 Vision marine cartography, the nüvi 500 series is great on the water, providing detailed chart-specific information, spot soundings, inter tidal zones, wrecks, port plans, restricted areas and more. The nüvi 500 is ideal for the occasional boating enthusiast who wants one navigational device for foot, car, bike or boat.

The nüvi 500 and 550 for Europe come preloaded with either country-specific City Navigator NT Map Data (500) or full European City Navigator NT Map Data (550) with detailed street and topographic mapping.

The nüvi 550 will be available in the UK in September at a RRP of GBP299

See the Garmin nüvi 500 series on Stand N118 - British International Motor Show at ExCel, London - 23 July - 3 August 2008: http://www.britishmotorshow.co.uk

[GPStracklog]

The keyboard includes raised, mechanical snap-dome keys under a hardcoated polyester film that's more rugged than conventional silicone rubber keypads. It also has an integrated Synaptics touchpad, like the ones found on laptops, which can substitute for a mouse. The device is especially built to withstand the humidity and dust of industrial settings, such as a work shop or food processing company (or certain blogging locations).

iKey's keyboard comes in either a conventional desktop design or a panel mount model that can be put in a stainless steel case. The company sells it quote-by-quote, so no pricing info was available. A backlit version will be out later this year. [Softpedia

The first waterproof camera I used was a Pentax W10 in 2006, one of the first simple cams that didn't need a case. It was only guaranteed to a depth of 5 feet, but it shot video, and that's all I needed for some snorkeling on a Kauai's north shore. I still have shorts of fish and turtles I took then. A year later, I used the same camera and lost it off some reef near a friend's house in Oahu. The current was strong and I was not, and when I swam to a safe spot the camera's lanyard had slipped off my wrist. The shiny little Pentax wasn't so shiny below the waves.

The second rugged, water resistant camera I used was a pistol gripped Sanyo E1. It was a lot more powerful of a camera, shooting DVD quality vids and 6 megapixel shots, but a lot bulkier than the Pentax. I called it in to use for the winter, during the snowboarding season. I couldn't use it but on the first day I used it, I noticed I couldn't toggle the buttons without removing my gloves, and mounting it on my strap as I rode wouldn't be a great idea anyhow. I lost it after not zipping a pocket after taking some shots and making a blistering run.

I'd chalk up these loses to my own user error to some extent, but if these cameras are waterproof and rugged enough to withstand the elements, shouldn't they also be fitted with accessories that assume the worst? Straps that can be fitted to gloves, neck lanyards, neoprene arm bands, or even orange buoys that can keep the cams from sinking during water adventures. I don't know. I just think that there has to be a better solution to keeping these cameras secured in the outdoors than the simple lanyards you find on your average point and shoot.

The G600 does movies too, shooting VGA video at 30fps, and you can even shoot up to a meter underwater. The G600 has been designed to work between temperatures of -10º and 40º Centigrade, and you can drop it onto 26 different surfaces from a height of 1.5 meters. Costing £350 when it comes out next month, that's almost $700—which proves that, while the camera may be shockproof, I am not. [Ricoh and Akihabara News]

The F5's magnesium frame, outdoor friendly display, resistance to dust and moisture and an easy-to-clean surface add to the semi-ruggedness of this Tablet PC. At 3lbs., it houses an HDD or an optional 32GB solid-state drive, a 2-megapixel camera, and, like its bright-red ancestor, a built-in mono speaker. There's no optical disc drive, though, as often is the case with these smaller tablets. It'll be priced from $2700 to $4000, not including the sweet dock, external keyboard or mounting hardware for the dashboard of your intergalactic space saucer emergency vehicle. [Motion Computing]

All three systems sport a 1.6GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, between 1GB and 2GB of RAM, Bluetooth, an SD card slot and a shock-mounted 80GB hard drive. They are all mobile broadband "ready," which means integrated antenna and Mini PCI slot for the wireless WAN card of your choice.

The Y7 has a 14.1" screen, weighs just 3.7lbs and can run for five hours on a single battery charge. The W7, with 12" screen, weighs just 3lbs even, and can make it seven hours on a charge. Both of those systems have DVD Super Multi Drive for massive multiple-format burning.

The T in T7 stands for "tablet," complete with touchscreen. The trade-off is there's no optical drive. The T7 weighs about 3.3 lbs, and can last the longest of them all, up to eight hours, on its battery. A hand strap on the T7 (shown in the gallery) means you can hang on tight, just in case you don't want to test the shock-proof claims.

In case you are interested in these tough little buggers, pricing is still a bit on the high side, but getting closer to earth: roughly $2,400 for the Y7, and around $2,100 for the W7 and T7. [Panasonic Toughbook]

*We at Gizmodo do no condone shooting computers, unless they are old, really crappy ones from Q1 07 or earlier. [aving via bornrich]

The case is magnesium alloy, and it's built so that dust, sand, rain and sub-zero temperatures won't affect it at all. It's quite well featured too, with Intel Core 2 Duo, 3G, Bluetooth and GPRS as well as a claimed six-hour battery life. The price hasn't been released, but is guaranteed to be big. [T3]

Thinking about climbing Everest in shorts? This may be the perfect laptop for you. The MW810 and ML910 will be on display at FOSE 2007 in Washington, D.C., with a release coming in the later months. –Travis Hudson

Motorola Unveils New ... Computers [Devicepedia]

HP Rugged Data Center Assistant/PDA Concept [Unwired View]

Asus Reveals Rugged UMPC [Crave UK]

Press Release [Laptop Magazine]

– Louis Ramirez
Tank Chair [via Jalopnik]

The camera also has a 6-megapixel sensor, can record 30FPS VGA video, a 3x optical zoom, ISO 1600 support, 23MB of internal memory and takes xD format cards. No availability info, but the functionality seems pretty good for such a Fisher Price/Nerf-like camera design. – Jason Chen

BIGJOB HD-3W, the rugged camera! [Akihabara News via Uber Gizmo]

bouncing it off concrete and playing a few games of "phone bowling" with it. They even dunked it in a pool (along with the reviewer) and successfully took some underwater pics with it. They nix it for not having Bluetooth and lacking media features (no music player, no expandability), but otherwise give it a 4/5 rating. As someone who always loses their Verizon phone in bars, trains, and puddles of whiskey, this phone is a nice welcome to the Verizon family, indeed. It's out later this month for $299. – Louis Ramirez

Verizon G'zOne [via PC Mag]

Tangent Rugged Mini [via CNET Crave]

The Catcher: a UMPC that won't break in half, but just might break the bank. Unless you're a bounty hunter (or a rich and spoiled youth), it's probably pretty safe to skip out on this one. – Nicholas Deleon

Product Page [Catcher via CrunchGear]

Product Page [Via Popgadget]

The Motorola i580 is as rugged as it is bulky, and as pretty as it is aerodynamic. Perfect for construction sites, parents of small children, and angry people who throw their phones, the i580 has a 1.3 megapixel camera with microSD slot and Bluetooth connectivity—not exactly featureless, but not top-of-the-line.

It's available now for $279.99 after discounts. – Jason Chen

Press Release [Motorola]

Motorola i580 Phone [Mobiledia]

Prices for MP-X.[Jensofsweden.com]

EDO Introduces Rugged Mini Tablet Computer: Situational Awareness in the Soldier's Pocket [Gizmag]