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Mostly Everything

Take your iPhone 4s underwater (up to 300 meters!!!) with Patima

Ed’s Note: Want to see the Samsung Galaxy Note underwater? Check it out!

As a guys who likes to take photos underwater, I tend to keep my choice of camera brands within the confines of the “1-Way Test” … which simply begs the question “Can I take it underwater?” So I’m more inclined to invest in photography equipment which you can wet. The geeky appeal of it all is trying to figure out how to keep electronics from staying dry at 100 ft below the surface and the concept is challenging. Well, we did it for an iPod, so what’s stopping us from taking the iPhone down?!

So when I got an iPhone 4s from SMART, I really had no intention to take it down. Well, I knew it could be technically done with a special consumer-rated case from Lifeproof (Howard did a review on it on Technoodling recently) and Gabe Mercado did give me a demonstration at 5ft deep in salt water.

But the question is, can you take the iPhone 4s down to recreational SCUBA depths of 60-120ft? Well, Patima’s new casing exclusively for the iPhone 4s allows you to do so. Not just into recreational depths … but up to 300 meters folks.

Exclusive for camera or video functions of the iPhone 4S
– Rated to 300meters, anti-moisture and anti-dust purposes
– Simple operation with 4 buttons
– Compact Size and light weight
– Material – CNC milled Aluminium Acetal, Stainless Steel
– Finishing – Anodized after Barrel, Sanding and coating
– Color – Silver
– Size: 185 x 70 x 40mm
– Weight – 400g on land
– Available controls: Rec Button, STOP button, Program Confirm Button, Camera/Camcorder mode Button and Power Button

PRICE: PHP 15,000.00 via Splash UW Imaging located at the 2nd Floor Greenhills Shopping Mall (across Krispy Kreme)

OK looking at the shots, I’m really wondering how exactly will you unlock the iPhone with the three buttons? The three buttons + home is obviously used for the camera, gallery and photo / video switch (again not sure how you’re going to switch). I’ll probably get an explanation how it works and hopefully a run-through. I don’t see any slots for strobes or video lights so you pretty much have to do a DIY config to get this thing working 100%. Nonetheless, I don’t think Patima designed this to be your primary underwater camera, but still. It delivers.

This Patima case doesn’t seem to be compatible with other iPhone models.

Categories
Mostly Everything

Finally, it’s complete: Sea & Sea DSLR housing with single YS-110 strobe

Procured from parts found all over, I finally completed my first professional housing set up. I’d like to send out thanks to Wowie Wong, Jan Acosta and Jovic Santos for giving really good buying advice (and in Wowie and Jovic’s case … parts!).

Categories
Mostly Everything

Synergy XIII: Club Paradise, Palawan

N.B. There’s still time before we close this week’s contest!

Synergy is a yearly event hosted by HP and Intel and 2010 marked year 13. Back then, it was one of the more innovative types of events as it paved the way for more intimate dialogue with the press. 13 years later, Synergy is still going strong and this year we’re at Club Paradise in Palawan.

Click on to see what happened at Synergy.

Categories
Mostly Everything

Did you know that Intel has an App Store optimized for Netbooks?

Applications stores seem to be the fad of the end of the decade. With Apple’s iTunes Store, Steam’s disc-less download app, the Android marketplace and the OVI store, it makes sense for Windows to have its own. Although this isn’t the only way for Windows users to find applications, it does allow developers an additional venue to showcase their wares. According to Intel, the online store does have a profit sharing model (up to 70% profit in favor of developer) similar to how the iTunes store works. They are provided with a developer forum and SDK to build apps for AppUp.

Optimized for netbook resolutions, the AppUp Store serves as a central hub for discovering new apps for Windows. Since one of the primary issues of netbooks are small screens, the AppUp store provides an ample list of resolution-friendly standalone apps (i.e. not running on your browser) such as Facebook and TweetDeck.

If you’re running a netbook, it’s definitely a worthy download. But even if you’re not (I’m running it on a MacBook Pro + BootCamp), it still works on any WIndows XP / 7 enabled computer! Even if the app resolutions are optimized for netbooks, some developers have gone the extra mile to make their apps compatible with higher native resolutions.