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What have we been doing since we released Origami Experience™ Pack 1.0 this time last year? Well, Origami™ Experience 2.0!
Origami Experience 2.0 is been shown at CES this week and is being made available to UMPC manufacturers for testing and pre-installation this month. In this release we have included four applications, all optimized for the UMPC. We go into more detail on the contents of the release in future posts but, for now, here is a quick peek.
The release has four applications.
Origami™ Central
Origami Central is an update to the original Origami Experience application in the 1.0 release. As well as the familiar media features, we have created a fully-optimized browsing experience for UMPCs and an RSS reader. We have also extended the media features to include feeds that can provide information on new movies, audio books, or any media content that can be published using RSS.
Origami™ Now
Origami Now provides one-touch access to the information that’s important to you, email, calendar, RSS feeds, weather, to-do lists… . All organized into one context-sensitive screen that can change the information displayed according to the time, your current location, and freshness of content.
Origami™ Picture Password
This is a real breakthrough for using mobile touch PCs. Origami Picture Password allows you to login by tapping on a sequence of points on a picture; this not only makes it easier to login on a UMPC but also personalizes the login experience. You can choose your own picture and select points that mean something to you. It’s fun and secure.
Touch Settings
This is the familiar Touch Settings application from the Origami Experience Pack 1.0 release.
Like I said, just a quick preview. More detailed explanations of each application and screenshots to follow….
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I find my UMPC particularly useful for consuming audio media. Others have written about using the UMPC as a music or podcast player. I want to share what I've learned using the UMPC as an “internet radio” for listening to on-line radio stations.
What is Internet Radio?
Podcasts are a popular format for internet content, usually delivering discrete “chunks” of audio content on demand. Whether you find podcasts by browsing your favorites, subscribing to them in RSS feeds, or using stand-alone software such as iTunes, when you listen to a podcast you generate a request for the audio file and a server responds by sending it to you. In this post, I use internet radio to refer to a different mode of content delivery.
Internet radio follows a more traditional broadcast radio model. Programming comes from a single continuous (or scheduled) source, which is delivered in the form of a stream. When you “tune in” to the stream, you hear what is being sent at that given time. This is useful both for covering near-real-time (a ten second lag or so is typical) events and for providing a “point-and-click” form of programming that you can enjoy any time without worrying about when new segments become available and keeping track of which ones you've already listened to.
Many existing broadcast stations (with real transmitters on the ground or on a satellite transponder) also broadcast on the internet. This includes many metropolitan AM/FM stations, which might be a good way to keep on “ear” on your favorite remote city. It also includes many stations that transmit in the shortwave spectrum, the “old school” way of getting a signal over the horizon. Shortwave broadcasters sometimes struggle to stay on the air through shifting technological and political trends, but many have invested in the internet as an outlet for their often high-quality programming teams. Here you can find overseas news, news from a different perspective, high-quality special-interest programming, practice with foreign languages, as well as a few remaining propaganda machines!
How is Internet Radio Received?
Internet radio broadcasters use a wide variety of streaming formats. Many can be received with a “stock” Windows PC (including your UMPC). Some require special codecs to be installed. I will only cover a couple of formats that I have personally set up.
The UMPC makes an ideal “radio” that, as long as you have a WiFi connection, you can move from room to room. If you have a nicer built-in speaker, the free-standing audio quality is comparable to transistor radio. You can also plug the UMPC into a good stereo system, a set of powered speakers, or a set of Bluetooth headphones. Some lower stream bitrates can even be delivered over a wireless wide-area network (WWAN), if you have such a data connection.
Finding Internet Radio Stations
You can usually find a stream for a known terrestrial radio station by going to their website. For instance, here in Seattle you can go to http://www.kmtt.com for 103.7 “The Mountain”. Like many broadcast stations, you'll find a “Listen Now” button somewhere on the page. In the case of KMTT, you are prompted with a request to register with the station. I have nothing against this. Providing a stream costs the provider in terms of infrastructure and bandwidth, and here they probably want to get some marketing data in exchange. Whether and how you register is up to you, but this step could present a problem when you are using a keyboard-less UMPC on the go (it also presents a problem to more limited devices like dedicated WiFi radios). To help with this, http://www.reciva.com is a comprehensive internet stream catalog. It can help you find streams as well as store your own favorite stream list online.
So, go to http://www.reciva.com and in the search box, type “KMTT”. You will find a listing for 103.7, including its genre and other information. If you click on the descriptive link, you will be taken to a page that shows additional information, including the results of collaborative filtering that show you what stations others are listening to (who also listen to the station you chose). You can find streams without registering with Reciva, but if you register you can keep your list of favorites there along with notes, and you can optionally log all station usage. With Reciva you can also browse stations by genre or location.
If you can't find the stream of the station you are looking for, there are ways to dig in and find streams, including using a WinPCap-based socket sniffer to find out what streams are accessed while you interact with a web site, use an Adobe Flash application, etc. I won't go into those details here, but you can read the help page on Reciva.
Playlists and Codecs
As I mentioned before, not all streams will play in Windows Media Player (or your other favorite player) unaided. There are many stream formats and other quirks of streaming systems. I can't possibly address them all in a blog entry, so I will mention two that I have personally tackled.
If you are a geek in western Washington, there is a pretty decent chance that you will at least have heard of Bellingham's American Museum of Radio and Electricity. AMRE operates a low-power FM (LPFM) radio station in Bellingham that mimics the programming of radio's “Golden Age.” If you need to set the mood, you'll be glad to know that KMRE-LP simulcasts on the internet. KMRE-LP uses the Shoutcast streaming system. The underlying format of this stream is MP3 (which WMP can play), but the launch point of the stream is wrapped in a playlist file in the PLS format, which WMP does not support natively.
Fortunately, there is a freely available utility, OpenPLSinWMP, which you can download from http://tools.veloc-it.com/. Once you have run the installer, a small console app will run when you allow the browser to open a .PLS file. This app will parse the XML and launch WMP on the contained stream.
If you wander through enough media sources on the internet, you will certainly encounter the AAC format. AAC is a standard that improves on MP3 in several ways, including better sound quality at lower bitrates. Its popularity has increased by its role as the audio layer of MPEG-4 and default audio format of the iPod and iTunes.
There are codecs that allow you to play various flavors of AAC in WMP. You can find them individually, but I installed the Windows Essentials Media Codec Pack, which provides an installer and a set of tested codecs that cover most common formats. With the codec pack installed, I was able to play more streams.
Of course, you could also just use another player client (like WinAMP or Quicktime), but I try to keep my installation simple and I am on the lookout for a user interface that is most usable on the UMPC form factor. Many streaming scenarios are not currently supported directly in the Origami Experience.
Optimizing UMPC Usability
With our newfound streams, now the issue is trying to conveniently select and control radio playback on the UMPC form factor. I often listen to internet radio in the kitchen, and like many UMPC scenarios I have limited attention and only a finger to keep my UMPC humming while doing dishes or whatever.
Creating a profile and adding a set of favorite stations in Reciva is a good start. If a stream moves, it is likely that the community of Reciva users will find it and update it. If you tire of your current selection, it is easy to find another station based on genre, location, etc. The downside is that you must log in and the web interface isn't exactly optimized for touch. One suggestion I have is to add www.reciva.com to your set of trusted sites to prevent additional prompts, especially when clicking on a link opens playlist files that must be trusted. Do this at your own risk, of course.
Setting favorite links in your browser is also a good way to keep track of stations.
One idea I tried with Origami Experience is creating URL shortcuts and adding them to the Programs center. Just to throw out another hopelessly geeky content source, I created a shortcut to the W0KIE satellite network, which carries mostly amateur-produced material around radio, electronics, and satellite TV. I created a direct link to their internet broadcast, and then dragged this shortcut from Internet Explorer to a known file location. This creates a file a .URL extension. I can then go into Origami Experience and add an item, browsing to this URL file. I chose to add it to the Entertainment group.
Really, I hope that some burgeoning software developer creates a great UMPC radio application, something that does what some of the stand-alone WiFi radios do and more.
As an aside, another fast-growing area of internet radio creates a personalized stream for you based on your likes and dislikes. Pandora is the canonical example. By making the content not completely “by demand,” but driven by preference, you can hear your favorite songs while the operator holds contents rights similar to a broadcast station.
In order to pull this off, Pandora uses a Flash-based client control that lives in the browser. Unfortunately, that Flash app is extremely UMPC-unfriendly. It depends on hover, has controls that are difficult to target, and for some reason its text input controls (i.e. for username and password input) don't work well with the TIP (the Tablet PC Input Panel or soft keyboard). We will have to see UMPCs and other mobile devices take increasing share of clients before most apps are very UMPC-friendly. If you use Pandora, let them know you want an accessible user interface!
I hope you find some of the ideas and tips in this post useful. If you discover great ideas for using UMPCs for internet radio, please share them with the community!
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Dear UMPC Enthusiasts,
As part of our ongoing efforts to better serve the UMPC category, Microsoft is conducting a survey to gather additional data on UMPC usage and perceptions. If you own a UMPC, or are interested in UMPCs, we invite you to participate in this short survey:
https://deploy.ztelligence.com/start/index.jsp?PIN=139JGXPZGJBJD
Please feel free to share this survey link with your fellow enthusiasts and to re-post it on blogs or other UMPC forums. This survey will remain open till October 28, 2007, 11:59 p.m. PT. As an incentive, survey participants are eligible to enter sweepstakes for prizes.
Additionally, you can choose – at the end of the survey - to voluntarily opt-into joining Microsoft’s Mobile PC User Panel, which will provide you with additional opportunities for participating in future studies.
Thanks in advance for your participation,
Microsoft Origami Experience team.
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Greetings fellow UMPC fans. I joined the UMPC test team this year and have had the opportunity to play with many different UMPC systems. As a test guy, I can never leave well enough alone, and am always tearing things apart to see how they work, and pushing them to their limit. My friends have learned to be cautious about what they give me to “play with,” because it just may not come back in the same condition.
I have been spoiled with big high powered desktop PCs for quite some time now, so it was a bit of a shift for me to start working with UMPCs. I found that my applications do not always run as fast or as smoothly. I realize UMPC devices are pushing the hardware and software design limits because of size and battery constraints, but after using it a while, I am now hooked on the size, and don’t want that to change much (if any) to increase the performance or visual look and feel.
I noticed that some of the UMPC systems had a choppy animation experience and poor video playback with the pictures stopping and sound not synchronized with the image. So I decided to do some playing around to see if I could get my video playback to run a little smoother. I tried installing the latest graphics drivers, but there seemed to be no change.
Next I decided to turn off hardware acceleration to see if the issue was with the graphics driver. I found an article from the MSDN library that talked about disabling Graphics Hardware Acceleration http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa970912.aspx#disablehardwareacceleration and decided to give it a try. I rebooted the UMPC after performing the steps, and tried playing back my video. The video skipped a bit as it was initially loading then became smooth and in synch with the audio. I was thrilled! The downside was my CPU was now using most of my CPU to do all of the graphics work. So when I tried running another application with the video playing, both the video and the application struggled to run. Granted, not a perfect solution, but one where I can now watch my videos at full screen.
In the mean time I have sent mail off to the various hardware providers and waiting for the updates to come out.
Here is the specific section I followed from the MSDN article:
Disable Hardware Acceleration Option
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Registry key |
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HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsof\Avalon.Graphics\DisableHWAcceleration |
DWORD |
The disable hardware acceleration option enables you to turn off hardware acceleration for debugging and test purposes. When you see rendering artifacts in a application, try turning off hardware acceleration. If the artifact disappears, the problem might be with your video driver.
The disable hardware acceleration option is a DWORD value that is either 0 or 1. A value of 1 disables hardware acceleration. A value of 0 enables hardware acceleration
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Since the early days of Digital Photography I knew I had found an area of art/technology that I was passionate about. I loved the ability to take images, quickly review them and then keep the images that mattered to me. Over the last few years, as Digital Photography has matured, I have really enjoyed slowly developing a workflow that really suited my “digital darkroom” style.
The one area of my “workflow” that I have consistently struggled with is storing images while I am on the go. Once my card in my camera runs low on storage I find that I am always looking for ways to off-load images. There are a few tools in the industry that can help with this. The two common solutions that I run into are carrying around a Personal Storage Device or a laptop. I often have found that both solutions were not quite right for me. Personal Storage Devices are great but they are not multi-function. They do one thing (store data) and do it really well. However, space is limited in my gear bag and I don’t usually like to pack stuff that just does one thing – I like multifunction tools![Smile [:)]](/emoticons/emotion-1.gif) . Laptops, on the other hand, are great multi-function devices – but they take up space and weigh you down. Again not a great option as it then makes it hard to travel very far with my gear.
Since joining the UMPC Team I have found what I feel is a great solution. UMPC’s don’t take up a huge amount of space in my gear bag and provide the “multi-function” capabilities that you can commonly find in a Laptop. What’s especially great is that I get to pack along media and navigation solutions in a small device which helps me with a few of my needs when I am out looking for images. I wanted to share with the community a few tips I have picked up for using a UMPC device as an “on the go” image storage and viewing solution.
- If you shoot raw files – see if your Manufacturer has a RAW Codec that will allow Vista to natively support the raw files in Windows Photo Gallery. Looking at the Microsoft PhotoBlog I see that several manufacturers have released codec’s for Vista .
a. Microsoft Photo Blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/pix
b. Example information on codec support on the Microsoft Photo Blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/pix/search.aspx?q=codec&p=1
- The Microsoft Pro Photo Site is a great place to look at tools and get tips for Photography on Windows: http://www.microsoft.com/prophoto/default.aspx. Tools from that site can be downloaded here.
- Make sure you take a USB storage card reader with you so that you can easily pull images from several different memory cards. (Alternatively you could take the USB sync cord for your camera and pull the images directly from the camera.)
Recently I have been reviewing Microsoft’s Expression Media as a way to manage and view my images on my UMPC. Look for a follow-up post in a couple weeks with my impressions
- Scotty (aka that photo guy)
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My name is Layla and I am a fairly new addition to the Origami team. Although I am new to the UMPC, I have worked with Tablet PCs and other devices in the mobile space for the last few years. Since I got my first Tablet PC in the summer of ’04 I have been excited about natural computing. It is great to have new ways to perform tasks, but what really excites me is finding new things I couldn’t quite do before. As part of my immersion into the UMPC space, I am seeing how my Samsung Q1 can change the way I do things.
Like Wendy going to the gym is an important part of my daily routine. So I have decided to pick up where she left off in the search for UMPC usefulness at the gym.
What worked for my workout
Like Wendy said, the Q1 does work well on the Stairmaster. It also worked fine on the Elliptical machine. Using it on the Treadmill was ok once I got it situated.
Works well for watching movies and TV shows I have stored on my UMPC.
With the extended battery on the Q1 I never have to worry about my UMPC giving up before I do.
The iffy spots
It was a bit trickier to get the Q1 positioned in a viewable angle on the Treadmill. I think the awkwardness can be attributed to the placement of resting locations – one was too low, the other was too far away.
My earbuds have pretty long cords, but it makes me nervous (especially on the Treadmill). I don’t want to slow down and accidentally send the Q1 tumbling down. I might invest in a Bluetooth set.
What was missing
There isn’t always anything good on the TVs at the gym, but sometimes something looks worth watching. In order to get sound I need an FM radio tuner. I’m not willing to carry two separate things around (like my mp3 player with built in FM) so I would like to get something I can plug into my PC. I have seen a few FM radio CF cards, but I haven’t really looked into them yet. Have a recommendation?
I have really gotten into tracking my workouts, but I feel like I should be able to do so if I have my PC right there with me. Do you know of any apps out there that are quick and simple to get data like that entered in a useful way?
All in all, I’m pleased. My setup isn’t perfect, but the size of the UMPC definitely lets me take it where I just won’t bring a full-sized laptop. I used to watch the news or listen to music. Now I can watch something fun and uplifting. Of course I end up feeling a little silly when I am the only one laughing while I run – oh well!
Beyond working out
This may sound crazy, but I do more than work out at the gym. For example, a few of my workout buddies and I get together weekly for dinner at the club restaurant. I didn’t originally plan on using my Q1 for anything other than watching movies during my workout. But last week, after running to an episode of Top Gear I headed to the club restaurant to meet my friends. I was 10 minutes early. I had just watched the only show I had brought with me. And guess what, no internet access. I had emails I could have read that were already cached, but this was not the time to dive into work. Then it hit me – all of my RSS feeds that I subscribe to are automatically downloaded for me. Viewing offline RSS feeds in IE is not full fidelity, but for some feeds it was sufficient. Not only did I have a fun way to spend that time, I also got to read a few feeds I probably wouldn’t have gotten to otherwise.
With past mobile PCs I spent so much time tethered to spots that have internet I didn’t really take advantage of RSS as an offline solution. I’d take other laptops between home, work and the occasional adventure. Taking it anywhere other than home or to work only happened when I had a real reason. I have found that the Q1 is just light enough (I’m not going to complain when they get even lighter) and small enough that I take it with me even when I don’t have a use for it sometimes.
The way I see it, the laptop let me leave one office and go to the next office setting. With the pen, my Tablet PC left the desk, let me wander a bit and joined me on the couch. With the UMPC it can go where I go. I don’t take it everywhere with me (at least not yet), but I have taken it one step further. I really like the idea of computing on my terms rather than on my PC’s.
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Over the weekend I helped out at a wedding by being the "official" DJ. Basically this meant that I have a fairly large music selection, and somewhere along the way someone believed I had some spare time, so the task fell to me.
Deciding to use the UMPC
The first thing I had to do was decide what to play music from. So why pick the UMPC? Well, we were moving a stereo to play music, so portability was key. The wedding was outside, which meant trucking a desktop wasn’t really practical. I could use an MP3 player, however I really wanted the option to change the playlist during the event (I’ve done this once before, and found a number of people who come up to you and ask “Can you please play…” and “Do you have any music by…”). So, the next obvious question – why not a laptop? Simply put – not enough room. The area to put the stereo was limited, and putting a hot computer that covers a stereo (precariously) on top wouldn’t work. Not to mention ease of use – it’s easier for me to pick up the computer and touch the screen to play music than it is to fumble with a laptop. Not to mention when using a laptop outdoors it becomes difficult to see the screen and nearly impossible to find a mouse cursor. The problems solves itself with touch – no need to locate a cursor (this to me was the killer difference).
Copying media to my UMPC
With the UMPC, I now began to realize my second problem. I have a single computer that stores all my music. It’s great for syncing my MP3 player and even playing music over the network, but I need an offline scenario for the actual wedding. Not only that, the UMPC doesn’t have enough space to fit all my music (currently stored in WMA lossless). So, I needed a way to copy my music and encode it to fit on the smaller hard disk. One advantage I have – since this machine is also a test platform during the week, I didn’t need the media I have on it and I also wasn’t going to be reliably able to maintain the media on it after the weekend (you never know when you need to change your media to test something new).
My solution was to take what I feel is one of the more underutilized of Microsoft downloads – Windows Media Encoder 9 (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/forpros/encoder/default.mspx). It is simple to install, will encode/decode, and best of all, it is free. Once installed, and with quick consultation of the script documentation, I could easily copy and encode my media to my UMPC using the following command:
cscript wmcmd.vbs -input <source> -output <destination> -profile a128
The nice part is <source> and <destination> can be directories – so I pointed the source to the root folder of all my music on my server and the destination to the root folder of where I wanted my music on my UMPC. The most important piece of this really is “a128”, which is the encoder’s default 128 bit audio profile. If you are strapped for more hard disk space, there are other default profiles or you can always create a custom profile. Once the command was started (from my main server, since it could decode/encode slightly quicker) I made sure to go to the “Power Options” control panel and change my power plan from “Balanced” to “High Performance”, which I had previously set up on both of these machines not to sleep while plugged in (this way the machines won’t try to power down).
Another key point here - Windows Media Encoder actually removes metadata as it encodes. This was kind of a pain for me, since searching in WMP was limited without this. I went back and wrote a quick app that uses the WMP metadata - I'll post more info on that when I blog my next installment.
Now, all I had to do was wait for the copying…
Ross
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I like my coffee in the morning. I like cereal, toast and a piece of fruit, at least during the weekdays. But most of all, I like my media to be mobile around the house. It goes where my UMPC goes.
What better time to engage mobile media than during the morning meal. As I sit down to nourish my mind with the goings on in the world I prop up my UMPC. I pop open IE and “check my vitals” (def: To check your email, myspace, facebook, blog, and/or any daily essential websites). Meanwhile I’ll stream tunes to my UMPC from my media library on my home server (currently a Windows XP machine) via Windows Media Connect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Media_Connect). Other times I may watch a show I recorded earlier using Media Center.
This was easy to setup. Windows Media Player 11 (WMP) has media sharing built in.
· I simply open WMP on my home server, click Library and select Media Sharing. I then follow the prompts to expose my media on the network.
· On my UMPC I open WMP and tap Library and select Media Sharing.
· The last step is to make sure my UMPC is given permission to connect to the Home Server’s media… so back to the Home Server, Open WMP, click Library and select Media Sharing and look for the name of the UMPC in the list of found devices to share media to.
Now that I've exposed this media and given permission to my UMPC device I'm free to play whatever media I've exposed. What’s also cool about this technology is that there are TVs that also make use of it (that is, if you don’t have an Xbox to act as a Media Extender).
I’m wondering if others find this usage to be common.
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I have been persuaded to try Bluetooth again. I’ve been waiting for a set of stereo headphones that I wouldn’t be completely ashamed to be seen wearing. A Plantronics 590E recently came my way and I gave them a try. For once, I am reasonably content. (I know they have been around a while but for some reason it took me ages to get hold of a pair.) I also became the ‘keeper’ of a new Stowaway® keyboard and mouse at the same time.
Why was I disgruntled with BT? Maybe I just had bad luck with the BT accessories I attempted to use in the past. I always had to constantly re-pair them to my UMPC. Sometimes after everyday tasks such as resuming from standby, e.g. BT GPS. I like to try new gadgets (obviously) but when it comes to things I need to use in my daily life I am pretty impatient. Try navigating for your wife in the middle of a hectic French city and having to say ‘hold on a minute while I reconnect the GPS antenna and scan the COM ports….’. The novelty wears off *very* quickly.
These headphones could get me back into the fold, though. They look ‘ok’. Being wire-free is almost priceless. I no longer send my UMPC flying to the floor when I jump out of my chair. I also like the volume control, mute, and prev/next features. And, they don’t use batteries so I don’t get caught with no power as long as I remember to recharge. Last, and definitely not least, they are stereo!
Installation was pretty easy. Once I got the pairing done, the drivers were installed automatically (I made sure I had a net connection before I started). There is still some room for improvement though. The pairing is preserved but I have to reconnect them in the BT settings control panel nearly every time I use them; this is a bit more than mildly irritating and spoils the spontaneity of listening to music.
The sound quality isn’t stellar either. But the benefits far outweigh any of these these small problems.
I haven’t tried them with my smartphone yet – not sure I would either, the scenario doesn’t really match my phone usage. But I am going to try VOIP with them.
As for the mouse and keyboard. I like the mouse, I use it all the time at my desk. The keyboard not so much. It is an interesting piece of engineering but I find my small USB keyboard is more reliable and easier to use. Oddly, the Stowaway keyboard doesn’t have an on/off switch which means the battery dies really quickly. It is supposed to have a power save feature but after a week in my bag it was dead. I guess the battery in the box could have been quite old.
Anyway, I'm back to using BT which is a good thing.
Disclaimer: these are just the personal opinions of the writer. Not intended to endorse, promote or otherwise critique any particular products. Just to share experiences.
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Hi! I'm Christine from the Microsoft Reader team. Some of you may know me from some of the other device forums like PocketPCThoughts, Aximsite or the Microsoft.Public.Reader newsgroup under the name MSReadergirl.
I know that many of you have been waiting for a long time for this download and we apologize for the wait but we hope you'll think it is worth it.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2213D032-F1AF-4FE4-A1A0-B895A35F743B&displaylang=en
Some of you have had a chance to give it a try if you purchased a Vista preinstalled Origami. For those that have, we hope that you are enjoying your reading experience. For those that had to wait, we have tried to give it a few "extras" -- features like:
- Support for Windows XP Tablet PC edition devices (UMPC only)
- Audible support for the newer audio formats
- Security and Performance updates
For those of you who have already tried it, you may have discovered some of the improvements we implemented to optimize this experience for the UMPC device platform.
We have added page navigation touch points on the left and right hand margins, where the hand naturally falls when reading. This works in both landscape and portrait device modes. 
These touch points are considered "Guides" and can be turned off under the "Settings" section of the Reader.
In landscape mode we have enlarged the screen to allow you a full reading experience. We feel that this is an improvement over the previous Tablet PC Reader experience where the screen rendered only a Pocket PC size screen, wasting all of that valuable real estate.
In addition we have also enlarged the "'riffle" control that results when you tap on the page number at the bottom of the page. This navigation panel is now tailored to using your fingertips to access the screen elements.
Context menus have also increased in size to allow you better access during your reading experience. 
For those of you who are Audible fans, you will discover that this new version supports Audible's newer audio formats. This is a feature that was not enabled on the OEM release of the Optimized Reader. We have tried to keep the same look and feel for Audible files as the controls already appeared optimized for touch based systems.
In addition to these new features you will find that your favorite features are still available in Microsoft Reader. Annotations - such as bookmarks, text notes, highlights and inking controls are all still available but many have been updated to accomodate easier touch based interaction. The "Find" and "Lookup" features are still available but have larger buttons for more clear action selection.
In short we hope that you will find that this Reader provides the same great reading experience you have come to rely on and that the Origami device is a natural addition to our reading device family.
As always your feedback is welcome and encouraged as it helps us develop better products to meet your needs.
Sincerely,
Christine - Microsoft Reader Team
For your Microsoft Reader support needs please visit http://support.microsoft.com/oas/default.aspx?LN=en-us&gprid=2748&x=6&y=8
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Hello all you UMPCers out there.
I am a tester (SDET to be precise) on the Origami Experience (OX) team. I am new to the team for version 2, but have worked at Microsoft for 7 years, including stints in PocketPC/Smartphone land when in its infancy, and recently on Windows Vista on the Mobile PC team (where I am currently working on OX).
Just wanted to introduce myself, and get a request out to all of you to ask for your participation in our forum poll. The poll is asking how you use your UMPC, and Origami Experience in particular. We want to make this the killer device we envision it as being, and we would like your help to do that.
Even if you aren't using it that much, or at all, please let us know why, and if there is anything we can do to change that. We want to focus the majority of our energies in the right area, so please do let us know by taking the poll, and if you want to tell us something about your usage or experience, post a response in the forum and let us know. Good, Bad or Indifferent, we want to hear from you.
Thanks in advance.
~Rob~
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One of the most difficult aspects of a mobile computer is keeping it mobile. I'm sure everyone knows what I'm talking about - how many of you carry around your power bricks along with your UMPC just to plug it into the nearest wall outlet in order to make sure you don't run out of battery power?
What can you do to help?
First, you can optimize how you use your computer. First is to select the right power settings - Windows Vista provides three default power plans that have unique settings for AC and DC power states. Normally "Balanced" will work just fine, but if you want to try to get a little more battery life you can use "Power saver". Or you can go and modify those settings individually. You can reduce performance but save power by stepping down the CPU - (Power settings, change power plan settings, Advanced settings, Processor power settings - change Maximum processor state down from 100% to 50%). Secondly, drop your backlight brightness. If your Windows Vista display driver supports this it will appear under "Edit Plan Settings" in your Power Options Control Panel. You can increase your lifespan by tuning down the search indexing service (Advanced power settings, Search and Indexing, modify on battery to power saver).
Next, reduce the power hungry tasks. Your top power consumers are your CPU and LCD panels, but everything draws power. If you have external USB devices that you aren't using, unplug them (they draw system power to run). If you aren't using your wireless card you can open up Windows Mobility Center, find your network card, and "Turn wireless off" (again, this appears if your hardware drivers support this functionality). Close down applications you aren't using - even background applications take battery life.
Finally, you can monitor your power consumption and the health of your battery. In the end, there's only so much you can do with how you use your computer (you still have to use it, right?). One case I've frequently seen is battery degredation. While lithium-ion batterys (what most of us have in our laptops) don't have the old "memory" traits, they do lose maximum charge capacity over time. You may see this where a laptop that is 4-5 years old may get a small fraction of battery life (I've seen people run from one power outlet to another due to this). You should consider the battery inside your computer as a part you need to maintain, and perhaps replace, through the lifetime of your mobile pc. So, when do you replace it? I honestly can't give a solid answer, but I would consider it about every 2-4 years, depending on the battery.
To help out a little, I've created a Windows Vista Sidebar gadget and posted it to http://gallery.live.com:
http://gallery.live.com/liveItemDetail.aspx?li=38ad04cf-2c94-43bb-9899-51814beaadbf&l=1
In addition to displaying your battery information (% remaining, time remaining when unplugged, AC/DC states) it also displays your tired battery state and lets you know (as a percentage) how much charge you are getting compared to new. This should help you determine if the loss of computing time is worth purchasing a new battery. Plus, it is far easier to see at high resolutions on small screens than the system battery icon in the tray.
Thanks,
Ross
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After Jeremy's post I thought I would follow up with one of my own. While I'm "new" to this forum, I've been a Software Developer here at Microsoft for over five years. I've worked on various projects from Tablet PC ink technology to Windows Vista power management, and most recently I helped finish the development on Origami Experience™ V1 (so I can't exactly say I'm "new").
I'm looking forward to taking the experiences from V1, the foundation that Dustin's team has created, and (most important of all) feedback from the user community to develop the full potential of the UMPC platform. I think we have developed a great team which I'm sure you all will have an opportunity to know (and give us an opportunity to know the community) as we move forward.
Thanks,
Ross
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To follow up from Oscar’s post this morning I want to give you a quick rundown of the new team. There is me (Jeremy), of course. I have been at Microsoft for 8 years and have been working with Dustin for the last 2 years. Among other releases, I worked on the Touch Pack and the Origami Experience Pack in both Test and Program Manager roles. I learned a lot working for Dustin (thanks Dustin!), those 2 years just zipped by. Now I get to build on that knowledge working with Oscar who brings a ton of industry experience to our team and will definitely keep us customer-focused.
Some of the Origami Experience V1 developers are also still with us and working diligently on the next version. Christian, the designer responsible for the interaction and look of our shiny new application is close by; in fact I see him nearly every day and he warns me not to ‘break’ his stuff. And of course Otto is just down the hall in case we need some wisdom to guide us through the mists.
We have an expanded Test team, more developers, program managers and all sorts of new support from different areas of Microsoft. The members of the team will introduce themselves over the next few weeks. As for Sears, I doubt he will be able to stay away completely, he just can’t help himself.
Jeremy
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