TiVo Blog has uncovered another TiVo-related iPhone application, DVR Shows. DVR Shows will show you a list of the programs your TiVo has recorded, by connecting to it over the network. (So if you’re away from your LAN it won’t work, or you’ll have to open a port to your TiVo on your router.) The $0.99 cent application allows you to check what’s waiting for you on your TiVo without firing up the TV and TiVo to check. TiVo Blog has some screen shots as well.

PC World’s Gadget Freak column is coming to an end after a five year run. And in his farewell post, Gadget Freak columnist Dan Tynan calls out the five best gadgets he’s encountered over the course of writing the column:

The best gadgets have certain qualities in common. They solve difficult problems simply and elegantly. They’re constantly ahead of the curve, adding new features before you realize you need them. And most important, they put you in control of your own digital destiny–so that you can make the decisions about what you want to do and how you want to do it.

Dan’s top five gadgets are: Apple iPod and iPhone, TiVo, iRobot Roomba, Sonos Sound System, and Nintendo Wii.

Seems like a respectable list to me. I would probably have few different choices, but each person has their own needs. TiVo would certainly be on my list as well, and probably my iPod.

Wal*Mart Wednesday will begin selling the T-Mobile G1 smartphone, powered by Google’s Android platform, for only $148.88 with a 2-year contract. That’s less than the $179.99 available directly from T-Mobile with the same commitment. The phones will go on sale at 550 Wal*Mart stores in the US. This according to CNNMoney. The Wal*Mart bump bodes well for Android.

For a very limited time, through October 29th, you can save $50 on any order of $200 or more from the Palm Store. That includes leading smartphones like the Centro, Treo 800w, and Treo Pro, handhelds like the Palm T|X and Tungsten E2, cases, software, and accessories including keyboards, headsets, and GPS kits. A good time to buy if you’ve been thinking of it.

TiVo Blog brought to my attention a new application for the iPhone. It adds a TiVo photo server application to the iPhone that allows you to view photos stored on your iPhone on your TiVo over the network without first moving them to a PC or Mac. The app’s creator, Chris Lundie, is also posting in TiVoCommunity. The app is just $0.99 in the iPhone App Store. And TiVo Blog has posted a number of screen shots.

According to The Official Palm Blog, Palm is releasing two new models of the Centro smartphone for Sprint, in Olive Green and Vibrant Rose. But new colors are the only differences, these Centros come with 128MB of memory, double that of the 64MB in all other Centros. They also come bundled with Facebook for Palm and Google Maps with the My Location feature, and a new low price of $79.99 (with a plan).

The new phones hit select retail locations on October 19th, and will be available online from Sprint and the Palm Store on November 2nd.

Nero was kind enough to invite me to a web conference on Friday to preview three new products that they’re announcing today: Nero Move it, Nero 9, and Nero LiquidTV. I’ll start by with Nero Move it.

Move it is an interesting product which aims to solve the problem of device proliferation and getting your content on the various devices, as well as moving content between them. The general idea is a drag and drop interface. You can select device one on the left, device two on the right, and then drag content back and forth between them. It handles photos, audio, and video content, and a myriad of devices - music players, PMPs, cell phones, cameras, etc. It will also handle transcoding, as well as uploading your content to YouTube, MySpace, and My Nero.

Here’s some official screen shots:

I also took some screen shots during the web conference on Friday:

So if you have content on your PC, iPod, PSP, cell phone, Nero Move it can keep everything synchronized, and also make sure the content is in the proper format for that device. If your device isn’t listed in the extensive default list of devices you can also create a new device profile. Or if you prefer different settings for one of the included devices you can also alter the default settings.

Move it will also handle ripping content from CDs and copying your content from mobile devices to the PC to backup your media files. In addition to uploading content to online services it can also download content to synchronize it to your devices to take it on the go. Renaming, copying, deleting, sorting, etc, it is all in there. You can even edit the meta data on the files - artist, album, description, etc.

Nero Move it will be available today, September 29th, for $49.99 for Windows PCs.

Press release:
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I’m, shocked, SHOCKED I tell you!

Well, OK, no, I’m not even mildly surprised.

According to Register Hardware, Palm is delaying Palm OS II, aka Nova, again. Palm OS II was originally expected on phones in 2007, then delayed until 2008, then late 2008. Now they say it’ll be ‘finished’ by the end of 2008, but we won’t be seeing any handsets using it until the first half of 2008. And, frankly, I wouldn’t place any bets on it. I’ve been a Palm OS user since 1998, but I’m not sure Palm is really relevant as an OS vendor anymore. They make some great Windows Mobile based devices, if I were in the market for WinMob the Treo Pro would be a top contender, but the existing Palm OS is terribly out of date. And now they’re going to be launching a new OS into a market full of WinMob, iPhone, Symbian, and two major Linux platforms - LiMo and Android. As a third Linux platform I don’t know that they’ll be able to garner developer mindshare. I really would rather see Palm take Android and work their magic on it as they’ve done to WinMob.

On the bright side for Palm, one of their major competitors, Windows Mobile, is also facing a delay. CNET reports that Windows Mobile 7 will be delayed from early 2009 to the second half of the year. That could be good news for Palm as WinMob 6 is starting to age and WinMob 7 promises a number of significant improvements. The delay means Palm’s Nova won’t be going directly against WinMob7 - unless it is further delayed, of course. The delay is also good news for Android, which, unless you’ve been under a rock, you’re probably aware launched today with T-Mobile’s G1. We should be seeing more Android phones and the WinMob delay gives Android more time to grab market share.

Picked up via Gizmodo.

I’ve been swamped with work so I haven’t been able to do more than skim most of today’s coverage of the Android launch and read a few of the reports in full. I have mixed feelings. The platform itself looks solid to me, but I think I’ll wait to see some more phones using it. I don’t like the G1’s lack of 3.5mm headphone jack, I can’t believe they left that off after the backlash against other phones. But that’s HTC and not Google or Android. And some of the features I’d need, like Exchange support for work, are being left to 3rd parties. I am 100% sure the hole will be filled, and can actually appreciate that approach - no native app makes the market more attractive to developers - but I’ll have to give it time. Still, I like what I see and think that with a little polish (this is the 1.0 release after all) it will probably be my next phone OS.