What's sharper than a razor? A scalpel. Motorola mobile devices overlord Ron Garriques unveiled the first of the company's new SCPL (that's "scalpel") line of phones today, the successors to the RAZR platform. The MOTOFONE is targeted at "high-growth markets," which is Motospeak for the third world where many people don't already have cell phones.

SCPL changes the cell-phone game in even basic phone performance, Garriques says. The MOTOFONE is super-thin, features two antennas for superior reception, "enhanced audio" that's super-loud and super-clear (think Nextel), and a screen which you can see "in unbelievably bright sunlight as well as no sunlight as all," according to Garriques. It'll have 450 minutes of talk time and 400 hours of standby -- you'll be able to go weeks without a charge. And it'll be really cheap.

The MOTOFONE is just the first in a long line of SCPLs which will hit every price level and every form factor, including clamshells, QWERTYs, and sliders, Garriques said. And the higher-end "SCPL Broadband" platform, to be unveiled early next year, will come to "all of our HSDPA and EVDO Rev A customers across the world" -- which means, at the very least, Sprint and Verizon.

Read my full story on PCMag.com for the SCPL's release date, the future of Linux on Motorola handsets, and more.

In the 84th running of the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb, racers equipped with a VortexValve, a performance-enhancing fuel-saver device, dominated the field. Wally and Paul Dallenbach took first and second place, respectively, in the Open Wheel Division. The brothers attribute a noticeable increase in power and torque, helping them come out of curves, to the VortexValve. And eight-time big-rig Truck Exhibition Division champion Mike Ryan made similar claims; he won again this year using a VortexValve for the first time. He set a new record, breaking his old record by 3 seconds.

But this technology isn't just for racers. The VortexValve is an airflow modification device designed to increase mileage and horsepower on the car or truck it's installed in, by modifying the air flow entering the intake valve and causing air to flow more effectively through the intake system, the engine manifold, and the pistons. This results in more complete combustion in the engine, which generates more horsepower using the same amount of fuel.

By allowing the engine to do the same work with more horsepower, the VortexValve increases fuel efficiency. Simply put, you don't have to press as hard on the accelerator, so you save more gas. Its stainless-steel Uni-frame construction is self-seating, only taking a few minutes to install, and comes in sizes to fit anything from a small gas-powered scooter to a Class 8 diesel engine.

It's so funny to witness the lengths that companies will go to in order to present their products in a unique way.

VakaDoo, maker of accessories for entertainment devices, sent us the iVak iPod case. Just look at their press kit! 

The iVak Domino Series come with an iVak key to open the case (BTW, the key looks like a credit card) and the VakWrap to manage your headphone wires.

The iVak iPod case is made of a durable white plastic, allowing you to throw, drop, or slingshot your 20/30GB iPod with video without fear of it breaking. It features a locking mechanism on each side, kind of like puzzle pieces, to keep the case in place. And I have to say, a puzzle it was. It took me a good fifteen minutes to get the damn thing back together! If you're having trouble opening the case, follow these instructions.

The 40/60GB iVak case is available in black.

Get the iVak for $19.95.

iPod nano users aren't left out. The iVak nano is coming soon with a range of fancy colors, including turquoise, cloudy black tint, and orange. This lets you mix and match colors with your friends by removing one part of the case. With the iVank nano, you'll receive the VakWrap, lanyard key ring, and a protective sticker for the clickwheel.

Have you got a movie in you, but you don't have the means? The newly launched LiveMansion.com takes social networking in a new direction, enabling its members to create a feature film from scratch. According to Variety, the film, titled "Live Mansion" will be a thriller set in the world of rave parties. Oh so LA. . . The budget for the film is estimated in the $1 to $2.5 million range. Members will be in charge of casting as well as choosing a director based on online submissions.

The powers that be behind this online venture is Ckrush, an independent film company behind many a testosterone-fueled flick including Beer League, due out this summer, starring Artie Lange, a regular on the Howard Stern Show. (Shocking!) The company has two other films in production filled with stars such as Wee-Man (a person of small stature, but also, hilariously, a toilet training device for kids) from Jackass, and Paris Hilton.

Sign-up is free, but it's not clear whether there are or will be any premium features. Blogging Molly will update this post once she snoops around a bit.

Lost amongst all the RAZR announcements, Motorola showed off some impressive new Nextel phones at the company's analyst event here in Chicago. Yes, Nextel.

You may have heard of the ic502 and ic902, the first cross-platform phones which will make calls using Sprint's CDMA network, but do push-to-talk "chirp" on Nextel's iDEN network. The ic502 is a pretty basic rugged phone, but the ic902 has the big new features for Nextel -- a 2-megapixel camera and a music player with external music buttons.

But you might not have heard of the i880 (at left) and i885, the new "fashion phones" for Nextel and Boost. Both have external music buttons and 2-megapixel cameras, and both snap open when you press a button on the hinge. The i885 has a faux-leather finish and the i880 is an odd but attractive fake snakeskin.

The ic502, i880 and i885 will appear by the end of this year; the ic902 will be released in early 2007.

Check out my in-depth slideshow on PCMag.com.

We had a fascinating meeting yesterday here at the PC Magazine office, with Taras Wankewycz of Horizon Fuel Cells. The company showed us its first product, the H-Racer: a toy car about 6.5 inches long that runs on hydrogen. Even better, you get to produce the fuel yourself, and the mini fueling station is powered by a fuel-cell battery, which in turn derives power from a solar panel; so much alternative fuel technology in one little package. (I know, I just used variations of the word "fuel" way too many times in one sentence.)

The H-Racer runs for around 3 minutes before it needs refueling. It will come in a kit (bundled with the refueling station and the solar panel), and is easily put together; parents and kids can do it together for a mutual learning experience. You can buy the H-Racer and fuel station now at Horizon's site, for a combined $80, and the bundle should be available in some stores and at sites like ThinkGeek in August.

Wankewycz told us that this is the first fuel-cell product that will be widely available to the mainstream commercial market. The company will be developing more hydrogen-powered toys, either on its own or together with actual toy manufacturers, many of whom have shown a strong interest already in the H-Racer. "Next year we'll have a bigger product," he said. Eventually, he hopes to design an actual, driveable hydrogen-powered car; but he decided to start small.

Take a look at our writeup on the H-Racer at TechnoRide, where we also posted a slideshow showing all the car's components.

Want to get the inside track on the mainstream technologies you might see in the next five years? Take a ride in the BMW 650i, a high-cost, highly desirable sport coupe that delights the driver (and coddles the passenger) with useful technologies such as a head-up display (HUD), active cruise control (ACC), night vision, active roll stabilization (ARS), and half a dozen forms of entertainment—plus the iDrive, for better or worse.

Head-Up Display

Audi, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, in Europe; Acura, Infiniti, and Lexus, in Japan; and Cadillac, in the U.S., are pioneering the technology advances that work their way into mainstream cars. According to the Technology Research Group , a Minneapolis consultancy, the BMW 6 Series came in a 6 way tie for the fifth most tech-savvy car on the planet, along with the BMW 5 and 3 series.

The 6 Series' most useful technology is the head-up display. It's a $1,000 option in the 650i as well as in the related 5 Series sedan. HUDs have appeared in a handful of earlier cars (Corvettes, Cadillacs)but BMW does it best and in color. Osram, a lighting company also working on LED headlights, created a 128-LED array, which is projected through a mirror onto a semi-reflective patch at the base of the windshield. Rather than seeing an image at the windshield, the driver perceives the display floating above the front of the car at visual infinity, which makes the HUD all the more useful for drivers who need reading glasses. The minimalist information is just what the driver needs for most of the journey.

ACC, Night Vision

Virtually every car has cruise control. Active cruise control (ACC) is expected now on very high-end cars such as the 650i, and has the ability to slow down automatically when there's a car ahead. ACC is a godsend in heavy traffic as well as late in the day when your reflexes aren't 100 percent. BMW's ACC is good, but others are more versatile with the ability to take the car to a stop and then resume; BMW ACC hands the car back to the driver with a loud chime at 20 mph.

BMW's implementation of night vision uses passive infrared that captures the heat from objects. (Mercedes-Benz uses an active illuminator that provides a lifelike picture good to about 500 feet out, versus BMW's 1,000 feet.) The information is displayed in the center-dash LCD. For some drivers, night vision is a gimmick that goes unused after the novelty wears off. ACC and night vision are each $2,200 options; if you're trying to keep the price of the car under $80,000, go for ACC, especially since this Bimmer comes standard with excellent steerable Xenon headlamps.

Active Roll Stabilization, Driving Thrills

With active roll stabilization (ARS), the 650i banks into a sharp turn like an airplane—almost. Actually, ARS reduces but doesn't eliminate sideways forces, because drivers sensing no lateral force would take corners too fast and eventually slide off the road. ARS isn't likely to be offered on mainstream cars soon; it's a costly feature whose mechanical components can't easily be made less expensive.

BMW also offers active steering ($1,250), a speed-related variable ratio where a quarter turn of the wheel turns the car a lot at 10 mph, and not much at all at 65 mph. It may be useful but the first couple days you may clip a few corners at low speed.

Although it's fine on twisty roads, the 650i feels even more at home on the Interstate. Most drivers can comfortably cover 500 miles in a day and arrive feeling tired, but not exhausted or stiff. Thank the superb leather bucket seats, too.

Performance Technology

BMW's 4.8-liter V8 engine produces 360 horsepower but returns a relatively reasonable mileage (for a 3,814-pound hot rod) of 15 mpg city, 23 mph highway with the six-speed manual. It's not good enough to duck a $1,300 gas-guzzler tax, though. If you want better mileage in an expensive sports coupe, check out the Lexus G 450h but pack light on trips, because half the trunk is taken over by the hybrid batteries.

The BMW engine uses variable valve timing and valve lift to improve economy, a feature that has already come to some of the mainstream, and adjustable variable length intake manifolds (think how a trombone changes length) to provide the right airflow at different rpm.

Power goes through your choice of three six-speed transmissions: manual, automatic, or a sequential manual gearbox (SMG), BMW's term for a no-clutch-pedal manual that shifts for you like an automatic, or manually with steering wheel paddle shifters. SMG is the sportiest and fastest option, but in other BMWs I've driven, it's been a bit jerky. BMW is likely to shift over to the smoother BorgWarner/Getrag dual shift gearbox (DSG) that Audi uses on cars such as the TT and A3. It goes without saying a car at this level comes standard with traction control, stability control, anti-lock brakes, eight airbags (front, side, head, and knee), and the BMW Assist telematics system that calls for help in an accident. Continued...

Exotic Materials

BMW fought to keep the weight under 4,000 pounds, and succeeded. To do that, the company employed a composite trunk, aluminum suspension, aluminum doors, and thermoplastic front fenders. Using run-flat tires eliminates about 75 pounds of spare tire, wheel, and wheel-well. The 650i's even-sportier twin, the M6 ($96,795) uses a carbon-fiber roof panel to shave off 75 pounds.

Making Peace with iDrive

BMW pioneered the cockpit controller in 2001 with the iDrive. The 6 Series uses a revamped controller and returns a few more functions to discrete dashboard controls, especially for entertainment. It's still an acquired taste and takes a couple thousand miles of driving to gain familiarity. There's also voice input, but it's not perfect either. The quality of the iDrive and voice input were two factors that hurt BMW in the most recent J.D. Power Initial Quality Survey rankings. Reportedly, BMW will completely overhaul the iDrive technology around 2008.

Before you set off, you must click the iDrive controller to consent to BMW's conditions ("Don't sue us if you drive off the road tinkering with our iDrive"). Many automakers do this. On BMWs with LCDs, it means you don't get the benefit of the excellent park distance (PDC) parking sonar display that shows, with green, yellow, or red bands, how close you are to a hazard at all four corners of the car. Many drivers say they prefer a video backup camera, but PDC may be more effective in making sure you don't crease another car's fender in a parking lot.

Entertainment Options

The 6 Series may be the ultimate listening machine. Choices include AM/FM/weather band radio, a CD player that plays MP3 and WMA CDs, and line input, plus a Logic7 surround sound system with a six-disc changer ($1,800), HD radio ($500), Sirius (but not XM) satellite radio ($595), and shortly, an iPod adapter ($400, estimated). To my ears, HD radio didn't improve music quality even with a strong signal, but it eliminated the hiss and static in fringe areas or urban canyons.

Navigation comes standard, and because it's controlled by the iDrive, it's a bit confusing the first few dozen times you drive. If and when you figure things out, you'll appreciate the size of the screen (8.8 inches), its high placement and deep recess under a hood for easier reading, the ability to split the screen two-thirds/one-third with two navigation views (map, arrows) or a navigation map and, say, the trip computer. And once you're underway, the maps and instructions are first rate.

The high mounting makes a touchscreen overlay impossible (although German automakers' apparent abhorrence of fingerprints on any shiny surface renders the matter moot). Most important, though, this is one of the few LCDs you can read in almost all lighting conditions. If nothing else, the iDrive makes for easy map zooming, even if it zooms backwards: You twist the iDrive knob clockwise to zoom out and counterclockwise to zoom in. Too bad BMW Assist can't download route instructions that are requested by a driver's phone call, the way OnStar Turn-by-Turn does.

Of course, BMW has wheel-mounted, hands-free Bluetooth phone controls, as well as Mayday calling and other assist services called TeleAssist. In addition to the warranty, BMW picks up the tab on maintenance for four years. Among other things, it ensures that people driving leased cars have fewer disincentives to having service done. Continued...

BMW Online

BMW's site provides useful but not world-class tools for building your own car and shipping the request to a dealer. Some information is missing, misplaced, or outdated. Try finding out quickly whether there's a gas-guzzler tax on the 650i, comparing the 650i to the even sportier M6, or learning whether the car has a line-in jack.

The Owners Circle sections provide a handful of services: tracking the status of your ordered car, understanding lease-end, summarizing and making lease payments online. It had two handfuls of services benefiting BMW (credit card offers, accessories for sale), and some missing features. The FAQ section for the 6 Series has zero FAQs, there's no 2006 owners' manual online this late in the model year, and for previous years you'll find only the main manual (high end cars usually have several). To BMW's credit, the manuals that are online have hot-linked page references. But mostly, this mid-tech Web site hobbles a high-tech car.

Should You Buy?

Half a dozen $70,000-plus sport coupes and convertibles provide luxury, technology, and handling. At this level, choosing among BMW, Cadillac, Jaguar, Lexus, Mercedes-Benz, and Porsche models is a matter of personal preference. By their nature, high-end sport coupes are luxuries rewarding the well-off for their skill or luck in achieving $250,000-plus incomes. All say, "I've got money," or at the very least, "I've got a malleable lending officer." (You're looking at a $1,500 monthly lease payment.)

It helps if you like your 650i in gray or black: Six of the 10 available colors are titanium silver, mineral silver, silver gray, stratus gray, black sapphire, and jet black.

The 6 Series coupe and its sibling convertible provide a practical note: a cockpit and trunk big enough for long distance touring in style and comfort. You'll quickly grow to appreciate the head-up display and active cruise control technologies. You'll love the variety of entertainment offerings, and those long trips are just the thing for getting to know iDrive. To sum it up: the BMW 650i is a most practical impractical car.

For a review of the Audi A3, click here.

For a review of the Lexus G 450h, click here.

For a review of the Subaru Legacy 2.5 GT, click here.

Play Slide Show/All Shots (15)

$73,795.00 - $85,890.00

A luxury sport coupe that's full of technology to make driving (and riding) more enjoyable, safer, and less tiring. The head-up display belongs on every car. This is the car to buy for two people who don't pack light.

Color head-up display, active cruise control, night vision. HD radio, satellite radio, and iPod connector all available. Big LCD with a bigger sunshade. Super-comfy seats. Suspension counters body roll in turns.

iDrive cockpit controller learning curve. Optional active steering is quirky. Snug back seat. Gas guzzler tax.

Although what appeared to be a perfectly functional Sony Reader was on display at CES six months ago, the actual product won't ship until late September. I am a big fan of ebook readers, as a concept, and I convinced Sony to let me try out a production sample for a few weeks.  You can read my hands-on Sony Reader Preview on PCmag.com, but don't expect a verdict on the product or a complete answer to the question posed in the headline of this post. The reason? Most of the product most interesting and promising features were disabled.

There was no way to connect it to a PC, no way to load ebooks, and of course no way to connect to Sony Connect to get content. Even the Memory Stick and SD slots were deactivated. I also really wanted to check out how RSS feeds look on the Reader, which I think is a killer app of this device.

As frustrating as this was, I am cautiously optimistic about the device. It is slim, super-portable, and the electronic ink display looks great. The reported $250-$300 price seems a little steep, but if the company makes it as format-agnostic as they have said (supporting PDFs, Word doc, and most other text files) they could have a winner.  I can't wait to test a model that I can actually load content onto.

Sony better hurry it to market, because Apple seems to have ebook plans for the iPod as well. More power to them! The more ebook reading devices there are out there, the more ebook readers there will be. And I am sick of trying to read ebooks on my Treo 650.

This tiny car is more than just a toy: It's the Horizon Fuel Cell H-Racer, the smallest hydrogen-powered car in the world, and the first mass-produced fuel-cell-technology product to reach consumers. It's also a great tool for learning and teaching about alternate fuel technologies.

The H-Racer (just 16 centimeters long, about 6.5 inches) runs on a 0.3-watt hydrogen fuel-cell motor and comes with its own refueling system. The fueling station derives hydrogen from water via electrolysis, which splits the hydrogen and oxygen molecules and feeds the free hydrogen through a pump into the car, filling up the proton exchange membrane (PEM) sac; the car's only emission is water. The refueling system is powered by a small solar panel (or batteries, on a cloudy day).

The car is simple enough for a child to put together, and runs for about 3 minutes before refueling is necessary. Fortunately, refueling is part of the fun; the car's designers made most pieces transparent, so you can watch the hydrogen filling up the PEM sac.

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Slideshow | All Shots

According to Horizon Fuel Cell's vice president Taras Wankewycz, the company eventually plans to develop full-size hydrogen cars. Meanwhile, the H-Racer provides a working, tangible example what clean fuel-cell technology has to offer.

While Horizon is not a toy company, toy makers have expressed interest in integrating fuel-cell technology into there products so fuel-cell-powered remote-control cars, boats, and other toy vehicles may be offered in the future. The H-Racer is available now on the Horizon Fuel Cells Web site for $80, and should hit other retail outlets in the U.S. in August.

Here in Chicago at Motorola's analyst week, during breaks between presentations on supply-chain strategy I've gotten to play with Motorola's new phones. Some somewhat disordered thoughts on the KRAZR, RAZR XX and RAZR MAXX:

The RAZR XX feels just like a standard RAZR in the hand -- same grooved-metal finish - but when you put it side by side with an old RAZR, you realize it's slightly larger.

The MAXX is a boat. It's huge. It also feels like furniture because of that silky soft-touch PEBL-like finish.

If the MAXX is furniture, the KRAZR is jewelry. It's very shiny, all over, and has an almost glassy finish. The touch-sensitive music buttons that appear out of nowhere on the front are very cool, though they didn't quite work on the prototype models here. The CDMA KRAZR I was using had US Cellular's EasyEdge service on board. That's a BREW system, so clearly Verizon is looking at this one as well.

The KRAZR feels noticeably thicker than the RAZR, too.

You like embossed metal keys? Everybody's got embossed metal keys. But the KRAZR's keypad is notably smaller than the RAZR's. The screen looks sharper than the RAZR's, too, not because it's higher-res but because it's smaller. The XX/MAXX screen actually is higher-res, and looks very bright and just gorgeous.

The menus on the KRAZR feel just about as slow as the standard RAZR. The MAXX and XX feel much faster.

Both the XX and the MAXX have a real Web browser, Opera 8.0. The KRAZR and the RIZR are stuck with WAP. Boo.

Nobody seems to know if the XX and MAXX will be sold in the USA. I've so far heard three answers from three different Moto folks.

For a full rundown of Motorola's new phones and lots of photos, see PCMag.com.

I'm at Motorola's annual analysts' meeting this week, getting the scoop on the new KRAZRs and RIZRs and MAXXes and other hot new handsets. Check out my stories on PCMag.com later today for more information.

If you've never been to a Motorola throw-down, though, you'd be surprised by the level of in-jokes and trash talking going on. For instance, at one point when discussing "tattoos" for Motorola phones, mobile device head Ron Garriques said that phone tattoos can be erased or replaced "if you and Mary broke up, for instance." On the screen, he showed a RAZR with a giant tattoo of a heart containing the name "Monica" – a reference to longtime Moto PR rep Monica Rohleder, who recently jumped ship and now represents Helio.

Other hits with the analyst crowd included a YouTube video about "Samesung" and Garriques quipping that "my wife really likes chocolates, but she likes shiny things more," a reference to LG's upcoming Chocolate phone.