We’ve asked our sources for screen shots of what Google Voice Desktop looks like. We didn’t get those, but we did get something better – the actual application. We’ve taken a video (above) showing what the application looks like, showing both outbound and inbound calls. This is mostly still branded Gizmo5, although the sign up screen says “Gizmo5 by Google,” and it is fully integrated with the Google Voice service, address book, etc. The Desktop application was also automatically added as one of my phones in the Google Voice for the browser. We don’t know if this is the current internal release or something more dated.

The test calls in the video above were done without a headset, I just used the internal microphone and speakers. I also left in the random Skype call I received in the middle of the video that I thought was Google Voice just because I was thoroughly confused for a minute.

We continue to urge Google to release this software. It gives people an extra way to use Google Voice and is particularly useful when traveling overseas, where Google Voice doesn’t yet work. You can use Skype and buy a Skype-In number for €50/year to duplicate much of this functionality, but that’s just a ridiculous price to pay for a soft phone in our opinion.

My first request to Google is not to block me from using the application. My second request is to reconsider their decision to delay or scrap the project and give the people what they want – Google Voice Desktop.

Hopes that homes in rural areas will have 2Mb broadband by 2012 have been dashed as government looks for new funding options.

The new government says it can’t guarantee 2Mb broadband for all by 2012 and is making the promise for 2015 instead.

The move has quashed the previous Labour government’s ambition to bring 2Mb broadband to every household in Britain by 2012.

Speaking at an industry event yesterday, Tory culture secretary Jeremy Hunt said: “I have looked at the provision the government had made to achieve this by 2012, and I’m afraid that I am not convinced that there is sufficient funding in place.”

The Labour government had provisionally assigned £250million left over from the digital switchover fund to help pay for its 2Mb broadband for all promises. It also intended to introduce a 50p per month landline tax to fund the rollout of superfast networks in rural areas, but this was shelved before the election and then abolished by George Osborne in June’s emergency budget.

The decision to push the date back to 2015 has come as a shock to many broadband experts and groups campaigning for decent internet access in rural areas that are currently broadband “notspots”.

Consumer Focus’ broadband expert, Jillian Pitt, said: “Often people living in these remote communities are amongst the most disadvantaged in our society, so there is also a wider issue about suppliers ensuring that broadband is not only available, but also affordable.”

At present, 99% of UK households are able to get some form of broadband connection, however about 2 million of these homes cannot get speeds as high as 2Mb, limiting the use of services such as video streaming and on-demand TV.

And around 160,000 rural households still cannot get any form of broadband, more than 10 years after the first services were launched

3 the mobile broadband provider came top in 10 out of 12 categories in a recent YouGov survey and beat off rivals including Vodafone to be named the UK’s best mobile broadband provider.

3’s mobile broadband network covers more than 95% of the UK and through some of the best deals on the market, including 15GB for just £15 a month and some of the most competitive iPad packages, 35% of all mobile broadband customers are now signed up to 3.

Joe Parker, 3’s director of mobile broadband, said: “It’s great that our customers have rated us the Number One Mobile Broadband provider in the UK.

“It is a customer endorsement of the massive investment we have been putting into our network over the past two years and the speed at which this programme is developing. The network continues to grow in reach, speed and capacity.

“It also shows that what customers value most when it comes to mobile broadband are reliability, speed, coverage, ease of use and great pricing – areas where we excel in the latest YouGov survey.”

Over the last 18 months, 3 has extended its network from 7,500 sites at the end of 2008 to more than 11,400 today – a figure that’s set to rise to 12,500 sites by the end of the year, further improving 3’s mobile broadband coverage.

BT’s trial, which runs fibre optic cables direct to home and businesses, completely bypassing the copper wire network, is being offered on a wholesale basis and it was actually a lucky Plusnet broadband customer that got the first connection.

“FTTP offers speeds of up to 100Mb down and currently up to 15Mb up (the upstream will be increased later in the trial),” said Dave Tomlinson from Plusnet.

“Unlike existing DSL broadband services there’s no copper involved in the connection. An engineer will run fibre optic cable direct to your home. As such, certain limitations on copper such as the speed decreasing the further you are from the exchange are no longer an issue.

“Is 100Mb overkill? What will people find to do with 100Mb?” he asked. “It’s hard to say, from an application point of view what services will make best use of speeds that high? File downloads will benefit of course and the faster upload will really help people that send large files or host services. Our first thoughts on the faster downloads will be the benefits it gives to people with slower speeds.

BT Wholesale’s latest trials, which were delayed by six months, have now gone live in the brownfield sites of Bradwell Abbey in Milton Keynes and Highams Park, London. Two additional areas are also due to be added to the trials in Leytonstone, East London and York, bringing the total number of premises in the trial to 40,000.

Some of the networks are still to announce their iPhone 4 tariffs but let’s   look at the  that are being talked about.

If you want a free Orange iPhone 4 16GB on a 24 month contract then you will have to fork out £75 a month. Ouch! The cheapest alternative if you want a contract iPhone 4 on Orange is to pay £169 for the iPhone 4 on a £30 a month deal, which will give you 150 minutes, 250 texts and unlimited data. You can also add tethering from £5 a month

Vodafone have not yet officially released their iPhone 4 tariffs but the rumours are that an iPhone 4 on Vodafone will cost from £35 a month with the 16GB handset costing £89. It looks like the Vodafone iPhone 4 deals will be cheaper generally, which is good news all round.

By contrast, the obvious limitation of getting an iPhone on O2 is that they are not currently offering unlimited data. O2 iPhone 4 data packages start at 500MB and go up to 1GB, which should be more than enough for most people. Taking a 24 month iPhone 4 deal for comparison, £25 month will get you 100 minutes at the 500MB level, increasing to £60 if you feel you need 1GB.

Don’t discount the iPhone 4 on O2 though, you might also want to look at their Simplicity range; top up £10-14 per month and grab 300 texts with the 500MB data deal for example. That is the best starting point and it is easy enough to change tariff once each month.

As the number of iPhone 4 deals on the market increases, the number of iPhone apps increases and the number of iPhones out there increases, the Apple iPhone success story just goes from strength to strength.

Apple are congratulating themselves on what they are calling their most successful launch and claim they could have sold more iPhone 4 deals had stock been available. 1.7 million in a matter of days is nothing short of a miracle given the state of the economy but it just goes to show the power of the Apple marketing machine. Even the 3G and 3GS only sold 1 million in the days after release.

Perhaps, given those volumes, the teething problems that some users have experienced were inevitable. Were similar problems encountered with the 3G or 3Gs or even the iPad though? Not that we can recall, so is the iPhone 4 release really a total success if you move away from the numbers? On balance, the answer has to be yes, the iPhone 4 is one heck of a bit of kit. 

The demand for the iPhone is going to increase as app developers are becoming more customer focused and providing apps for every niche of the market; therefore, the iPhone success juggernaught does not look to be slowing down.

 iPhone deals are presently available in the UK with Vodafone (Vodafone iPhone), Orange (Orange iPhone) and O2 (O2 iPhone)…all of these deals are available with the Carphone Warehouse and other suppliers.

Apple launched the iPad in the UK in May 2010, where it has been a dramatic success since this launch. able. The research suggests that consumers interested in purchasing the iPad or the more technology minded end of the market, aware of both it’s capabilities and it’s “geek chic” reputation.  

It is really interesting that consumers are demand for the 64GB the highest spec iPad as this will provide a bonus for app developers.  The huge demand for the Apple iPad was expected by the tech community with the success of the iPod.

As for protecting Apple’s latest device, the most popular choice of iPad case is in neoprene material, with rubber and leather being the 2nd and 3rd choices. Top iPad case colours are brown, pink and purple.

The Apple iPad is only likely to go from strength to strength, with additional models undoubtedly around the corner and hundreds of new Apps arriving for the iPad format every month.

Developers have rushed to modify iPhone apps for the iPad and take advantage of the  9.7-inch screen.

Book, newspaper and magazine publishers have joined in and it’s recognised iPad as a counterbalance to Amazon’s popular Kindle e-book reader.

The iPad only has  four buttons: an on/off button on the top edge, volume buttons (and a screen rotation lock) on the top right edge, and a recessed “home” button below the screen.  There is a standard headphone socket but no external expansion ports other than the dock connector.

The iPad is a great device for viewing video, digital photos and electronic books. Of course you can do all these things an iPhone or iPod Touch. But it is much easier to watch a film on the iPad’s big high-definition screen, or read a book using Apple’s beautifully designed free iBooks reader app.

Some of the biggest contributors to video on the iPad could prove to be the print-oriented news media. They have less invested in traditional forms of video distribution and graver concerns than entertainment companies about their industry’s health.

The iPad does not support multiple applications running at the same time, or multi-tasking another is that it cannot support Adobe Flash, this seems a bid odd as there is a high number of Flash sites on the web to display video.

Because of the size and weight (it is light weight) of the iPad it is is a handy bit of kit for your checking and replying to your e-mail and it has an internal rechargeable battery which lasts over 10 hours which is better than most netbooks annd laptops.

The iPad is a feature rich device which will only get better over time, remember that the iPhone didn’t have that many apps to start with, just wait until applications are developed specifically for the big iPad screen.

Microsoft Office 2010 includes slimmed-down versions of Word, PowerPoint, Excel and OneNote – under the term Office Web Apps.  The Office Web Apps is a good new feature and allows users to view, edit and share documents online.

Microsoft has also priced Office 2010 aggressively – you can download the basic Home and Student version, which includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote, for $149 (£110 in the UK), or buy it loaded on a new PC for as little as $119 (£90).

There is just one big interface change in the latest version: the inclusion of the ribbon on Outlook, Microsoft’s e-mail, contact management and calendar desktop app, making it feel much more integrated into the Office suite. Office 2010 users can now customise the menu ribbon in all the desktop apps to assemble the commands they use most often – which should help satisfy critics who felt the ribbon lacked the simplicity of the old Office menu bar.

Overall, Office 2010 will feel familiar to anyone who uses Office 2007, and the version of the software available on Tuesday is very similar to the beta version, which was Microsoft’s most extensive software trial to date. More than 5.5m users downloaded the beta code, which expires in October. 

I like the new feature, the Backstage view, which includes several new options for creating, printing, saving and sharing a document as well as information about recent versions of the document and the “permissions” (who can do what) associated with it .

Outlook that has undergone the most dramatic – and long overdue – changes.

Some, such as the option to view all messages in an e-mail thread, rather than in purely chronological order, match those already available in Google’s Gmail. Others make it easier to manage, delete and organise messages (including deleting a whole e-mail thread), add new e-mail accounts and configure automatic “Out of Office” replies.

Overall, these changes transform Outlook from an ageing desktop e-mail app into a modern communications-management tool that can compete with the best of the rest, including applications such as Mozilla Thunderbird and Gmail.