We've had the first Near Field Communication (NFC) phone, now hail the first NFC accessory to go with it. The Parrot PARTY Black Edition is a black edition of Parrot's boombox styled PARTY Bluetooth speaker but with one extra ingredient; NFC. No need to pair this wire-free speaker with your phone, just tap the two together and the Bluetooth link is established. Magic.

PARTY owners will recognise the rest of the spec list - a class-D amp with 6W output, eight hours rechargable battery life plus Parrot's top-secret Stereo Widening tech, oh, and Virtual SuperBass to add an element of grunt.

It'll be out in the summer for £79 - nicely timed for the arrival of Nokia's NFC loaded 6212 classic.

Believe it or not, music lovers frustrated with not being able to download their favourite tracks from online music stores are turning to an innovative new technology in order to get music onto MP3 players.

Apparently, it's all the rage with Beatles fans unable download the Fab Four's warblings from iTunes. Instead, they’ve “found their own way of getting hold of Beatles MP3s” and "side-loading is the popular alternative to downloading... where you copy pre-played CDs onto your MP3 player."

If you’ve ever been emailed an attachment, but lacked the application required to open it, you’ve probably spent some time scrabbling around online looking for a free viewer or open source app that can open the file. Alternatively, upload the file to Zamzar and you can get it converted to one of a range of other file formats and then download it again – without paying a penny.

Is there nothing those Scandinavians can't turn their designer hands to?  Bored of crafting minimalist sofas and desk lamps, they've created the Contactbox - a wall-mounted designer charge station for your mobiles and smartphones.

So no more cables dangling by the bedside or coiling into a viper's nest behind the desk, now you can strap your thirsty handsets into Contactbox's elasticated straps and plug in with minimum mess. It's available in lacquered red, white and black or solid oak for £54.40. That'll be the designer price-tag, then.

[Scandinavian Design Center]

The Atom based UMPCs are coming and leading the charge will be Asus's new Eee PC 900. The maker's UK office has been telling Techradar that its pencilled in the end of June for the Atom version of the 8.9in firecracker to launch here - just as soon as its finished its unveiling at Taiwan's Computex show at the beginning of that month. If that's too long to wait, stocks should be arriving of the Celeron M based models early next month but the Atom versions might well be worth waiting for given the improved battery times we're promised.

Update: We now have an Asus Eee PC 900 in the office, so we'll be posting a review in the next day or two. If there's anything particular you want to know about it, leave a question in the comments. 

Samsung's refreshing its Aura line-up of high-styled laptops with the new R410. It sports a 14.1in 1280x800 display with Intel's latest 45nm Penryn processors, ATI Radeon Xpress 1250M graphics, a DVD burner, 1.3mp webcam and built-in WiFi and Bluetooth - all inside Aura's customary shiny black shell. Prices will start at a reasonable £499 when they land in May. Just keep that polishing cloth close at hand.

We've already seen prices tumble in Germany and now it seems O2 is following suit with the UK iPhone. The trade magazine Mobile is reporting that the with-contract price of the 8GB version will be cut by a neat £100 to £169 tomorrow. The price cut is currently billed as being "for a limited time only",  running until 1st June.

Carphone Warehouse has confirmed the move, telling Stuff magazine that any customers who bought the 8GB iPhone at full price in the last month will be getting a £100 voucher as part of its "ultimate price promise".

Naturally the fire sale is prompting yet more rumours that a 3G iPhone is on the way, the suggestion being that O2, and T-Mobile in Germany, are clearing stock to make way for the new model.

Strangely, the price of the 16GB phone will apparently not change and now looks decidedly pricey at £329 with an 18 month contract.

It doesn't look like much - it's not even a smartphone (gasp) - but Nokia's 6212 classic is the handset that's set to "change the way mobile phone users interact with... their surroundings". That's according to Nokia's Jeremy Belostock, anyway.

He's the head of Nokia's Near Field Communications (NFC) division, the technology which this phone is the first to implement. Essentially a cut down version of Bluetooth with an extremely short range, it works by simply touching devices together.

So contact details or calendar can be transferred from handset to handset just by tapping them together - provided your buddy also has a NFC enabled handset (now we know how the chap with the first telephone felt).

This is the first we've seen of Sharp's plans for Intel's new Atom processor. The WS016SH is an ultra-mobile PC with a 5in touchscreen and full slide-out keyboard that can stay flat or lie with the screen tilted.

Inside is a 1.33GHz Atom processor and 1GB memory capable of running Windows Vista. It's also able to display an entire standard desktop, thanks to the screen's impressive 1024x600 resolution.

It has a slot for a SIM card and calling features built-in, alongside Wi-Fi and MicroSD expansion. There's also a docking cradle for hooking up a monitor and keyboard or other USB gadgets.

It'll be out in Japan in the summer, costing £650 with a two-year contract. We're starting the petition to bring it over here pronto.

[Electonista]

Getting your laptop online via 3G is no big deal these days, thanks to the wide range of mobile broadband deals that are available. If you just want to get one laptop online somewhere that isn’t served by an ISP, they work great, but what if you have more than computer, or want to try a little online play with a games console?

One solution is to use a Windows Mobile smartphone as a mini Wi-Fi router – all you need is a suitable smartphone and a handy program called WMWifiRouter. Full details after the cut.