Being the most tech-savvy of them all means going above and beyond. And so London hotel, Eccleston Square has done just that. Claiming to be the first hotel in Europe with an iPad2 in every room and offering what they call ’007-smart wizardry,’ Eccleston is allowing customers to easily manage every conceivable function, gadget and gizmo from one device. An app is available for guests’ mobile devices and includes tools like temperature, lights, curtain control, restaurant reservations, room service orders, spa reservations, housekeeping, along with helpful tips on the hotel and the city area.

The gadgetry doesn’t end there though. The rooms also come equipped with docking stations for iPhones & iPods, 46-inch 3D plasma televisions, Blu Ray DVD players, VoIP phones, HD television screens in the bathroom and ‘smart glass’ bathroom walls. WiFi is also free, which in many hotels can be an added expense.

Of course the hotel comes at a price and the price isn’t pretty. Rooms start at £250 a night. Even at this price, they should do a great job of enticing the tech-savvy bunch. And this could usher in a whole new crop of 21st Century high-tech boutique hotels.

Set to open August 1st

Do it the high-tech way & use mTrip’s London Travel Guide to get around!

Photos of Eccleston courtesy of Eccleston Square Hotel

iTunes broke down the top apps by individual categories. For the city guides category we are honoured to say we were rewarded #1 in Germany for our Paris city guide and #3 in France for our Amsterdam city guide!

Hot Trends for 2010

For iPhone, the hot trends categories featured were Augmented Reality, Fun for Foodies, New News, Generative Art & Sound, Tech for Tots, The Cloud, Quick Fix Games, Hardcore Games, Retro Revival Games, Multiplayer Games, On the Grid, Personal Training, Band in your Head, Zombies and Shoot, edit, share.

One of the hottest trends for 2010 was Augmented Reality (AR) and we are happy to say we made the iTune’s Rewind list for 2010! Another app that made the AR list was Star Wars Arcade: Falcon Gunner, which claims to turn ones surroundings into epic space battles. Other AR apps featured include Style.com, ARDefender, and Hidden Sky.

For iPad, there was much overlap in the categories chosen. They didn’t include photo and video apps due to the iPad’s lack of camera but they did include new categories like Pen & Brush and Mobile Office, which are much more relevant for iPad users.

If you regularly go on the App Store, their top paid and free apps won’t come as a big surprise. The top overall paid iPhone apps include Angry Birds, Doodle Jump, Skee-Ball, Bejeweled 2, Fruit Ninja, Cut the Rope, GAMEBOX 1, Plants vs. Zombies, and Pocket God. Top overall free iPhone apps include iBooks, Pandora Radio, Netflix, Google Mobile App, Solitaire, Movies by Flixster, IMDb Movies & TV, Kindle, Google Earth and Virtuoso.

To see all the top iPhone and iPad apps as well as the top TV shows, music, movies, audiobooks and podcasts for 2010, visit the iTunes Rewind microsite

mTrip sought out Falk CIS as its main content provider due to its long-standing reputation as a leading publisher specialized in the travel industry. Their expert, high-quality content makes them the perfect partner for mTrip.

mTrip Travel Guide has set out to reinvent the travel guide market with a more interactive, exciting approach. Compared to the traditional paperback guidebooks, travel guides on smart phones and portable devices can offer additional features for travelers. The product utilizes advanced technologies from the latest smart phone developments, making mTrip a leader in interactive travel guides.

Stay tuned for the exciting and much-anticipated launch!

Join the Facebook fan page and win a free travel guide.

Size & Shape – The iPad is .5 inches thick, only slightly thicker than the iPhone 3GS, and measures 9.56 x 7.47 inches. It weighs 1.5 pounds without 3G, and 1.6 with 3G.

Camera - There isn’t one. ‘Nough said.

Touch Keyboard - It’s a bit awkward to use with a very large touch screen keyboard.

Battery Life – Ten hours of constant use, with a one-month standby rating.

Email – Similar visual signals as the iPhone but better. You can preview your mailbox from any message with a pull-down menu, and preview any message from within the mailbox, with a pop-up window.

iPhone apps – The iPad is great for apps. Plus any apps you have downloaded to your iPhone can be automatically synced for free to your iPad.

Music – The music player is even more combined and exciting, a mix between the iPhone’s iPod interface and desktop iTunes.

Maps – Very similar conversion and interface from the iPhone but way better. You can view maps from above with high-resolution satellite imagery, up close with street view or with topography in new terrain view. You can also get directions from your current location.

Calendar & Contacts - The calendar app is desktop-like, until you open contacts and calendars, which look a lot like actual contact books and organizers.

iWork – A completely new version designed specifically for iPad. Each application has a great user interface. You can create slides, documents or spreadsheets with ease. Each App also integrates the Media inspector for easy access to photos and music.

Ebooks – Apple has developed an ebook to store for the iPad called iBooks. It greatly resembles iTunes.

So how do the iPad features translate into benefits for business travelers and backpackers?

The business traveler can now travel light, check emails, view contacts and work on docs, presentations and spreadsheets with ease all from the airplane, hotel or on the go. If you are seeking an intermediate mobile device that takes up little space, offers budget priced 3G connectivity, and provides all-day battery life the iPad might be your best option.

The backpack traveler will find some of the iPad features handy such as the maps, which are more interactive and easier to view than on the iPhone. No need to break out the giant paper map anymore! While checking email and IMs from the hostel or hotel is useful is this really a priority for the backpacker? And lets face it – the camera has become an integral part of our travel experience. The fact that iPad doesn’t have a camera could be a deal breaker for the traveler who seeks an all-in-one device.

So what are your thoughts on the iPad? Will it be your next travel tool of choice?