Tag Archives: Smartphone

Blackberry OS 10: An admission of guilt and punishment to loyalty.

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Blackberry OS 10:

Blackberry has finally come out with a survival plan. A new OS 10. New models of phones Z10 and Q10. I wonder what the alphabet stand for. Perhaps Z for ‘Last’ attempt at touchscreen type OS. While Q may stand for ‘Question mark’ on continuing with qwerty keyboard.
Many good reviews are already on the net which give detail review of features of OS. Here is a review from the perspective of a consumer called upon to decide if it is a time to shift his loyalty away from Blackberry.
OS 10 is based on QNX which is a Unix like OS. It is the same platform on which all the previous touch devices of Blackberry were based. Take a look: Continue reading →

Selecting right smartphone

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Making the right choice.
In smartphone market there are four choices: Android, BlackBerry Symbian, and Iphone. How to choose? Actually it is pretty simple.
If we want a phone with some advanced features and we were using Nokia Communicator or any other Symbian phone for quite some time without problems, go for any Nokia Symbian phone. Other wise buy BlackBerry. Yes the proper counterpart of BlackBerry is Symbian even if BlackBerry high end models are over priced.
Nokia and Symbian OS
Latest Symbian OS is Belle. Though Nokia is promising upgrade to Belle for many devices but all upgrades are not upto the mark. Choose the model which comes pre-installed with Belle.
BlackBerry and OS 7.1
As regards BlackBerry, its latest OS version is 7.1. Any BlackBerry phone installed with OS less than 7.0 in not worth buying but can be accepted as free gift. However if we rely heavily on GMail App which was available for earlier versions; it is not available for 7.0. But their are other choices. But before buying BlackBerry, be aware that its native programmes (bundled with device and produced by Research in Motion) work only with BlackBerry Internet Services which is priced at about four times the normal internet connectivity charged by Network Operator. Third party programmes work without BIS but would require little effort or tweaking.
Multimedia devices with phone.
Android and Iphone
Android and Iphones are not phones but multimedia devices with functions of phone as well.
If we want a multimedia device which may also be used as phone, choose Android or Iphone.
Now between them if I am of nerdy type who loves problems and is in habit of tweaking and have lived with Windows far too long, shall choose Android. It will be running out of memory everyday and shall be updating installed programmes everyday. Trouble shoot it everyday. But it is the most powerful OS (as a derivative of Linux) and is also available at cheapest prices.
However if my concepts of multimedia are clear and I want a stable solution for my fixed needs than Iphone would be phone of my choice. Though it may not give all the available options for file sharing and connectivity etc. inspite of my paying through nose.
As regard tweaking these phones, that is matter for some other time.

Android Battery Drain

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As a user of smart phone especially ‘Android’ we always wonder as two why it drains so much battery without any apparent use or over simple browsing. Following research may help:

Stanford computer scientist Narendran Thiagarajan and colleagues used an Android phone hooked up to a multimeter to measure the energy used in downloading and rendering 25 popular websites, New Scientist reported. Simply loading the mobile version of Wikipedia over a 3G connection devoured just more than 1 per cent of the phone’s battery, while browsing to apple.com, which does not have a mobile version, used 1.4%. The measurements were then repeated with locally saved versions of the website, facilitating them to separate out the energy needed to render a page from that need to download it. Javascript and CSS files are used in most modern websites that offer additional functions and styles that are not possible using basic HTML. However, the researchers found that several websites they looked at were loading large files that were not being used in the page. For instance, Wikipedia utilizes a custom file Javascript besides a generic library to collapse and expand the different sections on a page, but a great deal of the library goes unused. By rewriting the site’s Javascript to just perform the required function, Thiagarajan and colleagues were able to decrease the energy consumption from 15 to 9.5 Joules. Making similar changes to the CSS files and images, they successfully reduced the total energy used in loading Wikipedia from 35 to 25 Joules, a saving of 29%. (http://www.dnaindia.com/scitech/report_simple-web-browsing-may-drain-your-smart-phones-battery_1677747)

As for the practical solution: Install ‘Advance Task Killer’ from Google Apps a.ka. Market a.k.a. Play. It will keep killing inactive apps and will save battery.

Sony Ericsson teams up with Android

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History being made:

Mobile phone manufacturer Sony Ericsson has introduced its new range of handsets incorporating the Android operating system, which allows free access to a host of mobile applications that include games, music and mobile shopping. The Android Xperia range includes the X10, X10 mini and X10 mini pro. The company will launch the Xperia X8, this month, and the range will be further extended with additional devices being introduced in the first half of 2011. “Android is an open system that enables users to build the experience they want to have from their mobile phones. Android is the best platform for Sony Ericsson to deliver on its strategy of being the leader in communication entertainment,” says Sony Ericsson South African market unit head Sonja Shear. She explains that application choices for the Android marketplace grow on a day-to-day basis and, together with Android, Sony Ericsson has developed two of its own applications, Timescape and Mediascape. (Source: via Sony Ericsson teams up with Android.)

Added on 22 July 2012:

The above decision proved to be a good strategy. Sony Ericsson zoomed to the leadership in smartphones. So did Samsung, with the help of Android. Will honeymoon continue? Nokia chose to stay away. See next post. And suffered.

Nokia E5 launched in India

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Nokia Wednesday launched Nokia E5, its latest addition to the Nokia Eseries range, in the Indian market. Priced at Rs12,699, the handset with Symbian technology combines business as well as personal networking solutions. It is claimed that the model is perfect for managing busy schedules with a variety of productivity applications available in the Ovi Store.

“With features such as business and consumer email , chat, social networking, a 5-megapixel camera and long battery life, this phone will appeal to a large section of professionals who want a converged device to address their needs,” said Vipul Sabharwal, director, Sales, Nokia India. The handset will initially be available in two colours – Carbon Black and Chalk White. Source: Nokia E5 launched in India – The Economic Times.

Will it change the Nokia’s falling fortune, in India or anywhere. Who buys Nokia’s smartphone?